The Doll House

by Phoebe Morgan

  ‘What is it, my love?’

  ‘Mum,’ Benji says, ‘I can’t find Lucy.’

  ‘What do you mean?’ Ashley says. She presses the erase button to remove her latest attempt at guessing James’s password, stands up and takes Benji by the hand.

  ‘Holly’s crying too,’ Benji says. ‘She won’t shut up. What are you doing in Dad’s room?’ He follows her down the stairs.

  ‘Nothing,’ Ashley says. ‘Just looking for something.’

  ‘For what?’

  ‘Nothing, Ben,’ she tells him. ‘Just something boring, that’s all.’ Why is it her children are so inquisitive? She squeezes her son’s little hand, goes to Holly’s cot and lifts her daughter out. She is hot, her face a mess of tears. Ashley feels a wave of guilt; what is the matter with her, leaving her baby to cry like that? Benji peers worriedly at his sister.

  ‘Is she OK?’

  ‘She’s fine, Ben. She’s just little. You were like this once!’

  ‘Was I?’

  ‘You were. Now what do you mean, you can’t find Lucy? Isn’t she in her room?’

  Ashley taps on her daughter’s door before pushing it open, snapping on the light. It is empty, the bed a mess of sheets, discarded clothes all over the floor.

  ‘Luce?’ Ashley calls. Her voice echoes around the house, bounces back at her. Holly is silenced by the sound, her little face stares into Lucy’s empty room. Benji grips Ashley’s skirt.

  ‘We were playing,’ he says. ‘We were playing hide and seek but she’s gone, I can’t find her. I told you. I can’t find her, Mum.’

  Ashley frowns. She isn’t worried; her daughter has been moody recently, is probably bored of entertaining her little brother. Still, it is cruel of her to do this to Benji.

  ‘Lucy!’ she shouts again, but the house is quiet. Her daughter’s room has a funny smell, sort of stale. Ashley is never allowed in to clean any more. She feels a flash of frustration. When did she become a mum that followed her children’s demands, instead of them doing what she asked?

  ‘Come on, let’s go downstairs,’ she says. ‘We’ll find her.’

  ‘I think she went out,’ Benji says then, and Ashley stops, stares down at him. Holly reaches up, grabs at her neck.

  ‘Ouch, stop it, Hol. She went out? When?’

  ‘I don’t know,’ Benji says. ‘I was counting to a hundred, and I got to eighty-nine and she said she was going, ready or not, and then she put on her coat and those pointy shoes you don’t like. I know, because I looked through my fingers. I thought she’d come back but she didn’t, and I didn’t go out of the gate because you said I was never ever to do that because we might get hit by cars and be deaded.’ He starts to cry then, hot little tears that trickle down his cheeks. ‘Like the rabbit. You said, don’t go out to the road “under any circumstances”. That’s what you said.’ His cries become louder, snot begins to dribble from his nose.

  Ashley sets Holly down and pulls him to her, strokes the top of his head. His little heart is thudding away. Where the hell is James when she needs him?

  ‘You’re right, Benji, I did say that, and it was very naughty of Lucy to go out without telling me,’ she says. She closes her eyes and tries to keep calm, tries not to worry. This is typical teenage behaviour, she knows it is. She’ll probably be back very soon, she’s probably gone to meet Sophia from school, but Ashley wishes she knew where her daughter was, and she wishes it weren’t quite so dark and cold outside, and she wishes most of all that James were here.

  16

  London

  Corinne

  I’m waiting for Dominic. The door is tightly shut, and I’m sitting in the kitchen, clutching the little yellow rocking horse in my hand. I don’t know where else to go. I don’t even want to go to Gilly’s, she’ll think I’m mad already. Or her lover might be there.

  Every sound makes me jump out of my skin. Outside, the wind is howling; there’s a storm coming, the radio said. Rain spatters against the windows, the sound echoing in the empty flat. When I was little I found the sound of rain comforting; now it feels like a threat.

  He’s late home from work. When it gets to seven, I call him again, but he isn’t picking up, I get his voicemail. He could be driving, I suppose. The roads will be slippery; I don’t want him to crash.

  I put the horse on the side, get up and go to the window. A sudden clatter of sound hits me in the face and I start, propel myself away from the window as though something has touched me. But it hasn’t – it’s pebbles, dashing against the panes. Someone is throwing stones at our window.

