Perfectly Preventable Deaths

30 Chickweed

Little receptacles line the walls. Jam jars, bell jars, vials and old glass bottles full of dried-up little things. Feet. Eyes. Skin, leaves, powder. Shards of bone. There is only a very little light. The door clicks shut behind me and I start.

When we first moved here, Brian told us there were places that he didn’t know about, things his father built inside these walls. But this is some next-level wizardly nonsense. I’m not sure how to feel. Secrets are unnerving, but secret passages are kind of … magical. The proper kind of magical. That real good scary Christmas-morning feeling.

My excitement wanes a bit as I realise that the dark has enveloped me entirely. I cannot see my feet or hands. They say when you are sensory-deprived, your other senses start to compensate. I wish they would. I wish I had my phone, some sort of light. The stone is rough and jutting – unpredictable – and I am very glad of my thick boots.

My mind keeps replaying the conversation with Brian. Fluttering between two kinds of guilt. Does it count as betrayal when you’re worried about someone’s safety?

It will to her.

She’s going to be so mad. Maybe I should stay here in this musty, cobwebby passageway, and forge a new life among these cool jars. I could work my way up through the ranks of the jar-folk, carrying small and large items alike and being respected because of my pockets.

I inch my feet gingerly along the path. Baby steps. There could be a drop here, easily. Eroded steps. A surprise torture dungeon. Brian’s decent, but his house is weird as hell, pieced together by his father’s wants. Castle upon castle. Halls in walls. I wonder if it is a murder castle. How long have I been walking step by step? It seems to take me ages, tightrope-walking foot in front of foot. My mind is clear. I do not have to worry about the fallout from Catlin, or the story with Oona. I only have to get back to the light. I breathe the air in, dusty and thick with unfamiliar stuff. It’s coating my oesophagus with paste. Coughing doesn’t help. I need to keep on moving. Through the dark.

The walls feel rough and dry beneath my fingers. Brick meets brick until I reach an edge. I feel the sharpened slant of wall beside me. Two paths diverge. And I don’t know what’s right. I close my eyes, breathe in a layer of scum and try to think. Place my two hands flat upon the ground. It isn’t earth. It’s concrete, and it’s harsh. There is an unfinishedness about this place. I get the sense that there is something here I will not like. Or that there has been, maybe, in the past. I’m not sure if it’s intuition, fear.

I choose to venture on and see what happens. It feels strange to be eaten by Brian’s house. I keep on searching, hoping in the dark. My hand finds a door, thick and smooth with varnish. I grasp the handle, turn and it doesn’t give. I kick and bang. Scrape at it until hard flecks are caught beneath my nails. It doesn’t help. I might be here forever. Like the bones inside the steamer trunks.

I leave the door and carry on, piece by piece. There are some letters carved into the wall. I can’t make out the words. A zigzag, a circle, then some random scratches. Someone else was here before me, I think. And for long enough to do this. Pass the time with chipping glyphs into stone. I shudder.

I keep on walking, feet upon the path. The cement turns to flagstones, to pebbles, then to something soft. A fleecy damp. I put my hand down, pull at it, and smell it. It’s moss, or something that’s a lot like moss. I hope that’s a good sign. I still can’t see, the walls are close and it is getting colder. I wish I had something to keep me warm.

I move until I meet a metal door. I feel for, find, the latch. It’s fastened with a padlock that has rusted. I can feel it flake beneath my touch. There’s dust on it too. I don’t think it’s been used for quite a long time. My fingers search the ground for anything at all to bash it open. I find a stone; it’s small and thin and sharp. I saw and saw at the little lock. I have to hold it steady with one hand for this to work. It takes a while. I feel it start to give. My hand slips and the sharp edge slices deeply down into my palm. Blood drips. I use the stone again, my left hand stinging. Warm blood on the smooth surface. The shackle gives.

I push it open. Stumble into brightness. There are steps overgrown with ivy, brambles, nettles and herb robert. I see some bottles poking underground. Glass and stings are nothing. I am free.

The fresh air feels so healing in my lungs. I cough out dust and make my way down the steps and down and down again until I hit a road. My clothes are thick with dirt. I turn and walk until I hit the main street of the village. I make my way towards the long road home. My muscles ache. The sky is grey. I wonder how long it has been. Since I pushed in that door.

