The Book of Lost Things(17)
David was about to apologize, but he didn’t. What she was saying wasn’t fair. He had offered to help with things, but Rose nearly always turned him down, mostly because he seemed to catch her when Georgie was acting up, or when she had her hands full with something else. Mr. Briggs took care of the garden, and David always tried to assist him with the sweeping and raking, but that was out-of-doors, where Rose couldn’t see what he was doing. Mrs. Briggs did all of the cleaning and most of the cooking, but whenever David tried to lend her a hand, she shooed him out of the room, claiming that he was just one more thing for her to trip over. It had simply seemed to him that the best option was to stay out of everyone’s way as much as possible. And anyway, these were the last days of his summer holidays. The village school had postponed opening for a couple of days because of a shortage of teachers, but his father seemed certain that David would be behind his new desk by the start of the following week at the very latest. From then until half-term he would be in school during the day and doing homework in the evenings. His working day would be nearly as long as his father’s. Why shouldn’t he take it easy while he could? Now his anger was growing to match Rose’s. He stood up and saw that he was now just as tall as she was. The words poured from his mouth almost before he knew that he was speaking them, a mixture of half-truths and insults and all of the rage that he had suppressed since the birth of Georgie.
“No, who do you think you are?” he said. “You’re not my mother, and you can’t talk to me like that. I didn’t want to come here to live. I wanted to be with my dad. We were doing just fine by ourselves, and then you came along. Now there’s Georgie too, and you think I’m just someone who’s in your way. Well, you’re in my way, and you’re in my dad’s way. He still loves my mum, just like I do. He still thinks of her, and he’s never going to love you the way he loved her, not ever. It doesn’t matter what you do or what you say. He still loves her. He. Still. Loves. Her.”
Rose hit him. She struck him on the cheek with the palm of her hand. It wasn’t a hard slap, and she pulled the blow as soon as she realized what she was doing, but the impact was still enough to rock David on his heels. His cheek smarted, and his eyes watered. He stood, openmouthed with shock, then brushed past Rose and ran to his room. He didn’t look back, not even when she called after him and said that she was sorry. He locked the door behind him and refused to open it to her when she knocked on it. After a while, she went away and did not return.
David stayed in his room until his father came home. He heard Rose speak to him in the hallway. His father’s voice grew louder. Rose tried to calm him down. There were footsteps on the stairs. David knew what was coming.
The door to his room was almost blown off its hinges by the force of his father’s fists upon it.
“David, open this door. Open it now.”
David did as he was told, turning the key once in the lock, then stepped back hurriedly as his father entered. His father’s face was almost purple with fury. He raised his hand as if to hit David, then seemed to think better of it. He swallowed once, took a deep breath, then shook his head. When he spoke again, his voice was strangely calm, which worried David more than the previous show of anger.
“You have no right to speak to Rose in that way,” said his father. “You will show respect to her, just as you show respect to me. Things have been hard for all of us, but that does not excuse your behavior today. I haven’t decided yet what I’m going to do with you, or how you’re to be punished. If it wasn’t already too late, I’d pack you off to boarding school and then you’d realize just how fortunate you are to be here.”
David tried to speak. “But Rose hi——”
His father raised his hand. “I don’t want to hear about it. If you open your mouth again, it will go hard with you. For now you will stay in your room. You will not go outside tomorrow. You will not read and you will not play with your toys. Your door will remain open and if I catch you reading or playing then, so help me, I will take a belt to you. You will sit there on your bed and you will think about what you said and about how you’re going to make it up to Rose when you’re eventually allowed to return to life with civilized people. I’m disappointed in you, David. I brought you up to behave better than that. We both did, your mum and I.”
With that, he left. David sank back on his bed. He didn’t want to cry, but he couldn’t stop himself. It wasn’t fair. He had been wrong to talk to Rose that way, but she had been wrong to hit him. As his tears fell, he became aware of the murmuring of the books on the shelves. He had grown so used to it that he had almost ceased to notice it, like birdsong or the wind in the trees, but now it was growing louder and louder. A burning smell came to him, like matches igniting and tram wires sparking. He clenched his teeth as the first spasm came, but there was nobody to witness it. A great fissure appeared in his room, ripping apart the fabric of this world, and he saw another realm beyond. There was a castle, with banners waving from its battlements and soldiers marching in columns through its gates. Then that castle was gone and another took its place, this one surrounded by fallen trees. It was darker than the first, its shape unclear, and it was dominated by a single great tower that pointed like a finger toward the sky. Its topmost window was lit, and David felt a presence there. It was at once both strange and familiar. It called to him in his mother’s voice. It said: