by Gary McMahon
“I thought you managed to get here quickly. That explains it. What kind of stuff? Like, his will?”
“No, it was nothing like that. Just some old records... books and files, notebooks he’d kept about the Northumberland Poltergeist and something called Captain Clickety.”
Abby giggled. Then, softly, she began to chant a rhyme.
“Captain Clickety, he’s coming your way. Captain Clickety, he’ll make you pay. Once in the morning, twice in the night. Three times Clickety will give you a fright.”
“What’s that?”
“Just an old skipping song. We used to sing it when we were at school.”
“The Pollack children called their ghost Captain Clickety.”
She laughed, quietly, humourlessly. “He’s like a catch-all around here, our own little bogeyman. Everything gets blamed on good old Captain Clickety.”
Marc took another drink of wine, leaned his head back against the sofa. “I’m starting to think that Captain Clickety might be a lot more than some colourful local urban legend.”
“What do you mean?” her hand strayed to his thigh, rested there, gripping him lightly.
“I think he really existed. In Harry’s notes, I found a name. Terryn Mowbray. He was a plague doctor, back during the time of the Black Death.”
“Really?” She sounded drowsy. The wine was affecting her.
“Yeah. Not a very nice man, by all accounts, and he went missing in the grove of oak trees that used to be where the Needle was built. Two hundred years later, someone by that name also turned up at a colony of settlers in America. They went missing, leaving behind strange words carved into trees. I think the trees were oaks and rowans... English trees, not native to America. The same name was mentioned, but I’m certain it wasn’t the same guy... I mean, it couldn’t be. That’s impossible.” His mind was racing again, struggling to put together a puzzle to which he only possessed a handful of pieces.
“Sounds like a fairy story to me,” said Abby, stretching her spine, like a tired cat.
“Yeah. Yes, it does.” He closed his eyes and saw a beak-faced man standing unmoving in the darkness behind the lids.
Abby set down her glass on the floor, turned, and lunged at him. Her dressing gown gaped, exposing her breasts. She rammed her tongue between his lips, bit at his mouth, grabbed at his cock. She smelled of loam and wood smoke: the aroma of autumn.
“Whoa,” he said, pulling back. “At least let me get warmed up first.”
Five minutes later they were upstairs, fucking like banshees.
Afterwards they lay side by side in bed, finishing off the wine. Abby rested her head on his chest and he stroked her dry, brittle hair. He ran his fingers along her long, smooth throat, and cupped one of her breasts.
She stirred, moaned, pulled up her head and kissed his chest. Then she turned her attention to the tattoo on his left bicep. She leaned on one elbow and traced the outline with her other hand.
“What is it?”
“A flower.”
“I can see that, you idiot. What kind of flower?”
“It’s a daisy, I think.”
“You think?” She kissed it, the tip of her tongue flicking lightly at his flesh.
“Yes... it’s a daisy.”
“Does it mean anything? Anything particular, like?”
He shook his head. “No, not really. It just means I was pissed when I got it. See the weird black lines around the petals? I liked the look of it. I had it done when I was eighteen, after an all-day drinking session with a few mates. Not one of my finest moments, I’ll admit. In retrospect, I wish I’d got something more profound.”
“Like a British bulldog?”
“A Union Jack or a football badge... perhaps a scroll with the word ‘mother’ on it.”
She laughed softly. Pulling away from him, she lay on her back with her breasts exposed. The nipples were standing up like bullets. Her skin was corpse-white, apart from the few faint mucky smears he’d noticed earlier.
Marc shifted his position and lay on his side, so that he could watch her reaction to his question: “That bloke, the one who came to see you the morning I was here...”
“Erik? What about him?” Her face was impassive as she stared up at the ceiling.
“He was Tessa’s dad, wasn’t he?”
She nodded, but didn’t speak.
“He threatened me. Warned me off, told me he’d hurt me if I came around here again.”
“But here you are.”
It was his turn to nod. He stroked her arm and once again cupped her breast, unable to keep his hands off her.
She smiled. “Don’t worry.” She closed her eyes. “He does that all the time. He can’t stand to see me with someone else. It’s partly my fault, I suppose. I used to go with men right under his nose, rub it in his face. Just to hurt him, like.”
“Why would you want to do that – hurt him?”
She sighed and opened her eyes. Her breasts rose and fell, filling and then emptying the motionless palm of his hand. “Because he’s a reminder of the way things used to be, when Tessa was still here. I can’t stand to even look at him because whenever I do, I think of her. I see her, standing there, holding his hand and smiling. She loved her Dad... and he loved her, in his own way. He loved us both too much, and not enough.”
“I see.” But he didn’t; he didn’t see at all. She was making little sense, but he was too tired to go into it any deeper. Let her have her rants, her furies. Just as long as they could fuck: as long as she allowed him inside her, where it was cold and harsh and compelling.
Before long he heard the sound of her snoring. It caught hold of him, that sound, and he felt himself slipping away, entering a light sleep. He was still clasping her breast in one hand. The nipple was hard, but it started to soften as she slumbered. He tried to open his eyes but it was impossible. When finally he did open them, she was gone from the bed. Time had passed but he wasn’t sure how long. The bedroom door was open. There was a light on somewhere along the hall, coming from an open door.
