The Ice Twins

by S. K. Tremayne

  Angus it seems, was right; the night is clear and calm and the torch is unnecessary, the moon is ripe and bright, giving the waters a luminescence.

  And there he is: my husband waits on the Selkie pier, with the lights of the pub behind. He is in dark jeans – but a V-neck jumper with a checked shirt: a compromise between island life and an architect’s job. He seems energized, smiley, maybe happy from his first day of proper work in a while?

  ‘Hey, gorgeous the boatwoman. Bang on time.’

  Angus leaps down the steps and into the dinghy and kisses me, he smells of whisky but not too much. Perhaps a quick warming glass in the Selkie.

  ‘How’s Kirstie?’

  ‘She’s …’

  ‘What?’

  ‘Nothing.’

  The outboard Yamaha motor slices the cold, black, moonlit waters, as I steer us around Salmadair. The big house of the billionaire is dark and empty. The black fir trees defend it, in their legions.

  ‘Sarah?’

  The boat is hauled up safe above the bladderwrack. The moonlight guides us to the cottage. Lydia hears us and she runs out from her room to hand her dad the shells she found; he cups them in his big hands and says,

  ‘Hey. Sweetheart. These are beautiful. Really, lovely. Thank you.’ Angus leans and gives her a kiss on her small pale forehead. Then she skips back to her room, past the painting of the Scottish clan-woman.

  I sit Angus at the dining table and I make us both tea. He is very silent. As if he is expecting something big. Does he already suspect? Surely not.

  As calm as I can, I pull up a chair, and sit down opposite. And I say: ‘I’ve got something to tell you.’

  ‘OK.’

  My breathing is deep, but even. I continue, ‘It wasn’t Lydia who fell off the balcony, it was Kirstie. We got it wrong. We made an error. The girl in that room – our surviving daughter – she is Lydia.’

  He says nothing. He sips his tea, his dark brown eyes fixed on mine. Not blinking. But fierce. Like a predator, watching.

  I feel a sudden sense of peril. Of being menaced, as I did in the attic. My childhood stammer momentarily returns. ‘I sh – I sh.’

  ‘Sarah. Slow down.’ He glares. Dark, and brooding. ‘Tell me.’

  ‘I turned off all the lights in her room. To make her scream.’

  His frown deepens. ‘What?’

  ‘Remember how the twins screamed differently when they were really scared, when that phobia was triggered? Remember? The power cut? So I did it again. Plunged her into darkness. Yes I know, it was horrible but—’ the guilt is getting to me. I hurry on ‘—but it’s not something you could fake, is it? That scream was a reflex, it’s fear, it is an instinctive difference, so – so that’s it – she screamed like Lydia when she was in the dark. So she is Lydia. She must be.’

  He sips hot tea again. I wish he’d respond normally. Or in any way. Maybe cry. Shout. Do something. React badly.

  But all I get is this menacing stare. He swallows tea and says: ‘That’s it? A scream? A scream is your only evidence?’

  ‘No – it’s not just that, God, there’s so much more.’

  ‘OK. Tell me. Slow down. What else?’

  Angus wraps his big hands around his mug. Tight. He takes another gulp, his eyes never leaving mine.

  ‘Tell me, Sarah. Tell me everything.’

  He is correct, he needs to know everything; and so, like someone purging a night of alcohol, I chuck it all up. Voiding myself of lies and evasions, redeeming myself with the truth. I tell him about the behaviour of the dog, the literacy issues, the switch of friends, the tantrum in the school, the weeks of strangeness, the way our daughter will only now let me call her Lydia. I tell him about the trip to Kellaway in Glasgow, and how it convinced me, for a moment, that I was wrong, but then the doubts crept back. More persuasive and convincing than ever before.

  ‘She is Lydia,’ I say, in conclusion. Staring at my husband who stares back.

  I can see the teeth grinding in his jaw, under the stubble. I stumble on,

  ‘We – I – made some mistake, somehow, Gus, it was just because of that one line, that sentence, after the accident, I presumed too much, maybe Lydia got confused – remember they were swapping identities at that time, playing games, fooling about, wearing the same clothes, asking for the same haircuts. Remember all that and then the accident, who knows, maybe there was some telepathy, when Kirstie was in hospital, we cannot know for sure, some mingling of their minds, like – like the way they mingled in the cot, sleeping in the same bed – sucking each other’s thumbs.’

