The Lost Girls

by Sarah Painter

  ‘No,’ Aislinn shook her head vehemently. ‘No. No. No.’ Her voice rose and a couple of punters turned to look.

  Mal made a ‘don’t mind her,’ face to the onlookers and took Aislinn’s arm. ‘Come on, let’s get you home.’

  ‘No.’ Aislinn was still shaking her head, whipping it from side to side, making her look quite insane. Which was fair enough, really. Mal squeezed her arm in what he hoped was a reassuring manner. ‘It’s okay, calm down. She’s gone. It’s all over.’

  Aislinn danced to the side. She smiled, though, looking suddenly beatific. That should’ve been his warning, but he was still too caught up in his own failure and confusion and he didn’t react quickly enough. Aislinn’s arm came up from her side and that was when he realised that she had a piece of broken green glass concealed in her hand. She slashed it expertly down one arm, dividing the tissue from the inside of her elbow to her wrist.

  ‘Oh, Christ.’ Mal grabbed for her hand, shook the glass out from it before she could do any more damage. Aislinn twisted in his grip and, because he didn’t want to hurt her, she managed to break free. She grabbed a glass from the nearest table and smashed it. Tiny flecks flew into the air and one stung Mal’s cheek. There was blood running freely from her slashed arm, splattering onto the floor, but Aislinn was intent on cutting her other wrist. ‘Please, don’t,’ Mal said, shrugging off his jacket. People were up and shouting. Someone screamed. Mal was aware of someone else with their phone out, calling nine-nine-nine, giving the name of the bar in a steady voice.

  Aislinn dropped the glass and reached out for Mal, stumbling. He caught her before she fell and lowered her to the floor. He tried to wrap his jacket around the arm that looked the worst, tried to apply pressure, to lift the limb. It was slippy with blood. Aislinn touched his cheek, her eyes dimming in her pale face. He wanted to jerk away but he didn’t. He wasn’t a good man, he knew that, but he didn’t move away.

  Aislinn smiled at him, right into his eyes. ‘I like your pet,’ she said.

  ‘I’m sorry,’ he was surprised to hear himself say. ‘I didn’t mean for this to happen.’

  She went, then. Her expression slackened and the light went from her eyes. Mal heard sirens and climbed to his feet, letting the girl slump onto the floor. She was just a body now, it didn’t matter, and he had to put some distance between himself and this latest cock-up. He left the bar without anybody trying to stop him. His blood-soaked jacket was a wet bundle in his arms, heavier than expected.

  Chapter Six

  When Rose opened her eyes it took a few seconds for them to adjust to the lack of light. She was in a tunnel. A dim electric bulb encased in a metal cage cast a sickly glow onto the walls. Walls that looked oddly bumpy in texture. After a moment, the texture resolved into something so horrible that her brain simply refused to process the image for a further few seconds.

  It was a bit like when she woke from one of her blackouts, except that she was more frightened than she had ever been before and she wasn’t alone. Astrid was still in front of her, still gripping her hands, which hurt as if they’d been burned. There was water on the floor. As much as Rose tried to focus on that fact, she could no longer ignore the reality of the bumpy walls; they were lined with bones. Stacked on top of each other with thigh bones facing end-out, the pattern broken in places with a row of skulls.

  ‘Oh my God.’ Rose’s voice was thin and she cleared her throat. ‘What. The. Hell.’

  Astrid let go of Rose and wiped her hands on her jeans. ‘Excellent.’

  ‘Not excellent.’ Rose looked around, feeling the last shreds of her self-control ebb away. ‘Not excellent at all. What is this place? How did we—’

  ‘I think we should move.’

  ‘Okay,’ Rose said automatically.

  ‘Like, right now.’ Astrid put a hand on Rose’s arm. ‘It’s kind of crowded in here.’

  Rose felt the heat disappear and goosebumps spread across her skin.

  Astrid began walking and Rose followed. Her brain was still refusing to process that they’d just apparently jumped from one place in the world to another, and was snagged on the bones lining the walls, as that was, sadly, the more manageable part of the scenario. The passage opened out into a squarish area, which had more passages leading off from it. Behind a low wall, there was an illuminated space about six feet across. Inside that stood an artificial hill with a miniature stone building.

