by S Williams
‘What was the picture, Trent?’ Mary feels like she is in two different places, or in two different times. Now, and that night when it all ended.
‘There was a picture of us at the fair, Mouse,’ Trent says softly. ‘There was a picture of the three of us beside the car at the fucking winter fair.’
If he says any more, Mary doesn’t hear. She takes the phone from her ear like it has bitten her and swipes to end the call. Then she turns off the phone and puts it in her pocket. She can feel it like it’s radioactive, burning its isotopes into her skin through the fabric.
There was a picture of the three of us beside the car at the fucking winter fair.
She shakes her head.
Treachery and violence…
Impossible. Trent was messing with her for some reason. Playing some sick game, like he used to.
But his voice, she thinks, he sounded scared.
The very idea of seeing Trent again makes her feel like screaming, but the fact he’d been sent her number; that someone is bringing back the past…
‘Is everything all right?’
Mary looks up to see Athene standing in front of her. She realises she must have zoned out. She tries to smile, but fails. ‘Not really. Do you mind if we go?’
‘Shit, no! I’m sorry to have dragged you out here!’
‘No it’s fine, but I really need to–’
There is a sudden spear of lightning, followed a few seconds later by a growl of thunder. The air feels like it might ignite.
‘We’d better get back to the car before it pisses down,’ Mary says.
Athene nods, and begins turning, putting something in her pocket as she does so.
‘What did you find?’
Athene turns back, smiling. She shows Mary what she has in her hand.
‘Look,’ she says. ‘It’s lovely, isn’t it? I guess there must have been a baby in the house; there are a few toys half-buried over there. Maybe they had a playpen or something?’
Mary isn’t looking at her; she is looking at what she is holding. It is a little wooden animal. A little bird. The paint is faded, and the wood is covered with moss and slime, but Mary recognises it immediately.
Of course she does.
She was the one who gave it to Bella’s baby sister.
‘It’s an owl, you see?’ Athene says happily. ‘Which is a massive coincidence, because that’s my name!’
Mary looks at her, not understanding.
‘My name, Athene?’ the girl says.
‘Like the bird,’ Mary says numbly. Athene nods.
‘Yes.’ She holds up the wooden toy and gives it a little shake. ‘But particularly like this bird. Athene is a type of owl.’
‘Owl,’ Mary repeats, staring at her. ‘Your name means owl?’
Athene nods, smiling.
Which is when the lightning and thunder erupts directly above them, and the rain starts dropping like it’s the end of the world.
18
Bella’s Last Day: 10am
Bella walked across the frozen fields to Mouse’s house, her boots crunching through the crust of the snow. She started laughing. For some reason it made her feel like she was walking on a cake; like she was like one of those tiny model people you got on wedding cakes, trudging across the surface until, inevitably, she would fall off the edge and land on the table, breaking her little model neck.
Bella laughed harder, higher.
Even to herself, Bella knew the laughing wasn’t good.
A lone sixteen-year-old in a field, wearing a coat that looked like a coffin, laughing into the desolate day.
Bella stopped laughing.
She lay down, in the middle of the field, feeling the cracked snow form a Bella-shaped dent. Keeping her legs together, she slowly spread out her arms, dragging them through the crisp, cold snow.
Yes, this looks much more normal, she thought, and giggled a little. She brought her arms back down to her sides.
Carefully, she tightened her stomach muscles, and pulled herself up from her waist, stepping out of the hole she had made in the snow. Once clear she turned and cast a critical eye over her work.
‘Not bad,’ she said after a minute. On the ground was the ghost-Bella indentation, plus the two semi-circles where she had moved her arms.
Her wings.
When she was very young, her mother had taught her how to make a snow angel, but Bella had always hated the concept. She had never understood why the angels would be laying on the ground. Eventually, she had come to the only conclusion that made any sense to her.
The angels were dead.
Bella looked at her angel a moment longer, then continued across the fields to Mouse’s house.
