The Reading List

by Sara Nisha Adams

  Mukesh shivered despite the heat.

  Perhaps nobody was in after all. He looked at the note again, wondering if he had got the right house. There was no mistaking the 7, and it was hard to misread a 9. This was 79.

  His finger hovered above the doorbell, but for whatever reason, he couldn’t bring himself to press it. No one was in.

  Instead, Mukesh posted the The Time Traveler’s Wife through the letterbox – he would blame it all on Kyle if it was the wrong address – and walked to the high road to catch the bus.

  As he walked away from the house, he felt lighter with every step, glad to be leaving those shut windows, the sense of something ominous breathing inside the house, worried for whatever lay within. An image of Manderley flashed in his mind from Rebecca; walking away from Aleisha’s house felt like breaking free of that old place and the ghosts of the past it held, the secrets and fears. He shook his head, trying to banish the book’s hauntings. Aleisha was fine, of course she was fine. Wasn’t she?

  Chapter 31

  ALEISHA

  THE HOUSE WAS DARK. The policewoman and her constable had taken every bit of light with them when they left. They’d had to step over a book face down on the doormat to get out: The Time Traveler’s Wife. They had all heard the thud as it was dropped through, and then they’d both taken a moment to stare at it, apathetic to its arrival.

  Aleisha felt the silence of the house cascade around her. She took each step one by one, terrified to think about the next. When she reached the top of the stairs, her heart was beating out of her chest. As she placed her hand on the handle to Leilah’s door, she felt its cold like a fire on her skin – for a moment, she was frozen to the spot. Aleisha couldn’t hear anything coming from Leilah’s room, but when she stepped in she saw Leilah was standing upright, as if expecting her. Aleisha shut the door behind her. It was better to keep the whole world out for this one moment.

  ‘Mum, sit down.’ Aleisha rested a hand on her mother’s shoulder. She could feel herself trying on someone else’s skin. Atticus – wise, imposing. Nothing would faze him. Jo March, the moment she learns Beth is gone – broken, angry. Pi, realizing he’d lost his whole family and had nothing but a tiger, which could turn at any moment, for company – all adrift. Nothing was quite right.

  As she looked into Leilah’s eyes, she saw her mum was searching for the answer already. Analysing her face, Aleisha could see the policewoman sitting in front of her – she’d been calm. How had she been so calm? She had just broken someone’s world.

  Sharp pinpricks ran through her body, as though she was being lifted out of it. How she wished she could rewind time, rip out the last few pages of this story and rewrite them.

  Aidan would walk through the door, trip over the book, tell her off for leaving things lying around. He’d head to the kitchen, take off the Post-it notes that weren’t relevant any more and start digging around for some food. Everything would be fine, everything would be normal.

  Nothing would be normal again.

  Leilah’s eyes stayed fixed on her daughter, boring into her.

  Aleisha took a breath. For now, she could be Atticus. Relaying the facts. Stating the truth. Aidan had jumped in front of a train that morning. Suicide. But Aleisha was sure that couldn’t be true. She knew that feeling, standing on the platform, watching the train rush towards you. And that immediate, irrational impulse to propel yourself forward – wanting to know for a moment what it would feel like. To be hit by a train. But that was just a fiction, it wasn’t real life.

  Leilah watched her, and Aleisha couldn’t know if the words were even making sense. None of this made sense. Aleisha just kept talking, until there was nothing more to say.

  For a moment, the world stood completely still, as Atticus-Aleisha disappeared, leaving Aleisha alone in their place. Aleisha, whose heart was numb, who could not believe that anything like this could happen. She pushed herself forward, forcing herself to sit beside her mother. She ignored Leilah’s flinches and held her mother’s hand, as tightly as she could. Leilah’s hand was limp, it had no life. Aidan had no life.

  The room moved in slow motion – but the air stood completely still. Breathless. Lifeless. Until Leilah began to scream. Leilah, she had been right, when Aleisha had come home to find her panicking, drowning. Leilah – her instinct. She had known. She had always known.

  Leilah began to beat her hands on her thighs, until Aleisha moved them carefully onto the bed beside each leg. The sound of the beating was muffled, but Leilah’s cries made up for their silence. Her voice tore through the house, tore through the rest of the world.

