The Last Night

by Cesca Major

  Connie was waiting in the hall, a soft woollen coat buttoned up to her throat, a basket looped over one arm. Adjusting her hat in the hall mirror, she pursed her fuchsia lips. ‘Right then,’ she said in a voice that sounded loud in the narrow space.

  Abigail felt a surge of sisterly love as she stood next to her in the mirror. Their reflections showing two women with rich brown hair and the same hazel eyes but different in so many ways. Abigail had a longer face, a dimple in her cheek when she smiled, darker lashes fringing her eyes. Her sister had more of a snub nose, a neater version of her face.

  Connie smiled at her, her eyes crinkling slightly at the edges. ‘We’ll go down to Lynmouth today, the meat in the butcher’s is better and we need some lamb chops. I haven’t been shopping in Lynmouth in ages and yesterday reminded me how pretty it is.’

  ‘It’s so close,’ remarked Abigail, her eyes rounding in the mirror.

  ‘We tend to stick to Lynton, the two don’t really have a great deal to do with each other, but we are half one, half the other, so I do go down there sometimes. I like the Pavilion, and the sea pool in the summer.’

  ‘A pool?’

  ‘It’s in the harbour; it’s thrilling when it’s sunny. Oh it will be marvellous when it warms up.’

  Abigail felt a slow smile spread across her face as she imagined them both in bathing suits sitting on the side of a pool. She had learnt to swim in the local pool, thrashing about, clinging to the sides. Her mum had always been too scared to go in, but Abigail loved it. She was a fish, her mum had told her.

  ‘Edith, we’re going down to Lynmouth,’ Connie called before linking an arm through Abigail’s. ‘I can’t wait to show you off,’ she trilled.

  The path down to Lynmouth was steep, tree roots breaking through the concrete, bursting out of the earth as if they couldn’t be held down. Abigail walked carefully, with tight little bird-like steps, her hand looking for anything to hold onto, until the ground levelled out and they emerged from stone steps onto the road that disappeard around a corner. The high street snaked away from them up into the trees beyond, running parallel with the East Lyn river, which tumbled over rocks, rushing past them, merging with the West Lyn river further down. The noise of the water could probably be heard in every house in the village.

  ‘Round the corner’s where the pool is, the clifftop railway’s behind us, we’ll go on that of course, and oh, the Rhenish tower, obviously, just up there.’ She pointed to the end of the harbour, to a square stone tower with an open brazier on top. Abigail recognized it from the sepia postcard her mum had kept on the mantelpiece for a year.

  Connie swept along, past a row of cottages on a slope just above the road. ‘In the middle’s The Rising Sun,’ she said through tight lips, pointing to an old pub, whitewashed, an empty bench outside. ‘We’re headed to the butcher’s although I must show you the café on Watersmeet Road, it’s divine. We didn’t really have time to stop when you arrived yesterday, but I’m sure we do today. They do the most delicious rock cakes, so soft on the inside. Edith’s tried, but she can’t seem to get the recipe right.’ She rolled her eyes at that last sentence and Abigail tried to look sympathetic.

  They idled about, Connie picking up trinkets, mouth pressed tight as she held things up to Abigail. She bought her a thin woollen cardigan, rose pink and so soft to the touch. Abigail hadn’t owned anything new for years, she clutched the bag to her chest as they walked. They shared a rock cake and a pot of tea in the café, Connie’s high laugh making the woman behind the counter look up and smile at them both. Connie had told her they were sisters. That sentence had made Abigail feel lighter, that she still belonged somewhere and, as they came back out onto the street, she couldn’t help smiling too at the light bouncing off the river below them, the haze of sea in the distance.

  ‘Oh, I forgot the chops!’ Connie said, clapping a hand to her mouth. ‘What a dolt. I won’t be long, you stay here, I’ll be right back.’

  ‘But I…’

  Her sister didn’t give her a chance to interrupt, twisting quickly on her heel and heading back down the cobbled street, pausing once next to a woman pushing a pram, a brief look inside before she moved away, slower than before.

