by Sarah Dalton
I pause. Maybe she’s right. “If she ends up getting hurt because of me, I’ll always regret not saying something.”
“All right,” Lacey says. “Then I’ll help you. I’ll reveal myself, like we did to Neil in Nettleby.”
“Thank you.” And I thoroughly mean it.
I always have psychology with Willa Maynard on Tuesdays, and she always sits alone. She could be a mute. I’m not sure I’ve ever seen her speak. Even so, I see the way the boys react when she walks in. Her beauty is almost ethereal. She’s an elven goddess in a school full of clones. That is, if elven goddesses are into 90s fashion.
Lacey stays with me until the end of the school day. There’s no dancing or haunting hijinks today. She’s a sombre figure. Her skin pales as the day goes on. Her mood changes her appearance. It’s both fascinating and disturbing to watch the dark bruises appear under her eyes. Sometimes I could swear that I see burn marks appear on her hands and neck, but then I wonder if it’s a trick of the light.
I never tell her about these changes in her appearance. I’m not sure if she’s aware or not. I hate to even think about her death changing her into another person, or even a monster. The thought is so abhorrent that it twists at my stomach and heart.
The rain has set in for the day. I huddle under my umbrella. My Converse are soaked in mud. A few members of the rugby team are passing a ball on the pitch as I wait for Grace.
“She’s not coming,” Lacey says in a gentle voice.
I set my jaw and wait. One of the rugby players falls, sending a muddy spray up into the air. Their laughter is louder than the rain.
It’s not until after they’ve gone that I turn silently away and walk towards the road. I’ve missed the bus. The only thing for it is to walk. My water-clogged trainers squeak with every step, sounding as pathetic as I feel. Droplets of rain fall forlornly from the umbrella onto my cheek. There’s no point avoiding puddles now.
A familiar car pulls up next to me. The window rolls down and Willa Maynard waves from the driver’s side.
“Hey, it’s Mary, right?” she says. “You want a lift?”
I hesitate, looking up at the sky, and then down towards Willa. “Are you going anywhere near Ravenswood?”
“I can be.” She grins at me, forming dimples in both cheeks.
As I let down my umbrella, I turn to Lacey. Her skin is almost grey, and her eyes are dark. She stares at the dimples in Willa’s cheeks.
I climb into the front passenger seat and close the door. Lacey hops into the back.
“Thanks. I was getting soaked.”
“No problem,” she says.
For someone who seems so quiet and withdrawn at school, she’s sociable and easy to talk to now.
“We’re in psychology together, right?”
“Yeah,” she says. “You’re the new girl.”
“Yep,” I say. There must be some sort of despondency in my voice, because Willa offers me a sympathetic smile.
“People love to gossip in Ashforth. I think it’s because it’s such a small town. Just ignore them.”
I laugh without humour. “Trust me, I’m trying to.”
The car smells like lemon and sandalwood. And for the first time, I realise that it smells like her brother. The more alarming thing is, how do I know his smell? “Where’s Jack tonight?” I blurt the words out without thinking. Why do I care where he is?
“Oh, that’s right. You talk to my brother sometimes.”
Heat rises to my face. “I wouldn’t say… Well, we’ve had two conversations, I think.” I try to swallow a hard lump that’s formed in my throat.
“He’s out with some girl,” she says, waving a dismissive hand. “And, weirdly, I was on my way to a date, too.”
“Oh, sorry. I’ve made you late. I hope he doesn’t mind waiting.”
“She,” she replies. “And no, she’ll be cool.”
Willa’s eyes move towards the rearview mirror. My gaze follows, and that’s when I see Lacey, quiet and observant in the back. If Lacey weren’t dead, she’d have a shot with Willa. My heart twists with guilt and sorrow.
“I saw you at Colleen’s party,” I say, trying to fill the silence. “And Jack.”
“Let me guess. He was with some drunk girl,” she says.
“Yeah.”
“You could say that we have the same weakness.”
