She tries to call for her mummy, but her mouth is covered with some kind of sticky tape. Over and over again she tries to yell the single word that should bring comfort and reassurance. It has always worked in the past. When she has fallen and hurt herself, or when she has been frightened, one of her parents has always responded to her bleating.
But not this time. Nobody comes to soothe away her distress.
And as each minute passes, she realises she is moving further and further away from her family. She has no idea how long she has been unconscious. She could be anywhere by now. She might never see her parents again.
And what will happen at the end of her journey? Who has taken her, and what do they want to do with her?
The unanswered questions multiply her anxiety beyond measure. She is cold and she is shaking and she feels she is turning inside out with her crying. She prays for this nightmare to end.
And then the van comes to a halt with a squeak of the wheels. She hears the ratcheting of a handbrake being applied. The engine dies. A door opens and closes. There are footsteps moving away from the vehicle.
The seconds pass. Poppy begins to wonder if she has been abandoned. Left here in this freezing cold van to die.
But then more footsteps, coming towards her now. The handle on the rear door of the van is operated. The door swings open, and the dim light of the stars and the moon and the street lamps floods into her tiny prison.
She twists her head to look out of the van. Sees that a figure is looking back at her. A woman. Not her mother. Much older than her mother. But kindly. At least, that’s the impression she gets. The woman has the countenance of someone seeing her baby for the first time. A look of . . . love.
Poppy wants to beg her to help. If the tape were removed from her mouth, she would do her best pleading. She would promise the woman anything in return for being taken back home. She would pledge not to do anything bad for the rest of her life, if only she could be delivered safely into the arms of her parents.
The woman smiles. It’s a warm smile, a comforting smile. She reaches out a hand and strokes Poppy’s hair. The gentle caress is the first signal of reassurance Poppy has received, and she tries to hold on to that feeling.
‘So pretty,’ the woman whispers. ‘So beautiful. I’m so happy.’
Poppy wonders why the woman is happy. Is she like the wolf in the Red Riding Hood story? Is she about to gobble up the meal she has been brought?
But the woman seems far too nice for that. She reminds Poppy of her friend’s guinea pig. Small and skittish, with tiny bright eyes and bulging cheeks. Her hand slides across Poppy’s hair, down her forehead, over her eyes.
‘Hush now,’ she says. ‘You don’t need to be afraid. You’re safe here. We’ll look after you.’
Her palm is soft and warm. It blocks out all the light now, and Poppy suddenly feels incredibly tired. She starts to believe that perhaps these people don’t intend to hurt her after all. Whatever their purpose is, it is not to cause harm.
And then she feels the sharp prick of pain in her arm, and all her fears surface again for a few brief seconds before being sucked under with her drowning consciousness.
5
Maria hates the dark, cold mornings. When the alarm goes off, it always seems too early to get up. She could easily manage another hour in bed. She turns over, closes her eyes, feels the beckoning of her recent dreams.
The bed bounces as Craig clambers out of it. Without warning he turns on his bedside lamp. She moans.
Craig slaps her on the curve of her hip. ‘Move it, soldier. Don’t you know there’s a war on?’
‘With respect, Colonel,’ she says, ‘you can kiss my arse.’
Craig laughs heartily. He sounds far too bright and breezy. It seems unfair to her that he seems so refreshed while she could willingly curl up in a ball and go into hibernation for a month or two.
Perhaps it’s a sign of age, she thinks. In a couple of days she will be thirty. Thirty! That’s ancient. Another complete decade will have been put behind her. That’s hardly something to celebrate.
She moans again, but somehow manages to summon up the energy to drag herself out of bed. There’s so much to do, and in so little time. It’s all right for Craig, she thinks. He only needs to jump in the shower for two minutes, throw on the clothes I’ve ironed for him, swallow down a bowl of cereal, and head out. I, on the other hand, have to get two females ready – myself and Poppy – and that takes a lot more time.
She pushes her feet into some fluffy slippers. Shuffles across the room and takes her dressing gown from the back of a chair. She hears the shower hiss into life.
