Bad Little Girl(62)

23





The next day Lorna was grumpy. She refused all Claire’s ideas for lunch. She hated all the things she’d liked yesterday. Today, she would only eat chips, Nutella and tinned spaghetti, and the chips had to be oven chips, not the kind you make yourself and fry. They were shit.

‘Don’t use that word, Lorna.’ Claire sat down tiredly and tried to put some steel in her voice.

‘What? Shit? Shit!’ The girl, fiddling with a fork, took the seat opposite.

‘Don’t Lorna! Please!’

‘You should be calling me Lauren.’ She poked the fork prongs into the tabletop.

‘What’s happened? Why are you in such a bad mood?’

‘I slept bad. You woke me up.’

‘What? No I didn’t.’

‘You did. You kept coming in my room and stroking me and whispering.’ She jabbed the fork forcefully into a crack on the tabletop, and began working it out. The old wood splintered.

‘I didn’t! Stop that now.’ Lorna scowled and let the fork drop. ‘I came in to check on you a couple of times, but—’

‘Well what were you doing awake anyway?’ The girl’s eyes were small, angry coals. ‘What were you doing?’

‘I-I had a bad dream and I went downstairs for a cup of tea.’

‘And what did you do downstairs?’ Lorna almost sang the sentence. Her lips twitched.

‘I had a cup of tea.’

‘Is that all?’

‘Well, yes. Lorna—’

‘Lauren.’

‘Darling, what’s bothering you?’

‘Told you. Couldn’t sleep ’cause of you. Fiddling with my hair and stuff.’

Claire thought hard, and was sure she hadn’t touched her hair, just watched her sleep. Perhaps she’d stroked her hair? It was possible. ‘I’m sorry. Sorry. I really didn’t mean to wake you.’

‘I pretended to be asleep, didn’t want to hurt your feelings.’ She gave a grave smile.

‘Oh, well. Thank you,’ Claire murmured, confused.

‘Now I’m tired though. Can you get me my duvet? I’ll lie down and watch telly.’

Lorna strode to the living room, and turned on the TV. News channel. She walked back, stiffly, and stared at Claire accusingly.

‘I wanted to see the weather forecast,’ Claire lied.

‘Huh.’

‘I wanted to see if it was going to brighten up soon.’

The girl looked hard at her, then went back to the living room. ‘Duvet,’ she called.

‘Oh, yes, sorry!’

The atmosphere in the house didn’t brighten, despite Claire’s efforts. Eventually Claire asked permission to leave her alone while she went out to buy nice things for dinner. Fish fingers? And those chips you like? She thought Lorna smiled a little at that. When she started the car and saw the cottage recede in the rear-view mirror, relief spread over her tense shoulders and eased the frown lines around her eyes. She would have an hour to herself. Two if she was lucky. And when she got back, well, maybe Lorna would be in a better mood.



* * *



She stayed out longer than she’d intended to. After shopping, she drove back to the beach, and wandered slowly around the shore, picking up stones and telling herself she’d leave in a few more minutes. There was no-one else around, except for another woman, tall, willowy, and thickening just a little around the hips. A knitted hat covered her yellow curls. She was trying to play ducks and drakes at the shore, while a dog leaped around in the foamy spill, snapping at the air. The last of the hardy walkers were leaving by the cliff path by the time the woman turned round and walked towards the headland, and she didn’t look at Claire as she passed, although Claire got a good look at her; it was the woman they’d seen in the café that time. It felt nice to see someone almost familiar, after all those weeks of just Lorna. Still, she mustn’t linger. She couldn’t leave Lorna for too long. But a cup of tea wouldn’t hurt, just to keep the cold out, would it? Not if she drank it quickly? She walked to the Tiffin Bar and smiled at the thought of a toasted teacake to herself. Lorna always wanted to share but insisted that she take out the raisins. They weren’t as nice without the raisins.

By the time she left the café, two teacakes and one pot of tea later, Claire saw the woman again, on the darkening beach path, struggling with her dog. They looked like Lowry figures, jerky and ill-judged; the woman was especially comical, all careful poise gone, dragging the dog on its stiff limbs through the wet sand and mud. Stumbling at a curve in the path, she must have accidently dropped the lead, because the dog suddenly bounded off joyfully and charged full pelt back to the sea. It ran straight at Claire.

She fell, heavily, onto the wet sand; her ankle buckled and all the breath left her body. While her lungs squeakily tried to inflate, she heard the dog splashing about in the surf, jumping over her prone figure, yapping mindlessly. She tried to get up, couldn’t. She heard the woman’s scuffed knee-high boots running towards them, her mouth moving, but the wind carried her words away, and there was just that maddening, monotonous bark from the circling dog. Claire tried to get up again, but her foot slipped in the sand, and the dog lurched at her, all laughing jaws and manic eyes. The woman was nearly there now, shouting at the dog, leaning in to pick up the dripping lead, jerking its head viciously to the side, making it choke. Claire felt herself pulled up awkwardly. Pain flashed up her calf and settled in the smoky hollowness of her stomach again. One of her boots was missing and water clogged her sock.