I shook myself into the here and now. Star had disappeared from the kitchen, and I heard a thump from the front room next door to the hall, where we never usually sat except for when we had visitors. I remembered suddenly what was in the room, and panic assailed me. ‘Wait!’ I called, and flung open the door.
She had spread herself horizontally on the sofa, her legs raised, her skirt falling back over her thighs. I stood in the doorway and watched her, remembering how Harry had beckoned me to join him on the same sofa, that night when Mum was away at the farm sorting through my dead grandma’s bits and pieces, telephoning at ten o’clock to say there was so much work she was going to stay overnight.
‘Just you and me then, eh, Rosie?’ he’d said, offering me a beer and patting the space next to him. He’d bought me more presents since that first time, and had given me more kisses too, and sometimes fondled my breasts through my clothes. He was my secret sweetheart, nibbling my ear in his dusty office that day when I’d gone to visit him at the building site, telling me how beautiful I was.
I’d been kissing him a while on the sofa before he put my hand in his lap and had said, ‘That’s what you do to me, Rosie.’
I’d stared at him, not properly understanding, and then he’d said thickly, ‘We’ve just been playing toy houses up till now, haven’t we?’ He’d stood up and held out his hand. He’d drawn me to standing and led me out of the room and up the stairs.
Star beamed up at me, stretching first one arm, then the other, like a cat. ‘Lap of luxury, this. Not at all like the vicarage, you know. That’s about two hundred years old and it’s always freezing.’
She hadn’t seen the sideboard. To prevent her spotting it, I came over and sat on the sofa next to her. ‘Enjoying yourself, are you?’
‘Mmm. I think I’ll stay.’ She giggled.
I sensed she was about to look round the room, so I leaned over her, pinning her wrists to the sofa’s cushions with my hands.
She gasped a soft, ‘Hey!’
‘I’ll make you stay.’ I bent down, my hair trailing in her face. ‘And you can be the best daughter ever.’
She relaxed into my grip. Her elbows framed her face like a portrait. Her lips bowed into a smile. ‘You’ll make me?’ she whispered.
I nodded. I leaned closer, and Star’s eyes switched suddenly, nervously, her gaze skittering around the room. She squealed, ‘Oh, photographs!’ and pushed aside my grip, jumping to her feet.
I watched her approach my mother’s sideboard, my guts slithering. It had always been the repository for our important photographs, all the frames placed at an angle to avoid the bleaching of the afternoon sun through the net curtains.
Star picked up one and showed it to me. ‘That’s you, isn’t it? Aren’t you adorable?’
I nodded mutely. She picked up the photograph of my father in uniform, and cooed over his moustache.
‘And this one!’ she said, picking up another. ‘Is that your mum? And who’s this with her?’
‘My stepfather,’ I said miserably, as Star frowned at the handsome face, the face that she had seen twice already this week, and, beneath the photograph, the telltale inscription Harold & Grace, 11th April 1962.
She turned to me, still holding the photograph. ‘Rosie … ?’
I pounced on something. ‘Oh, God, what’s this?’
‘Eh?’ Distracted, she watched me pick up a small framed photograph at the back of the collection.
‘This wasn’t here before.’ I looked at the sepia snapshot of the baby in a crib, with a blurred speck of grass behind.
‘Okay,’ said Star. ‘Can I ask you something?’
‘No, but …’ I peered at the photo in my hands and looked up at Star. ‘I’ve seen it before, I’m sure of it. Recently. Very recently.’
‘Yes, well, all babies look the same.’ Star took the photograph from me and set it back with a soft tock on to the counter. She pointed to Harry’s face. ‘It’s him, isn’t it? The chap in the sports car who brought you the present.’
Her eyelids flickered, and I knew she was thinking of the note Harry had left with the shoes, the sort of note no proper stepfather would ever write. I flicked a glance at the clock on the wall. ‘I must get upstairs and sort out my clothes,’ I said, as breezily as I was able. ‘Otherwise I’ll completely forget, you know, and that was the whole point of my coming.’
I darted out of the room, muttering something about being back in a minute, and ran up the stairs, leaving her behind.