Stifling a yawn, she drags herself out onto the chilly landing. Despite the central heating, this house never seems warm enough in the winter.
Her first surprise is a relatively mild one.
Poppy’s door is wide open. She never leaves it open so much. Never fully closes it either. She likes it ajar just an inch or two.
Curious, Maria heads towards Poppy’s room. It’s still dark in there, the curtains drawn. Maria enters and turns on the light at the wall. She fully expects a groan of complaint, but none comes.
‘Poppy, darling, it’s time t—’
And then Maria sees the bed.
The empty bed. The bed with its duvet on the floor and its undersheet all rumpled. The bed with no Poppy in it.
There’s a smell here, too. An unfamiliar smell. Like something you might notice in a hospital.
And there is Huggles the teddy bear, lying on the floor in the unnatural pose of an accident victim, its dark eyes turned on Maria as if condemning her for not turning up sooner.
Maria returns to the landing. ‘Poppy!’ she calls.
No answer. Only Craig’s tuneless singing in the bathroom.
Perhaps the spare bedroom. Perhaps Poppy had a bad night and needed a change of scenery to help her sleep.
She flings open the door of the third bedroom. Its contents are undisturbed. Nobody slept here last night.
Back on the landing. Heading down the stairs now. ‘Poppy! Poppy!’
The shower goes off. Craig shouts, ‘Are you calling me?’
She ignores him. Picks up the pace as she reaches the bottom of the stairs with still no response from her daughter. ‘POPPY!’
Into the living room. Maybe she’s sleeping on the sofa. She’s done that before when ill.
But then why didn’t she call me? If she’s sick, why wouldn’t she come and get me?
Not in the living room either.
‘POPPY!’
The kitchen now. But why would she be in the kitchen and not be answering my calls?
Maria sees immediately that there’s nobody here. Where is she? Where could she possibly be hiding? Why isn’t she answering?
Through the kitchen. Into the conservatory with its empty wicker chairs and its unoccupied two-seater sofa and . . .
Its open door.
And now Maria’s heart is in her mouth. This scene is so, so wrong. That door is kept locked at night. The key is always taken out of the lock and placed on top of a high cupboard. Poppy couldn’t reach that key. She couldn’t have opened the door. What the fuck is going on here?
She’s through the door then. Out into the murky morning. The bare trees look skeletal and menacing. Even the birds don’t seem inclined to sing.
‘Poppy! Poppy!’
The only answer is from a neighbour’s dog. Maria turns and looks back at the house. Have I missed something? she wonders. Am I overreacting, or is this as bad as it seems? Is this the start of the nightmare it appears to be?
She sees it then. The hole in the door where the lock should be.
‘Oh, God! Oh, God!’
She knows. Someone has entered the house. Someone has broken in and they have . . . they have . . .
She goes around the side of the house. Sees that the wooden gate – the gate that always has its bolt drawn at night – is yawning w
ide open.
‘POPPY!’
Her calls are screams now – frantic, panic-stricken yells. Give me a word, she thinks. A single word, or even a cry of pain. Anything will do. Anything that will tell me you are still here with me.
If she’s here, I can fix her. But if she isn’t . . .
Maria passes through the front garden. Out into the street. She is crying now. She clutches at her hair, not knowing what to do. You can’t prepare for this. You can’t be ready to deal with a situation in which your child—
She’s been taken.
She has. That’s what’s happened here. My beautiful Poppy has been taken.
A voice from behind her. Craig, running up the driveway. She doesn’t know what he’s saying. Doesn’t acknowledge the stares of neighbours as they appear on their doorsteps, summoned by her desperate calls. All that is irrelevant now. Only one person matters.
And she has gone.
6
The girl called Daisy comes awake when she hears the bolts being drawn back on her bedroom door. She sits up, rubs the sleep from her eyes.
They switch the light on as they come in. Harriet first, beaming with excitement. Behind her is Malcolm. There is a child in his arms.
