by Beth Thomas
By this time my eyes are practically rotating in spirals in my head, and Linda is staring at me oddly. Although, to be fair, I am acting oddly.
‘Are you all right, Grace?’ she asks, then leans forward interestedly to watch my reaction.
I wonder for a tenth of a second whether I should try to give a more appropriate response – weeping, angry, distressed – but then I think better of it. Whatever response I’m giving is the appropriate one, because that is the one I’m giving. I have nothing to hide, I am not guilty of anything. This is just what my dad calls ‘Green Channel Guilt’: the way you always start sweating and glancing around you furtively, while walking like you’ve got five condoms packed with heroin up your bum, the second you set foot in the green channel.
‘No, I’m fine, actually,’ I say eventually, nodding slowly. ‘I suppose I must have accepted the fact that he’d left me of his own accord when we found that his passport was gone.’
‘Ah, I see.’
‘And the fact that there was no curry.’
‘Yes.’
‘There never was any curry. There was never going to be.’
‘No, no, I see what you mean.’ She takes a furtive look at her watch, which I find deeply insulting. I’m a hysterical wife here, on the receiving end of some potentially devastating information, and she’s wondering whether she’s got time for Sub of the Day on her way back.
‘Am I keeping you?’ It’s out before I can stop it.
She looks up, suitably embarrassed. ‘Oh, no, no, I’m so sorry, Grace, that was rude of me. Um, I got a message from you, something about a phone call?’
So I tell her about the call from Leon earlier and she writes it down in her actual notebook, although there’s not really very much to write down. She nods and looks interested, though, which is nice of her.
‘So your name isn’t Grace at all, then, Grace?’
‘No, that was the odd thing about it.’
‘Yes, I see what you mean.’
By the time she finally leaves, it’s well past three o’clock and I’m starting to feel like the entire day is getting away from me. I’m very conscious of the heavy silver key round my neck and the feel of it there reignites my fury and sets my jaw with iron determination; I will get to the bottom of whatever has happened to my husband and my life, no matter what it takes, where I have to go, or what I have to do, in a ruthless and relentless pursuit of the truth. But first I want my mum to tuck me into bed with a hot water bottle. I finish packing my case and drag it down the stairs, then quickly ring Mum from my mobile.
‘Is everything OK, poppet?’ she asks immediately on hearing my voice, and instantly I want to cry.
‘Oh, Mum …’ I start, but my throat aches too much to carry on. Isn’t it funny how you can stop yourself from crying for ages, or even not feel like crying at all, until you talk to your mum? She’s incredibly perceptive, though. All I had to say was, ‘Hi, Mum,’ and she’s got her nose up, sniffing the air.
‘Gracie, are you OK, love?’
‘Not really,’ I say now, my voice catching. ‘I’ll tell you when I get there.’
‘Oh, my love, what’s going on?’
‘I’ll tell you when I see you. All right?’
She tuts and sighs and is clearly not happy about waiting, but I want her to cuddle me as soon as I’ve told her. ‘All right, love. Tell Adam to bring his spirit level, would you? Dad’s got a—’
‘Adam’s not coming,’ I interrupt, ‘it’s just me this time. No, Mum, Mum,’ I have to raise my voice over her as she tries to cut in again, ‘I’ll tell you when I get there.’
There’s a pause while she no doubt reaches a conclusion. When she finally speaks, her tone, if not her words, are very much ‘I knew this would happen.’ ‘Right,’ she says, ‘I’ll make coconut cupcakes.’
SEVEN
I’m actually not a big fan of my mum’s coconut cupcakes. They’re a bit dry and woody for me. I prefer something moist and squidgy that’s going to coat the inside of my mouth with goo while I’m eating it. Mum’s cupcakes tend to leave a fine layer of dust behind. But once, when I was ill with tonsillitis or flu or something, back when I was twelve or thirteen, they were the only things I could stomach. They became my staple for about a week, only because they were bland and dry enough not to make me heave. Over the ensuing years, their performance during that time of illness has gone down in Kelly family history. Their healing power has been exaggerated so much, the cupcakes have taken on the role of a revolutionary new cure to which all known germs have no resistance. The story gets repeated at every family gathering: every barbecue, every wedding, every funeral. ‘Ooh, these cakes are lovely. Bet they can’t save a life, though.’ ‘Shame old Uncle Bill didn’t have one of Judy’s cupcakes, we wouldn’t be here now.’ ‘The wedding cake is coconut, actually. We’re hoping it will make sure we’re not ill on our honeymoon.’
