Dark Place to Hide (19 page)

‘You don’t have to, Vic. What happened to you was a terrible mistake that got out of hand. As it happened, you helped open up a whole new career for me,’ I laugh, wanting to avoid any further outpouring.

‘Let’s meet up then, eh?’ he suggests.

‘Sure.’

‘Give me a ring.’

‘Yeah…’

I end the call before we can fix anything more definite and instantly feel soiled with shame. I should never have rung him. It was a mistake when I have so little to give.

Frank yawns and stretches in front of the fireplace, then tucks his head into his tail in a soft croissant shape. It’s barely 10am and I don’t know what to do with myself. All my interests – squash, cooking, rugby, Formula One, crime novels – are meaningless to me. I can’t even listen to music; my old favourites – Dido, Coldplay, Moby – seem to have an instant connection that takes me straight to you.

I go out into the front garden and start cutting flowers: roses, heather, lupins, two large peonies, with sprigs of cotoneaster and fern for decoration. I know someone who will appreciate these far more than I’m able to.

Marion takes a while to come to the door. She’s not wearing her headscarf today. It isn’t difficult to see the hair isn’t her own; there is something about its gloss that makes the texture all wrong. Besides, when I saw her yesterday, she was blonde. I hold out the flowers and a bag of
provisions I’ve bought from the village shop. Her initial embarrassment melts into gratitude and she pats her heart.

I speak first. ‘I noticed you were low on cheese and butter – I hope you don’t mind.’ I put them on the kitchen table. ‘In exchange for the magnificent pie we had yesterday.’

‘That’s so kind – thank you.’ She invites me to sit as she opens the fridge to put things away. ‘Any news?’ she says, ‘I’ve been thinking about you.’

‘No – nothing concrete. The police are hoping to trace her phone and find out if she’s used her credit card.’

‘Oh, Lord. I wish I could do something.’ She puts the flowers in a vase and stands them in the centre of the table.

I nod, unable to smile. ‘Clara been all right?’

‘I’m not sure. All Dr Pike thinks is that she’s got fixated on certain fairy tales to help her retreat from the trauma of being trapped in the castle that night.’

‘You don’t look convinced.’

Her eyes narrow; she’s leaning against the sink. ‘Every time Clara mentions the night in the pit she sounds excited. I would have thought that if it had upset her that much, she would either avoid talking about it – or get upset when she did.’

‘I’m afraid I don’t know enough about children.’ I lean forward and stroke the leaves of the peony. ‘Isn’t she improving?’

‘No – I don’t think so. Maybe the diagnosis is wrong. Maybe she’s banged her head or developed some kind of mental…you know…psychosis, or something.’

‘She seems too normal for that, Marion. You saw her with Frank – she adores him and was as joyful and relaxed as a kid could be.’

‘I know – that’s true. She said an odd thing though, on the way home.’ She leans on the table as if she’s just trekked a considerable distance. ‘She said she could be friends with Frank, because he wasn’t a wolf – and that wolves are very bad.’

‘
Little Red Riding Hood?
’

‘Yeah – she goes on and on re-enacting parts of the story, ignoring what I say and quoting lines from that instead. Why
Little Red Riding Hood
?’

‘I wish I could help.’

She sits, letting her hands take the weight of her head. ‘She’s not here right now – she’s got story-time with Helen at the library. It’s the only activity that drags her out of her room these days, apart from appointments at the hospital – mine and hers – which have turned into regular excuses for tantrums. Once she’s with Dr Pike she’s fine – but she doesn’t seem to like the idea of going there.’ She looks at the clock. ‘She should be back from the library by now. Helen said she’d bring her home.’

‘And how are you?’ I ask.

She scratches her scalp under the lip of the wig. She isn’t hiding the fact that she wears one. I like her proud spirit. She waits. ‘I’m on the decline. I’m not sure I’ll see Clara reach double figures.’

‘I’m so sorry. That must be awful.’ I don’t know what else to say.

She scratches again at her head, dislodging the wig this time. ‘This bloody thing – it’s giving me a rash.’ She pulls it off. ‘I want to spare people the embarrassment of not knowing whether to mention my health or not. I also want to spare
myself
the looks I get when people try
not
to stare at my bald head.’

‘You could reinvent yourself,’ I suggest. ‘Blonde, red-head, brunette…’ She’s probably still in her thirties and has a pretty face.

