Water Shall Refuse Them

by Lucie McKnight Hardy

  I don’t know how long I sat like that. It could have been minutes or hours. Time vanished. It was just me, alone, and that was how it was meant to be.

  The last person I wanted to see was Tracy Powell. Her sallow, pimply face filled my field of vision, distorted by my tears. She was bending down, right into my face and her breath had the sour tang of vinegar and cigarettes. I put out a hand to push her away, but she moved aside before I could make contact. When I looked up, I could see that she had Fat Denise with her, and that they were both soaked to the skin. Their hair hung in sodden tendrils and the rain had glued their t-shirts to their fleshy torsos.

  ‘You alright?’ she said. ‘You look like shit.’

  There was something approaching empathy in Tracy’s voice, so when she held out the vodka bottle to me, I took it without hesitating. I took a deep swig on it, and then another and another, and the alcohol mingled with the rainwater and the tears that were cascading down my chin and I felt better, cleansed.

  ‘Hey, steady on, girl.’ Tracy made to grab the bottle back off me, but I held on tight and turned away from her, tipping it up into my mouth again. Already I could feel the welcome warmth of the alcohol mixing with my blood. All the while, the rain continued to batter down.

  Tracy started after me, and I ducked away from her, the treasure bag clutched under one arm, the half-empty vodka bottle held in my other hand. I ran back the way I’d come, my feet splashing along the lane. The dust had turned to mud already, and I could feel the splashes against my calves as I ran. I was a lot faster than Tracy and Fat Denise, so I slowed down when I got to the bridge and propped myself against the low wall that ran along the side of the bridge. The stream was still a meagre thing, but it was flowing swiftly now, the water having taken on a new urgency since the storm began. I cast a glance downstream, towards the oak tree that jutted out into the water.

  I took another couple of swigs of vodka and thought again about Alice. Would she have fought back? Would she have tried to get away? How many of them were there, the villagers who took her to the stream and drowned her? She would have been terrified, confused. She would have pleaded with her mother, Sarah, to help her. She would have looked to her aunt, Elspeth, with desperation in her eyes. How long had they held her there, under the water that I had washed in only days ago, until the air left her lungs and her body floated, lifeless?

  It was Tracy who drew up first—she stopped a couple of feet in front of me and leant forward and put her hands on her knees. Fat Denise arrived a couple of seconds later, red-cheeked and wheezing. I grinned at them and took another chug from the bottle. It was now only a quarter-full and the world was spinning.

  ‘Give it back.’ Tracy’s face was thunder and she was standing up, stepping towards me. I held the bottle out to the side and behind me and laughed into her face, and when she reached forward to grab it I pushed her in the chest. The flesh there was wobbly and wet and warm.

  I didn’t expect her to push me back quite so hard.

  The stream was cool, but it was still shallow, and when I landed on my back it took me a moment to realise what had happened. I was still holding the vodka bottle, and the treasure bag was still under my arm, but it was soaked through now. An absurd thought flashed into my mind: it was time to wash the raven’s skull.

  I’d turned myself over onto my front so that I could push myself up, and was crouched on all fours when Tracy landed with a massive splash next to me. She’d jumped down from the bridge, and had managed to land on her feet. She grabbed me by the shoulders, pushed me forward and straddled me—and my face was under the water. I was blinking and trying to push back, but she was stronger than me and I could feel the weight of her forearm against the back of my neck. I counted to twenty-three and the oxygen was thin in my lungs and I was getting light-headed when it came to me. I would be Alice. I would be the little girl who drowned—but in my version, I would come back to life. I let my body go limp. I let my arms fall underneath me and my legs give way and then I was face down, prone in the water. I let go of the vodka bottle and in my mind’s eye I saw it bob away from me, floating downstream. Tracy’s confusion was almost tangible. The pressure on the back of my neck eased, and I could feel her sitting up, even though she was still straddling me. I pictured her turning to Fat Denise, a frown puckering her forehead, concern clouding her stupid scrunched up face—and that was when I pushed myself up and all the air rushed back into my lungs. She staggered backwards and I threw myself at her and grabbed her round the waist, and the next thing we were grappling like wrestlers and splashing ineffectually.

  I knew the effects of the alcohol were making my movements clumsy and slow, but Tracy was too heavy and cumbersome to put up a proper fight. She squared up to me, but before she could land a punch I grabbed her by the hair and yanked her backwards. I could feel the grease on my palm even through the water. She fell over onto her back and I was on top of her, my hands on her neck, and I could feel her starting to weaken, tiring under my strength.

  Then I remembered the treasure bag and looked around, panic rising like bile into my mouth. I fumbled one-handed in the water around me, still holding onto Tracy’s throat with the other hand. My chest flooded with relief when my hand touched the sodden fabric, and then the hard glass of the raven jar.

  When the thought came into my mind, it was as though it had been put there by someone else. It just appeared, as if by magic. I saw myself holding the jar with the raven’s skull in it, smashing the rim of the jar against the rocks at the bottom of the stream, so that the lid came away and left a jagged edge. I saw Tracy, her mouth gaping, wider than it should be, and very red as I forced the broken glass into her mouth, making her smile grow and grow, even though she was screaming at the same time. I saw the bleach, thick and viscous like egg white, but now streaming with red, falling over her ruined mouth and down her chin.

  But I knew that was not how it would end.