  Her son was dead.

  Her son was gone for ever.

  ‘Get out!’ Leilah screamed at Aleisha, her eyes focusing for the first time. ‘Get out! I don’t want to see you! Leave me alone!’

  Chapter 32

  MUKESH

  THE HOUSE CREAKED AROUND him as he sat in his usual spot, lamps lighting up the space. As soon as he’d arrived home, he’d delved into Beloved, wondering if there was any sort of clue as to what Aleisha was going through within its pages. Had she left it as a sign for him? Or was it simply her next recommendation?

  He’d been met, immediately, with another strange and eerie house, a house haunted with sadness.

  He’d thought of number 79, Aleisha’s house – at the time it had seemed like Manderley, the last ominous house he’d experienced through the pages of Rebecca. But now it was clear that Aleisha’s house, with all its windows closed, its curtains drawn, shrouded in darkness, it was exactly how he pictured the house in Beloved – number 124. He knew it wasn’t plausible, that a house in 1870s Cincinnati would look anything like a terraced house in Wembley built in the 1940s. But when the author described the haunting feel of number 124, he just pictured Aleisha’s house – the windows shut, never to be opened, the silence echoing. But Toni Morrison allowed him to see inside the house in Beloved – he could see what happened there, he didn’t need to let his imagination run wild. Inside 124, he met Sethe, and her last remaining daughter Denver, and immediately his heart hurt for them, living in a home that they felt they couldn’t escape. Sethe’s sons, Howard and Buglar, had fled the haunted house years before; even Baby Suggs, Sethe’s mother-in-law, had been saved from its darkness by the next life, by death. Now it was just Sethe and Denver, alone. It was a house no one visited, a house no one entered. And Denver never went beyond the yard on her own. Her whole world was the house, her mother and the ghost who lived with them. The ghost of her dead sister, Beloved.

  Through every page, Mukesh wanted to throw himself into Sethe and Denver’s world, to show them how alive and vibrant they were, how ready for life they could be, if they weren’t being pulled back to trauma constantly by the ghost who could never leave them alone, who could never let them forget their past.

  As he continued to read, the phone sat right beside him; he was hoping for a phone call from Aleisha. He just wanted to know she was okay. But with every page he turned, every noise, every car that drove past, Mukesh felt a shiver down his spine. He’d been sitting there for hours, just reading, unable to leave the characters alone, but the air around him was getting colder. Aleisha hadn’t called. His worries weighed more heavily on him by the minute.

  If this was a message from Aleisha, his heart ached at the thought of what she was trying to tell him. Was she, like Sethe and Denver, trapped in the house, unable to leave? What was keeping her there? Did she have a ghost of her own?

  ‘Hello?’ Mukesh picked up the phone, half asleep, groggy. His alarm clock bleated 11:00 a.m. at him – later than he usually got up, but he’d been awake until the early hours, reading, searching for clues.

  ‘Can you meet me?’ the voice said, down the phone.

  ‘Sorry, who is this?’

  ‘It’s Aleisha.’

  Mukesh breathed in, he hadn’t recognized her voice, she didn’t sound okay. Number 124 floated to the forefront of his mind again.

  ‘Ale
isha, what can I do?’

  ‘Can you meet me?’ she repeated.

  Mukesh nodded, though Aleisha couldn’t see his assent. ‘I will come. Where?’

  ‘I’m at the park, the one near the library.’ Her voice was hollow.

  Mukesh shuffled to the telephone stand, where Rohini’s Post-it notes sat waiting. ‘Yes, hold on, I am just writing it down.’ He didn’t want to forget. He couldn’t forget. His hand was shaking.

  ‘Are you okay? Do you want me to call someone?’ Mukesh asked.

  ‘I have. I’ve called you.’

  Mukesh was silent. He hung up the phone and trundled as fast as he could to the bathroom. He got himself ready quicker than he ever had before.

  At the park, Aleisha was sitting on a bench, The Time Traveler’s Wife clasped tightly in her hands. Mukesh had taken forty-five minutes to get there, and he blamed the bus – stopping at every stop, letting on too many people so the bodies were squished together. He was ready to give his excuses and his apologies as soon as he saw her, but the look on her face told him she was somewhere else entirely.

