The Girl in Between

by Sarah Carroll

  There’s something wrong. I can’t figure it out. I try to look at the air but it’s real hard, cos how do you watch air? Instead I watch the space above the machine

  Then I get it. I know what it is.

  In some areas the dust is flowing but in other areas there is no dust. Close to the machine, the air above looks empty, like the dust avoids it.

  And now it’s moving! The empty space! It’s drifting away from the machine!

  I take a step backwards. Then another. All the way till I’m beside a pillar. I duck behind it, hide my body so it’s just my head poking out. I watch.

  I see it. The dust is parting and the empty space is moving through the room. It’s going from one machine to the next.

  I drop to the floor. Squeeze my eyes shut. Take a deep breath.

  Then I open them. I scramble around the pillar. Crawl on my hands and knees till I reach the next. I lift myself up a little and squint.

  I can’t see it now. I think it’s moved to the machine by the door.

  I push myself up and run fast around the pillar and stand with my back pressed flat against the next. I peer around.

  It’s there. By the door. Now it’s rushing out of the room. I sprint after it.

  I think it’s turning up the stairs but I can’t be sure. Blood rushes from my head to my stomach. I leg it up the stairs two at a time. At the top I swear I see an empty space in front of me. Then it disappears. Right beneath the trapdoor into the ceiling. The one that holds Caretaker’s secret.

  I’m panting and shaking and seeing stars. But I don’t see anything else. Not any more. It’s gone.

  After ages I turn to go downstairs. Maybe I should tell Caretaker.

  Or maybe not.

  Cos it might upset him. Or scare him. But it doesn’t scare me. Cos I’m not afraid of ghosts. I’m not.

  I turn back.

  ‘What’s up there, Rose?’ I whisper to the trapdoor.

  Then I have an idea.

  I run down to the classroom, grab a chair and bring it back up. I put it in the corner, beneath the trapdoor, and climb up. But I’m still not tall enough to reach it. So I go down to the backyard and grab some bricks and run up with them. I kick the chair out of the way and stack some bricks. Then I run down and up and down and up, and I keep on going until I’ve brought up about a million bricks and I’ve built a big box platform. I put the chair on top of that. I climb up on the box. Then up on the chair. Now I’m so high my head touches the trapdoor and I have to bend over.

  I push it. It doesn’t budge. I smack it real hard. It still doesn’t move. But then I whack it and it flies open and dust falls into my mouth. The chair wobbles and I almost topple off, over the bricks and down the stairs. I grab the edge of the trapdoor and hold tight. When I’m sure I’m safe, I take a deep breath and go up on my tippy-toes.

  I’m looking into the gap between the ceiling and the roof. It’s like the attic in Gran’s, though I don’t think mills have attics. There’s light coming from somewhere. Perhaps it’s the square hole in the wall of the mill that’s above the sky-bridge, where Caretaker says the conveyor belt came in. I pull myself up into the attic. I have to crouch. I blink a few times. I crawl towards the sunlight coming in through the hole in the wall, but I’m being real careful cos I can hardly see anything.

  When I get close to the light, I see it. The conveyor belt. It doesn’t run through the air over the sky-bridge any more but the part in the attic is still here. It’s hard but rubbery.

  I stick my head out of the square hole into the wind. The sky-bridge is below me and then nothing, all the way to the couch.

  I turn round and crawl past the trapdoor. There’s a shiny silver chute ahead of me. I know what this is. It’s how the grain from the conveyor belt came into the mill. It slid through this chute into the big bin on the sixth floor that has old bags of flour in it.

  ‘Why did Caretaker look so sad when he talked about you, Rose?’ I whisper to the attic. ‘What happened?’

  I touch the inside of the chute. It’s smooth and cold and made of metal. I reckon it would make a pretty good slide.

  I think of Ma’s mates daring her to break into the church. ‘You dare me to slide down it, Rose?’

  I pretend that I hear a laugh, like rain hitting a tin roof, and in the darkness I can almost see eyes glinting like sunlight catching a patch of sea.

  I laugh too. ‘Whoop, whoop, hurray! See you another day!’ I say and I put my legs through the metal chute and push off, and it’s so smooth it’s like falling through water and the whole world becomes a tin can, and I whoosh down and suddenly I fly out into the light and I plop onto the old bags of flour.

