The Red House (11 page)

I stand in Dora’s doorway.

She’s in bed, now, finally. I wasn’t sure if she’d go up when we got home, but she obeyed the suggestion without question. She looks safe in there. She looks safe.

We’d moved into this house when she was six and had bought the bed new then. We’d got it in pieces and screwed it together tight. The linens have changed over these nine years, from candy to stripes to the plain blue and purple they are now. It’s too hot tonight for the duvet, which is rolled up at her feet. She’s under a sheet, pulled up to her chest. The bed looks smaller now, too small for this full-sized person still trying to fit in it. She pushes her hair off her shoulder in a smooth, mature gesture. I barely recognise her behind her weary and wounded expression.

‘You want a cup of water? Hot chocolate?’ I offer.

She shakes her head.

I cross the room and check the locks on her two
windows, trying to look like that’s not what I’m doing. I’ve already checked the rest of the house, while she changed. I pull down the blinds, as if curtains aren’t enough.

Maybe they aren’t.

I pull out her desk chair and sit on it. ‘You should sleep if you can.’

She shrugs.

‘Music, maybe?’ I suggest.

‘No.’

‘I used to read to you, remember that?’ I look on her shelves, but none of the books are the ones I’m thinking of. The last book I’d read to her was
Swallows and Amazons,
years ago.

I reach for a paperback that’s face down on her desk.

‘Alexandra gave it for my birthday. It’s about vampires,’ she says, dully.

I start from the beginning, reading in that sing-song way left over from picture books, wholly at odds with the story’s teenage angst and earnestness. I plough through up until the young, fumbling lust between the two protagonists becomes embarrassing.

‘Shit, I can’t read this out loud,’ I say, laughing, then catch myself. ‘Don’t tell your mother that I swore in front of you,’ I add lightly.

‘You shouldn’t lie to Mum,’ she says, looking hard at me.

‘I don’t lie to your mother,’ I say, meaning that I don’t lie about anything important. She turns her head away. I’m not sure what she’s referring to.

The door downstairs rattles from a key. I jump to standing, protective, but I know who it must be.

‘Dora?’ Gwen calls up the stairs.

She’s in the room a second later, kneeling next to the bed. She’s got her hands on Dora’s cheeks, looking hard into her face. ‘I’m so sorry,’ she says, as if it’s a bad thing that she was at work, and hugs Dora, pulling her close.

I leave them to it, and step into the hallway to call Chloe. She’s not answering; I have to leave messages. I’m pacing back and forth, and my voice is clenched tight. I pause in Dora’s doorway, noticing how much they look alike, she and Gwen. They both look tired, and worried, and scared.

‘I think he’s dead, Mum,’ Dora says.

I’ve already explained the broad strokes to Gwen over the phone. ‘Good,’ she says.

‘I didn’t mean to do it, not that. I just meant to stop him, to—’

‘Ssshhhhhhhh.’ She jerks Dora back and forth, like rocking except that Dora’s not a baby any more.

The dog barks outside. I put her out the back when we were dropped home. It’s an idle bark, a chatty one, not like the urgent bark behind the barn. I need to know:
What did Jesse find under the blackberry bushes?

Gwen sits back and tells Dora that she won’t go back to work tomorrow and that we’ll all stay home together.

‘No, I want to sing tomorrow,’ Dora insists. ‘It’s the performance.’

‘You don’t need to, sweet. They’ll understand,’ Gwen says, stroking Dora’s arms now.

‘I want to.’

‘No,’ I say, supporting Gwen. ‘You’re not seeing that tutor again.’

‘Well, what am I supposed to do? Stay home with you
and watch TV and pretend that none of this ever happened? It did happen and it sucks and it’s horrible and …’ She’s crying again. Gwen glares at me over Dora’s shoulder. I was agreeing with Gwen; I’m not sure what I’m supposed to have done wrong.

‘It doesn’t matter if Mr Gant is there,’ Dora insists. ‘He
should
be there. He didn’t do anything bad. He helped me.’ Dora pleads her case: ‘I worked hard. I want to see my friends.’ Her eyes go big. ‘Where’s Fiona going to stay? They won’t leave her alone at home, will they? Ask Chloe.’

‘Chloe isn’t answering.’ I rub my face. ‘I’m sure she’s looking after Fiona.’

Dora comes to the door and tugs my sleeve. ‘We should check. Fiona can sleep here.’

Gwen and I exchange looks. I’ve missed this: that way we used to communicate every day, right over Dora’s head, just using our eyes. It’s been a while.

I get my keys and say I’ll drive over to check; my car has automatic transmission and I can control it fine despite my damaged hand. Gwen guides Dora back to bed. ‘If he brings her back I’ll look after her,’ Gwen promises.

