by Amy Lilwall
How wasteful it was to read a letter while letting tears re-liquefy the ink, magnifying then splodging each word. He’d spent his whole life perfecting the curve of every ‘s’ and the loop in every ‘l’, and this was to be their final show. What a waste, Susan had thought; and who was the show for? The life that was joined to his. Maybe that’s why she’d thrown it away, because with this wasteful letter, her life would be wasted too.
‘All that love,’ blubbed Susan. ‘Such a waste.’
The lines repeated, over and over; re-writing themselves in front of her eyes. Maybe that’s why Mrs Lucas had thrown the letter away; she couldn’t stand it reading itself to her any longer. But had he written like that because he was going to die? Maybe he’d been a real meanie all their lives and had only just come across all the lovely things he could have said, stored somewhere in a dusty part of his brain. Maybe that was why she had thrown out the letter. No… No, she couldn’t believe that either. There were layers in that letter that seemed to coat every word, like a very old house that had been painted many times. It was just a normal house. They were just simple words. But the charm of the years locked into that house seemed to transform it… ‘We had such a nice time, whenever we went to St Ives for an ice cream. That was our place, we used to say. Don’t go back there alone, will you?’ And the tears welled again as the lines read themselves over and over…
She came home to sit on the stairs and re-read the letter. Every so often she would get up and look through the window to see if the house next door would give a sign that Mrs Lucas was back. Susan would probably run outside and throw her arms around her the minute she saw her shuffling up the driveway. Poor Mrs Lucas. Poor Mrs Lucas.
She grabbed the phone. She would try again. Not for Bonbon and Jinx, but for Mrs Lucas.
‘Billbridge & Minxus headquarters, reception, how can I help you?’
‘Hello. My friend had her littler stolen—’
‘Hold on a minute, Madam, stolen by whom?’
‘By you, and—’
‘She wouldn’t have been stolen, Madam, there was obviously a reason why she needed to be brought in for examination.’
‘She didn’t show any signs of communication, but her owner is one hundred and thirty years old.’
‘Are you the owner?’
Susan smirked. ‘No, that’s why I said “My friend had her littler stolen”.’
‘I just needed to verify. I can’t discuss this situation with you if you are not the legal owner.’
‘The owner is currently trying to talk her husband out of euthanasia.’
‘—.’
‘When she gets home, the house is going to feel very lonely.’ Susan gulped. ‘So…’, sniff, ‘given the fact that…’ sniff, ‘her littler didn’t show any signs of communication…’ sniff, ‘I was hoping that you could tell me…’ sniff, ‘when you’re planning to return her.’
‘I’m sorry,’ the other said slowly. ‘I can’t talk about this with you.’
‘Well, what can you do for your customers?’ Sniff. ‘All I’ve had from you people for the last three days is no, no, no, no… Why are you even there?’
A long exhale fizzed through the line. ‘I have a daughter,’ said the woman. ‘And I live alone,’ she said. ‘I need this job. There is a one in five chance that this phone call will be re-listened to tonight and if it is, I’ll have a written warning. I’m really putting myself on the line here so that I can tell you I can’t give you information because I’m not allowed to access it. It’s a secret. But I wish I could,’ she sighed. ‘I’m sorry. I really mean that.’
Susan’s lips trembled. ‘Thank you. That’s the most human response I’ve had in three days.’
She couldn’t blame that lady; in fact, that lady made her understand that all of the ladies who answered the phone bobbed together in the same boat. Maybe if they had read the letter, that would have changed everything; that would have made them realize just how much of a joke their situation was compared to what really lay in store for them… Or to someone they had tied their lives to. What would she do if that were Hamish? Because it would happen; one or other of them would go first and that would be it. Such a waste. Life was too short to get cross with each other, even if they did have one hundred years left.
She was still wondering if she or Hamish would go first, when the phone rang again. She picked it up, making her eyes all wide and waving her hand next to them to dry them out. ‘Hello?’
‘Hello? Are you Susan?’
‘Speaking.’
‘Um… Hi. You don’t know me but… I made a promise to someone that I would call you.’
Susan turned her mouth upside down. ‘Oh, really?’
‘I know I’ll be found eventually and that I’ll lose my job over this but…’
Susan sat up straight. ‘What do you mean?’ It must have been the lady she’d spoken to not two minutes before. ‘No… No, don’t lose your job. I’ll just wait for the email!’
‘What?’
‘I don’t want you to lose your job. You have a daughter to think about. It’s the company that’s got the problem, not you.’
The front door opened and Hamish walked in. Susan frowned a frown at Hamish that was meant for the person at the other end of the phone. She got up so that he could sit on the stairs to take his shoes off.
‘I don’t have a daughter!’
‘You just told me that you have a daughter, didn’t you?’
‘Um… I think you think I’m someone else.’
‘You’re not the lady from Billbridge & Minxus.’
The line went quiet for a moment. ‘How do you know that?’
‘Because I just spoke to you,’ she said to the back of Hamish’s trousers as they walked up the stairs.
‘No… That wasn’t me…’
‘Really? Who’s the message from?’
‘Jinx,’ said the voice.
