Dear Jupe,

I don’t know why I’m sitting up in the middle of the night writing this letter in bed. Maybe it’s because I so want to talk to you and this feels like the next best thing. It feels weird staying in Crickle Cottage without you. But I realize we had to come. You made us when you wrote your will. You wanted us to clear out your house (did we ever realize what a mammoth task that was going to be?). We’re sorting and taking box after box to the charity shop in Polcreek. Ed keeps saying it’s mad, and that your stuff’d be worth a fortune – even your ordinary things like an old ciggie lighter or a pair of wellies with a hole in. He says we should eBay it. Mum won’t listen. She says she wants things sorted as quickly as possible, which means dumping it all at the charity shop. What they don’t want, the house clearance men will take away.

So we’re dead busy and that’s OK. Having loads of spare time means you start thinking too much and I’ve done more than my share of that lately. Sometimes, being here, I’ve even forgotten about Riley and Skelling in France, at least for a few minutes. (Riley is a boy at school. We were friends. Well, more than friends, I thought for a while, but it’s all gone wrong somehow. We used to play guitar together. To be honest, Jupe, Riley’s not that good really, but I was trying to help him, passing on all the tips you gave me. And Skelling? Well, she’s this girl with highlights who totally hates me. So it’s been good for me to get away from all of that.) Anyway, sorting your stuff has been almost fun. But I can’t shake off the feeling that there’s something else – some reason why you asked us to come to Crickle Cottage.

Am I going crazy? Maybe it’s all those creaks in the night. I thought the countryside was supposed to be quiet!

 

Love,

Clover xxx

 

Mum and Ed are on something like their ninety-fifth charity shop dash when I spot it, lurking outside in front of the kitchen window. Its fur is straggly and matted and, I have to admit, not unlike mine, pre-Bernice cut.

“Lily!” I yell, pelting outside. “Look who’s turned up! It’s Jupe’s cat. I’m sure it’s Fuzz.”

She thunders towards us. “Oh, isn’t he gorgeous?” She reaches out to stroke him, which Fuzz seems perfectly fine with – but when I venture closer he hisses and spits. Yep, that’s Fuzz all right.

“Bet no one’s feeding him,” I say. “Look how skinny he is.”

“Let’s bring him in,” Lily says. We coax him into the kitchen, leaving the front door wide open so he doesn’t spark Mum’s allergies. Lily rummages through our paltry provisions in Jupe’s rust-speckled fridge. We’ve been here for five days now, existing on basic stuff from the village shop. Ed still hasn’t caught a fish.

“D’you think he likes ham?” Lily asks.

“Don’t know. Let’s try him with a little bit.” I take out a packet and peel a corner off a slice, placing it on the floor in front of him. Fuzz scoffs it down.

“Wish we could take him home,” Lily grumbles, feeding him more ham while stroking his bedraggled fur.

“Mum wouldn’t let us,” I remind her. “Anyway, he’d probably have Cedric for breakfast.”

She sighs and gazes adoringly at him. Fuzz hoovers up the rest of the ham, then pads around the kitchen, sniffing expectantly.

He wanders into the hall, moseying in corners, as if he suspects that Jupe’s somewhere in the house, but isn’t quite sure where. “Let’s see where he goes,” I say, quickly shutting Mum and Ed’s bedroom door so he doesn’t sneak in and strew hairs all over their bed.

He trots upstairs and sniffs in Lily’s room, then mine. He prowls up to the top landing, where he looks up and mews. “What does he want?” Lily asks.

I shrug. “No idea.”

“Think he’s still hungry?”

“He can’t be. He’s had all our ham. We’ll have to tell Mum we ate it in sandwiches, OK?”

Lily nods gravely. Fuzz is really yowling now, all the time straining upwards, stretching his neck, as if he’s being pulled up by an invisible thread. I stare up, frowning. There’s a hatch up there on the ceiling. The entrance to the attic, probably. “Looks like he wants to go up,” I say.

“Maybe that’s where he used to sleep,” Lily suggests.

“I doubt it. Why would he sleep in the attic? I mean, how would he have got up? Anyway, I’m sure he used to sleep on Jupe’s bed.”

“Maybe there’s something horrible up there,” Lily suggests, shuddering, “and only cats can smell it.”

“Like what?”

“Like…” Her eyes expand so they’re almost circular. “Like … something dead.”

“Don’t be stupid,” I retort. “Look, if you’re that worried, let’s find a ladder and go up.” I shoot her a challenging stare. That’ll stop her morbid ideas.

“Yeah,” she says brightly. “OK.”

“I, um…” My heart flips anxiously. “You really want to?”

“Well, he does,” she says, indicating Fuzz, who’s mewing crazily and straining upwards towards the hatch. Like he really is trying to show us something.

“OK,” I say firmly. “I’ll see if I can find a ladder or something.” I check Lily’s bedroom, even though I’m pretty sure there’s no ladder up here, then hurry down to Mum and Ed’s room. It still feels weird. Not Mum and Dad’s room, but Mum and Ed’s room. As if he’s become part of our family without us noticing. An old, faded book called Sea Fishing for Idiots is plonked on their bed.

There’s no ladder there either, or anywhere else in the house. “C’mon,” I tell Lily, back on the landing. “If you get on my shoulders, maybe you’ll be able to push up the hatch.”