  My heart begins to jump. I look around the room, as though someone is going to appear, someone is going to help me, but of course I’m alone. Totally alone. The sound comes again; I see little grey stones rise against the glass, fall back. I strain my ears, and then I hear it, a shouting. Someone is shouting my name.

  ‘Corinne! Corinne!’

  A huge surge of relief hits me. It’s Dominic. He’s outside the window. It’s just Dom!

  I run forwards, yank up the sash. A gust of wind grabs the ends of my hair, lifts them up around my face. Water splashes my cheeks, the rain is coming down hard. I peer into the blackness of the night; try to see him on the street below.

  ‘Dominic? Dom? Is that you?’

  I run downstairs, my heart bumping in my chest. I push past an old woman who is bringing in her shopping, call out a rushed apology and fumble with the downstairs latch, open the door to the building and let him in. He is dripping wet, rainwater trickling from the ankles of his trousers, his shirt dark and sodden.

  ‘God, sorry Cor,’ he says, ‘I’ve lost my keys, what a fucking moron. It’s pissing it down out there.’ He sniffs, shakes his head from side to side like a puppy. He seems oblivious to the fact that I’ve been scared half out of my wits. I stare at him, the rain pelting down behind us. I feel shaky, slightly sick.

  He doesn’t notice.

  ‘Sorry I’m late,’ he says when we get back upstairs. He kicks his soaking shoes off at the front door and goes to the fridge, opens the door and grabs a piece of salami from within. ‘Work was busy, my phone died and then I spent ages trying to find my keys in the office. Dunno what I’ve done with them, I’ll have to get a new set cut tomorrow. Christ, look at me, I need to get changed.’

  He takes a big bite of salami and leaves the kitchen, a trail of wet footprints in his wake. Did he not see my missed calls? I hear the sound of the shower being switched on, then him singing the theme tune to Breaking Bad, tone deaf like he always is.

  I look behind me, at the kitchen counter where I left the little rocking horse. My mouth falls open. It isn’t there. The surface is empty. The wooden horse has gone.

  Then

  One of the teachers talked to me today. Not in our classroom, on my own. In her special office. I didn’t really like it in there, it smelled bad. Musty and old. I wanted to be out in the playground, in the fresh air. Still, at least this way I didn’t have to worry about people not playing with me.

  She crouched down so that she was looking right into my eyes, so that we were on the same level. I stared at the lines on her face, they’re like Mummy’s only worse. I think she’s really old.

  ‘Is everything all right at home?’ she said to me. I could feel the hotness starting in my cheeks but I took a deep breath, pictured a nice blue swimming pool, which is a trick I taught myself for when I start to blush. It’s really useful for when people ask you questions.

  ‘I know – Dad’s not around at the moment, is he?’ The teacher smiled at me, tipped her head to one side. I think she was trying to be nice but I remembered how Mummy’s hands felt digging into my shoulders, ouchie ouch, and so I zipped up my lips and I shook my head from side to side.

  ‘If there’s anything that’s making you unhappy, I’d like you to tell me,’ the teacher said, and I shook my head again, harder this time, and I pressed my lips together like they were stuck with superglue.

  Then I realised she ac
tually wanted me to speak so I unstuck them and I said:

  ‘Fine. Everything at home is fine. Thank you.’ And I gave her my best smile. And then I felt good, because I had got away with it. That was the best feeling; it lasted all the way through the day until I got home. Like a secret I had locked inside me.

  When I got back to the flat, Mummy was sitting in front of the mirror, and there were loads of bottles and tubes in front of her. Like in art class. She said that it’s time to get serious, and she started painting her face. Make-up. Red lips and dark eyes. I thought she looked lovely. I told her so but she just looked sad. I think I was annoying her so I went to play in the sitting room but after a while it got boring. I’m always on my own.

  They aren’t on their own, the people in the other house. We visited tonight and I saw them, very quickly, and they looked really happy and as though the game they were playing was a lot of fun. They were all sat together around a big table. He was there, he was laughing. The girls are older than me, their hair is long and their clothes look more grown-up than mine. I asked Mummy if she thought they might like to play with me and she laughed. It wasn’t a happy sort of laugh though, it was a mean sort of laugh, and her painted red lips opened wide so I could see her teeth. I didn’t like it. It made my tummy hurt.

