The Madness Underneath: Book 2 (THE SHADES OF LONDON) (21 page)

I stood there in the two feet of vestibule, the one that always stank so sharply of industrial carpeting. I probably would have stayed there all day, except that there were loud footsteps and Charlotte threw open the door behind me.

“Are you all right?” she asked.

That was all it took. I just started crying. Proper, full-on crying. I flowed like some kind of industrial hose. Charlotte instantly put an arm around me and walked me down to her room, pushing my face into her shoulder and her masses of red hair.

Charlotte had a single, much smaller than my room. But the smallness also made it feel more snug, and probably a lot warmer. Unlike me, she didn’t store her partially worn clothes on the back of a desk chair. I had seen her room from the hallway many times, but never from the inside. On the wall where the door was, the entire thing, floor to ceiling, was a collage. We were allowed to Blu-Tack things to our walls. She had a carefully curated selection of tear-outs from fashion magazines of models reading books, posing with books, or generally standing near or approaching books. Glamour and brains, all glossy, all perfectly arranged on the wall. It must have taken her a long time to put them up, to make sure they lined up just right, neat and square to the edges of the wall.

It took me by such surprise that I stopped crying. I’m not sure why it came as such a shock to see that Charlotte had decorated her wall in this way.

“I’m failing,” I said, wiping my nose with the sleeve of my fleece. There was a large floppy cushion on her floor, all ready
to receive my butt, so I took advantage of it. “I missed too much. I’m too behind. Claudia said I could stay and take the exams, but there’s kind of no point…”

To her credit, Charlotte didn’t argue this. Nor did she try the Jazza way, telling me things would be fine when they clearly would not be fine.

“Have you discussed some other arrangement?” she asked. “Maybe you can take the exams at another time?”

“No.” I shook my head. “They’re sure I’m not going to catch up, not this year. And she’s right. I’m not going to catch up.”

“So you’re going back to Bristol.”

“I guess?”

“And go to school there?”

That’s what my parents said
before
I returned to Wexford in this little experiment. That was before the experiment totally failed, and my parents were about to be told that this whole year was basically a bust. God only knew what would happen now.

I leaned back against the radiator and banged my head against it gently. It was much too hot to be leaning against, but better burning hot than cold. I didn’t really care if it seared my back. I looked from picture to picture on her wall, my eyes twitching a bit as they took in the information. Books and brains. Successful girls.

I was not a successful girl.

“Jane,” she said, handing me a box of tissues. “I think you should go talk to Jane. Today. Right now.”

“There’s nothing she can do,” I said. “This is all academic stuff—”

“No,” Charlotte said firmly. “She can help. And I know she’d see you.”

There was a look to Charlotte—a bit of an evangelical glow. Jane was the magic problem solver as far as she was concerned. It must have been nice to have that kind of faith in therapy, or problems that could actually be solved.

“Jane’s dealt with all kinds of people in crisis. Loads of people who have been expelled. I know she could help. Let me phone her. Please.”

Charlotte made the call. I could tell from her end of the conversation that Jane was fine with me coming over.

This was one of those moments when I was excruciatingly aware that I was not at home. At home, I had friends at the other end of a phone, friends who were close by. I had friends here, but they were friends I’d been lying to almost as long as I’d known them. I’d had a boyfriend up until last night. He’d probably be glad this had happened…

No. He wouldn’t. That was worse.

I had Stephen. I could call Stephen.

Except my being kicked out destroyed
everything
. All his work. The squad. Me gone from Wexford meant no terminus, no squad, nothing. How had so much come to rest on me? Me, the one who, given the opportunity, would wake up at three P.M. every afternoon and eat Cheez Whiz twice a day. I was not the kind of person on which the fate of police organizations should rest.

I just wanted to go back to bed and wake up when I was twenty-five.

“She says to come right over,” Charlotte confirmed as she
hung up. “I told her the basics. And don’t worry. I won’t tell anyone. Not a word.”

“Thanks,” I said.

“You’ll figure this out,” Charlotte said. “It’s going to be fine, no matter what happens.”