She laughs. ‘Cate Blanchett one week, Angelina Jolie, the next?’ She tosses the wig onto the nearest chair. It lies there like a dead animal.

I look away. ‘I’m beginning to think my wife might have done something similar.’

‘Oh, no, surely not. She’s always looked so happy when I’ve seen her. Radiant – you know, in a contented, peaceful way. She wouldn’t want a different life.’

I want to believe Marion, but I’m not sure. Have you grown tired of me, Dee? Do you want someone more interesting, more able to discuss art, music, culture? Should I be making more of an effort to get to know modern art after Picasso? Should I be reading Will Self? Getting tickets for new music at the South Bank? Are you sick of my silly celebrity commentary when I’m cooking? Perhaps if I’d fixed that shelf in the shed, made a better Christmas pudding (you’re right the one at New Year was bitter and doughy) you’d still be here. Maybe, if I’d been more outdoorsy – more interested in camping, hiring a boat. Would it have made any difference? I could go on like this for ever, examining my character and wondering which parts have fallen short.

There’s a sound in the hall and Clara comes in with a young woman who introduces herself as Helen.

‘My phone was out of juice or I would have rung,’ she says, out of breath. ‘Clara had something to show me at the church.’

Clara approaches me in a familiar manner and runs her finger along my arm. ‘Hello, Frank’s daddy.’

Clara met Frank yesterday and it was a match made in heaven. Marion had to drag her away. ‘I found a pink, glitter heart drawn on Frank’s back this morning,’ I say impassively.

‘Clara!’ Marion exclaims.

‘But I’ve no idea how it got there,’ I add, winking at Marion.

‘Only dogs who are special can have it,’ chirps Clara. ‘I did it near his collar so he can’t lick it off.’

‘Go upstairs and wash your hands, Clara.’

She obediently turns on her heels.

‘I’m so very sorry,’ Marion bursts out once she’s gone.

‘It’s no problem – no harm done. I can easily brush it out, but I thought Frank could look pretty for a day or so.’

‘Thank you.’

She asks Helen to sit and offers both of us a drink. We settle on lemonade, because she’s already taken the bottle out of the fridge for Clara. ‘What was Clara so keen to show you at the church?’ Marion enquires.

‘She took me to the bell tower.’

‘I thought that place was boarded up,’ says Marion.

‘It is, but Clara has been taking planks out of the old wooden door and replacing them once she’s inside. She’s been going there for months, she said.’

Marion rolls her eyes. ‘And you went in with her?’

‘She was too quick for me – I followed her up the stone spiral staircase all the way to the top. She likes it because it’s cool in summer, light enough to read and looks out over the countryside. She pretends she’s a bird. She takes a kneeling cushion from the one of the pews,
but says she always puts it back. She knows the schedule for the flower lady, cleaner, organist and the vicar, so she can get in and out unnoticed. Sits on the tiles at the top or in the bell room itself. I think sometimes she falls asleep.’

‘Isn’t it dangerous?’

‘Clara kept telling me to keep away from the edge. She’s very aware.’

‘What an extraordinary child I have,’ Marion declares with dismay.

‘She’s a smart little girl. No one knows she’s been visiting her secret hidey-hole, until now.’

‘Did she pay attention in the story, today? Is she talking normally to you?’

Helen hesitates. ‘To be honest, she seems to be getting a bit worse. She sat on her own in the library and read another book altogether –
Little Red Riding Hood
, I think it was – while I was reading out
Pippi Longstocking
.’

‘There’s a surprise,’ Marion says. ‘I wish I knew what was wrong with her.’ Marion wavers and I’m silently willing her to get to a chair before she falls. She grabs the back of one and slumps into it. ‘In her last session at the hospital, Dr Pike asked if everything was all right at home. What does she think I’m doing to her?’

‘That certainly isn’t an issue,’ I interject firmly. Helen shakes her head.

‘I’m not terribly well; I can’t be with Clara the whole time.’

Clara comes down from the bathroom and wants a toasted teacake.

‘Helen says you’ve been spending time in the bell tower?’ Marion announces.

‘We went to see something – only she wasn’t there.’

‘Who wasn’t there?’ Marion enquires.

‘She must be able to fly, because she was in the phone box – then she was already in the tower when I got there, but she didn’t look very well.’

I watch Marion who looks mystified.

‘I didn’t see anyone in the tower, Clara,’ Helen affirms.

‘Not
this
time – when I was there before – on my own. And I saw her in the church porch –
you
saw her too, Helen, you
did
.’ Helen looks uncomfortable.

