The Shadow House(19)

Ollie stared at me. On the floor, Kara rolled onto her side and patted me on the knee.

I shook my head and heaved another sigh. ‘I just don’t know what to do with you anymore.’

My son narrowed his eyes. ‘Are you scared?’

‘What?’

‘Are you?’ His face was blank, his voice flat. ‘I don’t know where the boxes come from. Anyone could’ve sent them. But whoever it is knows where we live. I had one sent here. We could all be killed in our beds tonight.’

I gaped at him. ‘Stop it.’

‘Someone could be hiding under our beds, behind the curtains, in the wardrobe. They might jump out while you’re brushing your hair and slit your throat.’

‘I said stop.’ I knew I should say something clever, something that proved that I was in control, but my mind seemed to have blown a fuse.

Ollie gave me a faux-sweet smile. And then, in a move that was now as old as time, turned on his heel and stormed out of the house.


Half an hour later, he still hadn’t come back. I started to worry. He’ll be fine, I told myself. Pine Ridge is small, there are people everywhere, let him cool off.

I distracted myself by playing with Kara. I cleaned the bathroom, played with Kara some more, then tried to put her to bed. But as soon as she saw her cot, she screamed for what felt like a year and I couldn’t get her to stop. She wouldn’t take her dummy, wouldn’t feed, wouldn’t be comforted; she seemed to be under the impression that I was trying to skin her alive, not lull her to sleep. As I waltzed her around the kitchen, I knocked a plate off the counter, which smashed on the tiles and sliced the top of my foot open, so by the time Ollie returned – safe and well, of course – my rage had shot to the next level.

I didn’t hear what Ollie said as he walked in the door, but I assumed it to be awful, so I snarled at him. He, of course, snarled back, and the whole circus started up again. He called me hysterical, so I confiscated his devices. Ollie clenched his fists and spat through his teeth while I stomped around the unit, picking up anything that could possibly connect to the internet and shoving it all into one of the topmost kitchen cupboards: a futile act, given Ollie was now taller than me by at least an inch.

The symbolism, however, was not lost on him. ‘One week,’ I shouted, brandishing my index finger like a dagger. He kicked the wall and burst into tears, triggering a sickening wave of mum-guilt. I reached for him – but then Kara upped her own game; she was a tiny dictator and volume was her weapon of mass destruction.

At some point during all of this, I glanced at the clock. Shit. No one had eaten. No wonder we were all apoplectic. I started tearing around the kitchen with Kara wailing on my hip, flinging open cupboard doors with my free hand and slamming pans onto the stove, attempting to both prepare the dinner and punish it for being yet another thing I had to do for someone else. Ollie disappeared into his room, and, despite having readymade meals from the neighbours in the fridge, I was determined to make the most elaborate dinner ever conceived, so that Ollie would feel terrible about treating his poor hard-working mother so atrociously.

But my fireworks display of martyrdom only served to upset Kara even more – and then it was really late and she still hadn’t had a wash, so I hauled her to the bathroom, peeling off her clothes and pulling off her nappy, at which point I understood the smelly and very unpleasant reason she’d been so cranky.

Sinking onto the tiles, I whispered heartfelt apologies while smearing Sudocrem over her angry red skin, kissing her pearly toes and crying a river of regret.


That night, Kara woke up roughly every forty minutes. She cried and cried, and I paced the room, rocking her, soothing her, cursing her, pleading with her, anything that might make it all stop. I was so hot, so sweaty. The claustrophobia of being needed all the time was choking me.

Of course, whenever she did pass out, I was so wired from the crying that I couldn’t sleep. Desperate for comfort, I turned to the internet. I dialled down the brightness on my screen to its lowest level, covered my head with a sheet and entered the late-night chat groups. I searched for all the usual hashtags: #3amfeedingclub, #twilightdairy, #sleepdeprivedbutstillalive. I scrolled through the posts, craving camaraderie – but the comments only fed my irritation.

It’s hard but hang in there.

It goes so fast, enjoy it while you can.

You’re a superwoman!

You’ve got this, girl.

I itched to reply with expletives. These women didn’t understand how I felt. If they did, they wouldn’t be writing peppy shit like that. Instead, they’d be writing Fuuuuuck meeee I want to diiiieee.

Around 3am, I started drinking. I pulled a bottle of vodka from my secret stash at the back of my wardrobe, gulping back way more than I’d intended. It didn’t help. I just felt sick and disorientated. I got up to go to the toilet and cracked my head on the doorframe. In the hallway, a flat line of light spilled from the bottom of Ollie’s door. Maybe he’d fallen asleep with the light on. Maybe he was still awake. Why and how did teenagers willingly choose to stay up all night? It didn’t make sense. I would’ve done anything, literally anything, for a full night’s sleep.

Feeling my way back to bed, I climbed between the sheets as quietly as I could, but Kara heard me. She howled and I picked her up. She wriggled and shoved me away. Our bodies bumped together in the dark like rubber rings. The bottle of vodka, on the other hand, behaved perfectly. It waited quietly and patiently on my bedside table like a loyal friend. I screwed off the cap and took swig after swig.