The History of Mischief

by Rebecca Higgie

I gathered up the papers in a panic, frightened you should see them. ‘We’re going home, Harry.’

  Elliot grabbed my wrist and yanked me to my feet. He shoved me towards the car. You tumbled as he shoved you too. We both got into the back seat. Elliot slammed the doors. He got in. The tyres screeched as we sped off.

  For the whole trip back, we were silent. When we got home, Elliot pulled out every rosebush in the front yard. He left them in a twisted pile in the barren flowerbeds.

  ‘What did we do?’ you asked.

  What could I tell you?

  ‘Go to your room, love,’ I said.

  You needed some comfort, but I couldn’t give it to you. I spent the next few hours poring over those papers. The newspaper articles told a tale of a missing girl and boy from the lighthouse. At first, they assumed Alexander and I ran away together. Then my mother claimed that Henry had been stalking me, that she’d seen us that night, by the edge of the rocks. ‘He pushed my girl in, I just know it!’ Our bodies were never found, but we were presumed dead. Henry begged his innocence; no one listened. There was no evidence but my mother’s insane ramblings. The paper reported that he hung himself. No reports of foul play. I don’t know what would have been worse. For him to end his own life, or for others to end it for him. Either way, I knew who was to blame.

  That night, I went to the backyard with the History. I lit a fire in an empty ceramic pot. I cried. I threw all the newspaper articles, all the photocopies Elliot had made, into the flames. Sobbed. Tore page after page out of the History. I started with Henry’s story. Watched the pages with his name burn. I was about to tear out the next history – Archie’s history – when a hand came out of the dark and grabbed the book.

  ‘What are you doing?’

  Robert.

  I wailed. Robert knelt down and embraced me. He stroked my hair and whispered, ‘Shhh, shhh, it’s okay.’

  ‘I killed him,’ I cried.

  ‘It’s okay,’ he said.

  ‘I killed him.’ I muttered it over and over again.

  Robert took my face in his hands and made me look at him.

  ‘I love you,’ he said. ‘I know it’s not what you had, but I love you. You gave me a family. I thank God for you every day.’

  I pulled my face away from him.

  ‘I’m so sorry we couldn’t be brave, you and I,’ he said. ‘But I’m happy. Aren’t we happy? Our boy’s grown up with joy and mischief and love.’

  I felt numb. I’d been crying for hours. Noticing the fire was going out, I remembered my task. I grabbed the History and tried to rip it up again. Robert wrestled it from me.

  ‘Let me burn it,’ I begged.

  ‘No.’

  I tried to grab it again. Robert backed away.

  ‘Lizzy, this is a testament of your love for our boy.’

  ‘Don’t let him know what I did, Robert,’ I begged. ‘Please. He can’t know.’

  He shook his head. ‘Elliot showed me this weeks ago. He was so angry, but I loved it. You found all the magical, beautiful things in our sorrows, and the sorrows of others. You made the past beautiful.’

  ‘Please, Robert.’

  ‘Elliot said you’d leave us one day. I never thought you would, but I don’t begrudge you trying.’

  ‘Please,’ I begged again.

  ‘Maybe one day Harry will want to know. Maybe one day he’ll figure it out. Maybe that’ll be nice. We can make him understand, he was loved. You turned our past into this for him. We sacrificed for him.’

  ‘We sacrificed nothing! That’s what I’ve realised, Robert. We’ve lived an easy life. We could hide.’

  ‘It wasn’t easy. I know you’ve suffered.’

  ‘I haven’t suffered. You and me, we could pretend. He couldn’t. Henry never could.’

  Robert nodded slowly. ‘You’re right. I’m sorry. But I can’t let you destroy it.’

  Robert hid the book somewhere. I wouldn’t find out where until decades later. It was easy for him to move on. He wanted his family, consequences be damned. But the guilt over what I’d done haunted me. It created a rift between you and me. You kept asking where the History was, why Elliot behaved the way he did. I never spoke about it again. First you were confused, then angry. You never forgave me.

  Robert tried so hard to bring back the mischief. Elliot continued to do various threatening things. Pulling out more flowers. When he did, Robert had those metal roses welded to the fence. He even put ‘Property of A. Mischief’ on the gate key.