‘I really do want to sing tomorrow,’ Dora repeats, to be sure that Gwen gets the message, but Dora’s exhausted. Instead of making Gwen promise that she can go, Dora lets herself fall asleep.

Gwen won’t let it go. ‘Why didn’t you notice when she didn’t come home? Did you try to phone her? Why didn’t you call me sooner?’ The three lights over our kitchen table make three distinct oases in the otherwise dark downstairs. Her head seems to hover.

‘I called Dora’s phone but she didn’t answer. I called you as soon as I knew that something was actually wrong,’ I say, in my self-consciously ‘reasonable’ voice even though I know that it pushes Gwen’s frustration up a notch.

‘I would say that not coming home when expected is something “
actually wrong
”.’

‘She’s fifteen! She doesn’t have to come straight home!’

‘I was the stay-at-home parent for fifteen years and I promise you that she does. She has to come straight home or call and say that she’s not. That’s how it works. It’s not because we don’t trust her; it’s because we don’t trust the entire rest of the world, and with apparently good reason!’

I pound the table with my hand that can make a fist. ‘You’re right. You’re right! I’m not fit for this job. Not fit for my actual job, either. Not fit, full stop.’

‘This isn’t about you.’ Gwen’s voice is wobbling.

‘No, it’s not. So let’s stop discussing what I should have done and how nothing bad would have happened if you’d been here.’

‘I’m not saying that it wouldn’t have happened! I’m saying that I would have been here and not two hours away! Do you know what that feels like?’

I do. I did the working for most of Dora’s life.

‘Stop it!’ Dora calls from upstairs.

We freeze. Gwen’s covered her eyes; she might be crying. I reach out and she turns her head away.

‘I’m sorry,’ I say. I pull her other hand, the one that’s dangling. I squeeze it.

We go upstairs together.

‘Sorry, sweetheart,’ Gwen whispers, and kisses Dora’s
cheek. ‘I’m upset about what happened to you and I shouldn’t take that out on your father.’

Dora says, ‘No, you were right.’ She gives me another hard look.

‘I’m sorry.’ I’ve already said that, but it’s important for Dora to hear it. Gwen lets me hug her around the shoulders. She closes her eyes and leans on me. ‘And I’m sorry we woke you up,’ I say to Dora, then correct myself to a whisper, because Fiona’s on the rug, in a sleeping bag, her eyes shut tight.

Fiona’s mother is in Ireland and there’s no flight until morning, so Spencer was relieved to have a safe port of call for the girl. Chloe confirmed with her that she knows our family and accompanied her to pack up a toothbrush and tomorrow’s clothes. Two of the uniformed officers knew me, and told me about the empty pill packets found in the barn. So much for hoping that at least one of the deaths was from natural causes.

For all the time that Fiona and Dora have spent together over the years, Fiona’s never stayed the night at ours before. I don’t know if that’s by chance or convenience, or if her mother had forbidden it even before the school-skipping.

Bringing her back here, the summer sun had been setting at last. Lights had been erected around the red barn to enable the forensics team to work into the night to secure the scene. Some of those lights were aimed at the patch of blackberry bramble behind the barn that had caught Jesse’s attention.

As I’d swung the car around onto the long dirt road out, I’d seen the White House in my mirror, partly lit up inside. The corner bedroom, where Fiona had gone to gather her sleepover things, had at first appeared to have a cheerfully
striped curtain. As my perspective changed, I’d realised that the window was barred.

‘Are you all right?’ I’d asked Fiona, glancing nervously at her, slumped against the car door.

‘No,’ she’d said simply, and nothing else for the rest of the ride.

When Mum and Dad go to their bedroom at last, ‘Fiona?’ I say. She’s still pretending to sleep. She’s good at pretending.

When I’d first got to the concert hall this morning, Fiona had paused by the name-tag table. We were always each supposed to make one, so that the tutors could call us by name. There were lots of pens, all different colours. Fiona didn’t choose one. She just stood there, being jostled. At arrival, everyone’s carrying, and bumping, their instruments. She’s lucky. Her harp is so big that it gets to stay for the week, instead of her dragging it back and forth.

I’d picked an orange pen for her at random and put it in her hand.

‘I have a crazy idea,’ she’d said.

‘What?’ I’d asked absently, distracted, then reached across for a bright blue pen and printed my name in clear, capital letters. I peeled the backing off and pressed the sticker onto my shirt.

‘Do you want to go to Milton Keynes again? Today?’

I’d laughed, assuming she was joking. Fiona had caught hell over that one day we skipped school. Her life had already been strict, but, after, it became near-jail. It’s not like we’d snuck out at night; we’d cut school one day, one out of every other tightly organised day of our lives, and didn’t even go to London. We took the bus to the mall. We browsed, and drank coffee. It didn’t hurt anyone.
Well, in the end it hurt Fiona.

