The cab is true to its word, arriving almost as soon as I’m on the street, and after barking an address at the driver, I leave a message on David’s phone telling him where I’m going and why. If it’s a trap and something goes wrong at least he’ll know what happened to me. Who happened to me. I try her phone again. Still no answer. My foot taps and I lean forward in the seat, urging more speed from the engine.
How long has it been since that text came in? Ten minutes maximum I think. But maybe several minutes too long. Am I already too late?
I’m out of the car before it’s fully stopped, calling back an absent goodnight. I fly up the thick stone steps and with a shaking hand press the buzzer hard. I hear the bell ringing out on the other side, but I can’t see any lights on downstairs. I push the buzzer again, holding it down for five seconds or more, but still nothing.
I crouch and peer through the letterbox. ‘Adele? It’s me!’ An acrid smell wafts out towards me. Smoke? At the far end of the corridor, from inside the kitchen, I see an orange flicker. Oh shit. Oh fuck. A fire.
What had Adele said? She was going to put things right? Was she talking about her parents more than Rob? A fire killed her family, and there was a fire at the florist where she worked. Is this her thing? Is killing herself by fire Adele’s way of somehow levelling things out? I ring the doorbell once more, my face flushing with panic, and then I remember the key and start to scrabble in the flowerpot, digging deep into the dirt before accepting that it’s not there. She’s taken it back. No way in for me.
I don’t know what to do. What if she isn’t inside? What if she’s trying to get me arrested for arson or something? But then, conversely, what if she’s upstairs in her room, drugged and waiting to burn or suffocate or however the hell else people can die in house fires? I bang on the door. She’s so close and yet so far away.
So close.
I think of the second door. I’m close now. Maybe I can do it from here. I sit on the top step and lean back against the porch, propping myself up in the corner. I take deep breaths, shaky at first and then smoothing out. I clear my mind, focussing on the silvery doorway. I’m getting better at this now that I’m not afraid of it. I can summon it now instead of it coming to me unbidden.
When the edges are glittering brightly in the darkness behind my eyes, I picture Adele’s bedroom. The image is clear. The colours of the walls, the green of guilt-ridden woods. The en-suite in the corner. The coolness of air trapped in by old bricks. The mirror on the back of the wardrobe. I see it so clearly, and then suddenly I’m through the door and—
—I’m there, hovering above the room. It’s dark, but I can see Adele, lying on the bed, still and perfect in cream silk pyjamas. There’s no sign of pills, or water to take them with, but I can feel a terrible emptiness coming from her as if she’s already dead. A grey dullness hangs in the air around her body as the first trails of smoke come up from the hallway below.
She’s gone, I realise. Not dead, but she’s out of her body. She doesn’t want to feel herself die. She doesn’t want to be here when it happens. Is she scared she’d change her mind? Panic at the last minute? Is this what happened with her parents?
I move closer towards her as I hear crackling coming from downstairs. Fires aren’t silent as they spread, and by the noises I can hear, this one is growing fast. I should have called the fire brigade. I should have called the police. I should have done something practical. Some neighbour will notice the blaze soon, but it’ll be too late. However Adele started the fire, it’s taking hold. I need to get her out of the house. I automatically reach for her, but I have no grip, I’m insubstantial, I’m nothing but energy. What can I do? How can I get her out of here?
A thought comes to me, cool and clear, as if the lack of a body’s chemical reactions has subdued my panic. It’s a crazy thought and I don’t know if it’s even possible, but it might be my only chance to save her.
Her body is empty. I’m right here. It would only take three or four minutes to run down the stairs and out of the house and then we’d both be safe. It’s all I’ve got. Soon the stairs aren’t going to be passable. There are wooden floors everywhere. Varnished. How fast will they burn?
I stare at her body, still mildly surprised at how beautiful she is, and then I think of her eyes. Hazel brown. I imagine seeing out from behind them. How it would feel to be inside that skin, toned and firm and so slim. I imagine being Adele, of slipping into that body, of controlling it, and then – just as I feel a terrible jolt of shock somewhere in the core of me, a feeling that something is very, very wrong – I’m inside her.
56
AFTER
‘She doesn’t mention the fire in her parents’ house in the letter she left,’ Inspector Pattison says, ‘but the reports state that it started in the fuse box.’ He’s a thick-set barrel of a man whose suit has seen better days, but he has a world-weariness in his eyes that speaks of a career policeman. He’s reliable. People trust him. He’s calm.