‘Mrs Darker—’ he said.
‘Yes?’
‘Please don’t tell anyone. He didn’t mean to do it.’
Nana had her back to him, and I could see she had tears in her eyes. ‘I had a dad who didn’t mean to hurt me too, once upon a time. I promise you can trust me. For now, just have your bath. There’s a clean towel and flannel on the side. Don’t forget to wash behind your ears.’
I ran back to my bedroom before Nana came out onto the landing, and listened to her march down the stairs. She was still wearing her fluffy purple dressing gown and pink slippers, but she looked really mad, and her face looking all cross like that made me feel a bit afraid. Nana was rarely angry about anything, but boy did everyone know about it when she was.
The only telephone at Seaglass in those days – or ever – was in the hallway. It was on a little round table along with a fancy notebook full of handwritten numbers. I watched from behind the banister at the top of the staircase, as Nana flicked through the book, found Conor’s dad’s number, and dialled. It was a rotary phone, so took forever. Her foot was tapping the way it did when she was proper cross, while she waited for someone to answer the call. Patience was never one of Nana’s virtues.
‘Hello, Mr Kennedy, how are you today? Oh, a little under the weather? I’m sorry to hear that. Is that why you beat your ten-year-old son with your belt last night?’
There was silence, in which I’m sure Conor’s dad and I were both busy putting together pieces of a puzzle we weren’t sure how to solve. Wondering if those pieces were in the right order. Not really liking the picture that they made. Nana went on.
‘I suspect you didn’t even know where he was overnight. Let me put your mind at rest and tell you that he’s here at Seaglass with me. Which is where he is going to stay, until I can reach social services and have him taken away from you forever.’
She was quiet again. I wished I could hear what was being said on the other end of the line.
‘He’s a child. It’s not his fault your wife died. You are supposed to be his father. You’re supposed to protect him from all that is bad and wrong about the world, not constantly hurt him and let him down. Doing your best? Well, your best isn’t good enough. You’re depressed? Aren’t we all. It doesn’t give you the right to do what you did. You are a disgrace to depression, and you don’t deserve to call yourself that child’s father. Either you get yourself some help or you will lose your son. I never met your wife, but I can only imagine that if she could see what you have become, she would be deeply ashamed and wish she’d never met you. He’s her son, all that is left of her; think of that next time you take your shitty existence out on your child.’
Then she hung up, and I was both scared and in awe of her all at once.
Nana never stopped looking out for Conor from that day on. His father went to AA, was in rehab for a while, and although there were months, sometimes years, when things would be okay, she always kept a close eye on Conor back then, trying to protect him.
Back in the present, I get up and leave the lounge to find out where he has disappeared to. I immediately feel the slap of cold air, and the sound of the sea is louder than before. Almost as though it is inside the house. When I step out into the hallway, I can hear the back door banging in the wind. Conor must have left it open when he went in search of wood. The quickest way to get to the log store is via the kitchen, but I don’t really want to go in there. I don’t want to see Nana’s body on the floor again, or the unkind chalk poem on the wall, so I avert my eyes as I hurry to the back door.
Conor walks through it before I get there, carrying a basket full of logs. He looks completely drenched, and I don’t understand what took him so long. I’m about to ask when I notice him staring at something behind me. I think I know what it is – Nana – but when I turn to look for myself, I see that her body has gone. Conor puts the logs down and stares at the kitchen table. There is a VHS tape on it. One of the ones I’m sure I saw on the shelf in the lounge last night. Someone has stuck Scrabble letters to the front of its white cardboard case, spelling out the words: WATCH ME. Next to the tape, there is a torn piece of paper. When I read the words that have been written on it, in handwriting I do not recognize, my whole body turns icy cold.
TRICK-OR-TREAT THE CHILDREN HEAR,
BEFORE THEY SCREAM AND DISAPPEAR.
Thirteen
31 October 1 a.m.
five hours until low tide
The clocks in the hallway all start to chime. Thankfully just once as it’s one a.m., but they are a little out of sync as usual. Conor stares at the space on the floor where Nana used to be, but there’s no body, and no blood, as though what we saw before might just have been a bad dream. Then he looks at the VHS tape and note on the kitchen table. He turns to look in my direction, but doesn’t say anything, almost as if he suspects me of putting them there. I can still hear my dad’s piano in the music room, he hasn’t stopped playing since he locked himself away from the rest of us. The men in my life have never been good at using their words, so I find a few of my own.