The Monster's Wife(32)

She sat and cupped her hand at her brow, squinting at tall ships melting into the band of silver light on the horizon. It seemed easy to vanish if you knew how. She wished that she was party to the secret and could escape all this.

From behind came a tumble of stone on rock. She braced herself. It would be Andrew coming back for another roll in the ash. At the memory of his stubble scoring her skin, her stomach rumbled greasily. Perhaps if he saw her like this, he would leave her alone. Footsteps crunched towards her, nimble and light. She smelled lavender. Without turning, she knew it was May. Slender arms slipped round her neck. Dark hair tangled with her hair.

“Still here, pigeon? The céilidh’s long gone.” May’s voice was sweetly admonitory.

Oona leaned and pressed her hot cheek against May’s cool one. “I saw him again.”

“Who? Andrew?” The last word was spoken with a mocking lilt.

Oona shook her head, the sick feeling rising again. “The scarred man, the one from the big house.”

May sighed, exasperated. “You were soused, Oona. How do you know what you saw?” Her tone was almost too certain. She didn’t even seem curious.

Oona turned so she could see May’s face. “You seem so eager to gainsay me. You know something about that man, don’t you?”

“How much more shall he clothe you, oh ye of little faith! The man you say you saw is no less a fable than your tale about Victor murdering young girls. Besides,” May kissed her ear, “a wee bird told me you got licked by a dog called Andrew.”

“I’m serious May. He was right there,” Oona pointed to the ashes where the man had stood, “watching us.” She shuddered.

May slipped her hands under Oona’s arms, making licking sounds and panting in Oona’s ear. “Fancy a tumble?”

The kisses tickled and despite herself, Oona began to laugh. “I’ll spew if you keep on and I’ll do it on you. Besides, I hardly recall it.”

“Just as I said, you were in your cups. Don’t ken what you saw, but I’m certain of one thing,” May’s tongue darted out. “He’d never have licked you if you weren’t so tasty,” she ran her tongue over Oona’s cheek. “C’mere lass, let me gobble you up.”

They tumbled back into the pebbles, tickling each other and laughing. May licked Oona’s cheek and forehead as a dog would. If anyone else had done it, Oona would’ve boxed their ears, but this was her darling May and she was laughing too hard to do anything other than fall back gasping for air. Her belly ached. All the dark thoughts concealed in her rose to the surface and burst. For their whole lives, May had always been able to turn the worst feelings into raucous laughter as imps weave straw into gold.

The wild sound of their laughter echoed from the cliffs towering behind them, shaking gulls from their roosts. Kittiwakes shot from grooves in the rock and circled the beach, a shrieking carousel of arced wings. Their fierce song wove with the echoing laughter until the bay seemed to fill with a cacophonous symphony of May’s making.

They fell from each other, heads touching. Tears streamed from the corners of May’s eyes, her mouth a gaping hole of laughter. The fit of mirth died in small stutters, the odd giggle spilling forth as if May was reliving her joke. Oona watched her, thinking, May is the only real thing.

The dead girl and the scarred man were far away, her panic the result of laudanum, cider and a too vivid imagination. Everything was well because May made it well. Oona wanted to say that she loved her so much, more than anyone, but in the end she settled for squeezing her hand.

May squeezed back, grinning. “Only three days ‘till I’m wed. A bloody week, Oona, and I’ve nothing prepared. Not even my dress.” She sighed and sat and pulled a clay pipe from her skirts.

“Aye.” Oona sat too, her sense of ease fading at the thought of May’s bridecog.

May tamped tobacco into the pipe and glanced behind them to make sure the coast was clear. “Looking forward to seeing me decked in my finery?”

Oona shrugged. Her thoughts on the subject of married May belonged to the realm of nightmare: losing her friend and fixing a smile to her face so everyone believed her glad... There was little pleasure in that.

“Another céilidh, another tryst with Andy the Dandy.”

Oona poked out her tongue. “He sickens me, truly.”

“And so you kissed him,” laughed May.

“I believed…” that he was Victor, she considered saying. It hardly seemed a good defense, though. “I was dead to the world. I did not know him.”

May raised an eyebrow and said nothing. She knelt over the ash pile to strike flints together. She’d always had the knack of building a fire, which was just as well since she loved smoking so much. She lit the pipe and sucked hard, holding the smoke in her lungs before exhaling four shimmering rings. “He fancies you though. We live on an island of thirty - you could do worse.”

Oona took the pipe from her. “I’ve no time for marrying.” She did not bother to add I’m too busy dying. May knew that if anyone did.

“Aye well, you could sail off with the doctor, I suppose, see the world. Escape. Seems so tempting at times, even for a jeune fille à marier.”

“What’s a jeune fille à marier when it’s at home?” The pipe had gone out. She stooped to light it, but the fire had burned down to winking embers with nothing but tinder to eat. Blowing hard, she roused a flicker of flame.