by William Wall
We didn’t walk on the gravel feature because it makes a sound.
The grass was crispy af from frost.
I said, It’s going to be cold up Ballyshane.
I don’t know why but I was suddenly hungry. I could murder for an apple turnover.
Ballyshane actually looks down on my house. Or my house looks up at it – you can see the first floor windows if our bathroom window is open. The bathroom window is frosted glass even though we don’t have any neighbours. In case of peeping toms I suppose. Idk. Someone who would come all the way out here and hide in the gazebo feature to watch us undressing for a shower or peeing. I wish. My mam said she couldn’t do a pee with clear glass. Even though it’s like the universal bathroom not their en suite. So she wouldn’t have to. They decided not to put an en-suite in every room when they built the place even though it enhances the value. I don’t know why. I would like to be able to look out when I’m doing mine, but I can only do it in the summer time when it’s hot and we leave all the windows open. And if my mam walks in she says, Shut that!
Serena had a ten per cent extra cleanser bottle full of petrol. It was plastic and she thought the petrol was dissolving it. It was also rock-hard and blown up like a balloon. I think the petrol got warmed up in my room. It might have exploded which would totally ruin my carpet. I didn’t know she had it. She said it was for me. Like I would want a mini petrol bomb sitting in her little overnight bag with a special inset for makeup and a mirror. Maybe she always travels with a petrol bomb. Serena is quite capable.
It was freezing. Like freeze your boobs off cold. Like frostbite your arse off cold. By the time we got to Ballyshane the cleanser bottle was soft again. A bit squishy even, idk maybe she was right and the petrol was eating it. There was some crazy bird singing somewhere. Maybe a blackbird or something. I wondered if birds got high if they ate something. Like fermented berries and stuff. Or magic mushrooms idk if birds eat mushrooms. History does not record.
All the lights were out.
Which was not surprising, it was four thirty more or less.
We went all around the house. It was totally cool being able to look in all the windows. It was very tidy. There was this one room which was old Corry’s study and it was full of books still. It looked like this Bowles dude bought everything. If he was such a hot-shot writer why didn’t he bring his own? Writers are always doing selfies in rooms full of books, I remember one of the late Seamus Heaney who is on our course and there were books falling off the table and stacks on the floor, like did he even read some of them? He is boring. We did ‘Digging’ in Primary and then we had to do it again when I came to Secondary, like three times because we changed English teachers. If fucking digging was so much fun how come he didn’t become a builder instead of a poet? He could be putting in foundations. And the one about his midterm break. I have a cousin in England she even did that one.
The moon was shining on that side of the house, a big rough piece of bone in a black box. The next window was the kitchen. It was the same higgledy piggledy Formica stuff, like you’d see in old people’s houses. Not built in at all. Like my grandad’s house was all over the place too.
We couldn’t work out how we might attract their attention to the fire until Serena got the idea of setting the alarm off. So that decided us to set the fire outside the drawing room window because we could see a wire and some kind of a sensor on the glass. Like old Miss Corry always called it the drawing room. So we would set the fire, wait until it was blazing and then give the window a thump and run for the trees.
The plan didn’t come together.
First we couldn’t find anything to burn. Serena started to complain that the petrol was leaking through the plastic so we put it down and then we couldn’t find where we put it. It took ten minutes to find it in the dark. Eventually we found the recycling bin and there was cardboard in it. Then we decided to make the fire in the bin. It was a plastic bin so that was good because it would burn too. But Serena knew we needed something a bit heavier. So we went into the trees and tried to break some branches off. They just bent. What kind of trees they were meant to be idk. Luckily we found a couple of bits that fell down sometime. One was heavy enough that two of us had to carry it. We got it into the bin. It was a wheelie bin. All our bins are. So we rolled the whole thing over the lawn to the drawing room window. I checked my phone and it was already well after five. I was starting to get worried that we’d get caught getting back in.
So we got the bin in place with the log sticking up in the cardboard. Serena opened the cleanser bottle and poured it in and I lit the match and dropped it in. But it went out. I threw another one. Same difference. Serena said it’s the cold that’s putting it out.
We have to light it inside the bin.
No fucking way, I said. Like the fumes. Like whoosh. No fucking way.
And she’s like: I’m gonna do it, Suzy, I’m gonna do it, baby.
She took the matchbox and sort of hunched over the bin. I saw the flare of the match. I closed my eyes. I knew I would hear a whoosh and then I’d know that Serena the fucking dinosaur had set fire to herself. But all I heard was Serena saying, Fuck fuck fuck.
The match went out again.
Jesus, this is pathetic, I said.
Serena just looked at me.
I said, We’re going to end up pulling the bin all the way back to where we got it and then we’ll have to put the branch back. And someone’ll come out tomorrow and they’ll get the smell of petrol from the bin. Like fuck’s sake.
Serena struck another match and put her hand right in and it went out on the way down. Her hand was shaking.
Wait, I said. Take out a piece of cardboard, dry stuff with no petrol. We’ll light it outside.
So we fished out a piece of cardboard and huddled it and the third match lit it. And we stayed huddled until it was well burning, then Serena lowered it into the bin. At the last minute she panicked and dropped it, but it stayed lighting in one corner. And then it started to burn and then there was a whoosh and the petrol caught. We got back fast enough. But I could smell burnt hair. We high-fived twice. We were laughing. The petrol was burned out now, but the cardboard was up and some plastic water bottles and bits of twigs were beginning to light. And smoke was starting, black horrible smoke. And the whole circa two hundred acres/circa eighty hectares was going to fill up with our polluted poison smoke. Suddenly I just thought this was a bad idea from the start, how did I ever go along with it?
I backed away but Serena stayed. She was standing sideways to me. Her face was the same as that morning I woke up and she was asleep beside me in her dinosaur onesie. Now I knew the word for it: serene. She was serene and the flames glowed in her eyes. Serena Serene, Serene Serena. It was beautiful. Maybe like something from Clash of the Titans. I took a shot of her standing like that but the flash is off and when I looked at it afterwards all you could see was a red glow from the bin and something like the ghost of Serena on the edge.
Serena, Serena, I whispered. We need to stop.
She looked at me. She was out of it. The fire idk took hold of her or something. She was in an altered state.
We need to go, I said, we’ll get caught getting back. And they might see the fire.
She grinned. Then she turned and ran at the window. She sort of just totally threw herself at it. She actually broke it but it didn’t shatter. A lightning down the middle. I could see it. She was probably expecting double-glazing but it must have been strong glass anyway. Old guys’ houses like this never have double-glazing. And a bell started to ring. Like a totally old bell, like something from a film about an old prison. I shouted to Serena and I ran. When I got to the trees she wasn’t with me. I looked back at the fire but she wasn’t there either. There was a light in the room with the broken window and I could see the old guy and someone else behind, maybe the housekeeper. The bin was melting and losing shape. It was slowly turning into a blob. The smoke was terrible. The wind was blowing in my d
irection and I could feel my throat closing against it. A light was on in an upstairs room.
Fuck you, Serena, I said.
I couldn’t see her.
I ran again. This time I went as far as the road. Then I thought they would have called the guards and the guards would come by the road. FFS. I would have to go home across the fields and the moon was down behind clouds. I decided to take a chance on the road and if a cop car came I would see the headlights in time. I ran all the way home. Serena wasn’t there.
24
My dad freaked. Legit he went purple in the face. I thought he would have another heart attack. The Dog went back to his basket. He just puts his head down when people shout. I was thinking oh fuck oh fuck. My dad is going to die because I did some pyromania with Serena. Like I googled stents and they can fail. And where was Serena? And my dad was saying how dare I leave the house in secret like that, and who was I seeing, and I was trying to say I felt bad and went for a walk to clear my head, and my dad said, What’s that smell? And I said, stupidly, I thought I saw smoke up at Ballyshane, I might be wrong. And suddenly my dad went upstairs and opened the bathroom window. And you couldn’t see anything.
