It’s tough work, out on the Ham Lands in the thick, dead night. It’s dark. It’s cold too, and their hands freeze against the handles of their brand-new spades. They bought these spades this morning, from the vast DIY warehouse on the outskirts of town. But none of this was their plan. It was never their plan.
Despite the cover of the trees, rain sticks the thin shirts to their backs, runs into their eyes and off the rounded points of their noses. Neither of them could have done this alone. Nor could they have trusted anyone else to do it. And so they are bound together. It could not be otherwise. This is the dark business of siblings, the wrestling of skeletons into the closet, the locking of the door. This is a blood bond severable only by death.
Through the rush of wind in the leaves she calls out, ‘Are you all right?’
No answer, only the thump of blade on sod, a grunt as the turf is sliced and lifted away.
Anxious, she switches on the torch to check. Catches a wide eye, a grimace.
‘Switch it off!’
‘Sorry.’
The darkness returns, blacker still. Lips pressed tight, she digs on. The rain has softened the ground, but still the work is hard – harder than she could possibly have imagined. Everything hurts: her arms, her back, her neck, her legs. But dawn will catch them red-handed if they don’t hurry. And so she must work, keeping her mind on the rush of the wind in the leaves, the blunt cut of blade on soil. They have been here for hours.
A while later, though how much later she cannot tell, the rain abates. The wind drops and a vanilla moon filters through the treetops. Not a single car on the road. It is calm, silent – almost beautiful. The hole they have made is deeper now.
‘Grab the feet.’
‘OK.’ She takes the stiff, bare ankles in her filthy hands. Her cold, muddy fingers slide against the marbled flesh. The touch, the way the skin feels against her hands, makes her shiver.
‘On three.’
Her arms pull at their sockets. A burning pain in her back when she straightens up; she leans forward to ease it.
‘One.’
The body swings like a hammock towards the grave, since that is what it is, this hole they have made.
‘Two.’
She focuses on her hands. She must stop them from slipping. Pain sears her neck and shoulders; hot needles prick the base of her spine.
‘Three.’
The larger weight hits the ground before the other, smaller weights: the torso followed by the collapsed jumble of limbs. Eyes closed, one arm flung across the belly, a snapshot, frozen in grotesque and helpless laughter. Not a dead body, not a person at all – a photograph, a memory, a bad memory best forgotten.
She closes her eyes. The scent of the soil is fresh and damp. She can smell her own sweat too, drying now to an icy film on the raised bumps of her skin.
‘Keep going.’
She startles, opens her eyes. Those are her shoes, wet and muddy at the edge; this is her then, staring down into the shallow abyss. This is her. This, now, is part of who she is. She grabs the spade and shovels the broken earth.
Smell… it’s… don’t think it’s coming from outside. I think… I think it’s up my nose… like… like a Vicks inhaler. Or is it the sea? Scratch on my arm. Ouch. Can’t feel tape on my mouth. But I can’t move it. I…
Ó Maidrín rua, rua, rua, rua…
Someone is singing. Daddy?
Ó Maidrín rua, rua, rua, rua, rua…
Oh red, red, red, red, red fox… Daddy? Is that you? You call me red fox, don’t you, Daddy? I’m your little red fox.
An maidrín rua tá dána.
An maidrín rua ‘na luí sa luachair,
Is barr a dhá chluas in airde.
‘Little Red Fox’! My song!
The little red fox,
The little red fox so bold.
The little red fox lying among the rushes,
And the tops of his two ears sticking up!
Dad? Daddy? Keep singing, Daddy, don’t go… don’t go, Daddy…
D-dum, d-dum. My heart. My pulse. D-dum, d-dum. Mum? Mummy? Auntie Bridge? Emily? Can anyone… can anyone hear?
A piece of paper in my hands…
You are invited to Stella Prince’s 16th Birthday Party.
Neon letters. Old-school font. Where am I? When is this? You’re there. You’re on the sofa watching the news. I’m standing up. I can see the top of your head, your parting white and straight. This is in our flat. I recognise our floorboards, our patterned rug. In my hands, the invitation to Stella Prince’s party. Stella Prince has got 2,000 followers on Instagram and she lives in a massive house in Strawberry Hill.
Mum, oh my God, look at this…
That’s my voice! I’m speaking. I’m saying, Stella’s having a marquee and waiters and a DJ and everything. Can I go? Please, Mum, can I?
I’m stoked because no way would I be friends with Stella Prince normally, because I’m in the year below. But I know her from theatre group. Not gonna lie, I’m well gassed to get the invite, because this is a whole year before I get the main part in Little Red and the Wolf.
