I made sure I slammed the door loudly behind me, leaving her and Sammy in the darkness of that room.
Outside, the sharp clarity of the air was a relief after the house. From further down the street I could hear someone starting up a lawnmower, the rich petrol mingling with the sweetness of the grass clippings, and I breathed in deeply. My bike was where I had left it the previous evening, near the gate and under the tree where Tom had once hung me a netball hoop to practise. The hoop was still there, rusted and askew on one nail only.
Down the road, a van had pulled into the Jacksons’ driveway. They had no kids so I didn’t really know them, but I nodded at Mrs Jackson as she looked across at me.
‘Quite a party a last night.’ She grimaced in the direction of our house.
‘We told them to turn it down.’ Shrugging my shoulders, I tried to smile. ‘But you know what parents are like. Never obey you. Joe and I are going to have to ground them.’
The driver of the van had stepped out now, and as he slid the door shut I saw the words: Security systems. Your safety. Your peace of mind.
‘Have you been broken into?’ I asked.
She shook her head, lowering her voice, ‘It’s what happened. With that poor young girl.’
Amanda, I wanted to say. Her name was Amanda.
‘I just want to be careful.’ Mrs Jackson signed the piece of paper the driver had given her. ‘And you children should be as well,’ she added. ‘I really wouldn’t be roaming the streets the way you do.’
Sitting at the kitchen bench in her pyjamas, Sonia poured us both an overflowing bowl of cornflakes. Her mum and dad had been at our house the previous night, and her mum was still in bed, the door firmly closed. After I’d finished eating, I told Sonia to get dressed.
‘Let’s have a go on the board.’
She wasn’t keen.
I was agitated, my anxiety like a fizzy poison, the worry about seeing Lyndon in detention, my conversation with Joe about Cherry, and then Mrs Jackson saying nothing was safe had made me addled, and I couldn’t sit still.
She shrugged her shoulders. ‘If it’s what you really want, I guess we’ve got time.’
She didn’t take long to get dressed, tugging down her uniform so that it just covered the tops of her thighs, and then doing up her sandals. She wanted to go back and get her lip gloss but she relented.
‘Even though I’ll look like a dog all day.’
I rolled my eyes. ‘It takes more than make-up.’
We rode together, through the back streets, talking as we weaved across the road. I had known Sonia all my life and although there were times when we irritated each other, there were also times of ease, where we didn’t need to say all that much, we just hung out, both at home in each other’s houses, and with each other’s families. Once Tom and Dee went away for a week and I stayed with Sonia, sharing a room with her and Sal, getting up and going to school together, eating the same packed lunches. I liked it and I can’t say I missed my family or my home.
But lately, it seemed she and Cassie had become more interested in appearance, and working out what was in and what wasn’t. I hadn’t changed in the same way. They had been my best friends for so long that I couldn’t imagine hanging out without them, and yet times like this, when we simply rode, barely talking, were now rare. More often we bickered, irritating each other with our endless differences.
As we reached the top of hill that lead down to the waterfront, we both let our bikes drop to the ground.
I put my board down and offered her first go. She didn’t really want to, but she stepped on, losing balance halfway down and leaping off as the board took off without her. She didn’t chase it. And I ran down the street, only to find it hadn’t stopped in the gutter where it usually did, it had rocketed down the steps.
‘Come with me.’ I was surprised at how nervous I felt about going down there.
Sonia picked herself up from the ground and followed. I waited before taking a couple of steps, only to realise she wasn’t right behind me. She was up the top, shifting from foot to foot, and staring up at the feathery jacaranda leaves splayed across the high morning sky.
‘Are you coming?’
She nodded, biting on her lip. ‘You know, I don’t like going down there any more.’
I could only agree with her.
‘Not since Amanda, and then last time, when Lyndon was there.’
I told her I just wanted to get the board. ‘It won’t be far. And there’s both of us. We’ll be fine.’
We walked together down the first flight of stairs. I could see she was on edge and so was I, ears finely tuned to any sound, eyes alert, so much so that when we heard a cough, I jumped and Sonia screamed – shrill and high, like the panicked screech of a bird.
‘What was that?’ She grabbed my arm, wanting only to run.
There was no one behind us and no one in front.
‘Who’s there?’ I called out, trying not to sound afraid. Sonia’s nails were digging into my wrist and I pulled away from her, taking two more steps down.