Well, you could see lights.
There’s no fucking fire anyway, my dad said. But all their lights are on.
He closed the blinds again.
I don’t want you sneaking out of the house, miss, my dad said.
No, Dad. It was just this once. Look my boots are filthy from the fields.
He looked at my boots.
Take your boots off and don’t be traipsing it all over the house, will you look at the state of that floor!
OK, Dad, sorry.
And stop shouting or you’ll wake your mother.
Sorry.
Stop saying sorry.
I took my boots off and wrapped them in toilet paper. I should have used kitchen towel. Dad decided to go back to bed. I said, See you, Dad. I went into my room and closed the door and very fast tucked some pillows into the bed to make it look like there was someone in there. Then I undressed and got in. I was thinking, This is so random, where is Serena, what’s going to happen when they find out, I don’t believe this is happening. And what was my dad doing awake at that hour walking around in his old-guy pyjamas?
Then I heard him go downstairs. I heard him go out. I heard the car move off doing its best to stay quiet. My dad making a mysterious getaway in the dark of night. Maybe he couldn’t sleep idk maybe there was a house for sale and he wanted to be first in the queue.
It was half past five when I heard someone throwing things at my window. I knew who it was. Like it wasn’t fucking Catherine Linton née Earnshaw. I sneaked downstairs, and turned off the alarm. She was outside on the step. I made her take her boots off and we got back to my room. As soon as we got inside the door we hugged so bad it was like we were never going to let go. She was shaking and her skin was totally icy cold. I helped her get her clothes off and into her onesie and then we got back into bed. She was shivering like crazy and crying and I tried to calm her down and warm her up at the same time. I had the feeling as I undressed her that she wanted to tell me something. She kept giving me puppy-dog eyes and biting her lip and stuff idk I just thought maybe there was a reveal coming. I just hoped she wasn’t going to declare her undying love for me or something else embarrassing.
But I had time to see the cuts on her thigh. I never knew about that. Little red slashes, some crossed. I didn’t say anything.
25
To everyone’s surprise except me, my brother broke up with his girlfriend. I don’t know why. It cast a gloom over the entire family including The Dog. But Not Me. My dad was eyeing that Audi dealership her father had. And my mam drives Audi. All that Vorsprung durch Technik. Whatever that means. But it’s in German so it must be good right? The German teachers in my school are all Nazis. You hear them screaming because someone forgot part of her uniform. Like her tie. Why do girls have to wear ties anyway? She said to Holly: Rules are rules, and we all agree to the rules so you must obey. Like who agreed? Miss Philpott would send you to the gas chambers for not having a tie or for tucking your skirt up into the waist to make a mini. Mr Leary made a joke once upon a time about Hitler’s speech at Nuremberg, like we did a case study on the Nuremberg Rallies. We were listening to Miss Philpott next door freaking about something. He sort of brushed his hair the way Hitler did and made a moustache with his finger and with the other hand he did the chopping-like gestures that old Adolf was so fond of and said, Ze uniform Nazis vill be holding a rally lader to check if the mädchens are vearing their knickerz. We all giggled, not because it was funny, which nothing Leary does is, but because Leary said knickers. Leary is all right. The next week he showed us a bit of this film about Nuremberg and sure enough they had the same uniform as us. Well, it was black and white. And we have a German girl in my school and she’s really chilled and when she hears Miss Philpott doing her Hitler thing she’s like, What the absolute fuck? Except in a real German accent. I didn’t tell anyone my brother’s girlfriend was allowing hate messages about him on her Facebook page. And my dad got into some kind of trouble idk. I came home from school after a shit day and I heard my mam shouting at him in the bedroom. She was saying, You stupid, stupid man, you thick bastard, Jesus Christ, did you think you’d get away with it? More stuff like that.