  ‘These were stone quarries originally,’ Astrid said. She glanced back at Rose. ‘We’re underneath Paris.’

  ‘Paris. Right. Gotcha.’ By this time, Rose’s brain had simply switched off. It had short-circuited, and she decided to just go with whatever this was until it came back online.

  Astrid chose a passage without any hesitation and Rose followed. After a few more twists and turns, they passed through a circular space with a giant pillar in the middle made of yet more bones and skulls, then went along a long corridor with a low arched ceiling that seemed to go on for a very long time. The air began to get a little fresher and – although Rose thought she might’ve been imagining it – warmer.

  Just when she was beginning to think they were irrevocably lost, the corridor ended at a spiral staircase. She followed Astrid up the steps, trying to remember to breathe and not to touch the walls, which were stone and not bone but somehow the colour and texture of bone. She wasn’t sure she was ever going to stop seeing those neat piles of dead humanity.

  She heard voices just before the final curve of the staircase, and then they were in a cramped room with a desk and a bored-looking woman who was idly flicking through a magazine. On her left, about halfway up the wall, was a clear-fronted case containing a defibrillator.

  The woman saw her looking and said, ‘For the fat tourists.’ Rose heard and understood, while simultaneously recognising that she had spoken in French. Pour les touristes obèses.

  A green door with the word ‘sortie’ was half-open and Rose tasted fresh air.

  After the gloom of the catacombs, the spring sunshine was almost painful. The scent wafting from a bakery fought with the smell of car exhaust, dog shit and tree resin. As they walked along the pavement, a waft of blocked drain joined the party, as if to underscore reality with a fat black marker pen. ‘I get it, I get it,’ Rose muttered. In her mind, she added, ‘Not dreaming.’

  Astrid was moving along at a clip, her stride purposeful and her eyes scanning upwards as if checking for something. ‘What are we going to do?’ Rose pushed down on her panic. No money. No passport. No suitcase of clothes or barterable goods. Not even her bloody hairbrush.

  ‘Okay, metro’s this way,’ Astrid said. ‘We need to find somewhere to stay.’

  Rose found her feet were stuck to the ground. ‘We’re in Paris.’

  Astrid stopped and backed up a couple of steps. ‘Yes,’ she said, almost gently. ‘Rose. We have to keep moving. I’m sorry.’

  Rose managed to force her legs into motion and she concentrated on following Astrid. They arrived at a metro station. The curly writing on the art nouveau sign made it, finally, inescapable. They were in Paris.

  Of all the questions she had, Rose settled on the least disturbing. ‘Why are we running?’

  Astrid gave her a funny look. ‘I don’t think that man wanted to shake us by the hand.’

  ‘No,’ Rose said. ‘I mean, why don’t we just hold hands and teleport or whatever the hell that was?’

  Astrid paused, pushing a stray curl out of her eyes. ‘You think you can do that again?’

  Rose looked inside herself, searching for some new area of her brain marked ‘this is how you transport people magically from one place to the other.’ It wasn’t there. She squeezed her eyes shut in frustration. ‘I don’t know.’

  ‘Do you remember being in Vassilikos? The turtles on the beach and the sunset so red it was like the sky was bleeding?’

  ‘No.’ Rose was off balance, falling. ‘I’ve never been anywhere. Was that with you?’

 
‘Then probably not,’ Astrid said. Her expression was a curious mix of disappointment and relief. ‘I think what happened back there was a result of the extreme stress of the situation. You bypassed the filter. Thank Christ.’

  ‘If you don’t stop talking like this and start making sense, I’m going to freak out. Seriously and totally freak out. I’m going to sit here on this Parisian-bloody-pavement and have myself a meltdown.’

  Astrid squinted at Rose. ‘Are you saying that because you think you should, or are you really finding this that difficult? I mean, you’re the girl who blacks out regularly and can’t remember where or why. You’re the girl who can’t remember a single thing about her childhood.’

  Rose stepped back, her insides suddenly liquid. ‘How do you know that?’

  ‘Sweetie. There is so much I want to tell you but I can’t yet. You won’t believe me, or you will believe me and your head will explode.’ Astrid said this seriously, as if she meant it literally. Perhaps she did.

