Seas of Snow

by Kerensa Jennings

  ‘I sometimes think perhaps I should try to help, but I wouldn’t know where to start. What do I know about getting a boyfriend! And anyway, she always seems so sad and upset all the time, I don’t think anyone would find her very much fun. She also isn’t as pretty as she used to be. It’s strange, because she’s not very old at all, but her face has got lines on it like someone much older. I think it’s all her worries, scratching away at her skin.

  ‘I’m sure she must still love me very much, even though she doesn’t want to do anything to stop him coming back. I wish I was a grown-up and able to understand what she’s thinking.

  ‘But then at other times I wish I was just a little girl again. Things were simpler and nicer then. Happiness was blowing bubbles, reading together with Ma, seeing spring flowers on a sunny day.’

  The old woman closed the diary shut, finding it hard to stop the tears coming.

  The childish scrawl felt so familiar. Read a hundred times, maybe more.

  Capturing the essence of the girl she had been with a wisdom and an incisiveness that you wouldn’t expect.

  And she wrote exactly as if she was chattering away to you. If she strained hard, she could still hear her teenage voice.

  She pulled the small box towards her and looked at the ­crucifix, a beautiful pendant without a chain. How did it go missing again? She wondered. And nestled inside, the brown, wrinkly rose petals curling up together.

  She remembered the Little White Pet rose, her rose. Even today, there was the faint musky scent lingering in the air.

  White roses had always held a special place in her heart. There was a purity and a freshness about them. And she remembered the words the young girl had written in her diary. ‘One day,’ she had said, ‘I will have a garden filled with white roses, their big, nodding heads floating in the breeze and wafting fragrance into the air.’ One day …

  The locket was tucked away underneath the petals. She opened it up, watching the golden curl tumble out. Then she looked at the inscription, tracing her fingers over it, searching her memory for some meaning.

  The curl of angel hair felt as soft as spun silk, and looked like it, too. It wasn’t hard to stretch back and reach for this particular memory. She glanced at the photos on the shelf. There, but not there.

  She opened the diary at another point, wondering what memory may be unlocked here.

  There was a poem.

  There is an absence of presence.

  A beauty in the stillness of the night.

  Being, unbeing.

  A journey begun.

  A heart awakened.

  The sense of the sun.

  There is an absence of presence.

  A calmness in the quiet of the bright.

  Shards

  The quest for a metaphor was like trying to solve a puzzle, only you weren’t quite sure what the puzzle was. So it was extra hard.

  Having decided to try to secretly capture something around her excitement about their escape plan, Gracie fell to the task of trying to extricate a story or a happening that would do the job.

  Her thoughts turned to dawn, to waking up, to that wonderful feeling you get when you know you are going to start a fresh new day, full of possibilities.

  Then she thought wouldn’t it be good to hint at the beginning of a journey – the travels she would take to her new ­destiny.

  She imagined what it would be like. They’d sneak out in the dead of night, slowly, quietly into the still, dark air.

  They would scarcely exchange a word, throats thick with heady anticipation.

  They would cover miles and miles, getting further and ­further away.

  Dawn would eventually break, warming her skin with its enveloping presence.

  Then, inspired by the thought of the sun’s presence – a thing you just knew was there even without opening your eyes – she realised she could do a bit of word play with the idea of something being there, but not being there. She thought that’s what it would be like, when she wasn’t there anymore. She would be, but not be. There would be a big Gracie-shaped hole where Gracie had been, as if her absence would have substance. But it didn’t mean she wasn’t actually not there – she would be miles away in London, going to her new school and making new friends, living a new life.

  Her thoughts were whirring into a dozen mind shapes as the dots flew together faster than she could keep up.

  It wasn’t long before she was sketching her ideas down and playing with rhythm and concept.

  She knew she couldn’t begin to compete with the Rilkes and the Wordsworths of the world, but she derived enormous ­pleasure whiling away hours in poetic endeavour. When she eventually got something down she was happy with, she read it out loud to herself, to test it on the air.

  Satisfied, she reread it, slightly louder, with slightly more conviction.

  She liked the way the words rolled around her mouth and the way she had spun a sense of calmness and stillness into the atmosphere. She liked the way she had captured something of the galloping of her heart and yet had managed to weave a sense of quiet into the poem.

  She felt exhausted. Outside, the stars were twinkling hellos and good evenings to each other. Her bed looked especially soft and appealing. She thought she could just lie down for a tiny moment, to rest her weary head …

  On the drive back down to London, Billy was quieter than normal. Aidan was doing the driving, bless him. So Billy had plenty of time to gaze out of the window, staring out absent-mindedly, scarcely noticing the gorgeousness of the countryside.

  It was a yellow-golden autumn day. One of those sumptuous, chilly breeze days where you feel extra cosy either being inside tucked into the warm, or outside, bracing the cold, but wrapped up nicely with comforting layers.

  Sunshine was bathing the horizon in a buttery goldenness and birds were circling in the sky.

  None of this attracted his attention in the slightest, eyes fixed as they were in unfocused thought, somewhere in the middle distance.