  He knew this must be about her mother. He saw Aleisha’s face on the day she’d opened up to him, how sad, how young she looked. A 17-year-old girl shouldn’t need to be strong all the time.

  ‘Aleisha?’ Mukesh sat down next to her tentatively. ‘How are you?’

  She looked to her knees and shook her head. He could see her body doing all it could not to curl up into a ball and disappear.

  ‘Miss Aleisha, what can I do? You can talk to me.’

  ‘No,’ she whispered, her voice breaking. She clutched her hand to her heart and Mukesh cautiously placed his palm on her shoulder.

  ‘There, there,’ he said, hating the words as soon as they’d left his mouth. They sat side by side, Aleisha staring at the ground, Mukesh staring at his knees.

  The silence stretched out for what felt like hours.

  ‘My brother,’ she whispered. ‘He’s dead. They said he jumped in front of a train.’ Each word exhausted her.

  Mukesh took a moment to understand. ‘Your brother?’ He said the words so softly, hoping she’d never have to hear them. Hoping he’d be able to change everything. But there was nothing he could do. He couldn’t make it better.

  Aleisha nodded. ‘I had to get out, of the house. I can’t breathe in there. I can’t—’ She was struggling to catch her breath; until her breathing turned sharp, but shallow. ‘It doesn’t make sense. He was fine. He was so strong. He looked after us all.’

  Mukesh squeezed her shoulder just slightly. He took a deep breath; he could feel his heart torn in two. He imagined Denver, fighting for her family, fighting to do her best to save her mother, to save her sister Beloved – but he didn’t have Denver’s power, her intelligence – right now, there was nothing he could do. He couldn’t hide behind someone else’s words now, searching for an answer, he had to say something himself, say something real.

  ‘I don’t know what to do,’ Aleisha looked at him, pleading. Aleisha, who always told him what to do, what to read – she was asking him for help.

  ‘Maybe, maybe you should go home. You should be with your mother, family.’

  Aleisha’s shoulders drew into her body.

  ‘I missed so much,’ she said. Her voice concealed a current of rage. ‘Mum missed so much. What were we doing? How could we have done this? I just had my head stuck in those books.’ Her voice turned into a shout – Mukesh skimmed the park to see if anyone was looking, but no one was paying them any attention at all. To everyone else, their lives were continuing – while Aleisha’s life had come to a complete stop. She slammed her fist on the book, roughly pulling it open, scraping her nails down the pages. Mukesh strangled a gasp. ‘I was crying over people who didn’t even exist, and all the time, my brother needed me, and needed my help, and I was blind. Completely blind!’ She threw the book to the floor. Mukesh watched it land, face down. He instinctually wanted to pick it up, to wipe it clean, to return it to safety. Instead, he turned to Aleisha – her face was screwed up, her eyes were shut.

  ‘It isn’t your fault.’ He could tell she wanted to disagree but had no energy to put up a fight. ‘I will call Nilakshiben. She will know what to do.’

  He hadn’t meant to say the last bit out loud but Aleisha nodded. She was looking at her shoes, brushing one toe over the other. Her fingers clutched the palm of her right hand, the thumb pushing in as hard as it could. She was checking if she still had the ability to feel, to understand the world around her. Hoping, praying, that this was just a dream.

  Nilakshi arrived half an hour later with snacks in hand. She had picked up some salt’n’shake crisps and some dhebra too. She offered the crisps to Aleisha, and when Aleisha asked instead about the dhebra, Nilakshi said, ‘Oh, just Indian food. You might not like it,’ but Aleisha tried it anyway. She ate the tiniest amount. No more than a fingertip-sized piece. She claimed that was enough. Mukesh wasn’t sure she had eaten for days.

  Nilakshi didn’t say anything to Aleisha, but she embraced her, without awkwardness, without asking for permission. ‘My beta,’ she said softly, and held on as tightly as she could. Eventually, Aleisha pulled herself away, gently. ‘I should go home.’ They all nodded, and Nilakshi led them to her car.