My old bedroom looked exactly as it had done when I’d left it at the height of summer. My schoolbooks were still lined up in a row on the edge of my desk. My pencil pot held a filigree of dust inside each compartment. I opened my wardrobe and found an old travel case inside, and as I put it on the bed to fold in jumpers, I remembered how I’d sat here beside Harry, and he’d said, ‘Are you ready to be a proper grown-up, Rosie?’
I’d shrugged, scared of what he’d meant by that, but he’d calmed me down by kissing my hands, then my mouth, and running his fingers along my arm, and I’d gasped with that ripple of desire he always managed to spool out of me. He then unhitched my blouse from its moorings in the belt of my skirt, and undid all its tiny buttons. He peeled the sleeves from my shoulders and slid a finger under one of the straps of my brassiere. ‘Take this thing off, won’t you?’
I did as I was told. I was glad to, anyway, because it was a horrible Marks & Sparks one, but once I was topless and sitting in front of him I felt a little bit like being at the doctor’s. I watched from above as he caressed my breasts, and concentrated hard to feel that ripple of desire again. It was there all right, but very faint, almost as if it had gone to sit in a back room while it worked out exactly what was going on here.
He reached around under my skirt and fingered aside the edge of my knickers. The ripple vanished into a seam of marble, and I wriggled away. He waited a second, staring at me impassively, and then said, ‘Don’t worry. We can take our time.’
I’d smiled gratefully, glad he wasn’t annoyed with me for being so gauche. ‘Thanks.’
He winked. ‘Still, you could help me out here, or I might be in trouble.’
‘Yes, yes. Of course.’ I had no idea what he meant. I watched as he unbuckled his belt, freed himself of trousers, underpants and socks, all in one go, and then dragged his shirt over his head.
His neck had a ring of red from its exposure to the sun when he’d been out on the building sites. His chest and stomach were pale, but tightly packed with muscle. His penis looked like nothing I’d ever imagined. It leaned upwards, listing to one side as if drunk. Underneath, his balls hung like two jowls. I felt a second of panic.
Harry took my hand and guided it towards his penis, unfurling my fingers and wrapping them around. ‘Like this,’ he murmured, moving my hand up and down. ‘That’s it. That’s it, baby.’
I moved my hand up and down as he’d shown me. He closed his eyes and rested his hands on the candlewick bedspread. I felt goosebumps prickle my chest. I tasted beer on my breath. I tried to give in to the moment, but instead found myself looking at my textbooks on the chair, my end-of-year revision notes pinned on to my bookshelf, my framed O-level certificates on the wall.
Harry shuddered. A milky substance shot from the end of his penis and I stared at it as it spurted out over my hand. Stupidly, I hadn’t even known about that. I supposed it was the baby-making side of the business. ‘Oh, God,’ he mumbled, and collapsed backwards on to the bed, releasing my grip.
I looked at the sticky stuff all over my hand. Harry still had his eyes closed, so I wiped it on my bed sheet. It smelled odd, sour almost.
‘You’re beautiful.’ Harry was looking at me through half-closed lids. He stroked my arm, and I felt as cold as winter. I sat still, until he’d sighed, pulled on his clothes and left, kissing the top of my forehead just as he used to back in the more innocent days.
Afterwards, I heard him moving around downstairs, opening another beer, goi
ng into the lounge to watch television. I’d pulled on my nightie and picked up the hidden base of my jewellery box where I’d put the chain he’d given me, holding it against my manhandled breasts as evidence of Harry’s love.
Now, as I stood in the bedroom, folding a jumper into a tight roll in my arms, I heard the click of a key turning in the front door, and then a thud as someone entered the house. The door closed with a tight bang, and my heart shot into my throat.
Five seconds later, I heard the door to the front room open and my mother’s gasp – no doubt as she came across a strange girl with her shoes on the sofa.
I stuffed my clothes any old how into the bag and struggled to close the zip. Voices rumbled back and forth below me, my mother’s fast and frantic, Star’s slow and laconic.
I finally closed the zip, picked up the bag and hurried downstairs. My mother was just inside the front room, and I almost walked into her in my rush. She turned with a startled yelp and said in an almost whisper, ‘Rosie.’