So now Mum thinks they’re the cure for every kind of ill or problem that befalls me. As soon as she catches a glimpse of even the slightest frown, she’s off into the kitchen whipping butter into coconut flakes and caster sugar before you can say ‘cholesterol’. Then thirty minutes later she emerges carrying a plate of confections like a crown on a cushion. Of course, I have to devour three or four, and then immediately declare an improvement in whatever it is that’s ailing me at the time; and she sleeps well that night knowing that her maternal job has been done well and all is right with the world (leaving aside the fact that at that moment saturated fat is silently and stealthily lining her child’s arteries and restricting blood flow).
But, having no car, it’s an ordeal of a journey on the bus with luggage, so by the time I get there after what feels like fourteen changes, all I want to do is retreat to my old room, get under the covers, and talk on the phone to my best friend about boys and homework. There’s the hint of warm coconut in the air, but I don’t have the stamina for it right now.
‘What’s he done?’ Mum asks me as soon as I’m safely over the threshold. I close my eyes. ‘What’s that look for?’ she goes on. ‘Obviously he’s done something, otherwise you wouldn’t be here.’
‘Mum …’
‘All right, all right. Shall I bring you up some soup and cakes?’ she asks as I head for the stairs.
I shake my head. ‘It’s been a ghastly few days, and today has been one of the worst. I’m going to have a lie-down. I’ll talk to you a bit later on.’
‘But—’
‘Later, Mum.’
My room is pretty much exactly as I left it when I moved out – cream walls, white bedding, a shelf of handbags, a shelf of books, that kind of thing. There’s a rogue exercise bike that’s crept in somehow, and a plastic storage box containing what looks like Christmas decorations, but other than that it’s all mine. I haven’t slept here in years, though; certainly not since Adam and I have been together. Right now, I dump my overnight bag on the floor and crawl under the quilt without even getting undressed. It’s probably only about half past five, but I’m not here because I’m tired.
When I wake up some time later, I realise that apparently I was tired. I haven’t slept well since Adam … disappeared? It seems much more accurate to say ‘left’ now. I haven’t slept well since Adam left, so it’s hardly surprising I’m tired. I do feel quite significantly better, though, after that little nap. It’s a bit darker than it was earlier so I must have been out for a couple of hours at least.
As I’m on my way back downstairs, I notice that the house is mysteriously and intensely silent. There’s no television noise, no talking, no sound of someone washing up, no kettle boiling or dishwasher rumbling. The hairs on the back of my neck start to prickle and my heart starts thudding. I head for the kitchen door; that’s where most of the activity should be this time of the evening. At the threshold, I hesitate. There is still no sound or movement coming from behind the door. What am I going to discover on the other side? Has Leon from the phone followed me here and, for reasons s
till unknown, slaughtered my entire family and left their lifeless bodies in a lake of blood by the laundry basket? When I open this door, whatever I see on the other side can’t ever be unseen.
I close my eyes and push it open at last, then stand there a moment, not wanting to look, dreading the sight of the blood in all its various forms – upswing spatters across the expensive chandelier light fitting that Mum bought from Habitat (and Dad always said was pretentious); pools collecting around the breakfast bar and in between the legs of the breakfast stools (‘completely unnecessary: we have a table’); drips and drops running down the door of the Whirlpool dishwasher (‘at that price it’d better prepare the food and put everything away afterwards, too’). I take a deep breath to do what I can to prepare myself for the horror I’m about to witness, raise my hand in readiness to defend myself, and open my eyes.
