Snap

by Belinda Bauer

  Jack found his mother.

  He was on the hard shoulder and she was in a field full of cows, speaking on the orange emergency phone.

  She waved at him, and he waved back.

  ‘Why’s the phone in the field?’ said Joy.

  ‘That’s just where they put them,’ he said.

  They stood in the hot sun and watched their mother hang up and start towards them, but as she did the field began to slope, so that she was walking downhill. At first it was OK. At first she just walked faster and faster, but soon the slope was a mountain and she had to run – out of control – her arms held out as if she were on a tightrope, and still the field continued to tip, from a mountain to a wall, and she couldn’t stop.

  ‘Mum!’ shouted Jack and started to run towards her – to catch her – but he was too late. Too slow. And she just lifted off the field and ran through the air with her white maternity dress flapping and folding around her flailing limbs as she fell down, down down down down—

  Jack woke with a grunt. For a moment he lay panting in the darkness, wondering where he was and where she was and if there was still time to catch her …

  Then he tensed.

  The smallest noise.

  There was someone in the house.

  He was out of bed in an instant, moving silently and with practised speed across to the window. It opened easily on to the roof of the garage. That’s why he’d chosen this room.

  He hung from the sill by latex fingertips, and could just feel the tiles beneath his toes. When he let go, he slid, but he let it happen – rolling on to his back, with his bag clutched to his chest, so that he could dig his heels into the guttering.

  A new house like this, it would hold.

  It did.

  He turned. He swung. He hung. He dropped. Softly as a cat, on to the back patio, next to the bike he’d found in the hallway. It was a blue Eddy Merckx. Worth a hundred quid of anybody’s money.

  Jack hitched his bag on to his shoulders. He stood in the shadow of the house, waiting.

  Low voices. Car doors closing gently so as not to wake the neighbours.

  They were supposed to be in Cumbria.

  Maybe it had rained.

  He waited until he heard the front door close and then got on the bike and rode away, past the sleepy Lego houses, down the hill to the old town.

  The bike was fast and light and it felt like flying.

  A hundred quid. Or he’d bloody keep it!

  The sky was turning pink. A light was already on in the Busy Bee and, as he flashed past, Jack could see Mr Dolan on the phone behind the sloping bank of chocolates.

  Jack was fifty yards from home when he saw Joy.

  She was in a dirty pink nightdress, barefoot, and with her lank hair hanging in her face. She was bent almost double with the effort of dragging two fat quires of newspapers along the pavement, with a sound like the roar of a waterfall in the silence of dawn.

  SCCCCRRRRRRRAAAAAAAPE.

  SCCCCRRRRRRRAAAAAAAPE.

  Jack dropped the bike alongside her. ‘What are you doing?’ he hissed.

  Joy didn’t look at him and didn’t stop dragging.

  SCCCCRRRRRRRAAAAAAAPE.

  ‘Shit!’ he said, and grabbed one of the stacks. She shoved him aside and he shoved her back and took it from her, and lifted it off the ground and carried it awkwardly the twenty yards to the front door and slung it inside.

  He came back for the second one.

  Joy straightened up. Watched him take it.

  ‘Get inside,’ he said.

  She did.

  He slammed the door behind them. ‘What the fuck are you doing? What if somebody caught you? What if the police come? They’ll take us away!’

  Merry came halfway down the stairs in her knickers. ‘What’s happening?’ she said, but they didn’t look at her.

  Instead Joy glared at Jack, panting – her pale eyes barely visible behind her wild hair. She bent to drag a bundle of papers into the front room and Jack stamped on it. The hard plastic tape bit into her fingers as it was wrenched away.

  ‘Ow!’ Joy stared into her cupped hand in shock, then lunged at Jack, smearing blood on his face.

  He recoiled and slapped her away.

  ‘Yaaaaa!’ she shouted, flapping her arms as if he were a crow on the hard shoulder. ‘Yaaaaa!’

  ‘Don’t!’ cried Merry. ‘Don’t fight!’

  ‘You’re crazy!’ Jack yelled at Joy. ‘Fucking crazy!’

