Of Things Gone Astray

by Janina Matthewson

  She said nothing as she approached Cassie, simply looked her up and down once before focusing on her feet. She knelt down and looked closely at the bark. She tugged gently at one of the roots. She leaned forward and gave a long sniff, breathing in the aroma.

  Cassie’s mother gasped as the arborist pulled out a small, gleaming knife. She swiftly and deftly flicked the knife over Cassie’s left foot, down and up again in one fluid motion. Cassie gave a sharp intake of breath and her mother cried out.

  ‘Did you feel that?’ asked the arborist, looking Cassie in the eye for the first time.

  ‘Yes,’ said Cassie. ‘Not on my foot, really. Just, I just felt it. In general.’

  ‘Hmm,’ said the arborist. She’d removed her gaze from Cassie’s face and was looking at the sliver of wood she’d just carved out of Cassie. It was very thin but wide. The arborist had sliced deep into Cassie’s foot. She looked closely at the sliver for some time.

  ‘Well,’ she said, finally, getting to her feet. ‘It looks like willow.’

  ‘She’s turning into a willow tree?’ asked Cassie’s mother.

  ‘Looks that way. Worrying. Willows like a lot of moisture. Not really suited to airport terminals.’

  ‘But how do we stop it?’

  ‘Stop what?’

  ‘Stop it happening. How do we stop her turning into a tree?’

  The arborist looked from Cassie to her mother and back again. ‘In these cases of spontaneous transformation—’

  ‘So it’s happened before?’

  The arborist blinked at the interruption. ‘What?’

  ‘You’ve seen this before?’

  ‘No. No, not at all, not at all, not me. Not anyone I know. But there are stories, you know. There have always been stories.’

  ‘What stories?’

  ‘Well. Girls that turn into trees for protection or for money or what have you.’

  ‘How do they turn back?’

  ‘Turn back? Well. Sometimes they do, that is true. But those are the parts of the stories that always seem the least plausible. Using the right kind of jug to water the tree, or even pronouncing some kind of spell. Ha! As if words are going to have any effect on a tree. Idiocy. Anyway, even if you allow for that kind of nonsense, it hardly ever goes well, hardly ever. Branches have come off, you know, so the girls will be missing arms and such like. But the girls that stay as they are, well. Sometimes it’s been the creation of a whole new kind of tree, and who wouldn’t want that?’

  ‘Who wouldn’t – what?’

  ‘It’s all right, Mum,’ said Cassie. Her voice felt rougher and deeper than it had been. ‘I have to stay here anyway. Floss is coming here. I don’t need to move.’

  ‘Yes, you do, love. You need to come home. You need to sleep in your bed and eat some good food. And you need to start thinking about the possibility that Floss isn’t coming.’

  ‘She is.’

  ‘Seems to me she’d have been here by now. Seems to me she’d have called you.’

  ‘I’m staying here. It doesn’t matter what my feet look like. Floss doesn’t care what my feet look like.’

  Cassie’s mum turned back to the arborist. ‘How can we stop it happening?’

  ‘Oh, you can’t. It’ll be interesting to see it progress, though.’

  ‘So there’s nothing we can do? We just lose hope?’

  ‘Lose hope in what? Nature? Quite the reverse, it’s a sign that we should never lose hope in nature. This is a fascinating occurrence.’

  ‘I am losing my daughter! This isn’t fascinating, this is horrific. Are you saying there’s no chance that this, whatever it is, is going to reverse itself?’

  ‘That’s what’s so exciting! I have no idea. I’ve never seen this before. As far as I know no one’s ever seen it before, at least not recently enough for it to be anything but legend now. We don’t know what started it happening, we don’t know what’ll keep it going or what could stop it. There’s just so much to discover.’

  Cassie could hear the impending rise in her mother’s pitch.

  ‘Mum,’ she said. ‘Mum.’ She waited a moment for the sound of her voice to register. Her mother coughed a little in the attempt to cease hysterics.

