by Rosie Walker
‘But Sir! I didn’t do anything!’ Thomas climbs back onto his chair, glaring at Maggie.
Maggie sucks in her bottom lip and chews on it, her cheeks turning red. She sits up straight in her chair and stares at her hands on the desk, fingers laced together like she’s been as good as gold.
‘Go and stand outside in the corridor,’ he says, and Maggie pushes her chair back and sighs like Mr Ketteridge is the one behaving badly.
‘But Sir—’ starts Thomas.
‘Maggie, outside. Thomas, you stay where you are.’
Thomas closes his mouth and stares hard at the top of his desk, where he carved his initials a few weeks ago.
‘This is your fault,’ Maggie whispers as she brushes past Thomas, and drops a scrunched-up piece of paper into his lap.
Maggie storms out of the classroom and closes the door hard behind her, not a slam to get her in more trouble, but hard enough for Mr Ketteridge to know where he stands with her. Thomas bows his head and unfolds Maggie’s note. ‘Knife lost. Need to go back. Tonight.’
His stomach twists and his skin goes cold and clammy. He really, really doesn’t want to go back to that caravan in the creepy forest, even though he promised. That was before.
‘Thomas?’
He’d rather give Maggie all the pocket money he’s ever saved up in his entire life so she can buy a new knife for her stupid brother. Yep, that’s what he’ll do. He’s got at least £54 in his money box. Maggie can have it.
‘Mr Mitchell!’ Mr Ketteridge is standing in front of Thomas’s desk. Thomas crumples up Maggie’s note and drops it on the floor, nudging it away with the toe of his shoe. He looks up at Mr Ketteridge, whose yellow waistcoat seems to have a tea stain on the chest about the size of a man’s thumb. The tweed suit and waistcoat outfit makes him look a bit like Toad from The Wind in the Willows.
Mr Ketteridge’s eyes flick to the floor and back to Thomas. ‘Am I going to have to send you out into the corridor too?’
Thomas shakes his head. ‘Sorry, Sir.’
‘What’s wrong with you two today?’
‘Nothing, Sir,’ says Thomas, sliding his foot to cover the note under his desk.
‘Hummph.’ Mr Ketteridge rocks forward on his heels and turns back to the whiteboard. He draws a compass on the board but doesn’t fill in the eight points. ‘Copy this and complete the compass points,’ he says to the class, and walks out of the classroom to talk to Maggie.
A few minutes later, the door opens again. Mr Ketteridge steps into the room, holding the door open as Maggie sidles through it. Her cheeks are still a bit pink.
‘Right, everyone. How’d you get on with the compass?’
Maggie climbs into her chair and doesn’t look over at Thomas until they leave the classroom at the end of the lesson and go into the playground for lunchtime.
***
‘I don’t want to go back. Forget the knife.’
‘No,’ says Maggie, panting. She’s jumping over a skipping rope, her voice staccato by her leaps into the air. She’s pretty good at it, and sometimes crosses her arms over and loops the rope or jumps extra high to double-spin the rope under her feet.
‘I can’t believe you left the knife behind. I remembered the binoculars, and they were massive and heavy.’ Thomas folds his arms.
‘We … Have … To … Get … It,’ she expels a word on every jump, which is annoying because Thomas wants this conversation to be over, with a quick and easy decision to abandon the knife. Then they can join the massive game of tig that just started in the main quad.
Maggie stops skipping, the rope slumped at her feet. ‘We made a deal. I kept up my side of the bargain: I told you what I know about your Dad—’
‘Not much, that’s what you know.’
She shrugs. ‘Doesn’t matter, you still agreed.’ She folds her arms and looks at him, thinking. ‘How about a new deal? I’ll do my best to investigate and find out more about where your Dad’s gone.’
Thomas opens his mouth but Maggie holds out her hand, palm up.
‘I’ll ask loads of questions. And I’ll tell you everything I find out. And in return we’re going exploring and back to get the knife.’
‘I told you, we’ll put together our pocket money and buy a new one for Duncan. He’ll never know what happened.’
