I always remembered a good grandpa and a bad mum. But I always remembered, too, a mean, cantankerous bully and a mother that stroked our hair and told us that more than a hundred thousand other children had to be born before a mum got to have children as special as us. But this – only this – is why I never wanted to remember what truly happened in this house. Not because I couldn’t bear the truth about my bad grandpa and my good mum, but because I couldn’t bear the truth about my Prince Charming. Easier to cover dirt and dark and dread with gold and twinkling, glittering lights, the smell of burning wood and winter forest, the feel of his hands on me, all the same as it ever was. The same wonderful. The same rush. The same madness. El was right: if she’d told me the truth about Ross, I never would have believed her. Because I’ve been pretending – lying – to myself ever since I ran from this house.
El was already going limp before I remembered the shank in my pocket. I took it out – two razor blades parcel-taped to half a toothbrush – and it didn’t seem like it would be enough until I jammed it into Grandpa’s neck and he gave a high female scream. He reared back and pulled it out, and I gave precious seconds away to the horror of waiting for El to start breathing again. And then Grandpa was on me, teeth snapping open and shut like he wanted to bite, blood pulsing out of his neck, thick and dark. I pushed him, and he slipped an elbow in his own blood, giving me space enough to scramble down the last few steps. El was still clutching at her throat, and as we ran back into Mirrorland, I realised that it wasn’t her screams that were echoing around the narrow space, deafening and frightening. It was mine.
‘It was you, it was always you,’ Ross says. Pleads. ‘I always wanted you. And she ruined it. She did.’
‘She’s here,’ I say again. Because I know it’s true. The house has helped me, Mirrorland has helped me; it seems like the most natural thing in the world that El should help me too. Not the El that has festered and grown inside my heart and my dreams. But my sister. My friend. The smell of her, the smile of her, the thoughts of her, running parallel to mine. It’s as if my whole world has changed from mono to stereo, 2D to 3. And it’s the first time I’ve felt it in so long – that I’ve even realised it was as missing as she was – I want to sob, I want to say sorry, I want to plead for her forgiveness.
‘Stop saying that!’ In the dim light, Ross’s expression is furious, but his eyes flicker up and around as if trying to find her.
I step back down onto the stony slabs of Mirrorland, let go of the bannister. I’m already stronger, braver. ‘Just tell the fucking truth.’ Because the truth is the only way out of this place for either of us.
He stays silent for a very long time. Comes out from the shadow of the staircase. His jaw is no longer tight, and his eyes are warm, full of the love I always longed for. His hair is too long, his shaved skin looks pink and vulnerable; I want to rub the back of my fingers against it. This is Ross.
‘You were going to leave. You were going to leave and never come back.’ He moves towards me. Reaches out his hands in supplication. ‘I would never have seen you again. I would have lost you. Just like Dad lost me.’
My breath stops at the moment the rain does. The silence is suddenly absolute.
‘He killed himself. Five years after Mum took me away. Hung himself from the ceiling light in my old bedroom.’ Ross’s smile is terrible. His hands shake. There is less than three feet of space remaining between us. ‘And I loved you so much. What would have happened to you? No one would look after you like I could. No one.’
I swallow. I don’t know who the you is in his mind. Maybe there, El and I were always fused together like sand and limestone. When he comes one last step closer, El’s musky perfume waters my eyes, and her whisper is loud in my ear.
RUN.
I do.
We ran east into the washhouse, Grandpa thundering behind us. The stone gave way to wood as we ran across the deck of the Satisfaction, the shriek of its boards spiking my terror. He was too close, too close. Ye’re goin’ naewhere, ye wee bitches.
I run towards the stern and the barely faded spectre of Blackbeard’s ship. Towards the small red-framed window. I frantically search for something, anything, I can use to break it, until I realise that its glass panels are even smaller than those inside the house.
‘You can’t leave.’
‘Ross, please.’
‘I’ve never told anyone about my dad before, Cat. Not even El.’
‘Ross. You’re scaring me. I won’t leave. I promise. Just let’s—’ When he keeps on coming, stepping back is as automatic as breathing. ‘Please don’t—’
‘I won’t hurt you.’ He looks affronted, wounded, but still he keeps coming, still the passion in his eyes is wild and dark. But I don’t think it’s love any more. Here, after all, is where we first sailed away from him. Left him on his knees in the Caribbean Sea. Left him bloody and sobbing and calling out to us, while we pretended not to hear him.
Grandpa slammed El against the wall above the stern. I howled, launched
