The Girl Who Came Back

by Kerry Wilkinson

  ‘Something like that.’

  Nattie looks to Rhys, who’s full of amusement. She slaps his arm. ‘You could’ve said something.’

  ‘I called you over as soon as I found out.’ He downs the rest of his pint, asks Nattie what she wants and then heads off to the bar.

  Nattie watches him go and then leans forward, eyes narrowing as she focuses more closely on me. ‘Do you remember me?’ she whispers.

  A shake of the head. ‘It was a long time ago.’

  ‘You used to come over after school. I think your mum had work or something like that. We’d play in the garden…’ she tails off and then adds: ‘I was never allowed in the back garden after that. Mum would make me play inside.’ She rubs her temples, as if caressing out the specific memory. ‘I still remember the day you went missing really vividly… it’s probably my clearest early memory. I know odd things before that – us playing – but those almost feel like I remember them because Mum told me. She’d say we used to play together and it’s like the memory formed from that. With this, it’s so clear. It was a Saturday and I remember Mum asking me if I’d seen you…’

  Rhys interrupts by returning to the table with a cider for Nattie. He hadn’t asked if I wanted another drink, let alone what I might want, but he nods to the bar where two Guinnesses are settling.

  I’m not going to complain.

  He slides into the booth, swapping places with Nattie and then looks between us.

  ‘Were you talking about me?’

  Nattie laughs. ‘You wish.’

  He ruffles his hair but it barely moves from the just-out-of-bed wax.

  ‘What happened?’ Nattie asks. ‘Where’ve you been? We thought you were, well… dead. Everyone did.’

  I finish the final third of my first pint in one go. I’ve only told the story once out loud and I’m already sick of it.

  ‘I might need a drink first…’

  Nattie is right on it. She fetches the two pints from the bar and then I tell them much of what I told my mum. Or, more to the point, much of what I think I told my mum. It’s better this time. I remember everything I say and, beyond that, I’m not nervous. Nattie and Rhys are like me. They react with shock and awe in the way I assumed my mother would. They don’t interrupt. They don’t cry. Perhaps there’s even a small part of me that enjoys it, like I’m a grandmother in a big ol’ rocking chair telling stories to her grandkids. The Guinness helps.

  I talk about the man, the caravan, being kept inside, moving around, the name Karen, eventually feeling like I belonged, escaping on a train…

  It’s more natural the second time but it helps that I have an engrossed audience of two. It feels strange yet satisfying to have people hanging on every word I say.

  Neither of them speak until I’m finished. Their drinks are untouched. After I’ve told them about checking into the Black Horse last night and looking for Mum this morning, I shrug as if to say they’re what comes next.

  There’s a pause where they stare at me, wondering if there’s more. As if I might pull off a mask and reveal this is all a prank for some TV show.

  ‘Didn’t you ever want to come home?’ Nattie asks eventually. Her throat sounds dry. ‘When you were younger, I mean. Like when you were nine or ten and you were allowed out to play…?’

  ‘What would I have done?’ I reply. ‘When I was nine, I’d already been away for four years. Say you don’t really remember anything before you were four years old, that means I only had vague memories a year or so from being in Stoneridge. By then, I already had four of being away. You don’t have much concept of time at that age.’

  Nattie nods in agreement. ‘Like with the school holidays,’ she says. ‘It seems like forever when you’re a kid but then, when you’re fourteen or fifteen, the six weeks fly by.’

  She gets it.

  ‘Right – it was like having two lives. It was only when I got older that I started to realise what might have happened. Before that, it was like watching a TV show. As if it had happened to someone else. Plus, you believe what adults tell you when you’re little. Like Santa, or the tooth fairy. It’s all real until you grow up and realise it’s not.’

  There’s a pause and Nattie gulps down some of her drink. ‘How old were you when you started figuring it out?’

  ‘Thirteen or fourteen, I guess… but it wasn’t like I had a Eureka moment. It was gradual. Flashes of memories. I’d wake up and wonder if I was dreaming or if something had actually happened. I remembered names and places.’

