The first room we entered was apparently an old nursery. It had been nicely dressed by the crew. There was some discarded luggage in one corner, a heap of old fashioned lampshades, a single wooden rocking chair and, just under the window, a single small child’s shoe.
Like a hound scenting a fox, Trevor went straight for the shoe. He lifted it tenderly and as the camera focused on him I swear it looked like he was trying to squeeze out a tear. ‘Oh, Dawn, what do you think happened to this poor little one?’ The rocking chair creaked loudly and the shoe tumbled from his hand. His mouth was wide with shock. ‘What the hell was that?’ he squeaked an octave higher than his previously well-modulated tones.
‘Just me trying out the rocking chair,’ I said. I thought the cameraman was going to drop the camera, he was trying so hard not to laugh.
Trevor was not pleased. We carried on into a scullery. I remarked on the unusual layout of the rooms and played an impromptu tune on a washboard and some buckets. Off camera Trevor was giving me looks that said clearly he wanted to kill me. I, on the other hand, was beginning to enjoy myself.
Of course, the director couldn’t let me carry on like this. I was midway through checking under a mattress for lost pennies in a musty old bedroom when Dexter Davies and Melanie Love swept through the door.
‘Dawn, darling,’ said Melanie drawing me to one side. ‘It really is all right to let it all out now. We know why you came on the show. We understand you need closure. It’s been almost two years, hasn’t it? Your sister wrote to us about how very concerned she was. I believe she’s outside. Would you like us to bring her in?’
‘No,’ I yelped, doubtless earning Tracey’s undying hatred. Melanie’s camera swung between us.
‘It’s just that we feel, Dexter and I, that you’re not embracing this experience.’ She put a hand gently on my arm. It was heavy with gothic silver rings. ‘I can promise you, Dawn, that once the other side has touched your life it changes you. It changes everything. I truly believe you can have an experience here tonight that will change you forever.’
I bit back my first response, which was to say ‘bullshit’. Dexter joined us. His back to the camera, he conveyed silently how extremely pissed off he was with me. His voice, smooth and quite at odds with his furious expression, intoned, ‘Indeed, my dear Dawn. We are here to help you. And also Trevor.’ He gestured to my would-be date, ‘Trevor wants to get to know you, Dawn. You should tell him your story. Allow him in. I’m sure he’d understand your reaction if only he knew the truth.’
Trevor looked up hopefully at the thought we might be being singled out for some serious airtime.
‘I can’t,’ I said. My voice came out wobblier than I wanted. The camera loomed into my face.
‘You poor girl,’ said Melanie.
‘She needs peace, Melanie,’ said Dexter. ‘She needs a respite.’
Melanie nodded frantically, and frowned heavily in sympathy.
‘Dawn. Trevor. It’s time for some tough love,’ announced Dexter. ‘I’m going to lock the two of you in this room for half an hour. By the time we open the door I hope you will have found the courage, Dawn, to let Trevor in. To let him understand your heartbreak.’
We were both being put on the metaphorical naughty step. I bristled. There was no way I was going to play the weeping girl to their camera. But it seemed this was not yet what Dexter had in mind. I had underestimated him. After Melanie and their cameramen, he ushered ours out too. I heard the sound of the key grating in the lock and we were left alone.
‘What the hell do you think you’re doing?’ shouted Trevor. ‘This is my one shot. My chance to get my foot in the door and you’re buggering it all up.’
‘Don’t you think they like my quirky take?’ I suggested nervously. Alone with Trevor I became aware he was a large lad. I didn’t think he would hit me, but there was an awful lot of rugby-loving Trevor to be cross with me.
‘Are you hanging out to tell your tragic story and get all the airtime? Because I can tell you now, I don’t give a flying f –’
‘Have you noticed how draughty it is in here?’ I said.
‘What?’ shouted Trevor.
‘There’s a really strong draught coming from the wall.’
‘Are you nuts? Wait … do you think we’re in the room with the hidden chamber?’
