by Abby Davies
After about twenty minutes, the little girl went quiet.
I sighed with relief and carried on with my grammar work.
Chapter 5
At midday I went down to the kitchen to prepare my own lunch, as instructed. Mother hadn’t said anything about making lunch for Clarabelle, but I made her a spam sandwich too. I also made one for Mother, cutting off the crusts carefully, just the way she liked. I tossed the crusts in the bin, thinking about when she’d taken some toast outside before. I couldn’t work out why she’d done that. She hated birds. And then I’d heard her saying something, like she was talking to someone, but that didn’t make sense either. There was no one out there to talk to – except for birds and bugs – and I doubted Mother would talk to animals. I probably would if I ever got the chance, but Mother was different.
Unable to stop frowning, I scanned the room. Mother hadn’t wiped down the kitchen, which was odd as she was usually so strict about keeping the house clean. To be helpful, I washed the dirty dishes, dried them and placed them in their cabinet, hoping Mother would be pleased. The problem was that it was hard to predict how Mother would react. I often wondered if all grown-ups were like Mother. In my books some of the adults were straightforward and predictable, but that was made up. That wasn’t real life. That was the perfect thing about books: you could turn reality into anything you wanted it to be.
If I wrote a book, every bit of the story would be set outside and the main character would be a girl who lived outside and had lots of brothers and sisters, a mother and a father. The girl wouldn’t be allergic to the light, and she’d be able to turn into a bird whenever she wanted to and fly all over the world and have wild adventures in all kinds of wonderful places. I sighed and finished wiping the surfaces with a dreamy smile on my lips.
I was carrying Clarabelle’s sandwich up the stairs, imagining I was the bird-girl, when the front door rattled. I froze on the stairs feeling guilty even though I could not put my finger on what I’d done wrong. I ought to get out of there, away from the doorway where sunlight would be pouring in any second, but my feet were stuck to the carpeted stairs, my neck craned round painfully, my eyes following the movements of bags as they were flung in through the door, which was open about a forearm’s width. I pressed myself flat against the cold wall, my eyes trained on the door, which swung open a few more inches every time Mother threw another bag inside. So many bags were piling up in the doorway that the door opened wider, allowing me a glimpse of light so blinding that I gasped and shielded my eyes. It felt like someone had just held a lit match a hair’s width away from my eyes and yet I peeled my eyelids open under the protective shield of my hand and stared at the wonderful array of colours outside. I caught a glimpse of shocking blue – the sky – and green so vivid it stung – grass – and a rich, lush, bunch of dark green – bushes, I guessed. I saw slices of wood poking up out of the grass and I saw golden pebbles on the ground. I drank it all in, lapped it up, cared little that at any moment Mother would step inside and see me bathed in sunlight. I suddenly felt so high that I wanted to throw myself down the stairs, jump over the shopping bags and run outside.
But then reality reared its hideous black skull and pain exploded in my brain. Mother was right. I was allergic to the outside, to the sun, to the lovely, deadly light, and I was going to die soon, sooner than I had to, because I had just sped up the process by allowing the light to touch me.
Dolls live short lives. This is the end. Mother’s right. Dolls live short lives. Mother’s always said it. My allergy to light means that I won’t live as long as a normal girl. That is, I think, why Mother calls me a doll. Because I’m not a normal girl. I’m not going to live to be old and wrinkly like other human beings. My light allergy is killing me. It’s been killing me from the moment I was born. I can’t believe it’s happening so soon. I can’t believe I’m going to die today.
Panic and fear tore at my throat and I raced upstairs. Clarabelle’s sandwich flew off the plate and landed in a mess on the landing. I knew I would be in trouble, but I had to get away from the light. I jumped onto my bed and grappled with my bedcovers, pulling them over myself until I was submerged in darkness. My body shook and my head pounded. The pain was killing me. I was too hot under the covers. I threw them off and lay back in bed. Nausea swept up my throat but the sick feeling hovered there and my mouth did not turn to liquid so I knew I wasn’t going to be sick this time.
