If this was a message from Aleisha, his heart ached at the thought of what she was trying to tell him. Was she, like Sethe and Denver, trapped in the house, unable to leave? What was keeping her there? Did she have a ghost of her own?
‘Hello?’ Mukesh picked up the phone, half asleep, groggy. His alarm clock bleated 11:00 a.m. at him – later than he usually got up, but he’d been awake until the early hours, reading, searching for clues.
‘Can you meet me?’ the voice said, down the phone.
‘Sorry, who is this?’
‘It’s Aleisha.’
Mukesh breathed in, he hadn’t recognized her voice, she didn’t sound okay. Number 124 floated to the forefront of his mind again.
‘Aleisha, what can I do?’
‘Can you meet me?’ she repeated.
Mukesh nodded, though Aleisha couldn’t see his assent. ‘I will come. Where?’
‘I’m at the park, the one near the library.’ Her voice was hollow.
Mukesh shuffled to the telephone stand, where Rohini’s Post-it notes sat waiting. ‘Yes, hold on, I am just writing it down.’ He didn’t want to forget. He couldn’t forget. His hand was shaking.
‘Are you okay? Do you want me to call someone?’ Mukesh asked.
‘I have. I’ve called you.’
Mukesh was silent. He hung up the phone and trundled as fast as he could to the bathroom. He got himself ready quicker than he ever had before.
At the park, Aleisha was sitting on a bench, The Time Traveler’s Wife clasped tightly in her hands. Mukesh had taken forty-five minutes to get there, and he blamed the bus – stopping at every stop, letting on too many people so the bodies were squished together. He was ready to give his excuses and his apologies as soon as he saw her, but the look on her face told him she was somewhere else entirely.
He knew this must be about her mother. He saw Aleisha’s face on the day she’d opened up to him, how sad, how young she looked. A 17-year-old girl shouldn’t need to be strong all the time.
‘Aleisha?’ Mukesh sat down next to her tentatively. ‘How are you?’
She looked to her knees and shook her head. He could see her body doing all it could not to curl up into a ball and disappear.
‘Miss Aleisha, what can I do? You can talk to me.’
‘No,’ she whispered, her voice breaking. She clutched her hand to her heart and Mukesh cautiously placed his palm on her shoulder.
‘There, there,’ he said, hating the words as soon as they’d left his mouth. They sat side by side, Aleisha staring at the ground, Mukesh staring at his knees.
The silence stretched out for what felt like hours.
‘My brother,’ she whispered. ‘He’s dead. They said he jumped in front of a train.’ Each word exhausted her.
Mukesh took a moment to understand. ‘Your brother?’ He said the words so softly, hoping she’d never have to hear them. Hoping he’d be able to change everything. But there was nothing he could do. He couldn’t make it better.
Aleisha nodded. ‘I had to get out, of the house. I can’t breathe in there. I can’t—’ She was struggling to catch her breath; until her breathing turned sharp, but shallow. ‘It doesn’t make sense. He was fine. He was so strong. He looked after us all.’
Mukesh squeezed her shoulder just slightly. He took a deep breath; he could feel his heart torn in two. He imagined Denver, fighting for her family, fighting to do her best to save her mother, to save her sister Beloved – but he didn’t have Denver’s power, her intelligence – right now, there was nothing he could do. He couldn’t hide behind someone else’s words now, searching for an answer, he had to say something himself, say something real.
‘I don’t know what to do,’ Aleisha looked at him, pleading. Aleisha, who always told him what to do, what to read – she was asking him for help.
‘Maybe, maybe you should go home. You should be with your mother, family.’
Aleisha’s shoulders drew into her body.
‘I missed so much,’ she said. Her voice concealed a current of rage. ‘Mum missed so much. What were we doing? How could we have done this? I just had my head stuck in those books.’ Her voice turned into a shout – Mukesh skimmed the park to see if anyone was looking, but no one was paying them any attention at all. To everyone else, their lives were continuing – while Aleisha’s life had come to a complete stop. She slammed her fist on the book, roughly pulling it open, scraping her nails down the pages. Mukesh strangled a gasp. ‘I was crying over people who didn’t even exist, and all the time, my brother needed me, and needed my help, and I was blind. Completely blind!’ She threw the book to the floor. Mukesh watched it land, face down. He instinctually wanted to pick it up, to wipe it clean, to return it to safety. Instead, he turned to Aleisha – her face was screwed up, her eyes were shut.