Of course, Charlotte had a very limited knowledge of things that could happen.

18

J
ANE’S VIVID RED HAIR WAS ONE OF THE BRIGHTEST THINGS on the street. She was wearing an extraordinary dress—one with long flat shoulder pieces that raised up at the tips. The dress was both boxy, baggy, and form fitting and was made of an African-inspired print in orange and black and yellow.

“Cup of tea,” she said, ushering me inside. “And a little something sweet.”

“It’s okay. I don’t want anything.”

“I have to insist. I don’t problem solve on an empty stomach. Let’s perk up your blood sugar a bit. You’ve had a shock. You look peaky.”

It was very dim in the hallway. I caught just the tiniest glint of the strange silvery leopard over in the corner and the fans of gold on the wallpaper. She drew me deeper into the house, past the staircase, to the kitchen. The kitchen had a bit more light pouring in from the garden windows—not that there was much light to be had.

“Very interesting ones today,” she said, pushing forward a container of baked goods. “This is an Earl Grey shortbread, and this brownie is made with orange and chili. Eat it. You’ll feel better.”

Jane’s practical and positive manner was infectious. I did as I was told. I plucked out a brownie and ate it in three bites, crumbs falling from my mouth onto the counter. She nodded in satisfaction and went about filling the kettle and setting it to boil.

“Now,” she said, “Charlotte told me the basics. What were you told, exactly?”

I recounted the conversation with Claudia, and Jane listened soberly.

“You could take the exams,” she said.

“I could. But I have more or less no chance of passing.”

“You’re sure?”

“I’m sure,” I said.

The kettle clicked off, and she filled the teapot and set out the mugs and milk and sugar.

“Let me ask you something,” she said. “And I want you to really think about this question. Tell me truly.
Why did you come back? 
”

“They sent me back,” I said.

“Who did?”

“My…doctor.”

Jane cocked her head at this answer.

“But you could have said no. Surely, you could have returned to America. But you came back here.”

“I had to,” I said.

“
Had
to?”

“It’s complicated.” The understatement of the year. “My shrink…sorry…thought it was a good idea. It was an experiment in making me normal again. And it failed.”

“Now, now,” Jane said sternly. “None of that. None of that. You’ve failed nothing.”

“Besides school.”

“You can hardly call what you’ve accomplished a
failure,
Rory. Think about it. How many people could come to a foreign country to do a year of school to begin with? And then continue with school after a brutal attack?”

“I kind of don’t care,” I said. “I’m tired of being different because something happened to me. I just want things to be regular. And nothing is ever regular now.”

A cloud passed over whatever sun there was, and the kitchen dropped into shadow. She got up and turned on the overhead light, then filled our cups with tea. She put sugar in hers, and I was mesmerized by the gentle
tink tink tink
of the stirring spoon against the side of the cup.

“I told you what happened to me when I was your age,” she said. “I told you about the man who chased me, how he hit me on the head and I ended up in that pond. I almost drowned that night. I touched death, and the experience left me a bit
changed.
And I have a feeling you know what I mean. It changed you too.”

She couldn’t be saying what I thought she was saying.

“It began with the Ripper,” she said. “Those of us with the ability recognized the signs. A killer who never showed up on CCTV. Pops up all over the place. No physical evidence. This same person gets into the BBC and delivers a package with a human kidney in it, and again, no one sees a thing. And just as
mysteriously, he goes away. He turns out to be a person without a past? Without relations? No trace in the world? Not very likely, now, is it?”

She smiled, her mouth broad. She wore dark lipstick, a shade between red and orange. The color made my eyes throb. There was an unreality to all of this—the big kitchen, the high counter stools we sat on, the swirling oil painting by the window that I’d never noticed before. It was a painting of the sun, or maybe some snakes…how was I mistaking the sun for some snakes?

“Charlotte told me about the night you and she were attacked,” she went on. Her voice was so low, so calming. “She saw and heard nothing until the lamp came down on her head. And you were found in the toilets down the hall, all the mirrors shattered, the window broken. The door had to be broken down. What was the story? That the killer escaped through that broken window and ran? But Charlotte told me the protective bars on that window had just been repaired, because they had been loose. No. No living person escaped from that room. What you saw and what was reported, those were very different things, weren’t they?”