  ‘Mum,’ said Cassie again. ‘It’s OK. It’s not like I want to leave here anyway. I have to stay.’

  ‘Cassie, I know you want to stay, but you shouldn’t. You should be coming home and living your life. And even if you are staying it should be because you’re a grumpy, stubborn, wilful girl, not because you’re physically unable to move. Not because you’re turning into a bloody tree. It’s just not right.’

  ‘It’s just my feet, Mum. Never liked them anyway. I’m fine. It’s fine.’

  Jake.

  Jake’s jersey is covered in tiny droplets of water as he stands on the footpath facing his house. It looks like a ghostly imitation of itself. It is raining, but not properly raining. It is the sort of rain that feels like it’s hovering, rather than falling. It’s almost mist, except without the mystery. Fine drops of water float morosely through the air, finding clothes and eyelashes to cling to.

  Jake wishes he’d gone back inside with his mother. She’d gone to get a recipe for the smiling lady. The smiling lady is friends with Mel, who is friends with Jake’s mum, but the smiling lady is not friends with Jake’s mum. Jake’s mum doesn’t really like her and is annoyed about having promised her the recipe.

  She said she’d be quick but it’s been ages and she’s not back yet and Jake’s hair is now uncomfortably damp.

  Jake wishes he didn’t have to go to the doctor. It didn’t seem to him like there was anything particularly the matter with his knees and feet anyway. He didn’t know why people kept picking on them. If he didn’t have to go to the doctor he could be inside playing or reading. Except if he didn’t have to go the doctor he’d have to be at school. Jake sighed.

  He stumbled when the ground moved, but only a little. He didn’t fall. The house fell, but Jake stayed standing.

  Jake sighed. He couldn’t remember, he couldn’t know for certain. Surely, when he figured out the right weather he would be able to tell. He would know what that day had been like. It would make sense.

  Jake was eating breakfast alone. No, his dad was there. He and his dad were eating breakfast at the same time. He suddenly felt like his dad had been talking to him, had been asking him questions, and he hadn’t even noticed.

  ‘What?’ he said.

  ‘Do you want to go out for burgers tonight?’ his dad said. ‘We haven’t done a boys’ night out for ages.’

  ‘Oh. Sure.’

  They sat with their toast, silently, companionably. Chewing. When they were finished, Jake’s dad took both of the plates to the sink and washed them. He looked at Jake, nodded a couple of times, and went down the hall to his office.

  Jake wasn’t really sure if he did want to go out for burgers. He wasn’t sure he wanted to spend a whole evening talking to his dad. He had other things on his mind.

  Marcus.

  HE NOTICED HE WASN’T WEARING shoes when he was in the middle of the shop. He didn’t know what to do. Pointless to go home, really, wasn’t it, just to put on shoes and come all the way back. All he wanted to do was buy milk. A man could buy milk, if he wanted, without shoes. And salt, he needed salt.

  He looked around. There were only a few people. They wouldn’t mind, there was no reason to think they’d mind. They probably had their own concerns, probably didn’t care at all about an old man’s naked feet.

  He was standing by the pet food. That wasn’t right. He didn’t have any pets. Had never wanted any. People had suggested he get a cat after Albert died, but he hadn’t. Hadn’t seen the point.

  How had he got all the way to the shop without noticing he wasn’t wearing shoes or socks? How had he not felt the concrete on the soles of his feet? He hoped he hadn’t stepped in something, or on something, without noticing it.

  A hand landed on his shoulder and he turned
around.

  ‘Dad?’ she looked upset. ‘What’s going on?’

  ‘I needed some milk,’ he said. ‘I had to come and buy some milk. And some salt. I need milk and salt.’

  ‘You said you’d be home for the piano man. He called me because no one was home. I’ve been waiting for you for almost half an hour.’

  How long had he been standing here? How long had he been staring at pet food he didn’t need?

  ‘What did he say? The piano man, what did he say? Can he fix it?’

  ‘Yeah, he’s fixing it now.’

