‘My brother,’ I try to sound unfriendly. I need to work out if Mace might know anything.
‘Oh,’ she says, slipping a stubborn twist of hair behind an ear and wrinkling up her forehead. I pull the pile of paper towards me. The girl holds on to the page she’s reading.
‘Shouldn’t you be at school?’ She pulls a face and her hair twists forward again over her shoulders as she finishes the article. In the daylight, she has more colour than I remember, but her clothes swamp her, and her sleeves reach down to her knuckles. She’s worn two holes in the cuffs for her thumbs to poke through. She leans back and glances around the room, pale blue eyes flashing through the overgrown mess of hair.
‘You won’t snitch on me, will you?’
I missed weeks and weeks of school, hiding from the questions. Kit would bring my work home in his own bag, and Matthew would sit with me while I tried to do it.
She’s still talking.
‘Is that your mum?’ She points at Mum’s name in the article. ‘Why would she lie like that?’ She leans back and pats the pocket of her school blazer and pulls out a packet of cigarettes. There’s something in the movement that feels familiar, and the skin on my neck prickles up.
‘It’s complicated,’ I say. ‘Are you a friend of Danny’s?’
She shakes her head, ‘He’s not in my year.’ She fishes a lighter out of another pocket and frowns at it as if she’s surprised to find it there. Eva returns with my tea and takes the lighter out of the girl’s hand.
‘Oh no you don’t, Michelle Hughes. Now, back to school with you or I’ll get Robyn,’ I nearly pour the milk on my lap, ‘here to walk you home and tell your mother where you were.’ Michelle looks like she’s got something to say but changes her mind and walks out. She leaves the door wide open so Eva has to follow after her to close it.
‘I’ve a good mind to have a word with Susan Hughes, if I could find her,’ she says when she comes back, her forehead creased. ‘I do wonder if she even cares where that girl is half the time.’
‘You remember me?’
‘Of course, I do,’ she blows her cheeks out. ‘Are Kit and Matthew here too?’
I shake my head.
‘Just me and Kit.’
‘Really? Matthew thought that was okay?’
I shrug. With Eva, there are always more questions coming, so I turn the conversation around. Even Matthew would find somewhere else to be if Eva was in interrogation mode.
‘How come you’re working here? I thought you loved your job.’
‘I did,’ Eva puts one hand on her hip, ‘and then I didn’t.’ She pauses and narrows her eyes as if she’s weighing up whether to trust me with a secret or not. I think I fail.
‘Besides, I don’t work here; I own it.’ She smiles so broadly I can’t help but look around and feel happy for her.
‘But really, Robyn, is Kit okay here? It can’t be easy.’
Why is she so worried about Kit? I pluck my waistband away from my scar under the table. Maybe Eva can tell it was my fault, but there’s no way she could know what I did.
‘Kit’s fine,’ I sigh, ‘he’s doing some supply teaching while we’re here.’
Eva raises her eyebrows, as if she’d have preferred him to be right in front of her so she could see for herself. I suppose there’s no reason for her to trust me.
‘We can’t stay for long.’ Eva wrinkles up her nose when I tell her why we’re here. I get ready for her objections.
‘They won’t like that — sooner forget that anyone here might have been involved.’ She looks out through the windows of the café. She could be talking about any number of people.
I remember Mum told me that Eva wasn’t born here either, that they were both like cuckoos in the nest. Two bold intruders carving out a life for themselves here without asking anybody’s permission.
‘I wish I could help you, but like I told Matthew, she never told me the whole story, even at the end.’ The thought silences her for a moment and then she straightens up. ‘She told us what she thought we needed to know.’
Matthew told me that. And Kit. But Mum told me we shouldn’t keep secrets from each other. Then she kept the biggest one of all.
Eva puts her hand on my shoulder and squeezes, and I shake her off. Why do people think that helps? The smile on her face falters and then she recovers.
‘So, how are you, Robyn? I’m guessing you’re not a teacher too?’ she asks with her social worker smile.