  Joy flapped her arms one more time, then turned and ran into the front room. She dropped to her belly and kicked frantically through the tunnel in the newspaper wall, like a mermaid in a dirty pink nightdress.

  Jack stood in the silence, shaken by the madness.

  There was a knock at the door.

  They both turned to look. Through the little glass porthole they could see the top of a grey head.

  Jack got awkwardly to his feet and hauled the stacks of papers out of the hallway and into the front room with two loud thuds.

  The person knocked again.

  They weren’t going away. Jack looked at Merry and put his finger to his lips.

  She nodded. He opened the door.

  ‘Is everything all right?’ said the new nosy neighbour in a dressing gown.

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘I heard shouting.’

  ‘Yes,’ said Jack. ‘That was me. I’m sorry.’

  The old woman’s eyes darted past him, seeking an explanation.

  Over her shoulder, Jack saw the bicycle, still lying where he’d dropped it in the street.

  ‘I fell off my bike.’

  He edged past her to pick it up.

  ‘Oh.’ She stepped aside to let him wheel it in inside. ‘Are you all right?’

  ‘Yes thank you,’ said Jack. ‘I’m fine. Sorry to have disturbed you.’

  He half closed the door, but the old woman kept talking.

  ‘Is your father home?’

  ‘Actually he’s working.’

  She put her hands on her hips as if she didn’t believe that for a minute.

  ‘I’ve moved in next door, you know. Mrs Reynolds.’

  ‘Yes,’ said Jack. ‘Hello.’

  ‘Hello,’ she said, just when he needed her to say Goodbye.

  There was a long silence.

  ‘Hello, Mrs Reynolds,’ called Merry from the stairs.

  ‘Hello,’ she said.

  ‘I’m Jack,’ said Jack. ‘And this is Merry.’

  ‘We’ve met,’ said Mrs Reynolds.

  There was more silence.

  ‘Mrs Reynolds’ lawnmower is broken,’ said Merry suddenly. ‘Maybe you can fix it?’

  ‘Yes,’ said Jack. ‘I’ll come round and have a look, if you like.’

  Mrs Reynolds frowned as if this was not good news. But she was left with no response to make other than, ‘Thank you.’

  ‘OK, bye then,’ said Merry cheerfully.

  ‘Bye then,’ said Jack.

  ‘Goodbye,’ said Mrs Reynolds reluctantly, and Jack closed the door and leaned his forehead against it.

  Shit.

  Later that day he walked back up to the Busy Bee and reinstated the newspaper deliveries, much to the delight of Mr Dolan.

  In a box on a low shelf were fake plastic vampire teeth, tipped with blood. Jack picked out a set for Merry.

  He reached into his pocket, but Mr Dolan gave a magnanimous flap of his hand.

  ‘The teeth are on the house.’

  ‘There’s something going on next door,’ said Mrs Reynolds.

  She stood at the back window with a dinner plate in each hand, like the Scales of Justice.

  ‘Hmm?’ said Reynolds, noncommittally.

  His mother was an inveterate curtain-twitcher. At the last house, she’d been convinced that the neighbours were growing pot and had made him climb over a wall and peer through a shed window, all because the husband had a ponytail.

  And sharp hearing.

  He’d come
outside, and Reynolds had had to pretend his mother’s non-existent cat had got lost in their garden, and then didn’t know what colour the cat was when Ponytail Man had wanted to help with the search.

  He still got flustered thinking about it, and didn’t want any repeat.

  So he tried not to be drawn into her nosy-parker paranoia by pretending he hadn’t heard her.

  Instead, he wondered what Rice was doing this weekend.

  Glen and Michelle had gone to the Reading Festival.

  Reynolds had baulked at even the virtual idea, but Rice had been twice before, and said he’d love it if he ever really tried it.

  ‘As much as the Big Mac?’ he’d asked sarcastically, and she’d just rolled her eyes as if he was her dad, being square.

  In reality, Rice had gone to the movies with Eric, and Reynolds was spending the weekend with his mother. They’d had breaded hake with peas, oven chips and a lemon wedge. She’d been eating the same thing for supper since 1992.

