Take Me Home

by Daniela Sacerdoti

  Inary

  PS: I’m sorry.

  I let myself fall onto the bed and curled up under the duvet. I was supposed to avoid him, and there I was, going to him again.

  I knew it was my fault. I should have not let it happen – that night between us, that night that had been so glorious, so tender; it just hurt too much to remember. When I told him it’d been a mistake I don’t know which one of us was more devastated, but I couldn’t allow him or anyone else to get that close to me. Nobody would ever have that sort of power over me again. And the way Alex had held my heart in his hands, that night . . .

  Never. Never again.

  And still, I couldn’t stop thinking about him.

  I was too tired to be angry at myself. My consciousness started ebbing away at once, just as I thought I’d heard Mary whispering again; I tried to listen, but I couldn’t stop myself precipitating into darkness. I fell asleep with her voice in my ears like a murmured lullaby.

  14

  A thought from me to you

  Alex

  I was in a restless sleep when I woke up with a jolt – a noise somewhere: my phone, ringing. I looked at my watch on the bedside table – four-thirty in the morning.

  I grabbed my phone – fearing bad news like you always do if somebody phones you in the middle of the night – and I saw Inary’s name flashing on the screen for a moment. Inary was trilling me. I blinked, trying to wake myself up.

  Yes. Missed call from Inary. I hadn’t dreamt it.

  I didn’t really think about it – I just texted her. If she’d trilled, it meant she couldn’t speak at that moment, so there was no point in calling her. I was still furious after what happened, but there was no way I could ignore her. I had to make sure she was okay.

  Her reply came after a few seconds – she’d lost her voice? Maybe she’d caught a bug. But it didn’t sound right. It didn’t sound like a bug. My gut told me it was something a lot more ominous. I got up and switched my laptop on to email her – nothing too intense, just a few lines to try and gauge her state of mind. But her replies were so vague, I couldn’t make out what was going on. I’m sorry, she’d said.

  My stomach churned.

  I was still angry. Whenever I thought of what she’d said the morning after – oh, whenever her words came back into my mind, my chest tightened again. She’d been so unfair. And still.

  It was Inary. Her sister was dead, and she couldn’t speak.

  I had to defend myself – but Inary was my weakness, my addiction. Stopping it would have been a lot more painful than giving in. I knew already that if and when she contacted me, I would always reply.

  15

  Voices from long ago

  Inary

  Aunt Mhairi turned up at our door on Sunday morning, dressed in her best. I knew what was coming.

  “I’m going to Mass. Will you come with me?”

  “Count me out,” Logan called from the kitchen. He was getting ready to go hillwalking.

  I hesitated. I hadn’t been to Mass in a long time. All of a sudden I felt a longing for the little stone church and all the times I’d been there as a child with my mum and my granny. Apparently when I was around three I became convinced that church was the place to sing, and I used to burst into random songs in the middle of the celebration . . . Father McCroury used to think it was hilarious (thankfully for my mum) and would thank “little Inary Monteith for her lovely singing”. I still cringe remembering it.

  Yes, I would go. I nodded, and Aunt Mhairi’s face broke into a smile. She was delighted her lapsed niece was still in for a chance at salvation.

  We walked up to St Colman’s, the church, under a fine drizzle. Every ten steps we met someone we knew – just like when I was a wee girl, and all my Sundays revolved around Mass and meeting friends and family there.

  Except Emily was always with us.

  Not any more.

  It was bittersweet to walk with Aunt Mhairi and feel Emily’s presence so strong, so real, hanging between us in every conversation, at every step.

  The chapel was a lot smaller than the Presbyterian church, but beautiful, with its stone walls and a simple cross on the top. We were about to step inside when Maggie, one of Aunt Mhairi’s friends who helped us at the funeral, appeared at our shoulder.

  “Oh, Inary! It’s good to see you here, dearie. How are you?” she said, concern in her eyes – I suppose it could have irritated me, but I felt her worry for me and her sadness for Emily were real.

  I nodded – all I could do. “She still can’t speak,” explained Aunt Mhairi. And then it happened.