Maggie shakes her head, flips the rope over her head to the back of her heels, and carries on jumping. ‘It’s … a … special … knife,’ she pants.
‘Special how?’
Her foot tangles in the rope once more and she stops, letting the handles slip from her hands onto the cracked tarmac.
‘Grandpa gave it to him. It’s engraved with a special message.’
Thomas sits down on the ground and puts his head in his hands, pushing his glasses into the bridge of his nose. ‘You can’t be serious.’
‘I am serious.’
‘Fuck,’ says Thomas, for the first time in his life. He has said bad words before, like ‘dick’, but never the F word. It makes him feel more grown up.
Maggie sits down next to him. ‘Yeah.’
‘But you heard it last night, right? The scream? There’s something bad happening there. Someone screamed, really loud.’
Maggie shrugs and examines her palms, picking a piece of grit from her skin. ‘Could have been a fox, or someone playing a game, or anything. Doesn’t have to be something bad. Listen,’ she says, holding out her hands towards the rest of the playground.
Tig has started and kids are screaming as Josie Steadman grabs for them, her long plaits flying behind her as she runs. ‘I can hear people screaming right now. It’s not something bad.’
Thomas feels sick. ‘But last night it sounded like something bad. Something really bad.’
He sinks his head back into his hands and listens to the playful screams, which sound totally different to the piercing shriek they heard in the woods last night.
Maggie shrugs. ‘I’m going back. Tonight. If you don’t come, then I’ll go on my own.’
Thomas speaks through his hands. ‘Fine. We’ll go back.’
Him
The smell hits him as he opens the door.
Damp, mould, and piss.
There’s a scrabbling sound from the darkness as the girl sits up. He pauses, waiting as his eyes adjust to the darkness. Four rooks observe from the branches above the caravan; his only witnesses.
After a moment, he makes out her shape on the floor. ‘Not exactly where I left you, then?’ he whispers.
‘Fuck off,’ she says, her voice tearful and congested. It’s probably hell on the lungs, all the mould spores floating through the air in here.
She’s dislodged the oven from its cavity, dragged it into the centre of the space. She pulls herself into a sitting position, her eyes watching him as she moves. Her pupils glint in the light from the doorway. She’s more alert than he expected at this stage. Good for her. He likes a bit of fight in them.
‘Sleep well?’ he asks.
Her expression changes from watchful to furious, but she doesn’t respond.
‘I bet you’re hungry,’ he says and then pauses.
After a minute, she breaks the silence. ‘You have food?’
‘If you’re well behaved,’ he lies, using a familiar phrase from his own childhood. He hasn’t brought anything.
‘What does “well behaved” mean in this context?’ she asks in a cold voice.
He smiles. ‘Oh, I do like you.’ Usually they’re begging and crying by now. This one’s steely. He appreciates her quiet anger; it’s admirable in a way.
She shifts her position. She’s leaning against the wall, her arms behind her. He moves to the sofa and sits, resting his hands on his knees and looking down on the girl, like a king from his throne looking down on his subject.
‘Your name’s Zoe,’ he says.
She nods.
He laughs, a sharp guffaw that fills the caravan with sound.
She sees his empty hands and her
eyes widen. ‘Don’t you at least have some water?’ she asks, her voice cracking with emotion and self-pity.
‘Now you sound just like the others. I’m disappointed in you.’ He stands and crosses the caravan towards her. He stops when his feet are a few inches from her and reaches down to the back of her head, cupping her frail neck. She flinches and moves her face away, a shudder wracking her body. He takes a handful of her hair, still tender, still slow. Her hair is between his fingers, tendrils caught around his hand. Her breathing is rapid; she’s not used to such a touch.
‘What are you doing?’ she asks, her voice trembling. ‘Get away from me.’
She tries to kick him, but he steps back and she misses. He brings back his fist and plunges it towards her stomach. She recoils, shrinks away from him, but the blow doesn’t come. He stops just at the last moment, hysterical laughter bubbling in his throat.
She looks up at him, confused. He strengthens his grip on her hair, pulling it tight. But not too tight. The threat often has more impact than the act itself; he knows this from experience.