  Aidan glanced at him, wondering how he was taking everything. He had seemed to react surprisingly well last night. But Aidan was glad they had brought a second bottle of good claret to take the edge off the news.

  It can’t have been easy.

  It wasn’t. Billy was still silently reeling from an invisible blow that seemed to leave an imprint of physical pain. He was thinking about that Tuesday night in January. He couldn’t help it. He usually succeeded in blotting out thoughts of it, but after last night his memories were flooding every nook and cranny of his mind like mercury.

  He pictured everything as if it was yesterday. Could remember the smell of the winter air, could even remember that he’d set off from home at seven thirty precisely because they’d just got to the end of a programme on the wireless and the announcer had given the time.

  He had raced over to Gracie’s house, eager to tell her the good news. That he had very nearly saved enough money for you-know-what.

  Rapping on the door once, twice. Then a third time. No answer.

  He nudged it open, slowly, and saw bedlam had returned.

  He sucked his breath in, wondering if Joe was still in the house. Furniture was splayed onto the floor, shards of broken things lay scattered in pointed accusation.

  ‘Gracie?’ he called out, hardly daring for the answer. ‘Gracie?’

  He slowly started to explore, inch by inch, wondering what he would find. In the kitchen area, Gracie’s Ma was lying, lifeless on the floor.

  Billy rushed to her and tried to shake her. ‘Wake up! Wake up!’ then ran into the street, calling for help at the top of his voice. Even if Joe was inside, people should find out what he was capable of. Enough of everyone hiding the truth. He saw doors opening in the Close and spotted his Da speed down the road towards him. Thank God.

  He ran back inside, and tried to see if she was breathing. Her skin was still warm, which was a good sign, but she wasn’t moving and seemed horribly heavy. Something wasn’t right.
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  His Da came in and Billy looked up at him. ‘I think she might be … dead …’ he said, quietly, ‘and I don’t know where Gracie is.’

  His Da let out a sound that was somewhere between a gasp and a scream. He sat next to her, on the floor, and pulled her softly onto his lap, looking for signs of life.

  He had fear and horror in his eyes.

  Billy meanwhile was likewise filled with anxiety. He tiptoed up the stairs and peered into every Gracie-shaped space to see if she was there, possibly hiding in fright.

  Nothing.

  Joe had visited several times over the last year or so. But not for several months. Billy searched his memory – he thought maybe September. He thought about the first time Gracie had properly talked to him about it. In the spring.

  He remembered her telling him that his stench reeked into every room, lingering there for days. Ash and bitter treaclish revoltingness. She despised everything about him. How he had stood there, in her house, permeating what was once her home with a soulless cold hate.

  Gracie had told him how she had been getting ready for school. It was a sunny, blustery kind of day. She had been staring out of the window at the hazy view – thought she may have seen crocuses and daffodils outside. Rain one moment, splashes of sunshine the next.

  And then my heart with pleasure fills,

  And dances with the daffodils.

  Then, the sound of that familiar gait traipsing onto the gravel outside.

  She had frozen, she said, ‘Oh God, please no, not again …’

  Her heart raced in desperation. Inside, she knew she just had to get through it. Again. Deep breaths.

  Gracie had told Billy how even the daffodils that her Ma had picked the day before smelt strangely chemical after he arrived. As if he drained everything of its beauty and loveliness.

  Like the last time, he had wanted her to go outside with him. And like the last time, he had enjoyed watching her discomfort and horror as she knew she couldn’t run away but had no idea where they were going or what they were doing.

  He thrived on her unease, taking more visceral pleasure in the sight of her big, fearful eyes than anything he had so far experienced. Especially with those long eyelashes, dewing with water in the drizzle. The sight of her slender form – so pretty – so small – made him feel like he could conquer the earth.

  He could snap her like a twig. And one day, one day, that was exactly what he was intending to do.

  But Joe being Joe, it was the careful, patient watching and waiting that was building up in him over time that so ex­­hilarated him. Gracie had no way of knowing that he had a long-term plan for her. He, on the other hand, knew he would keep taunting her like this for the next year or two then do what destiny told him was his rightful path.

  He knew he could wait. Watch and wait. His other accomplices would slake his thirst until then. But this heavenly girl – his Gracie – would be his finest prize. He just needed her to watch and wait, too, and then he would take what was his.

  Gracie couldn’t breathe, the pain in her heart was so intense. Forced to accompany him to a quiet, unknown place. Forced to sit on the ground with him. Forced to remove her clothing, piece by piece, watching his eyes hungrily tearing into her, as if he was a starving man and she the first food he had set eyes on.

  Her embarrassment melded into her fear, and her fear melded into her embarrassment. He would stroke her jaw, softly, feeling the child-like curve of her cheek, the peach softness of her skin.

  And his raven eyes would bore into her body, drinking in its possibilities and savouring the taste of her nightmare.

  Every time, he would take it slightly further – how long he made her stay with him and how much of her physicality he touched, and where.

  That spring day was the day Gracie decided her Ma was to blame for all of this. She could have protected her. Could have stopped him. Could have saved her from this twisted wreckage of a life.

  It was the day her resolve hardened on needing to do something about all of this.