  ‘He’s fixing it. He’s fixing it now. He’s fixing my piano.’

  His daughter looked at him closely.

  ‘Are you all right?’ she asked.

  He couldn’t answer immediately. He swallowed and let out a grunt.

  He’d spent hours over that piano, with his father, when he was twenty-one. Years before Albert, years before her; when he was deciding who he was going to be. He’d restored that piano and as he’d done so, he’d built himself; it was more a part of him than anything else he had.

  ‘Dad, I don’t know what to do.’

  ‘Salt. I need salt.’

  ‘Dad, where are your shoes?’

  She didn’t speak all the way home. She was silent as she opened the front door. Strange, for her. She’d always been a chatterer. She went to the kitchen and got out the kettle, but she didn’t fill it. She put it on the bench beside the sink and walked round and round. She’d never been able to hide the way she felt. She was far more expressive than he or Albert had ever been. He had always though it strange that she had made no effort to pursue the arts, having been raised as she had by him and Albert. She’d always been far more interested in science. He now thought it was because she didn’t need any more expression than her face already gave her. With a face like that, had she been interested in the arts, she could have been an actress. Like her mother.

  He was glad she preferred science.

  He watched his girl now: her mouth constantly moving, her lips pressing together, then coming apart, her tongue moving over her teeth. Searching for something to say.

  ‘I’m all right,’ he said. ‘I just need to be able to play. I just need some music.’

  ‘I know.’ She sighed. He hated making her sigh. She was not made for sighs.

  Delia.

  WHAT WAS HAPPENING TO DELIA had been happening for years, although she hadn’t noticed it. The first symptom showed itself seven months and five days after the accident. That was the day her mother felt strong enough to get dressed by herself for the first time. It was the day she almost managed to get from her bed to her wheelchair without help, and Delia could tell she’d get there within a few days.

  It was the day Delia’s mother said, ‘Soon you won’t have to look after me so much. Soon you’ll be able to start finishing your degree.’

  It was the day Delia stood in front of her old bedroom door. It was the day she stood there and thought about all the boxes of notes, of all the textbooks, of the so nearly finished dissertation. It was the day she stood in front of the door and didn’t open it.

  Right up until the moment when she didn’t open the door, Delia had been looking forward to starting her studies again. Right up until that moment she’d planned to take out her carefully filed notes and read over what she’d written so far, and decide whether she wanted to reconsider her angle. She’d thought about whether she wanted to work for a while or do further study. She’d browsed the internet for PHD options. But for some reason, when she stood in front of that door, she couldn’t figure out whether or not she wanted to open it. She had no reason for not wanting to open it, she just didn’t know whether she wanted to. So she didn’t.

  Delia’s mother was not an observant or thoughtful woman. As the weeks went by, she failed to ask when Delia was planning to keep studying. As the months passed, she didn’t ask whether Delia was going to do something else. As the years changed, she didn’t ask what Delia wanted.

  She had always believed Delia’s teachers when they wrote on all those report cards that Delia was driven, that she was focused and ambitious. She’d always been proud that people could say that about her daughter, but she’d never been one to say those things herself. She’d never noticed what it was about her that made her teachers so regularly make such comments. And she didn’t notice as that direction began to fade.

  Neither did Delia.

  They also didn’t notice it when, two years later, Delia stopped deciding what they should have for dinner. She made the same three indifferent meals in sequence, week after week, month after month, without thinking. They didn’t notice when she stopped thinking about what clothes she wanted to wear, or what she wanted to do with her hair, and instead started cycling through her most comfortable clothes in the order they were hanging in her closet, and throwing her hair haphazardly into a structurally unsound pile on her head.

  They didn’t notice it start and they didn’t notice it getting worse, until suddenly Delia couldn’t find her way anywhere at all.

  So it happened one day that she got lost in the middle of Trafalgar Square. She hadn’t decided to go there; she just came across the tube station and got on a train. She’d got out at the other end, and found herself in front of the National Portrait Gallery. She hadn’t been able to decide whether she should go inside. She hadn’t been there in years.

