Rose goes to the supermarket on the way home. It’s about time she has a proper meal. She is going to make some roast chicken for herself with all the trimmings, even if she has no real idea about how she is going to go about any of it. Still, she has her phone. She’ll work it out.
Before she goes inside, she sends Ewan a message saying, It really wasn’t you, but me. I’m sorry. But let’s leave it there.
Dots appear, signifying an incoming reply but Rose swiftly blocks the number before she can see it. No point opening a dialogue. Not with her life the way it is. And certainly not with a man who checks his cheekbones are on point, over her shoulder.
Still, as she picks out the ingredients for her meal, she can’t help imagining herself having a different sort of evening. One where she and her imaginary boyfriend eat their dinner at the table and discuss their days with easy familiarity. One where she sleeps in a bed, curled up next to him, rather than huddled on the sofa, flinching awake at every sound.
As she comes through the front door with her bulging carrier bags, the letter on the inner mat catches her eye straight away. It is a formal-looking white envelope but handwritten. After carrying it through to the kitchen, she puts it on the table, while she stows the shopping away, then makes a cup of tea. She’ll sit down for a little while and then get cracking on her gastronomic adventure.
When she opens the envelope and stares at the letter inside, it takes a few moments for the words to reach her brain. And then she says, ‘Oh shit.’
It’s from a solicitor’s firm called Allen and Isherwood. It says that the man who was her mother’s landlord – and then hers – for all these years has died. His son is selling the house. Rose has one month to move out.
Her heart begins to race. She knew this day was going to come at some point but was able to push it to the back of her mind most of the time. It’s not that she likes living in this dark little semi-detached house in East Barnet. If anything, it’s the albatross around her neck and reminds her every single day of her miserable childhood. And that’s not to mention the fact that it is haunted by her mother.
But there are several reasons to stay.
For a start, Rose’s salary isn’t going to go far for a property of her own in London. She could move up to near where UCIT is, but the thought fills her stomach with a cold stone of disappointment. It’s a bit grim around there. If anything she would like to live more centrally, somewhere with a bit of life. Ironic to say that though when it’s death that is also keeping her here.
Her internal logic goes like this: Adele’s ghost is tied to the house. If Rose stays here, she can be in control of when she sees it. If she moves away and Adele comes with her, Rose is never going to be able to have a normal life.
She’s aware the logic is somewhat shaky. Rose goes to the fridge and pours a large glass of orange juice, still thinking.
The slight disturbance of air in the room is like someone has slammed a door somewhere in the house, even though she hears nothing. It’s more like a change in pressure and as she turns her body she lets out a shriek and almost drops the glass.
Adele Gifford is standing right behind her, as substantial as a real woman but Rose knows that an outstretched hand will only meet cool air. Adele is wearing a strapless dress that’s far too young for her wrinkled décolletage and has her hair done differently. It’s in a twisted sort of bun Rose remembers from when she used to get a hairdresser friend to come round and give her a ‘do’ as she put it. Her eyes are closed and her mouth works as if she is speaking, her face a picture of distress. Rose notices the sparkly dangly earrings that she used to sometimes try on secretly are somehow reflecting the light, just like real earrings would.
‘Get lost,’ she says. ‘Just leave me alone.’ She makes a noise of disgust and backs away from the figure, which reaches out its fingers towards her. The characteristic talons with their shell-pink polish look filthy, and there is thick dirt under the nails. That’s new, and horrible. This in itself somehow fills Rose with a terrified sort of rage.
‘Get out!’ she bellows, with every breath in her body. ‘I won’t have you here! Get out, get out!’ Even though every fibre of her being resists the horror of getting nearer to this thing in front of her, she throws herself forward, hands outstretched as if she could push the spectre out of her kitchen.
Of course, there’s nothing there. She falls forward and almost hits the kitchen table.
Adele has gone.
Too upset to cook now, Rose sinks into a chair at the kitchen table. There was a time, not long ago, when she became inured to these visits. She was disturbed by them, of course, but they were so frequent they almost passed for normal after a while. It’s somehow much worse having had such a long break. So cruel to make her think that it was over.
But why is she back now?
Rose’s eyes skate to the letter on the table. It has to be because of that! She experiences a flash of something like hope in her chest. Perhaps Adele really will be gone forever once she moves out? Maybe that’s why she’s back? It looked as though she were beseeching Rose in some way … trying to tell her something. Maybe Adele knows that whatever is causing this horrendous unwanted reality needs all three sides of the triangle to exist: Rose, Adele and the house itself.
‘I’m getting away,’ says Rose to the empty kitchen, raising her glass of orange juice to the air. ‘Here’s to me being shot of you once and for all. You can creep around in here forever for all I care.’
