My mother comes running out of the house, half hysterical with fear, joy, and obvious lack of sleep. She flings open the car door and her clutch nearly takes the breath out of my body.
‘Sephone – where have you been?’ Turning to Gabe. ‘Where did you find her? God, she’s like ice, we need to-’
‘Calm down – she’s fine Cat. Just get her inside, come on, quickly.’ Before I know it I am bundled out of the car and into the house, wrapped in the red blanket from the sofa and placed in front of the fire. Gabe tells my mother to quickly go and get me something hot to drink, but she is unresponsive, glued to my side, so he’s in the kitchen and back out again with the sweetest cup of luke-warm tea that I’ve ever tasted. The disgust must be obvious on my face, but he practically holds it against my mouth, so that I have no choice but to knock it back. Then he disappears to the kitchen again to get some more.
A few minutes later he returns with another mug. This time the steam rises from it in spirals. ‘We need to let people know that she’s home,’ he says matter-of-factly to my mother.
‘Cat!’ His tone startles her, bringing her back into the room more fully.
‘Sorry … what?’ she says, looking at him as if he has just spoken to her in a foreign language that she doesn’t understand.
‘We need to tell people she’s back,’ he says in slow firm words that I’ve never seen him use before.
‘Yes…’
She’s still not fully with it, so he takes it upon himself to grab the phone to start to work his way through the numbers that are scrawled onto a scrap of paper. Before he dials he looks over at Mum.
‘She was with one of the kids from the party,’ he lies. ‘Must’ve gone off with them and fallen asleep over at theirs. Too much to drink again.’
Then he starts with the police, though for some reason they say that they want to come up and check for themselves anyway.
***
I sit and stare at him, his long arms and legs stretched out to the side of him, his head tipped back and resting on the top of the sofa. I’m still thinking about him finding me. Seeing how distraught he was – feeling his distress. After a while he looks up instinctively, as though he can feel my eyes on him. Focused. Full of questions.
Do I trust him? Is this real? More importantly – why did he lie to her?
‘How did you know where to find me?’
He looks at me like he doesn’t know where to begin, so he doesn’t. I ask him again.
‘I just knew.’ He looks me square in the eye, for the first time ever.
‘That doesn’t make sense – you couldn’t have just known.’
‘I just knew. It’s just the way it is.’
‘I dunno what you mean.’
‘I think you do Seph.’ He pauses, still with that serious look. ‘I felt it …the way I felt him – how close he was to you.’
What?
My stomach freefalls. It makes sense and yet floors me at the same time. There is nothing I can say – the two of us are looking at each other, as if none of this should make sense. None of it. Yet we both know.
Between us there is an unspoken understanding. An understanding that I have misinterpreted, and that Gabe has known all along.
How could I get it so wrong?
We are both the same.
***
After the police have been, spoken to me, pressed my uncle and left various leaflets about issues that might be affecting us, and after my mother has fussed around relentlessly, arguing with the both of us about whether I should go to the hospital, I eventually make it to the peace and quiet of my own room. Sleep comes easily, and as I run through my dream – his footsteps close behind me – something new happens, and I wake with an unfamiliar sense of relief.
I’m not alone now.
53
THE PHONE RINGS NON-STOP.Beth. Lowri. Evan. Dr. Lewis. I tell my mum and Gabe that I’m not up to speaking to anyone, but that’s not true. The person that I must speak to – more than anyone – is Gabriel.
I almost tear in two when Evan rings for the third time that afternoon. Mum looks over at me as she speaks to him, obvious sympathy in her eyes as she prepares to make yet another excuse for why I can’t come to the phone.
It’s too much.
I hold out my hand, as she says, ‘Oh … hang on a minute here she comes now … Seph love, it’s Evan for you.’ I roll my eyes at her rubbish attempt at lying and take the phone from her, getting up at the same time. She gestures that she’ll leave me in privacy, so I wait until I’m alone and then finally say, ‘Hi.’
‘There I was thinking you were avoiding me.’
‘Sorry.’ There’s that guilty feeling again.
‘Is everything ok? What happened Seph? Everyone was so worried!’
‘I know.’
‘Why did you just run off like that?’
‘Please Ev, I know, but I just don’t want to-’
‘Is there someone else Seph? Just tell me if there is.’
‘No! Look I said I’m sorry and I know I stressed everyone out but I can’t deal with this now Ev.’
‘Seph-’
‘Please Evan – I don’t want to talk about it now, so can we talk about something else please?’
‘Yeah.’
‘Sorry – I didn’t mean to shout …can we start over?’
‘Yeah, as long as you’re ok, and we’re ok?’
‘Everything’s fine.’
***
My mother watches me as I sit there on the sofa zipping up my boots, and shoving my hair underneath my hat.
‘I’m going out for a walk,’ I say without looking up, as I can just imagine the look on her face.
‘I don’t think so – not after everything yesterday – please don’t wind me up.’
‘I’m not trying to wind you up, I’m going out, I won’t go far, and Gabe can come with me.’
He looks up from his newspaper, shocked, but not as shocked as she is, given that she’s hardly heard us say two words to each other in months. Or ever.