‘I’m an artist.’ Well, I will be when this is all done. The café walls are covered in fading paper, striped in peach and green with a floral border. ‘Perhaps, you could sell my pictures in here?’
Eva laughs. ‘I don’t have enough hands to cope with the café as it is without trying to sell other things too.’ She looks out to where Michelle is still visible peering in the window of the newsagents. ‘Strange girl, that one. Still, they haven’t been here long. Perhaps she’ll settle down.’
The sound of plates breaking in the kitchen makes us jump, and Eva’s off, cursing and calling out to me as she goes, ‘Don’t be so cross with her, Robyn, she really was trying to do the right thing!’
I pull the article Michelle was reading over to my side of the table and skim through it. It was written later than the others, after the trial, and the author didn’t like Mum much.
When Eva doesn’t return, I finish my drink and pack everything back into my bag.
Talking to Eva has reminded me of all the schemes she and Mum dreamt up, laughing and smoking on the bench in the garden. Mum had so many plans for her life.
‘You can start any time at all when you really want something,’ she told us. She would talk about her ideas nineteen to the dozen with Matthew late into the evening until he begged her to stop so she could catch her breath and live long enough to do everything.
I’m so angry with her that my stomach hurts. I think of my own plans, the ones I’d made before Matthew announced he was leaving.
‘You’re both sleepwalking through life,’ he said. ‘I don’t know how else to make you wake up.’ We didn’t expect, Kit and I, that Matthew would be the first of us to walk away from that new life of safety he’d so carefully created for us. I can cope fine on my own, I really can, but the world does feel more unfriendly without him.
In the morning, I find a typewritten envelope waiting for me on the kitchen table. I turn it over carefully in my hands checking the solicitors’ address before finally sliding my thumb under the flap and peeling it away. My heart flips as I consider what this could mean. I’m invited to interview for the admin assistant’s job. I leave the letter open on the table while I eat breakfast.
Eva reminded me that I have plans, a life to go to after this. I find my portfolio and flick through the sheaves of paper, then I slide them back in, dropping the whole thing out of sight behind the sofa. My own plans can wait until later, just like Kit’s.
I’ve ticked off Court Records and Newspaper Archives from my list, and all I really have to show for it are articles about Mum and the Maces. The ones that talk about what happened to us are uncomfortable to read, written like cautionary tales to scare children. There’s nothing in them that could help anyone.
So far, only one person has called about my advert. The lady told me she dreamt about a woman trying to make contact with me from the other side. Said she could help me talk to her.
‘What does she look like?’ I asked. Short hair, plump, gold ring.
Useless.
But this job at the solicitors could be all the luck I need, and Kit will be pleased I’m making progress. I plan one of Mum’s special dinner nights to celebrate, as if she and Matthew were here.
The dining room is untouched as we’ve been eating in the kitchen like lodgers, ready for flight. The silence of it is strange. I feel a hard weight in my chest when I remember all the parties Mum and Matthew had here. We could never believe how many people she’d fit in and how many more there would be spilling out throu
gh the French doors into the sun-baked garden.
I throw the doors wide open so I can breathe fresh air while I unpack. A robin flies down on to the bench outside to watch and his song bubbles and flutes away the silence. I remember to stack the newspaper from the boxes without looking at it too closely. When I’m done, I ram it right back into the cupboard under the stairs too, until it completely hides the box that’s already there. Maybe Kit will look through it all with me, if I can just talk him round.
I set the room up the way I remember it, laying the table with Mum’s colourful china and chunky crystal and placing her candlesticks along the centre. She and Matthew always played music when they were setting the table. One of Mum’s favourite songs pops into my head. I start humming and dancing and it feels okay.
The very last box is marked Mantelpiece. I open it and take out the wedding photograph and a small carriage clock and put them in place. Wrapped in more newspaper at the bottom, I find a stone with a chip revealing the crystal inside, a collection of feathers tied together in a hair band, and a piece of yellowing paper with four stick figures and Kit’s handwriting underneath saying Our Family.