‘Hidden cameras?’ I suggested. Trevor began at once to adjust his hair. ‘Do you really think they’d just shut down a quarter of the programme because they didn’t like the way I was behaving?’
‘Of course,’ said Trevor. ‘We’ve been chosen. I knew it.’
We both inspected the wall. ‘It’s not going to be that hard,’ I said. ‘They want us to find it.’
‘Shhh,’ said Trevor.
We pulled and pushed and fiddled with everything we could find in the room, from the bedknobs to the old fireplace, and finally the wall slid open. Trevor bounded through like a puppy following a stick. I followed a little more cautiously. I didn’t like the idea of hidden cameras.
The corridor in front of us was dark and dusty, but candlelight flickered in the distance. It was so a set up. Trevor held out his hand to me and sighing inwardly I took it. Maybe if I behaved they would let me out early.
We crept towards the candle. Was it me or was it getting further away? They were really having a laugh.
Then my heel caught in the flagstones. I staggered sideways, the side of the passage moved, and I fell into darkness.
I landed on a heap of dirt. Real dirt. Dirt that hadn’t been disturbed for a very long time. A shadowy head appeared in the doorway. ‘Dawn? Dawn? Are you OK?’
‘I’m fine. A bit dusty. Keep talking. I can barely see my hand in front of my face.’
‘Quick, Dawn! It’s closing.’
‘Don’t be a prat, Trevor.’
‘I’m serious!’
There was a grinding noise.
Complete darkness dropped around me like a heavy blanket. I panicked. Of course I scrambled to my knees pushing at the wall and screaming. All thoughts of dignity or that I was somehow still on air forgotten. The wall remained solid, rough and unmoving under my desperate hands. Very quickly my hands felt wet and I realised my skin was scraping off against the stone, but to no avail. I tucked each hand under the opposite arm and tried to squeeze the pain away, or at least stop the bleeding. I caught sight of a tiny bead of light on my chest. The mic. ‘Can you hear me? Can you hear?’ I screamed. ‘I’m shut in. I’m …’ but even as I spoke the tiny light faded and went out. My mic was dead.
I leant against the now too solid wall and tried to calm my breathing. Hot tears were running down my face. Trevor will tell them where I am. Or would he? He didn’t like me very much. Think of the airtime he’d get if he lost me? But that wouldn’t be an excuse to leave me here to die, would it?
People don’t die on TV shows. Except they do sometimes. On the ones that never get aired or are suddenly cancelled.
I took a deep shuddering breath. This must be part of the show. Melanie Love had singled me out for this because I’d refused to open up to her at the start. Somewhere in here would be one of those heat-sensing cameras. Everyone in the garden watching the big screen would be laughing their heads off at how scared I was.
Hot tears were running down my cheeks. I brushed them away with my dirty hands. ‘You bastards,’ I shouted, ‘You rotten bastards. You think terrifying a bereaved girl out of her wits makes good TV? I hope the devil comes and personally rips you all a new arsehole.’
I continued in this vein for some time, dragging up language and obscene metaphors that shocked even me. I had never been so angry. I don’t know how long I raged for, but eventually my voice became thin and my throat raw. I was pretty sure that it’d be foul enough that even if this was ever broadcast it would need the soundtrack to be one long beep to block out my words.
So then I waited.
No one came.
It got colder and still no one came. Could I have it
all wrong? Could Trevor and I have actually stumbled on a secret room? Was the story of Jayne Withby more than a bit of Dexter’s nonsense?
Was I in the same place where she died?
My heart began to thunder in my chest. Then I started thinking about how much oxygen was in this space. How big was it? Was it airtight? And my heart was racing so hard I thought I would have a heart attack.
Could I die of fright?
C’mon, I told myself. I tried to imagine a comforting voice talking to me. Drumming some sense in. Bizarrely, it sounded like my first primary school teacher. C’mon, even if you are trapped it’s not the 1800s now. We have heat sensing equipment, ways to knock through walls, find survivors. No one is going to leave you in here. And maybe this is still part of the show.