  Nattie leans back, taking it in, and Rhys speaks next. ‘Have they ever come looking for you?’

  ‘Who?’

  ‘The other family. The travellers.’

  ‘I’ve never seen anyone.’

  ‘Do you think they could come here…?’

  ‘I doubt it… I guess I’ve never thought of that.’

  A couple drift past us and slot onto the table closest with a bottle of wine and an ice bucket. They’re twenty-somethings, set for a night out as a couple, not remotely bothered about who we are.

  So much of today hasn’t gone as I’d thought – and yet, I suppose, the main things have. What’s different is how it’s left me feeling. I wanted to keep things small, to tell my mother and no one else, yet here I am telling two other people everything as well. Beyond that, there’s a small part of me that wants this stranger couple to overhear us and make a big deal. To stick me on some throne and adore me as the village’s prodigal daughter. I want that fame but I know I really don’t.

  Nattie lowers her voice anyway: ‘What did the police say?’

  ‘I’ve not spoken to them.’

  ‘Oh. Is that tomorrow…?’

  ‘I’m not sure. This is all new for me. It’s not like I’ve got some grand plan for what happens next. There’s no guidebook for everything.’

  They both seem to agree with this.

  Nattie nudges Rhys with her elbow. ‘Do you remember the search?’ she asks.

  He nods. ‘Like it was yesterday – I wasn’t allowed out for the whole summer. I guess I was ten or eleven. I wanted to go out and play football with my mates but our mums kept saying no.’

  ‘I remember everyone going crazy,’ Nattie says. ‘We were at Ridge Park and there were loads of people. Some sort of village meeting, I think. Your mum was at the front, crying and thanking people for coming to search. I was with my mum at the front and remember looking up at her, not quite understanding.’

  The other couple are gazing longingly into each other’s eyes, whispering and giggling about who knows what. They couldn’t care less about what’s happening barely a few metres away.

  ‘I remember the cameras,’ Rhys adds. ‘It was the first time I connected cameras to what was shown on TV. There were all these news people here and I think I was scared of them. I’m not sure why – probably that it was so many new people. None of my friends were allowed out either, so if we wanted to go round anyone’s house, we had to have one of our parents walk us over.’

  ‘I think that’s what made it scary,’ Nattie says. ‘It was bad enough what happened with you but because we were kept inside, it made everything feel much worse.’

  ‘Like a prison,’ Rhys concludes.

  There are a few moments where we stop and listen to the buzz from the rest of the pub. That’s the thing with small communities – everything that happens has a knock-on effect to everything else. A child going missing is a scar on the lives of every other young person in the area. They even invented their own word – Oliviered – for when someone went missing. It’s a lot to take in.

  Nattie glances across to the couple who are closest to us but they’re still busy making goo-goo eyes to one another.

  ‘Your mum must’ve flipped out,’ she says.

  ‘Sort of,’ I reply. ‘Her husband wasn’t too happy, let alone his brother.’

  Rhys and Nattie exchange a sideways glance.

  ‘What?’ I ask.

  It’s Nattie who answer
s: ‘It’s just… in this village you either like the Pitmans or you don’t. It’s not your mum; she married into it. No one has a problem with her. It’s the brothers.’

  I barely have time to think that over before she’s moving on.

  ‘What now?’ Nattie asks.

  ‘With what?’

  ‘Are you back for good?’

  It feels like I should have an answer for that but I don’t. ‘I’m not sure,’ I say. ‘It’s all a bit odd. Everything’s happened really quickly. I didn’t have a real mum this morning, now I do.’

  Rhys picks up his pint and clinks the glass into mine. ‘You should hang around,’ he says.

  ‘I thought you said there were loads of better places than this…?’

  He leans back and laughs. ‘Well, yes… but Nat and I make it better just by being here. Besides, I can’t keep carrying her home when she’s too pissed to walk. I could do with a hand.’

  He gets a playful elbow for that.

  ‘You’ll have to come and meet my mum,’ Nattie says. ‘She still talks about you. She’s best friends with your mum, or she was at one point. I’m never quite sure. She’s got all sorts of photos and things. She’ll lose her shit when I tell her you’re back.’