“Right.” I’m not sure what else to say.
She rolls her eyes. “My brother has issues.” And then says in a more cheerful tone, “You like music?”
“I do.” I don’t know why it is, but everything I say to this easy, confident person sounds stupid.
I expect Nirvana or the Pixies to blast out from her CD player. Instead, it’s Beethoven. Somehow, it seems perfect.
“They didn’t let us listen to music in the commune,” Willa says. “When we got out, Jack and I listened to loads and loads of different stuff. Kath, my adoptive mum, likes classical music so we listened to those CDs for hours, and then 60s stuff like the Beatles and the Rolling Stones. I’ve crammed in the history of music in, like, four years.”
I’m not sure how to react to that. I offer a smile, hoping it’s not too patronising. “Are you into 90s stuff?”
“Yeah,” she says. “I love grunge. They’re so angry, you know?” She squeezes her right hand as she says the word ‘angry’. The Volvo darts forward and she changes gear quickly, revving the engine. “I love the urgency and the raw emotion. We were never allowed to be angry. We had to meditate or pray until it went away.”
“It must have been weird,” I reply.
She shrugs. “It was all I knew. I was born on the commune and didn’t leave ’til I was twelve.”
“Was it hard to get out?” I ask.
She nods. “Cults don’t tend to like people leaving.” She glances at me. “Don’t feel bad. I know it freaks people out when I talk about it and people don’t know what to say. Jack hates me telling people, but the way I see it, if I don’t talk about it, then I’m ignoring a big part of my life, you know?”
“Yeah, I think I do know.” If I have no one to talk to about the ghosts in my life, it’s missing out a huge part of who I am. If I never find a friend, or a boyfriend, I can talk to about this stuff, I’ll be hiding a massive part of my life. I can’t live like that.
“Cheer up,” she says. “Oh, this is a good bit. Listen to how the strings crescendo.”
She turns the music up to a deafening level, and for the rest of the drive, Willa emphatically conducts along with the music. We both end up impersonating instruments. I do a pretty good dun-dun-dun-dun-der alongside the tune. By the time she drops me off at the end of my drive, my sides hurt from laughing so much.
Chapter Nine
Later, as the sky darkens into night, I sit at my desk under the window in my room. Under the scant glow of a single lamp, I let the shadows play across the walls.
My head is filled with Ashforth people: from Grace, to Melanie, to Willa, and even Judith’s ghost. They each have their own story and their own secrets. The school building is crammed high with mysteries. Somewhere amongst all of those hidden secrets is the one that will unlock the reason behind Judith’s suicide.
I log on to Facebook and read through Judith’s memorial page. If I didn’t know better, I would assume that Judith had been a popular girl who was well liked. The comments are filled with heartfelt messages. She is missed. She is remembered. It’s funny how death brings out the phony in all of us. Mere acquaintances become best friends. People we cross the street to avoid are ‘heroes’. As I scroll down the page, I notice a comment mentioning someone else—Natasha MacIntosh. It’s not unusual to tag or mention someone else in a Facebook comment, but this is different. The commenter mentions how sad it was that both Judith and Natasha died that year.
I click into Natasha’s profile. She’s a pretty girl, wearing an outfit I could imagine Grace wearing. Her hair is long and luscious mahogany, her lips are round and red. Her ph
oto album is full of selfies in skimpy clothing, and pictures of her in groups of people, most of whom I recognise from the school. She has her arm around Grace, around Trav, Anil, Terri, Melanie, some of the geekier kids I don’t know. Even some of the teachers. She looks like the girl who has everything.
But she’s dead.
‘You’re a hero, Tash. Sorry you lost your battle with cancer. Heaven gained a new angel.’
‘R.I.P., Tasha. Strongest girl I knew.’
‘Can’t believe we lost you to cancer. Will never forget you.’
After over two weeks at the school, I’ve never even heard her name mentioned. Yet she looks like the most popular girl in school. Is this what happens when you die a natural death? For a brief, shining moment you’re a hero, and then you’re forgotten and everyone moves on?
