Amelia Grey's Fireside Dream

by Abby Clements

‘Ah,’ I said, feeling awkward and embarrassed. ‘That me and Jack had a bit of a domestic when she came to stay?’

  ‘She didn’t put it like that, but she did say it seemed a little tense. She wasn’t gossiping, just worried about you.’

  I sat down on a chair at the kitchen table. I guess I couldn’t hide how I was feeling from other people as well as I’d hoped I could. ‘It’s weird, Suni. We made this huge change – moving here, me giving up my job. I thought this was it – what we needed to do. But it seems it’s thrown up more questions than answers. I came here because I wanted a change in pace, in lifestyle – not to start a family. You know that.’

  ‘Only because you told me. Did you tell Jack?’

  ‘I guess I never said it straight out, but I thought it was a given. Jack knows I’m not the maternal kind. I’ve never felt that way. Dexter – yes. I can manage a cat just fine. But babies? I mean, Bella’s gorgeous – but I don’t feel any urge to have our own.’

  ‘It’s a tough one. That was how Nico felt at first. If it hadn’t happened by accident I wonder if it would have happened at all.’

  ‘There’s no chance of any accidents here. I’ve never been so religious about taking the pill as I am now.’

  ‘Have you and Jack talked much about it? Now, I mean, after what happened the other day?’

  ‘A little bit,’ I said. ‘But then we just come to a stalemate. He wants one thing, I want another. I love him – of course I do. But how do you meet in the middle on this? There is no middle.’

  ‘I wish I had an answer for you, hon,’ Sunita said. ‘What can I say? I think babies are great but only if you’re ready, and only if you want one. It’s your choice. I hope you and Jack can find a way to work it out.’

  ‘Me too,’ I said, a lump rising to my throat. ‘We’ve done all this, Sun. Moved here, bought this place together and invested in it – and yet there’s this distance between us that there’s never been before.’

  I heard an electronic crackle accompanied by the baby’s cry and then Sunita scrambling around. ‘Sorry – baby monitor,’ she said. ‘It sounds like Missus has woken up. I better deal with this,’ she said apologetically.

  ‘You do that. Listen, it was good to talk to you.’

  ‘Any time. I’m always here for you, Amelia. Now, you take care of yourself, OK?’

  *

  It was eight in the evening, and I was starting to wonder where Jack had got to. Even when his train was held up, he was never normally this late. I called his mobile.

  ‘Hi,’ he said. ‘Was about to ring you. Really sorry about this, but we’re up against a tight deadline this week preparing this pitch, and I’m afraid I’m not going to be able to make it back tonight.’

  ‘At all?’ I said. Jack had worked late plenty of times, but this was a first. ‘Where are you going to sleep?’

  ‘I’m not sure how much sleep we’ll get, to be honest. We need to have the trailer for LoveKatz ready for the film company by Friday, and there’s still a lot left to do. Hiro has a sofa in his office, so I’ll probably crash on that.’

  ‘Are there are few of you there?’

  ‘Oh yes, the whole team are here. We’re just ordering in some beer and pizza to see us through.’

  I pictured the scene – beer, pizza, crashing on sofas in the trendy Old Street office. I felt oddly envious of Jack’s work life.

  ‘OK. Well, good luck with it. I hope you get everything done that you need to.’

  ‘Thanks for understanding.’

  ‘You need to do what you need to do,’ I said. I was about to say goodbye, then stopped. ‘Jack,’ I said, ‘I love you.’

  ‘Pizza’s here,’ came a female voice in the background at Jack’s end.

  ‘Go on,’ I said. ‘You don’t want to miss out on that.’

  ‘Thanks. And— Yes, a slice of the pepperoni one, please. Sorry. Yes, Amelia, me too. I’ll see you tomorrow evening.’

  I put the phone down, and as I sat on my bed alone, the cottage seemed incredibly quiet.

  *

  Detective Sanders walked up the narrow ladder, and as he opened the hatch, it was the smell that hit him first. The metallic tang of blood mixed with the familiar trace scent of Formaldehyde. He had no choice now but to carry on up …

  For the past hour I’d been telling myself to stop reading and go to sleep, but each chapter was more gripping than the last. All I could think about was where Detective Sanders would find the teenage girl’s decapitated body.