Staring at the rough, white ceiling, I counted down from one hundred, slowing my breathing to match every other number. I could hear something downstairs, something amazing. I listened for a while and the pain lessened. Curiosity seemed to make the pain go away and my inner cat won.
Still feeling shaky, I padded out onto the landing and hastily gathered up the ruined sandwich. Tearing it into pieces, I flushed it down the toilet then went downstairs, trying to ignore a nasty stab of guilt.
Mother was in the living room dancing in front of a huge machine I’d never seen before. The machine seemed to produce the incredible sounds filling the house. The sounds coming out of the machine sounded like the tunes Mother hummed. So this is what music sounds like.
Mother had her eyes closed and her head thrown back. A dreamy smile played at her lips as she swayed her long, thin body to the music. I watched, mesmerized by her, transfixed by the peaceful look on her face. For a second, I almost didn’t recognize my own mother.
‘What’s that?’ I blurted before I could stop myself, pointing at the machine.
Mother laughed and opened her eyes. ‘It’s a record player, silly. I got it dirt cheap at the car boot. Got a load of records for it too. Thought the music might cheer me up a bit. Help Clarabelle relax. I’d forgotten how great it feels to dance. I only listen to music in the car these days.’
She showed me a bag full of huge black discs.
‘These are records. They have music recorded onto them, then they go in the record player, which makes the music come out. It’s the bee’s knees, isn’t it?’
I nodded. I tried to move my body to the music like Mother, but I felt too stiff.
‘How do you do that?’ I asked.
‘Do what? Dance?’ she laughed and grabbed my arms, ‘Like this, silly doll!’
She spun me around and around and around. I felt my chest loosen and a smile sprang to my face. It was strange but smiling made my cheeks ache. Maybe I wasn’t dying. I couldn’t be dying, not if I could feel like this. Not if I could feel so alive.
I laughed and Mother laughed. I felt like I’d been whisked to a fairyland. Like in Peter and Wendy. It was the best I’d felt for a long, long time.
‘Who made the music?’ I said as Mother let go of my hands and I fell onto the sofa, my head spinning with dizziness.
‘Only the best band on the entire planet. The Eagles, of course!’
‘The Eagles?’
She nodded enthusiastically.
‘What does take it easy mean, Mother?’
She laughed and held out her hands to me. ‘It means relax, chill out, that sort of thing. Come on! Enough questions. Let’s dance!’
I grinned and leapt up from the sofa. Mother grabbed my wrists and we spun and spun, around and around and around, like the spin top I used to play with when I was little. Tears shimmered in my eyes and I didn’t know why I felt like crying but I didn’t care.
‘I love you, Mother,’ I said, raising my voice so she would definitely hear me.
Mother grinned down at me. ‘I love you too, Mirabelle.’
‘Your hair looks funny when we spin!’
‘So does yours,’ she said gaily and she released her grip on my wrists and I staggered sideways and nearly fell over.
We laughed and I paused to catch my breath and Mother continued to dance and sing along to the song. She was so transformed in her face and body that I hardly recognized her.
‘Why don’t you dance more often, Mother?’ I said, trying to copy her swaying motion.
Mother fr
owned and stopped swaying. ‘That’s enough questions, Mirabelle. You always ask too many questions.’
She did something to the record player and a harsh scratchy sound cut off the music.
‘I’m sorry, Mother, I didn’t mean to—’
Without looking at me, she said, ‘Go upstairs and write a detailed description of something. I want to see how your control of tenses is progressing.’
I followed her out into the hallway where she was grabbing up bags and lugging them into the kitchen.
‘Can I help, Mother?’
She shook her head and I watched her pace back and forth laden with bags.
‘I made you a spam sandwich,’ I said, following her into the kitchen, ‘I cut off the crusts just the way you like.’
‘That’s nice,’ she muttered.
Feeling desperately confused about Mother’s sudden change of mood, I picked up my sandwich and took it upstairs with me. At the top of the stairs I listened for any sound of Clarabelle. I heard a sniffling sound and took a tentative step towards the door. Before I knew it, my feet had carried me to the spare room.
‘Hi, it’s Mirabelle. Are you feeling any better?’ I whispered, careful not to call her Clarabelle in case it upset her again.