And why shouldn’t they? If we spent all of our lives mourning every person who comes and goes, we’d never have a chance to live.
My thoughts are interrupted by a chat notification.
Grace: u there?
Me: Hey.
Grace: sry bout before. Got a call from Mum and had 2 go babysit my little sis.
Grace: hugs. :)))
Me: U could have text.
Grace: I no. I’m sry.
She sends me a barrage of emoticons. Hugs, sadface, kitten with a heart on its chest.
Me: It’s ok.
Grace: forgive me?
Me: Go on then.
The emoticons change to balloons, a cartoon dog dancing, and a party hat.
Grace: what did u want 2 talk about?
Me: It doesn’t matter anymore.
Grace: is it about the stuff in the bathroom?
Grace: cos that was fucked up.
Me: Yeah, it was. Do you know what it was?
Grace: dunno, some prank.
Me: There aren’t any speakers in the bathroom. And how would they make the water run red?
Grace: people find a way. air vents. food colouring.
Me: You really think that??
Grace: what else could it be?
I lean back in my chair, my fingers hovering over the keyboard. In my mind, I hear Lacey’s warning.
Me: You’re right. Must be a prank.
Grace: that’s not what you were going to say.
There’s a brief pause.
Grace: tell me.
Me: Seriously, it’s nothing. You’re probably right.
Another pause.
Grace: spill it.
Grace: u think it’s supernatural, don’t u??
Pause.
Grace: u think it’s a ghost.
Me: What other explanation is there?
Grace: that’s mental. do u believe in ghosts?
Me: Do you?
Grace: I asked first.
Me: Ok. Yeh. I do.
Grace: I guess a lot of people do. there’s definitely a proper explanation for the stuff in the bathroom though.
Me: Maybe.
I want to tell her about the face in the mirror, about Lacey and the Things I see. I want to warn her about me, and about how death and destruction follow me. About my procession of darkness, and my family filled with secrets and ghosts. I want to tell her that my mind is as haunted as the school, and that not a single night passes where I don’t think about the horrible things I’ve seen.
Grace: have u ever seen a ghost?
Pause.
I could lie.
Me: Yes.
Pause.
Grace: what was it like?
Me: I’ve seen a few. They’re like a faded TV picture. Like the old analogue ones.
Pause.
Grace: tell me more.
Me: They have a reason for staying. They can’t move on to the otherworld for some reason.
Me: Sometimes they are vengeful. They want to harm others.
Me: Sometimes they are the same as they were before they died.
Pause.
Grace: That’s creepy AF… think I should go…
Me: OK. Hope I didn’t scare you.
Grace: I g2g. c u 2moz.
As soon as I log off the computer I know I’ve said too much. I lean back in my desk chair and wipe a little perspiration from my forehead. I went too far. I revealed too many strange things about myself.
I can’t help but wonder if, come tomorrow, I’ll still have a friend.
There’s a soft knock at my bedroom door. I log off, climb off my seat, and slog over to the door.
“Honey, Emmaline has popped round for tea and cake. Do you want to come down? Dad is watching television.”
I glance at my watch. It’s only 8pm. Somehow, I’d thought it was much later. “Okay.”
When I see Emmaline at the kitchen table, it hits me that I could be her in forty years’ time. Right down to the burns on her face. We’re made of the same stuff. Shadow and death.
I fold my legs onto one of the chairs, sitting in a pose between yoga instructor and sloppy teenager. Mum hands me a steaming cup of tea and pushes a slice of Battenberg towards me.
“How are you getting on at the new school?” Emmaline asks. “What do you think of Ashforth Comp?”
Mum quietly closes the door. She nods to me. I’m now allowed to speak. I’ve been given permission to be myself. The relief makes my shoulders slump. I pull a patch of icing from my cake. A great wave of something works up from my belly and all of a sudden I’m wiping tears from my eyes.