  Later, when she was back at her house, she had asked Billy to come over to talk. It was the first time she properly opened up to him about what had happened. From that first time when he had forced her to sit in the bath to today.

  He wasn’t used to seeing Gracie cry, but big, sloppy tears rolled softly down her face. It was the first time she asked him for help, begging him to do something. She was sitting cross-legged on her bed, he close by on the chair next to the dressing table. He sort of wanted to go over and hug her but wasn’t sure if she would want him to. So he patted her hand, gently. She smiled, gratefully.

  That spring day was the day he started working on a plan in earnest.

  Echoes

  Of course, the picture she presented to the world was a mask. What choice did she have?

  Melting snowflakes trickled slowly into dropleted patterns down the glass. Rivulets making their cautious descent – fat luscious large ones and tiny, sparkly, little ones – still crystalline with snow. A kind of lethargy which echoed the mistiness of the day.

  Outside, the view was hazy through the fog of snowfall. Splashes of green and grey. The odd moment of brown and beige.

  Winter then.

  Her heart was beginning to beat with that familiar anxiety. Inside, she knew she just had to get through it. Again. Deep breaths.

  There was a straggly set of pansies squatting in a white china vase downstairs. The Formica gleamed. A scent of polish linger­ing in the air. Harpic and Jeyes fluid. Bitter. Piercing. It was a house that looked like one of those dream homes you saw in pictures. But this wasn’t a place anyone could call a home. Wasn’t home meant to mean something warm and inviting? Safe and cosy. Hearth and heart. Home, sweet home.

  This house was a dream that never was. A game of make-­believe. Of nightmares.

  The pansies looked defiantly on with their cheery yellowness. She bowed down and smelled them. Strangely chemical rather than floral.

  I wandered lonely as a cloud …

  A whisper of a thought crossed her mind but disappeared in a vapour.

  ‘You ready, then?’ he asked.

  She looked up, nodded.

  The sense of not quite being able to breathe constricted her. She wasn’t sure if she could speak.

  He wore a long, black coat and a long, stern face. Had slightly raised eyebrows, as if questioning.

  She collected her things and walked through the door he held open for her. Snowflakes lingered on her cheeks and clung to her eyelashes. Her soft hair began to feel damp.

  Crystals

  He couldn’t help but think of that spring day when he started working on a plan in earnest. But today was another day. A bleak, winter’s day where the wind stung you and whipped around your ears. Months on from that April showery day when Gracie felt her world close in.

  And now Gracie seemed to be missing.

  He wondered whether she had run away, managed to escape from Joe, or whether Joe had her somewhere for one of his weird sessions where he forced her to do … things, unspeakable things.

  Billy shuddered. But it wasn’t due to the cold.

  Downstairs, his Da was pushing a glass of brandy against the lips of Gracie’s Ma. He seemed to be hugging her tight to wake her up and make her say something. She was still lolling in his arms, still and quiet.

  ‘Can you get some help, Billy, please, son,’ he said, his usual knowing-exactly-what-to-do spirit battered into something cautious and frightened.

  Billy ran out of the house to see what help he could find.

  The rest of everything blurred into a haziness. Somehow, Gracie’s Ma was alive, but she had suffered a catastrophic blow to the head and would never be properly the same again. Forever after her memory would come and go – pockets of light filtering through the dusty cobwebs. Sometimes clear as day, her mind’s filing system would bundle everything into a tumble of clarity. Her life, her daughter, her brother … what happened … would sharpen into fo
cus and sting her with its vividness. On those days, the pain was excruciating, like a migraine piercing her consciousness.

  Other times – most times – there was a pleasant fog, a sort of unknowingness that she didn’t find altogether unpleasing.

  Still others, there would be shadows of memories that would poke through. In some ways, these were the worst times. Because during these times, a sadness would overwhelm her, more profound than anything she could imagine.

  Somewhere in the back of her mind, she would get the sense that life had not forgotten her, that it would not let her fall.

  But the sadness would rise up in her, subsuming her soul. A darkness would sink into her, and a veil of shame would descend.

  So while the remnants of skeletal leaves rustled underfoot, crunched into snow, Billy noticed nothing. As people bustled by, on their way somewhere and anywhere, Billy noticed nothing. His mind, lost in another time, was clearing the haze of a life lived long ago.

  He had run out for help for his Da and Gracie’s Ma. Then he turned to what was truly important. How to find Gracie?

  It was getting dark and there was no sign. All anyone knew was that there had been a worse struggle than normal. Anyone could see that by the detritus strewn over the ground floor of their house. Gracie’s Ma had been taken to hospital. Billy’s Da had shadows of grey across his face, as worry lines crinkled into etchings deep into his features.

  Billy didn’t know what to do. The police had been called and he made sure he got to speak to them. He decided once and for all someone needed to stand up for what was right. Someone had to stand up for Gracie.

  So he gave them the whole story, as far as he knew it. He spoke with revulsion of the gradual intensity of Joe’s attentions, how he forced Gracie to take her clothing off and do strange things. How Gracie described him, raven-like, soulless, somehow hungry for her. Ballbearing eyes boring into her and piercing her humanity.