I give the invitation to you. You read it fast, muttering the words, and then you say, For her sixteenth? What’s she going to do for her eighteenth, hire a yacht? When I was a kid it was a meal at Pizzaland if you were lucky. Round here’s Crazyland more like.
Yeah, Mum, good one.
So can I go? I chew my cheek. I like the feeling of my teeth cutting through the soft, knobbly bits of flesh. I suppose I must swallow them down. I guess I’m eating myself, if I think about it like that. Gross. Mum? Can I? Can I go? Please, Mum?
You’re looking up at me with that face now. Like I’m driving you nuts but you’re trying to keep it together. When you speak, you do your soft voice, your let’s-be-reasonable voice. That’s enough to drive me batshit, Mummy. It makes me want to scream, because I know you’ve already decided I can’t go, and no matter what I say, you’ve already won.
Sure enough, you say, You’re too young, Rosie. There’ll be drugs, and don’t tell me there won’t be – these posh kids always have drugs because they have the money, don’t they? And next thing we’ll be calling an ambulance.
But, Mum, I’m nearly fifteen!
You’re nearly fifteen – exactly. Which means you’re currently fourteen. You’re not a grown-up, you’re still a child, and while you’re under my roof you’ll live by my rules—
But even Ellie Atkins is going! And her mum literally doesn’t let her do anything!
You didn’t let me go, obvs. Everyone else went. I had to see all the photos on Facebook, see them all laughing with their arms round each other, the banter in the comments. I’m never allowed to go to parties. I had to wait till, like, a week after my fifteenth birthday before you even let Auntie Bridge take me to a gig. Not even a gig with my friends, no. I had to go with my auntie, for God’s sake. I mean I know Auntie Bridge is a legend and everything, but she’s still my auntie.
Come on, Toni.
That’s Auntie Bridge’s voice.
What about Frozen? she is saying. We can have a singalong? Pitch Perfect?
Where am I now? When is this? I’m… I’m in the living room in our flat again. Except I’m sitting next to you and I’m in my panda onesie and you’ve got wet hair and you’re in your dressing gown. We’re all cosy. We’re about to watch a movie. We have a good TV because you don’t go out at night. Auntie Bridge is kneeling on the floor in front of the telly, scrolling through the choices.
What about Bridesmaids? I say. Naomi said it’s hilarious.
It’s a 15, you say – so this must be before my birthday. Knowing you, it’s probably the week before. You didn’t let me watch a 15 until the actual day of my birth, probably after 10.13 a.m. because that’s the exact time I was born. I practically needed a birth certificate. So savage.
Auntie Bridge is looking at the TV screen, but I know what she’s thinking; she’s thinking: Who waits till their kids are the actual exact age of the film certificate? But she doesn’t say anything and neither do I because hello? Pointless.
So can I take her to see Honey Lips next month, then, Tones? Auntie Bridge’s scrolling through the films, acting casual. She calls you Tones, which is even more of a cringe than Toni *barfs into sleeve*. Shepherd’s Bush Empire has seating, she is saying. And I’ll only give her a little bit of coke, just a line or two.
You laugh a bit, but then you say, I don’t know, Bridge. These things get so crowded. What if she needs to go to the loo?
Auntie Bridge nods slowly, like someone trying to get a gun off a crazy person. They are crowded, yes. But it’s you that’s scared of crowds, yeah? And I’ll hold her hand if I have to take her to the loo. She winks at me. I’m not wiping your arse though, all right?
I laugh; you sort of laugh, maybe because Auntie Bridge said arse.
You hate crowds. And you hate gigs. You always complain that you can never see anything, or it’s too hot, or it’s all just tuneless noise. Naomi’s mum is the same age as you and she goes to gigs, like, all the time. And clubs, although that’s a bit dodgy to be honest.
OK, so you let me go to the Honey Lips gig, but you hardly ever let me do anything. Can’t you see? Can’t you see, Mummy, you were so worried about drugs and boys and dark nights, it’s like those things made all this noise in your head and it was so loud you couldn’t hear what I was actually saying? It’s like that time you found tobacco in my room. Oh my God, I haven’t even tried weed or anything and everyone else has tried it and some of the guys at theatre have taken MDMA and one of them has tried ket, but you went as mental as if you’d found skunk or something. I can see you, pulling it out of the drawer of my desk and holding it up like evidence.
What the hell is this? You’re shaking the yellow pouch, your eyes so round I can see the whites. You look like a bush baby on speed or something. What the hell do you think you’re playing at?