  The cold feeling was back in Rose’s stomach. ‘Don’t we need money?’ She settled on practicality. ‘For the metro?’

  Astrid clicked her fingers. ‘Damn. Yes. Stay here.’

  Rose stayed. She watched Astrid march off a little way down the street. Once she was about thirty paces away, her gait changed. She became relaxed, absorbed. She began looking into shop windows. After a few minutes, Rose considered following her. Perhaps she was meant to?

  A woman paused next to Astrid and, for a moment, Rose couldn’t see her anymore. The woman was leaning towards the glass, peering at something inside. Then Astrid popped out from behind her and began walking at a casual pace back to Rose. She didn’t pause or speak, just touched Rose’s arm as she went past.

  Rose followed her down the steps, feeling the change in air as they went underground. Astrid bought tickets using French that sounded fluent and assured, and they got onto the next available train.

  The carriage was only half full and they got a seat easily. The strains of an accordion wafted over the air, reminding Rose that she was most definitely in France.

  ‘Look.’ Astrid leaned in close and spoke quietly. ‘I’ve got enough cash for us to get a hotel room. For one night, at least. We can rest.’

  ‘And take a shower,’ Rose said. ‘I’m disgusting.’

  The woman sitting opposite visibly blanched. She had a creamy brown tan and a wrap dress that sat on her knee. Her hair was styled and she had neat earrings and a leather handbag.

  Rose leaned in closer still and whispered in Astrid’s ear. ‘Did you steal it?’

  Astrid went thin-lipped. She nodded once.

  Rose sat back. Her head felt fuzzy. The air in the carriage was soupy. It felt unbelievably warm after the brisk temperature of a traditional Edinburgh spring.

  The train stopped at a station and a couple of people got up and exited. The accordionist got off the previous carriage and stepped through the sliding doors of theirs. He stood in the middle and began playing. Bored Parisians stared out of the window or at their own feet. Nobody made eye contact.

  Rose tried to do the same, but her gaze kept being drawn back to the musician. He looked well fed and he wore a grey jumper that looked like it was made from a fine yarn, like cashmere. Busking in Paris was obviously quite lucrative. Unless cashmere was a basic human right in France. Like wine and decent bread.

  Astrid was staring out of the window, seemingly lost in her own thoughts. Rose wanted to say that there was something wrong with the busker, that she had a bad feeling and it was getting worse. But then, nothing was right about this situation. It would be weird if she didn’t feel odd.

  The train surfaced and the view of brick tunnel walls was replaced with above-ground Paris. Streets, trees, tall buildings that looked old but in a different way to the ones in Edinburgh. The landscape looked familiar. It didn’t seem possible that they were in Paris, though, despite the unmistakeably Gallic sound of the accordion and the graffiti on the railway siding that said ‘Je suis Charlie’. Then, as if the city was answering back, underlining its Paris-ness just for Rose’s benefit, the Eiffel Tower blinked into view.

  Rose turned to Astrid to point it out and caught sight of the accordionist staring at them both. Properly, unpleasantly staring. She poked Astrid.

  Astrid glanced up, then in one movement rose to her feet and threw something into the man’s face. Rose couldn’t see what it was, her mind was playing tricks and it had looked as if Astrid had thrown nothing but thin air, but that couldn’t be right. It must have been substantial. He stumbled back, his arms flailing, the weight of the accordion held by the wide straps he had looped around his shoulders. He grabbed at a seat back, which skewed his course so that instead of ending up on his back in the aisle of the carriage, he lay half on one of the seats as a horrified housewifely-looking woman on the other side tried to shrink away so that no part of her body came into contact with him.

  The train was slowing and Astrid pulled Rose to the doors. She kept looking at the man even while she pushed Rose onto the platform. Rose stumbled, falling to the ground and scraping her knees. The pain and the panic took over and she felt her grip on consciousness fly loose. She was falling and she expected everything to go black. She was passing out, some part of her knew that, either from the shock of the fall or the terror which had, finally, taken over every part of her being. Instead of blackness, though, there was a flash of white.