19
Mary’s Car: Blea Moor Back Road
‘Her name was Bella, and she died in a terrible accident.’
Mary shivers as she drives her car along the windy road, the heater turned up to the max, filling the vehicle with a low roar, and the smell of burning oil. She rips her eyes from the road for a second to look at the girl beside her.
‘Could you keep your eyes on the road, please!’
Athene looks petrified, gripping the car seat, with her feet pushed hard against the front of the passenger well. Mary’s gaze stutters across time, seeing a different girl in a different car, also with her legs pressed against the well, a mad smile hanging off her face, unloosed by the night. She stares at Athene for another long second, then drags her eyes back to the road, finally slowing down to a more acceptable speed. The rain is falling out of the sky so hard that it sounds like the car is being hit with concrete bees.
‘Fucking shit,’ she mutters.
‘Thank you,’ Athene breathes, unclenching her hand from the seat.
Mary nods, then pulls sharply into a lay-by, skidding to a stop and turning off the engine, killing the wipers. Almost immediately the rain made visibility impossible, sluicing down the windows. The over-revved engine begins ticking as it cools, pinging and clicking.
‘Jesus, it’s really coming down,’ marvels Athene, wiping at the screen.
‘How did you get the photo of Blea Fell, Athene?’ Mary asks, staring straight ahead at the rain streaming down the windscreen.
‘I told you,’ Athene says, her voice quiet, soft. ‘It was in the brochure my mum got s–’
‘Bollocks,’ Mary cuts across her. ‘The picture in that booklet was from before, when Bella lived there. How did you get it?’
Athene shakes her head. ‘Like I said, I–’
‘Stop fucking with me, Athene-like-the-bloody-bird! That picture? That’s a family picture! Personal! That’s not a professional photo! The house has been wrecked for years!’
Mary’s voice has risen. Athene stares at her, shaking her head. Mary can see a pulse in her neck, a repeat of the fear ticking in her eyes. Mary doesn’t care.
‘And that owl,’ she spits, jabbing a finger at the old wooden toy upon the student’s lap. ‘What the fuck is that about?’
‘I don’t know what you mean.’ There is a shake in Athene’s voice. ‘I found it while you were on the phone.’
‘What, after all these years?’ Mary scoffs, her own voice buzzing with incredulity. ‘It was just sitting there on the floor, was it?’
Athene nods. Mary watches as a large tear forms in the girl’s left eye.
‘Half buried, along with other stuff. I’m sorry if I’ve done something wrong,’ she whispers. ‘I just saw it there and it looked so sad. It was someone’s toy and it was laying in the dirt, so I picked it up.’
The tear slips out of Athene’s eye and begins a slow roll down her face, already wet from the rain. Mary watches, the anger and fear replaced by a horror at her shouting at the woman. She puts out her hand, but leaves it hanging in the air, unsure.
‘Athene, I’m sorry. It’s just that what happened, all that time ago.’ She closes her eyes tight for a second, then opens them, withdrawing her hand and placing it on the steering wheel. ‘B
eing in Blea Fell brought it all back. And then seeing you with the owl, well, I guess I lost it.’
Mary lets out a shaky laugh, and hits the wiper bar, causing the rubber blades to scrape across the windscreen. For a second the landscape becomes clear through the glass. The moor and the stone: the green and the grey of the world outside the car. Then the rain obscures it all again.
‘And Trent,’ Athene says softly.
‘I’m sorry?’
‘The person on the end of the phone?’
Mary feels the air condense around them.
‘What about him?’
‘I don’t know. You sounded upset.’
Mary nods, tapping the steering wheel with her fingers; beating out a rhythm only she could hear.
‘Look, Mary,’ Athene’s voice is tentative, like she is stroking a tiger. ‘I know we haven’t known each other very long…’
Haven’t we, Bella? Mary’s mind is shredded. She knew the girl couldn’t possibly be her friend from so long ago. Her friend who she had… Mary shut the thought down, and it was immediately replaced with another. She looked at the student, hard. She couldn’t be her friend, but she was the right age to be someone else.