The child looks dead. A sleeping child would waken with all the jostling, but this one is like a rag doll. Her limbs droop and swing. Her eyes are closed but her mouth is wide open. It’s hard to tell if she’s breathing.
Daisy wonders if she looked like that herself when she was first brought here. Sometimes she wishes she’d never woken up from that deep unknowing.
‘Hello, Daisy,’ says Harriet. ‘Look what we’ve got. We told you, didn’t we? We always keep our promises.’
Malcolm stoops a little, affording Daisy a better look at the child. She seems so fragile, so lacking in substance.
‘Is she asleep?’ Daisy asks.
‘Yes,’ says Harriet. ‘A very special kind of sleep. She’ll wake up soon, though. We thought you might like to keep an eye on her for us. You can let us know when she wakes up. Would that be all right with you?’
Daisy feels uncertain about this. She has never looked after another child before, especially one who appears as close to death as this. But she knows better than to be negative.
‘Okay,’ she says.
‘Let me put her on your bed,’ says Malcolm.
Daisy gets off the bed, stands at the foot of it while she watches the girl being placed gently onto the mattress, her head on the pillow.
Harriet moves in front of her husband and bends to give the new arrival a gentle kiss on the forehead. ‘See you soon, Poppy,’ she says.
The two adults turn to face Daisy. ‘We’re trusting you to look after your new sister,’ says Harriet. ‘You will do that, won’t you?’
Daisy nods. ‘Yes.’
‘Tell us as soon as she’s awake, okay?’
Another nod.
‘All right, then.’ They back out of the room, their eyes very much on Poppy. Harriet gives a little wave towards the bed before she closes the door.
And then the bolts are slid into place once more, and the children are alone.
Daisy stays where she is for a full minute, just staring at the still form of the six-year-old. She looks tiny, but then Daisy probably wasn’t much bigger when she was brought here.
She takes a step forward, then another. A sister, she thinks. She looks a bit like me, too. This is probably like looking at a photograph of myself from three years ago.
The thought pricks at her eyes. Three years without her parents, without family, without friends. She has not seen a single beam of sunlight in all that time.
She holds up her arm, looks at how pale her flesh is. Then she leans forward and lays it alongside Poppy’s. The difference is staggering. She feels like a ghost in comparison.
There are marks on the girl’s wrists: pink indentations where rope has dug into them. Daisy is pierced with another sharp memory of her own marks when she was similarly bound.
Her hand brushes against Poppy’s flesh. She recoils at how cold it feels.
Daisy climbs back onto the bed. She pulls the duvet over both of them, then snuggles into Poppy.
‘Please don’t die,’ she whispers. ‘Please don’t die.’
7
A long, shuddering intake of breath. Then a groan that turns into a cry of bewilderment and fear.
Daisy tries to keep Poppy close, to comfort her, but the child pulls away and sits up. She scans the unfamiliar room, then stares at her bedfellow.
‘Who are you?’ she demands.
‘My name’s Daisy,’ she says. She doesn’t know how else to answer. It doesn’t sit right with her to say that she’s her new sister. She doesn’t feel they know each other well enough.
‘Where’s my mummy?’
‘I . . . I don’t know. I don’t know where you came from.’
‘I want my mummy.’
‘I know, but . . . I’ll look after you, I promise. I’ll take care of you.’
She reaches out for a hug, but Poppy puts on an expression of disgust at the invitation. ‘I don’t want you. I don’t like you. I want to go home.’
She slides off the bed. ‘Mummy!’ she yells. ‘Mummy!’
Daisy goes after her, grabs her by the arms. ‘Hush, Poppy,’ she says. ‘Don’t shout. They don’t like it when you shout.’
But Poppy doesn’t heed the advice. ‘Mummy! Daddy! Where are you?’
She yanks herself from Daisy’s grasp. Heads straight for the door. Turns the handle to no avail.
‘Let me out! I don’t want to be here. I want to go home.’