‘Let go of me,’ she shrieks, as if she can request him to stop; as if she has any power over her own destiny. She has none. It’s all in his hands, literally and otherwise. In this moment, her life belongs to him.
He laughs in her face, his spittle spraying her cheeks. He leans down even closer, his forehead pressing against hers, pushing her against the wall.
She digs her fingernails into his forearm, tugging at him, trying to wrench him away. But every time she pulls at him, she causes him to yank out more of her own hair. He lets go, fingers still laced with strands of hair.
She wasn’t ready for the release of tension: her head snaps back and her skull slams into the floor. The noise is louder than he expects, the caravan echoing with the force of the blow to her head. He pauses with gleeful surprise.
She makes a strange noise, a mixture between a shout and a scream. He closes his eyes, relishing the sound of raw desperation.
He hears movement and opens his eyes to see she’s stood up. She must have somehow untied her rope. At the same moment, she lifts her leg, her knee smashing into his balls.
He doubles over with the pain, his eyes screwed shut, breaths fast and short. ‘You little fucker,’ he hisses.
She runs to the door, uttering little sobs. He straightens up and hobbles across the caravan, adrenaline overriding the pain.
She tries the other door, the bedroom door. He freezes, watches to see what will happen. If anything will happen.
She wrenches at the handle, smashes her fists on its surface. The door shakes in its frame, but the door doesn’t budge.
She runs back to the door that leads outside; howling, banging on the wood. She can’t get out. It’s bolted, the lock too stiff for her cold fingers. She turns her head to look at him, still wrenching, pulling and pulling at the immovable bolt lock.
‘Get away from me. Get the fuck away from me you fucking psycho.’
Nothing moves; there’s no way out for her.
He chuckles. He’s won. They both know it.
He grabs her shoulders, tripping her and she sprawls along the floor, face smashing into the lino. He winces at the crunch of her nose.
In the moments before she attempts to stand, to continue her pathetic escape attempt, she drags herself along the floor away from him. Just like Petra’s vole last night.
He stands above her, watches her try to crawl away. Time seems to move slower in moments like this. She must have untied herself overnight, waiting for the moment to reveal she was no longer bound. Clever little thing.
There’s a throb of pain in his testicles, blossoming up into his stomach. A reminder.
Energy surges through his body like petrol through an engine.
He grabs her discarded rope in both fists. His hands are shaking but he’s still in absolute control. A laugh escapes from his lips. He is panting and his heart is pumping. He feels so alive.
She moans, turning her head a little as if she is sleeping. He stands over her, one foot on either side of her torso. He gets down to his knees, straddling her chest. In any other circumstance, for any other person, crouching in this position would seem erotic. And he supposes it is, in a way. It is erotic and fascinating for him in the same way that children enjoy coating their hands with glue and peeling it from their skin; or putting raspberries on their finger ends and slowly plucking them off with their teeth, one by one. Or picking a dried-up scab from a grazed knee.
He pulls her arms behind her back and loops the rope around her wrists, tightly this time, and crosses the ends, pulling it taut into a secure handcuff knot. He can almost feel her wrist bones crumple under the pressure. Almost.
Her eyes fly open and her hands begin to flail, grasping at the rope, at his hands. Her movements are pointless; she is helpless against his strength. Her legs kick out, pawing the ground.
‘I was going to move you somewhere more comfortable,’ he whispers in her ear.
A noise emerges from her throat, a gasp combined with a croak.
‘But I think we’ll leave you here for longer. Let you think about what you’ve done.’
Soon, the hands stop grasping, the arms stop flailing. Her legs stop kicking. She realises that fighting is pointless.
The girl belongs to him. She’s totally, utterly his. He wishes this feeling could last forever.
Helen
The clock says 1pm. Zoe’s been out of contact for around fifteen hours.
Helen returns home to a quiet house. Alfie greets her in the corridor with a wagging tail. In the living room, one of the sofa cushions is warm where he slept away the morning. She looks over at him.
‘Sneaky dog.’
He wags his tail.