  I felt jumpy and I wished Jack was there beside me. I glanced at the alarm clock – 2 a.m. Even if he was still working, it was too late to call him.

  As Detective Sanders searched in the attic of the suspect’s home, I forced myself to put the manuscript down. I thought of the empty space above our bedroom. We’d never been into the attic. We’d never even taken a look up there. It must have been years since anyone had – I didn’t remember Callum and Spencer clearing anything out when they moved the rest of Mrs McGuire’s things. My skin prickled underneath my pyjamas, the tiny hairs on end. With the dark visions currently whirring inside my head, there was no way I was getting to sleep tonight.

  A weight landed on my legs and I let out a yelp, pulling my legs back swiftly. Dexter arched his back and stared at me, eyes wide. He must have leapt off the wardrobe. I’m not sure which of us was more surprised.

  ‘Sorry, Dex,’ I said, giving him a stroke. I tried to suppress the images of what might be up in the attic: bloody knives, barbed wire, the remains of …

  ‘That’s it,’ I announced to Dexter, who looked nonplussed. ‘I’m going up.’ I pulled on my dressing gown and slippers and switched on the main bedroom light.

  The only way to stop imagining what was up there was to go and see for myself. I stepped out onto the landing, flicked on the light switch and glanced around. Shadows danced on the walls as I moved, but the cottage was silent. I wanted desperately to hear Jack padding up the stairs or boiling a kettle, the gravel crunching under tyres as he returned to the house. But aside from Dexter, I was on my own. I picked up a torch from our toolbox and took it with me.

  I pushed the ladder against the attic hatch and checked to make sure it wouldn’t slip, then rubbed my hands, a little clammy from the anxiety, on my towelling dressing gown. I got a firm grip on the wooden ladder. There would be nothing up there but dust and spiders. ‘Dust and spiders,’ I whispered to myself as I went up the first couple of rungs. Nothing to be scared of.

  I hate confined spaces. I hate the dark. And I didn’t think I’d cope well with finding decomposing body parts. But if there was something bad up in the attic, it was better that we knew about it. We didn’t want to give it the chance to creep up on us in bed.

  I nudged the hatch open – it needed a bit of a push and then it came free. I put it to one side and raised my whole body up and inside the dusty room. It smelled stale, and dust motes floated in the beam from my torch. If Jack was here, I knew what he’d say – forget the disembodied head, the real risk is falling right through the floorboards. I cast the torch beam around the room. It was high enough for me to stand up in the centre and the floor looked sturdy enough – I pushed on the floorboards with my hands, then I stood up.

  Callum had overlooked the attic when he and Spencer came to clear the house. There were stacks of cardboard boxes, and in the corner was a black rocking horse with a faded fabric saddle. I walked over to it, and ran my hand over the worn material. I pushed it, rocking it gently. One of its ears had been nibbled away by moths.

  I went back towards the ladder, and caught sight of a brown leather chest tucked away under the eaves. I went over to it, and saw that on the top, written neatly in marker pen, was the name Eleanor McGuire. Eleanor McGuire – Callum’s grandmother’s name sounded flowery and sweet. A name that chimed with the beautiful garden he had described to me. I prised open the metal clasps at the front, and lifted the lid.

  As I shone the torch inside I thought I heard the sound
of scratching. But then, as I leaned towards the open attic hatch – nothing. I was imagining things. I went back to the chest, and looked inside. There were exercise books with boys’ names written in childish script – David McGuire, Ewan McGuire – and small school uniforms, grey with checked grey shirts. Beside them were bundles of letters, photos and postcards tied with green ribbon. I opened a red photo album and saw pictures of a good-looking young woman with dark curls, her hair falling over her shoulders. Her long dark lashes were just like Callum’s. At the back was a wedding photo of the same woman dressed as a bride, the groom blond-haired and wearing glasses.

  In the chest was a scrapbook, and at the back of it a folder with papers – notes and patterns on thin paper. I couldn’t see what they were at first, but as I flicked through the pages, I began to understand. They were designs for cushion covers and heart-shaped lavender bags to hang in wardrobes. Scraps of fabric accompanied the patterns – gingham, flowered and plain, in pastel tones.