‘Clara, have your teacake, honey.’ Marion has cut it into quarters and Carla stuffs one in her mouth.

‘She was smiling in the phone box…but not later.’

‘And when you got to the bell tower this…lady was already there?’ Marion clarifies.

‘Yes – and I ran, so she must be magical to get there first. She looked like a ghost – like sick people. She didn’t say anything.’

‘Well, fancy that,’ says her mother, ‘an imaginary friend who doesn’t chat back to you? Didn’t she tell you all about what it’s like to be Snow White or Goldilocks?’

Clara shakes her head.

‘Not a word this time?’

‘She isn’t a friend and she didn’t talk to me. She was crying.’

‘Okay, well, I don’t want you to see her again, because it’s dangerous to go up into the bell tower. It’s sealed off for a reason – because it’s unsafe and you’ll get hurt. You shouldn’t be up there. You’ve got much better friends closer to home. You can play with them instead. Now finish off your lemonade.’

Clara does as she is told.

Helen gets up to go soon after and I’m about to join her, but Marion asks me to stay a while. She leaves Clara and I in the kitchen as she takes Helen to the door.

‘I want to fly – like the lady – and Daddy,’ Clara tells me.

‘Like Daddy? What in an aeroplane?’ I ask.

‘No. He’s dead now. But he could just fly. In the sky on his own.’ She flaps her arms and spins around the kitchen making a whooo sound.

‘Right…’

Marion has been watching from the doorway.

‘Too many Disney movies?’ I suggest.

‘Oh, no. This time she’s absolutely right. Morris was a skydiver – a trainer and a stuntman.’

‘I see.’ Sometimes it’s the way children say things that makes us think they’re fibbing.

‘Granny had a new knee put on, didn’t she, Mummy. She was dead when they did it, wasn’t she?’

‘No, dear – she was asleep.’

‘Didn’t it hurt so much it woke her up?’

‘No – in the hospital they can give you a potion to make you very, very sleepy.’

‘Like Snow White?’

‘Yes.’

‘I know. Then the doctor has to kiss you to wake you up – right?’

‘Something like that.’

The doorbell rings and Marion goes out to answer it. Clara has started sticking tiny jewelled pieces onto a butterfly mosaic. She looks up at me as I’m checking my phone.

‘Can you crack walnuts with your knuckles?’ she asks.

‘My knuckles? How do you mean?’

‘Like this – when you squeeze your hands.’ She tries to show me, folding her hands and squashing them together.

‘Oh, I know,’ I say. I squeeze my left hand over my tight fist, but nothing happens. ‘Mine don’t seem to work.’

‘The wizard can do it,’ she says.

‘Who’s the wizard?’ I ask.

She ignores me and moves on to another question. ‘Do you ever get so kind of upset that you get juicy behind your knees?’

‘Er…yes, I suppose so.’

‘And hot inside your head and your eyes steam up and your hands go like boiling flannels?’ Clara has an amazing imagination. I fight to hide my smile until I realise she’s trying to tell me something significant.

‘And you’ve felt like that?’ I ask, keeping my voice even.

She gives a big nod. ‘Mmm.’ She pulls herself away from the shape she’s decorating to see what it looks like, then adds two more pieces. I marvel at her ability to be absorbed and wish some of it would rub off on me, so I could cope better with the cruel uncertainty that has become my entire life.

‘When was that – when you got very…upset? Can you remember?’ I can hear Marion closing the front door and I’m willing something to waylay her, so Clara can finish telling me what she wants to say.

Clara drops her voice. ‘I don’t like being there on my own…’ She appears to lose the rest of the words in the sentence and lets out her breath loudly instead.

I open my mouth to ask a question, but Marion is back in the kitchen before we can say any more. Marion claps her hands and our discussion is broken. ‘That was Tessa from across the road, I’m afraid I’ve got to get Clara over there – she’s babysitting. I’m going to the cancer support group at the community centre.’

‘Right – I’ll get going…’

Clara holds her mother’s hand as they lead me down the hall. ‘Do pop by again,’ Marion says with sincerity. ‘Thanks again for the lovely flowers.’

There’s a moment of awkwardness at the door, when none of us is sure how to say goodbye. Clara swings against her mother’s legs and I consider kissing Marion on the cheek, but the moment passes. She keeps her smile in place for longer than looks natural, holding the door. I pat Clara on the head, instead, and tell her that Frank sends his love.