‘No we haven’t.’
‘But I definitely feel we have a connection. I’m not sure what it is, but I feel it…’
Outside the storm has made the day dark, and Mary watches the ghost-like image of Athene tap her chest in the liquid mirror of the windscreen.
‘…in here. In fact the whole landscape, and the house and…’ Athene shrugs helplessly, and raises up the owl. ‘Even this! I don’t understand it.’
Mary stays staring straight ahead, watching herself in the windscreen. Watching the reflection of her face being pulled apart by the rain-trails that slipped down the glass. Finally she sighs and turns to face the girl. She sees the tear trails down her face, and bizarrely that makes her feel better.
I never saw Bella cry. Not once.
Mary reaches out and gently touches her cheek. Athene’s returning smile is wan.
‘The girl who lived there, in Blea Fell, was my best friend.’
Athene nods, her eyes wide.
‘She died in a terrible accident.’
‘Was it the fire?’ Athene asks, her voice barely above a whisper. The rain and the charged thunderstorm air has made the atmosphere in the little car electric.
Mary shakes her head.
What a fucking mess, she thinks.
‘No, the fire came later, after she had died.’
20
Bella’s Last Day: Mouse’s Room
‘Can you make me a car tape, Mouse? For tonight?’
Bella and Mouse were listening to music, ticking away the day in cigarettes.
‘I’m sorry?’
‘A mixtape: I’ve got a list.’ Bella reached into her coat, and took out a folded piece of paper. As she did so, her sleeve rode up, exposing the skin on her wrist for a brief moment. Mouse saw the cuts and burns before the sleeve rode back down. Smiling, Bella handed the sheet to Mouse. Mouse looked at it, just for something to look at, because she was too afraid to ask her friend what was so bad that she was hurting herself. Because she was too afraid of the answer. Instead she looked at the list. It had been written on a page ripped from Bella’s diary. On it were scrawled five songs.
‘Wow,’ said Mouse, scanning the list. ‘I think we’re going to need gin if we’re listening to this.’
Bella smiled, picking up her pack of smokes and the Zippo.
‘It’s for the drive home after the fair.’
Mouse gazed at her for the longest moment, then she took a deep breath and tried to be brave.
‘Are you okay, Bella?’
Mouse’s eyes flicked to Bella’s wrist, safely hidden behind the cloth armour. To her hair, hacked and crumpled. ‘I mean you can talk to me if…’
Bella nodded. ‘What would you like to talk about, Mouse? Would you like to talk about love? Or friendship? Or trust?’
Mouse stared at her. She wanted to say something, but all the words had run away. Bella looked at her a second longer, then smiled gently. Her face softened.
‘I’m fine, Mouse, really.’ Bella raised her hand and stroked her friend’s face. ‘We’re fine. I just need to get this year behind me, that’s all.’
Bella hugged the flesh and bones of Mouse, and left her bedroom for the last time.
On the way back across the fields she looked at the spot where she had lain down on the iced grass. Her angel had become a black hole, surrounded by the glitter of hardening snow.
‘You’re such a fucking bitch, Bella,’ she said, tears freezing in her eyes.
21
Bella and Mouse’s First Day at High School
the School Bus, 1996
‘Who’s that?’
‘That’s Trent. He lives in the next village. And he’s fifteen, Bella!’ Mouse hissed.
If Mouse thought that might put Bella off, she was wrong. Her friend leant closer to the school bus window, her breath misting the glass, her eyes creeping over the boy who stood by the side of the road. He was wearing a smile on half his face like a sideways question mark. Mouse thought he looked like a broken fire alarm in a burning building.
‘He looks like Heathcliff,’ Bella whispered.
‘He’s bad news, Bells.’ Mouse watched as the bus doors slid open with a hiss, and the boys got on.