  I wondered where the things Eleanor had once made were now. I thought back to the drab-looking sofas and armchairs we’d seen when we first moved in. The things it looked like she’d made had certainly not been hanging up, or decorating the house. I went back to the photo album. They could be seen in the early photos: pretty curtains and elegant throws. The pictures were in black and white, but I could tell they were in the same material as the pieces of fabric I now held in my hand. I could only assume they’d been boxed away, perhaps after Eleanor’s husband died. There had been a lot of things still in the house, but nothing as pretty as these.

  I closed the book, but didn’t put it away. Tomorrow I’d tell Callum about the boxes so he could come up and clear them.

  As I went to close the chest, I noticed a bronze-coloured tin box tucked away at the back, the red and teal Bluebird logo faded with age. I reached for it and tried to open it, but the lid was stuck tight. Perhaps there were sewing materials inside.

  I heard it again – a definite sound this time. Scratching and scrabbling, like someone was trying to get closer to me.

  As I closed the chest and latched it shut, my arms were covered in goosebumps. I took the scrapbook and tin with me and climbed back downstairs.

  *

  ‘Callum,’ I called out to him the next morning, as he got his tools out of the van. He and Spencer had just arrived to start work at ten. ‘Have you got a minute?’

  ‘Sure,’ he said. He rested his things against the wall of the house and came inside with me.

  ‘Last night I was having a look in the attic and found a few of your grandma’s things up there. I thought that you or your family might want them.’

  ‘Oh, sorry,’ he said. ‘Completely forgot about the attic when we were clearing out. What kind of things?’

  ‘Boxes mainly, a big leather chest, a rocking horse.’

  ‘Dad’s old rocking horse,’ Callum said with a smile. ‘I have a feeling he’s fond of that – he’ll be glad to hear it’s still around.’

  I thought about the tin I’d found with a pang of guilt. I’d tried to lever the lid off with a spoon last night, only to find it was stuck tight. I’d put it out of the way on top of our wardrobe.

  ‘OK if I come up and see how much there is?’

  We went upstairs together, and I was conscious of Callum’s closeness to me. He didn’t seem to notice, keeping step so our bodies were almost touching. He smelled of fresh air, of the outdoors. He put the ladder in place and I passed him a torch, then he climbed up to the attic while I stayed on the landing below, peering up through the trapdoor.

  It was quiet for a moment, and I could see the beam of light moving under the roof. ‘There’s quite a lot, isn’t there?’ he called. ‘Can I pass down a few boxes to you? Most of these are small enough to take in the truck today.’

  ‘Sure, that’s fine.’

  I took the boxes from him and stacked them carefully on the landing. Once or twice my hand brushed his, and it sent an unexpected tingle through me.

  ‘Christ!’ Callum said, starting to laugh. I made my way back to the foot of the ladder and looked up.

  ‘What is it?’

  He looked down through the hatch. ‘Did you know you’ve got squirrels nesting up here?’

  ‘Oh.’ I laughed, remembering the noise that had scared me half out of my wits last night. ‘That’s what it was. Are there many of them?’

  ‘I don’t know – only saw one, but there are a few droppings up here. You don’t really want them hanging around, I’m guessing?’

  ‘I’m not that keen, no. I might let Dexter loose.’

  ‘Worth a go. I have a friend who got humane traps and put out crackers with Nutella on them – that did the trick. Anyway, the rocking horse, chest and a couple of other things I’ll have to come back for, I’m afraid.’

  ‘That’s fine,’ I said. I thought of the tin – it was too late to discreetly add it to the pile now, but I could put it with the other things when Callum came back for them. ‘Whenever suits.’

  ‘Dad and Uncle Ewan are going to be really happy to hear about this, though,’ Callum said, walking back down the ladder, facing me. He closed the hatch cover and reached the landing with a small jump. ‘Anything that can trigger memories for my grandma really helps. The photo album will give them something to look through and talk about together. A lot of her long-term memory is still there, and the smallest reminder can get her talking.’

  ‘Well, I’m glad I ventured up, in that case.’

  ‘You’re a brave woman. There are massive spiders up there, you know. As well as the squirrels.’