  I laugh real loud and I can hear it bounce through the metal chute. ‘Your turn, Rose!’ I call up into the chute. ‘Don’t be scared – the machines aren’t grinding any more!’

  But I hear the floorboards beneath the bin. They rattle and creak. I sit up and look over the side. The boards are real rotted up here and I’m scared that the whole floor will collapse.

  In the middle of the room the massive metal thing sways and I realize that it actually does look like a corkscrew, like Caretaker said. Back then, when the mill was open, I bet the corkscrew was standing in the middle of the room, all safe and secure, but now it dangles off the ceiling by a few metal threads like it’s a bullet waiting to be fired.

  I lift myself out of the bin real careful and it takes me ages to crawl across the floor cos there are more holes than floor. When I get to the doorway I stand up and look at the chute. I imagine a girl my age coming flying out of it and bouncing into the flour bags, and the flour rising in a big cloud and filling up the whole room.

  But there’s really no one here. All there is, is a bit of dust and flour floating in the air.

  YELLOW JACKETS AND BUSYBODIES

  Ma promised we’d only stay one night sleeping in the shed in the park. She didn’t keep her promise.

  The next day we stashed the rucksack in a bush behind the shed and we went off looking for a castle. As soon as we stepped outside the park, though, we saw two coppers coming up the street. Across the road, the woman from the pub came outside.

  Ma cursed and grabbed my hand, and we ducked behind the pillar of the archway and waited. After a while, Ma said, ‘Right’, and she pulled me back through the arch. The coppers were gone and so was the woman from the pub.

  Ma’s hands were already shaking, and the more we walked, the more they shook.

  ‘Ma,’ I said, ‘What about that? That could be our castle.’ I pointed to this building that was so new, it looked like it was wrapped in blue plastic. I was only messing but Ma said, ‘Don’t be bleeding stupid.’ She started walking even faster.

  By the time Ma’s eyes started to sink, her arms were pumping. We’d reached the street in the middle of the city that’s packed with people, the one where cars aren’t allowed to drive. I didn’t want a castle there. And I didn’t think there’d be one anyway. It was too crowded.

  ‘Ma, do you think we’ll find a castle today?’

  Ma didn’t answer. She was looking at this van that was parked in a side street. It looked like a chipper van, only they weren’t selling chips. They were selling clothes. Ma was biting her nails, even though she had no nails left to bite.

  ‘See them?’ she said. She pointed to some people that were wearing neon yellow vests, standing around the van.

  ‘Yeah?’

  ‘Don’t ever go near them. Bleeding Do-gooders. They work with the coppers, you know?’

  I didn’t know. But Ma looked stressed and I knew not to say anything.

  ‘Stay here a minute,’ she said.

  Ma went over to the Do-gooders and started talking to them. After a bit they handed her a load of stuff and she walked away. She hadn’t paid, but they didn’t seem to care. Ma came marching up to me and right past me. She didn’t even stop. I had to run through a crowd of people to catch up.

  ‘Ma, what’s that?’


  ‘New clothes. You can throw away your dirty ones.’

  I didn’t want to throw them away. They only needed to be cleaned.

  ‘My runners too?’

  ‘No, ye eejit,’ she said.

  ‘Ma, you didn’t pay for them.’

  ‘No,’ she said.

  ‘Why?’

  ‘Cos they’re free.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘Cos that’s what they do. Give out clothes and soup, and take information back to the coppers. They’re all in it together, the coppers and the ambulance people and the Do-gooders.’

  ‘And the social workers,’ I reminded her.

  ‘’Zactly,’ Ma said. ‘All them Yellow Jackets and busybodies. So don’t you go near any of them, ye hear?’

  ‘Yeah,’ I said.

  We kept walking up the street and I kept a lookout for the Authorities.

  ‘Ma, are we going to find our castle now?’

  ‘Jaysus, enough!’ she said.

  I nodded and I said nothing for ages. Loads of times I wanted to ask where we were going but I didn’t. Not even after lunch when we just got up and started walking again.

  By the time it started getting late, though, I was worried cos I didn’t want to sleep in the park again. Ma had promised. So I said, ‘Are we sleeping in our castle tonight?’

