I stood still, waiting, in case that was his game. When he comes, I thought, I can grab him and tickle him, hearing his laughter turn wild, and carry on tickling until his giggles go breathless, and when he whines that he doesn’t like it anymore, my fingers slip from soft belly to hard ribs, and he begs me to stop because it’s hurting a bit, but I carry on tickling him through the hysteria because I’m so relieved to have my hands back on his flesh, and I honestly don’t know how to let him go.
A buzzard rode the updraft. From the road, two sets of footsteps belonging to Peter and Charlie pattered on the wind. A gust rose in a sudden burst, and a stand of tall poplar trees on the other side of the road bent and swirled as though they’d been waiting for the opportune moment: now they thrashed back and forth like an unruly crowd, a baying mob yelling out curses of “creak-a-wish, creak-a-wish.”
Burn-the-witch. Burn-the-witch.
An echo of the boy who’d stood on this spot, pale hair wild in my headlights. Holding up my axe. Taunting me.
Fat drops of rain crash-landed, helpless and winded, on the paving stones around my feet. A first foray that presaged the onslaught to come. The sky was furred with a dark underbelly of clouds. It spat in my face, glutinous drops that I tilted back my head to receive, even while Joni and Lola and the others ran squealing for the car. And then the rain fell with a sound like dustbin lids.
If Billy had crept up behind me, I couldn’t have heard him. I closed my eyes and felt the water course through the gullies of my body: down my spine, between my breasts, into armpits and buttocks, running down my legs and out between the crevasses of my toes. I spread my arms to let it have its way.
The image of that boy in my headlights occupied my mind. Where had the Wild Things appeared from so suddenly last night? Are they here now? Could Billy have spotted some children and run after them; would he do that? Or—I opened my eyes and wiped them clear of rainwater—they could have lured Billy away. The Wild Things have taken him. Why, I don’t know, but Billy didn’t wander off, that wasn’t his style; someone has taken him. And the only people we know are alive are the Wild Things.
“It’s the only thing that makes sense,” I told Joni moments later in the car. “They must have grabbed him.”
“So we split up and go find them,” she said.
“No way. You take everyone back to the camp, and I’ll find them.”
“But we’ll find them quicker if there are more of us,” said Lola.
“And what if they grab Maggie next? Or the Lost Boy?” Even as I spoke, Lola was shaking her head. “Or you?”
“All right, we go in groups,” she said. “An adult in each group.”
“There are only two adults.” I spoke over Lola’s objections. “Two. Adults. And I’ll move faster on my own.”
“I could stay with you, and Mom can take the kids back.”
“No, Lola. I need to concentrate on finding Billy without worrying where you are.”
“But that’s stupid! I can help you—”
“You can help me by shutting the fuck up and doing what you’re told.”
Lola spun round in the seat to turn her back on me. Joni told me to calm down. I pushed the Lost Boy’s feet aside so I could scrabble about in the foot well for the crowbar and torch. I opened the door and slid back out into the drenching rain.
“If you’re not at the camp by nightfall, I’ll pick you up here,” said Joni.
“Mom!” Lola spun round in her seat to confront Joni.
Joni ignored her and pointed at me. “Can you walk that far with your leg? You should bandage your hand too.”
“What the fuck?” Lola jabbed her mother in the breast.
“Don’t speak to me that way, Lola,” said Joni.
“It’s only a mile or two to the camp. I’ll be fine.”
Lola shook her head and ran both hands over her dark hair to push out the water. “I always thought you humored her, Mom. Keeping the peace, like you said. But you’re her doormat.” As the door closed out her voice, Lola was telling her mother that she was pathetic.
I ran back to the supermarket and wrapped the torch in a plastic carrier bag. The crowbar was comforting, so I kept it in my hand. Behind the counter was a display of medicines, and I swallowed down two different painkillers and added the silver packets to the carrier bag. The wall clock told me it was past lunchtime, so I scooped some energy bars and chocolate into my bag, a packet of crisps for Billy. Outside in the car park, the Beast splashed through the puddles, and I heard it growl away down the main road.
The dark sky made it feel much later in the day, like I should be heading home to roost, not setting out on an expedition with no obvious destination and, certainly, no resting place. I had several hours to find Billy and get back here for our lift home.
I set off in the direction the Wild Things had gone with their stolen trolleys.
The invisible thread that remains after the umbilical cord is cut tugged at my core. I felt Billy as acutely as a contraction, a sign that I had to deliver him back again. But the empty streets and blank windows rendered me so alone that I longed to hear another human voice, anyone; there had to be someone out there who could help. I tried the police on my mobile, but the electronic voice just repeated a single word: “Sorry.” I ran to a red phone box farther down the main road. It contained only a defibrillator. “Saving lives in your community.” I picked up the emergency phone, which automatically dialed 999. Waited. Listened to a hollow line. Was someone listening back? “Hello? Hello?” Maybe this was an elaborate joke at my expense. A studio audience laughing at my confusion and then going “aw” at an image of Billy’s kissy-lip face. Or maybe I was already dead, like in a TV program I’d watched once, and this was my own personal purgatory. An eternity of trying to reach my kids. I slammed the handset down, then picked it up and slammed it down again. Or maybe it was real, and I was alive, and Billy needed me. I shouldered open the iron door.
The village was bigger than it seemed, a web of streets stretching from the main road in arcs and squares. No rhyme or reason to the layout. I jog-crouched up the driveway to each of the houses, checking for signs of life. Some of the front doors swung open at a touch. I couldn’t bring myself to enter, as though the spaces were congealed with dead air. The tangible silence told me they were uninhabited by anyone living. Some revealed the buzz, and I sprinted away. There were many cats, unperturbed. A few croupy dog barks. At every catatonic house I berated myself for wasting more time, each failure opening a new chink in my facade of determination until it crumbled altogether, and I ended up running up and down the streets, screaming Billy’s name and thrashing under hydrangea bushes as though he were a strange boy in a fairy tale who might have inexplicably curled up to sleep.