  Nattie’s mother is apparently in every morning, so I get the address and say I’ll head over tomorrow before noon. The three of us swap numbers and it suddenly feels as if this place could become home after all. It’s not just weird sets of brothers, creepy barmen and shops that close on Thursdays; I could make friends here.

  ‘You free tomorrow afternoon?’ Nattie asks.

  ‘I guess so. It’s not like I’ve got a full diary of things to do.’

  ‘Good – there’s something you should probably see.’

  Eight

  The post office might be closed on Thursdays but it was open today and they sell village maps. I’m not particularly sure why as I can’t believe this is a haven for holidaymakers but I’m not complaining.

  It’s dark and the pub is quiet as I lay the map out across the bed and mark the places I know. There’s the Black Horse, of course, then the coffee shop, Via’s, on the High Street. Figuring out the location of Mum’s house is a little more difficult, largely because I didn’t drive there or back. There are half a dozen roads out of the centre, two of which are easy to ignore because they’re too big. Of the other four, two head south and so it’s not long before I’m able to trace the route I think Mum took. At first I think the house must be a little off the map, then I realise it’s in the top corner, a few miles from the village itself.

  I find the old house, too, and write the name ‘Janet’ underneath. I have Nattie’s address, so find that and write her name on the page. It feels useful to have the information in front of me and though I’d been online to look at everything before, it’s more real now I’m here. The church isn’t simply a word next to a patch of green, it’s an actual place.

  When I’m confident I know enough of the village layout to get around for now, I skim through the bookmarks on my phone, reading the Olivia Adams articles for what feels like the hundredth time. Perhaps it is. Perhaps it’s more. I know some of the lines word for word. If it happened now, there’d be so much more content online. Newspapers didn’t have such a large Internet presence thirteen years ago but there are still a handful of pieces.

  What is clear is how quickly people forget. Not those who live in Stoneridge, everyone else. For Nattie and Rhys, the missing girl is part of their upbringing, but for the rest of the country, it was a big deal for a month and then it was gone.

  There’s one line in the reports that jumps out. It’s never meant anything before but there’s context now:

  Ashley Pitman, who owns Pitmans Garage in the village, has been helping out with the search since the beginning and remains hopeful. ‘We’ll find her,’ he said. ‘We’ll keep searching for as long as it takes. Someone, somewhere must know something.’

  That was a load of nonsense. ‘As long as it takes’? They must have given up at some point and he didn’t seem too pleased earlier at the prospect of a thirteen-year hunt finally being over.

  I search for Pitmans Garage but nothing comes up online. It’s not necessarily the type of place that would have a website and neither Max nor Ashley seem techie types, but I’m sure there’d be a listing for it somewhere, if only a phone number. Mum said something about a taxi business – and that does get a hit when I search for it. There’s a Pitmans Taxis listed in Stoneridge and I mark that on my map. It’s not far from the back of the Black Horse, perhaps a couple of minutes’ walk away.

  I cross the room to my window, which looks diagonally over a courtyard towards the back and side of the pub. It’s hard to see much of anything when I wipe away the condensation to stare out into the darkness.

  After meeting Rhys and especially Nattie, it’s impossible not to imagine how things might have been if I’d actually grown up here. I liked Nattie when I thought she was a sarcastic slightly two-faced waitress but after spending an evening drinking together, I like her even more. Self-awareness is appealing in people. That sense of being a very small part of this massive world and not worrying about it. Of not taking yourself too seriously.

  Perhaps I would have been happy here?

  I’m distracted by something on the other side of the door. The bar is on the ground floor, I’m on the middle, then Pete lives upstairs. The only other room on this floor is the bathroom. It’s not en suite as such but I don’t have to share. The toilet is in a small room connected to the bedroom.

  I creep back to the bed and listen, wondering if the floorboards actually did squeak. It could be Pete on his way up or downstairs, and yet…

  The noise sounds again. A definite creak, as if someone’s standing directly outside my door. Perhaps the person is listening to me as I’m listening to them?