‘What?’
‘Jinx told me to ring you. She needs your help to get out of here.’
‘Jinx? What… My Jinx?’
Hamish’s trousers turned and descended four steps.
‘Yes!’
‘She told you that? She’s been clapping?’ Her voice started to tremble again.
‘No, she didn’t clap. She spoke! She asked me for help and… I have to pass her message on, even though I’ll lose my job.’
‘She what? Did you just say that she spoke?’
Hamish jumped the stairs two at a time and put his ear next to the other side of the phone.
‘Yes!’
‘You’re joking?’
‘No! She told me to call you so you’d come and rescue her. You need to know, they have voice recorders in that room. As soon as someone realizes that she can talk, I don’t know what’s going to happen to her. They don’t want them to clap let alone talk. And she talks well; just like you and me. I’ve never seen that before. Never, never, never…’
‘But no one gave us the address; we don’t even know how to get there,’ Hamish cut in. ‘Hello? Hello?’ The line was dead.
Susan’s mouth dropped open. ‘You scared her! Ring caller ID!’ she said, fumbling with the phone to try to do exactly that. ‘Ring caller ID!’
‘Well, give me the phone, then!’
The phone started ringing in her hands.
‘Hello?’ she said, turning to Hamish and putting her finger to her lips.
‘Sorry. It’s Moira, the lady from before. The man’s voice scared me. I didn’t realize that I was talking to two people.’
‘I know. I’ve just told him off.’
‘Will he come too?’
‘Well… Where, exactly? We don’t know where to go; no one will give us the address.’
‘That’s no surprise. In fact, this is the reason why I’m going to lose my job. I’ll most probably be taken to court as well. If the company gets away with this, it’ll have to change its geographical location. I’ll be completely unemployable…’
&
nbsp; ‘Oh gosh, well… No. I had no idea. No, you mustn’t do that.’
‘I’m hoping it won’t get away with this. I’m going to take that risk because what goes on here is sick, you know? A human spoke to me today. She told me that she and her friends don’t want to be in prison any more because they tried to clap their hands; how dumb is that? I feel like I have to do this. Does that seem strange?’
‘No, that’s very admirable,’ said Susan. ‘Good for you.’
‘Meet me in the eighty-ninth.’
‘The eighty-ninth? Wow, is that where it is?’
‘Yep. I’ll bleep the exact address to this number; is that okay?’
‘The eighty-ninth is… you know; dodgy and… I don’t mean to be rude but, you could, you know… be anyone, couldn’t you?’
‘Ah… I get it.’ The line was silent for a moment and just as Susan was about to say something the other blurted: ‘Bring people! In fact, bring as many as you can.’
‘People, why?’
‘The more people that witness this, the better. Can you do that? Can you bring people?’
Susan’s gaze leapt about the hall. ‘I’d have no idea where to start looking for…’ A crumpled sheet of paper lay on the bottom step. Greying heads bobbed like balloons as they took sips of tea in Susan’s mind. ‘I think I probably can,’ she said.
‘Can you be there at nine?’
She looked at Hamish. He nodded. ‘Yes. But how will we get in? What will we… I mean… Will you let us in?’
‘Let me worry about that.’
They hung up and Susan scanned her wrist for Meredith’s number, called it, then strode between the kitchen, hall and living room telling her exactly what had happened. Could she round up the others? Could she get them there by nine? Susan would bleep her the address. Yes, she was pretty sure that she could trust this person, she sounded really convincing… Oh really? A set-up? But who would want to do that? Well, surely if all of them arrived together they’d be all right. It didn’t matter if it was a hoax; it was worth taking a look. Yes, she did realize that they were all quite elderly. Yes, she had had her own reservations to start with. No! She was sure that they wouldn’t line them up and push them into a mass grave! Well, yes, the company did seem to want them out of the way, but mass murder? Well, yes, her exact words were ‘bring lots of people’. And yes, the eighty-ninth was dodgy. No, she’d never, ever heard of a talking littler. Susan pinched the bridge of her nose and walked to the kitchen to look for Hamish. Then back to the hall. Empty. Then another look in the living room; maybe they’d crossed paths along the way? Well, if Meredith didn’t want to put the others in danger, wasn’t she slightly curious herself? A little? Would she perhaps send word out to see what everyone else thought? They’d have to leave in an hour. Not much time, no. Where the hell was Hamish? Susan opened the dining-room door – odd that it was closed… She looked inside; Hamish stood by the window with his wrist up close to his lips. He turned and looked at her with eyes so wide and so frightened that she said: ‘Excuse me one moment, Meredith.’ She strode over to him. ‘What’s wrong?’
‘Me… Oh, erm… Nothing,’ he said to her. ‘Yes, yes, it is Susan,’ he said to his wrist.
‘Who’s on the phone?’
He ignored her question, apparently listening to the other person. Then: ‘Susan, who are you talking to now?’
‘Meredith. Hamish, she doesn’t think we should trust the call.’
‘Meredith doesn’t trust the call,’ he repeated to the wrist.
‘Hamish, who are you…’ He held a finger up to her. ‘Susan, who was the call from?’
