My Name is Anna

by Lizzy Barber

  Like the pulling back of a curtain to let in the first glimmer of dawn, I watch the tip of her head rising. Mamma’s body stiffens, and as she turns her gaze directly to me.

  ‘Anna was alive.’

  ROSIE

  24

  It’s barely dark when I get home from Chesterfield. I open the front door and the house comes alive. Dad has Madama Butterfly on at full volume, singing along as he manoeuvres the vacuum cleaner through the living room. I catch sight of Rob’s feet, sticking over the arm of the sofa; his thumbs going tap, tap, tap on his mobile. Mum’s in the kitchen; the clatter of pans.

  At dinner she rubs my arm. ‘You look tired, sweetheart. Is everything OK?’

  I think of burying my head in her chest, letting her stroke my hair, like she used to when I was little. The moment is here – I could snatch hold of it, tell her everything. And then I see her pull at a streak of grey in her hair, tuck it behind her ear. Was it there a few weeks ago? What will telling her do? Cause more arguments. More upset. She’ll ban me from doing anything further; or worse, dismiss the whole thing completely: Leave it to the professionals, Rosie, she’ll say. We’ll never know.

  And so I jerk my shoulders, up, down. ‘Just exam stress.’ I force a tight smile, take a mouthful of peas. ‘Not long to go.’

  Later, ignoring the drone of the TV and Dad shouting out the answers to a quiz show, I play back Michael’s story, pulling it apart just as I did with Keira on the train home. If I can get to The Lilies, I feel sure I can follow the trail to Emily. Keira told me not to do anything stupid before we parted ways at the station. But she knows exactly what I’m planning. And she knows my mind is made up.

  In the morning, I make a show of getting ready for school, threading my backpack over my shoulder before Mum can realise it’s lighter than usual. I duck into the nearest coffee shop, exchange my uniform for jeans and a jumper and stuff it into my bag. The train to Slough is barely half an hour. I have netball first thing, then a free period, then break. I’ll be there and back before anyone realises I’m gone.

  When the train pulls up at the station, I’m struck by the urban-ness of it all. From the way Michael described it, I imagined The Lilies only existing in some sort of rustic farmland, far away from people and places; not nipping to Sainsbury’s for their weekly shop. I’m surprised further when I arrive at the address I found on their website and discover that The Lilies’ UK headquarters are nestled within a fairly commonplace stretch of residential roads.

  But all that is stripped away when I see the building itself. It is starkly white – even on a beige day like today it gleams – and is striking in its simplicity, lacking the ornate windows and spires of a typical English church. It can’t have been built more than fifteen, twenty years ago. Fifteen years ago: after Emily?

  What do the neighbours think, with it plonked there in the middle of them? Or perhaps, I realise with a chill, perhaps they’re all part of it. I whip around, half expecting to see someone in a white robe walking out of their front door.

  I scan the frontage for something to confirm that I’m in the right place – a name or a banner – and can’t avoid a tiny prickle of hope that I’ve got it wrong, that I can just say, forget it, I didn’t find them, and give up. But as soon as I walk up to the high arched door, I see it. Carved into the wood, its leaves curling down the centre of the door, is a lily.

  I press my hand to it, feeling the grooves of the pattern rise and fall beneath my fingers, willing the lily to give away its secrets. The wood is cold to the touch, tells me nothing.

  Standing on the precipice, I am seized by a sense of vertigo. A wind has picked up, threading through the trees that line the pavement and dampening my cheeks with a wet drizzle. Until now I’ve never really thought about what I’d say, what I’d do, once I got to this point. I’ve been propelled only by the furious need to get here. Now, all Mum’s warnings whirl around me like phantoms in a nightmare: all the crazies, all the dangerous people she’s been worried about me getting mixed up with; surely, surely, this is exactly what she means?

  No. I shake my head, and the thought away with it. I can’t turn back now. I put my ear to the door, listening for voices inside; perhaps a service under way.

  And when I hear nothing, I push it open.