‘No, I mean it,’ she’d said in front of the name tag table, pink from excitement. ‘We can just …’

She hadn’t written anything on her sticker. That’s when I realised she meant it.

‘We shouldn’t have done it the first time. Your mother—’

‘Sorry, I knew it was stupid.’

She looked really sad.

‘Maybe we can go next week?’ I suggested. ‘Before school starts back?’ We both knew that her mother would never let us.

‘Yeah. I’ll ask her. I only … Thanks for that. I think that was one of the best days of my life.’

I didn’t know what to say. ‘Yeah, it was fun,’ I’d agreed. It had been fun, but not worth it, surely? Then the lobby chaos around us had started emptying out into the rehearsal rooms. It was almost time to start. ‘Can you watch my bag?’ I’d said, needing the toilet.

When I came back, and scooped up my backpack, I’d headed to the band room. Fiona and I play in different groups for the first session, so it’s not strange that Fiona turned the other way. I hadn’t thought anything about it then. I hadn’t realised what she was trying to get away from. Had she already done it by then? Had she been
about to do it? Is it because her mother was away?

In my room, I sit up and nudge her with my foot. I kick her and hiss, ‘Fiona!’

She rolls over, eyes open. She props up on one elbow.

‘I know what you did,’ I say.

Grandma Ro hadn’t been happy. I know Fiona would never hurt her, would never do it against Ro’s will, and you couldn’t make someone take that many pills anyway. They have to want to, even if you grind them up; who would drink something that tastes like that? Ro must have asked Fiona to do it. It had been a kind of love, I get that. But she shouldn’t have involved anyone else. Most of those pills had come from me.

Pharmacies have sold paracetamol in tiny packets for years now, to discourage suicides. You have to make an effort to collect enough, not just give in to a whim with the bottle in the bathroom. There had been packaging for several dozen pills in the barn, enough to do the job. She had to have been lying to me for weeks, claiming monthly headaches. Her mother doesn’t believe in PMS and doesn’t keep paracetamol in the house. Ever since we cut school, Fiona hadn’t been allowed to cycle home on her own any more, and it’s not like she had money of her own even if she could get to shops.

Fiona’s face is blank. It’s like she doesn’t even feel guilty. Maybe she really doesn’t; maybe Grandma Ro was in pain or something. Maybe she had cancer.

‘You used me!’ I accuse, as loudly as I dare, but I’m running out of energy. Fiona looks like she’s punishing herself already. She looks … stopped, like her switch is off.

‘I’m sorry,’ she says.

I think about how long it would have taken, one pill at a time, handing them over, then maybe tilting a cup of water to Ro’s lips. Ro, who Fiona loves. Fiona loves her better than she loves her own mother. Maybe Fiona assumed that she would be in jail by now. Maybe she’ll go to jail tomorrow.

I slide off the bed and throw my arms around her. Fiona makes this humming noise, which turns into hiccuping and tears. I’m crying too. We just cry into each other’s hair and hold tight.

Dad knocks on the doorframe. He’s wearing a dressing gown now, and shoves his hands into the pockets. ‘You all right?’ he asks.

I nod. Fiona nods too, our heads in sync.

‘Did that builder ever hurt you? Did he even talk to you?’ Dad asks Fiona. He’s lost his job but you wouldn’t know it from the way he talks.

Fiona shakes her head and crosses her arms over her chest.

‘Good,’ says Dad. ‘If you want,’ he says to both of us, ‘go ahead and watch TV downstairs, or I could make you something to eat, or …’

‘No,’ says Fiona. ‘I need to sleep.’ Her head is bobbing slowly. She looks terrible.

‘We have to sing tomorrow,’ I remind him. I want it, that feeling of being inside a note that fractures into a chord so beautiful that you wouldn’t mind breaking into pieces yourself.

‘Me, too!’ Fiona blurts, sounding surprised at herself. It’s like she forgot it was ahead. ‘We need to sing tomorrow,’ she repeats.

Dad looks like he’s about to fight, but instead he just says, ‘We’ll talk about it in the morning.’

‘Sorry I missed practice today,’ Fiona says, as if it were a normal day, reaching out for my hand. The bracelet she’d left in my bag hangs from my wrist now. We used to dress up in Rowena’s jewellery when we were younger. Now I understand why Fiona had wanted me to have it. Now that Grandma Ro is gone, I have this little memory I can wear.

‘It’s all right. I know you weren’t feeling well,’ I answer, which is how I promise, right in front of Dad, that I’ll keep Fiona’s secrets.