Hide and Seek

by Amy Bird

  There’s a tug on my skirt from one of the schoolchildren. I hate her for being a child, for being hardly older than Guillaume was. For my knowledge that, given the right circumstances, the right equipment, she too could be a killer. Right now, she just wants to know about what notes she should play.

  “Pas de dièses,” I mumble at her. I can only mumble, because this is the beginning of the disintegration. I have journeyed so far into my painful past that I have begun to hallucinate. My fevered mind has created the image of a grown-up Guillaume. And in my hallucinations, he is standing outside the window of the classroom, staring in.

  Chapter Four

  -Will-

  There she is. My murdering mother. Just like the photo Ellie showed me. A woman too well-groomed to show guilt. The dyed hair, painted lips, pinched-in waist. They are not the features of a woman destroyed by remembering what she has done. No. They are just the sort of self-indulgent traits I would expect of a woman who killed her husband and abandoned her son. Then apparently got engaged again. I know those features well, of course. From the moment I saw the pictures Ellie gave me, of the woman as she was back then, as she is now, and of the inside of our former home, all my memories have come back. My mother, that woman, standing in the kitchen, with those black and white tiles, holding a hammer, shouting, slapping me, leaning over my father, my Max, to examine her handiwork. My subconscious was trying to tell me the truth, but Ellie and her detective work unlocked the secrets, uncovered the memories that were always there.

  And what new memories I will have by the end of today! The hammer smashing through her skull to her cortex. The moment she is still and cannot move any more, cannot do any more harm.

  Look, now, at the harm they are letting her do to these children. If they knew, would they let her stand there with them? Address them, give them a perspective on life? Her warped, cruel perspective, that meant she killed so she could live alone. Maybe I should be grateful she didn’t take the hammer to me literally too. Only figuratively. And look, look at all those electronic keyboards that the children are sitting at. Curtailed, castrated pianos, their hammers removed, half their span cut out. How can a woman married to such a man as Max countenance that? How can she have the cheek to teach these small children to play, when she murdered the one true talent she had known? And when she gave away her own child? Never before will someone so deservedly have been brought to a halt.

  But how do I do this? I have not given much thought to how I go in for the kill. The hammer and the smashing, yes, I remember that. The hammer reminds me of itself even now – it’s slipped lower in my jacket, and creates a pressure at the top of my groin. It will only come out for Sophie. But when to do it? How to get her alone? Or do I even need to get her alone? Why not just march into the schoolroom now, let the hammer do its work, then walk out again before anyone has realised why the children are screaming?

  No. No, that is not right. The children. Think, then, of the lives that they will lead. The trauma counselling that they will need. The memories that they will repress. That will later resurface, and appal them. Lead them to kill. No. I do not want to gift to them my horrors.

  And besides, we need a showdown. I need her to know, before she dies, what she has done. Before I force the hammer into her brain, I need to force Max and myself back in there. Even if she resists, I will push into her thoughts the lives that she shattered. Push, push, push, until just when she thinks her head is about to split – it will.

  So alone it is. I must wait here, until she comes out. Perhaps move away from the window, lest I scare her. Then, when she emerges, I will follow her home. To the home that must hold Max’s piano, and more remnants of my past. Although that is not the main mission. Just a perk, if I can attain it. The ending of Sophie is the main prize. So should she choose to remain in the school, I will get her there, when everyone else has gone, when she doesn’t expect me. I look at my phone. 3pm. Can’t be more than about thirty minutes until the end of the school day. Good. My wait will not be long.

  Chapter Five

  -Ellie-

  So she calls the ambulance. She relents, and she calls, on Will’s office phone. She puts my mobile in her bag, where I can’t get at it. And finally, they are there, with their gas and air. The paramedics, from the hospital, the hospital I am already in. For a moment, we are almost a normal domestic scene – the daughter-in-law soothed and shushed by a doting grandmother-to-be, surrounded by a caring ambulance crew.

  “Don’t worry, love,” they are telling me. “You’re in one of the top units in London.” And “Of all the places this could happen, this is the best. The birth centre is well-used to complications. You’re in safe hands.”

  Their assurances as I – 1, 2, 3, breathe in – are welcome. But they assume that what they can see is all that’s going on. They assume that as they wheel me along, down, up, to their consultants, doctors, midwives, that all they are dealing with is the little thing of a premature birth. In Paris, I want to tell them, there is a premature death happening right now. Two deaths, three deaths, four deaths, more, if we count all who will be affected. I want to tell them: give me a phone. Because I’ve still got to tell Will. He needs me. I need him. Leo needs both of us. Maybe they can give me a phone. Gillian still has mine. I would be happy, it pressed into my hands, Will’s voice next to my ear, my voice in his. Then I could manage this.

  But all they are interested in is pressing speculums, swabs, steroids into me. Telling me the amniotic sac has broken. I know, I know, I know these things. Is it not my body, my baby? They tell me the contractions should get slower now, but – there – I can feel them. Still fast. And little Leo, his heart rate is as speeding as mine. Beat, beat, beat we go. Will, leave Sophie! Come to us, not in a prison van, but in a bedazzlement of flowers and concern and awe!