  ‘Good luck to Elliot now, hey?’ he joked.

  I said nothing, never commenting on how beautiful they were. Eventually, Robert asked Elliot to leave. I said nothing again, ignoring this attempt to bring us closer. We grew old like this. He tried to make amends, to make us a real family, to his dying day.

  When Robert died, I was alone. You were married, had your own family. Elliot lived a few suburbs away, barely spoke to me. Then, the most unbelievable thing happened. A woman, almost as old as me, moved into the house across the street. She came over one day, introduced me to her oddly well-trained cat, and explained that she was staying with her daughter. She seemed a bit mad, this poor woman. When I asked her to repeat her name, she told me.

  ‘Chloe Moran, at your service.’

  Chloe. The name made me sad.

  ‘My husband’s away. He’ll be back soon though. You got a good man, dear?’

  ‘My husband died a few years ago.’

  ‘I’m so sorry to hear that. Loss is a horrible thing, isn’t it? Stays with you. My sister Lou was killed when I was just a girl. I miss her every day.’

  I stared at her. Could it be?

  ‘I’m so sorry,’ I muttered.

  The woman looked down at her cat. ‘We all are, aren’t we, Cornelius?’ When she looked back up, I saw my sister’s eyes. Deep. Dark. Brown. ‘I’ll tell you about her sometime. You can tell me about your old man. We’ll have tea.’

  ‘That would be nice,’ I said.

  ‘Right you are,’ she said. She gestured to her cat. ‘Come, Cornelius.’

  That night, I called you. Said I was tired. The house was too big. A nursing home. Might as well. I gave you the house to sell. I never saw her again. I don’t even know if she’s still alive.

  Soon after I moved into the nursing home, Elliot visited me. As an old man with skin further gouged at with the removal of skin cancers, he exuded this weary energy.

  ‘You know, I saw Harry the other day.’

  You’d distanced yourself from Elliot as well, so this was a strange piece of news. ‘Why would you see him?’

  ‘He wants the History.’

  We hadn’t spoken about it in years. ‘Why would he want it now?’

  ‘Trying to get a passport to go away with the family. Wanted his birth certificate.’

  You’d asked me for it weeks before. I lied. Said I didn’t have it.

  ‘He went to the Office of Births and Deaths. Robert’s not on there. The father isn’t even listed. He wants to know why. He wants the History.’

  I sighed. ‘Why is he asking you?’

  ‘He doesn’t trust you, Lizzy.’

  ‘He doesn’t trust you either.’

  He let out a long sigh. ‘Guess he had no one else to ask.’

  ‘Do you know where Robert hid it?’

  ‘He never told me. But he had a floor safe in the study. He got that carpet put in and covered it, remember? Never let me have the key.’

  I did. ‘Why would he do that?’

  Elliot shrugged.

  ‘Well, Harry sold the house. If it’s there, it’s gone.’

  ‘Good.’

  Elliot died a few months later. You came to me with questions, careful, polite and a little begging at first. Then, you became angry.

  Guilt is such a powerful thing. It rots you. Disables you. I couldn’t tell you.

  So why am I writing this? The same reason I wrote the History. So I could share my past with you, the people I loved and the peo
ple who loved me. I write this only to explain, and to honour them. I don’t deserve any pity. As I said to Robert, we could do this. We could write new stories for ourselves. We could steal the stories of others, pick from tales of war, and refashion other people’s mythologies to hide the violence in our past. We could make the past mere fiction, something that happened to other people.

  I try to tell myself nothing is worth the sorrow I caused that little town with its beautiful lighthouse. But if I’m honest, you were. You, my darling boy, were worth everything.

  Jessie

  I finish Grandma’s history. I fold it up carefully, then throw it, like a piece of rubbish, by the bin. I feel angry. Grandma lied. She hurt so many people. My grandad, my real one, died because of her. But I’m not angry for that. The History isn’t real. It’s a lie. All of it. I know it was stupid to believe in it, but I did. It was mine, this secret. And she ruined it.

