The Whispers of Wilderwood Hall (18 page)

Well, I'm trying, but at the same time I'm fixing my gaze, of course, on one face in particular. What's happening in Flora's world right now? I wonder. Will she be getting snapped at by another member of staff for some made-up misdemeanour, or will the servants all be too busy, getting in a tizzy of preparation for the trip to London and beyond?

When we get back home to Wilderwood, I'll try to slip away – slip
back
– and find her…

“
All these people,” murmurs Weezy, intrigued by the photo, if not me. “You just wish you could know all about their lives, don't you? For instance,
this
girl. She looks so sad. What do you think her life was like?”

My heart thuds in my chest at the coincidence of Weezy's finger landing on Flora.

“I – I'm not sure,” I say, flustered, turning to face Weezy.

And then everything… everything begins to sink sideways and downwards and dark.

(Whirl, tilt, shift.)

“I'm absolutely fine,” I insist for the millionth time.

“She's not been eating enough,” says Mum to anyone who'll listen, which is me, RJ and Weezy. All four of us are in the small, temporary living room of the East Wing. “You know, I think I'll get her something else…”

Mum pushes herself up from the sofa and heads to the kitchen for some more of the vat of bolognese she made everyone for tea.

“I really don't need—” I begin to protest, and then realize I'm wasting my time.

Mum won't take no for an answer, even though I've proved I'm OK now and already had a bowl of her bolognese and garlic bread too.

“
Sure
you're OK, lovely Miss Harper?” asks RJ, stopping softly strumming his guitar to lean over and pat my leg. “Or do you want everyone to stop asking?”

I appreciate the jokey remark and smile gratefully at him. Obviously, I'd quite like to forget that I sort-of-but-not-quite fainted in front of a packed café, and managed to fall backwards on to Cam, but not before I'd tried to break my fall by putting my hand on his mum's slice of carrot cake and squashing it flat.

That same (now clean) hand is currently in Weezy's lap. I don't know if she thinks offering to paint my nails navy blue is in some way medicinal, or will at least maybe help take my mind off what happened in the café, but whichever, I appreciate it. And the colour's pretty great too.

My other hand is done already. While Weezy concentrated on stroking polish carefully on to each nail, I kept sneaking a peek at her, searching for that fierce look of hers … but it didn't seem to be there any more.

Isn't it funny? Earlier today, when I'd been at the side of the building with Flora, I was flooded with loneliness. But now – with RJ strumming away and
Weezy
all softened and painting my nails – I can't help but feel a small, delicate sense of
happy
. The sort of thing that you don't want to think about too much in case it gets shy and twitchy and vanishes on you…

Actually, the first flutter of happiness started up on the car journey back to Wilderwood, when Mrs Fraser insisted on driving Mum and me home while RJ and Weezy tramped back via the shortcut through the field. It was too hard to hang on to my embarrassment when both Cam's sheepdogs kept trying to lick me to death, with Cam doing these stupid cartoon voices for each of them. (“Who
is
this?” “I dunno, but I like her. I wonder what her nose tastes of?” “Ooh, can I lick it first? Can I, can I?”)

Even with something simple like Mum fussing over me once we got dropped off, settling me on the sofa, putting my feet up, getting me a cloth for my forehead and a glass of iced water, the flutters of happiness kept coming.

And they kept fluttering all the more when RJ brought his acoustic guitar in from the hire car, sat himself down in one of the squashy white armchairs and began to gently pick out the notes of something
new
he was working on. (“Haven't got any lyrics yet; it's just something I'm playing around with.”)

But hiding behind the flutters are those familiar ripples, lurking, biding their time, ready to roll in.

The trouble is, I'm just not sure it's safe to feel good. I'm not sure I can trust that it's OK to.

“Look, I'll go speak to your mum and try to stop her from force-feeding you,” says RJ, putting the guitar down and pushing himself up off the chair. “Back in a sec…”

“No, you don't have to,” I mumble, but he's gone.

And now I'm alone with Weezy. What are we supposed to say to each other? Do I come right out and ask her why she's doing something vaguely nice for me all of a sudden?

“That was pretty wild, what happened back there,” says Weezy, without looking up at me.

So
that's
it. In movies, people don't like each other, but then when something over-the-top scary happens to one of them, the other realizes life's too short (like RJ said back in the café) and they make up, etc., etc. Well, this isn't a movie, and nothing over-the-top scary happened to me. I went a bit light-headed in an old-fashioned café, that's all, as far as anyone is concerned (even if
I
know differently).

But
it was obviously enough to rattle Weezy. And if she feels sorry for me, that's fine, especially if it means she stops shooting me the evils and carries on painting my nails this great colour.

“What did
you
feel?” Weezy asks, now lifting her brown eyes to meet mine.

“I – I just…”

Stumbling over my words, I grind to a halt. I'd been about to describe the sense of swirling and sinking when my mind properly registered what Weezy just said. The way she put the emphasis on “
you
”. “What did
you
feel?” It meant
she
felt something too…!

“Dizzy. I just felt dizzy,” I say eventually, blinking back at her.

“Look, don't freak out or anything,” says Weezy, holding the nail polish brush in mid-air. “But just that second when we looked at each other, the weirdest thing happened. It was like I saw a – a – shadow coming over you.”

I jerk as a blob of navy-blue varnish drops unexpectedly on to my thumb. And whatever Weezy said, I
am
freaking out. I don't understand what she saw, but it feels like she was
almost
able to peek into my other world, my other Wilderwood.

