Page 59 of We Live Here Now

He starts to cry when he reaches the top landing and wobbles slightly, his legs shaking and tired, and momentarily thinks he may fall backward himself. But he grips the banister hard and yanks himself forward. He won’t be found at the bottom of the stairs suffocating and broken under the rotting body of his girlfriend. The door creaks open, and as he drags her in, the heel of her shoe, poking out from the sheet, scrapes on the wood like fingernails before the door creaks and clicks shut again.

He drops the body in the center of the room and staggers out, closing the door behind him. He opens the windows on the landing again. He changes the bedsheets so they’re fresh. He unpacks Sally’s case of things she kept in his house, putting them all back where they were, sobbing some more, remembering how lovely she could be when she wasn’t so jealous. How perfect they were in those heady first days.

He scrubs the landing floor and burns his bloody clothes in the fire. Finally, he has a long bath, and eventually, after three long days and nights, he crawls between the clean sheets and falls asleep.

He has somehow, just by moving her, resigned himself to his fate. He can’t cut her up. He’s not that person. One last sleep in his bed, and then tomorrow he’ll face the music. There’s nothing left to do.

He is fast asleep when the upstairs door opens. He doesn’t hear Sally come down the stairs and then go down to the kitchen and boil the kettle.

He only wakes up when she’s beside him on the bed, a cup of tea on the table for him, sitting cross-legged in her leggings, hair Bardot-sexy around her perfect face.

“I had the strangest dream,” she says. “But I can’t remember it. Everything is a blur.” The confused look lasts only a moment before she shakes her head and smiles at him. “Anyway, I’m cooking eggs. You coming down?” She gets up, then looks back from the doorway, frowning. “By the way, did I have a fight with Georgina about something?” She’s puzzled, a memory not fitting quite right. “I should call and apologize. So silly. Maybe we should have her over for a drink. Maybe you should paint her.”

He stares after her as she goes.

The sheet is gone from the upstairs room, back in the laundry cupboard. It smells fresh and clean. It’s as if it never happened. Maybe it didn’t. Maybe it was all a crazy, long acid trip. That has to be it. There’s no other explanation. Only weed from now on. No more nightmares like that. Still, he locks the upstairs bedroom door and decides he won’t use it anymore. Maybe it’s time to move out of this house—

73

Emily

And then I’m back in the room, gasping for breath. There’s no black smoke, just the pale light of the bulb and the remnants of ash cooling in the baking tray. I look around me. Ifeelfor something in the house. Nothing. Just me and the bricks and mortar. No bad smell or oppressive atmosphere. It’s a lovely spacious primary suite ready to be moved in to.

I sit back on my heels, and while the world has righted itself, my head still spins with what I’ve seen of the past, what I’ve justlived, and it takes a few moments before I feel like me again. Now that I’ve lived it, I understand everything that’s been going on.

The nail in the hallway that kept appearing and disappearing. That was where Sally died. The window opening and slamming. The sound of the bedroom door opening and creaking shut. Bits of the past being visited on me. Clues as to what Joe did to Sally.

Thinking of her body lying rotting for days on the landing outside our current bedroom makes me shiver. It’s so horrifying, and it’s left me shaken, but I know it’s all true. As my breath slows down, I know with absolute certainty that Sally Freemantle was murdered and her soul torn in two. One part free and one part trapped in this room until I freed her.

I stay there in a daze until pins and needles force me to my feet. I pick up the pan and hobble out into the hallway. Still nothing. No smell. No awful sensation. Just a house with only me in it. Will Larkin Lodge get hungry again? Want a new occupant in the room? Does it attract couples with secrets? Couples like Freddie and me?

You will die here.

No, I won’t. I know the secret of the house now. I’m prepared. And despite his debts, I’m not killing Freddie. We are not like those other couples. Hannah and Christopher Hopper. Fortuna and Gerald. Joe and Sally.

Sally. Has shejoinedback up already? Would that be instant? What was she doing when it happened? Would Joe know? Has he noticed a change in her yet? Is she angry with him? Will she even know what happened? More than that, will Joe? My head is a whirl of questions and I’m afraid of most of the answers. But I did what Sally wanted. She can’t come after me for it, and their marriage isn’t my business.

We need to sell this house and get out. Start again somewhere else.

It’s a relief when Freddie comes home. We order Chinese, curl up together on the sofa, and watch a movie. Despite my sore breasts my period still hasn’t come, and as I lie there in his arms, I realize that I really am hoping I’m pregnant. Freddie wants to put his mistakes right. I need to do the same. A baby that is truly ours. No guilt attached. A fresh life for a fresh start. We’re not like the rest of them. We’re really not.

74

Bright Wing is gone.

She’s flown back to the roosts where the others gather, nevermore to return. He barely remembers that she was here, as if she too was part of the strange dream of his life these past few seasons.

Broken Wing is back!

Her chest is plump, feathers glossy, and her black eyes shine with the fierce bravery and intelligence and humor that made him want to nest with her so long ago. Before the white came into her feathers and brought with it the mean streak that had hidden inside her.

The white patches are still there amid the damage, but the mean streak has gone, and she flies as well as she ever did. They soar together above the frozen moors, cawing to each other, dancing together. And while he knows that this isnot right, this is not the way of beasts and birds and man, and dead is dead, whichever you are, he finds he does not care. His mate is not dead. That is all he knows.

His mate is not dead and she no longer pecks at him.

They turn their backs on the strange house on the moor and fly away toward the warm roofs and nests of the villages and towns. They fly away from farmers’ guns and strange houses that sit and wait to lure them in. They fly away from other birds. They don’t need them. His head bends in toward hers, warm and inviting.

They have each other again.

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