As a teenager, all I wanted was to be the same as everyone else. It’s only now that I realize how dull my life might have turned out if I was.
I reached the top of the hill, soaked to the skin and out of breath, and had to put everything down and rest for a moment. I looked at the pattern of ugly red grooves on my cold fingers—temporary scars from all the bags—and rubbed the palms of my hands together, trying to make the lines disappear and warm myself up at the same time. Then I turned onto our lane, the highest in Blackdown. You could see for miles from up there in those days, before they started building the big fancy houses on the hill. There were uninterrupted views of the village below, the woods surrounding it, and the patchwork quilt of countryside in the distance, unfolding all the way to the blue haze of the sea on a clear day. It was the perfect spot to look down at all the people who normally looked down on us.
Our house might have been the smallest, but it was also the prettiest, tucked away all by itself at the dead end of the lane. In summer there were coachloads of tourists that came to visit what is still often described as England’s most quintessential village. They walked to the top of the hill for the views, but sometimes they took pictures of our cottage too while they were there. Not that my mother minded. She would spend hours in the front yard, planting and pruning, as well as painting our front door every spring. She made the place look shiny and new, despite it being over one hundred years old.
I didn’t bother to look for my key; there was always one hidden under the pretty flowerpot on the porch. Even before I slotted it into the lock that day, I could hear the television, and suspected my mother had fallen asleep in front of it. I stepped inside before deliberately slamming the door behind me.
“Mum!”
I shouted her name like an accusation, before dropping my wet coat and bags on the floor, literally dripping onto the carpet. I thought about not removing my school shoes—that would have really upset her—but instead I dutifully untied my laces and left them by the door. My socks were wet, so I took them off too.
“Mum!”
I called her again, irritated that she hadn’t already answered and acknowledged my existence. I stomped through to the living room and saw that she’d put up the Christmas tree. The fairy lights were twinkling like stars, but they didn’t hold my attention for long. There were no presents underneath, just my mother, lying facedown on the floor and covered in blood.
There was a trail of muddy footprints on the carpet behind her, as though she had crawled in from the garden. I tried to whisper her name again, but the word got stuck in my throat. When my brain caught up with what my eyes were seeing, I fell down onto the floor beside my mother’s broken body, and tried to turn her over. Her hair had been stained red with blood, and was stuck to the side of her battered and bruised face. Her eyes were closed, her clothes were torn, and her arms and legs were covered in cuts and scratches.
“Mum?” I whispered, afraid to touch her again.
“Anna?”
Her head turned and her right eye opened a little; the left one was swollen shut. I didn’t know what to do. The twisted sound of her rasping voice seemed to hurt my ears, and I had a terrible urge to run away. She looked over my shoulder then, at the old cream rotary phone on the coffee table. I leapt up, hurrying toward it.
“I’ll call the police—”
“No,” she said.
It was clear from the look on her face that speaking—even a single word—was causing enormous pain.
“Why not?”
“No police.”
“I’ll call an ambulance then,” I said, dialing the first nine.
“No.”
She started to crawl toward me, and it was like something from a horror film.
“Mum, please. I have to call someone. You need help. I’ll call Dad. He’ll know what to do and he’ll come home and—”
She reached toward me with a trembling, bloody hand. Then took hold of the phone, and ripped it right out of the wall before collapsing back onto the floor.
I started to cry, and thought of maybe going to find a neighbor who could help.
“No neighbors,” she croaked, as though reading my mind the way she often did. “No police, no anybody. Promise me.”
She stared at me with her good eye until I nodded that I understood, then rested her head back down on the floor.
“I’ll be okay. I just need to rest,” she said, her voice so faint I could barely hear it.
She seemed determined to make the decision for me, but I still wasn’t convinced it was the right one.