  17

  London

  Ashley

  Lucy gets home at ten. By this time Ashley has tried her mobile over twenty times and is pacing the kitchen floor, her heart in her mouth. James is on his way back; Ashley managed to get hold of him about an hour ago and he said he would come straight home.

  When her daughter falls through the door, Ashley feels a whirlwind of sensations: overwhelming relief, joy and anger. The combination makes her legs weak. She grabs Lucy by the shoulders, feels the slender bones beneath her fingers.

  ‘Where the hell have you been?’

  Benji is watching from the top of the stairs, his fingers in his mouth. Ashley buries her face in Lucy’s hair for a second then pulls back, stares at her daughter. With a shock, she sees the way Lucy’s eyes are out of focus, her skin blotchy. The smell of tequila hits Ashley, acidic and unpleasant. Lucy lets out a giggle, shortly followed by a hiccup. She’s drunk.

  Ashley tells Benji to go back to bed, brings her daughter into the living room and sits her down with a glass of water. Her skinny legs fold underneath her like Bambi.

  ‘I need to know where you’ve been, Lucy,’ she says. ‘The reason we allowed you a key is not so you can go out at all hours without even telling me where you were going. I have no problem with you seeing your friends—’

  Lucy giggles. Ashley isn’t even sure if she is listening. She hates having to do this alone. Where the hell is her husband?

  As if on cue, his key is in the lock and James walks in. Relief crashes over his features as he sees Lucy.

  ‘Thank God for that! Jesus, Luce, you’ve had your mother all worried. You OK, Ash?’

  Ashley stares at him. Anger pulses in her fingertips.

  ‘Am I OK? No, James, I’m not OK! I’ve been worried sick about our teenage daughter for three hours and you swan in here, ludicrously late as usual, back from “work”—’

  She is interrupted by a retching sound; Lucy is doubled over, strands of spittle dangling from her mouth, heading towards the cream of the living room carpet.

  ‘Stop shouting,’ Lucy says suddenly, her voice groggy. She lifts her head up from the floor, her eyes focus on her parents. ‘Don’t feel good.’

  ‘No, I’m sure you don’t, young lady,’ James says. ‘Are you going to tell us where you think you’ve been?’

  Lucy smiles. Her mouth is smudged slightly, red lipstick filters into the skin around her lips.

  ‘She told me not to tell you.’

  18

  London

  Corinne

  I wake up in the night, my body jerking. I can’t relax, can’t lie here knowing someone has been inside. I haven’t told Dom anything yet, I didn’t want to sound mad. He’ll think I’m talking rubbish. But I can’t keep still.

  ‘Dominic,’ I hiss. ‘Dom! Wake up!’ I shake his bare shoulder, he grunts and turns over in his sleep. I reach over, switch on the little bedside lamp. ‘Dominic!’

  This time he hears me. He opens his eyes blearily, puts a hand up to shield his face from the light.

  ‘What time is it?’ He squints at the clock and groans. ‘God, Corinne, what are you doing? What’s the matter?’

  ‘Dom, please, listen to me for a minute. We need to get up, I need to look for something.’

  He’s still half asleep. I sit up straight and he yanks the duvet up so it’s covering his face. ‘Go to sleep, Cor, please. I’ve got work in the morning, I need to rest. Do whatever you need to do tomorrow, please, babe.’

  I wait, stare at the hump of his back. He reaches out, switches off the light and tries to pull me close to him. I wriggle away. Fine. If he won’t help me, I’ll do it myself.

  I grab my phone and flick on the flashlight. Leaving Dom asleep, I search the flat for the little rocking horse, turning out the drawers in the kitchen, shaking out the sofa covers, rummaging through the pile of clothes lying by our bed. Dominic thinks I’m going mad, and maybe I am. I can’t understand how this happened; it was here, it was right here on the kitchen surface. I had it in my hand! I only left the flat for a few minutes, to let Dominic in. Could somebody have got inside? Is someone hiding inside? No. The thought feels as ridiculous as it sounds, plus, despite my efforts, I can find nothing out of place, nothing looks touched. I think of hands turning our door handle, fingers running over the surfaces. I feel cold, as though I cannot get warm.