  Another scrape, louder and longer this time.

  I tiptoe to the door and press my ear to the wood. I don’t have a lot of experience with hotels but this room was cheap and it feels like it. The door is thin and the whole place is a mass of clanking pipes and screeching walls. It would be a nightmare for anyone who believes in ghosts.

  There’s a shuffling from the other side of the door. Someone pacing, or…

  I swing open the door quickly, expecting there to be someone on the other side but there’s not. There is a stack of crisp boxes next to the stair banister and a row of other bar-related merchandise. Packets of nuts stuck to large sheets of cardboard, a box of empty, new glasses, filters for the coffee machine, bottles of cordial.

  No point in pretending I didn’t have a nosy poke around last night.

  The floorboards creak as I step onto the landing and look both ways. The same sound I heard a few seconds ago. I peer over the rail to the floor below – but there’s no one there.

  ‘Hello…?’

  The paint is peeling from the walls and my voice echoes around the stairwell, unanswered. I tread on the squeaky floorboard again and then return to the bedroom, closing the door, locking it, and listening to the silence. No scrapes now. If there was anyone outside the door, they’ve gone.

  I fold up the map and return it to my bag. The room is small; a bed, dresser and side table is pretty much it. I sit at the dresser and turn on the lamp, staring at myself in the mirror. Today has been a long time coming – and then it was a long day.

  ‘Olivia,’ I say, watching how my lips move. It sounds good. It sounds right. I’ve been living under a different name for a long time but I can get used to Olivia.

  ‘Olivia Adams.’

  That sounds good, too. Not Olivia Pitman, that’ll never be my name.

  ‘Olivia Elizabeth Adams.’

  I like that, too. I wonder where the middle name came from. If it belongs to someone important to my mother, or if it was chosen at random.

  ‘Oh-liv-ee-aah.’

  I stretch out the sounds. Six letters, four syllables. That’s pretty good. Olivia is m
y name – now I need to get used to other people saying it.

  2008: Lily, 11

  My dad squeezes my hand and the rough, poky bits of his skin make mine itch. He’s not been to work for more than a week and yet there are still dry prickly bits on his palms. There is dirt under his fingernails, too, something for which Mum always used to tell him off. I wonder if that should be my job now.

  It’s uncomfortable to sit still on the hard wooden benches but Dad fidgets before I do. He lets my hand go for a moment but I’m instantly reaching for him again. Spiky skin or not, I don’t want him to let go.

  This is my first time inside a church and I really don’t think I like it. Everything’s so big, the ceiling so high. It’s hard to hear people speak because their voice drifts up and away. Dad leans in to whisper something to me but I don’t hear him. Then he lets my hand go and, before I can strain for him once more, he’s on his feet, heading along the stone floor and up to the stage at the front of the church.

  There’s a priest or a vicar, I don’t know the difference. He’s an old man who said hello to me as we came inside but I didn’t know what to say then. He looks to me again now and I feel very alone in the front row.

  Dad stands behind this large wooden desk thing. He’s talking about Mum but I don’t really hear what he’s saying. It’s partly because of the echo but also because he’s busy biting his lip and trying not to cry. When he looks at me, his eyes are red and his bottom lip trembles. It makes me want to cry but I don’t.

  I heard Dad whispering to someone he called a social worker a few days ago. I was in the living room and they were in the kitchen. They thought I couldn’t hear but I could. Dad said I hadn’t cried and he asked if that was strange. He asked if I was strange. The social worker said people deal with loss in very different ways and then Dad started to cry.

  He’s still crying now, still looking straight at me as he talks about Mum. He says she was a good mother, a loving wife.

  This is the first time I’ve seen him dress in a suit like the men on TV. He spent the morning pulling at it, saying it was too tight and that it didn’t fit any longer. I’ve had to wear the black skirt I usually have for school and a new black jacket he bought me because I didn’t have one. Mum didn’t like dark colours – which is why it’s so strange that everyone in the church is wearing black.