The pain of seeing it all is so unexpected and disabling that I need to stop and wait it out. When the room has stilled again I place each little gift on the mantel, carefully leaving a gap on either side of the clock.
‘For all the other beautiful things you’ll bring home,’ Mum always said. She would take a step back and stand with her head on one side, hands on hips to consider the effect of each new addition. We watched her face carefully in the mirror above the mantelpiece. Her smile would change slightly just before she turned, skirts swinging around her ankles, and chose one of us to whisk up into the air while the other ran away squealing.
I pick up the clock and release the little door at the back to wind it up and then stop myself. If it was still ticking when Mum muffled it in paper and put it in the box, how long would it have taken for time to slow down and the ticking to finally fall silent among our gifts? I put it back and leave the hands at seventeen minutes past two.
I cover the chilli in the pan and go to meet Kit, the sunshine lifting the weight of the day’s work. The walk takes me out of town towards the open countryside, where the railway line winds in and out of the foliage around the hills, finally escaping far away into the distance.
I struggle to hold my course against the flow of children, who are pouring out of the gate as I reach the school. I catch sight of Kit’s head above the crowd and wave. The sea of blue uniforms slows a little, trying to hear our conversation as they pass. When Kit notices, heads drop, and speed picks up so that we’re carried along in a wash of hormones and satchels.
‘Hey, guess who got an interview at that solicitors?’ I can’t help grinning — it’s been so long since I did something that might please him.
‘I see, and you’re just going to walk in, ask them to hand over the files and then we can get outta here?’ He’s smiling, so I play.
‘Yep, just gonna ask for ’em. Job done!’
Kit’s face softens, and he throws an arm around my shoulders as we walk.
‘And I’ve made us dinner,’ I’m enjoying his approval, ‘from scratch.’
‘Not that awful lentil thing?’ He pretends to gag, and I mock thump him.
‘Well, you can’t go to an interview like that,’ he grins. I glance down at my shorts and boots and pretend surprise.
‘What? You don’t think I’ll fit in?’
Kit laughs.
The kids around us slow down to watch something on the other side of the road, and I put my hand on Kit’s arm to stop him.
A boy is sitting on the back of a wooden bench as a girl tugs at the school bag under his foot. He’s got one hand on his knee and the other holds a cigarette high in the air like a trophy. We can hear the sharp edges of her shouts through the traffic.
Most people round here might ignore a little thing like that, but we won’t. The boy clocks us crossing over first and stands up. He towers over the pathetic figure of the girl. A battered trainer keeps her bag trapped, and he cups the lit cigarette in his hand as if hoping we won’t notice it.
The girl’s words are fast and rushed, and I can only make out the odd phrase.
‘You’ve got to …’ she is screaming as she finally notices us. She falls silent. It’s that girl again. Michelle. Her face is flooded with colour, and the tips of her hair coil on to her jumper as she stops pulling the bag.
I step towards the boy, ready to grab him, but Kit stops me. This is his domain.
‘He won’t give it back,’ Michelle appeals to Kit. Her eyes flicker towards me, but she keeps her chin drawn to her chest and squints up at Kit as if the sun is behind him.
‘Oh, it’s you, Mr Stanton.’ The boy dips forward in a musketeer style bow. ‘I’m teaching this blow-in some manners, look at the screaming fury of her!’ He hooks his trainer under her bag and flicks it towards her. The contents skid across the pavement.
My fists itch to make him sorry. Count to ten, Matthew used to say, keep your cool.
I cross to where Michelle kneels among the books that have spilled from her bag. Her humiliation is obvious in the bend of her back, and I feel my own skin burning in support.
‘Cigarette,’ Kit says. The boy shrugs and throws it on to the ground, jumping off the bench to put it out.
‘And the packet,’ Kit sounds bored. They like it if you get shocked or angry, he told me once, that’s what they’re after, the difficult ones. Not me, I just wanted to be left alone.
The boy smiles again and points at Michelle. I watch as her shaking fingers pick up the red and white packet and pass it up to Kit. It’s the same brand she pulled out of her blazer at the café.
‘They’re not mine, anyway!’ She shoots me a look as if I might contradict her, but I say nothing. Maybe her mum smokes.
The boy throws his hands up in the air and rolls his eyes. He’s still grinning.
Kit crushes the packet and tosses it into a bin, little bits of tobacco scattering in the breeze.
‘You’re both under age — I should talk to your parents.’ The boy’s smile fades.
Michelle’s head droops forward.
‘Sorry, Sir,’ She grabs my hand as I pass her the last book. ‘They really are for someone else,’ she says, her eyes pale in the lowering sunlight. I look down at her hand on mine and see the green tinge of bruising around her wrist. She snatches it away again and tugs her sleeve down.
‘Who did that to you? Him?’ It won’t stop there. The hairs on the back of my neck rising. I study her pinched little face for an answer as Kit stands between us and the boy, his tone a lecture. The girl’s eyes slide away as they meet mine and she heaves the bag on to her shoulder, turning her back to me.
‘Can I go?’ she asks Kit. As she passes the boy, Michelle leans in to him and says something I can’t hear.
The boy’s face darkens, and he jumps into Michelle’s path.
‘I won’t!’ he shouts. It looks like he’s going to take a swing at her, but Kit puts a hand on his shoulder.
The boy tries to twist out of Kit’s grip, but Kit doesn’t let go. Michelle disappears through the crowd of navy waiting at the bus stop.
‘Alright, Daniel Mace, that’s enough.’
‘Danny Mace!’ I don’t want to believe it, ‘You’re Danny Mace?’ They both turn to me in surprise, as if they’d forgotten I was there. When I think about Danny, he’s just a toddler with large eyes and a runny nose, wrapped up in his mother’s arms, or the child in the newspaper pushing himself away from Mace. I was a fool to forget that he’s his father’s son too.
‘You stayed at our house once, with your mum.’ When the blood rises in Danny’s face, I can see Mace shouldering the door open. ‘Well, it was a long time ago.’ Danny looks at me blankly. ‘I gave you my teddy, actually, a pink one.’ I try and concentrate on the boy in front of me, holding my hands out to show how big the toy was, ‘beca
use you were crying. You probably don’t remember it.’ I can’t believe I didn’t consider that he might be like his father.
Kit frowns at me.
‘What if you did?’ Danny puffs out his chest, and Kit shoots me a look telling me to back off.
There’s a shout of ‘Oi, Danny’ from across the road where a group of boys has stopped to watch us. Danny looks at them, bows to us with a hint of his earlier cheek and says, ‘Gotta go.’ He crosses the road merging into the group as it wanders off along the High Street, whooping and pushing each other.
‘What d’you think she said to him?’
‘Who knows,’ says Kit. He glances at my hands as I stuff them into my pockets. ‘Hey, you look a bit pale. Why don’t you go straight home, and I’ll pick up a bottle of wine to have with this gourmet dinner you’ve made?’
When Kit gets home with the wine, I’m sitting on the stairs leaning my face against the spindles so I can see between them into the dining room. The light from the candles on the table leaps across the walls as the front door opens.
Kit waits as I drop over the banister just the way we used to, and we walk into the room together. When he sees the table, he pauses in the doorway in surprise.
‘I missed all the noise and the stuff,’ I tell him.
‘It looks nice,’ he says. He catches sight of the ornaments above the fireplace, puts his hands in the gaps on either side of the clock, and his head drops forward. I place my hand on his shoulder and hold on tight while his world tips and turns. After a while, he turns and gives me a half smile.
‘For all the other things we’d bring her,’ he says. I give him the shell that I’ve been holding in my hand, one I picked up from the beach this summer. It’s small and delicate with pink and purple lines etched into the whorls that spiral to a tiny chipped tip. He smiles at me and places it in one of the gaps.
When we have finished the chilli, I tell him about seeing Michelle in the café and how she read the newspaper article about Mum.
A Little Bird Told Me Page 6