And
that can't happen.

It's mine, mine and Flora's.

“Got to get a drink of water,” I mutter, slipping my hand off Weezy's lap and getting up to leave the softly lit room and this staring girl.

I suddenly, urgently want to keep the two parts of my life separate, so the tiny, fluorescent-lit kitchen and the comfort of my smiling, chatty mum is all I want right now.

Except Mum seems a bit busy at the moment, I see, when I hover in the kitchen doorway. She's over by the chipped worktop, having some earnest conversation with RJ. An earnest,
secret
conversation, it seems, since they jump apart guiltily when they notice me.

“Hey, gorgeous!” says Mum, switching her smile on and holding out her arms to me.

I don't go straight to her. Instead, I warily prop myself against the fridge. Mum and RJ exchange fleeting glances. And those secret looks; they send the last few of my happiness butterflies reeling off into the dark corners of this huge, echoing house.

“Better get back to my guitar … that song won't write itself, will it?” RJ jokes, reaching out to ruffle my hair as he leaves us.

“
Are you all right, Ellis?” asks Mum. “Not feeling rubbish again, are you?”

What's really rubbish is knowing you're being talked about. What's really rubbish is secrets.

I picture my phone, lying dropped somewhere in the mess of my unpacking, and remind myself that I was brave enough to hang up on Shaniya. To delete her from my contacts and my life.

I can be brave like that again. I can ask my mum straight out. 'Cause after all, isn't it better to be angry on the outside (like Weezy) than scared on the inside (like me)?

“What's going on?” I ask as I start to pick at my barely dry navy nails. “Why are you and RJ talking about me?”

“Oh, but we weren't,” Mum says hurriedly and unconvincingly. “We were chatting about … house stuff.”

Body language. Mum's nibbling at the inside of her mouth. She's lying; keeping something from me for sure. And then I think of a trick I heard that counsellors and therapists do; they go totally quiet, which
forces
their patients to say more.

So I fix Mum with a long look, and wait. It works.

“
OK, OK … we were just talking about these – these turns of yours,” she says at last. “We think they may be some kind of panic attack.”

“I know, I heard RJ say so on the phone, when we were driving back from the pool this morning.”

Mum is taken aback.

“You heard? Sorry, Ellis – you weren't meant to. I thought you were listening to your music,” she says apologetically. “But anyway, they keep happening, don't they? And they're worse than your usual waves…”

The “turns” Mum is talking about; I know they're not panic attacks. But whatever they are all of them, I realize now with shock and sureness, have been somehow linked to my connection to Flora, and to both my Wilderwoods. For a split second, I wonder if I should come clean and tell her that, tell Mum
everything
, but my mind is so muddled and I'm so very angry with her that the words won't come.

“Mmm,” I mumble instead, wondering where she's going with this.

“So, I'm thinking that I should make an appointment with the local doctor for you,” she says, tilting her head, as if she's waiting for me to flip out. I don't.

To
be honest, I'm flooded with a sudden sense of relief. I mean, I know no doctor can help with the whirls, tilts and shifts, but I am
so
tired of the never-ending waves that ripple and roll and ruin everything. My shoulders sink and tears prickle in my eyes.

“Aw, Ellis, baby! C'mere,” says Mum, spotting what's happening and opening her arms to me again. This time I go over, and sink gratefully into her small-but-strong hug, resting my tired head on her shoulder.

“I know it all started at your last school, because of not settling and the friendship issues and everything,” Mum mutters softly in my ear. “And that's one of the reasons I thought coming here would do you good. A fresh start.”

Oh… This whole move – it wasn't
just
about Mum and RJ and their Shiny New Project? She was thinking about me too in all this?

“But you know, maybe I was a bit naïve to think the anxiety would switch off, like a light, the moment we got here,” she carries on with her soothing voice and that comforting circular stroke of my back. “I just think we might need a little help to send it on its way. Don't you? Especially if you're starting at a new school.”

“
Maybe,” I murmur in reply, into the softness of her pink Arran jumper. I might tower over Mum when I'm standing, but right now I feel as cosy and held and safe as the tiniest of toddlers.

And that feeling lasts for, ooh … all of three seconds. Because I've suddenly noticed something over Mum's shoulder. Some random bits of paper plopped on the work surface. Scribbled to-do notes for Mr Fraser. Something that looks like a paint colour chart. A brochure.

It's the brochure that makes my heart stumble and practically stop. Tucked – possibly hastily – at the bottom of the pile, the heading on it is still mostly visible. Enough that I know it says INVERKELLEN SCHOOL.

OK, so it's
not
a brochure; it's a prospectus. A prospectus for the boarding school Mum and RJ must be considering for me, as soon as the local doctor “sorts me out”.

“Ellis?” says Mum as I pull myself free from her.

“It's fine. I'm fine,” I say flatly. “Think I'll just go lie down in my room.”

Wow. There's a great big secret right here in the kitchen, and Mum's
still
not able to come out with it. So all this time, I've been fooling myself about how
close
we really are. What a joke…

An overwhelming feeling of loneliness wells up inside me, making me feel almost sick, and all I want to do is run from it and the waves. But I don't want Mum to see me cry, so with all the calm I can fake, I walk steadily out of the kitchen, down the corridor and into my room.

Pressing the door closed behind me, I slide down it on to the floor with my back against it so no one can come in. Because right now, I want to see no one but Flora. Only Flora keeps the waves at bay. I close my eyes tight, press my hands palm down on the cool floorboards, and will the whispers to come…