This time he had it written down in advance what he wanted me to say, and I had to copy it, him watching over my shoulder. And I realised, as I wrote. This stuff he was making me say, this load of lies, about me and Danny, him scaring me after I did the test … Someone had worked out I’d got pregnant.
But these cruel things I was writing, would people believe them? They’d hide me even further away, like piling branches on top of a body in the woods. I don’t know why I had to think of a nasty thing like that.
So I went as slowly as I could, trying to think of what I could do. Finally I was done, flicking back through the diary before I handed it back – and then I saw the title page.
‘But it doesn’t have my name in it,’ I said.
‘What do you suggest, that I post it to the police with a covering letter?’
‘No, of course not,’ I say. ‘It’s just – like you always say. People have forgotten about me.’
He couldn’t admit I was right. But he leafed through it, irritated, and then handed it back to me. ‘Fill in your details then. Don’t make a mistake.’
That’s when I did it – I wrote down my email address, only it was the wrong one.
You see, I’ve had a lot of time to think in here – about what I might do, if I ever get the chance.
He’d told me to delete our last email conversation, and I had. But just before that, I’d pressed ‘forward’, saving it to my drafts. I don’t know why, really. He was so thorough. Maybe the finality of it all scared me a bit.
I wasn’t going to do anything with it. But I couldn’t sleep that last night. I stayed up, quiet in my room, just messing around. Not thinking about what I had to do. Everything was ready. Almost everything, I remembered, and I got up and went to the computer.
Even then I was going to delete the draft. But I didn’t, not properly. Instead, I found myself setting up another email account, to hide it in. It wasn’t a plan, really, so much as a … souvenir. I think I just wanted to leave a trace, even if it was just for me. Proof that all this had really happened.
Of course, it asked me security questions. Well, he knew all my answers. So I set them up as if it were my mum answering. I told myself it was kind of a dig. I was still annoyed about the diary. But maybe part of me knew: you can trust your mum.
Even as I handed the diary back to him the other day, I could feel the greyness coming over me again. Who am I kidding? Who’s even going to see that? Not for the first time, I wanted to go back in time and shake myself, scream in my own face.
I am so desperately, totally over my head. But maybe … just maybe …
If anyone can find me, she can.
40
KATE
The stairs are a broad sweep towards the landing, passing under tall leaded windows, more boards blocking out their light. This must have been expensive carpet once, too, but now the thick weave is dirty and worn bare in places. Here upstairs, someone’s covered the wood panelling in shiny white gloss in the bedrooms, in some misguided attempt to lighten the place. But it’s the bathrooms more than anything else that show their age against the classic bones of the house: there’s one very eighties avocado suite, rust stains under the taps.
From the main landing, overlooking the entrance hall, short twisting corridors lead to more rooms, shabbier, strewn with the detritus of their former inhabitants: a flimsy folding table; an old sun lounger that can’t have been intended for inside; piled-up magazines, National Geographics. I pick up one and open it, and see the small insect body. I put it down quickly. Silverfish.
I start edging around the half-open doors after that, unwilling to touch anything else. I don’t know why empty houses get so dirty – heavy grey clumps of dust fill the corners.
I’m nearly done now. I must have covered most of the house, moving quickly, and I’m about to head downstairs for a final look, when I realise I’ve missed a door, in a corner I thought I’d checked. It’s shut. But the old iron key turns smoothly in its lock, the door opening into a small set of stairs, and I start climbing, my head close to the ceiling.
I must be under the roof now, in a little hallway under slanting eaves. I explore; the rooms here are smaller, oddly shaped, light coming through the boarded-up windows close to the floor. Servants’ quarters, once upon a time? No, I think, they’re too nice. The outer, original walls, have the same wooden panelling, the rose decoration, as the showier rooms on the lower floors. Perhaps this was a nursery, or some quiet living space for the lady of the house, that’s since been sectioned off. My footsteps sound on the threadbare carpet as I emerge at the end of the hallway.
I’m at the last door, now. This one’s shut too, but the key’s still in it.
There’s a light coming from under the door. And there’s a bolt at the top, and the bottom.
Heavy steel bolts, I can see. Locking only from the outside.
The skin on my arms is prickling. I look down: I’ve goosebumps, I notice absently.
I bend to unslide the bottom bolt, then the top. I turn the key, feel the gears of the lock shifting.
I open the door.
The room’s empty, one glance tells me that. Now I see why it’s lighter in here, even before I flick the switch to turn the bulb on. The modern partition walls have cut off the room from the attic’s original windows, so they’ve put in a modern skylight overhead, through which the sky is a dark violet square. No one’s bothered to board it up – I suppose it’d be hard to climb in from the roof.
I check around with care, anyway, my last hope dwindling.
The wooden roses run around the wall panels, below the sloping eaves. Behind a door in the corner is a small loo and sink; old-fashioned black and white with a hanging flush. Maybe they put it in when this was a place to send the kids – a den, or games room. But that’s it.
And that’s the house done.
There’s nothing here.
Fantasist, my mind whispers. Paranoid.
She’s not here.
I’ve looked everywhere now. This house gives me the creeps. And no wonder, with its sad history. I suppose Nancy and her sister could have played in this room. But Sophie’s not here.
I go over to the window, and look up: fat drops starting to hit the glass, one by one. Rain, finally. Of course she’s not here. What did I think; she’d just be cowering behind some door? So I thought she was telling me it’s all to do with Nancy. Or Nancy’s house. That didn’t mean she’d actually be in here. She meant something else, maybe, that I’ve misunderstood.
And now it’s time to go home. Face the reality. Sophie left. I’ll talk to my family then, maybe Dad – if I can get the police to … Exhaustion overwhelms me. I don’t know what to do now. I’m failing her. Again. She’s leaving me these messages, and I’m failing. Wearily, I walk to the doorway.
I start to pull the door closed behind me, just as I left it.
The pain’s like a bite. I snatch my hand away – a splinter. ‘Ow!’
In the dim light the bead of liquid swells up on my fingertip. I suck it automatically, and wanting to see what I cut it on, swing the door round.
Someone’s forgotten to take these down. That’s my first thought, when I see the drawings pinned to the back of the door.
There must be dozens of sheets of paper tacked to the wood, stuck on with Sellotape, and they’re all covered in crayon scribbles – blue, green, purple, yellow. On one sheet, there’s a wobbly red spiral – a snail? Or perhaps it’s just a shape that’s fun to draw, if you’ve little fingers and a bright red crayon. On another, a rainbow splodge. Whoever did them can’t manage stick people yet – and there are no trees or flowers or farmyard animals. But someone’s bothered to keep them, all the same. Just like I did, with Sophie’s first drawings.