‘What the fuck are you doing?’ My eyes get instantly wider and scan the picture before me to try to make sense of it. In the kitchen, sitting at the table reading the back of the cornflakes box while he munches, is nothing more than my little brother, Robbie. He’s turned to look up at me with a grin. ‘You look like a proper twat.’
‘Oh, Robbie.’ My relief is intense and I feel a bit dizzy with it. The only spatters and drips anywhere in here appear to be standard gravy. And a small pool of milk next to Robbie’s bowl.
‘Mum says you and Adam have split.’ He shoves in another loud mouthful.
I frown. How was that the conclusion she reached, just because I arrived without him? ‘She doesn’t … That’s not exactly … Rob, what’s going on? Where is everyone?’
‘Probs still in bed, what’d you expect?’
‘Still?’ I frown, then look up at the clock above the sink. Distractedly I notice that the old Mickey Mouse one from Florida has been replaced with a sleek, shiny stainless steel job with no numbers on it. It’s difficult but I can make out that it’s around quarter to seven. I look back at Robbie. ‘Is it morning?’
He rolls his eyes. ‘Well duh. What did you think it was?’
‘Evening, dick head. What other quarter to seven is there?’
‘All right, smart arse.’
At this moment, a small black cat wanders casually into sight from under the table. When it sees me it freezes and stares at me with saucer eyes. I stare back.
‘Rob,’ I whisper, ‘there’s a cat in here.’
He looks round the end of the table. ‘Oh, yeah, that’s Ripper. Hey Ripper.’ He leans forward off his chair and puts his arm out towards the cat, which immediately starts in abject terror and skitters away, zooming past me into the hallway and up the stairs.
‘Who the hell is Ripper?’
Robbie goes back to his cereal. ‘Our cat, numbnuts.’
‘Since when have we had a cat?’
‘Dunno. Ages.’
‘But … you can’t have had it ages. I’d have known.’
He shrugs but says no more.
I move to the table and sit down opposite him, feeling more than a little out of kilter. I’m astounded that I’ve slept for over twelve hours. I’m astounded that my family have got a cat and I didn’t know. As I look around the kitchen I notice other things askew: a new knife block on the side in the shape of a man, with all the knives protruding from his torso; a mug tree I’ve never seen before, festooned with white and purple patterned mugs; this table in front of me is unfamiliar. And now that I look more closely, I notice that the walls themselves have been painted. They used to be yellow; now they’re lilac. I feel like a time traveller coming back to my own time to find everything changed.
But obviously I haven’t just turned up from a trip into the past. Obviously last time I was here, I simply didn’t notice these things. Probably because Adam would have been with me. That’s all. Maybe I’m just weirded out now because of the cumulative lack of sleep finished off by a mammoth thirteen-hour sleeping jag. And who wouldn’t have bizarre thoughts after what’s happened?
It occurs to me, in the light of my strange, bloody imaginings just now, to wonder whether it’s thoughts of Leon that have been keeping me awake at night. I hadn’t believed I was all that bothered by those two odd calls, but it seems that I am. Here, back in the bosom of my family, I feel safe again. I glance across at Robbie, his head low over the cereal box, spoon poised mid-air, a dribble of milk on his chin. ‘It says here,’ he says, not looking up, ‘that when snakes are born with two heads, they fight each other for food.’ He raises his head. ‘How cool is that?’
Yeah, not sure how much use he’d be against a ruthless assassin, but still.
‘Why are you up so early, dog breath?’ I ask him.
He looks at me scathingly with hooded eyes. ‘Because it’s Thursday, slug head. Some of us have to go to work.’
‘Oh, really?’ Robbie’s got a job? I feel left behind again, like things here have progressed and got older and moved on, and I’m stuck in that moment immediately before I left, when Robbie was still at school and there was a Mickey Mouse clock above the sink. I know Robbie’s twenty now, and works … somewhere, but I suppose it hasn’t really sunk in.
‘Yep. I’m a man now, Gee,’ he says, nodding wisely. ‘Got commitments and responsibilities, just like you.’ Then he picks up his cereal bowl and drinks the last of the milk from it.
Gradually over the next half-hour the other members of my family appear in the kitchen, starting with Mum.