  ‘Did you hear me?’ she said sharply. ‘I’m telling you, there’s something going on!’

  ‘Sorry,’ he said. ‘What?’

  ‘Something funny,’ she replied. ‘There’s a boy and a small girl. The girl told me her father works away and her brother and sister look after her, but I’ve never seen a father or a sister, and she said her brother’s twenty but the only boy I’ve seen looks all of twelve.’

  He joined her at the window, but it was getting too dark to see the garden next door, let alone the ages of any children that might be in it.

  ‘Well,’ said Reynolds, ‘do they seem neglected?’

  ‘They’re very thin.’

  ‘Well, there are too many fat children now,’ said Reynolds, taking the plates from her and putting them in the dishwasher.

  ‘I had to go round at six the other morning!’ said his mother. ‘I was woken by the shouting and yelling. The boy said he’d fallen off his bicycle, but it was more than that. And the little one runs wild. Digging in the dirt and mowing the lawn at all hours. And she talks about nothing but vampires and killing old people!’

  Reynolds said nothing. Just let that minor bit of melodrama hang in the air – and then blow away on the wind.

  Sometimes that was enough.

  ‘What’s for pudding?’ he asked after a minute.

  ‘Apple tart. Just warming it through.’

  ‘Mmmm. Lovely,’ he said, and let her get on with it, while he wandered into the other room, where the computer was. He’d bought it for her so she could email her sister in Australia, but he noticed the last message sent was the one he’d sent when he’d shown her how it all worked.

  ‘I don’t see what’s wrong with a letter,’ she had sniffed. And when he’d told her that email could deliver her message to Australia virtually immediately, she’d frowned and said, ‘How annoying.’

  Rice had sent him the photos she’d taken. Her standing in front of the B&O stereo. Him arranging photos on the mantelpiece. That one of them, bound together by green velvet, with her arm around his legs …

  She was smiling happily, and the flash had brought out her freckles.

  At the time Reynolds had been so conscious of her touching him that he’d only blushed and teetered, but in the photo it all looked very natural. As if Elizabeth Rice was happy to have her arm around his legs – and he was happy to have it there.

  They looked as if they were just goofing around.

  They looked like people in love.

  Reynolds hoped Rice hadn’t shown it to Eric. She’d said he wouldn’t mind about their arrangement in the capture house, but Reynolds had seen Eric and thought he looked like the kind of man who might mind very much indeed. Eric wore grey tracksuit bottoms and a Gold’s Gym T-shirt with the sleeves cut off in the middle of winter. As if even short sleeves were too namby-pamby for him. He was no taller than Reynolds, but he was so muscular that his head/neck combo formed a dome on his shoulders – of the kind that might contain a stuffed Victorian pheasant, rather than a brain.

  Reynolds didn’t want any trouble. Especially over someone like Elizabeth Rice. She didn’t hang up the wet bathmat. She left the TV on when she wasn’t watching it – wasn’t even in the same room! She didn’t put a clip on the Frosties to keep them fresh – just crumpled the plastic down into the box and hoped for the best. She dropped a knife in the sink with butter and Marmite on it and considered it ‘washing up’. She left the top off the shampoo. His shampoo. And his toothpaste – which she used as if it were her own. And Reynolds couldn’t even hide it, because there was nobody else in the house, so she’d know it was him – and that would make him look petty.

  And she’d complained about hair blocking the shower drain.

  Reynolds had stood his ground on that one. It wasn’t his. His hair had always been firmly anchored to his head, thank you very much!

  Rice had backed down with a tiny little smile that made him want to slap her.

  Reynolds had known living together would be difficult. But it had been much harder than that, and he was relieved that the ‘establishing the house’ period was at an end. They’d be back and forth, of course, until they caught Goldilocks or gave up trying, but the week-long relentless twenty-four-seven-living-with-Rice time was over, and Reynolds felt as if he’d weathered such a storm that he was grateful for the safe haven of breaded hake and a lemon wedge with his mother.

  ‘Cream or ice cream?’ she called.

  ‘Cream, please,’ Reynolds called back.

