Tell-Tale

by Sam Hayes

  ‘Oh Laura, I’m sorry,’ Nina said, thankful for the diversion. What she really wanted to say just wouldn’t come out right. Instead, she touched a hand on Laura’s arm as she took the milk.

  Laura pulled away. ‘You can’t leave me hanging like that. Tell me what you were going to ask.’ Laura slurped her drink then emptied an entire bag of oven chips on to a baking tray. ‘Get this. Tom said he’d cook every other night to share the domestic burden after I asked him if he’d forgotten where he lived.’ She said it in a demented voice. ‘So far that’s amounted to him bringing home two takeaways in the last week and suggesting we eat out for his other shift.’ Laura shoved the chips in the oven and cracked the ring pull on a can of baked beans.

  Nina watched her friend blast angrily through the evening’s domesticity. She found herself thinking back to last night and the prawn curry Mick had whipped up. He’d even made his own naan bread. ‘Men are lousy cooks anyway,’ Nina lied, hoping it would make Laura feel better. ‘They make too much mess and we’re the ones left—’

  ‘I just can’t bloody take it any more, Nina.’ Laura slammed her mug on to the worktop and a circle of coffee pooled beneath it. ‘All I do is moan. It’s soul-destroying. And all my moaning is about him. It never used to be like this. There’s someone else. I’m sure of it.’ Laura’s brittle voice was desperate. Nina had never witnessed her so close to breaking. ‘It’s over, Neen. I give up. I want a new life.’ Laura briefly sank her face into her hands, let out three or four pitiful sobs before wiping her eyes and fixing a smile on her face. She was adept at burying her feelings. ‘Now, damn well tell me what you came here to get off your chest.’

  ‘Forget what I was going to say. It’s not important.’ Nina burned her tongue as she gulped her coffee. ‘Talk to Tom. Talk to anyone. Just get help.’

  Nina helped by slapping sausages on a baking tray and snipping the twist of skin joining them. ‘Nothing like a bit of home cooking, eh?’ She laughed.

  ‘The kids like sausages,’ Laura said dismally. She took the greasy wrapper and chucked it in the bin. ‘It wasn’t meant to be like this.’ She dropped her arms against her thighs. ‘You know, sausages, arguments, two kids who grunt to communicate, and a husband whose personality warrants a search and rescue team.’

  Nina threw her arms around her friend. ‘Oh Laura,’ she said. Their faces were close, a mass of tangled hair and tears. Laura let it all out on Nina’s shoulder.

  ‘You’ll get through this,’ Nina whispered. She held Laura at arm’s length and laughed when she saw the scribbles of mascara on her cheeks. ‘It takes me hours to achieve that look,’ she joked, but then she was reminded of what happened at the theatre.

  ‘I’d better get going,’ she said. ‘Hungry hordes at mine too, you know.’ She pulled her car keys from her trouser pocket.

  ‘Wait. Are you OK? Really?’ Laura asked, noticing Nina’s deep sigh.

  ‘Yeah. It’s nothing,’ she said, smiling brightly.

  Laura shrugged. ‘Get out of my house and go back to yours. Hug Josie and Mick for me and send Natalie home when you see her. That girl would live at your house if she could.’ She gave Nina a tight squeeze.

  ‘I will.’ Nina went outside and got in her car. Laura waved and closed the front door.

  The street, similar to Nina’s only a short distance away, was deserted apart from another vehicle about fifty yards along the road. The car was stationary so Nina continued rolling backwards out of Laura’s sloping drive. She wondered what was in the refrigerator at home.

  Suddenly, her head was jolted as her car was clipped from behind. Her foot instinctively jabbed the brake as she was knocked sideways.

  ‘Christ! Watch out!’ she cried, rubbing her sore neck. The impact rang in her ears and it took her a moment to regain her senses. She turned and stared down the road, watching the big dark car driving off at speed. She saw 5 and 7 and M in the number plate, but that was all.

  ‘Stupid, stupid man,’ she wailed, pumping the horn way too late. ‘Damn him,’ she said, slumping forward, wondering if she could offer even a vehicle type to the police.