She was wearing a matching wool skirt and jacket; I supposed she’d dressed up to see the solicitor. Her hair was ruffling loose of its curls. She’d put on a dash of make-up: pearly lips and cream-edged eyes. I squeezed past her into the room. Star was on her feet, some sort of excuse on her lips.
‘Mum,’ I said. ‘This is my friend Star. I invited her to … um … to …’
But Mum was already taking in the zipped bag in my hands. She put a hand to her chest and bit her lip. ‘Oh, Rosie,’ she said. ‘Do you really hate me all that much?’
A blur of guilt heated my head. It hadn’t even occurred to me that she’d think that. ‘No, Mum, no. Of course not.’
‘I’ll just …’ Star walked to the door, squeezing past Mum. ‘I’ll be outside, okay?’
I wanted to ask her not to go, but I stayed silent as she left. We listened to the front door opening and closing and I said, utterly inadequately, ‘I came back to pick up a few things.’
She sat down heavily in the armchair. ‘You want to avoid me that badly,’ she said, staring glassily at the coffee table. ‘You knew I was going to be out, so you came by.’
‘It’s not how it looks,’ I croaked, sitting down too, on the sofa arm. But then again, it was exactly how it looked. ‘I’m so sorry.’
She glanced up at me. ‘What did I do? That’s all I want to know. What on earth did I do to drive you away?’
‘Nothing.’ I put out a hand towards her, and she whipped her own back. ‘Of course you didn’t do anything.’
‘Then why all this?’ She waved a hand. She’d lost weight; the jacket hung loose on her frame. ‘And before you left. Don’t think I didn’t notice you avoiding me, leaving the room if I came in. I mean, God, Rosie, I can take it, but I need you to tell me the truth.’
I shook my head fiercely. ‘I just needed my independence.’
‘What, am I so smothering? I’m not as strict as … well, as lots of people.’ She got to her feet and walked towards the sideboard, hugging herself. Absently, she began putting the photographs back in their proper places. ‘You must think me a complete bitch.’
‘Of course not.’ I blinked away my shock at Mum swearing in my presence. I stood up too. ‘I’m so sorry. I never wanted this.’
‘What did you expect?’ I noticed she was holding the photograph of the baby, the one I’d picked up earlier. ‘That I’d say, “Oh well, my daughter’s suddenly left home in the middle of her A levels and won’t tell me why. Never mind, I’m sure it’ll all come out in the wash.” ’
‘That photo.’ I indicated it. ‘Is it you?’
‘Mmm?’ She glanced at it. ‘Yes. I found it when I was going through Mother’s things at the farm. My uncle Peter took it with a Box Brownie just after I was born.’
‘I think I’ve seen it before,’ I said. ‘Very recently.’
‘Well, you can’t have, dear.’ She sighed. ‘I haven’t seen it myself for years.’
‘There’s something about it …’ I began, but I saw I wasn’t going to get away with changing the subject that easily. ‘I can’t talk about what’s going on, that’s all.’
‘I thought you might be having a baby.’ She looked down at my stomach. ‘I’ve been asking around, you know. I’ve spoken to all your school friends. They said you’d been acting a little strangely recently.’
I shook my head. ‘I’m not having a baby.’
‘Then there’s a boy involved.’ She tilted her head back and looked at me, and I had the feeling she saw straight into my warped little brain. ‘I thought so.’
‘No …’ I said miserably.
She turned and walked a few paces away, throwing her arms in the air. ‘I’m not some innocent, Rosie. You can talk to me about … about boys, or sex, or … well, you know.’
‘Not this,’ I whispered. ‘Not this.’
She sighed, and when I looked up saw she was leaning on the doorway. She took me in slowly. ‘You’ve lost weight,’ she said.
‘So’ve you,’ I said.
She tugged at her skirt. ‘Oh, I’ve been trying to do that for years. Very fashionable now, isn’t it?’ She rested her chin on the edge of the door. ‘How are you doing in that draughty old place?’
I shrugged. ‘Fine. I’m working. Paying my rent.’
‘And that girl?’ She indicated the hallway, where Star had gone. ‘Is that the one I spoke to on the telephone the other day?’
I nodded. ‘She lives on the top floor. She’s … um … she’s nice.’