Rose forces herself to cook the meal, which she eats mechanically, barely tasting it. Carrying a mug of tea into the living room, she looks around cautiously, in case the spectre is standing anywhere nearby, but she feels alone, in a good way.
Switching on the television, she finds a Netflix comedy that she can numb out to and contemplates her new situation.
The insistent way Adele had behaved was disturbing. She had never reared up behind Rose like that before. That had been horrible and alarming. But maybe it really was due to desperation that her days were numbered?
Rose reaches for her iPad and starts looking at rental properties in her area. She has been paying a peppercorn rent for a long time, she quickly discovers. Suddenly overcome with a vast weariness about the whole business of having to sort out this house and find somewhere else to live, she puts the iPad down again and mindlessly watches the television under her duvet.
The harsh ringtone of her phone sometime later is an aural assault. She hadn’t even realized she’d fallen asleep. For a moment she can’t find the phone, then feels the vibration against her back and retrieves it from where it slipped behind her body on the sofa.
The caller ID says, Gwen Fuller.
Rose heaves a sigh and contemplates not answering. There’s nothing she can do about whatever is going on in that house. As Moony said to her when she first started working at UCIT, they’re in the business of solving crimes, not carrying out exorcisms. She’s not sure what else she can do.
But what if it’s Gregory, and he’s in some sort of trouble?
She’s going to have to answer.
‘Hello?’
There’s such a loud crackle on the other end, it makes her hold the phone away from her ear in shock. It’s followed by a whirr-click, whirr-click. Like something being turned. A picture comes into her mind of an old-fashioned telephone, where people had to dial the number with a finger. Adele had a broken one that Rose sometimes used to play with as a little girl and she could remember the effort of turning the stiff rotary dial with her small digits.
‘Is someone there?’ she says again.
Whirr-click, whirr-click.
There’s the sound of breathing now, very faintly. Someone’s on the other end.
‘Gregory?’ she says. ‘Is that you? Are you all right?’
A manic giggle makes Rose’s stomach free fall. It sounds male, but somehow not a child. It’s not Gregory, then. But who? She hears the word ‘Rose’ as if like a sigh and more breathing, which starts to speed up into a shockingly recognizable rhythm.
Uh-uh-uh.
‘Oh God!’ she says. ‘Are you serious? Are you wanking, whoever you are?’
The breathing stops and another low giggle fills her ear. It is the single most malevolent sound Rose has ever heard. Every hair on her body seems to stand to attention. She wants to throw the phone down in disgust but makes herself keep hold of it, her palm beginning to sweat.
‘Who is this?’ she says in a bold, strong voice she really isn’t feeling. ‘Because it’s not very funny.’
There’s a silence, then another painfully loud burst of static that almost makes her drop the phone.
The line goes dead.
Her heart seems to be bouncing around inside her ribcage as she hastily dials the number.
It rings a couple of times, then: ‘Hello, this is Gwen Fuller speaking?’
‘Gwen,’ says Rose, conscious that she is heavily breathing herself now with the shock, ‘it’s DC Rose Gifford here. Has Gregory tried to call me on this phone again?’
‘DC Gifford,’ says Gwen, ‘no, he definitely hasn’t. He’s in bed. My phone has been with me the whole time. Hang on …’
She’s quiet for a moment and then comes back on the line.
‘The last number dialled from this phone was this morning so I think you must be mistaken.’
‘Right,’ says Rose, a little numbly. ‘Maybe I was. Sorry to bother you.’
‘Well if that’s all, I’ll—’
‘Wait!’ says Rose. ‘Is everything okay there? How is Anton?’
‘They have let him come home,’ says Gwen tightly. ‘Thank God. He’s very weak and his tummy is still quite poorly. But there is no long-lasting damage and we’re going to try and put everything behind us now and move on.’
‘And Gregory?’ says Rose. ‘How is he doing?’
Gwen sighs before answering. ‘Thinking on,’ she says, then, formally: ‘Thank you for your concern.’
When Rose comes off the phone, she’s shivering, and she chafes her arms. First, she has the weirdness with Adele appearing again after such a long absence. Then this vile and creepy phone call.
It definitely wasn’t Gregory on the other end. It had sounded like a young male – maybe someone in their teens, judging by the voice, and well, the behaviour. Was it a crossed line? Was that even a thing that could happen anymore? It probably could. But the person, whoever it was, on the other end of the phone, had whispered her name at one point.
Rose turns up the volume on the television with the remote control, simply to surround herself with something real and normal and pulls the blanket around her once again.
It must have been some sort of technological glitch.
But Rose’s skin won’t stop crawling.
Because there was something about that voice that wasn’t entirely human.