The Guest List(41)

‘Goodness no, love. We’ve been up for … well, it feels like hours.’

When she passes me to Ben I can hardly make out what he’s saying, his voice is so high and reedy.

‘What was that, darling?’ I press the phone to my ear.

‘I said hello, Mum.’ At the sound of his voice I feel it deep down inside, the powerful tug of my bond to him. When I look for something to compare my love for the kids with it’s actually not my love for Charlie. It’s animal, powerful, blood-thick. The love of kin. The closest thing I can find to it is my love for Alice, my sister.

‘Where are you?’ Ben asks. ‘It sounds like the sea. Are there boats?’ He’s obsessed with boats.

‘Yes, we came over on one.’

‘A big one?’

‘Big-ish.’

‘Lottie was really sick yesterday, Mum.’

‘What’s wrong with her?’ I ask, quickly.

The thing that most worries me is the thought of anything happening to my loved ones. When I was little and woke in the night I’d sometimes creep over to my sister Alice’s bed to check that she was definitely breathing, because the worst thing I could imagine was her being taken from me. ‘I’m OK, Han,’ she’d whisper, a smile in her voice. ‘But you can get in if you want to.’ And I’d lie there, pressed against her back, feeling the reassuring movement of her ribs as she breathed.

Mum comes on to the line. ‘Nothing to worry about, Han. She overdid herself yesterday afternoon. Your dad – the dolt – left her on her own with the Victoria sponge while I was at the shops. She’s fine now, love, she’s watching CBeebies on the sofa, ready for her breakfast. Now,’ she says to me, ‘go have fun at your glamorous weekend.’

I don’t feel very glamorous right now, I think, with my soggy sock and the breeze stinging tears from my eyes. ‘All right, Mum,’ I say, ‘I’ll try and call tomorrow, on our way home. They’re not driving you too crazy?’

‘No,’ Mum says. ‘To be honest—’ The little catch in her voice is unmistakable.

‘What?’

‘Well, it’s a nice distraction. Positive. Looking after the next generation.’ She stops, and I hear her take a deep breath. ‘You know … it’s this time of year.’

‘Yeah,’ I say. ‘I get it, Mum. I feel it too.’

‘Bye, darling. You take care of yourself.’

As I ring off it hits me. Is that who Olivia reminds me of? Alice? It’s all there: the thinness, the fragility, the deer-in-headlights look. I remember when I first saw my sister after she came home from university for the summer holidays. She had lost about a third of her body weight. She looked like someone with a terrible disease – like something was eating her from the inside out. And the worst part was that she didn’t think she could talk to anyone about what had happened to her. Not even me.

I start walking. And then I stop, look about me. I’m not sure I’m going the right way but it’s not obvious which way is right. I can’t see the Folly or even the marquee from here, hidden as they are by the rise of the ground. I’d assumed it would be easier going on my return, because I’d know the route. But now I feel disoriented – my thoughts have been somewhere else completely. I must have taken a different way; it seems even boggier here. I’m having to hop between drier tussocks of grass to avoid soft, wet black patches of peat. I plough on. Then I get a bit stuck and chance a big leap. But I’ve misjudged it: my footing slips and my left welly lands not on the grassy hillock but on the soft surface of the peat.

I sink – and I keep sinking. It happens so fast. The ground opens up and swallows my foot. I lose my balance, staggering backwards, and my other foot goes in with a horrible slurp of suction, quick as the black throat of that cormorant swallowing the fish. Within moments, the peat seems to be over the top of my boots and I’m sinking further. For the first few seconds I’m stupid with surprise, frozen. Then I realise I have to act, to rescue myself. I reach out for the dry patch of land in front of me, and grip hold of two hunks of grass.

I heave. Nothing happens. I seem to be stuck fast. How embarrassing this is going to be, I think, when I get back to the Folly absolutely filthy and have to explain what happened. Then I realise that I’m still sinking. The black earth is inching over my knees, up my lower thighs. Little by little it is drinking me in.

Suddenly I don’t care about embarrassment any longer. I’m genuinely terrified. ‘Help!’ I shout. But my words are swallowed by the wind. There’s no way my voice is going to carry a few yards, let alone all the way to the Folly. Nevertheless, I try again. I scream it: ‘Help me!’

I think of the bodies in the bog. I imagine skeletal hands reaching up towards me from deep beneath the earth, ready to drag me down. And I begin to scrabble at the bank, using all my strength to haul myself upwards, snorting and growling with the effort like an animal. It feels like nothing’s happening but I grit my teeth and try even harder.

And then I am aware of the distinct feeling of being watched. A prickle down the spine.

‘You want a hand there?’

I start. I can’t quite twist myself round to see who has spoken. Slowly they move around to stand in front of me. It’s two of the ushers: Duncan and Pete.