She walked quickly past the lift. Its rusty golden doors had CB luvs PF graffitied onto them in yellow, encircled with a lopsided heart. The corridor looked like many of the others she had passed, and yet something was so different. The closer she got to her mother’s apartment, the louder she could hear that warm tinkling sound that she had heard in her dream. Soon she was standing outside the dirty wooden door with the number 72 glaring back at her through a glaze of dirt.
Her stomach flipped nervously when she realised the door was closed. Of course it is, she thought. How stupid of me to think I would be able to waltz right in! She took a chance and gave the doorknob a sharp twist, at the same time jolting the door with her left shoulder. Much to her surprise and delight, it creaked and cracked open in a cloud of dust. She stood back and let the dirt settle before she entered.
The apartment was entirely empty. No furniture, no curtains, no anything. Isla wasn’t sure why she’d thought she’d find it filled with her mother’s things. She’d imagined it would be bursting with character, splashed with green, burgundy and orange, cupboards full of tea bags and hard boiled sweets and the smell of treacle. Her mother had always smelled of treacle. Isla closed her eyes and tried to picture the young Evie she’d only seen in pictures buzzing around these rooms. She smiled, because it was so easy to imagine. She couldn’t put her finger on it, but something in the walls and the atmosphere screamed Evie Snow. It was clear that this was where her mother had fitted in.
Standing in the middle of the empty apartment, Isla suddenly realised she had no idea what she was looking for, or if there was anything to look for at all. There was a familiar flutter as Little One flew on to the balcony and perched on the railings. Isla tugged at one of the windows and it put up a good fight, but eventually its hinges cracked and it opened. Before she had a chance to step outside, Little One hopped in.
‘No!’ Isla panicked that she would be there for hours trying to usher the bird out of the apartment. She wouldn’t be able to lock him in and leave him for someone else to deal with, because she wasn’t sure there was anyone left to care for this building. August had grown so attached to the bird, she’d never be forgiven if she let something happen to him.
However, Little One wasn’t panicked. He was calm and quiet as he paced the floor, waddling to and fro until he finally settled on a single floorboard, which he tapped with his beak three times. Isla tilted her head, confused. Little One pecked three times again, this time harder. Isla knelt down by the bird, who hopped off the board, and with her heart racing, eased the plank of wood up quite easily with her nails. Underneath was a dark hole, deeper than she’d imagined. She had uncharacteristic thoughts of reaching in and monsters grabbing her wrists and pulling her under, never to be seen again. She shook her head. Then an even worse thought struck her: what if she reached in and found nothing at all? It was more like Isla to be scared of reality than the unknown.
She looked at the bird, who was perched on the very edge, stretching out his neck to peer into the hole. ‘Here we go,’ she whispered, and lowered her right hand into the darkness.
She was almost shoulder-deep before her fingertips tapped against something solid. She jumped at the sudden feeling and retracted her arm instinctively. Then, laughing at herself and her silliness, she rolled up the sleeves of her jumper and plunged both arms in, grabbing whatever it was she had felt and bringing it into the light. What she found herself looking at was a very ordinary brown shoebox. It hadn’t been sealed shut and it was covered with an inch of dust, but, amazingly, it hadn’t been chewed to pieces by mice or termites. Isla blew on the lid like she was blowing out birthday candles, and Little One covered his head with his wings as dust billowed into the air around him.
‘Oh, sorry!’ she said, wafting the air around the dove with her hand. Little One cooed his acceptance of her apology and ruffled his feathers.
Isla shook the box lightly and was greeted with that tinkling sound again. Curiosity washed over her. She couldn’t wait any longer. She flipped the lid open with her thumbs, and immediately her face was lit up by hundreds of slivers of glass catching the light from the windows and casting rainbows here, there and everywhere. She laughed, but it caught in her throat underneath a lump of emotion.
‘It’s like my dream,’ she managed to say, although she still wasn’t entirely sure what she was looking at. It was just a box of broken glass. There was no paper or drawings, and nothing that said this box had once belonged to her mother. For all she knew, this was simply a drinking glass that someone had once broken. But then why would it have been saved at all, let alone hidden away from the world under a loose floorboard? So many questions hummed in her head, and yet she still felt relieved that she’d found something, even though she wasn’t entirely certain what that something was.
Isla closed the lid and all the light was sucked from the room once more, then with Little One close by, she left Apartment 72.
11
the greatest artist who ever lived
Isla refused to show August the box and its contents until she’d figured out the puzzle. She carefully tipped the glass on to a blanket on the floor of her bedroom and, with her gardening gloves on, tried to piece the glass together, but there were just too many shards. Some weren’t pieces at all but more like ground-up glass dust that was no use at all. Some slivers fitted together perfectly and Isla would vocally triumph, causing August, Jim and Eddie to jump somewhere in the house and wonder what on earth she was up to. However, most pieces had cracked so badly and had edges so jagged that there was no guessing where they slotted in.
After hours of toiling and a few cuts despite the gloves, Isla gave up trying to create that crystal-clear sheet of glass she still had glimmering in her mind. Carefully she poured the glass from blanket to box, then reluctantly closed it and pushed it under her bed out of sight. She pulled her legs towards her chest and hugged her knees tightly, fighting back tears of defeat.
