Page 33 of The Memory Wood

Elissa

Day 3

I

After putting Andrea from Wide Boys into the drawer at Y8, Elissa is about to interrogate her memories of the Marshall Court Hotel when she stops and backs up. Although the waitress – with her green eyes, big boobs and attitude – made everyone else fade to grey, she wasn’t the only person in the restaurant that day. On the next table sat the couple who engaged her in conversation before she took refuge in her book.

Closing her eyes despite the darkness, Elissa transports herself back to Wide Boys. As she settles in her seat, her mum and Andrea begin to materialize, but she purposely keeps their details vague. The restaurant, too, is sketched in the faintest of charcoal shades. She reserves all the colour for the table on her left and the couple sitting around it.

It’s hard, this. Andrea stole so much of the light. The pair are likebodachs– shadow creatures from a ghost story Elissa once read. Their faces are foggy blurs. One of thebodachslifts a hand to its throat, stroking and fondling. Abruptly, Elissa remembers the spot of shaving cream and the man’s dirty fingernails.

Colour rushes into the scene. She sees slick-combed hair, mud-stained shoes. The woman has a jade necklace and violet lipstick.Stop that, she hisses.Always touching yourself.

When Elissa’s mum went to the loo, the couple spoke a few words, but the details have slipped away. She does remember the woman’s apologetic smile. Did they talk about the chess tournament? Possibly.

To her right, Elissa spots anotherbodach. This one sits alone. Its clothes are clear enough – turquoise jumper, mustard corduroys, toffee-apple-red shoes – but its face is a child’s black scribble, entirely absent of features. It swivels towards her and she knows, despite the lack of eyes, that it’s evaluating her. Minutely, it shakes its head. With a start, she recalls the older man thisbodachrepresents. He’d been reading – a history of some ancient Greek war. At the time, she’d wondered if his head-shake indicated disapproval or solidarity. Now, as she tries to tease more detail from that sooty smudge of a face, it splits open to reveal a set of pointed yellow teeth.

Disturbed by the image, Elissa blinks it away. Wide Boys folds into darkness.

The drawer at Y8 glows with Andrea’s vibe. Anything else Elissa puts in there will likely be outshone. Instead she opens Z8 and deposits the threebodachs. Even as she’s loading them, she recalls the man with dirty fingernails gesturing at her book:

‘What’s it about?’

‘It’s about chess.’

‘Huh. Ain’t ever been my thing. Used to like a bit of poker, before.’

‘Before what?’

His knife angles towards the woman. ‘Before … you know.’

Elissa shudders. Slams the drawer shut. She might have to revisit the contents at some point, but right now they feel toxic, dangerous.

Her memories of Wide Boys exhausted, she’s about to move on to the Marshall Court Hotel when she hears the muted but now-familiar rattle of deadbolts.

II

Her first visitor inside this cell was a ghoul, her second a creature even more complicated. She fears both, but of the two, the one whose name she doesn’t know scares her most, and when the door opens and she sees a torch far more powerful than Elijah’s, she knows it’s the ghoul who’s returned.

That smell accompanies him, of something rotten and sweet. It gets in her nose and won’t let go. His light picks out her manacle, her chain. Then it darts around the floor, pausing at each item of note.

Again, the aroma of food slowly permeates. She hears the shuffle-scuff of approaching feet and cringes, holding herself still. Something is placed on the floor near by.

Silence ensues. Elissa counts to thirty before the ghoul breaks it.

‘When one has a visitor,’ he whispers, ‘it’s polite to ack—’

‘How long have I been here?’

Her voice is firmer than she’d expected. She’s terrified that this attempt at bravery, however pathetic, will backfire; even more terrified that meek acquiescence will ensure a slow walk towards destruction. A cat, she knows, plays longer with a mouse that fights back.

The ghoul draws a breath, slowly lets it out. In that moment she recalls his words from their first meeting:There’ll never be anything, ever in this life, that you can conceal from me. Take as long as you need to learn that lesson, but for your own comfort I’d advise haste.

The smell of cooked food intensifies. Her stomach growls, her body admitting to weaknesses that her mouth will not.

‘Well, I suppose that’s an acknowledgement,’ the ghoul hisses, ‘even if it’s little else. I see your manners haven’t improved. Perhaps your mother never taught—’

‘Howlonghave Ibeenhere?’

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