by Fiona Harper
She supposes she must have known someone would buy it eventually, given the desirable location, despite the state it had been in.
It almost looks like a different house now, as if their life there has been erased, like a computer drive reformatted and written over. It will be as if her past, her childhood, never occurred. A new family will lay down their memories here now. From the quality of the work done so far, she guesses they’ll be bright, happy ones, and she silently hates them for it.
She isn’t quite sure why she drove here, only that she thought there might be clues, something ghostly left behind that would silence the questions that have been running round her brain since her discovery last week, but this is just a blank canvas.
But then Heather remembers that, even if you erase a hard drive, little telltale fragments are left behind, and as she continues to stare, the air around the house starts to shift and shimmer until she can almost see the Virginia creeper crawling back up the house, suffocating each window as it goes. The overgrown shrubs that almost obliterated the path and obscured the plastic storage crates and junk from passers-by begin to form like ghostly shapes in the garden.
She can imagine her mother sitting on the only seat in the house: one end of the sofa where she’d made a nest for herself, where she sat to watch the TV, slept and even ate. Heather takes a step forward until she is right on the very edge of the kerb, but she goes no further.
Why? It is a question she has never asked of this house before. In the past, she didn’t want to know. Recently she’s been so focused on the immediacy of her anger and hurt that she hasn’t looked for the root beneath it.
Why did things get this way, Mum? How did you come to do this to yourself? To us?
And why did she never ask these questions of her mother while she still had the chance?
CHAPTER NINE
DOORBELL
The doorbell is old. Not horrible old, like one of those plastic boxes with a flat, round button that fools you into thinking it’s working but never produces any sound. No, nothing as cheap and deceitful as that. This bell was installed in the 1920s. It has a creamy domed Bakelite button set in a decorative brass surround. Even now it works, heralding the arrival of every visitor with a clear, self-confident ring. The sound can be heard in every dark and shadowy corner of our house.
THEN
‘Mummy, can I have Megan round for tea?’
Heather’s mother looks up from where she is digging in a pile of clothes. She’s trying to find Heather’s PE kit. Heather brought it home to be washed before the Easter holidays, but she’s been back at school for three weeks now and nobody can find it. Miss Perrins has said she’s very sorry, but she’s going to have to give Heather a red mark on her behaviour chart if she doesn’t have it for her next lesson. Heather really doesn’t want to get a red mark. She hasn’t had one yet, because she tries super-extra-hard to be good at school.
‘What?’ her mother says.
‘Can Megan come for tea one day?’ Heather hops from foot to foot because she’s really excited about the idea. ‘I’ve been round to hers loads.’
Her mother sighs and looks around the living room. ‘I don’t think so, darling. Sorry. Maybe when I get the house straight.’
Heather looks down at her shoes. Ever since the hide-and-seek incident, the whole family wears shoes indoors all the time. ‘But you said the same thing after the summer holidays…’
Her mother stops rummaging in a pile of clothes that has just come back from the launderette. The washing machine is broken, but her mum gets cross if her dad mentions getting someone round to fix it.
‘I said “no”, Heather. Now run along. It’s teatime soon.’
Heather crosses her arms. ‘It’s not fair! Megan says that proper best friends go round each other’s houses, and Katie Matthews asks her to tea nearly every week. If we don’t let her come here, she might just end up being Katie’s friend instead and I’ll be left out.’
‘Heather! Just go and find something to do! I’m trying to find your PE kit, and you know you’ll be upset if I don’t, so you need to let me do this now and we’ll talk about it later. Understood?’
‘Understood,’ Heather mumbles, reversing back through the rabbit trail and going to find Faith, who’s in the kitchen cooking their tea. Now Faith’s eleven, she’s allowed to do things like that.
Heather climbs over some plastic bags tied at the top when she gets to the hallway. They weren’t there yesterday. They’re full of dollies. But these dollies aren’t pretty ones like Cassandra. A Barbie with no clothes on is sticking out the top of one bag and her hair has been cut funny. It looks rough and fluffy, not smooth and silky like it does when they come out the box. She’s also missing one arm. Heather guesses her mother must have been to the charity shop again on one of her ‘rescue missions’. She gets the dollies so she can fix them and make them better, then she’ll be able to give them to the hospital or to poor children.
Heather thinks her mummy must be a very good person to do something like that; she just wishes there weren’t so many of them. There are bags and bags now, lining the hallway and the landing. Some even creep into Faith’s room, but Faith keeps putting them back outside again. Not where anyone will notice they’ve reappeared, of course. She finds a spot somewhere else and hides them so their mother won’t get upset she moved them.
Faith is cooking chicken nuggets and chips in the oven. They have to do everything in the oven at the moment because the bit on top doesn’t work.
‘Go and find the ketchup,’ Faith says when she sees her younger sister. She’s looking a bit cross, but Faith always seems to be cross these days. Their mother says it’s because she’s almost a teenager. Faith says it’s from living in a dump like this.
Heather climbs on top of some boxes full of pots and pans to reach the cupboard where the ketchup lives. She pulls the bottle out, but it’s empty apart from some red sludge at the bottom. ‘It’s all gone,’ she calls to Faith.