  They are telling me that if the contractions slow, they can monitor me for infection, for bleeding, keep me here, send me home, whichever I prefer. Gillian is hovering, feigning concern. But she does not understand what I need to do.

  “Send her away,” I tell whichever person it is that is standing over me. “Send her away, I don’t want her here.”

  “Poor thing’s delirious,” says Gillian. “I’d better stay.” And then she talks to me. “You’ll be quite alone, if I go,” she says. “Do you know what it is to bring a baby into the world alone?”

  No, I say in my head. And nor do you! You weren’t here, you weren’t in a hospital with Will. You merely borrowed him, from a friend, for a while. A friend he is trying to kill. Apparently not a very good friend, if she can be sacrificed at the altar of Will-protection.

  “I’d rather be alone than with you,” I say.

  Gillian leans down and whispers in my ear. “Ellie, love. Think. You want someone that you know, for these hours. Or they’ll be dark, lonely hours. All alone, with strangers. When your child arrives, will you know what to do? How to look after him? Keep him alive?”

  I jolt away from her. She is like a wasp, her words buzzing in my ear. I cannot shake them off as easily as I’d like. I’ve heard stories of people being left in wards, alone, and only a persistent relative brings the midwives running. At least Gillian will look out for her adoptive grandson, if not me. Maybe I should keep her here, not send her away? I toss my head from side to side as I try to decide.

  “Try to rest,” a doctor/consultant/midwife tells me. “You’ll need all your energy, later.” In those dark, lonely hours. Perhaps Gillian can stay? “Just focus on the contractions. Are they still close together?”

  I nod because they – ahh – definitely are.

  And then Gillian, she does the unthinkable. She leaves me. She sort of potters off, her bag over her shoulder, leaving me alone. And I feel it then, what she has said. That now I am alone. Alone with people who take only a professional interest in me, not personal. Alone, and about to become a mother two months early. I’ve only had one antenatal class. I am not ready.

  “Gillian?” I ask h
er retreating form.

  She turns round to face me. And I see from her face that she wants me to feel this. This fear, this abandonment.

  “I’m just going for some water,” she says. “I won’t be long. I know you need me.”

  She is gone. And she has my phone. I’m alone and I’m no closer to Will. But there may still be a chance, while Gillian is away.

  “Doctor,” I say to a man.

  “I’m a midwife,” he says.

  “Midwife,” I say. “I need you to phone my husband. I’ll give you his number. I need you to say exactly this: ‘It wasn’t her who did it, it was you. Who ended Max. In a tantrum. But now, I’m giving birth, early. You must come home.’”

  “Right, you’re giving birth, he must come home. Except, you know, the doctors haven’t decided if you should give birth yet, we might try to delay – ”

  “But the first part of the message, as well, the first part. ‘It wasn’t her who did it, it was you. Who ended Max. In a tantrum.’”

  “Let me get a pen, write that down,” says the midwife.

  “We’re losing time, don’t you see, we’re losing time!” I say.

  “Don’t worry,” hushes the midwife. “You’re the most important person here.”

  But how can he say that? Because I have a role, I have a role for my family. As – ahh – nurturer. For Will, and for Leo. Must be a life preserver, a life giver.

  “Bring me a phone, then,” I say. “Bring me your mobile.”

  He looks me in the eye. I plead into his. He disappears. And I realise, I am alone. The doctors and consultants, they are off somewhere, discussing, looking at swabs, at liquids, at charts. Then he reappears, the midwife, with a phone. I take it from him, and I’m dialling, I’m dialling, I’m dialling Will. Gillian is still nowhere to be seen. I can tell him. Come on, Will, answer. Please.

  Chapter Six

  -Tutti-

  Will

  My phone rings in my pocket. I pull it out. An unknown number. I could answer it, while I wait for Sophie. But look – what’s that? The children are getting up from the non-pianos, starting to leave the room. Sophie is turning out the light, her favourite trick. Now is not the time for unknown callers. I flick the phone to silent and put it in my pocket. It continues to vibrate away. I do my best to ignore it. It will ring out. I must focus on more important things.

  In there, inside, I have lost sight of her now. I move my position, round to the front of the school. There are women and men at the gates. Parents, they must be, waiting for their children to emerge. How many of them are adoptive? Or killers? Or abandoners? None. They announce it just by being here. ‘We are always present when our offspring need us.’ And the offspring, they spring from the gates, into their waiting parents’ arms. So small, some of them – they seem barely three. Only just gone past the stage of being gathered up in woollen blankets.

  I hang back, behind the parents. They are all chatting to each other. Each face will be known. They will be on the lookout for unknowns, if they are as obsessed with paedophiles here as we are at home. I mustn’t cause alarm, or alert. I must just stay here, under this tree, inconspicuous.

  Still the phone vibrates in my pocket. I pull it out. Still the unknown. I put it away. Then I take it out again. And turn it off.