  Abigail sat on the edge of the harbour wall, tempted to spin round and dangle her legs over the water as if she were ten again. Instead she leant out towards the sea, looking across at the navy line of the horizon, her hair whipping over her cheeks as the wind swept round her in a sudden gust.

  Up ahead a boat was turning into the harbour, men in long waders or string vests and long trousers moving down, carrying buckets to be hauled up over the wall. Buckets that brimmed with fish, their silver bodies catching the sunlight so they might have been full of molten silver.

  The men were tanned from the outdoor work, calling instructions to one another as they moved straight past her. One man stood out, white teeth flashing even from that distance, grinning and shouting something over his shoulder to a wiry man in round spectacles. His shirt was rumpled and loose, his braces crisscrossing over his back where a patch of sweat had spread. Wiping his brow, he took off his cap, his hair flat before he pushed a hand through it, and caught her eye, his face breaking into a grin she couldn’t help but return.

  Her sister appeared then, frowning at Abigail as if she had just witnessed it. ‘They didn’t have any, which means we’ll have to try in Lynton. So irritating, but it can’t be helped.’

  ‘Oh.’ Abigail spun back round, glad her blushes went unnoticed as her sister chided her to come along.

  She moved away from him, the boat. But just at the last moment before they climbed up the path by The Rising Sun, she couldn’t resist, she turned to stare back, and there he was, looking straight at her. She sucked in her breath as he waved one hand in acknowledgement. He was nudged then by the man in spectacles, his head shaking, white teeth flashing and she turned away, following her sister’s calves back up the side of the cliff, still thinking about the boy in braces.

  IRINA

  Irina hadn’t realized she was avoiding it, but as the day wore on she prioritized yet another repair not due for another month. She snatched a look. The bureau seemed to take over one half of the workshop, squeezing her back into an ever smaller space. She was unwilling to move across the workbench, sitting hunched over a stool as she adjusted the small desk lamp and used her jewellery loupe to examine the hallmark on the bottom of a silver salver, scraping out the grime around it in delicate strokes.

  Yet again her eyes were drawn to it, the large bulk in the shadowy corner of the room. It wasn’t a big job, she assured herself, it wasn’t damaged in any serious way and it shouldn’t take long. The email from the client had been clear: it was to be restored and returned to an address in the West Country. She’d have to phone her contact in Brighton who helped her with leathering on desks, but otherwise she’d be removing the top coats of varnish, sanding it down, reapplying a stain, checking the compartments, ensuring the drawers ran smoothly.

  She wondered briefly why he had sent it through; most of the items he sent her needed extensive repair work, a unique part that only she could source. This bureau seemed different from the other items he’d commissioned her to work on. The last had been a mahogany chair missing a slat from the back. He had been impressed before by her ability to conjure up wood that could usually no longer be found. She kept an old stock of wood, and it was a thrill to match it, like fitting the last piece into a jigsaw puzzle. She went back to the salver, aware of the bureau watching her work, in the room with her like a second person.

  The end of the day seemed to trudge round. Irina felt a strong desire to be outside. The air was balmier and the hint of better weather coming seemed to tug at her as she locked up the shop for the evening.

  Changing into her running outfit, a polo shirt and leggings, Irina laced up her muddy trainers and planned the route she woul
d take. It was getting dark later now, the sky at that moment a wonderfully opaque shade, a bluish silver, the thin crescent of a moon suspended above her. Hearing the brief wail of sirens in the distance, she paused, holding her hair in a ponytail. The sound always made her wonder if someone’s life was about to change. She remembered sirens from that day, had momentarily glanced in the direction they’d come from, not a thought for who they were racing to, not realizing they were heading for the house.

  She finished tying up her hair and stepped out into the street. The streetlamps had come on and she decided to stay within the village itself, feeling safer, pounding along, manoeuvring round a couple off for dinner, an elderly man loaded down with shopping bags. The wall of Petworth House rose up above her, blank and impenetrable as she followed it round.