  Chapter Seven

  Rose must have fallen asleep again. She wiped her face, hoping she hadn’t drooled. She didn’t remember having dinner or going to bed or getting up that morning, but she must have done those things because now she was sitting in the Costa Coffee on George Street. Another blackout. Another chunk of lost time. The light through the plate glass had that insubstantial night-is-falling look to it and the place was packed with people; students and shoppers and a few in suits. Astrid was sitting opposite with an enormous mug of hot chocolate. She was spooning whipped cream into her mouth with a determination Rose recognised from many other such cafe visits. The familiarity was soothing and she felt her heart rate slow.

  She quickly checked herself. She was wearing a purple corduroy skirt, thick tights, a Fair Isle patterned jumper and her long brown boots. She turned slightly and found her coat over the back of her chair and her bag to her side. This was not normal. People didn’t dress themselves in weather-appropriate gear when they fell unconscious.

  Astrid paused. ‘What?’

  ‘Have you ever fainted?’ Rose was surprised at how natural her voice sounded. She wasn’t screaming or crying. But then, blackouts were nothing new and, as always, she couldn’t hold onto a sense of panic. She felt rested, like she’d been asleep, but also wired and jumpy like she’d just had a boatload of coffee. Maybe she had.

  ‘Everyone has fainted at least once,’ Astrid said airily. ‘Or passed out, at least. Haven’t you seen the amount we all drink?’ She put a hand onto Rose’s arm. ‘Why? Do you not feel well?’

  ‘I think I’ve been losing time,’ Rose began.

  ‘That happens when you sleep. It’s normal for humans,’ Astrid said.

  ‘Very funny.’ Rose dipped a spoon into her own hot chocolate. It was creamy and rich, the sweetness catching at the back of her throat. ‘I’m serious. I think something might be wrong with me.’

  Astrid put down her own mug and regarded Rose for a long moment. ‘I think you need a breather.’

  ‘I don’t think that’s—’

  ‘Time out. A holiday. Let’s go somewhere. Italy’s nice.’

  ‘We’ve got uni. Lectures. Essays. Exams.’

  ‘You’re just listing things now.’

  ‘Lists are good,’ Rose said. ‘Lists are sane. Lists are sensible. I need more lists in my life right now.’

  ‘You need a plan,’ Astrid said.

  ‘Yes, plans too. Plans, lists. Maybe a graph or two. Or a diagram.’

  ‘If you say the word ‘spreadsheet’ I’m leaving,’ Astrid sai
d, smiling a little. ‘We should go somewhere hot and lie on a beach.’ She stretched her arms above her head. ‘I can’t remember what it feels like to be warm all the way through.’

  Rose was distracted. ‘I thought you liked Edinburgh. You said the climate suited you.’

  ‘It does,’ Astrid said. ‘But I fancy a change. The cold has got a little old.’

  Rose still wanted to tell Astrid about her blackouts but the moment seemed to have passed. She thought, instead, that she might try to fill in some blanks. ‘Where are you from again?’

  Astrid eyed her. ‘Northumberland. You know that.’

  ‘Yeah, yeah. That’s right. I forgot.’

  ‘And I’ve got a mum and a dad and a younger brother and two dogs. Black labs.’ Astrid nudged her. ‘Your turn.’

  ‘I’m from Edinburgh. I live in Edinburgh. I go to university in Edinburgh.’

  ‘Family,’ Astrid prompted.

  ‘I live in Bruntsfield with my mum and dad. It’s cheaper than digs. I don’t have any siblings or pets. My mum is a—’ And there was the blank. It reared up so quickly that Rose felt dizzy, felt like she might fall into it. She didn’t know what her mum did. She knew there was an office in the house but she had no idea what either of her parents did in there. In that moment, she couldn’t even picture her parents. There was just a space where they should be. Figures shaped like paper dolls that were completely black and featureless.

  Astrid put a hand on her arm and Rose felt instantly better. The image of her mum and dad came back. Her mum had brown hair in a bob. There were a few streaks of silvery grey that she said she couldn’t be bothered to dye. She had kind blue eyes and wore soft cotton fairtrade clothes in shades of aubergine and ochre. Her dad was really tall and skinny. He wore checked shirts tucked into cord chinos and brown loafers with a tassel which Rose hated and had begged him on more than one occasion to burn.

  Astrid pushed Rose’s cup towards her. ‘Drink up. We need to go shopping.’