I heard Mother’s footsteps on the stairs and rushed into my bedroom. I thought about going out to talk to Mother, but I didn’t want to upset her any more than I already had.
As instructed, I sat at my desk and began to write, but it was hard to concentrate when all I could think about was whether or not the light was slowly killing me. I couldn’t even ask Mother; if she knew I’d let the light touch me, I’d be in terrible trouble.
‘Don’t throw the crusts away when you cut them off. Leave them on the side,’ Mother said, making me jump.
‘What? I mean, pardon, Mother?’
I looked up from my robin description and leaned forward in what I hoped was a casual, natural-looking movement. Mother was standing in the doorway, her eyes fixed on something far away. My arm obscured my work. I didn’t want her to see it. Not yet. Not until I had decided whether to show her the description with my drawing or without it. Mother used to let me draw pictures to go with my work when I was little, but I was learning that the rules were different when you turned thirteen. Mother might disapprove of the fact that I had drawn a sketch to go with the description. Then again, she might not. I was beginning to realize that I could never be sure which way Mother would go. It was starting to make me more nervous but more careful too.
I distorted my face into a fake smile, trying to ignore the soft crying sounds coming from the spare room. If Mother heard them, she did not show it. I wanted to ask if Clarabelle had had any lunch but the words dried up on my tongue.
‘I said, don’t throw the crusts away.’
‘Why? Are you going to give them to the birds?’
‘That’s none of your concern. I need them, that’s all you need to know.’
‘Oh, OK. Sorry, Mother.’ I dropped my gaze, fought tears. Wondered why she needed to keep the crusts. It seemed very odd.
‘That’s all right,’ she said. She took a small step into the room. Her voice soft, she said, ‘I didn’t tell you about my sister before.’
‘Your sister?’
‘Yes. I had a sister,’ she said.
‘Really?’ I sat up straighter. The fact that Mother was opening up to me filled me with hope that I was not a lost cause. I was not going to die – not soon anyway. Mother still loves me.
I leaned forward, drawing forgotten, the mystery of the crusts pushed to the back of my mind.
‘Yes. Her name was Olivia. She was my twin.’
‘Your twin?’
My mind buzzed with this new information. Why had she not told me this before? If she had a sister, then I had an aunt. Why was Mother talking in the past tense? Was my aunt dead? But I knew better than to blast out loads of questions like bullets from a bank robber’s gun. If Mother wanted to tell me stuff, she would, in her own time.
‘Yes,’ she said solemnly.
‘Were you and her identical?’
‘You and she,’ she corrected.
‘Were you and she identical?’
She shook her head, her eyes glazing over. ‘We had the same blonde hair, but she was a great deal more beautiful than I was. She looked like the most perfect little doll you could ever imagine. Very like you, in fact. Everyone commented on her beauty. Complete strangers would stop in the street and give her compliments. Grandfather loved her for it.’
She moved over to my bed and sat down, beckoning me to join her. I got up from the desk and perched on the edge of the bed and she patted her lap, like she used to when I was little. I lay down and rested my head on her thighs, looking up into her face, thinking about how difficult it must have been for Mother, being the ugly duckling and always being second best.
The knots in my chest loosened and began to unravel as Mother’s fingers lightly stroked my forehead. She had not treated me so lovingly for a while now. Tears bubbled up but I suppressed them by focusing on the angular cut of Mother’s jaw, the way it moved as she talked.
‘Olivia was perfect,’ Mother repeated. ‘Grandfather thought she was an angel – his angel – and he spoiled her rotten. On the outside she looked so innocent and sweet and lovely, but on the inside she was pure evil. Rotten to her core.’
She went quiet for a while but continued to stroke my head.
‘What was he like?’ I said. I had asked about my great-grandfather before, but Mother never told me much.
‘After breaking his leg fighting so bravely in the First World War, Grandfather went into the oil industry – that’s where he made his money. When my parents died in the car crash, he retired and came back to look after us. We were only two years old at the time. We were a handful, but Grandfather raised us all by himself. My grandmother had died ten years previously. Grandfather was a faithless man after that – rare for that time – but he was also traditional, like me. He was very strict.’