  She imagined then the people living beyond the walls in the house itself, generations before, when they’d needed the wall to keep the people out. She imagined the family, dripping in jewels, bouffant hair, velvet dresses, complicated patterns intricately woven into their surface, at the end of a long, polished-oak dining table. The small, bewigged servants standing underneath enormous gilt-edged portraits in the vast room, hands clasped behind their backs, awaiting instruction. Now the house was open to curious, camera-snapping tourists, teenagers taking selfies in front of sombre-looking ancestors. She visited the house on occasion when she wanted inspiration; some of the pieces in there were spectacular, rooms made up in different periods. They had created Christmas in the 1950s, leaving vintage magazines on top of tattered children’s board games.

  She wiped at her face, a sheen on her top lip as she turned to make her way slowly back. The exercise had cleared her mind as she knew it would, her head now filled with the sounds of her feet slapping the pavement, her even breathing and the gentle hubbub of the high street, windows glowing orange, curtains drawn, shapes and shadows enjoying their evening. She pictured candles burning down to stubs, half-finished bottles of red wine, weary feet on upholstered pouffes, TVs on but being ignored in the corners.

  As she turned the last corner to her apartment she heard a noise that stopped her running. A shout, somewhere up ahead. She squinted in the direction it had come from, trying to make out shapes in the distance. The sun had long since set and a handful of stars could now be glimpsed through moving piles of cloud. The pavement, punctuated by light from lamps or windows, was grey and empty ahead of her. She moved on, the shop a minute away, already picturing the bath she would run when she got in. The noise came again, behind her now so that she stopped, half-spun round, her head snapping behind her. She came to a stop, her breathing faster, loud and insistent in her ears. She stepped forward, the hairs on her arms standing on end. She couldn’t pinpoint what was different about the noise but it seemed so unfamiliar.

  She found herself walking quickly, glancing behind and around herself warily as she headed home, wanting to be inside, to shut the door behind her. Something about the sound. She could make out the shop window up ahead, the silhouettes of the furniture in the glass, the burgundy facade almost black in this light. Her eyes instinctively moved to her flat above, the opaque glass of her bathroom, next to that a square of light, the curtains of her sitting room, and then… She froze, her body rooted to the pavement, the breath catching in her throat.

  Silhouetted in the light of her living room was a figure, the face staring back, straight at her. Hair hanging limply on either side of pale skin, one palm up on the glass. Irina made a noise in her throat, her eyes flicking to check the shop; the windows, they couldn’t be hers, she’d made a mistake, her brain chugged into gear. When she looked back there was nothing there at all, the curtains hanging still, the light on, no woman, no face, no palm. Irina wrapped her arms around herself protectively, her mind already doubting what she’d seen.

  It was the darkness, the sounds behind her, the high street now eerily quiet. She returned, a half-glance, eyes unable to resist: there was nothing but the blank window. And yet she remembered the face, the wide eyes, focused on her, she was sure of it, the hand up on the glass. She reached the door, flinching at the sound of the bell as she pushed through into the shop, stepping carefully in the half-light to the beaded curtain, wavering in front of it, her hands damp as she reached to pull it back.

  She wished she was with someone, that Patricia was in the shop, that it was twelve hours later and the sun was up and customers were bustling about, bringing noise and chatter and the sounds of the till opening and closing, the bell jangling. Not this awful silence, just her own hammering chest as she told herself to stop being stupid.

  As she pushed the beaded curtain aside she felt the temperature drop a fraction, fumbled to find the key to the staircase and the apartment. The air seemed weighted and the sound of her breathing was still in her ears. She could make out the workbench, a couple of the tools on the sink, silvery in the half-light. To her right the bureau, its bulk outlined by a dust sheet. She dropped the key, swearing as she heard it bounce away, losing sight of it.

  Calm down.