  She walked around a bit while she thought about whether or not she should visit the gallery, and two minutes later she was standing beside a lion, completely lost.

  She knew where she was, obviously, but she didn’t know how to get anywhere else. She didn’t know how to get back to the gallery, but then she still didn’t know whether she wanted to go in. She didn’t know how to get to the tube station, even though she knew it was right beside the square. She didn’t know how long she’d been standing there, lost beside a lion.

  ‘Wow,’ someone said. ‘Hello again.’

  Delia blinked. It was the man from the park.

  ‘Oh. Hello. Anthony.’

  ‘Are you all right?’

  Delia bit her lip and thought about it. She wasn’t sure what was going on and she wasn’t sure how worried she should be. She’d been panicked when she got lost in the park, but this time she was simply baffled.

  ‘I,’ she said. ‘Yes, I’m all right. I’m lost again, but I’m OK.’

  That was the moment she discovered that Anthony’s face got very still when he didn’t believe someone. He persuaded her to come with him for a coffee, and pointed out the entrance to Charing Cross Station on the way past.

  They sat in silence for a few minutes. Delia couldn’t tell if it was an awkward silence or a comfortable one. She wondered if she should start talking just in case it was the former.

  ‘So you’ve a kid,’ she said, awkwardly.

  ‘Yeah.’

  Delia cleared her throat and continued. ‘How’s he liking London?’

  ‘He’s good, I think. He’s pretty relaxed, you know, pretty philosophical. I was worried, but he’s doing well. He’s quite quiet, you know, he’s not a big talker, but he’s made some friends, he gets on with the other kids. He’s good at maths. He’s very good at maths. But his grammar is appalling, apparently. Standards are higher here, I think. Teachers are better educated. That seems mean. Might not even be true. Anyway, Jake’s doing well. I can’t believe how grown up he’s becoming. He used to be this gangly knock-kneed kid who never stopped talking, and now he’s all tall and serious.’

  ‘He had knock-knees?’

  ‘Yep. And a pudding-bowl haircut. Not anymore, though. Now he looks like a proper human.’

  They sat some more.

  ‘What did your mother do?’ Anthony asked. ‘Before the accident?’

  ‘She had a bookshop.’

  ‘She can’t still do that?’

  ‘I don’t know. I guess she doesn’t think so. Tall shelves, not much room, you know. And she’d have to leave the ho
use.’

  ‘Right. Why doesn’t she want to leave the house?’

  ‘I don’t actually know.’ Delia said. ‘Whenever I try to encourage her to, she gets petulant and awful. So now she embroiders.’

  ‘She embroiders?’

  ‘She only embroiders. She doesn’t do anything else. Ever. She doesn’t even watch television, so we don’t have one in the house.’

  ‘Jake decided he wanted to try that once. Embroidery, I mean, not the not watching television. He asked his mum to teach him, but she was terrible at it, was never good at sewing-related activities actually, so I had to take over. Our biggest achievement was a ten-inch-square picture of a pair of gorillas that we very nearly finished.’

  By this point they’d finished their coffees and Delia didn’t know whether she wanted another one so she stood up.

  ‘Will you be OK?’ asked Anthony as they left. ‘Do you want me to help you get home?’

  ‘No,’ said Delia, too abruptly. ‘I’ll be fine. I just need to make it to the tube station. Which is just over there, right?’

  ‘Sure. I mean, it’s more in the other direction. But you were close.’

  ‘Right. If by close you mean incredibly far away.’

  ‘I should help you get home.’

  ‘Absolutely not. I will not be a girl who’s literally lost without a man.’

  ‘But you’d be happy to be that figuratively?’

  ‘Thank you. I’ll be fine.’

  ‘You know the way home from the station at the other end?’

  Delia knew she didn’t. She knew by now the chances of her getting out of the station and knowing where to go were a pale shadow in a dimly lit room by this point, but there’s a limit to how often you can admit to being lost in one day.