‘Where’s Zoe, Alfie?’ she asks, dialling her number and getting sent straight to voicemail again; the phone is still switched off. Helen swallows her panic, replacing it with irritation. Irresponsible. Thoughtless. Selfish. A normal teenager.
She dials the office and Diana answers, giving her usual lengthy intro spiel. ‘Lancaster NHS Property Services, Diana speaking, howmayIhelpyoutoday?’
Helen pats the sofa next to her, inviting Alfie to join her. He leaps up immediately and snuggles into her side, the comforting biscuit smell of his fur filling her nose. ‘Diana, it’s Helen.’
‘Helen! You’ve had a leisurely lunch.’ Her girly giggle resonates through the phone and Helen resists the temptation to hang up. ‘Been anywhere nice? Think you’ll wander back any time this afternoon? I still need you to look at those reports, I hope you haven’t forgotten.’
‘I won’t be coming back in, I’m afraid.’
‘Why ever not? Ooh, Helen, what’s the gossip?’ Diana loves scandal, gossip, and drama. If there’s none, she’ll invent it.
‘Family emergency,’ she says, and realises she’s never used that excuse before in a genuine situation, until now. There were the intense hangovers of her early twenties when she couldn’t rouse herself from bed, and then there were a couple of days after Tony told her he was leaving, and then once more when she had a particularly bad bout of insomnia. But never for a real family emergency like this.
‘Oh, dear.’
Helen can picture Diana looking around the open-plan office, widening her eyes at anyone who’ll meet her gaze, pointing at the phone with her red-tipped fingernails and signalling ‘scandal’ to anyone who’ll pay her attention.
‘Anything you need to share?’
Helen pulls a face. ‘I’m sure it’ll be fine, but I can’t be in the office for the rest of the afternoon. Can you please move any appointments and give my apologies for the staff meeting?’
‘Do you know when you’ll be back? I’ll tell Gary.’
‘No. Sorry. I have to go.’
Disappointment seeps down the line at the lack of gossip fodder. ‘If you need to talk, you know where I am, love.’
‘Ha.’ The small mirthful laugh escapes before she can stop it.
‘Thanks, Diana. I’ll call tomorrow if I’m still off.’
She ends the call and stands up. Alfie leaps onto the carpet, following her with anticipation.
‘Just settle down, Alfie,’ she says as she walks to the telephone table by the front door. They barely use the table or landline phone any more now that they both have mobiles and contact lists. The red plastic phone looks lost, as if it’s a prop in a film that never gets to play its role.
Inside the drawer there are various household odds and ends: loose buttons, biros long run dry, and there: the tattered address book. She hasn’t opened it in years; all of her numbers are stored in her mobile now. But she does recall updating it five or six years ago when Zoe started secondary school, adding the phone numbers of new friends’ parents each time Zoe attended a party or a sleepover.
She flicks through the pages, scanning columns of her own scraggly handwriting, suitable only for shopping lists and signatures. Here and there she comes across an entry in Zoe’s careful pre-teen hand, recorded as she started to add her own friends to be just like Mum.
Eventually Helen finds the number she’s looking for: Abbie’s house. The ringing stops and a male voice asks ‘Hello?’
She feels like a teenager herself when she asks: ‘Is Abbie there please?’
Minutes pass, with silence at the other end of the line except for occasional footsteps and murmurs far away from the phone. As Helen’s about to give up, the receiver crackles and a voice comes on the line.
‘Hello?’ Abbie sounds sleepy, her voice cracking like she needs water.
‘Abbie, it’s Helen. Zoe’s mum.’
Abbie is silent for a moment.
‘Abbie?’
‘What happened?’
‘I was calling to ask you that. Zoe didn’t come home last night.’
‘What? Oh shit.’ Abbie’s voice is slow, her usual enthusiasm dimmed and muted.
Helen frowns. ‘I need you to give me all the information you can.’
‘She didn’t … what?’ There’s a pause on the other end of the line and Helen hears Abbie, her breathing ragged like she’s ill. ‘I’m sorry Helen, I just can’t think today. Last night was crazy.’ The teenager laughs.
