My Sister's Bones(40)

Each word twists inside me like a knife. She’s done it; the little witch has finally done it. After months of trying to undermine me, she’s got her big assignment. I look at the accompanying photographs. There is Hadley simpering into the camera while holding a small child. I notice she’s done her hair and has a full face of make-up. The child she is holding looks uncomfortable. It’s a typical staged shot. Dear God, woman, you’re supposed to be a journalist. I read the first couple of lines of her report, incredulous at her lack of impartiality. ‘I’m so angry I can barely speak,’ she bleats in the second paragraph. I turn the page and see that at the bottom of the report is a link to her Twitter page. ‘For more updates from Rachel’s exclusive story please follow @rachely88.’

I remember Harry imploring me to set up a Twitter profile so that readers could follow me and I told him in no uncertain terms that I didn’t do social media, that readers could read my reports in the newspaper. I mean, Jesus, how are you supposed to update your social media page when you’re trapped in a bombed-out city without running water, never mind bloody WiFi?

‘Bullshit,’ I exclaim, ripping the paper and Hadley’s insipid face into pieces. ‘All of it.’

I need to get back there immediately. I need to talk to Harry, tell him that I’ve recovered from what happened in Aleppo, that I’m ready to go back.

My heart is thudding so hard it feels like I may have another panic attack. I sit down in the chair, the remnants of the newspaper still in my hands, and try to catch my breath. And then I see it, a nice full bottle of red, on the shelf in the pantry. Good old Paul. I stand, pick up my empty glass and take it and the wine upstairs to bed.





18


The sky is raining blood as I crawl through the bodies. Where have they all come from? A few minutes earlier the room had been quiet, the only noise the steady hum of the refrigerators and the gentle ticking of the clock.

Explosions ravage the air above my head and with each detonation blood trickles on to my hair, my clothes, my skin, as more body parts drop from the sky like scraps of meat being flung into a lion’s den. There is no sign of him, though I know he will be here somewhere, clutching his scrapbook in his hands and waiting to show me his favourite picture. I have to find him before the weight of the bodies suffocates him.

So I press on, flinging aside corpses to get to where he is.

‘Kate.’

There. I can hear him, his voice a faint whimper against the barrage of bombs that rage in the skies above. But how to determine his body from the swell of body parts all about me? My nostrils fill with the smell of decay as I wipe my face.

‘Kate.’

I’m getting closer; I can sense him, though I know I don’t have much time. The fridges whir as I dig and dig to the bottom of the pit. Then I hear a groan and I know I’m close.

‘I’m coming, Nidal,’ I yell into the darkness. ‘Stay there, I’ve almost got you.’

Deeper and deeper I dig until I see a flash of dark hair and his face, expectant and terrified all at once.

‘I see you, Nidal. I see you. Now hold on to my hand.’

I feel him grip my hand tightly.

‘Now pull, pull with all your strength,’ I shout but my voice is obliterated as the sky explodes and we are saturated with red rain.

‘Kate.’

His voice grows louder though I know that’s impossible as he is deep underneath the ground.

‘Kate.’

The door of the shop bursts open and a soldier stands there caked in blood and sweat and excrement, a dead body draped across his arms, its entrails hanging out in silken threads behind him.

‘This what you’re looking for?’ he growls as he steps towards my prone body and throws the corpse on to the ground where it bursts on impact, spraying me with a fine mist of deep-red blood.

‘Kate.’

The voice grows fainter as I shield my eyes from the putrid liquid and curl myself into a tiny ball.

‘No,’ I cry. ‘No, no, no.’

I open my eyes and slowly unfold myself. My hands are shaking and my mouth tastes of foul gristle. As the bedroom comes into focus I exhale long shallow breaths to ward off the nausea that is rising in my gullet.

Two bottles of red. Why did I do it? I climb out of bed in search of water and pills.

Red wine always brings on the blood dreams. They’re the ones I dread the most because they are relentless and there is no way out of them.

The room is cold. I drag my suitcase from under the bed and take out a thick wool cardigan. I put it on and step out on to the landing. As I walk down the stairs I hear a tapping sound. I pause and listen for a moment. There it is again: a muffled tap, tap, tap, like the sound of distant shelling.

I slowly make my way downstairs and stand in the hallway listening. The noise has stopped. It must have been the pipes spluttering out the last of the heat. Another thing in need of modernizing, I tell myself, as I wearily make my way to the kitchen.

The water is heavenly and I drink glass after glass of it, washing away both the taste of the blood dream and two more oblong pills that will ensure me a few hours of blank sleep. I turn off the tap and stand for a moment, my eyes sore from exhaustion. The noise, when it comes again, is harder, more insistent, a bang rather than a tap. It’s coming from outside. I go to the back door and unlock it. What is it? The banging continues. It’s coming from the garden next door.