I’m minding it for a friend. I’m trying not to laugh; you look so stupid with your nose in the Golden Virginia. I didn’t even buy it; Naomi’s brother got it for us from Waitrose near Twickenham station when he bought us some Kopparberg Summer Fruits for a party. Oops, I didn’t tell you I was going to that party. I told you I was staying at Naomi’s.
Soz.
If I smell pot in this, young lady, you say, you’ll be grounded for a year.
You can ground me forever if you want. And I won’t even care because I’m practically a prisoner in this flat anyway.
You come over to me and put your face so close to mine your eyes go all blurry. You almost slap me! I hate you when you’re like that, Mum, you’re soooo savage.
We made up; we always do. I sat on your lap and kissed your cheek.
I’m sorry, no, I’m sorry, I love you, love you more, wrong, I love you more…
But I kept my roll-up stuff hidden after that.
Like other things.
Like my Instagram account.
Like Ollie.
So here we are, my love. West Middlesex University Hospital. West Mid, as it’s known locally, the place you were born, where I have worked for most of my life. It’s my hospital – that’s how I think of it. Only today I’m not organising patient data, I’m not giving birth in a delivery room and no one is saying Congratulations, Mrs Flint. This time – oh my love, my darling girl – this time, fifteen years on, your dad is long gone, and you’re lying in a bed. Saline drips into your arm through a tube. And I… I’m right here by your side with nothing better, nothing more productive to do than bury my own stupid head in my own useless hands.
This is my fault. How did I let things get this far?
Come back, darling girl. I can make everything right if you just come back. I don’t know what to do, where to put myself without you.
Without you, I make no sense. I am alone. I am pointless.
Come back…
We were all right before all this, weren’t we? We thought we weren’t but, looking back, we were. We were so much more all right than we realised, as all right as anyone, our good days as happy as anyone else’s, our bad days no worse: the car not starting, or getting soaked in a sudden downpour, or a bank card getting eaten by the machine. Normal bad stuff – black-sock-in-the-white-wash stuff.
Maybe it had taken us so long to get to that level of all right that we didn’t realise we had got there, that we had made it.
Did we forget to start living afterwards, Rosie? Yes, at first. Of course we did. We were taken up with the business of surviving. But I like to think that, these last couple of years, we had started to live, you know, in the sense of taking joy in everyday things, like laughter, food cooked for deliciousness and company rather than for the sole purpose of nutrition. Each other. Your auntie Bridge, you and me, we were getting on with it, weren’t we? We felt joy; we achieved joy, didn’t we? Not all the time, but sometimes, and that’s enough, isn’t it? For anyone.
And now here I am by your side, alone with my thoughts, but I can’t tell you what I’m thinking, or that I’m sorry, because you can’t hear me. I hope we’re going to be all right again. Sometimes I call your name, but you don’t respond. I hold your hand, but it is limp in mine. They said you will wake up, not to worry. But worrying is what I do, Rosie – you know that. Your auntie Bridge says I’d win gold in the Worry Olympics, doesn’t she? When you wake up, then we’ll talk. We’ll really talk this time. We’ll move on from all of this, if you allow us to, but first I must tell you I am sorry. I am so very sorry.
The floor squeaks.
‘How’s you?’ A nurse appears at my side. She lays a hand on my shoulder a moment, unhooks your chart from the end of your bed. Overdose, that’s what she’s reading there. That’s the word on the sheet. I fight shame, the urge to explain. The less I say, the better. She puts the chart back on its hook and looks at me with a compassionate expression. ‘Can I bring you a cup of tea, Mrs Flint?’
Tea. The British cure-all. Makes me think of World War II, of the poster that was all the rage the other year: Keep Calm and Carry On.
‘Call me Toni,’ I say. ‘Everyone does. I work here, actually, in Records.’
‘Do you?’ She smiles and folds her arms over her chest. She doesn’t have a large bosom, a bosom you could lay your head on and cry, but she should have, do you know what I mean? She has that comforting manner about her. ‘So you know your way about then.’ It’s a statement, not a question, but I answer anyway:
‘Yes.’
‘So.’ Eyes on mine, she raises her eyebrows for a new question. ‘Milk and sugar?’
‘That’s very kind.’ I check her name badge. ‘Thank you, Linda. Milk and half a sugar.’
She touches my shoulder again, lightly, before walking away. Her white rubber clogs squeak, squeak, squeak as she disappears into the corridor.
I turn back to you in hope, but nothing, no change. I can only talk to you here in my head. I’m thinking about you, and I’m thinking about me and about how I thought I was looking after you. I thought I was protecting you, but I think now you were protecting me, weren’t you?