‘Meredith.’
‘No!’ he said, with a little, sweet laugh that she’d never heard before. ‘The lady who called us about Jinx!’
‘Oh!’ Susan scrunched her eyes shut then flung them open again. ‘Moira! It was Moira!’ she said.
Hamish nodded deep nods as he listened to what was being said to him. ‘Okay: tell Meredith that this is not a hoax and that Emma Howards is going to call her in just a minute to confirm this.’
‘Right,’ Susan repeated this to Meredith whose voice became all high-pitched and clipped. ‘That changes the situation, somewhat,’ she said. ‘I’ll be waiting for her call.’
Susan hung up and tapped the end of the phone against her teeth for a moment. Emma Howards. She watched Hamish as he did strange things like standing with his hand behind his head and his elbow in the air. His cheeks were blotchy and his eyes jumpy. She turned to leave and do something important like phone someone else but found herself walking in a little circle until she was looking at him again. Now he was running his finger backwards and forwards along the edge of a chair back. She frowned. She’d never seen him interacting with other people; only Mrs Lucas, but that was different, she was their neighbour; this new person was someone from Hamish’s world… She smiled at the way he listened to her so hard that his irises flicked about like dragonflies in a jar. This was what he was like with other people. It had been so long since they had been two separate people that she’d completely forgotten.
‘Hang up,’ he said to his wrist before heading for the door.
‘Who was that?’
He looked at her with his ‘people’ face, all dancy and listening. ‘Erm… Emma. One of my clients. She used to work for Billbridge & Minxus, so, she knows Moira.’
‘Really? That’s quite… handy.’
‘Well…’ Hamish started to explain then changed his mind. ‘She’ll be here in twenty minutes. She’s going to help us.’
CHAPTER 22
Susan had let Emma sit in the front seat. From there she was able to notice that every time Emma turned her head towards Hamish to talk to him, her lips were shaking, but not just the red part, the bit that went down towards her chin and the bit that went up towards her nose. Where her Cupid’s bow was, Susan thought, wondering if Cupid had a shaky aim and conjuring up the loveliest picture in her head of the cherub leaning out of his cloud with one eye closed and his tongue hanging out as he tried to concentrate on not shaking.
Susan decided to ask her a question. ‘Was it long ago that you left the company?’
Emma turned to look into the back seat. Susan saw the full shakiness of her face. ‘Erm… Well actually, not long after you adopted Bonbon and Jinx.’
Susan raised her eyebrows. ‘Oh right! Hamish told you about them, did he?’
Emma twisted right round in her seat. ‘There’s a bit more to it than that—’
‘You, erm, don’t have to tell her,’ Hamish interrupted.
‘What’s the point in not telling Susan? There’s no going back now, really.’
Susan smiled at Emma, grateful that she had called her ‘Susan’ and not ‘her’.
‘I’m in the same situation as Moira now.’ Her bangles jingled as she waved her hand to indicate the space around her, her same situation. ‘I’m probably going to get into a lot of trouble, so I don’t have to keep secrets any more.’ She looked at Hamish. ‘Dr Wix has been my confidant during these last two years and… Well… The reason I know him is because I was checking up on him, actually.’
Hamish let out one of those sweet laughs again. On hearing it, so did Emma. Susan watched them and decided that she had better do the same.
‘I chose you both to be Bonbon and Jinx’s family.’
Susan let her mouth fall open.
‘I needed a family that would fit specific criteria. Preferably a couple, so there would be more eyes kept on the littlers and more money in the house.’ She looked up at the roof of the car as she counted on her fingers. ‘Preferably young; I didn’t want them to be outlived by their family and… What was the last one? Oh yes. Preferably childless; I didn’t want their arms getting pulled off by kiddies.’
‘Childless? But the whole point of the “Little Love” scheme is to make kids care about something other than themselves.’ Susan scrunched her fingers into fists; when had she picked up this habit of making them in
to speech marks?
‘You’ve been watching that documentary.’
A nod.
Emma took a deep breath. ‘This company is so full of lies that you would not believe it. What you’re living now is just the very surface of everything it’s done and got away with. Its lawyers are among the highest paid in London… Where was I?’ she said, looking at Hamish. ‘Ah yes. Hamish will be the first one to tell you how children behave towards anything that is smaller than they are.’
‘Would I?’
‘I hope so,’ she replied. ‘They usually want to hurt it or love it. And when I say love I mean in the way that they would love a doll.’
‘I thought there were follow-up visits?’
‘There are. That part is not a lie. And some of our inspectors’ reports would make you wince. But does the littler ever get taken away? Once. That happened only once in my time. The Toe Biter of Michigan, remember him?’
‘But he used to bite toes.’
Emma shook her head. ‘He was tied to a broom handle and laid on the floor while the kids took it in turns to put ice cream on his genitals then let the cat lick it off. Can you imagine how a cat’s tongue must feel to them? Eventually he leaned over and bit one of their toes really hard. He got taken away because the family thought he was dangerous for kids. Then it was all over the press and the company had to make out that he was an exception who had overridden his anti-aggression feature.’