  Shaking, Nina got out of the car to examine the damage. There was a dent along the rear quarter of her small red car, framed by a dark green streak of metallic paint. She ran her finger along it, as if it might give a clue to the car’s owner. Was it a Rover? A Jaguar? she wondered. Definitely a male driver, she recalled, trying to re-create an image of the face she saw flash past, but it had been too fast.

  Nina glanced at Laura’s house but somehow couldn’t face adding to her friend’s troubles. She got back in the car and drove off, slowing at every dark car she saw in case it had a dented front and she could get a number plate.

  At home, the kitchen was a mix of teenage giggles, something burning, and a laptop balanced precariously on the edge of Natalie’s knee as she sat on the worktop, swinging her legs and kicking the cupboard doors with an annoying beat. The girl was hunched over the screen, her fingers jabbing at the keys with the skill of a speed typist.

  ‘What’s that smell?’ Nina asked. She had dumped all her make-up kit in the hall. It could stay there until morning.

  ‘Toast,’ Josie replied. A shower of black crumbs rained on to the floor as she scraped the blackened bread. ‘It burned.’

  ‘No way,’ Natalie cried. Without looking up from the screen, she pulled the toast from Josie’s fingers and bit into it. ‘You’ll never guess who Kat’s going out with?’

  Nina shook her head and went into the downstairs toilet. Her head was throbbing from the wretched day she’d had. The girls’ voices faded to distant whoops and incredulous laughter as she locked the door.

  Nina flicked on the light and leaned against the wall. She just needed a moment.

  ‘You in there, Mum?’ Josie said, hammering on the door. ‘Hurry up. I’m desperate.’

  Nina stood and flushed the toilet. She was being ridiculous. She was tired, stressed about her extra workload, even though it was exciting. And she’d not been sleeping all that well. Mick had been restless because of his new commitments. They were no different to many families she knew.

  Nina splashed water around the basin and opened the door. ‘Sorry,’ she said, and she was squeezed against the wall as Josie rushed in.

  Mick suddenly came through the front door.

  ‘Oh God, I’m so glad you’re back,’ she said, delivering a long kiss on his lips.

  ‘Mmm, I should go out more often.’ Mick hugged her fondly with one arm, dangling a shopping bag with the other. ‘I’ve been hunting,’ he said, pausing, frowning at Nina’s worried expression. ‘Chicken OK?’ he asked. ‘Come and help me prepare it.’

  Nina followed him, glad of the distraction.

  ‘Christ, has there been a volcanic eruption?’ Mick asked, wiping the worktop free of black crumbs. Then, ‘Nina?’ He paused, hands spread wide on the laminate – clever, capable hands that Nina just wanted to have encase her and keep her safe forever. ‘Are you OK?’

  ‘Sure. I’m fine.’ She snapped out of it and helped unpack the groceries.

  Perfectly safe, she said over and over in her head as later, in bed, she tangled the sheet around her restless body. She was hot. She was sweating. She couldn’t sleep. Instead she listened to Mick’s gentle sleep-breaths as they bordered on a snore. She was, of course, perfectly safe.

  CHAPTER 10

  Still my dad didn’t come to visit. ‘Been forgotten?’ the horrid man asked, shoving me back on the cold window seat where he’d found me. I cowered as he raised a hand, but he thought better of it as one of the female carers walked past with a bunch of kids in tow.

  I stared out of the window, willing my dad’s car to appear. My eyes were still smarting from the glare of the light in that horrid room, and my heart pumped a rich mix of cold blood and fear. I gripped the stone window sill and stared down the drive, pressing my nose to the glass. I focused hard on the trees, the tarmac, the dingy grey sky, and prayed that my father
would come to save me.

  As dusk fell, so did my eyelids. Once or twice I dropped off – sweet oblivion where me, my dad and my mum were all back together. Vague memories of a slim woman with a ponytail, the scent of her skin – face cream and lipstick – teased me into believing she was still alive for several blissful moments even after I woke.

  It was a smell that brought me round the third time I nodded off. It made me feel ill. Disinfectant overlaying the stench of fear – my fear – and that’s when I realised I’d wet myself. Too scared to tell anyone, I crept off the dirty cushion and sloped off to the dormitory. As I peeled off my knickers, I realised that the ugly man had been right. I’d been forgotten. My dad wasn’t coming today, and he probably wouldn’t come tomorrow either. Or even the day after that.