  Inside, it’s eerily quiet. The white walls bounce light across the room, highlighting rows and rows of empty pews. Encouraged by the emptiness, I take a tentative step forward, freezing instantly as the sound echoes into the air. I look down to find the floor is made entirely of white marble, shining in its spotlessness. Working each footstep slowly from toe to heel, I make my way across the room, breathing in the tart chemical smell of cleaning fluids. Like a hospital waiting room. Or a morgue.

  With every step I feel my pulse quicken, my vulnerability increasing the further I get from the door.

  In many ways, it’s just like the churches I remember from our infrequent visits as kids: the occasional wedding, the once-in-a-blue-moon trip to a carol concert. There’s an altar at the front. And an upright piano to the side of it, painted white. And casting a dappled shadow over the room is a huge stained-glass window, each jewel-toned panel polished crystal-clear. When I look closer, I see it’s a depiction of Christ on the cross, a spurt of lilies wrapped around his ankles and trailing up the cross. They’re clearly not ones for subtlety.

  Feeling bold, I move faster, brushing my fingers against the tops of the pews as I try to think of how I could possibly extract the answer I am looking for. My foot slips on the polished floor, and I find myself clasping the air, my hand jerking in front of me to get some purchase. It lands with a clash on the piano keys, a cacophony of notes ripping through the silence, and I freeze in horror as I wait for an army of Lilies to storm in.

  The notes evaporate into the ether. No one comes.

  I spy a door off to the side and slip through it, finding myself in a window-lined corridor. Outside is garden, bare but for a couple of trees, and to the left of that a small graveyard with a cluster of tombstones like a toddler’s gap-toothed smile. I wonder with a grey dread if it’s possible one of those belongs to Emily. Beyond, right to the back of the garden, I can tell there’s some sort of stream, and it makes me think of the ceremonies Michael talked of, their strange ‘purification’ rituals. And then with a start I realise there are people in it.

  I quickly duck my head down below the window ledge, and creep backwards away from it in a crab-like crouch. My shoulders butt up against what I think is a wall, only I realise too late it’s not a wall at all, but a door left ajar, and I find myself falling, back first, straight through it. I clamp a fist against my mouth to stop myself crying out.

  When I pull myself to my feet, I find I’m in a study. Unlike the rest of the church, here it’s not white at all, but more like an old gentlemen’s club. The bovine reek of expensive leather hangs in the air, from the dark brown sofa in the corner and the swivel chair pushed against the oversized hardwood desk. The walls are lined from floor to ceiling in wood panelling, hung with black-and-white photographs. Photographs, I see as I step towards them, of The Lilies.

  At first, I can’t tell what the distinction between them is. Each one shows a group of people, huddled together with the briefest of smiles on their faces. They’re all wearing the same thing: loose-fitting white robes that hang to their bare feet, their arms clasped in front of them just like we’re told to do in school pictures. I scan their faces eagerly, convinced I’m going to spot Emily among them, but there are barely any children, and none of them are my sister.

  In the centre of all of them is the same man, his smile the brightest and biggest of all. Unlike the others, he’s not wearing a robe but a suit, and in his hands he clasps a copy of the Bible, a cross etched on its cover. This must be Father Paul. I can make out his ponytail, just like Michael described. I wonder how many secrets that satisfied smile is hiding.

  In one of the photographs, I follow the line of his feet down to the cen
tre of the frame, where I make out, printed in even, sans serif type, the name of a city, and a date. Jerusalem, 1991. Searching, I discover all of them have a similar stamp, the locations and years changing with the faces in each one: Oaxaca, 1995; San Francisco, 1988; Rome, 2009. They must be the locations of the Lilies churches. I scan the room, trying to find the one labelled ‘Georgia’. There it is, deep in the right-hand corner: Georgia, 1999. The year before Emily was born. I press a finger to the glass, marking each face, trying to search out the woman from Michael’s photo. But it’s too hard: both Michael’s printout and this photo are too obscure. Besides, in their robes they all look alike.

  Frustrated, I turn away and focus instead on what the rest of the room may hold. There’s a bookcase, filled mainly with religious texts and various copies of the Bible, along with tracts that have obviously been plucked from some sort of ‘top books to look educated’ list: volumes of Shakespeare, Dickens, Keats. None of them revealing anything that could tell me about Emily. A filing cabinet holds various bills and receipts: lighting, heating, none of them untoward.