‘Was he nice to you?’
‘He taught me right from wrong. He fed me and clothed me and made sure I wanted for nothing. He was a good man, most of the time.’
‘But was he nice?’
‘Nice. Such a subjective word. Such a meaningless word. I’d rather you didn’t use it, Mirabelle.’
‘Sorry, Mother. Was he kind?’
‘He was a hard man. War had seen to that.’
‘I’m sorry, Mother.’
‘He spoiled her rotten.’ Mother’s tone darkened, ‘Bought her everything she wanted. Every book she liked, she got. Every doll she liked, she got. I mean, listen to this – one day, when we were very young, perhaps four or five, Olivia decided she wanted my doll. She already had several dolls, but he didn’t even hesitate. He just let her have her. Just like that. My sweet, beautiful, little Isabelle. And when I got angry about it and tried to take Isabelle back, he shouted at me and told me I could never have a doll again and Olivia – I still remember the smug look on her perfect face – yes, she loved the fact that she could simply flutter her eyelashes at him and he’d get her anything she wanted. She loved the attention too. Craved it …’
She trailed off like she was lost in thought. Lost in memories. I felt sorry for her, but I was desperate to know more. Questions scratched at my throat like sandpaper.
I waited a few beats then asked my question, ‘Did Olivia … die?’
Mother’s fingers stilled on my head.
‘That’s enough,’ she said sharply. She looked down at me suddenly. From this angle her eyes looked crossed, her nose knife-sharp, her cheekbones blade-like.
Without warning, she stood, making my head jerk forward then flop back onto the bed. I sat up and watched her walk away, longing to hear all about my evil aunt Olivia and my great-grandfather.
After a moment, driven by a reckless impulse I couldn’t understand, I dashed after Mother. I froze in my bedroom doorway and watched her stop in t
he centre of the landing. She reached up and pulled the bronze knob that was attached to the door in the ceiling. The trapdoor dropped open and she reached up again and pulled down a metal ladder. The silver rungs squealed as she climbed. She disappeared into the attic and I heard the creak of her weight as she walked across the ceiling above me.
I sighed, disappointed, my tongue sizzling with questions, but then an idea popped into my head. I looked up at hole in the ceiling and began to think. I had never been in the attic before so I didn’t know what secret treasures lay up there, no doubt hidden beneath dust and cobwebs and other gross, disturbing things, but a tingling feeling in my chest made me feel that at least one answer lay above my head, cloaked in darkness, waiting to be uncovered.
The thought gave me hope and I latched onto it like a leech.
I returned to my bedroom with a plan forming in my head. If I was going to die soon, I wanted answers before that happened and I wasn’t going to get them from Mother.
I sat down at my desk and smiled nervously.
Mother had never said I couldn’t go up into the attic.
Chapter 6
The front door banged shut and the key crunched in the lock, signalling Mother’s departure from the cottage and unlocking the rising hysteria that was gurgling inside me. Mother was gone. Gone shopping for groceries and maybe a few more books and another pop or psychedelic piece of art. Gone for how long, I did not know.
The little gold clock on my desk helped me to track the seconds and minutes and hours that made up a day. I could never be certain, but on average Mother’s trips into the outside lasted two hours. On occasion, of course, they hovered around the six-hour mark, but these lengthier trips were few and far between, so I could not bank on her being out for anywhere near that long.
Clarabelle was quiet, which was good. Perhaps she was asleep. I had seen Mother go into Clarabelle’s room this morning holding a syringe. Mother loved Clarabelle and she had worked as a nurse, so I guessed the syringe had been full of some calming medicine that would help Clarabelle adjust to her new way of living. I felt sorry for Clarabelle. Even though Mother had rescued her from a nasty family, Clarabelle had been torn abruptly from everything she’d ever known. I wondered if she used to go to school every day. Did she have a best friend who she missed? Did she miss her school teacher? In many of the books I read, teachers were mean. But in some stories, the teachers were lovely. Maybe Clarabelle’s teacher was lovely. Maybe her teacher had comforted poor Clarabelle when she had been beaten by her father.