  ‘I think it was too dark to see them. But I’m OK with spiders, anyway.’ I wasn’t going to tell him how spiders compared with what I’d prepared myself to see up there.

  ‘Right,’ Callum said. ‘I’ll load this lot up and get the rest soon.’ He walked over to the stairs, away from me.

  ‘Callum.’ I took a deep breath as he turned to face me. There was a doubt that had been nagging at me for days now. ‘This is probably going to sound weird, but how do you know my mother?’

  ‘Rosie? I’m not sure I should be the one to explain. Maybe this is something she should tell you herself.’

  I stood there on the landing, frozen to the spot. I felt something – Disapproval? Envy?— that I couldn’t pin down.

  ‘If there’s something to know, I’d rather hear it from you.’

  ‘OK.’ Callum shrugged nonchalantly. ‘It’s all quite new. But your mum’s a lovely woman.’

  A lovely woman?

  ‘My dad’s been single a while now. It’s been over ten years since Mum died, and Rosie’s the first person he’s gone out with since then. It took a bit of getting used to, but she’s changed Dad so much. They seem to bring out the best in each other.’

  The truth hit me, and I felt instantly idiotic. ‘My mum …’ I said, relieved, ‘and your dad.’

  ‘That’s right. David, my dad. One of us should have explained when she came round the other day, but I felt it was her call. Maybe she wanted to tell you on your own.’

  ‘Your dad,’ I repeated, as it sank in properly.

  ‘She could do a whole lot worse, I promise you,’ Callum said. ‘We’ve had our ups and downs, but he’s a thoroughly decent bloke.’

  ‘You don’t think it’s weird, at their age?’

  ‘No. I think Rosie’s a star,’ Callum said. ‘They’re a great match.’

  Somehow, when Callum put it that way, it didn’t seem like as big a deal any more.

  *

  That afternoon I painted the walls in the upstairs landing, a warm cream that set off the oak beams and flooring. It was already starting to look brighter.

  As I painted, Dexter kept me company, bathing in a patch of autumn sunlight by the window. I climbed up on to the ladder and rollered the top part of the wall, reaching up high. I lost my grip on the roller and it dropped just next to Dexter, startling him.

  ‘Oh crap. Sorry, Dex,’ I sa
id. He was on his feet, back arched, then dashed over the paint lid, treading a trail of paint-covered paw prints across the landing. ‘Dex – stop!’ I called out fruitlessly, coming down the metal ladder in a hurry. His footprints led into our bedroom. When I opened the door I saw he was cowering on top of the wardrobe.

  ‘Come down, Dex,’ I coaxed. I had to clean those paws or he’d cover the whole house in paint.

  With a flying leap, he came towards me, sending the Bluebird tin from the attic crashing to the floor. It hit the floorboards with a smack, the contents spilling out.

  Dexter looked at me, trying to work out what he’d done wrong. I bundled him up in my arms and cleaned his paws off in the bathroom with some white spirit, which he complained about with loud meows, then wiped the paint from our newly stained floorboards.

  Back in the bedroom, I picked the tin up, relieved there was only a tiny dent on it from the fall.

  On the floor lay a pink bonnet. I bent to pick it up. The crocheted fabric was soft, and it looked as if it had barely been worn. Scattered beside it were photos, face down, and on the back of one a name was written: Sarah. I turned it over to see the face of a small baby with a bow in her hair.

  Chapter 13

  The Bathroom

  On the Mood Board

  Wooden cabinets to match the beams, floorboards stripped and varnished, free-standing tub, Victorian-style bath/shower mixers, large gilt-framed mirror.

  Thursday, 10 October

  In the morning I drove into town, bought some new fabric for throws, and then went into the antique shop. The bell rang out as I entered.

  ‘Morning,’ the woman behind the counter greeted me. ‘Anything in particular you’re looking for, love?’

  ‘Just browsing this morning,’ I replied.

  It felt good to be out of the house. Jack had got back at around seven thirty the night before, so tired from his all-nighter working that he’d fallen into bed after a quick dinner, with barely a word. There was nothing wrong with him working hard, of course – but given the way things had been I couldn’t help but wonder if it had been an excuse to get some space.