So I took The Dog out for a walk. I think he was surprised but he liked it anyway. He wanted to go down Regan’s Glen and he’s the boss. I let him snuffle along the furze clumps and the riverbank. He had fun. He is always hoping for a rat. I was thinking of the time my dad took me for a spin and we ended up at one of the houses he owns in some Avenue or Close or Paddock or Drive called after some godforsaken English village like all of ours are, and there was a woman there with a new baby. I don’t know what we were doing there. She was nice and the baby was adorable, a little fat Tupac, like when he was bald. Not as black though. More brown. The mother was brown too. She had a long neck. Not just a long neck but like a swan, a brown swan. She was beautiful. Her eyes were comforting. When she looked at me I thought she loved me. I always go for the eyes first.
I asked my dad afterwards.
What was that about, Dad?
I wanted you to meet her.
Why?
She’s a nice person.
I thought about that. My dad never brought me to see a nice person before. For all I know all the people he didn’t evict out of our houses might have been nice people. But he brought me to see this one person. True, she was nice. And she had a baby and babies are irresistible. And I couldn’t see any man things around the place. And my dad made her tea like he knew his way around the kitchen. Well, we own the kitchen. Some kind of special tea, Lapsang thingy. And she didn’t even say, I’ll do it, like my mam would. She let him make it. And bring it out. And my dad even cuddled the baby. I have never seen my dad cuddle anybody especially a baby. The closest is I saw him put his arms around a horse’s neck once.
So, I said, what’s the story about the baby?
He shrugged. The father went back to Africa.
Africa is a continent, Dad. What part of Africa?
Nigeria I think.
Dad, Nigerians are real black, like black black. If you mix a brown person with a black person you get a baby who is browny-black. This baby is the other way. Like the baby is only off-white or something.
I was thinking that if I had John Brown’s baby he would have been that colour. A beautiful oily brown like some kind of dress fabric, like satin or something. My mam has a tan satin blouse. It would be like that. It gave me a warm feeling just to think about having John Brown’s baby, but it made me sad too. Because I will never get him back. Even though he wasn’t mine ever. I just liked being near him.
That’s all genetics stuff, he said, you never know what way someone’s skin will go. I’ll tell you something for nothing, Suzy, sometimes two white people get a black baby. And anyway not all Nigerians are that
black. She has Irish citizenship and so has the baby.
Cool.
She was born in Morocco or someplace.
And how old is she now?
My dad looked away. Look at that fucker, he said.
A man was trying to reverse a forklift out of some kind of a factory or warehouse and he backed it straight into a parked car. We drove past. There was no one in the car. The guy in the forklift was scratching his head. I looked back. He made shit of the door and the passenger side mirror. My dad was still saying nothing.
Does she pay her rent, Dad?
He nodded.
Like if she didn’t pay her rent my dad is Conan the Barbarian. No prisoners taken. It’s just his way. No arrears, no deposit back until the cutlery is counted and the bills come in marked paid and the accounts closed. On the other side of it, if someone rings up and says there’s a leak in the roof or the toilet is blocked, he’s on to it. Joe Daly is his man. Joe Daly fixes everything. And Joe has Piotr, a Polish guy and there’s a Latvian what his name is Idk. They do our garden. Mam says they’re butchers but Dad says they keep it clean and tidy. Nothing much grows in it except blackbirds and finches and grass.
So I was thinking about the black lady and watching The Dog snuffling along the river bank. Her name is Sarah. I was just standing there in the middle of this rough field in the shelter of a furze bush when I noticed something in The Dog’s mouth. It was a purse. I took it from him. I had to slap him on the nose to get it. It was a cheap purse and there was money in it and a mascara tube and other stuff and a pack of Durex Tingle Me with Minty Lube for a Tingly Sensation. It was a twelve pack and just for fun I counted them and there were twelve. The twelve apostles. I thought about keeping a few and then I thought what if there’s a body in the furze and this is evidence? It would be evidence tampering. All the programmes are very strong about evidence tampering, like The Wire and idk detective thingies. I dropped the purse. I walked all around the furze clump trying to see in. When I got back to where I dropped the purse it was gone.