Girl A(94)

‘You used to tell me that the ends had justified the means,’ I said. ‘Well. Look at us now.’

The tears rolled down my face and into my ears.

‘Lex,’ she said. ‘I need to hear you say it.’

The police reached the house thirteen minutes after I left it. The smell of it made the first responders recoil from the doorway. They found Father slumped by the back door, as if he had tried to run and then thought better of it. Mother was with his corpse, of course, and wailing. They found Daniel like an afterthought, in a plastic bag and bent into a kitchen cupboard; he had been matter for many months by then. Noah was in his crib, matted with his own faeces. Gabriel and Delilah were wide-eyed and skeletal. Ethan waited calmly on his bed, considering exactly how much he would say. Evie was still in our room, and still in chains. She was unconscious. When a policeman lifted her, she felt as light as his own daughter. His own daughter hadn’t started school. He went against protocol, and broke the chains himself. He carried her from our room and down the stairs, and out into the road for the arrival of the paramedics. Girl C. Ten years old. She was pronounced dead at the hospital, a day later, having never regained consciousness. For me, that was the worst part of it. The last thing she could have known was that room.

After two nights in hospital, there was little left to do but to go home. Mum and Dad collected me from my room and walked me to the car, and I sat in the back seat, observing their hair over the headrests, like a child.

When I woke up, we were in Sussex, and close to home.

The cottage is at the end of a shady track, off one of the roads out of town. There is a bench next to the front door, with Dad’s papers spread across it, each supplement weighed down with garden stones. When it rains, articles break off and dissolve between the slats. Behind the cottage is the garden, stuffed with bees; herbs; trampoline. From the cottage, you can cross a stile to a great field, stretching across to the Downs. A single white windmill turns whimsically against the sky.

It was some time before I understood what had been sacrificed in the relocation. Just before I left home, I found a set of photographs of the old house outside Manchester, which had three floors and an elaborate mosaic path leading to the door. Here, we had two and a half bedrooms, and the land bulged with my parents’ projects. Something was always dying because it had been eclipsed by something else. Mum had been a lead nurse in accident and emergency; now she worked in a general practice, dispensing vaccinations and conversation.

‘It’s not as simple as that,’ Dad said, when I questioned him.

‘It looks pretty simple to me.’

‘Believe it or not, there are some things that you don’t understand.’

At the cottage, he extracted himself from the little car and took my suitcase from the boot. ‘Let me,’ I said, but he shook his head, and lugged it through the door.

‘Home again,’ Mum said.

The sun teetering on the ridge of the Downs. We passed into the shadow of the house and beneath the hanging baskets, and set about making tea.

The first time that I had come here, Dr K and Detective Jameson were in the front of the car. Me in the back, with Detective Jameson’s wife. During the drive, her hand hovered between us, as if she was frightened to touch me. At the service station, she bought me a packet of Quavers, and told me that I could call her Mum – if I wanted.

There was still a For Sale sign outside the cottage, which I didn’t like; Dr K had told me, in no uncertain terms, that this place would be my home. ‘Perhaps you could take a photograph?’ Mum had said, and the three of us, my new parents and me, huddled at the doorway, unsure whether to smile.

‘I took a few,’ said Dr K.

Once the photograph was done, the three of them ducked into the house. I stood at the threshold, a bedraggled vampire, waiting to be invited in.

I spent September reading and sleeping. The sleep of the dead, happily dreamless. In the morning, sunlight puddled across the duvet and illuminated childhood books; posters; the framed certificate of my degree. I woke up knowing exactly where I was.

On Saturdays, Olivia and Christopher spilled from the train. Edna called, questioning my whereabouts and financial prudence; paying for an unused room, she said, indicates poor monetary policy. Devlin sent flowers and emails. Her messages read like extracts from a particularly direct self-help guide.

Don’t be embarrassed. Think of all of the shit that didn’t get done because of embarrassment.

Fuck those stale swamp nuts. I’m keeping you on the payroll.

Jake is asking for you, so marrying a millionaire remains a viable option.

I replied asking for details of autumn deals, and she sent those, too.

I refreshed my inbox as many times as I could stand it, hoping for news from Bill. Whenever I did, I thought of him in front of a battered laptop, refreshing his own inbox, waiting for my apology.

I read, ran, masturbated, bathed, ate. That was the problem with coming home: you also had to come home to the self which resided there. When I talked to my parents, we discussed the easier things. There was the weather, of course: the summer was always just about to end. Mum asked about Olivia and Christopher; about Devlin, and the wilder clients in New York; about JP, with disdain. I accompanied her to the supermarket and to the newsagent. I spent some days with her in the surgery, assisting with her filing, the two of us sitting on the floor, back to back, besieged by paper. ‘Expect an invoice,’ I said.