  So far I’d spent my time at Roecliffe Children’s Home ducking and diving, smiling sweetly, innocently, getting by any way I could. I longed to be a shadow, a picture on one of the grimy walls, a rat scurrying about in the basement. The other kids were harsh, sometimes sad, sometimes bruised, and sometimes screaming with laughter. They were a rainbow of every emotion, from the tots gurgling in their prams to the teenagers who punched the walls as they idly walked past. Me, I was somewhere in the middle. Trying to hide, trying not to be noticed. If my father didn’t come to fetch me soon, I vowed I would fly away. Ava, his skinny little bird.

  The carers trudged through their duties each day. I mistook one or two of them for kids from the home, they were so young. Others were older, weary, grey, and most of them filled with resentment. None of them seemed to like us.

  I tried to find my mother inside everyone I met, just in case, but none of the carers resembled her. I wanted to make friends with the grown-ups, but they couldn’t be bought with a gum-lined grin or a cut knee – not like Dad – and it was impossible to play a sneaky prank to get more bread at tea. I soon learned that ferocious punishment followed even tiny steps out of line. Once, I went up the back stairs, forgetting they were strictly off limits. Each step hit my head as I was pushed back down by a shadowy figure at the top.

  I wasn’t stupid, far from it, and mostly kept quiet and watched the goings-on, learning how it all worked, especially when I first arrived. I didn’t want to get taken to that room again, to see what was behind the bright light. No, I just kept my head down and waited for Dad to come back because he’d promised me he would.

  It was on one of those waiting days, sitting, staring at the wall, swinging my legs, biting my nails, when I noticed that one of the carers, Miss Maddocks – who seemed about a hundred years old to me – wasn’t quite as scary as the other grown-ups. She bustled about the home more like a mother; someone with a heart.

  I thought back to my first night at the home, when I’d had no idea who anyone was. It was Miss Maddocks who had stroked my forehead until she thought I was asleep. I’d been sobbing for my dad, and eventually lay quiet but completely awake – too terrified to realise that she was being nice – as she ran her papery hand over my damp head. Through my tightly shut eyes, I stared at the backs of my eyelids, seeing the warped face of my father as I was prised from him, the grim expression of the children’s home director as I was brought here, and the feral whoops of the other kids when they found out about me. The new girl.

  ‘What did you do wrong?’ a grimy boy of about twelve asked me on my first morning. He passed me a bread roll and allowed me to wipe up the scrapings of jam on his plate. There was nothing else left. I’d spent most of the night sobbing and, when I did finally sleep, it was as the other children were waking and rushing for breakfast.

  ‘Do wrong?’ I asked. I wasn’t very hungry and didn’t like the look of the bread. ‘I didn’t do anything wrong. My mum died and my dad couldn’t cope. I tried to help.’ The other children fell silent and listened to me, even the older ones. ‘But I can’t have done it very well because they brought me here.’ I shrugged. It was the way things were, but that didn’t mean I had to like it.

  The grimy boy patted my shoulder. His hair was all messy and he smelled. ‘Never mind,’ he said. ‘You’re with us now.’

  I looked around the group of children that had gathered. It felt as if I was in a circus and that made me want to howl and sob until my dad came for me. I didn’t want to live here with Miss Maddocks or any of the other carers who skulked in and out of the shadows. I didn’t want to eat dry bread for breakfast, or sleep in the lumpy cot next to a dozen other kids. I didn’t want to do anything except go home. I wanted things how they were.

  ‘How do you run away?’ I whispered to the boy. It made me feel sick to think of it. I had never done anything bad before. I didn’t want to appear ungrateful or hurt anyone’s feelings, but I didn’t think I could spend another hour in the horrid place.

  There was a round of laughter followed by silence. ‘You don’t,’ whispered the boy, his eyes as black as coal. ‘Because there’s nowhere else to go.’

  Later, we were given different things to do. Two of the big girls had to clear and wash the dishes; another couple were instructed to strip the beds in B dorm and take them to the laundry. The boys were given brooms and had to sweep the hall then polish shoes, while the tall bony lady giving out instructions asked the rest of the group to shower and clean their teeth. These were things that I’d done at home every day for as long as I could remember. Why, then, did it seem so cold, so wrong, so cruel as the woman ushered everyone along with the back of her hand?