  Angus still says nothing. During my soliloquy. But his grip on his mug is so hard I can see the straining whiteness of his knuckles. As if he is going to pick it up and smash it in my face. He is angry and he is going to be violent. I am scared yet not scared. Angus is going to hit me, to ram the Edinburgh Castle coffee mug in my face. I am telling him his favourite twin is dead and that mine has been resurrected.

  But I don’t care, I have to say it.

  ‘The girl in that room is Lydia. Not Kirstie. We cremated Kirstie, Lydia is still alive.’

  Here it comes. His reaction. Angus drains the last of his tea. He puts the mug down on the stained and dusty table. The moon is white and horrified outside, I can see her through the windows. Gawping.

  At last he speaks.

  ‘I know it’s Lydia.’

  I gaze his way. Stunned into muteness.

  He shrugs at my bewilderment. Yet he is also tensed, and muscled. Then he says, ‘I’ve known for a while.’

  I am dumbed. He sighs, loudly.

  ‘Guess we’d better get the death certificates changed.’

  My silence is pathological.

  Angus stands. And goes into the kitchen. Pans and plates rattle in the sink. Beany skitters into the dining room, then stops and looks at me; his unclipped claws have scratched the cold flagstones. We need a carpet in here, or some rugs. Everything is bare and cold and hard.

  From somewhere I find the energy to respond. I go into the kitchen, where Angus is washing cups under the spattery water of the tap in the big ceramic sink. Our water coughs forth, belching and uncertain, like rain from a storm overflowing from a gutter. My husband’s thick fingers rinse and clean the mugs. Obsessively.

  ‘Josh and Molly have invited us for dinner next Thursday. They’ve got some London friends staying, there’s a big wedding at Kinloch.’

  ‘Angus.’

  ‘Also, heard some good news at the Selkie. They may be putting up a mobile mast, back of Duisdale, might give us proper reception. We won’t have to drive up that bloody hill.’

  ‘Gus!’

  His back is facing me as he methodically does the dishes; he is gazing at the dark kitchen window – the kitchen that faces landwards, over the tidal flats, towards the line of low bald hills behind the Selkie, a horizon of deepest blue against the stars and darkness.

  But I can also see his face, reflected in the window glass by the kitchen lights. He does not realize this. And I can see intense anger on that handsome face: a twisting, suppressed rage.

  Why?

  He clocks me looking at him, and the anger disappears. It is hidden away very quickly. Now he sets the mug to dry on a rack and he turns, plucking a tea towel, carefully drying his fingers of the suds.

  He speaks at last.

  ‘About six months ago …’ He pauses, and drops the tea towel on top of the fridge. Looks up again. ‘Lydia came to me and told me what she told you. That she was Lydia. That it was Kirstie that died. That we got it wrong. That you got it wrong. That we all got it wrong.’

  The dog is in the kitchen, whimpering, for no apparent reason. Sensing the tension, perhaps? Angus glances at Beany, and nods.

  ‘I also noticed the dog. Behaving differently. With Lydia.’

  ‘Beany? You—’

  ‘So. Adding it up, I thought – Well, I thought Lydia might be right. Or, rather, telling the truth. That’s why I got Lydia’s toy o
ut.’

  ‘She asked for the toy?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Sorry. What? I don’t see …’

  ‘It was a test, Sarah. An experiment. Just like yours.’

  I gaze. I can hear the rats in the lumber-room. Why doesn’t Beany kill them? The dog is pathetic. Morose, depressed, frightened.

  ‘Sorry? What kind of test?’

  ‘To see how she reacted. Testing Lydia. Or testing Kirstie. See if she reacted differently to her own toy, Lydia’s toy.’

  ‘And? Did she?’

  ‘Yep. I got the little dragon out, secretly. Without her knowing. Got him from the attic. And I put him in her room, mixed with all the other toys. And then I watched her without her knowing. See how she responded.’

  ‘You watched her secretly?’

  ‘Yes. And as soon as she realized it was there, she went straight for the dragon. She clearly preferred Lydia’s toy. Entirely unprompted. But emphatic.’

