Bad Little Girl(91)

In her own, tidy, room, she considered the pills she found in the airing cupboard. Little comforting dots, all of them, with their friendly score down the centre like a winking eye. Nearly a full bottle. Their rattle, loud in the quiet house, was friendly too. Simple. Simple to let it all go, lie back and sleep for ever. No need to think because thinking was hard. No way out of this lunacy Lorna had concocted. No need to confront her again; no need to accept defeat. No need to grope, painfully, towards the source of Claire’s own errors, understand where she’d gone wrong, how she could have predicted something this terrible, how she’d trapped herself. She lined the pills up, cheerful soldiers, on the scarred bedside table and pushed them this way and that way with her fingers, arranging them into patterns – starbursts, houses, letters. An L and an M and a J. Marianne’s sudden snoring from next door startled her, and she cleared up the pills with shaking fingers, snapped the lid back on and shoved the bottle in her cardigan pocket. No more of that, Claire. No more of that.



* * *



The next morning, Claire woke to find that the door to the cottage stood open and the wind had torn the pictures, lists and self-help mantras from the fridge door into a loose pile on the floor. In amongst them was a note that must have been on the table:

Gone to the beach L NEEDS ICE CREAM! Recording something, so don’t turn off box. M



Claire put on the radio and closed the door. Elgar surged through the kitchen as she scrubbed the surfaces, gouged grime from the grouting, changed light bulbs, cleared bugs off the sills. Enough, enough of the filth. Fingers stinging with bleach, cuticles red, knees aching, teeth gritted, she attacked the kitchen ruthlessly, like an enemy. She was still at it when Lorna and Marianne came back, and by that time it was nearly dark.

‘Jesus, Claire.’ Marianne dropped a bag of doughnuts on the floor. ‘Stinks of bleach in here. Open a window, Lauren? Can you open a window? Or the door?’ Lorna slunk in, retrieved the doughnuts from the floor and went straight to the living room. Marianne took a boot off and propped the door open with it. Her sock made little sweaty prints on the floor. Benji pushed his way past her, padding mud and seawater. Claire, her mouth set in a hard line, leaped forward with a cloth to wipe up the smears. Marianne stared, chuckled, and eventually, when amused censure didn’t work, said: ‘Seriously, Claire, you’re making me tired doing all that. Sit down. You look poorly. Ankle playing up? Do you need me to get a repeat prescription or anything?

‘She looks fine to me.’ Lorna was leaning in the doorway, picking apart a doughnut. ‘Looks all right.’

Claire straightened up. ‘I’m feeling much better.’

Lorna smiled, turned her eyes to the doughnut. ‘Really?’

Something had changed in the atmosphere.

Marianne dropped the concerned look and stared impassively at Claire. ‘That’s great. Good news,’ she murmured.

‘It is, isn’t it? So, no more pills,’ Claire answered. Lorna looked up. There was a smear of jam on her lip like a bloody fang. Claire kept her gaze ‘No. No more nonsense like that.’

Now Claire did want to sit down; this open rebellion was enervating. But she didn’t. Put some steel in your spine, Claire! Don’t let them see you cracking. There was a long silence. Marianne glanced at Lorna questioningly. Lorna sneered through the doughnut, but backed away into the living room. Claire tried to keep the shudder from her voice. ‘And you, Marianne? How are you feeling? After your long night’s sleep?’

Claire saw the woman try on various expressions: bland, arch, stubborn, saw her falter and lapse into confusion, and she felt a surge of victory.

‘Maybe you’re sickening for something. You need to sit down, you look peaky.’ She put more syrup in her voice, and leaned in to take her hand. ‘How about a drink?’ Marianne pulled her hand away, straightened up. Her mouth hardened, and they stared at each other. The wind howled through the door, and Benji licked doughnut crumbs off the floor. They stayed that way until Lorna shouted from next door.

‘It’s finished. I’m watching it now. Bring the biscuits!’

Marianne put a smile on her face, looked down and strode into the living room ‘Jammie Dodgers or those big choco-chip ones?’

‘Both! Shut up, it’s on, it’s on!’

They’d recorded a countdown show, the kind that cable TV channels use as fillers – The Hundred Most Shocking Soap Opera Moments! – and it lasted for two hours. Lorna had kicked off her shoes and socks and was staring, rapt, at the screen, as a series of half-known comedians on the up or on the slide trotted out their scripted puns. Lorna snorted, groaned and hid her eyes at the kissing. Marianne perched next to her on the edge of the sofa, so she could dash away when the girl hollered for more biscuits, Coke, a blanket.

‘Move up a little, Lauren.’ Claire poked at the girl’s foot. ‘I need to sit down too.’

Lorna glanced at Marianne. Her mouth twisted. Marianne kept her face immobile, though one eyebrow twitched.

‘You don’t like these kind of things. Countdowns,’ Lorna said flatly. ‘You say they’re rubbish.’

‘Well, maybe I’ve changed my mind. Maybe I want to try something new.’ Claire picked up Lorna’s legs and placed her feet firmly on the floor, then sat down. ‘Move further into the middle, won’t you? Then poor old Marianne can have a seat instead of sitting there looking like she’s about to topple over.’