Me, you, Auntie Bridge. Auntie Bridge looking after me and you, me looking after you and Auntie Bridge, you looking after your auntie Bridge and me. You could put us on a diagram, couldn’t you? We would be a triangle. But would you, would anyone really be able to look at that triangle and know which was the base and which was the point?
Tell me, Rosie: who was looking after whom?
Heart pounding, Bridget searches through her box of memorabilia: old programmes, her scrapbook of reviews and photographs from her TV work, from theatre work, from some of her early gigs. She should be packing some clothes to take to the hospital, making sandwiches, filling a flask; she should be…
Where is that programme? A Midsummer Night’s Dream… Where the hell is it?
‘I’m your only niece,’ Rosie says, loud in Bridget’s mind, as if she were right here in this room, as if she hadn’t just been driven away, unconscious, in an ambulance.
‘You’re my favourite niece,’ Bridget will have replied. Yes, she can remember saying it; it’s their script, as old and worn as her leather jacket. ‘You’re going to nail it tonight,’ she remembers telling her. ‘It’s in the genes, yeah?’
Rosie. Squirt, Bridget calls her when she’s teasing. Her goofy wide smile, her eyes almost shut. Rosie, for the love of God. That cheeky face alongside Bridget in the cab of the van, the gangly teenage legs shrink-wrapped in ripped black skinny jeans, blue Doc Martens crossed on the dashboard. That was the first night of Little Red and the Wolf. April – not quite three months ago. That’s right. Bridget was running her up to the theatre while Toni got herself together after work. Funny, the things you remember.
‘You’re so mad.’ Rosie, giggling.
Bridget pushing her on her skinny shoulder. ‘I think you’ll find madness is the only reasonable response to the world.’ Pulling onto the roundabout.
Rosie moves her feet down from the dash, wriggles in her seat. She’s pale suddenly, and her smile has gone. ‘I feel sick,’ she says. ‘What if people think I’m crap?’
‘Come on, Squirt. Don’t panic. One, feeling sick won’t kill you. The more you think about it, the more sick you’ll feel, so try and forget about it. Two, you won’t mess up, and three, as far as other people and what they think goes, I’ve told you – you have no control over that shit.’
‘You said shit.’ The smile is back, but it doesn’t reach her eyes.
‘Stuff, then, smart-arse…’ Bridget grins at her niece, changes back into fourth gear. ‘I tell you what – if I thought about that stuff, I’d never do anything. No acting, no band, no nothing. You can’t worry about what other people think, yeah? Do you get what I’m saying? You’ve just got to do what you do, in the way that you do it, and whatever anyone else thinks is up to them. You have zero control over it. None whatsoever, yeah? I’m not saying go round beating people up or anything, but if people want to laugh or take the mick or criticise, let them. Honestly, it says more about them than it can ever say about you, all right? So do yourself a favour and let that shi— stuff go right now.’
‘Thought you told me to put it in a box and shut the lid.’
‘Don’t be pedantic.’ Bridget glances at Rosie; the two of them exchange a smirk. ‘You’ll be great. Do your exercises and your breathing, you’ll be fine.’
Rosie pulls a silly face and salutes – this Bridget catches out of the corner of her eye. ‘Do re mi fa so la ti do,’ she sings, then makes an exaggerated show of a deep, yoga-style breath. ‘Yes, boss.’
She was fifteen by then. She’s still fifteen, not sixteen until August. Bridget’s jaw clenches at the thought. She empties the box onto her bed. The paper trail of her life scatters, slides onto the bedroom floor.
Where is that bloody programme?
The opening night of Little Red and the Wolf – that was the night Emily introduced herself. Came bowling into their lives pink-cheeked and waddling like a jolly character from a Christmas card. Except it was Easter, not Christmas, and she wasn’t waddling – she was limping, on account of her hip, but they only found that out later. Bridget can see herself and Toni in the theatre bar. Rosie has just that minute come up from the dressing rooms to join them, flushed with adrenalin and beaming from ear to ear.
‘Bloody brilliant, kid.’ Bridget recalls her niece’s bony little body in her arms. ‘You beat the nerves and you nailed it. Told you you would. Got your auntie’s designer genes, innit.’