“OK,” she says eagerly, clambering on to my back as Fuzz yowls and twitches around my ankles.

“It’s OK, puss,” I say, straightening up so Lily can push the hatch open. Fuzz hisses and turns away in disgust.

It’s hard for Lily to lift the hatch at first. She pushes and pushes, jiggling on my shoulders until I’m not sure how much longer I can take the weight of her. “Hurry up,” I plead.

“I can’t do it, Clover…”

“Give it one more try,” I tell her. “Quick, they could come back any minute.” This time, with an almighty groan, she manages to push the hatch over to one side. Now we can see there’s a ladder attached to the opening, which pulls down easily to the floor. I clamber up, with Lily close behind me, relieved that she’s the one carrying Fuzz.

The attic smells warm and woody like the inside of a drawer. There’s no window, no skylight or anything, so I grope about in the pitch black for a light switch. When I find it, the room fills with dim orangey light. We both peer around as Fuzz springs from Lily’s grasp, zooming straight for a scruffy leather armchair. He leaps up and stretches out on it.

I’m staring – not at Fuzz, who I can sense is giving me the evil eye – but at what’s laid out before us.

A complete drum kit. A row of guitars lined up on their stands. Amps and mics and chairs all around, crammed into the tiny space. We gawp in silence. It looks as if Jupe and his band could climb the ladder and start playing at any moment. It’s his secret room. He never showed us, not even me.

“Wow,” Lily breathes. “Why’s all this stuff up here?”

“I don’t know,” I murmur. “Maybe Jupe put it here when the band broke up.”

“Why?”

“Lily, I’ve no idea!” I do, though. Jupe never admitted he was upset when the band finished. But he was, I could tell. He seemed to miss playing with other people. I sometimes wondered if that’s why he enjoyed teaching me so much. “Maybe he just didn’t want his bandmates’ stuff lying around the house,” I add, “because it reminded him of the old days. So I guess he just stuffed it all up here.”

“Well,” she says, grinning, “aren’t you going to play?”

“I … I can’t, Lily.”

“Why not?” she demands.

I pause. It would feel wrong, sort of like trespassing, but how can I tell her that? It would sound crazy.

“Jupe’s dead,” she reasons. “He wouldn’t mind.”

I exhale as something catches my eye in the corner. A guitar. Burnt orange, fading to gold in the middle like a sunset. The one I smashed all those years ago.

It’s polished and gleaming, as good as new.

 

I step towards it, wondering now if it really is the same one. But when I’m right up close, I know it is, because it’s not quite perfect. There’s a thin wiggly line where the neck was broken and has been expertly mended. “Go on, play it!” Lily insists, picking up a drumstick and giving the snare drum a gentle tap.

“Shhh!”

“Why? There’s no one here. Mum and Ed’ll be ages.”

“They’ve only gone to the charity shop,” I remind her.

“No,” she insists, “they’re going fishing as well. They took Jupe’s rods.”

“Are you sure?”

“Yeah.”

Grinning, I eye the guitar on its stand. My hand twitches. I so desperately want to touch it. Just a little go – surely that wouldn’t do any harm?

I pick it up and lift the strap over my head. Fuzz glares from his armchair, sending a chill right through me. Slowly, my thumb skims the strings. “Too quiet,” Lily announces.

“It’s not plugged in, OK? It’s supposed to go through an amp.”

“Plug it in then.” She juts her hands on her hips.

Like it’s that simple! I don’t know how, because I’ve never played an electric guitar apart from with Jupe. How long has this stuff been set up for anyway? It could be years since he came up and played. It might be dangerous. What if a billion volts surged through me? I’d be fried to a crisp, and Lily would have to drag me down the ladder and Mum’d go mad.

With an exasperated sigh, Lily plonks herself on the stool behind the drum kit. She picks up a pair of sticks and starts to play. A proper rhythm, I mean, just like that – dead simple. A steady four-four beat. It’s not often you’re awestruck by your little sister.

“What?” she laughs, stopping.

“That’s good!” I say. “How d’you know how to do that?”

She shrugs. “I just do.”

“C’mon, someone must have a drum kit and let you have a go…”

She’s stopped listening because she’s playing again, more confidently now, bashing the hell out of the kit. Well, if she’s playing, I am too. I find the wall socket, click on the switch and prime myself to be electrocuted – and nothing happens. I’m still alive, at least. I find a lead and, after stabbing it into random sockets, finally strike gold. There’s a scream of feedback. Fuzz scoots off his chair, streaks across the floor and cowers behind a speaker in the corner.

I strum quietly, not sure what to play. Then I bang out a chord much louder than I meant to. “That’s better!” Lily yelps. I start playing properly, and the first song that pops into my head is “Clover’s Song”, the one Jupe wrote for me. I haven’t figured out how Ed knows it, but playing it now, in Jupe’s secret room, it starts to feel like mine again. And it seems right, the two of us playing away. Lily’s transfixed by the drums and if Riley was here, it’d almost feel as if we were a band, the three of us. He could sing, I know he could. He’s just too shy to give it a try. Lily and I play on, and we’re totally lost in the song until there’s a bang downstairs and we stop suddenly.

“We’re back!” Mum shouts.

I stand dead still. Lily freezes, drumsticks in mid-air.

“Clover? Lily?” Mum yells up. “What’s going on up there? Is that you?”