I look back at YOU’RE NEXT.
It had to behim. No one else knew.
Ten years old and already wicked.
Martha’s voice slips into my head. I can still see the angry look on her face when she caught me at the cottage, peeking through the windows one evening I’d stayed out too long.
She always said ten. But I’d only been eight. She got it wrong every time she said it in the years that followed.
I’d been out after supper, which was against therules, but Martha was usually too deep into the brandy bottle to notice me slipping out. The woods were my playground, and other than the cottage, there was nothing but trees and roots. Not that there wasn’t danger. Between the stream and the well, there were plenty of ways to hurt myself. In the confidence of youth, I thought I was invincible. I knew every root and branch. Exactly which stones wobbled when crossing the river. The bottom of the old well was littered with pennies. Whenever I found one in the house, I’d go and make a wish. The same wish. I’d wish for a friend. After that summer, I hadn’t thrown any more pennies.
I’d gone to the cottage, crouching in the undergrowth below one of the filth-covered windows. Grime and cobwebs everywhere. The boy didn’t have a gardener or housekeeper to take care of it. And not even a mother to take care of him. I cleaned a small corner of the glass with the cuff of my cardigan.
I wish I hadn’t.
Branches snagged in my hair and caught on my clothes as I ran home, the woods far scarier after the sun had set. Martha, my nanny, stood in the kitchen in her housecoat, eyes rimmed red and unsteady on her feet. She slapped me before I could open my mouth. Hard enough that my ears rang.
It was the first and last time she struck me.
What were you doing out there?
Nothing,I said.I couldn’t sleep.
You don’t go near that cottage.You don’t speak about it. You haven’t seen anything. Do you understand me? If I catch you near there, you’ll never go into the woods again.
I went to bed with a stinging face and a headful of images I didn’t have words for yet. If Martha thought that we should be quiet, who was I to doubt her? She was a grown-up. She knew more than I did.
I lay under my blankets and shook, holding my flaming cheek.
Martha called me wicked the next day when I’d tried to bring up what I saw. To find a way to help the boy.
Sighing, I take photos for the insurance company and ring my mother.
‘Katherine.’
‘Hi Mum. Someone’s scratched the car.’
A pause. ‘What kind of scratch?’
I look at YOU’RE NEXT. ‘A fairly big one,’ I say. ‘Both tyres too.’
‘Oh, for goodness sake. I’ll get Marcus to deal with the insurance. And Katherine, I have told you about keeping the car there. We can pay for a garage to keep it in…’
‘It’s fine, Mum.’
‘Clearly, it’s not fine. Anyway, while I have you, Daddy and I have been talking about graduate positions. There are a few very good options coming up, and it would be worth?—’
‘I’ll call you later, Mum.’
‘I just think it’s?—’
‘Later,’ I say. ‘I promise.’
I hang up and try to ignore the bite of guilt. I’m sure my parents mean well, but it’s like they don’t know me at all.
My feet slow as I take the long way home, unease following me through the streets.
As I walk through the concourse, my shoulder blades prickle. That familiar, crawling sensation of being watched.