Tessa’s room.
He got out of bed and put on his clothes, feeling drowsy and disorientated. He left the room, walked along the hall, and stood outside the room, looking in. Abby was there, naked, kneeling before the pile of clothes and toys and paper. Her left hand was thrust between her legs, working furiously. There was sweat on her brow. Her shoulders were hunched, her back arched. When she came, she did so silently. Then she stood, walked past him without noticing, and returned to bed. By the time he’d followed her back into the bedroom, she was once again sleeping. He stood there, listening to her snore, wondering exactly how fucked up she might be. Wondering if she was more fucked up than he was.
HE WALKED BACK to Harry Rose’s place. It wasn’t far, and by now he knew the way. The night air was warm, the moon and the stars were bright, and most of the streetlights were still working. Voices carried on the air; he heard the distant sound of a revving engine; an alarm started to blare, but it was too far away to bother him. Occasionally, he glanced back over his shoulder, certain that he was being followed, but there was never anyone there. One time he thought he glimpsed a shadow – not much, just a swiftly moving dark patch. It looked like it might be a dog, but its head was much too large, lolling on a thin, stalk-like neck. He only caught sight of it for a second, and then began to doubt that he’d seen anything at all.
Back at Harry’s place he locked the door and checked the ground floor windows were secure. Everything was good; he was sealed safely inside, where no one could get to him. He tried to shrug off these paranoid thoughts, but they wouldn’t let go. They clung to him like strands of silk, sticking wherever they touched.
The sex and the wine had exhausted him, but not enough that he’d wanted to stay at Abby’s place until morning. He’d left a note on the bedside cabinet, a hastily scribbled message telling her that he’d call her in a few days. He figured that it was enough. If she didn’t want commitment, it should
be plenty.
He sat down on the sofa and grabbed the remote control, switching on the television. Harry had only used the normal terrestrial channels: no cable, no satellite. There wasn’t much on at this late hour, just a re-run of some old black and white American sitcom, a documentary about insects, and news programmes. He left on the documentary, staring at images of mandibles and segmented exoskeletons. Before he knew it, he was dozing again, the world growing dark and empty.
He woke to the sound of movement. At least that’s what he thought. He couldn’t be sure, because he had been dreaming of movement, too: massive insects, crawling across the estate, scuttling through the darkness.
He sat up and felt the muscles in his neck tighten. He rubbed at the area, trying to ease the pain. “Fuck...”
The sound came again: this time he heard it properly, something shifting upstairs, like furniture being moved. The television was off but he couldn’t remember if he’d done it or not. Hadn’t he gone to sleep with it still on? The room was dark, with only a chink of streetlight leaking through gap in the blinds.
Marc was no longer alone. He could feel it, just as he could feel the sofa beneath him, the cushion pressing against his back. It was not some abstract emotional sensation, but a physical realisation that he was not the only one occupying the space between these walls. There was somebody else inside the house.
He thought about leaving but he would feel cowardly if he left without checking that his suspicion was true. His mobile was somewhere near by – perhaps even in his pocket – but he didn’t want to call the police. He wasn’t sure how he knew this, but a burglary was not taking place. Whoever was in the house, they meant him no harm. He was afraid, but he felt in no danger. If they’d wanted to hurt him, they could have done so while he slept.
He remembered the man who’d threatened him, Erik Best. Abby’s ex. What if he’d been watching the house, and then had followed Marc back from her place?
No, if it was him, he’d have hurt Marc by now, probably battered him half to death as he dozed on the sofa. This was someone else, something different.
Calmly, he stood and walked to the living room doorway. None of the lights were on in the house. He considered reaching out to switch on the stair light but that would announce his presence in the stairwell and give whoever was up there fair warning that he was going up. So he left the light out, and slowly began to climb the stairs.
Halfway up, he paused. Fear had crept softly up the stairs alongside him, and now it had reached out to grab his hand. His palms were sweating. His knees felt soft, as if they might give way.
What if it was Erik, the crazy ex-boyfriend? What if he was playing a game, toying with Marc, luring him upstairs so that, once he reached the top, he could push him down and pretend that his death was an accident?
He got himself under control and finished climbing the stairs. At the top, he looked around at the door which led to the attic rooms. It was open. Faint light spilled down the attic stairs. There was somebody at the top of the house. He moved slowly along the landing, and when he reached the open door he peered around the frame. He couldn’t see anyone, but the door to the model room was open, and he saw shadows spill across the stair walls as someone or something moved and momentarily blocked out the lamplight. He could’ve sworn that he’d turned off the lamp and shut the door when he came down earlier that evening. Now the door was open, the lamp was on.
He climbed slowly, lifting his feet with great care and setting them down again as gently as possible. Boards creaked; the banister shuddered against the wall, the screws slightly loose. He couldn’t believe he was doing this, approaching potential danger – whenever he saw it in a film, he always mocked the character’s stupidity.
When he reached the top of the stairs he was unable to move. He was too afraid to do anything but stand there, poised for fight or flight, and stare at the door frame. He drew in a deep breath, clenched his fists and moved.