  Which only leaves the desk. Blood pumps in my ears as I step towards it. I think of the people outside. I don’t know how long their ceremonies last: at any moment they could stop, find me here. Every second I hesitate brings me closer to being discovered.

  The surface itself is meticulously clear, as I would expect from the little I know about The Lilies’ scrupulous manner. One of those fancy pens that comes in a silver holder sits at an exact angle. Next to it, a brass paperweight the shape of an egg bears the engraving, Blessed are the pure of heart, for they shall see the Lord. The second I touch it, I leave the filmy depression of my thumbprint on it, and instantly regret it. There’s a bone-handled letter opener, out of its sheath, and I think about pocketing it, just in case, but then my eyes drift to the drawers that run down both sides of the desk. I tug at the first, then the next, then the next, my movements getting sharper and more frantic as I realise with a quickening heart that they’re all locked.

  I scan the room, looking for somewhere a key could be hiding, but it’s all so sparsely neat I can’t begin to think. I run my fingers along the books, hoping, in the wildness of my imagination, that one will turn out to be a hiding place. I feel along the inside of the filing cabinet, hoping to find a groove I’ve missed, pull back the pictures, searching for a key taped to the back, and I am just about to give up when I feel it: an unmistakable bump. Carefully, so as not to leave a mark, I peel the picture from the wall.

  Taped to the back, a piece of yellowing Sellotape on each corner, is a folded piece of paper. I look back again at the photograph and my breath shortens: it’s the one from Georgia. Again, I scour the faces of the women in the photograph, trying to seek out my woman in navy. There’s one next to him, next to Father Paul, her head slightly bowed as if trying to avoid the camera. It could be her, but then again, how would I know for sure?

  Frustrated, I turn to the paper on the back, agitating the space between the tape and the cardboard backing, working it until it peels loose. I unfold it, and something falls to the ground. When I bend down to pick it up, my world comes undone.

  It’s a photograph. Formal, like it has been taken professionally: there’s a brightly painted background, with writing in the right-hand corner: Alachua County Fair. A woman, her features plain but not ugly, staring unsmilingly into the lens like this wasn’t really what she had in mind. Beside her, a child, beaming.

  The child is Emily.

  ANNA

  25

  ‘Anna was alive.’ Mamma’s fingers begin to dance a tarantella in her lap, and I see a bead of sweat snaking from the tip of her forehead down the side of her face. The sight of this liquid makes my temples throb in response, but the thought of myself, of my own body, seems insignificant in the face of this name.

  My name.

  The outside world has become a vacuum: all that exists is the attic, Mamma, me, this story.

  ‘Father Paul allowed me that, right away.’ She lets out a bitter laugh. ‘But then he told me there was something else I needed to know. I was still trying to take in the news about Mason. I felt like I was in one of those circus fun houses: floor sloping at different angles under my feet, the walls of the apartment distorting as I tried to find my balance. Father Paul could see that I was near to fainting. He caught me underneath the elbows, just before I fell, and helped me to the sofa. I remember noticing how there wasn’t a single hair on his head out of place, and thinking, how is it that this pristine man is the one to throw my life into chaos? And then he brought his face right up close to mine so that I couldn’t help but look at him, and he said, “Do you hear me, Mary Elizabeth? Anna is fine. Untouched, in fact.” He told me that the crash had been severe. The impact had killed Mason instantly. But not a hair on Anna’s head had been harmed. When they found her, she was still strapped into her car seat – thrown from the wreckage, managing to land completely upright – dazed, but undamaged.’

  Every movement, every sound in here seems amplified. I can smell my own sweat, taste the salt drying on my lips as I try to piece together the story as fast as Mamma tells it. I know deep in my soul that this Anna can’t possibly be me. But if she’s alive, where is she now?