‘That ok?’ I say. It’s more of a statement than a question.
She huffs and looks at Gabe.
‘Course,’ he says getting up, ‘don’t worry Cat, I’ll go with her – you can’t keep her prisoner here.’
‘Thanks for the advice,’ she snaps, now turning on him.
‘We won’t be long. A bit of fresh air, that’s all – it’ll do her good.’
‘Okay, okay – just don’t be gone ages.’
As we leave I make sure not to slam the front door. I don’t want her to worry anymore.
The wind bites, but I’ve become used to it. Gabe huddles into his coat, his hands pressed tightly into the pockets. Not a word spoken since we left the house, but it’s a comfortable silence. How this has happened yet another mystery to contend with – me, Gabe and comfortable all in the same sentence – but that’s where we are. So comfortable that I’m able to say, ‘What happened to her – to Kathryn?’
A long pause, as if he is preparing himself to be able to go there.
What must he be feeling? I’m so sorry Gabe.
‘He did,’ is his response, natural and matter of fact.
‘I thought it was you.’ He winces, chews on his bottom lip, and looks at the ground.
‘Of course you did. Everybody did.’
‘I saw you in the barn that night. I woke up and there was a light flashing outside, and I saw it was you.’
Silence.
I carry on with what I want to say and it seems as if I can’t get it out quick enough – because this well is about to burst and this is the freest I have been able to talk in so long and it has to come out – it just has to.
‘I was so scared … but I had to find out what you were doing in there, so I went out there before Mum was up and I saw the bones … I found the bones … why is Kathryn’s skeleton in our barn?’
I’m talking so fast that I can’t breathe.
Stop. Breath
e.
‘Why did you have them? Why haven’t you been to the police? I mean what am I supposed to think? It’s crazy – it’s been driving me mad Gabe – it doesn’t make sense!’ I realise that I’m shouting now and look around to see that nobody else is within hearing distance.
‘It’s not Kathryn, Seph … it’s him.’
The words take me by surprise, failing to register, and I’m not quite able to make the right connections in my head – to replace the connections that I had made in error.
‘Kathryn disappeared. I never saw her again … dead or alive.’ His right hand moves to his temple, where it scratches nervously, digging into his skin. ‘I knew she was gone … I knew it was him.’ The words hang in the air, and it’s as if he can read my mind, as I look at him questioningly. ‘The same as you know things, I s’pose.’
As much as the old thoughts about Gabe try to make their way back into my system, it makes sense.
‘So this is all real then,’ I say, more to myself than to him. ‘I thought that it was me – that I was going crazy – so much weird stuff has been happening.’ My head spins – all of it heaving and hurling around. The room. The mansion. The painting. The woman covered in blood. That key …
‘I mean, it happened before I came here … I just never really thought about it … that it was just me dreaming it up or something. Kid’s stuff.’ Then the terrible thought hits me. ‘Then he is real.’
‘Like I said, the bones are his.’
‘How have you got them then? And if you’ve got his bones and he’s dead then it doesn’t make sense.’
‘Are you trying to tell me that any of this makes sense Seph?’
I place my hands over my face, pushing my fingers into my forehead that has started to throb. I don’t want him to see me cry, but I just can’t stop it from happening, and before I know it those tears of frustration, fear and heartbreak are erupting from my eyes, finally freeing themselves from the chains in my head. I feel Gabe’s hand on my arm as he clumsily tries to console me.
‘I thought you hated me,’ I admit.
‘What are you on about – I’ve never hated you Seph!’
I’ve hurt him – I can tell – it is in his voice, on his face.
‘You’re my niece for Christ’s sake … Cat’s daughter! I never wanted you to come here, but that should be obvious why, now.’
It is obvious now.
The man who I thought hated me, who I thought was capable of terrible things, was in fact looking out for me, and probably knew me better than anyone else ever did.
‘We’ll sort this Seph. I’m not going to let anything happen to you. We’ll sort it.’
After letting all of the built-up emotion go, I feel calmer, though completely lost about how we are going to ‘sort it.’ Still so many questions running through my head.
‘I am sorry you know – for all of the things that I thought about you – I really am.’
‘Let’s not even mention it again – it’s not exactly a straight forward situation is it? I get it – don’t worry.’
I believe what he’s saying, but he looks so sad that my heart breaks for him. The things that he’s had to carry around with him – alone – just like me.
I think of his face when he found me, alive, in the field. Desperate. Sad. Relieved.
‘I knew I was wrong when you found me the other morning – seeing how worried you were.’
‘I knew something was wrong, I went looking for you at the party and when Beth and Evan said you were gone – well – I just thought that-’
‘I know … and I thought that … Beth. And then I saw the blood and the marks on you and …’
‘He came for me. I fought as hard as I could because of you … I couldn’t let him … you know. I left, but managed to get back somehow. When I saw you turn up at the house I’d never felt so relieved … until you just disappeared right in front of me.’
It’s so much for the both of us to take in.