Her sister sighs dramatically. ‘Keep looking. There’ll be another one back there. You know how mum likes to stock up.’
Heather throws the empty bottle on the floor with the rest of the rubbish, then stands on tiptoes to reach further into the cupboard. The box wobbles a little but she manages to stop herself from falling by holding onto the cupboard door. There’s another bottle in there, and it’s half-full with ketchup, but round the top it’s green and fluffy. ‘Shall I throw this one away too?’ she asks.
Faith shakes her head. ‘Put it back for now. Mum will want to check it if it’s not properly finished.’
‘But it’s yucky!’
‘I said she’d want to check it. I didn’t say it’d make sense,’ Faith says. ‘There’s only one thing for it – we’ll have to break into the emergency rations.’
Heather jumps down from the boxes, smiling. ‘Cool! I know where Mummy keeps them!’ She goes to the drawer by the back door and opens it. Inside are hundreds and hundreds of tiny packets – sugar, salt, pepper, salad cream, vinegar – just about anything you can find in a café or a restaurant. Mum always puts loads in her handbag when they go out to eat (which is getting to be more and more, with the top of the oven being broken) because she says it’s part of what they pay for when they pay for the food, and you never know when they’ll come in handy. When Heather got up this morning, she didn’t know today was going to be that day. It’s kind of exciting!
She reaches into the drawer, feeling the sachets slide through her fingers, enjoying the shifting colours as she searches for the ketchup ones. It’s kind of like looking for buried treasure. By the time Faith gets the nuggets and chips out of the oven Heather has six sachets clutched in each hand. Faith serves up their food and carries the plates through to the living room. They have to squish up together to fit into the space on the end of the sofa, but they don’t mind. At least this way they can watch cartoons while they eat.
The best bit is opening up the little packets and sque
ezing out the ketchup from the inside. It feels like they’re being fancy. There are still two or three each left over when they’ve finished eating.
Faith grins at Heather as she rips open another one. ‘Look, Heather! It’s like blood.’ She says the last bit in a creepy voice that makes Heather’s spine feel all tickly, and when Faith presses on the packet so the ketchup oozes out, she does a laugh that goes mwah-hah-hah! and makes Heather giggle, so Heather tears open one of her packets and does the same.
After that they can’t stop. They both keep ripping and mwah-hah-hah-ing until they’re laughing so hard they’re in danger of missing their plates and decorating their legs instead.
But then the air in the room goes instantly cold. Heather and Faith freeze.
‘Girls! What on earth do you think you’re doing?’
Heather drops her last unsqueezed ketchup packet onto her plate, where it lands in the big blob of pretend blood she’s been collecting.
‘Just eating our tea,’ Faith says. ‘I cooked chips and nuggets for me and Heather.’
Heather’s mother hasn’t got time to be impressed by that; she’s too busy staring at the twisted and torn wrappers littering the girls’ plates. ‘Where did you get those?’ she says, and her voice sounds all quiet and quivery.
‘From the ’mergency draw,’ Heather says helpfully. ‘The other ketchup was fluffy.’
Their mother’s expression changes to the one she wears when she’s trying to explain something and keep her temper at the same time. ‘Those… those… They’re not for you to use! They’re to be kept there. Just in case.’
‘But it was “just in case”, Mummy!’ Heather explains.
Their mother shakes her head, closes her eyes. ‘You don’t understand.’ And then her eyes snap open again and she looks at Heather. ‘How many did you take? How many?’
‘I… I…’
‘How many, Heather!’ She’s shouting now and Heather can’t seem to make the counting bit of her brain work.
Faith stands up. ‘Don’t shout at her! It’s not her fault. I told her to get them. And there were twelve, okay? Just twelve. And there are hundreds left in there!’
Their mother runs down the hall. The sisters put their plates down on the sofa and follow. Inside the kitchen, their mother wrenches the drawer open. The packets rustle and slide over each other as she sticks her hands inside and moves them around, counting softly.
She goes still and lifts her head up. ‘Right. Girls, get your coats on. We’re going to the Harvester for tea.’
The girls look at each other, big grins on their faces. That’s really fancy! But then Faith stops smiling. ‘But we’ve just eaten our tea,’ she says, looking confused.
‘Don’t get cheeky with me, young lady!’ Mum yells. ‘I need to get a dozen more and then it’ll all be okay again. You did say it was twelve, right?’
They both nod, but neither moves, and then their mother’s expression stops being hard and angry and she starts to look as if she’s about to cry.
‘Sorry, girls. Sorry, my babies.’
She comes and puts her arms round them and pulls them to her, one in each arm. ‘I tell you what, you don’t need to eat more tea – just dessert. How about that? An absolutely giant ice-cream sundae if you like. With sprinkles! And I can pick up more sachets to replace the ones we’re missing.’
She lets go of the girls, and all three of them are excited now.
‘Is Daddy coming?’ Heather asks.
‘No, poppet. He’s working late again tonight.’