‘Oh, there you are,’ she says, as if she’s been looking for me everywhere. ‘How are you feeling, love?’ She uses a tone that says ‘I’m so sorry for you’, and comes over to enfold me in a hug. I’m feeling so much better after such a long sleep, I find I don’t actually want her sympathy any more. Not when I know she’s thinking, ‘It was only ever a matter of time.’
I return the hug, but after a few seconds I give a couple of gentle pats on her back – hug language for ‘enough’. She moves away and looks at me with her head on one side. ‘What happened? Has he found someone else?’
‘No he hasn’t found someone else, Mum, and thanks for the vote of confidence.’
‘Oh …’
‘What happened was, he went out for a take-away on Friday evening, and never came back.’
Mum’s head snaps upright and her face opens out. ‘Friday?’ she says, aghast. ‘He went on Friday, and you’re only just telling us now? It’s Thursday!’
‘Well, you know, it’s been a bit weird, the police have been—’
‘The police?’ She glances around her in panic. I wonder why, then realise she’s probably thinking a team of armed officers on ropes are going to crash in through the windows at any moment and go through all her unpaid parking tickets.
‘Mum, it’s fine, it doesn’t concern you.’
She breathes heavily a moment, then sits down at the table. ‘Well,’ she says, ‘what a shock.’
‘Yes, it was awful.’
She looks at me. ‘Oh, yes, yes, of course, for you too.’
I roll my eyes and notice Lauren standing at the kitchen door trying not to laugh. She sees me see her and comes over to give me a squeeze.
‘Older sibling,’ she says solemnly, holding me at arm’s length. ‘Female sibling.’
‘Younger sibling,’ I reply. ‘It’s good to see you.’
She gets a cup out of the cupboard and puts the kettle on. ‘Your choice. You could’ve seen me any time you wanted. I’ve been here, like, the entire time.’
‘I know. It’s just, you know, Adam was …’
Her head snaps round. ‘Adam was what?’
‘Oh, nothing. Bit of a homebody, that’s all. Wanted to be at home all the time.’
She goes back to making her drink. ‘Ooh, did I hear right? Has he done a bunk?’
‘Shh, Lo,’ Mum butts in. ‘You’ll upset your sister.’
‘No I won’t, she’s clearly fine. So, come on, spill. What’s happened?’
I spend a few minutes recounting the events of Friday night, and each d
ay since then, to the tuts and sighs of both of them, until finally Dad comes in.
‘I see next door have got a driveway man in, now,’ he says as he joins us. He spots me there straight away and a loving smile breaks out on his face. I’m so happy to see him, my eyes actually tear up as I get up and cross the kitchen to hug him.
‘Ah, Gracie. Have you had something bad happen to you?’ he says gently, wrapping his big old arms round me. It’s what he’s been saying ever since I can remember, for every bumped head and scraped knee, every disappointment or let-down over friends or boys or parties or plans. I stay there for a few moments, my head pressed against his sweatshirt.
‘What’s happened, puddin’?’
So I recount the story again of the missing madras and the passport gone and the car in Linton and Dad nods and makes soothing noises while in my periphery I can see Mum trying to raise her eyebrows at him.
‘How long are you staying?’ Mum says when I’ve finished.
‘Are you moving back in?’ Lauren joins in excitedly.
‘Do you need to borrow my car?’ Dad asks, looking at me closely. I smile at him gratefully. It’s the only useful thing anyone has said.
‘Mum, Lauren, I don’t really know, but no, I’m not moving back in.’
‘Can you manage your mortgage, though?’
‘It’s not mortgaged, Mum, it’s rented. And no, I probably can’t manage the rent on my own.’
Mum looks at Dad. ‘I thought they’d got a mortgage, didn’t you?’ He shrugs. ‘I could’ve sworn they’d decided to buy.’ She shakes her head. ‘Can’t understand that, these days, renting. It’s just money down the drain, with nothing to show for it at the end.’
‘Yes, well, luckily my husband didn’t hang around for that, and now I’m not stuck with an expensive mortgage all on my own, so it’s worked out for the best, hasn’t it?’