There was only one way I could think of to be sure. I reckoned if I collapsed and anyone was watching they’d have to open up the room. After all I might have had a heart attack.
It had to be realistic, but I tried to remember how to fall from my drama lessons at school. The trick was to collapse in sections on your side: knees, hips, back, shoulder and don’t let your head slap suddenly on the floor.
It was a pretty good fall for an amateur. I lay on the floor and waited. Time passes oddly when sight is removed. And when you’re afraid. So very slowly in my head I counted to a thousand. This took more effort of will than enduring those terrible lessons on Wednesday when the entire morning was devoted to physics. Why was I thinking so much about school?
Of course, Andrew had been training to be a teacher. He’d decided that working in the corporate world wasn’t for him and he’d gone into retraining. He’d just finished his first teaching placement and had been over the moon about the choice he’d made. I pushed the memories away.
I counted to two thousand.
No one came.
No one was coming. This wasn’t part of the show. We really had found the hidden room. The room Jayne had never left. Somewhere, back in the darkness, lay her remains. Bones or dust? I didn’t want to find out. I sat up and shuffled back against what I hoped was the wall that opened. Icy prickles were running up and down my spine. I found myself straining into the darkness, trying to see. Surely, she’d be nothing but dust by now? I rubbed my hands together, down my dress. Maybe I already had some of her on me.
I thought about Mum and Tracey. There was no way they would leave the set without me. Tracey was probably already nagging the director that they couldn’t see me on the screen anymore.
More time passed. I don’t know how long. I leant against the wall and faced the darkness. How far did it go? I can’t say precisely when but somehow at some point I became aware I was not alone. Out ahead in the darkness there was something else.
My throat went dry. Whatever it was I knew this wasn’t something I wanted to engage with in any way. The darkness seemed to be turning more solid. The temperature dropped again. I strained my ears for the sound of breathing. The lack of sound echoed back at me. I’d read a poem once about how complete silence is loud. For the first time I understood.
I could feel tears beginning to course down my face again. I didn’t understand. Why was I crying? Then it dawned on me that what I was experiencing was terror. True, abstract terror, that tears at your throat, your lungs. It makes you sob and shake. Your heart goes into freefall. But somewhere inside you sit watching yourself disintegrate, utterly unable to stop the tremors or the screaming. I no longer had any control over myself. It was coming for me. Whatever was out there was coming.
When it reached me I would die. I knew this as certainly as I knew my name. This was the end.
‘Where the hell are you, Andrew?’ The words rang out as if someone else had said them, but it had been my voice. Andrew. Andrew, who had said he’d always be there for me. Who had been crossing the road outside his school when a driver lost control of his car, when a child was crossing, when Andrew thoughtlessly pushed the child away and was struck himself. And died. Died, saving someone’s little boy. Where was he when I needed saving?
He was gone. Just gone. One morning we were having breakfast together. He was dashing out the door, dangling his briefcase by that loose strap he kept saying he’d fixed. Then that evening I was sitting alone, after the police had left, knowing that there was nothing left in this universe that mattered to me.
Only now, when it was almost over was I discovering that I did want to live. Even if it was without Andrew I wasn’t yet ready for death.
It was closer now. It was creeping, toying with me. Whatever was in here with me was no heartbroken young woman. This was something evil, Something old. Something only the primeval part of me properly recognised – and that part of me was terrified. It was a visceral, all-consuming fear. This thing in the darkness: had it been what Jayne had been running from? Had it been what trapped her? Whatever it was it had been made out of fear and hatred, and now it thrived on both. It wanted me to be afraid. Deathly afraid, and I was. I knew my death was coming and it would not be either quick or easy. Certainly nothing like the sudden obliteration Andrew had found in front of that car.