  I pace around the flat, go from room to room like an animal on the prowl. The doors and windows are tightly shut. I hear a faint sound, it sounds like a baby. I think of Gilly getting up in the night, soothing her child, stroking his forehead. Outside it’s black, the moon shines into the kitchen, highlighting the blank work surfaces. I feel as though I am the only person awake in the world. There’s a sudden cry outside; a horrible keening sound, and my heart leaps. I look down onto the street, see the flick of a fox scuffling round by the rubbish bins, the burnt orange of its tail just visible in the moonlight. It’s scavenging. I know I won’t be able to get back to sleep.

  I go back into the bedroom, snap on the big light. Dom shifts and groans, but this time I ignore him. I feel jittery, wired. Why should I have to go through this on my own? If he thinks I sound mad, tough. I’ve got to tell him.

  He sits up in bed, and I tell him about the rocking horse. He looks completely confused, his hair sticking up on end.

  ‘Babe, I don’t know what you’re talking about,’ he says. He’s got that tired, grumpy look but I keep going, sit opposite him on the bed so that he can’t lie back down.

  ‘I’m telling you, Dominic, it was here! A little rocking horse, the one Dad bought me for the doll house when I was a child. I promise, I had it, someone put it on my pillow. Someone has been inside this flat.’

  He’s shaking his head. ‘So you’re telling me somebody came in, put a horse on your pillow, and then came back and took it away again? This isn’t The Godfather, Cor.’ He snorts to himself at his stupid joke and just for a flicker of a second a tiny bit of me hates him for not taking me seriously.

  I swallow, trying not to snap at him. ‘I don’t know,’ I say, ‘I don’t know where it’s gone. I know how it sounds, but someone is threatening me, Dom. Think about it – think about the rabbit on our car. It was dead, Dominic. Killed. Think about what that might mean!’ I break off, push the palms of my hands into my eyes. I want to go back to sleep, I want to wake up and all this have been a nightmare. I reach out and grip Dominic’s hands, try again.

  ‘I don’t know why and I don’t know who, but it’s frightening me, Dominic. Please, try to listen, try to understand!’

  He puts his arms around me, kisses me on the forehead.

  ‘Shh, shh,’ he says. ‘OK, OK. Let’s th
ink this through. Who has all your dad’s things now, who would have access to your old doll house?’

  ‘I don’t know!’ I say. My voice is coming out high and squeaky. I hate whoever is doing this, whoever is playing games with me like I’m their little puppet on a string. Because somebody is. They must be.

  ‘I thought Mum did,’ I tell him, trying to stay calm. ‘Last I knew they were in the attic, but they aren’t— ‘

  ‘How do you know?’

  I pause. I’ll have to tell him. ‘I looked for them. When we were at Mum’s.’

  ‘You looked for them? When? Why didn’t you say?’

  ‘When you were asleep, I got up one night. I didn’t want you to think – I thought you’d think I was being silly.’

  Dominic exhales, runs a hand through his hair.

  ‘Christ, Cor. You snuck up to the loft in the middle of the night?’ He puts his head in his hands. ‘Come on. Are you going to be roaming around the flat every night from now on? ’ He shakes his head. ‘You loony!’ He smiles at me; he’s joking, he isn’t taking me seriously.

  ‘Dominic!’

  ‘OK, OK. Sorry.’ He holds up his hands. ‘Look, do you want me to be honest? I think you’re just panicking, you’re thinking too much about the baby stuff, you’re getting things a bit out of proportion. That’s all. The dead rabbit – I know it was horrible, I do, but it wasn’t a personal attack, babe. You heard your mum – sometimes that kind of thing happens in the country, it’s just nutters! Nobody even knows us in Kent. And I’m telling you, no one’s been inside the flat. Don’t you think they’d take something a bit more valuable than a little wooden toy?!’ He sighs, runs a hand through his hair. ‘I mean, how would they even get in? Unless—’

  He breaks off. I jump on it.

  ‘What? Unless what?’

  ‘Well . . .’ He looks down at the bedclothes sheepishly. ‘Nothing, nothing. I just . . . well, all right, I probably ought to find my keys. That’s all. I’ve lost my keys, I mislaid them at work the other day, which you know, so yes, technically we ought to change the locks. But come on! I’ve probably dropped them, and they don’t say our address on anyway. I’m not worried, Cor. And you shouldn’t be either.’