Daisy feels her own tension mounting. She thought it would be easier than this. Thought that Poppy might be willing to listen to her older and wiser roommate. But it seems that Poppy is headstrong. She has an independence that could attract danger.
‘Poppy, please. You need to keep quiet. There are rules here. We have to obey the rules.’
‘I want to go home!’
She starts kicking the door with her bare feet. Daisy’s heart jolts with each bang. She races across, encircles Poppy with her arms and drags her away. Poppy responds with more kicks, this time into Daisy’s shins. She begins running around the room, a whirlwind of devastation. She knocks chairs over, pushes all of Daisy’s schoolwork onto the floor, drags books from the shelves, pulls the roof from a Lego house.
‘Poppy! No! Please.’
And then Daisy hears them. The footsteps coming up the stairs. She turns towards the door, and then back to Poppy, and she realises how clearly her fear is written on her face. She sees how easily Poppy reads it, how abruptly she abandons her trail of destruction.
The bolts are drawn back. The door opens. Harriet and Malcolm enter in solemn, disconcerting silence. Their collective glare alights on Daisy first, and the force of it pushes her back into the corner of the room.
‘I thought you were going to let us know when she was awake,’ says Malcolm. His voice is calm, quiet, but Daisy is experienced enough to detect the undercurrent of threat.
She looks across to the button on the wall that she can press to summon her keepers.
‘I . . . I was going to. I’m sorry. Poppy was . . . she was really upset. I was trying to help her.’
All heads turn to look at Poppy. There is defiance in her eyes. Her chest heaves with her fury and the effort of her exertions.
‘Is that right, Poppy?’ asks Malcolm. ‘You were upset? Why is that?’
‘Go away,’ says Poppy. ‘I don’t want you. I want my mummy and daddy. I want to go home.’
Malcolm finds a smile for her. ‘Don’t be like that. It’s nice here. You’ll like it once you get used to it.’
Poppy looks to her right, sees three dolls sitting in a row on top of a bookshelf. She sweeps them onto the floor.
‘It’s shitty here. Shitty, shitty, shitty.’
Daisy sees how each expletive hits Harriet with th
e force of a punch. Harriet can’t abide swearing.
Harriet turns to her husband. ‘Daddy, I hope you’re not going to let our daughter talk to us like that.’
‘I’m not your daughter,’ says Poppy. ‘And I’ll say what I like. You stole me. I’m going to tell my dad, and he’s going to punch you.’
Harriet keeps staring at Malcolm, urging him to exert his authority. ‘Well?’ she says.
Daisy senses the agitation building in both of the adults. Malcolm is bunching and unclenching his fists now. The veins have begun to bulge in his forearms and on his temples. Soon he will snap.
He takes a single step towards Poppy. She takes a step backwards, maintaining the distance between them.
‘Go away,’ she says.
Malcolm raises a warning finger. ‘Poppy, you need to start behaving yourself. You should be grateful to us. We brought you here to look after you.’
‘Fuck off!’ she yells.
Harriet brings her hands to her ears, which only encourages Poppy to escalate her cursing.
‘Fuck off, fuck off, fuck off. You fucking bitch. You fucking bastard.’
‘Stop her, Daddy!’ says Harriet. ‘Stop her!’
‘Yes,’ says Malcolm distractedly. ‘Yes.’
Backed against a wall, Poppy begins screaming as loud as she can. Malcolm glances to his right, and it seems to Daisy as though there is a glint of fear in his eyes. She knows that soundproofing has been fastened to the walls of this room, but perhaps it is not perfect. Perhaps the banshee scream of a young child could still penetrate through to the neighbours or the outside world.
‘Come here, please, Poppy.’
But then Poppy takes off again. She heads for the door, but Harriet blocks the way out. She runs back to the centre of the room, attempts to duck under Malcolm’s outstretched arms . . .
And is caught.
Malcolm snatches her by the wrist and whips her towards him. She begins to scream again, but Malcolm clamps his other hand over her face. She writhes in his powerful grasp, her cries muffled.
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