My mind side-steps now, over to the unearthed memory of that day back at the house, years ago, when it was my grandparent’s home. The day all hell broke loose because of my presence. Gabe’s illness, his odd behaviour. I think about the weight that he must have been carrying around all of these years. A living hell that crushes my insides, when I think of the pain he has endured. At least now we both have someone who understands.
‘Ok … so what about the bones then?’ I ask.
‘I dug them up. You know the big tree at the bottom of the drive?’
I instinctively shiver at the mention of it.
‘They were buried there. I dug them up not long before you arrived here.’
‘How did you know they were there? Why were they there?’
‘I’ve dreamt about that tree since I was a kid. More nightmares than dreams really.’ What he’s saying starts to feel familiar.
‘First of all it started as a typical monster type of dream, where the tree would be alive grabbing at me with its branches. Used to scare the crap out of me. I’d always be waking up in the middle of the night screaming. Then it started to get weirder – I’d wake up with scratches on me and eventually when I was about your age, I’d wake up sometimes under that tree.’
‘You mean like I did in the field?’
‘Yeah – just like that.’
‘Anyway, they got stronger and stronger til one day I woke up there, covered in blood.’ He swallows hard. ‘It wasn’t mine though. There were girls – young women – scattered around the bottom of the tree. Red from head to toe.’
‘The Red Lady?’
‘Ladies,’ he corrects, ‘and a rope – a hangman’s noose – empty and swinging from one of the biggest branches.’
‘Was the rope for you?’ I ask, terrified now for his safety too.
‘I think maybe it was – it is. But originally it was for him. See, the stories about the Red Lady aren’t complete crap. There were murders – no one really knows how many – but they happened a long time ago and the person who did it was strung up from that tree.’
‘What … you mean they just killed him and no one found out?’
‘It was a long time before CSI Seph.’ He laughs to himself, and I wonder how he is able to find humour in all of this stuff. ‘I think people just had enough and some of them took it upon themselves to deal with it. A place like this all that time ago – who knows what used to go on?’
‘Hasn’t our family always lived here? Was it someone who was related to us that killed him do you think?’ I ask, trying to make connections.
‘Could be …’ he trails off, like he’s still trying to work it out himself.
I feel my stomach heave suddenly, and before I know it I’m doubled over, throwing up its contents onto the grass. Gabe doesn’t really know what to do. But as soon as my stomach has been spilt it feels ok.
‘I’m fine,’ I insist, spitting onto the grass, then wiping my mouth on my glove.
There is a connection; a black thread. Deep down in the dark pit of my stomach I know that this is all true. I’ve felt him crawling around in there for more years than I can even remember.
‘Is that how we both feel him? – it seems that we both do – and what does he want from us? – how is any of this even possible? – he’s dead – you have his bones for Christ’s sake!’
‘I’m not going to pretend that I have any answers to all of this Seph. My main concern is keeping you and your mother both safe. How we seem to be involved – I’m not quite sure, just drawn together like magnets somehow – me through guilt and the need to protect you … you through whatever you’ve been going through after your dad and moving here and everything, and him through his need to-’
‘Kill,’ I interrupt.
‘Like magnets,’ he says brushing the grass with his foot, and I realise as he speaks that I’ve always felt the pull.
‘It’s just the three of us now – you’re all I’ve got left.’ I’ve heard those words before, and once agai
n a feeling runs over me – but this time it is so much different.
‘How has Mum never been involved in this – how does she not know about him, and why hasn’t he come for her?’ I wonder aloud.
‘I don’t know. I just don’t. All I can think is that we are more sensitive – susceptible to all of this. How we are – I mean emotionally and everything – has something to do with it too. Has she ever mentioned anything like this to you?’
‘No, never, that’s why I’ve never said anything to her about it – to anyone – except now to you. But-’
‘What?’ he asks impatiently.
‘She worries a lot about me. One night she woke me up with her screaming. When I went in she was having a nightmare about me. It was horrible and scared the hell out of me.’ There’s a few seconds of silence between us as we both try to reconcile all of the information that’s just been shared.
‘It’s me isn’t it?’ My voice is calm, but small. ‘It’s me he wants.’ The wind blows up through the valley.
‘Let’s go,’ he says, ‘your mother will be worried.’
***
Walking along the track below that hill we come across the rocks, and I tell Gabe everything – almost everything – as I run my gloved hands over their sharp edges. The building, the locked room, the way that somehow I move from here to there, and how it is real – as real as being here now. How it’s happened for a long time, but has got so much worse since being here.
He doesn’t say anything, just listens until I’m done and then he says, ‘Promise me you’ll never go there again with your friends or anyone – do you hear me?’
I nod. I can promise that I won’t go there of my own accord, but that place always seems to bring me to it, and I’m not sure how I can stop that.
We approach the house and stop at the tree. I see my mother in the living room window, no doubt glad to see us back.
‘You didn’t finish telling me about the bones,’ I say.
He takes a sharp intake of breath.
‘I came out here not long before you arrived. I knew he’d swung from this tree – I could feel it, and that when they’d finished him off they’d buried him here.’
The Twist in the Branch Page 16