But had it been sudden? What had gone through Andrew’s mind when that car bore down on him. Suddenly I knew with upmost certainty that he had been thinking of me. Of course he had. How could I ever have doubted him. He’d save that little boy knowing that it would cost us our life together, but could I honestly continue to blame him for doing so. Would I even have had the courage to do that same? With what I believed to me my final thoughts I sent out my love and forgiveness to Andrew. I hadn’t deserved him. Suddenly it was as if a barrier had been broken. I remembered not only how much I had loved Andrew, but how much he had loved me. I remembered being cherished and held, and I knew that love was more powerful than death. Wherever we go and whatever we do the love of those who have departed remains with us if we allow it to do so.
It was almost on me now. There was no more time. But strangely I was no longer afraid. Even if this thing did its very worst, even if I died, I had been loved in life and I had loved, and at this moment I knew that was all that mattered in the universe.
I heard a roar and the world went white.
‘Are you OK?’
Our cameraman, was looming over me. My eyes stung with the light. I put out a hand to push myself up from the floor. That hurt a lot. The man helped me sit.
‘Jesus, your hands,’ he said looking at my blooded palms.
‘I was very frightened.’ It was only four words, but it took a while to get them out.
‘I should bloody think you were.’
‘How did you find me?’ I asked.
‘It was the strangest thing. Suddenly I just knew where you were and I had to come get you. I turned off my camera. I’ve never done that on a job, not ever. If I believed in any of this nonsense I’d say something or someone was guiding me.’
‘You turned your camera off?’ I said in alarm. ‘Won’t you get fired?’
‘This is my last job for Spooky Date anyway. I’m moving to Countryfile next.’
‘Oh right,’ I said. There was an awkward pause. I was safe. There was no sign of any more ghosts. We were both sitting side by side in the dirt. I probably bore more than a passing resemblance to Worzel Gummidge. The cameraman broke the silence.
‘Look, I know now isn’t really the time, but when this is all over, I don’t suppose you’d like to get a coffee would you? You know, meet up again.’
It took me a while to frame my response.
‘Sorry, stupid idea. I imagine you can’t wait to put this all behind you.’
‘No,’ I said. ‘No, not all of it. I’d really like to have coffee with you.’ And I meant it. For the first time since Andy died I was seriously considering that it might be time to move on. ‘Dawn,’ I said holding out my hand.
‘Oh good grief. You don’t even know my name. Guy. Guy Andrews.’
I shook his hand. ‘It’s up to you,’ I said seriously, ‘to make sure I take someth
ing positive away from his whole experience. The spirits have obviously brought us together for a reason.’
‘Um – er,’ said Guy.
‘Decent coffee,’ I said with a grin.
Guy’s face relaxed. ‘That I think I can manage.’
Lots of things happened after the show. Being live, just about all of it made public viewing. There was the normal few seconds’ lag so the producers could ensure that swear words didn’t go out. They could swap between the cameras – although this became more difficult when Guy abandoned his to rescue me. But overall a huge farce went out on live TV.
The consequences of this were that Mum and Tracey didn’t talk to me for a week, which was kind of relaxing. Trevor got a part in an advert for shampoo. He wrote to me thanking me for the break and asking me to dinner. I declined. Most surprising of all, the ratings for Spooky Date went through the roof. Dexter got a national tour and he and Melanie Love were signed for another three series. Who can predict reality TV? It seems the audience like it better when it goes wrong.
The downside to this was that Mum and Tracey thought I was brilliant again, and when I was invited back for a special to find out what lay behind the evil in the manor house they were relentless in ‘encouraging’ me. The TV company offered me a lot of money. I told them were they could shove it. So then Mum and Tracey stopped talking to me again … but only for two weeks. I love them both dearly, but I did enjoy the respite.
Guy and I are now on our sixth date. We’re taking things slow, but it’s going well. I had one dream about Andrew where we were saying goodbye at my old school gates. In the dream he was off on a gap year adventure. There were lots of tears and hugs, but there was also acknowledgement of an unbreakable bond between us that had nothing to do with sex and everything to do with love. I woke up the next morning with tears streaming down my face, but a sense of completion.
Mum and Tracey are nagging Guy and me to get engaged. If we ever do I’m going to elope. One thing you can be assured of: if I do, it will be to the newest, least interesting, and most un-ghostly hotel I can find …
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