‘So what?’
Trent paused just past the bus driver, and quickly surveyed the bus, looking for the best seat. The school bus was a war zone, with lines decided on the first day, that would be hardwired and difficult to break. The back seats were taken by the sixth formers, boys and girls who had earned their spot; had fought their way through the battle of school life. The next few rows were occupied by the wannabes: girls who would put out for the older boys; who thought slutting it up was cool and would make them accepted. The front rows were like the back rows, but in reverse; they were reserved for the freaks and geeks; the refuse-niks who stood outside of the war; who took the front so they could make a quick getaway.
The rest of the bus was a chessboard, with the seats as strategies for developing friendships or protecting from enemies, or sometimes both.
By rights, at fifteen, Trent should have gone near the back, away from Mouse and Bella, who had positioned themselves near the front; but because he was new to the area, like the kids who had come up from middle school, he had to make quick decisions.
He scanned the bus until he saw Mouse and Bella. When he looked at her, Mouse wanted to hide, as if she was eight again. His eyes stayed fixed on her for a nanosecond, passed on to Bella, then continued scanning. He nodded, seeing someone behind them, and sauntered up the aisle. As he passed by their seat he ignored them, even though he must have felt Bella’s eyes burning themselves onto him, following him. Mouse grabbed her arm, and dug her nails into the skin until Bella looked at her.
‘You’ve got to stop staring at him!’ she whispered urgently.
‘Why?’
‘Why? Because he’s fifteen and if he has any interest in a thirteen-year-old he’s sick! Because he’s got arrogance coming out of his ears and he’s going to be in detention forever! And because… because…’
Mouse ran out of road with her mouth, but kept the accelerator pressed down with her eyes.
Because he’ll steal you away from me, she screamed with her gaze.
Bella stayed staring at her, quizzical, then slowly reached up and placed her hand gently over Mouse’s.
‘It’s all right, Mouse,’ she said, her eyes locked on her. ‘I’m only looking. I’m not going to do anything.’
Mouse stared deep into her eyes, trying to see the woman hiding behind the girl. Her feelings for Bella, so simple and sure in primary school, were becoming… something unknown. She ripped her gaze away from Bella’s eyes and down at her friend’s hand, gently resting on her arm like a butterfly.
Then she watched as the butterfly
pushed, slowly pressing Mouse’s hand down, making her dig her nails further into Bella’s flesh.
‘Bella, stop it…’ Mouse whispered. She watched as the hand pushing hers whitened, flattened with the pressure. She tried to push back, but Bella was stronger than her; stronger than anything.
‘Bella, it hurts,’ whispered Mouse.
Still keeping the terrible pressure on, Bella leant forward and whispered in Mouse’s ear.
‘Yes, it does,’ was all she said, releasing Mouse’s hand, and leaning back again. Mouse pulled her hand away feeling, actually feeling, her nails slide out of Bella’s skin, like she had claws. Bella turned away and looked out of the window. Mouse stared in horror at Bella’s arm; the bruised skin and the four crescent cuts. She reached forward with her hand, unsure what she should do; whether to stroke it, or pull the jumper down. In the end she did nothing, just looked at the girl beside her, staring out of the window.
Why did you make me hurt you?
Then she realised that Bella wasn’t staring out of the window at all; she was using it as a mirror. Mouse turned around in her seat, and raised her head over the headrest, to see what Bella was looking at. Three rows behind them Trent was sat next to Jamie, the creepy boy who always seemed to be undressing you with his eyes. The boy with the camera.
And he did not look happy to have Trent sitting next to him.
He looked absolutely petrified.
22
Mary’s Car: Blea Moor
Present Day
‘Wow; the weather in this place doesn’t mess about, does it?’
Mary shakes her head. ‘Not hardly. It’s like a drunk at a party. One minute interesting and funny and giving you the best time ever, then the next throwing up on your cheese plant.’