  Maggie had begun to talk – I could see her mouth moving, and I could see Aunt Mhairi nodding – but I couldn’t hear what they were saying. All of a sudden, my limbs were tingling all over, and a low drone had drowned out every other sound. My heart started pounding – it was like I was somewhere deep underwater, far removed from everything around me. I closed my eyes briefly, overwhelmed with fear and the sense of unreality – and when I opened them again I was somewhere else.

  The church was still behind me, and there was Glen Avich, spread at the foot of the small hill. But Aunt Mhairi and Maggie were gone; everyone was gone.

  I could feel a fine drizzle falling on my arms and shoulders; I could feel the breeze in my hair and smell the wet soil. Suddenly, a line of people started streaming out of the church. Their clothes were strange – the women in long dresses and stiff felt hats, and the men in woollen trousers and shirts, all in muted colours. Fear streaked through me. Nothing like this had happened to me before. I saw spirits in my world – but I never saw the world they came from. I’d never been transported somewhere else – to some other time . . .

  I jumped. Someone had appeared beside me – a priest, standing to greet his parishioners after Mass. I looked at him, waiting to see if he saw me, if he sensed me – but he took no notice of me. I was there, and yet I wasn’t.

  I stood watching face after face, men and women and children walking out of the church doors, exchanging a few words with the priest – Father Hall, they called him.

  Finally there was a face I recognised. Mary, walking beside an older woman . . . I did a double take, and a sudden longing filled my heart: the woman looked just like my mum. At her side there was a little girl with long black braids.

  “Mum, I’ll just wait for Leah,” said Mary. “Oh, there she is . . .”

  I forced myself to leave the older woman’s face and followed Mary’s gaze towards a tall, full-figured blonde girl, rosy-cheeked and giggling, smiling at a young man in a tweed jacket. The man walked off to join a small group of women standing on the grass a few yards from the church.

  “See you in a moment,” whispered Leah, who ran to catch up with the young man she was chatting to. Mary was watching them, a smile on her face.

  My gaze returned to Mary, who all of a sudden seemed far, far away, removed from the group, removed from everybody, in her own world. She was standing still, looking over at something – someone – a man who was watching her in return, their eyes locked. It must be Robert. He was smiling, but he looked bewildered too. Like he wasn’t expecting what had just happened.

  My head spun a little as I felt Mary’s emotion sweep over me, so intense that it was almost physical, nearly painful. I clutched my heart as Mary’s consciousness exploded into mine.

  And then a woman with a beautiful face and poised expression, dressed in an exquisite woollen coat and a velvet cloche, came to stand beside Robert and rested a hand on his arm. The gesture said he’s mine – and the silent bond between Mary and him was broken.

  Suddenly, the contours of the scenes started to blur, and it was like looking through a window in the pouring rain – everything melted and smudged before my eyes, until I could see only black. Nothing – and then my eyes snapped open and Maggie was talking.

  “So I said to Father McCroury, if we can’t find another catechism teacher before the spring, I’m going to have to step up . . .”
>
  “Absolutely. Unless she tells us for sure if she’s coming back . . .”

  The world was spinning around me, and the sky and the ground were about to swap places. I tapped Aunt Mhairi lightly on the shoulder and gestured towards the church door. “Sure, on you go, dear,” she said, unaware of what had just happened to me. I stepped inside and let myself fall on a pew, breathing heavily to calm my heart. I was sure I’d just witnessed Mary and Robert’s first encounter, and I couldn’t wait to see what would happen next.

  16

  The days between winter and spring

  Inary

  Lesley left the day after. She couldn’t have taken more time off work at such short notice. As I watched her car disappear I felt like my old life was finished, and a new one was starting. One without Emily, and without Lesley beside me every day like I was used to. It was so hard – and still, I knew I had to face it. I had to live my days and nights and be grateful for each of them, as difficult as it was.

  It does get better, even if it seems impossible now, Eilidh had said. I had to believe her.