  ‘Oh I forgot to tell you,’ she went on, ‘the lawnmower won’t start. Could you have a look at it?’

  ‘When I get a minute!’ he shouted.

  He did ponder showing his mother the photo of Rice with her arm around his legs. She took his celibacy very personally, and it would get her off his back for a good long while if she thought he was actually living with somebody. With shift-work it would be simple for her not to meet his supposed girlfriend for months, and by the time she got insistent, he could easily have broken up with Rice. Reynolds was not a naturally deceitful person, but he was heartily sick of his mother getting all misty over babies on TV ads, and going on and on about his chunky cousin, Judith, who plopped them out like a sea turtle laying eggs.

  It wasn’t that Reynolds didn’t like women – or want a woman – just that he always thought he could do better than any of the women he actually knew. And if he could do better at some point in the future, what was the point of doing anything at all with what was available to him now?

  He wasn’t an animal!

  With a sigh of regret, he decided showing his mother the photo of Rice would only open a can of worms.

  But he did save it.

  He’d save the others too, of course. Maybe he’d create his own personal record of the progress of the Goldilocks investigation. It might be useful at some point in the future. Some clever reference system he could do for each investigation he was on. Or a feature for the Tiverton Gazette once it was all over.

  But for now, he’d just save that one …

  His phone rang in his pocket and he flinched guiltily.

  It was Marvel.

  ‘Where the hell are you?’ he shouted. ‘There’s someone in the house!’

  The house belonged to Glen and Michelle Lee, who had gone to Reading Festival and wouldn’t be back until Sunday.

  Jack knocked on the front door. Nobody answered, of course.

  He walked boldly down the side of the house and into the back garden.

  The guttering was brilliant, as expected.

  Shawn hadn’t mentioned a cat, but they’d left the bathroom window open …

  Stretch, hang, wriggle, and he was in.

  There were a lot of toiletries to avoid on the sill.

  He went downstairs, his footfall so soft that even he couldn’t hear it, and unlocked the back door in case he needed a quick getaway. Louis’s voice in his head: Make sure you can get out before you get into it.

  Then he went into the
front room.

  The first thing he did was close the ugly green curtains. It was easier said than done because they had been hung so badly. They didn’t meet in the middle, but Jack wasn’t too bothered. He turned on the light anyway. At the front of a house it was less suspicious than a torch beam in a dark room. Anyone who knew Glen and Michelle were away would assume someone was there to feed the cat or pick up the post, if they cared enough to assume anything at all.

  He looked around the room and was disappointed.

  The place was sparsely furnished – as if Glen and Michelle had only just moved in. Sure they had the big TV and the B&O stereo, but he wasn’t about to carry either of those out of the house in his backpack.

  There was a camera on the coffee table, though. A Canon Ixus. Forty quid’s worth, and easy to carry. He put it in his bag and moved on.

  On the bookshelf were photos of Glen and Michelle. Two separate photos. Glen had pale, knobbly knees, and looked like the kind of man who’d rather stick pins in his eyes than go to a music festival. Michelle was at a beach bar, wearing an orange bikini and drinking a lot of drinks that required the shelter of a small umbrella.

  She was out of Glen’s league – but Jack thought that was good. Maybe he bought her expensive jewellery to make up for it.

  If he did, Jack would find it.

  He ran his eye along the spines of the books: Pushkin, Camus, Dawkins.

  No vampires.

  There was a watch. Jack shook it and held it up to his ear but it wasn’t working. He’d take it anyway. Bulova was a good make. He put it on. If he was stopped, a camera in his bag was logical, but a watch should be on his wrist.

  He turned to go upstairs, hoping for better. At the very least there would be a bed for him that wasn’t covered in papers and musty with mouse shit.

  He was almost out of the room when he halted – his gut telling him that something wasn’t right. Jack backed carefully into the room again and turned a slow, puzzled circle, seeking the source of his disquiet.

  And then he stopped dead, and his heart thudded.

  On the mantelpiece was a photo frame. And in the frame was a photo of two children …

  And a fucking beach ball.

  And before his brain even processed why or how, Jack’s gut told him to run.