Ghost Wall(24)





We set off back to the woods, not hurrying. Molly said she’d been yesterday to visit the midwife, Trudi. But you can’t just go to someone’s house like that, I said, we only met her once. Well she did invite us, Molly said, she said if we wanted a hot shower we could go there and I did want a hot shower, I couldn’t go out with my hair all greasy, so I went and she was in. You should go too. Trudi had given her tea, with home-made cake that was a present from the mother of a patient, and let Molly use her expensive shampoo; I don’t think it surprised either of us that the brands Molly found exciting meant nothing to me. It felt so good, Molly said, a proper shower, I feel so much better, and she says we can go back any time. She’s really interested in what we’re doing here, she likes the Roman stuff. We could probably go tomorrow, if you like. No, I said, it would feel weird, I’ll get Mum to heat some water for my hair, or I can just use the stream, that’s what I do when we’re camping in Scotland. We found another plum tree and I climbed it and shook the branches while Molly skipped around gathering falling fruit. They did eat a lot of fruit and veg, I said, must have been such a relief when someone invented bread. And ovens. And pies. Come down and have some biscuits, said Molly, here, I bought them yesterday. Bet no-one got fat, anyway, she said, and poked her own belly as if she thought there was something wrong with it. I don’t know, I said, they had time to make jewellery, didn’t they, and to have rituals and festivals and decorative objects, they weren’t all busy with subsistence the whole time, there must have been a surplus at least sometimes. Yeah, said Molly, that or the women spent all their time foraging and cooking so the men could play with Lego and bang drums and howl at the moon. I did hear you, you know, when I got back, your mum and I had a bit of a giggle. I ate another biscuit. It was weird, I said, the way it went from being a bit daft to feeling like something real. I didn’t know people could decide to make that happen. Have some peanuts, she said, lots of energy and protein, what do you mean decide to make that happen? I shrugged. Don’t know. Like in a church, I suppose, do something that would be really silly if you did it in the street or even on your own in a room, but somehow it’s not when everyone joins in. Silvie, she said, you’re scaring me, this is sounding like a cult. What, I said, Dad and the Prof and some rabbits? Let’s see if we can find those mushrooms, I saw some in the wood the other day. Yes, she said, Silvie, what happened to your legs? I could see them, you know, when you were up the tree. The marks.

Oh. My heart flopped under my breastbone, as if I’d been caught out. A teacher had noticed once, changing for PE, but it wasn’t illegal for a parent to use reasonable chastisement and there were still plenty of teachers in post who had wielded canes and rulers in their day. Children’s bodies were not their own, we were all used to uncles who liked to cop a feel given half a chance and mums who showed love in smacked legs. I cheeked my dad, Miss, got a walloping. Yes well, she said, I can’t say I’m entirely surprised.

Nothing, I said, must have been a trick of the light. She looked at me. I looked away. He hits you, she said, your dad. He’s been hitting you here. You’re scared of him. No, I said, no I’m not, of course I’m not, you don’t know what you’re talking about, maybe—I stopped. Maybe you’re jealous because your dad left you, because he doesn’t love you, because he doesn’t care enough to teach you a lesson. Haven’t you been listening, people don’t bother to hurt what they don’t love. To sacrifice it. It’s nothing, Moll, I said, really, there’s nothing wrong. OK, she said, fine, you don’t have to talk about it. But there is something wrong. It’s not OK for someone to hit you.





THE NEXT DAY was the hottest we’d had, shimmering and windless. By mid-morning you could smell the heather baking underfoot on the moor, and the telephone mast on the horizon floated and wavered as if it had gone adrift. When I went into the woods the shade under the oak trees felt cavernous but there was no memory of cool ground even in the middle of the forest; the air fizzed with midges that massed on exposed skin as soon as I stopped moving. I felt as if I could still hear the beat of the night-time drums, as if somewhere in my head or my guts they went on sounding. After breakfast Dad and the Prof went off up the hill to the moor again, as though they were negotiating the end of the Cold War up there rather than playing at Picts and Romans. We’re working on an idea, said the Prof, we might have something rather special to do later. Foraging again, you lot, you might go back to the beach, the mussels are an obvious protein source. Pete and Molly looked at each other, visibly remembering the heat of our last beach trip. The tide’s just coming up at the moment, said Dan, I suppose we could go later this afternoon, it should be cooler then as well. There’ll be hazels by now, Dad said, if you know where to look, keep better and safer than mussels an’ all. Hazelnuts, said Dan, really, they grow wild? Yes, I said, and you can eat them green, if you’ve ever had cobnuts they’re just a cultivated version. Oh, OK, he said, thanks, and I blushed. Little Miss Show-Off.

I couldn’t really remember where hazels were likely to grow, and anyway no-one else much cared. The others were tired, it was clear that the grown-ups’ attention was not on us, they wanted to sit somewhere shady and chat about people and plans that they knew and I didn’t. I’d never seen Dad as distracted from me and Mum as he was then but I didn’t trust that he’d forget what he’d told me to do. The hazels were just a suggestion, Sil, said Dan, he didn’t say you had to. I didn’t tell him that Dad didn’t make suggestions, but after a while I left them sitting at the top of the woods batting at midges and arguing about who’d got most drunk the previous term. I wandered through the trees, heading vaguely down hill although there wasn’t a path, treading quietly for no particular reason. Pete’s voice and Molly’s laughter came winding through the branches for some time after I’d stopped hearing Dan. The drums beat in my head. Skin drums, sheepskin, and when I listened I heard a sheep call from the hillside. They hear the drums too, I thought, the sheep and the rabbits, the owls and foxes, they pass by and see the skulls raised high, their own skulls. I licked sweat off my upper lip and let the twigs scratch my arms as I pushed past. I was hungry again.

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