He was there, right behind the wall of his garden, and when he jumped and said ‘Boo!’, his huge face red and open-mouthed right next to me, I felt the air sucked right out of my lungs, and I tried to scream but – fortunately – made no sound.
‘It’s only Bradley,’ I called out, laughing with relief, and he laughed too, wondering what the joke was.
‘It’s only Bradley,’ he repeated. ‘Only me.’ He came right up to the bars of the gate, reaching out to touch me. ‘Whatcha doing down here?’ he asked, his skin clammy on mine as he tried to keep hold of my hand.
I looked up to the top of the stairs, through the knotted branches of the trees, smooth-limbed and pale-wooded, to see if Sonia was there, my heart still thudding with a panicked beat.
She’d done a runner.
I turned towards the waterfront and realised you could see the whole sweep of the river from here.
‘Where’s your friend?’
I thought he meant Sonia and I told him she’d pissed off on me, but he was shaking his head, blowing raspberries as he did so.
‘No, no, no.’
I didn’t know what he meant.
He ran his fingers along the metal rungs of the gate, humming to the thrum it created, and then he looked at me again. His smile was wide, and there was a gap between his front teeth.
‘I love her.’ He rubbed at his heart.
And then I remembered. It was Cassie he was talking about.
‘She’s not with me,’ I explained.
‘Oh.’ His whole body slumped. So much so that I reached through the bars and took his hand. ‘I’ll bring her soon,’ I promised.
At that moment, Mrs Parsons opened her front door. I couldn’t see her, their garden was overgrown, a great tangle of rhododendrons and camellias under the shade of trees that stretched, gnarled and knotted in ivy, towards a sky that probably wouldn’t have been visible overhead. It was a garden of shame, I thought, one in which you hid from the world, and as I realised this, I felt overwhelmingly sad.
‘You mustn’t bother people,’ Mrs Parsons said as she came out along the path, slippery with rotting leaves, to take Bradley back inside.
She barely looked at me.
It was fine, I told her. He wasn’t bothering me.
‘He was telling me he was in love with one of my friends,’ and I smiled.
She was about to lead Bradley away, her hand clasped firmly around her son’s, and then she stopped, the expression on her face eager, but hesitant.
‘I couldn’t ask you a favour, could I? I just need to get up to the shops,’ she pressed her hand on my shoulder. ‘We have no milk, you see. I don’t like leaving Bradley alone but he’s so difficult to get in the car. If you could just stay with him for five minutes?’
I could see how much she hated asking, and I felt I had no choice but to agree. She told me the front door was open and to help myself to anything if I was hungry.
She wouldn’t be long, she promised. With her bag over her shoulder, she was out that gate quicker than I had thought possible, barely looking back as she made her escape up the stairs and onto the road where she would have parked her car. For an instant, I wondered whether she’d come back. The relief of being on her own must have been enormous.
‘Mum,’ Bradley called, his face red as he opened his mouth wide and wailed. ‘Mum.’ He gripped the gate and tried to open it.
‘Don’t.’ I seized his arm in an attempt to stop him, but he pushed me aside.
In her rush, she had forgotten to lock the gate behind her, and before I had time to do anything, he fumbled with the bolt, his thick fingers sliding it back. It squeaked as he pushed the gate outwards, and he stepped out onto the small path that led from his house to the waterfront stairs. He stood under the great sweeping shade of pale green plane tree, his hands held up in confusion as he called out for his mother again.
‘Come back in,’ I tried to coax him. ‘She’s just gone to the shops. She won’t be long.’
But he ignored me, and I watched in dismay as he turned towards the waterfront, lumbering and heavy. His breathing laboured, he stumbled down the uneven stone steps, like a giant in a fairy story, crashing through the undergrowth.
‘Wait,’ I called out, and I ran straight after him. My board was there at his feet and I picked it up as I told him not to go any further. ‘It’s dangerous.’
He looked at me, wiping his nose with the back of his hand, and considering my words.
Overhead a magpie watched us, a bright stony eye focused on our struggle.
‘You go down there.’ He folded his arms across his chest. ‘I’ve seen you.’
I did, I agreed, but not at the moment. ‘Bad things have happened down there,’ I told him. I didn’t want to be responsible for him at the waterfront; I just wanted to keep him at home until his mother returned.
‘Someone died down there.’ He leant in close to deliver this last bit of news and I could see the pinkness of his tongue. ‘I know.’
‘Who told you?’ I asked, hoping now to distract him with conversation.
