vulnerable, especially at night, when the darkness pressed in on him like a physical weight.
Julian left his car and climbed a gentle ramp to the front door, which slid rather than swung open. As he entered the house, a black Labrador ran up to him, whining and wagging its tail. “Hello, boy. Hello, Henry,” said Julian, scratching the dog’s ears, ruffling the fur under its chin. Henry followed him through a minimally but expensively furnished, open-plan living space to a gleaming kitchen of stainless steel and granite. The kitchen had low work surfaces and no high cupboards. A brunette woman, about forty, with thick wrists and powerful sloping shoulders that looked like they were used to heavy work was in there chopping vegetables. She started and turned her head. “Bloody hell, Julian, you gave me a fright. What are you doing back from university?”
“Hi, Wanda. I decided to pay a surprise visit. Where is she?”
“Where do you think?” Wanda motioned with her chin towards the garden.
“How is she?” Julian asked hesitantly, as if afraid what the answer might be.
“She had a bad night. I told her to take it easy. Christine, I said, the garden will still be there tomorrow, but you might not be if you don’t rest up. But would she listen, would she hell as like. You know how she is about her precious roses. They won’t prune themselves, she says. Mind you, what do I know — or the doctors, for that matter. They all said she wouldn’t last more than six months, and that was over seven years ago.” Wanda paused to shake her head in awe. “She’s an amazing woman, your mother. A lesson to all of us.”
Julian nodded agreement. “I’d better go see her.” With Henry still at his heels, he made his way to the back garden. A series of flat, smooth paths wound their way amongst the lawns, flowerbeds, rockeries, ponds and trees. He followed one to a rose garden. Some of the roses were just coming into bloom, others were already turning brown, drying-up. They gave off a mingled, sickly-sweet scent of life and death in the afternoon sun. Christine was bent forward in her wheelchair, pinching the deadheads off with her right hand — her left rested in her lap, clenched into a fist like an unopened flower.
“It’s good to see you’re still not listening to Wanda,” said Julian, smiling.
“Julian!” Christine spoke with a slight slur. She slowly straightened to look at her son. The right side of her mouth lifted as she returned his smile, the left remained immobile, drooping like a sleeper’s, a thin line of drool sliding from it onto her chin. “What are you doing here?”
“I’ve got a fortnight of study leave,” said Julian, almost flinching from doing so, knowing how his mum hated even the smallest of lies. “There’s too much noise, too much going on to concentrate at my halls. So I decided to come home for a few days.” He stooped to kiss his mum on the right cheek — he could hardly bear to look at the left side of her face, never mind touch it. “You look well.”
“No I don’t, and neither do you.” Christine studied her son’s face as if examining it for symptoms of some disease. “You’ve lost weight and you look tired. How have you been eating? How have you been sleeping?”
“Fine and fine. Although I’ve been missing Wanda’s cooking.”
“And what about the dreams?”
“I told you, everything’s fine.”
Christine continued to look intently at Julian, eyes like fingers, probing. “I’m going in for something to eat,” he said, turning away.
“I’ll see you inside once I’m finished out here, and we can have a proper chat.”
Great, thought Julian, wondering suddenly whether he’d made a mistake in coming home. The last thing he wanted to do was dump his anxieties on his mum, but he wasn’t sure how long he’d be able to hold out under the steady probing of her eyes. Although he longed for someone to speak to, he couldn’t imagine telling anyone, not even his therapist, about the new twist in his dream. Just thinking about it made him want to lower his eyes in shame.
Wanda made Julian a sandwich, which he ate on the sofa in front of the TV. Henry lay curled at his feet, waiting for any titbits that might come his way. The local news was on. Police were searching the woods around Five Springs after reports that Joanne Butcher had been seen there the day she disappeared. They’d not found anything yet. A journalist interviewed her mother outside a block of flats that looked as grey and rundown as she did. She was clutching a small brown teddy bear with a heart on its stomach that read ‘This is all I have to give.’ “If there’s somebody who has taken Joanne please contact the police,” she pleaded, her voice weak and tearful, pitiful to hear. “The family don’t feel safe anymore, it’s broken us apart. It makes you think you can’t trust anyone, not even the people closest to you. If you have Joanne, please let her go.”
