“Can I use your bathroom, please?”
I perched on the edge of the sofa and wriggled a little as if I really had to go. Dr. Rhodes gave me a look. A look that said, I’m a highly experienced psychotherapist and I know exactly what you are doing.
She paused for a moment, leaving me in suspense.
“Of course, it’s just outside on the left, and if you could send your parents back in on your way out that would be …” But I’d gone. I rushed past Mum and Dad, who were hovering by the door, and ran to the small bathroom, locking the door behind me.
The stall was modern, sleek, and had a small pot of potpourri on the back of the toilet tank. I quickly unbuttoned my shirt as I filled up the sink with hot, clean, cleansing water. After taking my shirt off, I tucked it into the waistband of my trousers to keep it safe and peeled my gloves off, pushing them into my back pocket. Without touching anything else, I dipped my right arm into the scalding water and used my left hand to scoop the water up and over the top of my arm, washing away all of the germs that Dad had passed on to me.
We drove home in silence. I had put my gloves back on but they felt wrong. They felt dirty. As we approached Chestnut Close, Dad pulled over next to the yellow tape that stretched across the end of our road. A large news truck was parked nearby and a small group of journalists looked up at us as we sat there, waiting to be let in.
Mum’s window went down as a policeman approached with a clipboard. I hadn’t seen this one before; he was older and his uniform looked much too tight around his stomach.
“Afternoon,” he said. Mum gave him our names and address and he looked at his list.
“Number nine,” he repeated back to her. “Right next door then?”
“Yes, it’s not been very nice, officer,” said Mum.
I leaned forward.
“Can we just go? I really need the toilet.”
“So you must be the boy in the window,” said the policeman, waggling his pen in my direction. “Matthew, isn’t it? You saw him before he went missing, didn’t you?”
“Yes, yes he did, officer,” said Dad, sounding strangely proud.
The policeman scribbled something down.
“What are you doing out then? I thought you were one of those reclusive types.”
“He’s started therapy today actually,” said Mum.
“Can we just get home? Please!” I said. Mum wound her window back up and the policeman unraveled one end of the tape, leaving just enough room for Dad to drive through.
Gordon was walking down the road toward his house and Mum wound her window back down again as we pulled up beside him.
“Any news, Gordon?”
He shook his head as he fanned his face with his hat. His wispy hair was wet with sweat. He looked exhausted.
“No. Nothing. We’ve looked everywhere. Everywhere.”
He was so tired he could barely speak.
“And how’s Penny? Tell her to pop over any time, won’t you?”
Dad groaned, probably too loudly. He couldn’t stand Penny. He called her an interfering old bat.
Gordon wiped the sweat from the back of his neck.
“Oh, Penny’s Penny. You know what she’s like, always keeping busy.”
His shoulders slumped forward as he plodded on back toward home.
We pulled into the driveway and Dad turned the engine off as we all looked at number eleven in silence. Standing on Mr. Charles’s path with her back to us was Melissa Dawson, Teddy and Casey’s mum.
An officer in a suit was talking to her, gesturing at the roses as if he was just giving gardening advice and not talking about her missing son. She stood with her arms folded tightly, her head twitching briefly as if the shock was still pulsing through her. The policeman carried on; his hand waved toward the gate, which had been locked and then unlocked, then toward the house where Casey and Mr. Charles had been, and then he pointed up at our window, the office window where I had watched Teddy picking the petals.
Melissa Dawson turned to see, her face agonized, her eyes watering, and then, like a broken elevator, she plummeted to the ground, settling into a heap onto the concrete. Mum gasped and put her hand to her mouth. The man in the suit shouted to one of his colleagues and bent down beside her as she began to wail. The noise was unlike anything I had ever heard before: animal-like and agonized. I put my hands over my ears, feeling the germs from my used gloves spread all over my face. The man patted her rhythmically on one shoulder, and then a policewoman appeared and they pulled her up and into the house.
“Oh Brian, that poor woman,” Mum sobbed. Dad seemed unable to speak.
When we got inside I kicked my shoes off and ran upstairs. In my room I stripped down to my boxer shorts, feeling the Wallpaper Lion laughing at me. I threw the dirty clothes outside my door and peeled off my very last pair of gloves, now ruined with sickness and disease. Back in my room I grabbed my cleaning supplies and began to spray myself with the antibacterial spray. My skin tingled as the cool mist left tiny, miniscule droplets on my arms and legs, and then I grabbed my notebook from my bedside and angrily scratched at the paper.
Tuesday, July 29th. 11:34 a.m. Bedroom.
Number of Wallpaper Lions = 1
Number of filled notebooks = 8
Number of unused notebooks = 4
Number of half-filled notebooks = 1
Number of missing neighbors = 1
Number of useless twelve-year-olds = 1
To: Matthew Corbin
From: Melody Bird
Subject: OLD NINA!
She’s got a cellar!!!!!!!!!!!
Agent M. x
My heart was pounding as I typed back. I had tissue wrapped around my fingers and it kept slipping.
To: Melody Bird
From: Matthew Corbin
Re: OLD NINA!
What? How do you know?!
I rewrapped the tissue around my fingers.
To: Matthew Corbin
From: Melody Bird
Re: OLD NINA!
I knocked on her door. She didn’t answer, of course, but under her front room window, behind that big bush, you can see glass. It looks like skylights to a cellar!!!! Should we tell the police?
I sat back and thought about it. You couldn’t accuse someone because they had the perfect hiding place right there in their house. You needed evidence. I stood up and looked down at the Rectory. An angry-looking shrub with needle-like thorns spread across the whole front of her bay window; beneath it something was twinkling in the bright sunlight. I squinted. I could just make out a tiny triangle of glass—a sliver of window barely visible behind the thick branches. I’d never noticed it before, but Melody was right. Old Nina had a cellar.
To: Melody Bird
From: Matthew Corbin
Re: OLD NINA!
You’re right. Good work! Can you get around the back? See what you can see from the graveyard?
To: Matthew Corbin
From: Melody Bird
Re: OLD NINA!
I’ve tried. It’s too overgrown and I couldn’t see a thing. I think you need to watch her house, Matthew. See if you spot anything unusual!
Jake came out of his house and began to walk slowly around the cul-de-sac. He stuffed his hands into his jeans and scuffed his feet along the ground at a stone, kicking it until it dropped into a drain. Every now and then he looked over at the policeman standing outside number eleven and then up at me, but he didn’t shout anything. He looked bored.
My hands were throbbing. They had been washed and washed, but still the germs were finding their way under my nails and deep, deep into my bloodstream. The urge to wash yet again was overwhelming.
To: Melody Bird
From: Matthew Corbin
Subject: Help
Melody. I need your help.
I stopped typing, but I had no choice. She might be a bit odd, but there was no one else I could ask. I took two deep breaths. After this email I would be exposed. Vulnerable. The tissue slipped on my index finger, so I tightened it the best I could before I continued:
I need you to get some latex gloves for me. A boxful. I can pay you when I see you next, OK? I think you should be able to get them at the pharmacy on High Street.
You can’t bring them here though. I’ll have to meet you somewhere nearby.
Matthew