He ground the tip of his finger into his chest, nodding his head up and down without answering me.
‘Well,’ I said eventually, ‘that’s why we shouldn’t go down there, it might be dangerous.’
He looked at me, considering my words for a moment, and then he remembered why he had left home in the first place. ‘Mum,’ he called out again, his voice high and anxious.
She might be home now, I suggested. We should go and look.
I turned back up the stairs, holding my hand behind me for him to follow, and I was relieved when I heard his footsteps, slow, but right behind me.
Mrs Parsons wasn’t back yet. I knew she wouldn’t be, but I told Bradley we should hunt for her in the house. ‘In case she’s hiding.’
He narrowed his eyes, turning my suggestion over in his head for a few moments, and then he clapped his hands in glee. ‘Coming ready or not,’ he called out as we stepped into the darkness of the front hall.
It was a house that people didn’t visit, a place that was kept shut up from the light and the world. Thick velvet curtains were drawn across each of the windows, and the air was musty. In the darkness I could only just make out the large pieces of furniture, heavy sideboards and tables, wardrobes and dressers, making it difficult to edge through the spaces without knocking an elbow or stubbing a toe. Only the kitchen had any light, and I waited in there while Bradley looked, under beds, behind doors, in the folds of the drapes until eventually he gave up.
‘Where is she?’ He was certain I would provide a response.
She would be back soon, I promised and I offered to get him something to eat while we waited.
He opened the fridge and looked at the contents. There wasn’t much.
‘I like ice-cream.’ He took a large tub of chocolate from the freezer.
I made him a bowl and then one for myself, despite the fact that I’d only just had breakfast. Dee never bought chocolate.
We sat out on the front step, eating.
‘What’s your name?’ Bradley asked me, and I told him.
‘That’s a funny name.’ He grinned at me, and then he pointed at his own chest. ‘My name is Bradley.’
‘Pleased to meet you.’ I held out my hand to shake his and he thought it was very funny. So much so that he wanted to do it again, and again and again.
As I looked at my watch anxiously for the third time, I finally heard footsteps coming down the stairs. Light, delicate steps, and it was her, Mrs Parsons, with a shopping bag.
‘Mum.’ Bradley held her tight as soon as she opened the gate, and she hugged him back, the look on her face enough to make me also smile.
She was so sorry she was late. She hoped I didn’t mind, and she fumbled in her purse to find some change to give me – ‘for your trouble’.
I didn’t want to take it.
She insisted.
I said I had to get going or I’d be late for school, and as I headed to the gate, Bradley let out another wail. ‘Don’t go.’ He reached for my arm, and Mrs Parsons tried to pry his fingers off. ‘Don’t go.’
His cry made me feel awful. I promised I’d be back, that we’d eat ice-cream together again soon.
‘And play hide and seek?’
‘And play hide and seek.’
Mrs Parsons took him out the gate and onto the first of the stone steps so that he could wave goodbye to me.
‘Don’t go down there.’ He pointed to where the path led to the river, the steps an uneven tumble of sandstone under the knotted shade of coral and plane trees. ‘It’s bad down there.’
I told him I wasn’t. I was going to school.
‘Promise?’
I crossed my heart.
The assembly bell was ringing when I got to the gates and I rushed straight to Joe in the hope of reminding him to get Cherry to go to the police. I lowered my voice because she was only a couple of kids away. ‘Did you tell her she had to go? It’s wrong not to.’
The amplifier crackled as Mr Castle turned it on, and I had no way of making it to my line in time now, so I slipped in, next to Kate and Cherry, hushing them both with the tip of my finger. I could only hope I would escape unnoticed and somehow find a way of rejoining my form when the long list of announcements was finished.
I glanced behind me quickly, and there at the other end of the boys was Nicky Blackwell. I looked down, but not fast enough to escape his wink and raised eyebrow.
I stood perfectly still, not wanting to be noticed. At the end of the line a couple of teachers clustered together, Miss Ingleton among them. I was sure I saw her shake her head in dismay as Mr Castle began his usual speech about hair length, dress length and jewellery, but I didn’t want to watch her for too long in case she turned in my direction.
Finally, he called us to attention. The same two syllables – the long drawn-out ‘Atten–’, followed by the snap of the ‘SHUN’, and the slap of ankles being drawn together, never as crisp as he would have liked (if fact, we often had to repeat the drill until there was a perfect clap), and the slow shuffle of the lines towards class.
Darkwater Page 11