No, she thought. I’m not giving up. Mum wanted me to find that box for a reason, and if I can’t create that impossible sheet of glass, I’ll just have to make something else.
With renewed determination she pulled the box out once more, then went to the desk. She quickly set aside all of her old, useless trinkets and rooted through cupboards and drawers, trying to find her old green box of tools and art and craft supplies. At last, two shoeboxes sat on the table: the fifty-five-year-old brown box from Apartment 72, and a thirty-six-year-old bright green box that had once contained a pair of school shoes Isla had worn when she was eleven. Isla opened her own box and in it were ribbons, string, glitter, sequins and buttons, and there at the bottom, neatly folded away, a drawing of Horace, his waistcoat neatly buttoned and his monocle in place. Isla waited for his ears to prick but they never did. She flattened out the piece of paper, smoothing its creases, then propped it against the wall so that Horace could watch her as she set to work.
She sorted out the pieces of glass that were useless and the pieces that were large enough to do something with. She sanded the edges of each shard, taking away their ability to hurt or harm those who came into contact with them. She drilled a hole in the tip of each, being careful not to shatter them into further tiny pieces, then threaded a length of string through each hole and tied a secure knot. She fished out an old cross-stitch hoop from her box and tied the other end of each piece of string to it. All the while, Horace watched her, and Isla often glanced up, wondering if he’d been moving about the page when she hadn’t been looking.
Finally, when the moon was almost saying its goodbyes, she took out a piece of ribbon and tied both ends to either side of the wooden hoop so it could hang. She held it up to survey her hard work, the pieces of glass swaying happily, and Isla was happy too, so happy that she hung it from the handle of her bedroom window so that each piece would catch the light in the morning.
All of a sudden she felt exhausted, and she let tiredness take over. She hadn’t realised how hard and for how long
she’d pored over that glass. Her hands ached from handling the sharp shards and sanding them down, and her neck was sore from craning over them, and for a second time that week, she fell asleep in her clothes.
The following morning, the sun had indeed flooded Isla’s room through her window and caught the suncatcher she had put together. But it wasn’t patterns of light dancing around the walls that she could see. What she saw made her rub her eyes like a child.
‘August!’ she called. ‘Come quickly!’
Like a gun from a bullet, August heard her cry from the kitchen and bolted up the stairs, taking them two at a time, believing his sister was in danger. However, when he rushed through her bedroom door, he was greeted not by trouble, but by a drawing of Horace, alive and running about the walls. A goose waddled across the ceiling, flapping its beak and its wings. A happy couple waltzed clumsily with each other. A little boy threw his hat into the air and then fired his pistols at it. After fifty-five years trapped in a shoebox, the drawings had found their way through the glass into the room and were celebrating their freedom at last.
Evie’s children stood dumbfounded, tears spilling down their cheeks.
‘Mum was an artist,’ Isla sobbed.
‘She was,’ said a voice from the door. As Jim watched, the waltzing couple spotted him and waved, to which he doffed an imaginary cap and smiled.
‘Why did she never tell me?’ Isla asked, running her fingers up the wall for Horace to chase.
‘There were lots of things she never told anyone, things that were all connected. If she told you one thing, she would have had to tell you them all, and she just … couldn’t. That’s why, when you showed not only an interest in art but a talent, she was terrified of sharing her own passion for it, just in case you asked questions. She hated keeping things from you, but now it seems she feels you need to know.’ Jim looked upwards, as if gesturing to Evie, wherever she was.
Isla walked over to the drawing of Horace she’d found the night before in her own shoebox. She felt the eleven-year-old inside her rise to the surface as she asked, ‘So she didn’t think my drawings were awful?’
‘Oh Isla. Is that what you thought?’ August went to his sister and put his arm around her shoulders as she nodded tearfully.
‘Isla,’ Jim said, ‘she saw herself in your drawings. You took after her so much in that respect.’
‘That’s good to know. Because to me,’ Isla sniffed and smiled, looking up at the Horace that was watching her from across the room, ‘she was the greatest artist who ever lived.’
Evie had been lying on the floor of the basement for what felt like years. The journeys through the wall had taken their toll. She wondered why she felt so exhausted when she wasn’t even alive any more, but she was too drained to ask. She simply lay there, letting the hum of the wall comfort and warm her until, when she’d almost given up hope, she was aware of that feeling once more. It started in her nose, like she was about to sneeze, and spread down her throat and through her chest. She didn’t move from where she lay, but Lieffe sensed the difference.
‘Evie, is it happening?’ he asked, and she nodded feverishly, her eyes shut tight. Something started to rattle and clang in her chest, ten times harder than before, and she had to use all her strength to keep herself clamped to the floor. She thought it might never stop and was about to cry out for help when all at once it disappeared, leaving her whole body tingling.
‘Well …?’ asked Lieffe, wondering if she was still conscious.
Evie wiped the sweat from her brow. ‘If these get progressively worse with each journey through the wall,’ she said, ‘then I dread what’s coming next.’
