Violet grunted with effort as she moved the cabinet, wincing at the sound of it scraping across the floorboards. Her pulse slowed when she spotted the necklace, the links of its chain threaded through with great ropes of dust. She couldn’t recall the last time her room had been properly cleaned: Penny, the maid, only seemed to give it a cursory mop once a week. Guilt tugged at her stomach. She knew Penny was a little afraid of her, ever since Violet had convinced her to peer into Goldie’s hatbox. She’d only wanted to show Penny the pretty gold stripes on his legs. She couldn’t have known that the maid – who, it transpired, had a horror of spiders – would faint clean away.
Violet bent down to retrieve the necklace and was just about to move the cabinet back again when she noticed something. There was a letter, scratched into the white paint of the wainscoting, half hidden by a spool of fluff. It was a W – the same letter engraved on the pendant she gripped in her hand. Gently brushing away the dust, she uncovered more letters, which looked as if they had been painstakingly etched with a pin, or – she shuddered – a fingernail. Together, the letters formed a word which was somehow familiar, like a long-lost friend, though she had no recollection of ever seeing it before.
Weyward.
9
KATE
Kate grabs her bag and runs to the car.
In the rear-view mirror, she sees that the birds – crows, she thinks – are still ascending, higher than the bone-yellow moon, the night shimmering with their cries.
‘Don’t look, don’t look,’ she says to herself, her breath misting in the chill air of the car. Her palms are slippery with sweat and she wipes them on her jeans so that she can turn the key in the ignition. The engine jolts into life and she reverses onto the road, heart pounding.
There are no streetlights, and she flicks on the high beams as she speeds down the winding lanes. Her breathing is shallow, her fingers tense as claws on the steering wheel. She half expects the headlights to reveal something menacing and otherworldly lurking around each corner.
She makes it to the slip road. If she keeps driving, she could be back in London by morning. But then, where would she go? Back to the flat? Staring down the barrel of the motorway, she remembers what happened the first time.
The first time she tried to leave.
It had been soon after they’d started living together. Another argument about her job in children’s publishing – he’d wanted her to quit, said she couldn’t deal with the stress. She’d had a panic attack at work, during the weekly acquisition meeting. Simon had picked her up and brought her home, then sat across from her in their living room with its glittering view, haloed by the sun like some terrible angel. His words crashed over her – she couldn’t cope, he didn’t have time to deal with this, there was no point in her working when he earned so much. It was a useless job, anyway – what was the value in a bunch of women nattering about made-up stories for children? Besides, she obviously wasn’t very good at it – after all, she barely brought home a quarter of his salary.
It was this last statement that did it – that sparked some forgotten fire in her. And so she looked him in the eye and said what she hadn’t been able to tell the kindly colleagues who’d brought her tissues and a cup of tea, as she’d recovered at her desk.
Work wasn’t the problem; Simon was. His face darkened. For a moment he was still, and Kate’s breath caught in her throat. Without a word, he threw his cup of coffee at her. She turned her face away just in time, but the boiling liquid splashed her left arm, leaving a pink line of scalded skin.
It was the first time he had hurt her. Later, it would scar.
That night, he’d begged her not to go as she’d packed her things, telling her he was sorry, it would never happen again, he couldn’t live without her. She had wavered, even then.
But when the taxi arrived, she got in. It was the thing to do, wasn’t it? She was, supposedly, an educated, self-respecting woman. She couldn’t possibly stay.
The hotel – in Camden, she remembered; it had been all she’d been able to find （and afford） at such short notice – had been cold, with the musty stink of mice. The room overlooked the street and the window shook with every car that drove past. She lay sleepless until morning, watching the ceiling glow with the passing headlights, her phone vibrating with pleading texts, the burn on her arm throbbing.
She’d called in sick to work the next morning, spent the day wandering the markets, staring into the oily depths of the canal. Searching for resolve.
By the second night, she’d decided to leave him. But then came the voicemail.
‘Kate,’ he’d said, voice heavy with tears. ‘I am so, so sorry that we fought. Please, come back. I can’t live without you – I can’t … I need you, Kate. Please. I – I’ve taken some pills …’
And just like that, her resolve evaporated. She couldn’t do it. She couldn’t let someone else die.
She phoned 999. As soon as she knew the paramedics were on their way, she called a taxi. On the drive back, she stared blankly out of the window as the neat terraced houses, gleaming dark in the rain, gave way to the images from her childhood nightmares. Black wings, beating the air. The tarmac glossy with blood.
I am the monster.
What if she was too late?
The yellow ambulance was parked on their street by the time she got there. She’d barely been able to breathe in the lift, had hated it for delaying her as it cranked slowly up the building.
The front door of their flat was open. Simon sat on the couch in his pyjamas, flanked by two female paramedics, pill bottles glinting on the coffee table in front of them. Unopened. Ice formed in her gut.
He hadn’t taken them at all. He’d lied.
She stared. He looked up at her and the tears fell freely down his face.
‘I’m so sorry, Kate,’ he said, shoulders shaking. ‘I was just … I was so scared that you would never come back.’
The paramedics didn’t notice the blistered skin on Kate’s arm. She walked them to the front door, promising she’d call 999 again if Simon displayed any more signs of suicidal ideation, agreeing not to leave him alone, to follow up on a referral to the local psychology team. Then she shut the door behind them carefully.
Simon got off the couch and walked towards her, until she felt his breath on the back of her neck. Together, they listened to the lift going down the shaft.
‘I’m so sorry that I left,’ said Kate, without turning around. ‘Please promise me you’ll never hurt yourself or do anything stupid again.’
Stupid.
She knew as soon as the word left her mouth that she’d made a mistake.
‘Stupid?’ Simon asked, keeping his voice low. He gripped the back of her neck tightly, before shoving her against the wall.
She resigned from the publishing house the next day. Surrendering not just her pay cheque and her sense of self, but her strongest link to the outside world. To the women who had made her feel valued, intelligent – like she was more than just his girlfriend, his plaything.
Kate switches off the indicator. She thinks of the cells knitting together inside her and is hit with a wave of nausea. If she goes back … if he finds out about the baby … he’ll never let her leave.