‘I did!’ I say, even though I know my defensiveness is ridiculous.
‘A family friend, then?’ Ross shrugs. ‘They were at the house often enough. We always had to be quieter when she was around; you were terrified of her.’
All that venom and hate. Bared teeth and blood-filled gums. That oval locket glittering in her fist.
How could I remember every corner and code of Mirrorland, and yet twist my memories of two people enough that I thought them as imaginary as a monstrous Tooth Fairy or a sly, grinning Clown? And why? Because if I’m not crazy, then I’ve deliberately chosen to remember them that way. To misremember. Not even now that I know they existed is anything any clearer – they remain vague and indistinct, like smoke blown on an angry wind.
I KNOW THINGS. THINGS YOU’VE MADE YOURSELF FORGET.
I close the album, turn back to Ross.
‘You said she’d – Mouse – that she’d come back?’
‘Round about mid-October last year.’ Ross folds his arms. ‘Ding-dong, the Witch was dead. Apparently.’ He stops, and I can see that he’s trying to hide his anger, stamp it out. ‘I don’t know how she knew we were here. I don’t know why she waited until the Witch had died to come. She looked a complete mess. Worse than when we were kids. Said she wanted to get to know El again. And El was so happy about it at first, you know?’ He looks at me. ‘Maybe she saw Mouse as a substitute for you, I dunno. Nothing El did in the last six months made much sense.’
‘What happened?’
He shrugs. ‘Like I said, Mouse was delusional. She needed help. She’d turn up at all hours of the day and night. Crying, inconsolable, and then the next minute lit up like a kid at Christmas. She hated me. Wanted El all to herself. One day – get this …’ His anger wins, and he stands up, hands clenched as he paces. ‘She waited until I’d gone to work, and then turned up at the house with two one-way plane tickets to bloody Ibiza, of all places.’
‘Ross—’
He makes a visible effort to calm himself down. Sits, and takes two long, slow breaths.
‘When El tried to get her to back off, she started following her, spying on her.’ He shrugs. ‘Us.’
‘You thought she was sending the cards.’
‘She was the first person we thought of when they started arriving. The police followed it up, found no evidence to prove it either way. But it did the trick because she left us alone, didn’t come back. And we figured she’d turned all that crazy on someone else.’ His eyes go cold and hard; he looks suddenly like a stranger. ‘When we were kids, all she ever wanted to do was keep the three of us apart, turn us against one another. That’s what she has to be doing now. It makes sense she’d have El’s diaries, she probably stole them when she was here.’ He pauses. ‘You really don’t remember her?’
What I remember is that the Mouse I knew wouldn’t have said boo to a goose. She was timid and kind, most often submissive. A sponge for all our fears and weaknesses and secrets. A cabin girl, a powder monkey, a skivvy. Our favourite piñata. The Mouse I knew refused to fight pirates, refused to take sides, refused to choose punishment.
Ross is still shaking his head, still sporting that cold, hard expression that I’ve never seen before, when suddenly his shoulders slump. I see the pity in his eyes before the kindness or the love, and he reaches for my hands, grips them tightly enough to hurt. ‘El didn’t send those emails. I’m sorry, Cat. Christ, I’m so sorry. But she’s gone. She’s just gone.’
*
There’s a squall coming in from Cuba. I can see the smoky grey clouds on the horizon: a tropical thunderstorm near the Bight of Bayamo.
The day grows darker as I scramble down from the crow’s nest and run across the main deck. The Satisfaction is already listing hard to port, and the wind is picking up. I can feel hot splashes of rain against my face. When I look over at El, she’s already fighting to hold the wheel steady.
‘There’s no time to get to Port Royal,’ I shout. ‘We won’t make it!’
A scream, then a splash, and I’ve time to see a pirate slip over the port side and into the swirling, climbing sea as a wave washes high over the stern.
‘Heave to?’ El shouts. Her grin is big enough that I can see all her teeth.
And I’m grinning, too, as the bayamo rolls towards us. The wind gets higher, it slaps the rain against my face and into my eyes as I reef in the mainsail with Annie and Belle, my muscles shrieking, my heart thundering.
A sudden roar, and the Satisfaction begins to list.
‘We can’t turn downwind!’ El yells, and I see her and Mouse clinging to the wheel, faces straining with effort.
And then Ross is sprinting along the half-deck towards the stern. Putting an arm around El and reaching for the wheel with the other. Shoving Mouse out of the way, hard enough that she lets go with a scream and is washed down towards the bow.
By the time the Satisfaction steadies and starts drifting downwind, the squall has blustered itself mostly out, and I stagger down towards the bow amid pirate cheers and backslaps. Mouse is curled up into a ball behind a lashed-down barrel, her short hair plastered to her skull, ugly sack dress sodden.
She looks up at me, her white face streaked with rain or tears. ‘I hate him.’
And I don’t turn around to look at Ross and El, but reach down to help Mouse back onto her feet instead, because part of me hates him too. Part of me hates them both.
Mouse doesn’t let go of my hand. She looks at me, wipes her nose against her sleeve. ‘I wish I was like you.’
And I believe