Rosie is laughing. Blushing crimson with delight. People come over and congratulate her on her performance – wow; amazing; you were awesome; well done, Rosie! – friends from the cast, parents of those friends. Everyone’s so nice, so generous, and it’s so bloody brilliant to see Rosie get the fuss she deserves, see her squirm with pleasure. She’s worked so hard, rehearsing like a demon since January. Toni’s a basket case by this point, of course: can’t speak for tears, bless her, which is understandable after all she’s been through. She just looks so happy. She looks like the old Toni, when Stan was alive. Bridget’s struggling to keep it together herself, but it’s all over when Toni take Rosie’s hands in hers and whispers:
‘Your daddy would have been so proud of you.’
Too much. Bridget has to grab one of the little black paper napkins they put under the drinks and use it to blow her nose.
‘Hay fever,’ she says, to no one in particular. ‘Must be the lilies on the bar.’
And that’s when she notices the middle-aged woman limping towards them, smiling away and sticking out her podgy little hand. As Bridget watches her, a smile forms, even though she has no idea that things are about to go from brilliant to full-on amazing.
All of this she remembers as if it were yesterday. That feeling, that life was finally getting better for all of them, that this was the break they needed to put tragedy behind them once and for all.
But like theatre itself, there was already so much going on behind the scenes. And neither she nor Toni would realise until it was too late.
I am alone. Alone in the soupy dark. Thick, heavy eyelids. Dead, lead limbs. Still can’t get up off the… my neck is fixed to the pillow… my head… my head so heavy. I… Ollie… Ollie?
You’re too pretty to play rugby… cool auntie… so tell me, how was school today?
I like your eyes.
I like your hair.
You are so crap at techy things, Mum. Soz, but you are. We had that on our side, Ollie and me. You made me be Facebook friends with you so you could see what I was up to. I couldn’t get Snapchat because hello? Too risky. So I got Instagram. But not as an app. I turned off notifications. I deleted recent history…
Delete recent history…
I wish I could. I would delete everything: bleach it out, scrub this sicky shame feeling away…
Mummy? I want to… please, I…
But literally all my friends have tattoos. Stella Prince has, like, three, and Naomi’s mum said she could get one.
This is a different memory. Where am I? When am I? You’re there. This is you and me. We’re in the kitchen at home. This is quite recent, I think – a few months ago. Auntie Bridge isn’t there. I don’t tell you that Naomi’s mum said she can only get a tattoo when she’s eighteen. She’s going to get a Thai letter N, which I think is a mistake because in, like, two years she’ll think that’s lame.
You’re like, That’s ridiculous. It’s not even legal.
I’m like, You can get fake ID. Stella’s got fake ID.
That’s legit, she actually has.
I don’t care what bloody Princess Stella’s got! You’ll have to wait till you’re eighteen, by which time, hopefully, you’ll have come to your senses and gone off the idea.
You turn your back on me then. You always do that when you want the conversation to be finished. I’m not gonna lie, you can be pretty savage sometimes.
So harsh, I say and you tell me off for banging the cup on the worktop, which I didn’t – I just put it there. Auntie Bridge has got tats and you don’t say anything to her.
You reach for the chopping board. I can’t tell her what to do, can I? She’s my sister! You pull the sharp knife from the drawer. You go over to the fridge and rummage around in the salad-tray bit, but roughly, as if you’re angry with the vegetables. Eventually you straighten up, a big brown onion in your hand, holding it up like, One more word from you, lady, and the onion gets it.
You don’t really say that. That’s just me messing about. But you never ask me to pass you stuff when you’re cross; it’s like you’re trying to make some sort of point or something.
She’s my sister is what you actually say. And she’s a grown-up.
So?
Don’t so me. You go all huffy and puffy, as if I’m so impossible. I’m thinking: do re mi fa so la ti do, which is one of my exercises for stress. You put the onion on the board and slice off the top, your mouth closed tight. I feel sorry for the onion. If you want to be an actress, you can’t go covering yourself in tattoos, can you?
Auntie Bridge is an actress and she’s—
You hold up the knife – psycho alert. Your auntie Bridget is a grown woman. This discussion is over. Chop chop chop.
I walk off. You shout after me not to slam the door. But I didn’t – it just closed loudly behind me. In my room, I lie on my bed, pick up my phone. Swipe, Safari, hello, Instagram… a red circle, a message. It’s from him, from him, from him… a message for me… from Ollie, my Ollie… my…
I only wanted to have a space. Everyone else has Snapchat, Instagram, Facebook, everything. Just FB and Insta, that’s all I have. I’m being completely straight now. I’m not going to lie to you. I’m not going to lie to you ever, ever again.
I wonder if your auntie Bridget is on her way. I wonder if she’s called the police yet.
No. No, she wouldn’t do that. Not without talking to me.
She should be here soon. There was no room for her in the ambulance so she said she’d grab a change of . . .
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