  Aunt Mhairi offered to sort out Emily’s things for us. To see what could be given to charity, what could be gifted, and what was going to be thrown out, she’d said, her voice trailing away at once as she saw my and Logan’s horrified faces. She didn’t mean any harm, we both knew that, and we both knew that some kind of sorting was actually needed – but to throw out some of Emily’s things, anything of hers, anything – even old magazines, a half-used bottle of nail-polish remover, the used bus tickets in her bag, the debris of her life – just seemed too cruel.

  And there we were, in Emily’s room, me sitting on her bed, freshly made – I couldn’t bear to see it stripped – and Logan on the carpet, his back leaning against the wall. Neither of us was showing any signs of wanting to move. For a moment grief overcame me again and my eyes welled up. All of a sudden all the details of the room – the piles of clothes folded neatly on Emily’s bed, her books, her perfumes, the photographs that Logan had lovingly taken, printed and framed for her – were such an unbearable sight. Everything spoke of absence. The plum-coloured shirt she’d been making was still in the sewing machine. I didn’t have the heart to remove it. It was as if she’d come in at any moment and sit there to finish her work . . .

  Suddenly, I couldn’t take the silence any more. I had so many thoughts in my head, so many emotions overflowing in my heart that could find no outlet, no relief, in the spoken word. I couldn’t find respite even in the simplest conversation. Silence was devouring me. I ran to my room, under Logan’s perplexed gaze, and opened a drawer in my desk, and another, until I found some paper and a pen.

  Do you want me gone? I wrote, leaning on my desk. I went back into Emily’s room, sat on the floor beside Logan and showed him my note, my hands shaking.

  “Do you . . . Don’t be stupid.” He gave me a look, a Logan look – then got up and leaned against the window. “But you’re going to go anyway.”

  I stood up too and took hold of his arm, forcing him to look at me, and then I shook my head.

  I don’t want to go back, I wrote. I was furious at myself, because I felt tears stinging my eyes and I didn’t want to cry in front of him. I showed him the notebook. The writing thing felt good. Not as immediate as talking, but at least I could communicate.

  “You don’t want to go back? Why, what’s wrong with London now?” he said, taunting me.

  What could I say? I don’t want to go because you need me? Because we need each other? I could imagine what he’d reply to that. That it was too late. That the damage was done. How could I explain how all this had poisoned me from the inside so that my life just didn’t feel right, ever, since I’d gone away from Glen Avich and from my brother and sister?

  There was only one thing I could say.

  I’m sorry I left, I wrote, and handed him the notebook. My hands were trembling. His eyes flickered across the page, and handed it back without looking at me. I dried my tears with my fingers and took a deep breath.

  “It was bloody hard, Inary,” said Logan. His face was dark.

  For a moment I thought that there was no hope for us, that the wall between us would never come down. And then, suddenly, he turned towards me.

  “Do you still have a pair of wellies here?”

  What? I mouthed.

  “Wellies. It’s soaking on the hills this time of year.”

  I nodded, bewildered.

  “Good. Otherwise I was going to run to the shop and get you a pair. Let’s go.”

  Where are we going?

  “I need some fresh air. I’m going on the hills with my camera. Come with me?”

  You want me to?

  “Ach, yeah. It’s not like you’re going to bother me with endless chatter,” he said, perfectly deadpan. His joke was so surreal, given the situation, that I couldn’t help laughing. There was so much sorrow around me, and still a little spark illuminated the dark. There would still be a time for laughter, even amidst our tears. As I slipped my boots on, thoughts of hope blossomed in my mind and surprised me.

  *

  We walked in silence, our breathing the only sound. Out there in the winter woods, silence felt peaceful and completely right. The sky was pewter and steel overhead, and a soft drizzle had begun to fall. We had warm, waterproof jackets from Logan’s shop, so the rain didn’t bother me. Everything was too beautiful for me to mind the weather anyway.

  It had been a mild winter, and red unshed leaves covered the trees. It was too early for blooms, too early to see little shoots breaking the soil, but somehow, though I couldn’t see any, I could feel them. They were curled up inside the branches and under the earth, like babies in the womb, waiting for the right moment. The emptiness of winter was about to end and the air was full of the scent of things to come, whispering and quivering and dreaming dreams of life.