Faith sighs. ‘He’s always working late,’ she grumbles.
Their mother’s eyes get that shiny look again, but then she smiles and says, ‘All the more for us, then! Go on, go and get your coats!’
Heather starts to run towards the piles near the front door. She thinks that’s where she left hers, but then the doorbell goes and everyone freezes. Both sisters turn and look at their mother. She puts her finger to her lips and motions for them to come towards her. Quietly. It’s hard to do, because everything underneath their feet is crunchy, but they’ve had plenty of practice.
‘Hello?’ a voice calls through the front door. ‘Mrs Lucas?’ The man knocks loudly. Heather starts to feel scared.
Her mother points at the next room, near the big table that’s always full of all her important papers. There’s a space down the side and both girls instinctively head for it and crouch there.
The letterbox clatters. The man must be peeping through it. ‘Mrs Lucas? I’m just here to read the electric meter… Are you there?’
But Mrs Lucas doesn’t answer him. Instead, she runs to where her daughters are hiding and squats down beside them, holding them tight. As they all close their eyes and wait for the man to go away, Heather realizes there probably isn’t going to be any ice-cream sundae tonight after all, and probably no chocolate sprinkles either.
CHAPTER TEN
NOW
It’s much later in the afternoon when Heather gets back to her flat after visiting her old house in Bickley. She goes into town for a cappuccino, sits outside her favourite café and watches the people march up and down the pedestrianized section of the High Street.
This is a mistake.
Because eventually she joins them, and then Mothercare pulls her inside, and by the time she’s feeding pound coins into the parking machine in The Glades shopping centre a squashy toy giraffe is tucked securely in the side pocket of her bag.
She’s really glad to get back to her flat, her sanctuary. She stows her contraband in the forbidden drawer and hurries into the living room, ready to perform her breathing ritual, but when she finds her usual spot in the middle of the rug and looks up she gets a shock.
Instead of flat, green grass and regimented borders, she’s met with a garden full of people. And there’s Jason in the middle of them, flipping burgers on a barbecue and swigging Coke from a bottle. He looks completely at ease as he smiles and chats with a group of guys.
Heather is completely infuriated, but she knows she has no right to be. When they’d bumped into each other in the hallway a couple of days ago, he’d told her he was having his housewarming thing this afternoon. The weather forecast was good for once, he’d said, so he’d decided to go for it. It’s not Jason’s fault her thoughts have been so tangled lately that the information got lost inside her head.
As if he knows she’s staring at him, he turns and looks at her, meets her gaze and smiles. She waves back. His smile grows wider and he makes a beckoning motion. She has no choice but to follow his tractor beam, to unlock the French doors and walk outside. She doesn’t look to the left or the right, doesn’t pay attention to the other bodies or the curious glances she’s getting. She just walks straight towards him.
‘Hi,’ he says softly, once she is standing in front of him.
‘Hi,’ she says back.
‘Want a burger?’
She nods, even though she has no idea if she’s hungry or not. It’s not a fancy affair, no lettuce or pickle, just a charred piece of meat stuck inside a floury white roll with a blob of ketchup. It tastes like heaven.
‘Glad you could make it,’ he says as Heather takes another bite. ‘I wasn’t entirely sure you were going to put in an appearance.’ And before Heather can say neither was she, he steers her towards a group of people. ‘Here, let me introduce you to the gang.’ Her mouth is too full of burger to object.
‘This is Damien, my partner in crime from my university days, and this is his girlfriend Tola.’ More names fill Heather’s head as he goes round the group, all instantly rejected and lost – her brain’s storage drive is too full – but she pulls her cheek muscles into what she hopes is a smile and nods with each introduction.
‘So,’ says Damien (the one name she can remember), ‘you’re Jay’s mysterious girl downstairs.’
Heather’s eyebrows rise. She’s mysterious? That sounds a lot more interesting and romantic than the truth: that she is Jason’s terminally damag
ed girl downstairs, the one who’s on the verge of being arrested for petty theft. She doesn’t disabuse Jason’s friend of the notion, though. She learned right from childhood that most people don’t look too far below the surface and anything they superimpose on you is invariably better than the reality. These assumptions create a useful shield, one she does her best not to dislodge.
‘Put on a good face,’ her mother always said when they left the house. So no one would guess, so no one would know. Even social services hadn’t guessed the horror that lay inside the detached house in a ‘nice’ area for years. And Heather has cultivated this approach in her adult life, carefully painting a veneer of Perfectly Normal on top of her real self.
‘Oh, I’m not mysterious at all,’ she says.
‘How long have you been living here?’ Damien’s girlfriend asks.
‘A couple of years,’ Heather replies, feeling as if she’s giving something away she shouldn’t. Her mother taught her that information was to be hoarded just as much as belongings. It wasn’t until Heather was almost a teenager that she realized not everyone shared this mindset, that some people live their whole lives spilling everything out of their mouths with no thought for the consequences.
‘Oh well, don’t let Jason here keep you awake late at night when he gets maudlin and decides to play his Smiths albums back to back,’ Tola adds, sticking her tongue out at their host.