  I felt very calm. I let go of the treasure bag and adjusted my hands around Tracy’s throat. I pushed her face slowly and gently under the water. I was focusing on the row of pimples around her hairline, little white pustules against angry red bumps. I looked down and she was blinking and trying to say something, but I couldn’t hear her. Everything had gone silent. It was as though someone had switched off the world, and there was just me and Tracy Powell, and the cool water washing over us. A baptism.

  Then there’s a bird. It’s a bird that sounds like a phone, a trilling that won’t stop, and my mother goes to answer it. It’s not a phone, it’s a bird, no it’s a phone and it stops ringing and she’s gone for ages and I’m in the bathroom. Petra is little. Pink skin under water. Dark hair spreading like a bruise. She’s smiling and I’m smiling and she’s precious like a flower and she’s my mother’s favourite and I must look after Lorry because he’s more special and my mother doesn’t want us and she loves Petra and my hands are gentle on her shoulders. I’m pushing her under the water and she’s stopped smiling and she’s splashing, legs and arms, and there’s water over her face and her eyes are open and I’m stronger than she is and she’s weak and I’ve counted to 197 and she’s limp under my hands and she’s got her eyes open. Bubbles. A stream of bubbles from her nose is all.

  And I dry my hands and go to make sure that Lorry’s OK.

  When I woke, there was the taste of vomit in my mouth. It was like the morning after Petra’s funeral, when I woke up covered in puke and bile, but now there was blood there too. I was lying on the bank of the stream, soaked to my core, and I was shivering, even though the rain had stopped and the sun had reappeared. There was no sign of Tracy or Fat Denise.

  I sat up and felt my chin. One of my teeth was loose and I worked my tongue around it, feeling it start to come free. Then a jab of pain shot through my jaw, and instantly the numbness was gone. The numbness I felt around Petra’s death was gone and all of a sudden my instincts were twitching, my synapses were firing and all my senses were interwoven. I could hear the s
hriek in the hairs on the back of my neck and the look of the rain as it hit the stream tasted salty. The treasure bag was lying next to me and it sounded blue and heavenly and when I picked it up the fabric tasted of sunlight.

  I pulled out the jar with the raven’s skull and unscrewed the musty lid. The bleach smelt shiny as I poured it away into the stream and I tipped the feathery-whiskered skull onto my palm and washed it in the sweet water.

  The incantation came to me, unbidden, and I let it skip through my brain.

  Robin’s egg, magpie’s egg, duckling bill and bone. Blackbird’s egg, feathers of wren, the skull of a crow.

  And then I was flying. I was a bird. I was outside of myself and I was lifted up, hovering in the sky above. I was flying above the lane and I could see the bridge and the plague cross and the stream, and I flew even higher and I could see the pub and the chapel and the cottage, and even Lyndon Vaughan’s little dog, skittering around on the verge.

  And Mally’s house.

  And all of a sudden I was back down again, walking along the lane, the dust turned to mud by the rain. I was drenched to the skin, my orange hair made auburn by the water, my pale skin shining, translucent and radiant.

  My hand was at the back pocket of my shorts and the wire was still there. I nipped it out with two fingers and felt the strength of it as it sprang open in my hand. It was burning with power. The raven’s skull was in my other hand, its empty eyes now full of meaning and urging me onwards.

  First of all, I decided, I was going to go and dig up the relics and put them back in their rightful place on the altar.

  Then I was going to find Lorry and kiss him and hug him harder that I’d ever hugged him before.

  And then I was going to go back to Mally’s house.

  My sister was dead, and I had killed her.

  That was OK. I could fix that. The Creed had taught me that.

  Because sometimes two wrongs can make a right, right?

  Acknowledgements

  My thanks go to Nathan Connolly for recognising the merit in my peculiar little book and for wanting to publish it. I am also grateful to Gary Budden for excellent editing skills and insightful comments.

  This book was written while I was studying for an MA in Creative Writing at Manchester Metropolitan University. During that time I was very fortunate to attend the writing centre at Moniack Mhor on two occasions, as part of a group of students and tutors. The first time, I was close to giving up on this book. The second time was after it had been accepted for publication and I was struggling with the edits. On each occasion, the camaraderie and support of the other attendees kept me going. There were many people involved; I am grateful to them all and it would be wrong to name individuals (oh, go on then: Nick Royle, Livi Michael, Matthew Adamson and Charis Wightman).

  Sincere thanks are also due to Georgia Davies, Jacqui Grima and Rianne Harney whose friendship and feedback on my writing have been invaluable. Ladies, I salute you. My thanks also go to my dear friend and staunchest advocate, Sara Cox.

  I am also grateful to my parents Chris and Toni, and my sister Emma, for the gifts of a happy, loving childhood and a curiosity about words.

  Finally, and most of all, thank you to Dom, and to Ted, Ben and Florence, for providing love and inspiration on a daily basis.

  About the Author

  Lucie McKnight Hardy grew up in rural West Wales, the daughter of London immigrants. She speaks Welsh and her education was through the medium of Welsh. She studied English at the University of Liverpool and after falling in love with the city, stayed on to work for an advertising agency there.

  From Liverpool she moved to Cardiff to study journalism, and then worked for a not-for-profit organisation as public relations and corporate policy officer. She then moved to Zurich where she worked, for four years, in marketing.

  After moving back to the UK, she worked as a freelancer before taking a break from work to have a family. During this time she studied creative writing with the Open University and then completed the MA in Creative Writing at Manchester Metropolitan University. She has now settled in Herefordshire with her family.

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