  Ellie

  Answer, Will, answer. Can’t you hear me, your wife, trying to save you? From yourself, from Gillian, from your invented Sophie. None of it is real, not even you, in your present frame of mind. The phone rings and rings and rings. And I can see the midwife looking on in sympathy. Oh well, he is probably thinking, she’ll have to go it alone, but hubby will be sure to find her later, when he notices she’s gone. He doesn’t know what I am dealing with.

  If Will would just pick up… Leo, he is demanding an audience with me, cannot wait. I can feel his excitement, beating away inside me, ever faster. Will, why so slow to – the ringing stops, is this an answer? No. No. It’s a silence. My call has been cut off. He has seen me ringing, from this midwife’s number, and he hasn’t answered. Wherever he is, in Paris, out of my supervision, he has made another of his mistakes. An error of logic. Another nail in another coffin.

  I call back, leave a voice message. It must still be in code, with the midwife just there. But I give it as much meaning as I can. In case he listens. But what if he doesn’t? I must take other steps. I must warn Sophie. While – ah! – I still can. I must call L’école Sainte-Thérèse.

  Sophie

  Somewhere in the school, a phone rings. And rings. Am I the only person here? Will no one else answer it? Am I even here? I don’t think so. I walk towards the sound of the ringing phone. If I answer it, that will be proof, I suppose, that I am here. Because it’s possible I’m my own hallucination – like that Guillaume outside. Maybe I’m not really here, in this school, in this place. In fact, that’s a given. Whatever this place is, I’m not here, I’m not in it. I’m with that image outside. That ghost from the past, come to find me.

  My feet seem to be here, though. Clack, clack, clack they go in their heels along the corridor. There are no other sounds, just my shoes and the phone. Clack, ring ring, clack ring ring, they go on the linoleum. I’m not very interested if I make it in time. It will not be for me. It will be a message to take, to give to someone whose name I probably will not even remember, now.

  My feet stop clacking as I reach the carpeted staff room, from where the phone rings. There, in the corner, overlooking the gates. I go to the phone. I put my hand on the receiver. And then I stop. I cannot lift it. Because there, outside the gates, almost hidden by the tree, is the image again. The Guillaume. The ringing of the phone has stopped, but there’s a ringing in my ears. I hold the chair behind me for support. The phone begins to ring again. It is too loud. I cannot answer it. It feels like the image under the tree calling me. If I pick up the phone, it will be his voice, aged four, screaming at me, screaming as he has just made the hammer-blow that will kill my Max. My Max, my Max, my Max. I cannot be in this room, with its view. I turn away from the image, from the window, from the phone, and I run. I run away from that room as the ring of the phone chases behind me.

  Ellie

  I redial, and I redial, and I redial. But St Thérèse will not help me in my hour of need. There is no other way to get the message through. Unless – unless I can get the number of Sophie’s flat? I phone directory enquiries again, or whatever we’re meant to call it now it’s privatised. They answer. I tell them, between puffs and pants, that I want another French number. The midwife is screwing his face up a bit, probably thinking about the costs. Or worrying, as I admit I am worrying, about the fact I can hardly get the words out. The French people answer and I don’t even bother with a bonjour, I just launch straight in, in English, with the information I need. I wait, and I wait, and wonder how much more I can wait and Leo can wait. And then they tell me – the bastards, even though it’s not their fault – that the address I want is not listed. It is ex-directory. Sophie does not want to be disturbed.

  And that is when I start to weep. Because what is happening is clear: I have bet my Leo’s life against Will’s, and good mother that I am, I am preserving my Leo. As much as I want to tell Will, the fates are against it. Some force that Gillian has allied herself with has decided to intervene and – ah, Leo, please, not yet! – stop me from sacrificing Leo for this cause. But they don’t understand, these fates, how we need Will to stop. Me and my little boy, we need my bigger boy, we need – ah! I need, I need, I think, for Leo, to emerge. But my own phone, if I could just get my own phone, I could find the email, the email from the detective – oh, Christ! – agency, and in it Sophie’s number, but Gillian, she has it, the phone and – oh oh oh OHHHAHHH! And the midwife is running and the doctors are running as I cry out and they say what I think what I feel what I know:

  “He will not wait. It’s happening now!”

  I couldn’t stop it, I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I’m sorry. Will, Leo, Sophie, I’m sorr
y.

  “Your little boy knows what he wants, Mrs Spears. There’s no delaying it any further. He wants to meet you, now.”

  Will

  And there, on the steps, is what I’ve been waiting for. A slight pause, a looking around, as the sunlight greets. But then it’s down the steps, pushing through the gate and out into the open. There she is. Standing but a few steps away. My mother.

  But then, of course, she is walking past. Walking on, away from me. Leaving me, again. This time though, it will not work. Because I am following. And I will catch her up. And then, alone, I will kill her. Because there is nothing that can stop me.

  Chapter Seven

  -Sophie-

  I had hoped that out here, in the air, the image would go. That the light and the oxygen would clear my mind. And at first, it seems I am right. It is just me again, in the world. No spectre sons hiding in my mind’s eye. No killers’ faces on the horizon. My feet feel like mine again as I walk on the tarmac. Nobody else is lurking within.