They were back. I could hear voices once more, drifting up the stairs from the hall far below. My head swayed, the ground heaving beneath my feet. I clutched at the door, trying to hear, struggling to stay calm.
I looked across to the attic window. There must be some way out. The first burst of a crimson sunset bloomed like some exotic cocktail, orange and red quivering over an aquablue horizon. I pushed myself onto my feet, moving towards it. My fingers clawed at the window catch but it was no good. I contemplated breaking the glass, but the frame was too small for me to climb through, and to what purpose? To leap from the roof and make their plans for suicide real?
I spun around, my eyes darting from wall to beam to ceiling. There must be another way out. This room didn’t cover the whole roof, only the highest section. Most attics were interconnected. If there was a hatch to the rest of it, if I could escape through some other opening, then maybe I could find a way into the main house. My old bedroom on the floor below had an attic trapdoor.
I’d wasted too much time, brooding on my sister and Craig’s betrayal.
I began to feel the walls, groping the rafters with shaking fingers, beneath the tiles, in the corners and behind the beams where the light didn’t quite reach. Yes, there was a hatch, screwed into place above the floor. I flicked my eyes toward the steps, listening. It was quiet.
I looked at my thumb. It was my longest nail and I slotted it into the first screw. It was a really crap way to undo a screw – even though it wasn’t tight, I had to press down hard to get it to move. It was so painful and kept slipping, my thumb bleeding. But eventually it shifted and the screw dropped to the ground. Using the head of the first screw, I freed the next one and a third. They were tighter, the skin on my knuckles shredding, but I carried on. The fourth screw fell into my hand. I licked my lips as the hatch door lifted smoothly away. Propping it up against the wall, I peered into the hole.
Carefully I climbed into the void. I’d thought it would be pitch black but the roof wasn’t felted and through the gaps in the tiles came tiny chinks of dying sunlight, like scarlet pinpricks over my head. I inched across the joists, razor-sharp beams of fiery red moving across my body, my arms and legs. I heard something scuttling in the distance and swallowed. The wood was rough, splinters caught in my hands and knees, I was terrified of my weight crashing through the ceiling. Slowly I progressed, exploring with painful fingers for another hatch. At least on the second floor, the rooms below were empty. I couldn’t be heard.
Dusk began to fall. My pinprick lights were fading. I hadn’t found a thing except an old plastic bottle, a crisp packet and some loose wiring, left behind by a previous builder no doubt. Then I felt a cold draught, a change in depth, a square shape emerging beneath my touch. Excitement bubbled. I traced the edges: no screws this time, thank God, but loose planks of wood resting on a frame. I peeled them off, one by one. Relief flooded my body. I felt the rush of fresh air. One of the planks slipped, I caught it just in time and held my breath, my heart thudding as I waited for a reaction. But there was none. My head hung over the hole, my eyes blinking from the dust as I tried to figure out where I was. Yes! It was my old room!
I pulled myself back into the roof. What was I going to do? I had some half-baked idea that I could sneak across the landing and down the stairs, all without either Craig or Steph noticing. Really? I held a hand against my chest, willing my heart to slow its beat, so loud I was sure it could be heard two floors below. The house had a front door and a back door but that was it. Either I got across the main hall and out the front or ducked into the kitchen and round the back. I felt my coat pocket, I still had my car keys. But it seemed so completely impossible either way.
Then I heard something – a car outside revving up the drive, skidding on the gravel. A visitor?
I hesitated – did I drop down now? Into my old room where the window faced the garden? Whoever it was could be in as much danger as me. How did I warn them? Or did I go back to the attic where the window overlooked the drive, where I could see who it was, get their attention, call for help? I wavered in an agony of indecision. Who was it?
I clambered back across the joists as far as I could, through the hatch into the attic. I scrambled to my feet and ran to the window. In the far west, the sky was blazing red, the horizon alive with colour. I gasped. The figure climbing out of the car was Mary Beth.
My hands splayed against the window. She was tugging a woollen hat further over her ears, fishing out her bag, locking the car door. She couldn’t see me. Was she a part of this? No, I didn’t believe it. That time on the bench outside the church after the funeral, she’d spoken like a true friend, for all that we hadn’t known each other long.
I swore as the fear gripped me. She was in danger, interrupting Steph and Craig’s plans. Another witness was the last thing they wanted. I hammered on the window, shouting and screaming. But outside she couldn’t hear me. Downstairs, Steph and Craig were still ignoring me. Did they know yet about our visitor? Mary Beth moved out of sight and then the doorbell rang.
I flew down the steps to the door to the attic and hammered again.
‘Mary Beth! Mary BETH!’
‘Caro? Are you there? Are you alright?’
She’d heard me! Her voice sounded distant and confused.
‘Get out of there!’ I screamed through the door, hammering still. ‘Go!’
‘Caro?’
Mary Beth’s husky voice was followed by a yelp and the crashing of some kind of a struggle.
‘NO!’ I cried.
I rattled and hammered at the door with all my strength, determined to break through but it held fast. I heard the sound of furniture smashing, the splinter of breaking glass. Mary Beth screeched in alarm. My heart thudded in my chest, what were they doing to her? What could I do? Anything to distract them, to get one of them to come up here.
My eyes flew to the crate with the pear drum and then to the hatch into the roof void. Maybe?
I ran to the crate and lifted up the lid. I grabbed the pear drum. I dropped to my knees, grasping the handle on the pear drum. It was stiff at first, but then it began to move, sliding round as the fingers of my other hand fumbled with the keys.
I pressed on the first note and a melodic drone began to thrum.