I could only nod. Jane let out a tiny, contented sigh.

“When did it happen?” she asked. “When did you get the sight?”

Ever realize you’ve been holding your breath? You think you’re breathing normally and then you just become aware that you’ve clenched your abdomen and the space around your heart is full and your lungs are filled to bursting and you let go…

I let go. Of all of it. Well, mostly all of it. I began with the
night of the double event, when Jazza and I snuck through the bathroom window and went to Aldshot. How we ran back across the green in the middle of the night, and as we climbed back into Hawthorne, I saw a man that Jazza couldn’t see. And the next morning, they found a girl’s body on the green. When I got to the part where Stephen and Callum and Boo entered the picture, three words popped into my mind: Official Secrets Act. The terrible document I had to sign in the hospital, the one that made me promise that I would not talk about the squad under any circumstances. And while the Official Secrets Act might not have been written with people who saw ghosts in mind, it was still scary, and my signature was still on it. And I was pretty sure they were not joking when they said I
really
wasn’t supposed to say anything.

“Right after I got to England,” I said. “I choked at dinner. Stupid.”

“Not stupid. It happens how it happens. But I suspected you were one of us. That’s why I reached out to you. I wasn’t certain, but I felt it was very likely.”

“The trouble now,” I said, “is that I lie all the time.”

Jane nodded. “So tell me what
really
happened to you. Because I imagine this is what complicated your therapy before. You can tell me the whole story.”

“I don’t know how to talk about this,” I said. “I broke up with my boyfriend yesterday because of this.”

“I know the feeling. At first, I thought I was mad, so I lied to cover that up. But then, through some sheer effort of will, I convinced myself I was
not
mad. What I was seeing was real. Now, luckily for me, this was the late sixties—pretty much the best time to run away to London that there ever was. People
were open then. There were squats to live in. The rock-and-roll world was vibrant, and yet strangely down to earth. If you hung out on the street long enough, you could meet pretty much anyone you wanted. And there were many mystics, and a lot of people on a lot of strange drugs. If you said you could see ghosts, well…people didn’t look at you quite so strangely. They either believed you or thought you were as high as they were. I knew, if I looked long enough and asked around, I would find more people like me. And I did. I found friends. And that changed everything for me. Everything. Rory, the things you’ve been through, with no one to talk to. Unless you know people like us? Surely, you must have met someone?”

“No,” I lied, again. “No one.”

“No wonder you feel so alone,” she said.

I started laughing—I mean, really laughing. I have no idea why, but I laughed until tears ran down my face.

“Why am I laughing?” I asked when I could catch my breath.

“Relief,” Jane said, patting my hand. “It’s relief. You’re not alone anymore. You’re one of us.”

Relief.
Such a nice word. Such a sweet word.

“Who is us?” I said. “There are others?”

“Oh, yes,” Jane said. “Many others. And some live in this very house.”

She held up a finger, indicating that I should wait, and slid off the chair. She opened the kitchen door and called into the dark.

“Devina! Are you here? Mags?”

There was a high-pitched reply from somewhere in the house.

“Come down for a moment, won’t you?” She left the door cracked open and returned to her seat. I could hear a quick patter of footfall on the steps, and then a girl appeared in the door. She was very tall and very slender, with short silvery white-blond hair. Despite the chill, she wore a shift dress that exposed much of her very long legs. Her bony knees had scratches on them, like a little child’s knees. As a concession to the weather, she wore a cropped denim jacket and a pair of short boots.

“This is Devina,” Jane said.

“Hello.” Devina’s voice was high and light. Pixie-like.

“Is Mags in, darling? Or Jack?”

“Just me right now.”

“Devina also lives here,” Jane explained. “In fact, several people live here. The house has seven bedrooms and I find I can only sleep in one at a time. So I had the idea to share the house with people like us. Call it a home for the exceptionally sighted. Devina, be a dear and put that casserole in the oven? Rory needs a proper meal.”