Crushed

by Kate Hamer

  ‘Let’s sit,’ I say, and we do, on the cold earth.

  ‘Do you remember us talking about the three of us being buried side by side?’ Her eyes are on my face.

  I don’t but I nod anyway, to humour her, but also because there is a kind of sense in it too. The three of us are locked in such a way that maybe we will lie in our graves side by side, our flesh gradually conjoining because of what binds us. But there is Daniel and there is Sam, and that’s why our flesh cannot meet just yet.

  She speaks quietly of how she longs for it sometimes. When she tells me she has actually bought the two plots next to Orla, a bone-deep dread takes hold of me that almost causes me to gag.

  I breathe my way through it and let her speak.

  And then we lie down and I let my voice join with hers. I roll onto my side and look into her face as she tells me about a tree in her garden, one with seeds so poisonous that eating just one or two is enough to kill you.

  I remember how our minds are magic lanterns and we can see what we want or what we’re most afraid of, even if it doesn’t exist. How things can be pushed in there, just like the weird sisters did with Macbeth. I ask her to describe those seeds and how they feel to the fingers and what they’d look like on the tongue. She tells me in a way that is shot through with longing.

  The sun is high in the sky by the time she leaves. I come back to myself with a start. I’d even forgotten Sam, lying there all this time, probably screaming blue in the face by now, so intent I was. I didn’t let on once or tell her how I know it’s those with other people to protect who fight the hardest to survive. That’s how I’ve done it all these years.

  I see her leaving, her figure getting smaller and smaller as she walks away into the landscape.

  I know how it’ll be and what will happen now when those thoughts start creeping back to her late at night. I know what I’ve just done. She came back for some kind of resolution, for us to finish this together, but I knew I’d have to weave a kind of magic to survive. And after all, she forgot.

  I was a witch once too.

  Acknowledgements

  A heartfelt thanks to my inspired and inspiring editor – the brilliant Louisa Joyner. Also thanks to the very lovely and very talented Alice Lutyens – you are one in a million, Alice. A huge thank you to Faber publicist Sophie Portas for her sheer energy and dedication – you are a total joy to work with. Melissa Pimentel, deep gratitude for your outstanding work in foreign rights at Curtis Brown. To the sales team at Faber & Faber – who traverse the country, combining phenomenally hard work with enthusiasm and good humour – a huge shouted-out thanks!!! Libby Marshall, thank you for your wonderful reading of the manuscript and help with all things practical. Luke Bird, whose cover design captures the book so creatively and boldly – a big thank you. Thanks to Tamsin Shelton for her impeccable and elegant copy editing. Anne Owen for seeing the book safely through to press with such care and professionalism, and to Ruth O’Loughlin who applied the same care and kindness with paperback editions – thank you! To the brilliant proofreader Lisa Morris – I am extremely grateful for your assiduous and creative work. And to all my fellow writers who, when startled out of writing burrows to meet at literary events, are unfailingly generous and great fun to share a stage with. I feel ridiculously lucky to be part of this community – thank you. Also very special thanks to my Mum, who sowed the seeds at a very early age for a lifetime love of books and reading.

  About the Author

  Kate Hamer grew up in the West Country and Wales. She studied art and worked for a number of years in television. In 2011 she won the Rhys Davies short-story prize and her short stories have appeared in various collections. Her debut novel The Girl in the Red Coat was published in 2015. It was shortlisted for the Costa First Novel Prize, the British Book Industry Awards Debut Fiction Book of the Year, the John Creasey (New Blood) Dagger, and the Wales Book of the Year. It was a Sunday Times bestseller and has been translated into eighteen different languages. It was followed by the widely acclaimed The Doll Funeral in 2017. Kate now lives with her husband in Cardiff.

  Also by the Author

  THE GIRL IN THE RED COAT

  THE DOLL FUNERAL

  Copyright

  First published in 2019-02-15

  by Faber & Faber Ltd

  Bloomsbury House

  74–77 Great Russell Street

  London WC1B 3DA

  This ebook edition first published in 2019

  All rights reserved

  © Kate Hamer, 2019

  Cover design by Faber

  Quotation taken from Macbeth: York Notes for AS & A2

  (York Press, 2001); reproduced with permission.

  The right of Kate Hamer to be identified as author of this work has been asserted in accordance with Section 77 of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988

  This ebook is copyright material and must not be copied, reproduced, transferred, distributed, leased, licensed or publicly performed or used in any way except as specifically permitted in writing by the publishers, as allowed under the terms and conditions under which it was purchased or as strictly permitted by applicable copyright law. Any unauthorised distribution or use of this text may be a direct infringement of the author’s and publisher’s rights, and those responsible may be liable in law accordingly

  ISBN 978–0–571–33668–5