  ‘I want my dad,’ I said when I was the last one sitting on the bench. I would tell him everything, I vowed. About how horrid the place was.

  The bony woman crouched down beside me. ‘Hey, orphan Annie,’ she said with a smile. ‘Have you got any muscles?’

  I shook my head. Was she nice too, like Miss Maddocks, perhaps?

  ‘Well, you’re going to have to get some, living here.’ The woman gently squeezed the tops of my arms and smiled. ‘Ah, you have the muscles of an ox. Now would you like to help me carry in a basket of logs so we can get the fire lit?’

  I shrugged. I didn’t want to do anything except go home.

  ‘Come on. No use moping about. You want to be able to tell your dad about how you’ve been a helpful girl all week, don’t you?’ The woman lifted my chin with her finger.

  ‘OK,’ I said, sliding off the bench and following her. ‘But can I strike the match to light the fire?’

  ‘Of course you can,’ she replied and told me her name was Patricia. She seemed nice. ‘I work here when Miss Maddocks has gone home.’

  ‘You mean you’re allowed to go home?’ I stopped. It didn’t seem fair.

  Patricia laughed. ‘Of course. I have a son living at home. Miss Maddocks has to feed her cats.’

  I was worried. ‘But what if everyone goes home? Who will look after us?’ I didn’t fancy the thought of all the older kids bossing me about. Most had been friendly, but one or two looked like trouble. I kept my head down and didn’t cause a fuss.

  ‘That never happens,’ Patricia assured me. ‘There’s always someone on duty and some of the carers live here.’

  My shoulders dropped. Without really noticing, we’d walked along several corridors, down a flight of stone steps, through the endless basement until we arrived at a small room that smelled of wet forests and moss. ‘The log and coal store,’ Patricia announced. ‘It’s freezing today and I think we need a fire.’ She grinned as if everything might not be so bad after all. I wiped away a tear and took the small basket Patricia held out. ‘You pick out all the little bits of wood. You can carry the kindling upstairs and lay it in the grate.’

  I did as I was told and within the hour a group of children had gathered around the massive stone fireplace to soak up the warmth of the blaze. For some reason, I felt proud, maybe even a little warm inside myself. I had struck the match, held the tiny flame to the newspaper knots that Patricia had shown me how to tie, and these in turn had ignited the kindling. Soon, giant logs were crackling and popping in the grate,
while plumes of black smoke rushed up the chimney. Lost in my make-believe world, I stared at the flames, fascinated as insects scurried from the logs in panic.

  ‘Do you think they’ll get a new home too?’ I said to the boy sitting next to me. We’d been given biscuits, and I sucked on mine to make it last. The boy shrugged as if I were a mad child.

  But I didn’t feel mad at all. Neither did I feel like orphan Annie, or Cinderella, which one of the older girls had called me for helping with the fire. No, I was bursting with fresh hope, with purpose, with a lust for life that I’d long forgotten existed. For that one day, I had a feeling that everything was going to be all right. It was in my tummy; it was in my bones; I could even taste it. All I had to do was get through the next ten years to prove myself right.

  CHAPTER 11

  Even in the rain, Mick spotted the dent. From the window, Nina saw him crouching next to the rear end of her car, running his fingers through the beads of water, wondering if he was seeing things as he walked out to the street to add another bag of rubbish to the already full dustbin. Squinting through the summer drizzle, Mick frowned and viewed the damage from several angles, just to make sure it was really there.

  ‘Damn,’ Nina whispered. Her breath fogged the window of the utility room.

  As she heard Mick stamping his feet on the front door mat, Nina bunched up the pile of ironing that was still warm from the tumble dryer.

  ‘We need to recycle more,’ Mick said, washing his hands. Nina dumped the laundry on the kitchen table and put up the ironing board.

  ‘Do we?’ Perhaps he wouldn’t mention the car. She wasn’t entirely sure why she hadn’t told him. Mick would understand. Accidents happen. She plugged in the iron. Flattening clothes, stacking them in neat, pressed piles.

  ‘The bin’s stuffed. Surely there are things we could take to the—’