  But of course: now I get it. The logic is clear – and gratifying. That’s Angus. Logical and sensible, clear yet creative: an engineer, a problem solver. He thought of a subtle test, for our daughter, with a toy. Much less distressing than mine.

  ‘So you knew all along, or you suspected, so – you agree? You really think she is Lydia?’

  Angus leans back, his hands on the edge of the sink, as he faces me. Defiant, or maybe contemptuous? Or am I just imagining this? My confusion is a whirlpool; and I am drowning.

  ‘But, Gus, why didn’t you tell me then?’

  ‘Didn’t want to upset you. Wasn’t sure.’

  ‘That’s it? That’s your reason?’

  ‘What else? What did you want me to do? You’d barely gotten over, you hadn’t gotten over Kirstie’s death. Then I slope up and say, Oh, by the by, you got it wrong at the accident? Wrong daughter. Come on, Sarah. Really? Was I really going to do that? To add to your pain?’

  His frown softens to something else. Not quite a smile; but not a scowl either. Angus shakes his head and, as he does, I see a glisten in his eyes, the wetness of emotion. Not tears, but close. And I am pained for him, as I am pained for all of us. This must be so very hard for him. He’s been dealing with this alone. And here I am, being the accuser. For months he has been coping with the desperate knowledge as best as he could. And he has lost Kirstie as he thought he lost Lydia.

  I say, ‘So she is Lydia?’

  ‘Yes. If that’s what she believes, and it seems that is the case, then that’s who she is. We have no choice. It’s Lydia, Sarah. Kirstie died. There. That’s it. That’s that.’

  He swallows emotion. Then, across the kitchen, he opens his arms, beckoning. And I feel a surrendering inside me: I am tired of this renewed and anxious hostility between us. We need to be a family, to move on together. Lydia Moorcroft and her parents. I cross the kitchen and he hugs me and I rest my face on his shoulder.

  ‘Come on,’ he says. ‘Let’s make some dinner. Me, you and Lydia. And Beany the useless dog.’

  I manage to laugh, and I almost mean it. And so we go into the living room. Angus builds a big fire and I cook up some pasta and then Angus calls, gently, down the hall into Lydia’s bedroom,

  ‘Lydia, Lydie-lo,’ and she comes running out and this is a moment, this is such a moment – yet she just hugs him around his waist as high as she can reach her arms, and he tousles her blonde head, and kisses the top of her head, and he says Lydia Lydia and I can see that he means it.

  Her calls her Lydia, I call her Lydia, she thinks she is Lydia. She is Lydia. That’s it.

  How easily an identity is changed.

  Too easily?

  We need to mark this. We can’t just switch from one name to another, one identity to another, as if it’s an everyday occurrence. We’ll have to do something serious and symbolic. Perhaps a funeral; yes, almost certainly a funeral. My daughter Kirstie is dead and that needs to be remembered. Properly.

  But that can wait. Right now I want this evening to be a resolution, to be final, to be some kind of catharsis for us. And it is: up until the time when I’ve cooked dinner and Angus finishes the washing up, again, and Lydia is playing with Beany on the rug in front of the roaring and comforting wood fire.

  Then my mind casts back. Thinking of Angus’s expression in the window. He was furious. There was a deep, fierce anger there. It was as if I’d uncovered a terrible secret, and he hated me for it; but what was that secret?

  My husband paces into the living room. And squats by the hearth.

  I watch him as he pokes the fire, shifting logs, shouldering and levering, so that a raw gash of burning vermilion is revealed in the charred and flaming woodlogs, and the golden sparks fly up. He looks masculine. A man and a fire. I like Angus’s masculinity: tall and dark, a sexy cliché.

  But something in his account is disquieting, still. He was prepared to let Lydia go on being Kirstie, possibly for ever, just to avoid upsetting me? Really? Does that make sense? I know I did the same to him, but that was only for a few weeks, and I always intended to tell him in time. So maybe it was more the case that he wanted Lydia to stay Kirstie, because he preferred Kirstie? So he kept it quiet? But even that seems bizarre, and wrong.