  I leave the toilet. The nurse has gone. I go. I walk straight out of the nursing home. No one even sees me. I walk to the bus stop. I wait. I get on the bus, ride it to the train station. I don’t really think about it. As the train rocks me back and forth, I’m somewhere else. My friends are gone. All those adventures, running around school with the mischiefs by my side, being a dragon made of magic and fire … I feel like an idiot.

  ‘Next station, Guildford.’

  I get off the train. The History and Frostiana are still in my backpack. It feels heavy as I walk along the main street. I cross the busy roads, make my way to Theodore’s house. I creep around the side and peek through his window. He’s inside, sitting in a beanbag, singing along to something on his iPad.

  I knock on the window. He looks up and smiles. He stumble-runs out of his beanbag, almost falling over, and flings the window open.

  ‘Hey!’

  I’m not in the mood for ‘hey’.

  ‘Get your dad’s lighter.’

  He doesn’t ask why. He just says, ‘Okay.’

  He leaves and returns with the red lighter. His cheery mood is gone. He knows how I need him to be.

  ‘Come on,’ I say.

  He climbs out the window and follows me. We walk in silence through the quiet streets, before coming to the main road. We run across between breaks in the traffic and make it to the railway lines. We run across them too, as the loud bells that warn of an oncoming train start to sound. We just get under the boom gates as they come down. Then, we’re here, the park where I count the graves around the big tombstone. I think, right then, I accept there are no graves. This is, as Kay tried to tell me, just a memorial. A memory. It’s just like the History. A lie. A stand-in. I wonder where all those men have gone.

  I place the History at the base of the memorial. I open it up in the middle. I see now why Grandma’s handwriting was familiar. It’s the handwriting of the History. I touch it, thinking of her writing it. Not Henry, not a mischief. Her. Tears flow down my cheeks. Theodore touches my shoulder.

  ‘I’m sorry,’ his little voice comes.

  What does he know? What does he have to be sorry for? He doesn’t know anything.

  ‘Give me the lighter.’

  He hands it to me. I try four times before a flame shoots out. I hold it down to the History, right where the pages come together at the spine. The flame catches, and starts to eat through the paper. As the whole book is engulfed in fire, I stand back next to Theodore. He takes my hand, squeezes. I’m sobbing. It’s shocking how it looks. It’s just like Lou described. Its centre is black except for the red waves rolling through it. The edges, already burnt, crumble off. Flames and black smoke come off the top of it. It looks angry.

  A train sounds its horn. I think I hear someone scream my name.

  The fire jumps to the grass by the memorial. Theodore’s grip tightens. I cry and cry. I feel so betrayed. This book gave me hope. It was full of sadness and tragedy but still managed to be fun and magical. I made my sad new life in this stupid old town magical through the mischief. Now it all feels like nothing.

  Theodore glances behind me. Stephanie runs towards us. She screams something and shoves us away from the book. She whips off her cardigan and starts beating the flames. Red embers and ash fly off in every direction, but the flames don’t die.

  Then, the screech of tyres and a slamming car door. Kay.

  ‘Jessie!’

  She rushes towards me and grabs me up in a big hug. Then she notices the fire and lets me go, running to Stephanie’s side. She tries to stamp on the flames with her boots. David’s here too. He throws a bottle of water on the fire. Eventually, the three of them put it out. Nothing’s said for a while. We all just stand there, staring at the blackened book and the burnt patches of grass.

  ‘How could you?’ Kay says.

  I glance at her. She’s in tears too.

  ‘This was our history,’ she says.

  ‘It was all lies!’ I shout.

  Kay shakes her head. ‘It wasn’t though.’

  Kay mumbles an apology to Stephanie. She tries to pick up the History, but it’s still hot. David runs back to his car and returns with a green shopping bag. Kay snatches it from him and uses it like a glove to pick up the burnt remains of the History. Pages crumble and half the cover falls off. I don’t know why she bothers.

  She then grabs my hand and walks me home in silence. Her breath shakes. She’s trying not to cry.

  I’m sent to my room. I slam the door as hard as I can. I sit down in front of my mirror, see the hair that’s grown back. I almost look like my old self, before Mum and Dad died. I hate it. I take my scissors and cut off as much of my hair as I can. The scar becomes visible again. It’s paler now, just a thin line. I feel betrayed even by that. My scar should be red and angry, like it was before.

