Ashley was leaning against the kitchen counter, staring at her bare feet and twinkling her toes. “I’ve told you,” she muttered. “It’s the truth. There was a woman in the woods.”
Ashley’s mum put a hand over her face and groaned. “Ash, you need to stop this. You’re going to end up in so much trouble. I know the summer’s been boring, but this isn’t right. You can’t tell lies like this.”
Her dad put the ladle down and finally looked at Ashley. “I’m so disappointed in you, Ashley. I didn’t raise a liar. This isn’t why I work so hard.”
Ashley’s hands clenched into fists. She kept focusing on her toes, trying to stay calm. It was difficult. “Why don’t you believe me?”
Her mum spluttered. “The police said there was nothing out there. How can we believe you?”
“How about because I’m your fucking daughter.”
Her dad pointed right in her face, his heavy gold bracelet catching the kitchen’s spotlights. “Don’t you dare use that kind of language under my roof. In fact, get to your room. I can’t even deal with you right now.”
Ashley sneered. “Fine!” She stomped towards the kitchen door. “Thanks for nothing.”
“I’ll bring you something to eat,” her mum called after her.
Ashley stomped into the hallway and started upstairs, making sure her feet pounded every step. Her heart was thudding against her chest again, and as much as she wanted to punch the walls, she also felt a flood of tears coming. She didn’t understand what the hell was going on. How could such a mundane, boring day end up this way?
She went into her bedroom and pulled out her phone. The screen was cracked, but she could still see most of the display. She pulled up her short list of contacts and called Jude. He answered after only two rings.
“Ash?”
“Yeah. You okay, Jude?”
“Not really. This doesn’t make any sense.”
Ashley chuckled without humour. “Tell me about it. That woman was there, wasn’t she? She was real.”
There was a slight pause before Jude answered. “There’s not a doubt in my mind, Ash. That woman was chained up.”
“So where the hell did she go?”
“She must have… that… somewhere.”
Ashley pressed the phone against her ear. “What did you say? I didn’t catch that.”
“I said… that… must have… where.”
“Dammit. The signal is bad. Can you hear me? Jude, are you still there?”
There was a beeping sound, and when Ashley looked at her phone, the call had ended. She thought about calling him back but decided against it. She just wanted to lie back on her bed and stare at the ceiling. Her mind had been running a thousand miles a minute for the last few hours and she was exhausted. No more thinking or talking or moving.
She threw her phone on the bed and perched on the end. Her sheets had been changed, and she could smell the scented dryer sheets her mum used. The duvet cover was pink with little rainbows on it, one she’d had for years. It suddenly seemed childish. Likewise, her purple-painted walls annoyed her, and she wished they were just plain white. The things in her room that had once given her comfort now only made her sad. The stuffed unicorn on her windowsill that her dad had won from a grabber machine on a day trip to the seaside now only reminded her of how old she had got, and how she could never go back to those carefree times of being a child.
My dad doesn’t look at me the way he used to. I’m not his little girl anymore.
She listened to her parents arguing downstairs and tried to make out the words. As usual, it was her dad’s voice which was loudest. He was ranting and raving about everything and nothing.
What else is new?
She didn’t know if he had always been this angry, or if it was just lately, but she hated being around him. He was constantly grumpy. Perhaps it was his job – he never stopped going on about how much he hated it – but she wasn’t even sure what he did, other than it was at a factory. He often came home covered in oil and would spend a full hour in the bath with a glass of wine. Often, he would say that it wasn’t who he was supposed to be, like he was being forced to work against his will. If he hated his job so much, he should just quit. Maybe then he would cheer up and be her old dad again.
I miss him.
When Ashley had been a little girl, her dad had always told her he would one day open an Italian restaurant and let her work in it with him. Her grandfather had owned a restaurant in Italy before she’d been born, and it was her dad’s dream to do the same in the UK. The older she had got, however, the less her dad talked about the restaurant and the more she realised dreams didn’t come true. Now, even if he did open a restaurant, the last thing she would do was work there.
For a while, she sat on the end of the bed in total silence, staring at herself in the mirror attached to her rickety old wardrobe. The scratch on her face had scabbed over, and her hair still had bits of twigs and leaves in it. She looked like a lunatic.
Maybe I’m crazy.
Maybe I imagined the whole thing about the woman in the farmhouse.
But Jude saw it too.
Lost in thought, she flinched when her bedroom door opened. It was her mum, holding a tray with a plate of sandwiches and a packet of crisps. “Your dad was going to make spaghetti,” she said, “but he’s too stressed now. If you get hungry later