‘I’m sure she is,’ said Mum, with just a hint of scepticism in her tone. ‘A little self-obsessed, perhaps, but I’m sure I was the same at her age.’
‘I’ve made a heap of friends,’ I said earnestly, nodding the white lie into truth. ‘There’s an old man in the basement.’
‘An old man?’ Mum coughed.
‘I mean, he’s adorable. He’s sort of … um, grandfatherly.’
Mum took a step towards me. ‘People aren’t always what they seem, you know.’
‘No.’ I wished I’d never said grandfatherly. ‘But he is. I mean, he’s rather a lost soul. He can’t remember things, you see, and he turned up with a ton of money and a photograph …’
I trailed away as I looked again at the sideboard. ‘Perhaps you ought to keep yourself to yourself a little more,’ Mum was saying, but I wasn’t properly listening, because I suddenly twigged where I’d seen the photograph of the baby before.
‘Oh my goodness.’ I picked it up and showed it to her. ‘He has the same one. I mean, his is ruined, but still … it’s the same.’
‘Don’t be silly.’ She stalked towards me, snatched it back and returned it. ‘Why would some old man have a photograph of me as a baby?’
‘I don’t know. It just looks …’ I squinted at it, remembering a splash of grass, a blurred hint of a baby’s forehead. ‘So similar,’ I ended lamely.
Mum held my chin and turned my face towards hers. ‘Come home, Rosie,’ she said softly. ‘It’s not too late. The school will take you back. I’ve spoken to them: Miss Waverley’s very anxious about you.’
My stomach sagged, because the thought of waking in a warm bed, with nothing more to worry about but unravelling the origins of the Hundred Years War, was so appealing I nearly burst into tears right then. I shook my head. ‘I’m sorry,’ I said. ‘Tell them I’m sorry.’
She let go of my chin. ‘Wait there,’ she said, and clipped away to the kitchen on her heels. I picked up the photograph again and peered at it. Perhaps she was right. After all, Dockie’s photograph was almost completely obliterated.
When Mum came back into the room she was holding a roll of notes held tight with an elastic band. She pressed it into my hand. ‘Take it. Please.’ She smiled in a wobbly way. ‘Buy yourself those sandals you wanted.’
I swallowed, and took the money. ‘Thank you.’
She held me by the shoulders. ‘Look, if you can’t bear to move back, at least return my telephone calls.’
I
nodded. ‘I will. I promise I will.’
‘And you could visit, you know? Just to let me know you’re alive.’ She paused. ‘How about on Sunday? You could come for lunch. I’ll pick up a joint of beef from Dodds. Just the three of us: you, me and Harry.’
‘I can’t. Um … not Sunday,’ I said, my heart racketing hard in my ribs. At her disappointed face I said, ‘I could come on Tuesday. I get Tuesdays off. I could come for lunch. How about that?’
‘But Harry won’t be there,’ she said, frowning.
‘No. Well …’ I trailed off, and then in half a second saw her face change as a new idea lit up her brain. Before it had time to plant itself, I leaned forward and groped her into an embrace. ‘I love you, Mum,’ I said, and she laughed, startled, because I wasn’t the sort to show affection usually.
‘I love you too.’ She hugged me back and kissed my cheek. I pulled away from her as quickly as was polite, and picked up my bag. ‘Just a second, Rosie,’ she said.
‘I’ve got to go.’ I made a show of looking at my watch. ‘The bus’ll be here any minute.’
She stayed me with a hand on my arm. ‘Harry …’ she began.
I pulled my arm away. ‘I’ll call you,’ I said, forming a telephone shape in the air. ‘About Tuesday, okay? See you later.’
And with that I dashed into the hall, pulled my jacket from the peg, opened the door and hurried down the path, swinging through the gate, past a surprised Star, who was leaning on the wall, and walked rapidly down the street.
Star found me at the bus stop outside Drover’s News. I tapped a nervous tattoo on the post, pretending to look down the street for the bus. ‘Should be here any minute,’ I muttered.
She gazed down at me. ‘I take it that didn’t go too well,’ she said.
‘I didn’t think …’ I said quietly. ‘It just didn’t occur to me how upset she’d be that I’d left home.’
The Mysterious Affair at Castaway House Page 20