  It’s really late when Kay knocks at my door. I ignore her, huddled in bed, but she comes in anyway with a plate of fish fingers and a jar of tartar sauce. She sees the piles of hair on the floor. She looks at me.

  ‘You cut your hair,’ she says.

  I pull the doona over my head.

  She puts the plate down on my desk. She then sits on my bed, way too close.

  ‘I know you’re angry,’ she says. ‘I am too.’

  I move closer to the wall, pulling more of the covers over me.

  ‘Grandma lied about a lot of stuff,’ Kay says. ‘I keep telling myself that she didn’t mean anything bad. It was a different time … I dunno. But someone died because of her.’

  I DON’T CARE! I want to yell at her.

  As if she can hear my thoughts, she says, ‘I know you don’t care. You’re angry about the History. But you need to realise something. It was real. It was the only way Grandma could tell Dad the truth. At its core, it was real. I can’t believe you burnt it. It was the only thing you’d talk to me about. It was the only way we connected.’

  I feel a little bad.

  ‘I wish you could fix this. I wish I could fix this. I think Grandma does too.’

  ‘She lied!’ I shout through the covers.

  ‘I know,’ Kay says. Through the doona, she strokes my head, really soft and gentle. Again, I feel bad. Guilty. ‘But the History was real. The people were anyway. And they were good people, I think. They were part of our history.’

  She strokes my doona-covered head again.

  ‘Don’t ever run away like that again. I called the police, Transperth, Stephanie. I was terrified.’

  I nod under the blankets.

  ‘Don’t let your fish fingers get cold.’

  I wait until I hear the door close. I get up and eat my dinner. I’m hungry. And guilty. I know Kay’s right.

  I can’t sleep. At 2 am, I tiptoe to the study. I see the bookshelves in a new light. I wonder what else is hiding here that went into making the History. Then, I hear the sound of a vacuum cleaner.

  Mrs Moran is out again. Cornelius grooms himself on the veranda as she vacuums up the sand in her driveway. This is my great-aunt, I realise. I stare at her through the lacy curtai
ns, remembering the card that slipped out of her Sherlock Holmes book. Signed A. Mischief. I guess Mrs Moran never got over her sister’s death. The mischief games they played around the lighthouse: she must’ve shared that with her husband and made a whole other History.

  Then it sinks in. I destroyed the History. Mischief was something these sisters used to escape their grief. It was what Kay and I used too.

  I promise Mrs Moran, right then and there, I’ll fix it.

  Monday comes around, but I already have a plan. I have to wait till Saturday, but I feel better, and go to school without causing a fuss. Theodore’s waiting for me on the benches by the office.

  ‘You okay?’ he asks.

  ‘Yeah,’ I say.

  ‘You get in trouble?’

  ‘A little.’

  ‘Dad took my iPod and iPad away. You can’t come over for a while.’

  ‘Sorry.’

  ‘It’s okay!’ he says cheerfully.

  I smile at him, at his chirpy tone that’s just a little too loud.

  ‘Theodore?’

  ‘Yeah?’

  I want to thank him for the way he follows me into stupid things without question. I want to thank him for not being angry at me, even when I’m mean or I get him in trouble. I want to thank him for being my friend, a true friend, the kind I don’t deserve.

  Instead, I say, ‘You’re cool.’

  He smiles at me. ‘You’re cool too.’

  Saturday comes. Kay leaves in the morning in her car. I go over to Mrs Moran’s. We eat gingerbread from the bakery.

  I tell her, ‘Dragons like gingerbread.’

  She says, ‘Of course they do, dear.’

  Kay returns within the hour. Grandma gets out of the car with her. Mrs Moran waves to them. Grandma just stares.

  I run across the road and hug Grandma. She hugs me back.

  ‘I’m so sorry about the History, Jessie,’ she says.

  ‘You have to make up for it, Grandma,’ I say.

  ‘I know.’

  I take Grandma’s hand and lead her across the road. The whole time, she stares at Mrs Moran with fear.

  ‘I don’t think this is a good idea,’ she whispers to me.

  ‘It’s a great idea!’ I say forcefully.

  We make it to Mrs Moran’s veranda. Cornelius is on her lap. She smiles at me.