Julian took out his mobile-phone, scrolled down to ‘Kyle’ and pressed the green button. After a couple of rings, a hushed male voice answered, “Hey, dude, how’s it going?”
“It’s going good. I’m back in town for a few days. Fancy meeting up at The Cut for a beer?”
“Course I do, bro. What time?”
“About eight.”
“I’ll be there. Listen, bro, I can’t talk now, I’m in class. See you later, yeah.”
“Later.”
Julian could hear his mum and Wanda talking in the kitchen. He went to his bedroom. He didn’t want to risk lying down — his body felt heavy and ready for sleep — so he booted up his PC and Googled Joanne Butcher. She had a Facebook profile, which was set to private. He scrolled down her friends list. He didn’t recognise any of the names, but a picture caught his eye. It was of a teenage girl wearing thick black eye makeup. Her tongue was stuck out, revealing a silver stud embedded in its centre. There was also a stud in her nose and several earrings in either lobe. Dozens of tiny fresh cuts, like tribal markings, were visible on her inner left wrist. As the cuts ran down towards her hand they crisscrossed to form the words ‘HELP ME’. The girl was instantly familiar, but it took him a few seconds to realise where he recognised her from — she was the schoolgirl who’d handed him the flier. Her name was listed as ‘Morsus’. He clicked on her, but her profile was set to private too. He sat staring at her photo. There was something about it, something he couldn’t quite define, but which held him strangely fascinated. He sent her a friend request and, shaking himself free, navigated back to Google. He searched for the meaning of the word ‘Morsus’ and found that it was Latin for pain.
Julian frittered away a couple of hours browsing the internet, emailing university friends to let them know where he was. At one point, he heard the burr of his mum’s wheelchair motor in the hall. It paused outside the door. He held himself silent, hoping she’d think he was asleep. After a few seconds, she continued past the door. At six-thirty, Wanda knocked and said, “Food’s on the table, Julian.”
“I’ll be there in a minute,” he replied.
Christine and Wanda were already eating when Julian got to the table. Christine used a fork with a sharpened edge for cutting. “Where’s Dad?” he asked.
“He phoned to say he’s working late,” said Christine.
Julian’s eyebrows lowered in a frown of surprise. Ever since his mum’s illness, his dad had made a point of not working late so that he could be with her. “Is everything okay at the factory?”
“He says so, but then you know how he is.” A note of irritation came into Christine’s voice. “He thinks he’s got to wrap me up in cotton-wool. I keep telling him, I worry more not knowing what’s going on. I may be ill, but that doesn’t mean I have to be treated like a child.”
“Robert doesn’t treat you like a child,” said Wanda. Her expression suggested this was a familiar topic of conversation. “I’m sure he’d tell you if there was anything to really be worried about.”
Christine looked doubtful, but said nothing. The conversation turned to Julian. Christine wanted to know how his studies were going. And more importantly, had he managed to find himself a girlfriend yet. He answered that his studies were going fine. And no, he hadn’t got a steady girlfriend. He’d had a few flings, but nothing serious. He felt relaxed talking to his mum, knowing she wouldn’t ask him about the dreams, not with Wanda there. After the meal, Julian helped Wanda clear the table and wash-up. Then Wanda gave Christine her daily massage. Julian watched as she massaged his mum’s spinal column and paralysed limbs with scented oil. The limbs looked withered and dead, like wilted vines. But it was clear there was still some life in them from the way Christine grimaced as Wanda pushed her hands over their slack, veiny flesh.
At half-past seven, Julian said he was going out to meet Kyle. “Don’t stay out too late,” Christine called after him as he left the house.
Chapter 2