  Every once in a while, Logan stopped and studied a shot, silently considering the light and the frame that would satisfy him. I stood beside him, taking in the peace of my surroundings, letting it enfold me and loosen all the knots in my soul. The more I was in the woods, the more serene I felt.

  After a couple of hours we sat on Logan’s waterproof cloth, wrapped in our high-tech jackets, dunking digestives in brightly coloured melamine mugs. Logan loved his equipment. He would have taken a compass to go to Tesco, just for the fun of it. He carried a fire kit everywhere he went, even to the cinema – in case he got stranded between there and home. Sooner or later he’ll end up mistaken for an arsonist.

  “I saw you chatting to my pal Taylor, at Emily’s funeral.” The words Emily’s funeral were like nettles brushing against my skin. I nodded. “He’s from San Francisco,” he continued. “Here for the dig on the loch.”

  San Francisco? Not New York? I was really rubbish at accents. I made a face as if to say what dig?

  “They’re digging a crannog out of the loch. You know, those houses on poles, built right into the water. He’s an archaeologist . . . pass me the chocolate ones. Thanks. He’s based in Edinburgh but he’ll be here for a few months. We go for a drink once in a while.”

  Right. Why was Logan talking about Taylor so much? Was he trying to set me up with the guy? It couldn’t be. My brother, a matchmaker? Impossible.

  “So, yeah, he said he’d like to take you to see the dig. I wasn’t sure, I mean with you not liking the loch much . . . But I thought I’d leave it with you. I’ve been to see the crannog. It’s quite amazing, took lots of shots.”

  I wasn’t sure I wanted to go back on the loch – I had avoided it for the last thirteen years, especially on misty days. I brushed biscuit crumbs off my jacket and took out a crumpled piece of paper and a pen I’d brought with me. I peered at Logan as I did so, and as I’d guessed, he looked completely cool and unconcerned, as if our conversation about Taylor had been no important matter. He was more concerned about the biscuits. I breathed a sigh of relief. There had been no conniving between my brother and the
American archaeologist (A.A., I would call him) to try and cheer me up or distract me. Or find me a boyfriend.

  You been seeing someone? I wrote on impulse, knowing I was stepping on thorny ground. Logan didn’t seem to do that well when it came to relationships. That made two of us, I suppose.

  “Ach, just people, you know. Nobody important.” He shrugged.

  Logan seemed to only do casual relationships. He didn’t find it hard to meet people; he was a handsome man, with sharp features and an intense look in his eyes, that “I’m in charge” look women seem to love. Yet he’d spent all these years with Emily, caring for her; he never seemed to want to work on any kind of a romantic relationship. I used to think that that was the way he wanted it to be: occasional relationships, nothing too deep. But in the last few years I’d come to wonder if it was enough for him.

  “Time to get back,” he said, gathering the remains of our picnic. I got the message – no more talk about his love life. But I still had something to ask him.

  You still didn’t tell me if you want me to go, I wrote.

  “Do you really want to stay?” he said, busying himself with our flasks.

  I nodded.

  “Stay, then.” He tried to sound unconcerned, but I knew him too well not to detect emotion in his voice. I inhaled deeply. It was the closest thing to a reconciliation we could have at this time. It had to be good enough. Maybe it was the right time to tell him about Mary. He knew everything about my granny and me, how we had the Sight, and how I lost it years ago. My parents thought that it was better if Logan and Emily were aware of it, especially if the gift ever turned up in their children.

  The Sight is back, I wrote.

  “The Sight is . . . Oh . . . And how do you feel about it? I mean . . .” He stumbled. His eyes were full of worry, and I could guess why. I never told anyone what I saw that day on the loch so many years ago, but my family easily worked out that something very frightening had happened. My mother and my grandmother tried to find out – they asked me gently but persistently, and they grilled my father, who’d taken me out that day. But I never said, and my dad hadn’t seen, of course. To put it into words would have been too terrifying, too real.