“Fuck!” He screamed the word at the top of his voice, planning to shock whoever might be in there into making an error. But the room was empty; there was nobody inside. He looked around the room, looking for signs of interference, but nothing had been moved. He walked over to the model table and stared at the miniature layout of the estate. It took him a while to see it – longer than he would have thought possible, when he thought about it later – but eventually his eyes picked up on the changes.
Someone had added certain details to the model.
Small trees had sprouted, breaking through the roads and pavements and thrusting upwards. Windows were broken, cars were overturned, and yet more trees had appeared inside some of the tiny houses. He could see their shapes through the intact windows; in other places, spindly leafless branches poked through the shattered panes.
Dotted throughout the model neighbourhood were small figures, half-bodied scarecrows dressed in rags and supported on thin wooden stakes. They lolled at angles, leant against walls, and a couple of them had fallen over and seemed to be frozen in the act of crawling along the street, dragging their supporting columns behind them like battered and exposed backbones.
The biggest change had been wrought upon the Needle. The base of the tower block was wrapped in thick, gnarled roots, as if it were in the process of transforming into a massive oak tree. Trunks and branches had penetrated the concrete walls, growing from the inside, and snaked around the building, forming a fibrous spiral along its length.
Marc’s mouth was dry. His hands were shaking. Was somebody playing tricks on him, having a laugh at his expense? It might even be Abby. She was certainly psychologically damaged enough to think that something like this would be amusing.
He reached out and touched the wide, serpentine trunk that had wound itself around a portion of the Needle. It was not made out of paper or card, or even rubber and plastic. What he felt beneath his fingers was real wood. Like some kind of freakish bonsai, the small tree had taken root, sprouted, and started to grow.
Then he noticed the figures. He was sure they hadn’t been there, in this position, when he’d first entered the model room. Tiny scarecrows, their upper bodies wrapped in raggedy clothing, their lower bodies consisting of nothing more than cocktail sticks pushed into the ground, anchoring the figures in place. They were standing on the Roundpath, the narrow road that circled the Needle, looking up at the central tower. Each of them was wearing a floppy hat; their arms were outstretched, in a Jesus Christ pose. Marc wasn’t sure if they were caught in an act of worship or surrender. He didn’t think it made much difference either way.
The lamplight began to flicker, creating a strobe effect. Between one second of light and the next, something appeared on the model table. It was a small notebook, like the ones he’d found in the attic library. A patch of darkness moved away from the table; a quick, snaking movement, like an arm being drawn back.
“Harry? Is it you, Harry?” He was too anxious to feel stupid, but somehow the very idea of talking to a ghost felt wrong, awkward. He didn’t believe in ghosts... Or did he? If that were true, then why was he researching the Northumberland Poltergeist? And now that he thought about it, wasn’t he holding back on that research, keeping it at arm’s length? It was as if he were attached to a heavy weight by an elastic belt. Whenever he moved forward, the elastic became taut and it held him back. He could feel his feet sliding across the floor, moving backwards.
He stepped over to the model table and picked up the book. The front cover was dusty. He opened it to the first page. There wasn’t much written down there, but it was enough.
He read the words and felt doors opening up inside him:
Apart from the Pollack twins, there was a third child in the flat. A baby.
He closed his eyes and things twitched back there in the reddish darkness. Those doors stood ajar; they would not open fully, but it was enough for light to leak through the gap. Shadows twirled and danced; a ballet of darkness. Marc struggled to grab hold of whatever it was that cape
red there, inside him, but it was too slippery to get a grip on.
There was something there but he couldn’t make out what it was. Like a body under a sheet, he could discern only the outline. No details were visible.
He left the room, closing the door firmly behind him. In his hand, he gripped the notebook.
On the small landing, he stood with his back pressed up against the door, trying to convince himself that he could not hear the sounds of scrabbling from behind him, somewhere inside the room. On the table that held the model of the estate. He wasn’t quite ready to accept that. Such an admission would indicate a state of mind that he wasn’t prepared to face.
In fact, admitting that those sounds were real would be akin to embracing madness.
Downstairs, he sat on the sofa and began to read the rest of the notebook.
Apart from the Pollack twins, there was a third child in the flat. A baby.10
Jack Pollack died when he was thirteen. He was found hanging from a rafter in the squat where he lived.
Daisy Pollack turned to prostitution when she was fourteen, then drugs. She was dead in a gutter by the time she was fifteen.
Nobody knows what happened to the baby.11 There is no record of the twins having another sibling – itself a surviving twin who’s brother was stillborn, if local gossips are to be believed.12 After the events in the Needle, when it seems that some kind of spirit came through and wrecked the flat, the family disappeared – they seem to have vanished off the face of the earth, up until the car crash that killed the parents. All the stories and rumours told on the estate make specific mention of the twins and what happened to them, but not once have I been told about a baby.
But there was a baby. I’ve seen it. The baby came to me in a waking dream. It crawled across the ceiling of my room and spoke to me, telling me that nothing ever ends and nothing ever begins, and saying that Captain Clickety will return.