  She wasn’t normally in the workshop this late, that must be it, she assured herself, crouching to pick up the key. Creeping forward, brushing the floor with her hands, sawdust in a thin layer coating her palms, there was a wave of smell, a salty tang, sharp, sticking in her nose, reminding her of her last trip to Brighton, being on the beach there. She looked over her shoulder at the workshop, the pieces waiting for the morning. The smell had gone, replaced with the familiar clash of animal glue, resin and polish, which never seemed to fade.

  ‘Stupid.’ She huffed quietly, straightening up to put the key in the lock, then took the stairs two at a time. She didn’t allow herself to think about things, just turned the key in her front door and stepped inside. She swept through each room. Nothing, no one there, her wallet and phone where she’d left them, the plate and glass still on the side table next to the armchair. She checked the whole flat, knowing she wouldn’t relax without having looked.

  She felt her body calm as she finished searching every room, behind doors, only scaring herself once when she caught her own startled expression in her bedroom mirror. She walked slowly back into the living room, moving to turn on the radio. It was only when she crossed the room to the windowsill that she saw the drops of water on the glass and scattered along the frame, as if it had been raining inside.

  ABIGAIL

  Connie had an appointment, she told Abigail in a lowered voice over breakfast, tight-lipped. Larry looked sharply across the table at her as her hand wavered protectively over her stomach. Abigail glanced down, wanting to ask, the expression on her sister’s face closed, the colour draining out of her cheeks; but she felt the words halting within her, aware of Larry’s look.

  She was getting up from the table when Larry put a hand on her arm. Abigail froze, half in and half out of her chair, as he reached across to pluck something from her cardigan, his two fingers brushing her chest. She arched up and away from him, her eyes widening.

  Larry laughed as he dabbed at the crumbs on his lips. ‘Loose thread,’ he said, scraping back his chair.

  Connie busied herself with the marmalade. Abigail found her chest was rising and falling as she stayed standing once he’d left the room.

  Connie left shortly after, adjusting her hat in the mirror, opening her mouth to speak before shutting it quickly and reaching for her coat. Abigail wandered around the house, mindlessly picking up things to examine, planning to wait for her sister to return. She traced her outline on a photograph of them all standing outside St John’s Church in Bristol all those years ago, her mum looking unusually sombre in her wedding suit, mouth a thin line, the black and white photograph dulling her features. She moved away, not wanting to look anymore, reclined theatrically for a moment on the peppermint chaise longue, briefly imagining she was Joan Crawford or Marilyn Monroe, a quick grin into the silence as she thought of Mary there with her, pou
ting and preening as they imagined themselves as Hollywood stars.

  Edith walked in to dust and Abigail strained herself rearing up into a seated position, feeling the heat creep up her neck and into her cheeks as Edith looked at her. Abigail knew she should introduce herself and half-rose to say something, wondering why she was so tongue-tied. Edith was wearing an apron, her hair tied back from her face, strands escaping from the pins. She was a little older than Abigail perhaps.

  ‘I…’

  ‘Miss?’

  Her accent was hard to place. Not English. Scottish perhaps? Or Irish? Perhaps it was this that threw Abigail into a further spin. She got up quickly, feeling that she should be occupied with something. She left to go to her room, mumbling something inaudible as explanation on the way out. She took the stairs two at a time, closing the door to her room behind her, idly folding her clothes from the day before, then sitting at the stool in front of the dressing table and twisting her hair up into a low chignon, pinning it in place. She had an urge to escape. Seizing her coat from the hook on the back of the door, she tripped down the stairs, listening to the sounds of Edith in the kitchen, the mangle being wound down, the soft hum of an unfamiliar song.

  She found herself wandering down the hill back towards Lynmouth. Something calmed in her as she descended, caught glimpses of the sea, the rooftops below. She breathed out. The trees formed a canopy above her, speckling the path with light. There was a strong breeze: a seagull hovered, its wings ruffled by it, and a man on the beach below chased after a loose sheet of newspaper.