The bright red car pulls up beside me. ‘State of you,’ she tells me. ‘Hop in.’

‘How did you know I’d be here?’ I ask.

‘Brian called me – said you’d gone wandering in the walls. There’s only a few places that you’d come out in one piece.’

‘Wait – what?’ It’s hard to tell if she’s joking or not and then I remember she is Mamó.

‘Did you break the padlock?’

I nod. She says, ‘You’ll be replacing that for me.’

‘For you?’ I ask. ‘Is it your secret passage to Brian’s office then?’

‘It was in his father’s time. I mainly use it for storage now.’

‘What was it for before?’

She grunts at me. That’s all I’m going to get. I nod at her. It’s easier than speaking. My throat is dry. She hands me a little bottle of clear liquid. I drink from it. It burns my well-worn throat.

‘What is it?’

‘Something small to help you,’ she tells me. ‘We used to use it for babies when they were teething back in the day. To shut them up. We called it Mother’s Lull.’

It tastes and smells like nail-polish remover. ‘Thank you?’

‘You are welcome,’ she says, and replaces the bottle in the glove compartment. ‘Father Byrne makes his own brand too. But mine is better.’

‘Who’s Father Byrne?’ I ask.

She snaps, ‘A priest. A man of God. One of them, at any rate.’

‘Everyone has secrets here. Even Brian. I wonder –’

‘Madeline,’ she says, ‘haven’t you enough to worry about, without putting names on everyone around you? And you can’t just dip your toe in and out again with this sort of thing. Either I’m training you or I am not. And currently I’m not. So save your questions.’ Her face is impassive, but not unkind.

‘Whatever happens though, we live here now. And surely I’m entitled to some sort of explanation of what is going on around us, in the place.’

‘Entitled. That’s you, right enough.’ Her tone is contemptuous. ‘You can’t refuse to turn around and ask someone to draw you a picture of what’s behind you instead of facing it. There are things you don’t know because you don’t have to know them yet. Accept it. Or turn around and LOOK.’

‘But Catlin –’ My voice slices through the air, more whiney than I had intended.

‘Look, Madeline. Your stepfather is trying,’ Mamó tells me. ‘And Lon won’t get very far with everyone watching your sister. Reporting back. And believe me, they will be.’

‘What happened with Helen Groarke? And Lon, before?’

‘No one’s sure of anything in this life. But if I had a daughter. Or a sister. Or a stranger. I wouldn’t want them spending time with that.’ She spits on to the dashboard. It leaves a white slick mark. An eye inside a face.

I look down at my shoes. They’re wet and filthy.

‘Sorry about the floor,’ I say, ‘and the lock.’

‘Sure they’re just little things,’ she says. ‘You’ll make amends for them. It isn’t complicated.’

I look down at my feet. I rub my boots, and smell my fingertips and rub again.

‘Mamó?’ I say.

‘What?’ she asks, and I shrink a little, but keep on going. ‘There’s blood on my boots, and it isn’t mine. Look.’ I thrust a grubby hand at her. ‘It’s old, I think. But it smells like …’

She pulls my hand to her nostrils, takes a sniff.

Our eyes meet.

She turns her face back towards the windscreen, grunts again. A different kind of grunt. Surprise, I think.

We reach the driveway. ‘I’m in a hurry, so I’ll leave you here,’ she tells me. ‘Also, I have to give you this. It was made with yourself in mind, so it’s no use to me. I know enough.’

I take it. It’s the small round sphere from in Bob’s beak. So black it’s blue and somehow also milky. I stare at it. It isn’t smooth. It’s pitted like a peach pit. On the surface, tufts of something cling.

‘What is it for?’

‘Just keep it in your pocket,’ Mamó tells me. ‘It’s not a charm, but it is good to have.’

I step out of the car, still none the wiser, and she speeds away. I stumble down the path towards my home that doesn’t feel like home. The sun is pale in the sky. The air is freezing. I feel the shadow of the yew trees on my face, and carry on going, shivering and limping. Cobwebs in my hair and dirty fingers. I need to shower and I want to sleep.

I lift my hands to my nose and take a breath.

She took her eyes off the road.

This blood surprised her.

And you can’t tell, from blood, where it came from. But when I smelled it, flash of recognition. Fear and fur, the forest.

And a blade.