Her fingers touched the ancient, smooth wood, fumbled for the handle, pulled herself up and inched it towards her, her arms weak and exhausted, hopping backwards on her good leg.
The cellar stairs were dark, but she could just see that the kitchen door at the top of the cellar steps was opened; the kitchen was bright with sunlight. They could still be in the house; asleep, maybe. Or waiting for her. She stopped at the second step up, eked out her breath, waiting for any shift in the shadows, any noise from the house above. She stood there for an hour, dizzy, sick, but conscious, and getting stronger.
They had gone. They must have gone. She’d heard the car leaving, and there was no way that Lorna could keep this quiet for this long, or Marianne either. She put one foot on the next step. Then the other.
The outline of the kitchen window faded. Outside now it was twilight. They must have left, they wouldn’t have gone to bed, not this early. She grasped the shaky bannister, climbed up, slowly, grimly, into the kitchen.
And then something moved, quick and close. Claire stumbled, caught her foot on the top of the stair, and nearly fell backwards. She clung to the bannister; it creaked alarmingly under her weight. That’s it, that’s it, now. They have me now. A soft moan escaped her.
But whoever it was hung back. Claire saw its shadow move so, so slightly. Then it sneezed.
‘Benji?’ she whispered. The dog wiggled into view – all laughing jaws and pricked ears. He placed a ball at the top of the stairs, and gazed at her. Claire, frozen, waited. He barked, a sharp, impatient command, and poked at the ball with his nose. Claire leaned forward painfully, and pushed it with one finger. Benji leapt joyfully, clattering through the kitchen, bumping against chair legs. The ball eluded him, and his frustrated, excited whimpers echoed through the house. He sent one chair crashing to the floor before retrieving the ball, and laying it, with quivering respect, at Claire’s feet again.
Surely, surely if they were in, they would have come down by now! Unless they were waiting, standing just out of the way, waiting for her to gather up the courage to make the final step out of the cellar, into the house.
She stayed still for a long time, feet cramping, head throbbing. The dizziness had gone though, that was something. Benji nosed the ball towards her a few more times, and then, sighing disappointedly, collapsed into a heap at the top of the stairs. Every minute or so Claire would poke one freezing foot underneath his stomach to warm it. Still no sound.
When the clock struck nine, she crossed the boundary of the stairs, towards the light switch. The kitchen dawned on her like a developing photograph. Cupboards were open, the remains of food lay on the table. A pair of Lorna’s knickers lay on the welcome mat. Claire edged forward, until she could see the corner of the driveway from the window. Marianne’s car wasn’t there. No, take a proper look, go to the window. No, no it wasn’t there. They must have gone! Adrenaline burned through her suddenly, and she limped swiftly into the living room. All of Lorna’s DVDs were missing. Benji followed her upstairs into the bedrooms. Lorna’s room was incongruously neat, all the toys gone, all her clothes gone. All that remained in Marianne’s room was an old lipstick and a couple of tattered paperbacks. Benji stayed close as she opened drawers, checked the bathroom for their toothbrushes, walked painfully back downstairs to look for any other bits of the detritus Marianne and Lorna spread about, but, apart from the breakfast things and the knickers, there was nothing. Nothing at all to suggest Lorna had ever lived there.
She fed Benji. They must have been gone for a long time, given how hungry he was, and when he whined to get out of the door, she left it open for a while, letting in the breeze, hoping it might clear her aching head. There was paracetamol in the cupboard, and she took four, swallowing painfully, her throat swollen. She didn’t dare look in a mirror yet.
Then Benji began to bark, ran back to the door and carried on barking, leading Claire to the very end of the garden, just where the slope led to the crumbly hills that were a precursor of the beach below. Something smelled, a familiar smell. A horrible smell. It grew stronger the closer she got to the wall Lorna had destroyed. And then she saw them.
Heaps of burnt toys. Lorna’s toys. Melted and melded together into grotesque, blackened forms. There was the battery-powered yapping dog she’d begged for, there was the pink teddy she slept with every night. Here were the books, the Famous Five, the Secret Seven, The Faraway Tree, their pages now delicate, blackened petals. Here was Mother’s Dickens, ripped and ashy. The clothes, the lipsticks, the hair grips, the ballet shoes – and, at the very top, only partially melted, the Disney princess snowglobe Lorna had given to Claire, ages ago, a lifetime before. They were all in an ugly heap and stinking of lighter fuel.
Claire backed away, as if from something monstrous, unclean, but couldn’t leave, couldn’t look away, until she felt Benji’s wet nose in her palm, heard him whine.
A car was coming, far away, but horribly loud in the quiet night. Benji leapt away towards the house. Claire followed as fast as she could.
40
Back in the kitchen, Benji was cowering under the table, his eyes shifting from her to the door, from her to the door. The sound of the car grew closer, and she could hear the familiar grind and whine of gears: Marianne’s car. Claire scurried back out of the kitchen, down the stairs and back into the cellar, easing the door closed. She shoved her hand and her ankle through the tattered loops of plastic again, and curled up in an approximation of where she’d fallen, thankful that she hadn’t washed the blood from her face.
Benji barked as they came in. Claire heard the tap tap of Marianne’s broken-down heels, Lorna’s signature slam of the door. Then only dulled murmurs. After being in the warmth outside, her aching body groaned against the cruel cold of the cellar floor.
The door to the stairs opened.