  That’s when Ma spun round and I saw that her eyes had sunk to the bottom of her head. ‘I said enough! Just stop! Going on all day at me, stressing me out!’

  It wasn’t fair. It was only the third time I’d asked in the whole day. But Ma was looking at me the same way as she had the last time she slapped me. Maybe the only reason why she didn’t slap me again was cos her hands were full of clothes. So I said nothing. I just kept walking. But then we came up to the black rusted gate. With the evil smiley face. And my heart fell into my runners.

  ‘Ma!’ I said.

  She knocked real loud. The bolt grinded back and forth. I hid behind her. A second later I heard his voice.

  ‘Look what the cat dragged in!’

  I didn’t look at Monkey Man. I stayed hidden. But his head appeared around Ma’s shoulder. ‘And your precious daughter too.’ I closed my eyes so I couldn’t see him.

  ‘Just sort me out,’ Ma said.

  ‘Not coming in then?’

  ‘No. Thanks.’

  ’Where ye staying?’ Monkey Man asked.

  ‘A mate’s,’ she said.

  There was silence for a while and then he said, ‘Suit yerself. What’ll it be?’

  When Monkey Man disappeared for a minute, I stood back from Ma and made her look at me.

  ‘Ma? Please? I don’t want to stay here.’

  ‘We’re not. I’m just collecting something.’

  And at least she wasn’t lying cos a few seconds after Monkey Man came back, we were walking again. This time I didn’t care that we were going back to the shed in the trees. Anything was better than staying there.

  CHRISTMAS IN THE CASTLE

  It’s Christmas Day. I’m sitting outside the basement in Caretaker’s room. I don’t even smell him any more. I’ve got three blankets wrapped around me. Caretaker went to the building where the Do-gooders give out food and he brought me back a mince pie. I haven’t touched it, though, cos I don’t think mince in pie sounds very nice. Gran used to make burgers with mince and they were real good. But she never used it for pie. She’d use apples or rhubarb or something.

  ‘I like your hat,’ I say.

  Caretaker’s wearing a Santa hat over a black wool one.

  ‘It brings out my eyes,’ he says. ‘It was a present from the centre. Bunch of down-and-outs and junkies wearing Santa hats. Now there’s a sight worth seeing,’ he says and fixes his sunglasses with the one lens and then he starts rummaging around under the blankets.

  ‘Got you a present,’ he says.

  ‘You did?’ I say and I’m excited, but I feel a bit bad too cos I don’t have a present for him.

  He holds it out to me and it’s wrapped in brown paper and I know it’s a book cos I can feel it. I rip the paper off. On the cover is a fireplace with stockings hanging from it. The fire’s blazing and it looks real warm. It reminds me of Gran’s house at Christmas.

  I had a stocking too and it had my name on it. There weren’t any hooks for hanging it to the fireplace, but on Christmas morning it’d be lying against the wall in the sitting room and it’d be so full that it’d stand up all by itself.

  I open the book and flick to the end. The last picture is of a mountain. It’s covered in snow. Above the mountain there are all these green lights in the sky.

  ‘Hey, Caretaker, what’s this?’ I ask and I hold up the book and point at the lights in the sky in the picture.

  ‘Them’s the Northern Lights. The aurora borealis. Made by the Hidden Folk who live at the North Pole and spread magic over the world at Christmas.’

  I trace my finger over the lights and I imagine being there and watching them.

  ‘You ever been up to the North Pole?’ I ask him.

  ‘Yeah,’ he says.

  ‘What’s it like?’

  ‘Cold. Beautiful.’

  ‘Why were you there?’ I ask.

  ‘Got lost.’

  ‘What did you do?’

  ‘Tried to get home. Took me a while, mind you. And by the time I got back, everything’d changed.’

  And I know he’s just telling stories but I’d love to see them. The Northern Lights. And trudge through snow so deep I’d sink up to my chin. ‘I’m going to go there some day when I’m grown up and the Authorities aren’t after me any more.’

  ‘Why don’t you just go now?’

  ‘Can’t,’ I say. I lift the mince pie and I try to make myself take a bite. But all I can think about is slithery pink worms of raw meat. Is the mince in the pie cooked? It must be.

  ‘Why not?’

