The Retreat(102)

I went over to the window. Chesney had vanished, and Julia and Lily were playing together on the lawn, running through the sprinklers, laughing as the water soaked them. They collapsed into a heap on the grass and Julia threw her arms around her daughter, pulling her close.

I had a feeling there was something Lily wasn’t telling us, as if part of her story was missing. But when I said this to Julia she told me not to be stupid. Why would Lily lie? I had no answer to that, but there was something niggling at me.

Now, in Julia’s embrace, Lily looked over her shoulder so I could see her face. She wore that expression, the one I caught occasionally when Julia wasn’t looking. The smile she wore for her mum slipped away and her brow would furrow, eyes darkening.

I guessed she was remembering her time in that room beneath the basement. She would recover, I was sure, but sometimes her expression frightened me.

Sometimes, like now, she looked murderous.





Epilogue

It was the last day of summer. Tomorrow, Lily would have to go back to school and guests would start arriving at the retreat. Right now, Mum and her new boyfriend Lucas were still in bed, enjoying their last lie-in. Mum would never have let Lily come down to the river on her own. She wouldn’t let her go anywhere. And that was fine. Lily didn’t want to go anywhere.

But she had unfinished business.

Walking down to the riverbank, she’d thought about Lucas. He seemed all right. He wasn’t her dad, but at least he seemed to make Mum happy and they never argued, not seriously anyway. Sometimes, at night, she’d hear them laughing together. Maybe, Lily hoped, he would ask Mum to marry him and Lily could be a bridesmaid. That would be pretty cool. Just as long as he didn’t expect her to call him Dad. She already had a dad.

And every time she thought about her father and why he was dead, she felt as if there were a flame inside her that filled her entire body. She tried to hide it from Mum and was sure she had succeeded. But the flame drew the moths: the black moths that came to her in the night, each one representing a dark thought. They landed inside her head and clung there, dozens of them, hundreds. A whole swarm of bad thoughts that wouldn’t go away, no matter how hard she tried.

She wondered if this was how Rhiannon, the woman who became the Red Widow, had felt after her husband died. If that was what made her put the curse on the town.

Revenge. That’s what the bad thoughts were about.

Revenge for Dad’s death. And for the two years she’d spent locked in that room.

She reached the river. It had rained all night and the water was grey and high and choppy, rushing around the bend like it was late for an important date.

Lily pictured Dad drowning in that water and was forced to look back – and there she was, threading her way through the bushes towards her.

‘Hi, Megan,’ Lily said.

Megan looked nervous, just as she had yesterday. Lily had sneaked through the woods and emerged by Megan’s house, hiding and hoping to catch a glimpse of her former best friend. She got lucky. A bus pulled in at the end of the road and Megan got off. She gasped when Lily stepped out of the trees and said hello.

‘I want to talk to you,’ Lily had said. ‘Meet me tomorrow at nine in the morning, okay? Down by the river. I’ve got something to tell you. Something important.’

Lily knew Megan would come. She was a curious girl. And sure enough, she did. Lily watched her walk across the field, dragging her feet slightly.

‘How are you?’ Lily asked when Megan reached her. ‘How’s Jake?’

‘He’s fine. Not happy about going back to school but, like, who is?’

Lily didn’t blame Jake for what had happened. He’d simply been following instructions.

‘I’m looking forward to it,’ Lily said. ‘Even though I’ve missed, like, nearly three years and am going to be bottom of the class.’

She walked closer to the river, Megan following after a pause.

‘I’m . . .’ Megan started, before swallowing her words. Finally, she spat it out. ‘I’m sorry. I was just . . . I was scared. I really thought the Widow was real. I was a kid, a silly, scared kid. And when they said you’d gone missing, I was convinced. The witch really had got you.’

Lily stared at the water, letting Megan ramble on.

‘I felt so guilty, though, especially after— especially after what happened to your dad. I used to watch your house, wishing you were still there. Jake wanted to tell, to confess, but I knew they’d send him to prison. I thought they’d send me to prison too. I was terrified.’ She tried to meet Lily’s eye. ‘I didn’t want it to be you, but there was no one else . . . You were the only other kid who didn’t live in town, who we could . . .’ She trailed off.

‘It’s okay,’ Lily said. ‘It all worked out fine in the end.’

Megan stared in that annoying way of hers. Some things never changed.

‘You really mean that?’

Lily nodded.

‘Is that why . . . ?’ Megan’s voice dropped to a whisper and she looked around, as if someone might be lurking in the trees, listening. ‘Is that why you didn’t tell anyone what really happened? Why you didn’t tell them about me and Jake?’

‘That’s right.’ The black moths fluttered their wings, ready to take off, to bash and batter the inside of her skull. ‘I don’t want Jake to go to prison either. And you’re too young. You wouldn’t be punished.’