“Come on, now, love.” Mum’s arms wrap around my shoulders.
Emmaline sits with her arms folded across the table. Her lips remain pursed together. Her eyes shine with moisture. She knows.
“The education institution is a dangerous place for those who differ,” she says eventually. She leans forward with those bright eyes. “I should know.”
I clear my throat and wipe my eyes. “I thought I fit in. For a brief moment, I thought I had friends. But I had to say it. I had to tell her I believe in ghosts. I bet she never talks to me again.”
“You don’t know that,” Mum says.
Lacey appears at the table. She sees my wet eyes, and her hand snakes out to touch mine. For one exhilarating moment, her fingers make real contact with mine. Mum gasps.
“Is there someone here?” she asks, her arms tight and tense around my shoulders.
“It’s Lacey, Mum. It’s all right.”
Mum relaxes a little, but she still frowns at the table.
“I would imagine Lacey knows a thing or two about feeling like an outsider,” Emmaline says.
“I do,” Lacey replies. “Even before I died, I knew that feeling. I was a skank. I was a chav. I was a weirdo. But then I found you. And even though I only knew you for a few weeks before I died, I knew we’d be friends forever.”
The tears spring up in my eyes again. “I did too.”
“Mary,” Emmaline says, pulling my attention back to her. “You are a very special girl. Your compassion and strength is infinite. You have two short years at this school. Then you have the rest of your life to find people deserving of your friendship.”
“What if I never find anyone? What if this… this darkness inside me frightens everyone away?”
Mum kisses the top of my head. “There’s no darkness inside you.”
But she’s wrong. She’s so wrong.
*
The next morning, I find myself dressing with trembling hands. I pull out black skirts, black tops, and dismiss them. I want to be light. I want to be bright.
Lacey sits on my bed, giving me thumbs-up and thumbs-down instructions. Eventually, running seriously late, I settle on a yellow summer dress with thick tights and a long cardigan. I splash on a little lip gloss and belt down the drive to catch the bus. Dad hasn’t mentioned the car for a while, but I’ve become accustomed to catching the bus now. I like the rowdiness and the way I can stare at the school building as it comes into view.
“Everything is going to be fine,” Lacey says. “It’s not that big a deal. Loads of people bel
ieve in ghosts. Loads of people think they’ve seen them as well, which is funny, because it’s usually not a ghost. Trust me, I’ve been experimenting. I reveal myself to non-believers and they think it’s a trick of the light or their imagination. The believers see ghosts in everything. A coat hanging on a door, a bit of lint travelling across their eye—”
“Lace,” I whisper.
“Got it. Rambling. Sorry.”
My nerves have infected her. Today she is wired. The grey colour of her skin is now almost pure white. The dark circles have gone, but her lips are cracked, as though she has talked so much they’re splitting.
“After you’ve made up with Grace, we need to find out more about Judith,” Lacey says. “I could try to force her to face us, but we’d need to come to the school when there’s no one around.”
I nod.
“We have to release her. She’s in too much pain to go on like this.” Lacey wrings her hands together as we make our way to the form room.
“I know,” I whisper. I remember the gnawing in my stomach. The sadness. The loneliness. I want to help Judith too. I need to help her. But it’s hard to get anywhere when everyone is holding back a secret.
Mrs. Blake smiles at me as I walk into the room. “What a pretty dress. You’re our ray of sunshine today. Hell knows we need it.” She rolls her eyes towards the grey morning through the window. Low-settling fog hangs around the rugby goal posts.
“That dress would look good on my bedroom floor,” Travis says. He high-fives Rob, and the group starts laughing.
This isn’t the entrance I’d imagined.
“Stop being a pig,” Grace says, pushing Travis off the side of the table he was sitting on. She bursts into giggles when he loses his balance and sprawls out on the floor.
“Fuck’s sake, G,” Travis growls as he climbs back up. But he’s soon punching Anil’s shoulder and laughing.