12
the final journey
Evie sat and told Lieffe all about her children. Lieffe had left the world before August and Isla were born, and she truly wished they had had the chance to meet.
‘Isla is stubborn and very clever,’ she said affectionately.
‘A deadly combination,’ Lieffe laughed.
‘And doesn’t her brother know it! August, bless him, was terrified of her growing up. August is creative. Unlike anything you’ve ever seen. The way his fingers move across a piano and the melodies he just plucks out of the air … he’s astounding.’ Evie’s eyes had glazed over, but it wasn’t her son she was thinking of now. Someone else had entered her mind. A brilliant musician she’d once known who would have been proud of the son she’d had and the man he’d grown up to be.
‘Evie,’ Lieffe said gently, breaking her out of her trance.
‘Yes?’
‘Is it time to get the sweets?’ He smiled.
‘Yes, Lieffe,’ she said. ‘It’s time to get the sweets.’
Evie had been nervous about seeing her son and daughter, but there was nothing she could do to prepare for the next trip through the wall.
‘Is Vincent still … y’know?’ Lieffe interrupted her thoughts.
‘What?’ Evie asked, confused.
‘Alive?’ Lieffe whispered.
Evie was pulling on her green coat. She dropped her hands by her sides, completely flabbergasted. ‘I have absolutely no idea. I hadn’t even thought of that. How had I not thought of that?’
‘Maybe you’ve just been hoping for the best. If he’s somewhere in this world, the wall won’t do anything. I’ve seen it happen before. There are ways of seeking him out here, though, don’t worry.’
To think that Vincent might have passed away before her without her knowing, and to think that he could be much closer than she’d initially imagined … Evie experienced just about every feeling before she decided to settle on nausea.
‘I hope that wherever he is, he’s happy,’ she said.
‘Me too.’ Lieffe smiled kindly. Although he hadn’t really got to know Vincent like he knew Evie, he knew Vincent had been a nice man. He had seen how happy Evie had become when Vincent had waltzed into her life. He’d hear her humming from two floors away, before she stepped out of the lift, and her hugs were warmer than they’d ever been.
Lieffe didn’t have to know Vincent any better to know that he was a good man because he knew Evie.
Evie grabbed a handful of the sweets from the Lost Box and stuffed her pockets full.
‘I think just the one will be enough,’ Lieffe said, looking at the shiny wrappers spilling out of her coat.
‘I think so too. The rest are for me,’ she said, smiling. She plucked one out and laid it in her palm. ‘It’s so small. So simple.’ She held it up to the dim lighting. ‘A handful of these was what brought me closer to the only man I ever loved. They were the start of everything,’ she said, marvelling at the huge significance of something so small.
‘Some would say they were to blame!’ Lieffe said. ‘There are people who would never touch a hard boiled sweet again after going through what you went through.’
Lieffe moved the desk chair into the centre of the room so he could watch the entertainment unfold.
‘Yes, it was horrible, and yes, I spent my whole life hiding it.’ Evie unwrapped the sweet and popped it into her mouth. ‘But that doesn’t mean I’d change a moment of it. Not for the world.’
‘Why not?’ Lieffe asked, sitting himself down in the desk chair with a groan.
Evie smiled, remembering a similar conversation many years ago. She pushed the sweet into her cheek and began to explain. ‘Because if none of that had happened, I might have grown into a very different person. If I’d got everything I’d ever wanted in life, I might have become a spoiled brat. If I’d never bothered to pursue that dream of being an artist, if I’d never stood up to my mother, I might never have known what being in love with someone really felt like, because I never would have met Vincent. Yes, that dream ultimately failed, but I learned so much. Mostly tiny things, but it only takes a spark to light a fire. All those tiny things accumulated to make me who I am. If none of it had happened, I could have lived a far worse life than I did. That’s why, despite all the heartbreak, the failure and th
e secrets, if I was given the chance to go back in time and change things, I wouldn’t. Not even a second.’
Lieffe looked at her. When she was alive, she had been a singular person who’d had all this fire in her and nowhere for it to go. She’d pushed against boundaries and fought against people who told her no, but to no avail. For most people, that would have been the end; they would have given up and turned back the way they’d come. Some might even have become bitter, feeling like the universe owed them and begrudging those who did succeed, but not Evie. She’d lost the battle, but her war was won when she became the mother her children needed. When she allowed them to grow into the people they wanted to be. And most of all when she accepted the hand she was dealt and made the absolute best of it. Part of Lieffe wished he could go back in time and change her past for her so she could have become everything she’d ever wanted to be, but he was also very glad that what had happened had resulted in the woman standing in front of him now, because he thought she was simply brilliant.
‘Are you ready for this?’ he asked, meshing his fingers together and sitting back in the chair.
‘Ready as I’ll ever be, which isn’t very, but it’ll do.’
Evie took the orange sweet out of her mouth. It was warm and sticky, so before it had a chance to dry out, she stuck it to the centre of the wall with a firm push. The humming stopped abruptly. She was expecting the sweet to disappear, or for the wall to turn into something that represented her long-lost love, but it remained the same plain yellowing surface with its jagged wallpaper around the edges. Please be alive, she chanted over and over in her head.
On the Other Side Page 18