  They drove to Aleisha’s house in silence. As they parked, Aleisha stayed in the car, rooted to the spot. She was clearly terrified of setting foot back inside – she didn’t want to meet whatever was waiting for her there: sadness, emptiness, heartbreak. Mukesh didn’t blame her. He remembered his own house when Naina died. He couldn’t be in it. He couldn’t do anything there. Rohini had taken it upon herself to sort everything out for him. She’d tidied Naina’s things away for him, putting them in safe places, but making sure the house felt as if she was still there without reminding him that she was gone for ever. He wondered who would do this for Aleisha. Where was her father? Would he come home to help?

  A voice inside Mukesh – perhaps Naina – told him to distract Aleisha, to help her focus on something else, to get her through the present moment. ‘Aleisha?’ he asked tentatively. ‘What did you think of Little Women? It’s good, ne?’

  Her eyes darted up at him, and he knew he shouldn’t have said anything. ‘I don’t care about Little Women, Mr P!’ she snapped, but clutched her hand to her mouth – willing the words to unsay themselves. Softer this time, she continued: ‘I’ve spent too much time in books. I need to start living again, or who knows if I’ll fuck everything else up?’

  She pushed herself out of the car. The Time Traveler’s Wife was sitting on the back seat. They watched Aleisha walk away, taking a moment for herself before stepping into her house. Just as she turned around to close the door, she glanced at them both one last time.

  Mukesh smiled at her – hoping she would understand that he was trying to send her all the strength he had in that smile, and to show her all she had in her young life to look forward to. He also wanted it to say something like, ‘I’m always here if you need to talk.’ Though he hoped she had someone closer.

  After a few moments, Mukesh picked up The Time Traveler’s Wife from the car seat, and took it over to Aleisha’s front door, where he posted it through as gently as he could. She might not need it right now. But if in one moment, minutes, days, weeks, or months from now, it might prove a comfort, an escape – just like it had for him – it would be worth it.

  Chapter 33

  ALEISHA

  ‘ALEISHA, I’VE BEEN TRYING to call you,’ Dean said down the phone, his voice laced with anxiety.

  The glass of the screen felt like ice against her ear. ‘I don’t know what to do, Dad,’ Aleisha whispered.

  It was her habit to speak quietly on the phone, especially to her dad, but Aleisha knew it was futile – Leilah was upstairs, dead to the world in her room.

  She’d tried to get Leilah out of bed today, because she knew she should. But she also couldn’t bear being around her in the same way she couldn’t be
ar being around herself. They were both to blame.

  ‘I don’t know what to do,’ she repeated, a tear tracking down her cheek. And it felt like the first time she’d been honest with her dad in years. ‘I don’t know how to fix things.’

  ‘I know, sweetheart.’ His voice was cracking, but she couldn’t bear his emotion. He didn’t understand her. He didn’t understand anything. ‘We can work this out together. What can I do to help? I can come over, help with anything. Just tell me. You don’t need to take this all on alone, okay? I know what you must be going through. How is your mum?’

  ‘Come over’ – those words just reinforced to her that Dean didn’t live here. For him, this tragedy was for ever at a distance. He existed outside of Aleisha’s world, outside of Aidan’s world, and after the funeral, he would walk away to his own life. Aleisha could never walk away. She’d done too much of that already – she’d been too busy feeling sorry for herself, crying about her friends not being her friends any more, living in other people’s fictional worlds, to focus on her own, on Aidan’s.

  ‘No, it’s fine, we don’t need anything from you right now. Uncle Jeremy and Rachel are coming next week. They’re bringing everything we need.’

  Uncle Jeremy and Rachel hadn’t asked what they needed to do – they’d just done it, insisted. Hun, we’ll be with you in a few days, we will stay as long as you need. Xx R

  Dean didn’t have a response to that. Instead he said, ‘Okay, I’d better go then … But, I love you, okay? We will make it through this. Tell me, if there’s anything I can do. We will get through this, Aleisha.’

  Aleisha put her phone down. They hadn’t been ‘we’ for years.

  As she hung up the phone, she saw three text messages from Zac. He’d been worried about her. She’d told him what had happened in brief, painful detail, but couldn’t say anything else. He told her he was there if she wanted to talk, and had continued to send the odd stupid cat meme. She knew he was trying his best, but nothing felt like enough.