  I look at him for a second before I remember what we’re talking about. Going to the North Pole. ‘Cos. I can’t. Ma needs me. I don’t leave her and she doesn’t leave me. That’s the deal. Anyway, she can’t fight off the Authorities on her own.’

  Maybe the pie will taste like a burger, with ketchup and all. I’m about to take a bite when Caretaker says, ‘What about next year? Where are you going to spend Christmas?’

  ‘Here.’

  ‘No, you’re not,’ he says.

  The mince pie is touching my lip. ‘Why?’

  ‘Cos the times are a changing, kiddo. Time to move on.’

  I drop the mince pie onto my lap. ‘Why does everyone keep saying that?’

  Caretaker doesn’t answer. Instead he says, ‘Where’s your ma?’

  ‘Upstairs. In bed, I think.’

  ‘Not doing so well, ha?’

  ‘She’s stressed out,’ I whisper.

  ‘Why’s that?’

  ‘The Authorities,’ I say to the mince pie.

  ‘Huh?’

  ‘The men in the yellow jackets,’ I say a little louder. ‘They came in here. They stressed Ma out.’

  ‘And they’ll be back.’

  I look up. Someone is walking along the street above us. They stop by Caretaker’s books. It’s Short Guy. I nearly didn’t know it was him cos he doesn’t look that short when he’s not standing beside Red Coat. He’s scanning the books. Actually, he’s staring at one book.

  Caretaker stands up and watches him, which is weird cos he never speaks to the book buyers. He never talks to anyone but me and Ma.

  ‘Forty-three days,’ Caretaker says.

  This makes Short Guy look down at him. I look at Caretaker too cos I don’t know what he’s going on about.

  ‘That’s how many days you’ve stopped here and stared at Ulysses,’ Caretaker says. ‘Didn’t think you’d come today, though.’

  Short Guy doesn’t say anything for ages and when he does, he sounds nothing like I thought he would. He sounds real serious. And he’s not from the city cos his accent’s real weird.

  ‘Forty-fiv
e,’ Short Guy says. ‘It’s been forty-five days.’ He crouches down and picks up Ulysses and turns it over. He doesn’t read the back or anything, just bounces it in his hand like he’s trying to guess how heavy it is.

  ‘We used to pass here every day. We’d joke that the day Ulysses was gone would be the day we’d leave the city and start a new life . . . Somewhere. Anywhere. It didn’t matter.’ He stops bouncing the book. Him and Caretaker look at each other. ‘We never said where we’d go. But I believed we would. Some day. You know?’ Then he looks down the street like he’s watching her walk away.

  ‘Why can’t you still go?’ I say before I remember I’m not supposed to speak to anyone from outside. But it’s okay cos he doesn’t hear me. He’s too busy thinking.

  Caretaker heard me, though, cos he waits till Short Guy turns back to us and then he says,

  ‘Isn’t there still a way?’

  Short Guy shakes his head. He’s almost whispering when he says, ‘She won’t forgive me.’ He looks at Caretaker, like Caretaker might forgive him instead.

  I wonder what he did that was so bad. Caretaker doesn’t ask him, though. All he says is, ‘Time to move on?’

  But Short Guy doesn’t reply. He just shakes his head like he doesn’t agree and puts the book back down.

  ‘Take it,’ Caretaker says. He means Ulysses.

  Short Guy doesn’t. Instead he picks up another book. He doesn’t even bother to read the title. He stands up and roots around in his pocket and throws twenty quid in Caretaker’s cup.

  ‘Merry Christmas,’ he says. He nods at Caretaker. Then leaves.

  We both watch him till he’s gone. After a while, Caretaker lies back down and pulls a blanket around him.

  ‘She should forgive him,’ I say.

  ‘Why?’

  ‘Cos he looks real sorry,’ I say.

  ‘Maybe what he did was very bad.’

  ‘Yeah. But she should still forgive him anyway.’

  ‘Maybe she’s happier without him,’ Caretaker says.

  ‘She’s not. She’s real sad. She never laughs any more.’

  He peels back the blanket from his chin so he can see me. He’s wondering how I know that. He’s waiting for me to tell him but I don’t. He doesn’t ask though. He says, ‘Maybe what he did was unforgivable.’