  Angus sits next to me on the sofa and puts an arm around my shoulder. This is it: or this is meant to be it. The moment. Us three, a family. Cosy in our cottage, which is now halfway habitable: the bathroom is grouted, half the walls are painted. The kitchen still offends but it is clean and usable. And here we are. The dog, the daughter, the cold bright night outside, the flashing of the lighthouse, calling out to all the other lighthouses, along this lonely coast: to Hyskeir and Waternish, to Chanonry and South Rona.

  This is what I dreamed of all those nights when I gazed at the laptop screen, and the crystal images of Eilean Torran, with the cottage by the sea. And everyone and everything forgiven. Or forgotten.

  Yet I am having to force myself not to shrink away from my husband’s touch. I sense Angus knows something else. And he’s still not telling me. And whatever it is, it is so bad he will lie, and has lied for months. Maybe fourteen months.

  Or maybe I should get a grip and let it all be.

  The fire crackles. Lydia plays. Our melancholic dog snores, and dreams, his muzzle twitching. Angus reads a big book about a Japanese architect of concrete churches. Tadao Ando. I sip some wine then yawn myself from half-sleep, I need to do a few chores before I can sleep properly: so many of Lydia’s school things need sorting.

  Making my way into the big bedroom I switch on the pretty feeble side light. There’s a folded note on the bed. A note?

  My heart sends out the alarm. The note has big childish letters on the front.

  To Mummy.

  My fingers are trembling – and I am not sure why – when I open the note and read. And now my heart trembles, too.

  Mummy. She is in here with us. Kirstie.

  12

  Angus sat in the bedroom watching Sarah get ready for supper at the Freedlands’. There was a time when this would have been a sensuous interlude: his wife would half-turn, and ask him to zip the back of her dress; he would oblige, sowing delicate kisses on the whiteness of her neck; then he would watch her dab perfume there and there.

  Now he had to resist the urge to walk out, or worse. How long could he do this? And now he had to pretend that Kirstie was Lydia.

  His wife slipped on her shoes, nearly ready. Angus regarded the fine muscles of her shoulders, revealed by her backless dress, as she curved to smooth her tights. The softness of the skin above her spine; the subtle beauty, glinting. He still desired her. But it was all meaningless now.

  Perhaps he could convince himself, over time, that Kirstie was Lydia? He thought he knew the whole of it, understood everything, but there was a strangeness here. Kirstie was acting differently. She was acting like Lydia, the dog was behaving oddly and differently. And he believed Sarah about the scream. Could Angus have got it wrong, too?

  No, this was stupid. He was g
etting lost in these reflections. A labyrinth of darkened glass.

  ‘Can you go and get Lydia?’

  She was asking him, directly.

  ‘Angus? Hello? Lydia. We need Lydia ready. Now. Can you go and get her please?’

  Her instructions were clipped, and careful. Much like everything she said, now. It had the troubling subtext: We know this is a nightmare but we have to try. Or pretend.

  ‘Yes, OK.’

  He walked towards Kirstie’s room. No, he walked towards Lydia’s room. He had to pretend she was Lydia. He had to start believing she was Lydia, he had to think she was Lydia, for the moment, to keep the family stable. It was like learning a foreign language: he had to think in that language.

  Angus knocked and opened the door.

  His little girl was dressed, uncomfortably, in a summery frock, and spangly sandals. Just standing there. In the middle of the room. Unspeaking, and alone. Why was she doing that? Increasingly his daughter’s behaviour unnerved him: again he felt a tingling panic. Time was running out. He had to rescue her from this madness. But he didn’t know how.

  She asked, ‘Will there be other kids there, Dada?’

  ‘Maybe,’ he lied. ‘Think Gemma Conway has kids.’

  ‘Gemma who?’

  ‘Conway. You’ll like her, she’s a bit weird and woolly, but she knows everything about everything—’

  ‘No she doesn’t, Dada, no one knows everything about everything, except maybe God and I don’t know if HE is clever enough to know all that?’

  Angus gazed at his daughter. This was new, this God stuff. Where did it come from? Kylerdale School was Church of Scotland, but it didn’t seem especially tambourine-bashing; maybe she had new friends who were religious. The Hebrides were fiercely devout in places; they still locked playing fields on the Sabbath, out there on Lewis.

  But then he remembered his daughter had no friends. She kept telling him this: Daddy, no one will play with me.