  ‘Father Paul leaned towards me.’ Her voice is teetering on the edge of breaking. ‘So close I could see the scrawling lines of purple in his irises, which made his eyes appear sometimes grey, sometimes navy. So close I could smell again the cloves on his breath, the mint of his aftershave. And he said, “Doesn’t that strike you as odd, Mary?”’ She shakes her head. ‘I couldn’t think what he meant: the room was still a whirl around me, but he pressed himself closer. He said, wouldn’t I say it was odd, that the crash was so severe that it killed Mason on impact, but yet Anna was untouched? Somehow my words found my lips, and I said, “It’s a miracle.” Father Paul shook his head from side to side, no, no, no. And his voice was low and mean: he said it wasn’t a miracle, that he had prayed to the Lord, and the Lord had shown him the answer: Anna was unclean. “There is sin in that child,” he said; it was clear to him now. He told me: “There is dirt, deep inside her, that has caused the death of her own father.”’

  A tremor runs down my back. ‘How could he say that, Mamma?’ I can’t help but cry out. ‘About a child!’ Mamma’s face has turned ashen. I see her struggling, wrestling with the memories of that night, and whatever self-realisation hindsight has afforded her. ‘Why would he even think it?’

  ‘He’d always found any reason he could not to like her.’ She speaks through a fixed jaw, her voice low, resigned. ‘As she was getting older she was becoming more high-spirited, especially during prayers. She’d shout out, in the middle of ceremonies, try to run down the aisles, so I’d have to pull her back. And she hated the water; she’d scream during every baptism, kicking her legs when we tried to hold her down. But I knew, still, there was a deeper reason that Father Paul hated her: she was a constant reminder that she wasn’t his. She was the living embodiment of his failure – the proof that it was him, not me, who was incapable of producing a child.

  ‘I tried to tell him it couldn’t be true! But he pressed his lips together and then he got up from the sofa and looked down at me on the floor. He said, “I’m afraid it is, Mary Elizabeth.” There was a toy, a doll, wedged beneath the brakes, that prevented Mason from stopping the car when he swerved. He said she must have thrown it – in her wilfulness, he said. He said that if she were a child of God, she wouldn’t have behaved in such a way, that ultimately killed a man. “We are the lilies among thorns, Mary: here to cleanse the world. And your daughter must be cleansed. Tonight.”’ Mamma’s voice hangs pendant in the heavy air.

  I picture the tawdriness of that living room, filled with the cheap possessions they could afford after the church had had its fill of their money. Father Paul, his whiteness marred by his wickedness. Mamma, barely more than a girl, grief-stricken and frightened, and so terribly alone. All this
talk of purity and cleanliness? What wickedness, what monstrousness did this man possess, that he could twist and turn her vulnerability and her faith like that, with such preposterous reason?

  ‘I followed him blindly out of the apartment,’ she says, ‘barely remembering to put shoes on. My confusion and my pain were like a cloud around me, suffocating my senses and pushing me toward wherever Father Paul was taking me. What about Mason, I remember asking. He didn’t even bother to turn around.

  ‘We arrived at the church in the half light. It must have been three, four in the morning at this point, but I don’t remember feeling tired. I don’t remember feeling anything. I dimly heard Father Paul call “I have her” as we made our way over to the river. When we approached, there must have been about ten of them there, senior members of the congregation, all dressed in their white robes. And as we got closer, there …’ all the air seems to compress in her lungs as she fights to take a breath, ‘there she was – her fragile little body dressed in white, held by the arms by two of the women …’ Mamma stops, unable to carry on. A sound wrenches from her throat – like a cat being stepped on.

  ‘Go on, Mamma, go on,’ I murmur, her hurt cutting through me too. ‘What did they do?’

  She wipes a slack hand across her mouth, muffling herself, and then her head bobs, rhythmically, up down, up down, up down. ‘I ran towards her. All I wanted to do was take her in my arms and breathe in her baby smell, but Father Paul gripped me by the wrists, held me back and whispered, “It wouldn’t be a good idea, Mary Elizabeth.” I stumbled dumbly along beside him towards the water. I hadn’t noticed until then, how odd it was that he was already in his robe, rather than a suit. He waded into the water, up to his waist, and then he called to one of the women to give him the child. She saw me; she squirmed and tried to free herself to run towards me, her fat little arms writhing in the air, but Father Paul held her firm, and then he gave a signal to the congregation, and they made their way into the water.’