‘Kitty.’
I woke at once, gasping as I sat up. It was Dad. He was on the end of my bed, looking at me. He looked sad and tired, even more than usual, and his eyes were red, like he’d been rubbing them.
‘We’re going home.’
I had given up hope I would hear those words. I didn’t know how long we had been there by this point, but it felt like for ever. ‘Home? Like, as in …?’
‘Proper home,’ he said. He gave me a little smile, but his eyes had more sadness in them than happiness. ‘Amanda and Father Tobias have been helping me pack up the house downstairs. Nearly everything is cleared away now. It will be like we were never here.’
It was a strange thing to say, that last bit. I almost asked him to explain it, but there was another question I wanted answered first.
‘And Mum? What about Mum?’
He took a slow, deep breath.
‘She’s better now. She’s very tired and has been through a lot. But we’re hoping she’ll be back to normal within a week or so.’
‘Back to normal?’
He wasn’t properly looking at me. His eyes were on my shoulders. ‘Yes. Or thereabouts.’
‘But …’ I was struggling to get my thoughts in order. Things weren’t fitting, like puzzle pieces being forced into the wrong slots. ‘Mum got better before, and then she wasn’t better … she started getting bad again … She went back to being …’ I found I couldn’t finish the sentence.
Dad brought his hands to his face and slid them down his eyes to his nose. He didn’t say anything at first, then he said, ‘Well that’s just a risk we’ll—’ He stopped himself and sighed. ‘It will all be OK, Kitty. Can you get your stuff together? All your books and clothes and duvet and things? We’ll be leaving very soon.’
He got up and walked slowly out of the room.
I wanted to ask him what had happened during the night. What happened after I left the door to the lounge and ran back to my room, trying my best to pretend what I thought was happening wasn’t really. And as I got up and started taking my books off the top of the chest of drawers, I only had one sound in my ears. The sound of Adah’s screams. Confused, frightened, and surrounded by strange things she didn’t understand. And nor did I.
Downstairs, the lounge was back to its usual arrangement, but a lot of our things had gone. The rug and blankets, cushions, Amanda’s video machine – all had been taken away. The kitchen was looking bare too, although there was a plate remaining in the centre of the table. On it were two little bakewell tarts. I half expected to see Mum standing in front of them, telling me she’d baked them for me, with an instruction to get my apron on and make a new batch with her – this time with even more cherries. But she wasn’t there. And neither was Adah.
I craned my neck out towards the hallway, and then turned to glance into the living room. Still no Adah.
I was about to leave the kitchen when I noticed something on the floor. A little pile of something. Clothes. I nudged them with my foot and saw that they were jeans, a t-shirt, some socks and a dark green jumper. I recognised them immediately as Dad’s. And they were covered in dirt. There were patches of soil and mud all over them, especially on the knees of the jeans, as if someone had been sitting or kneeling on the ground outside. As if he had been doing something outside, in the forest, in the mud.
Then Dad came into the kitchen and made me jump.
‘Have you packed up your things?’ he asked. He saw what I’d been looking at on the floor. ‘I thought I’d packed these,’ he said, gathering them up quickly, pulling a folded plastic bag from his pocket and stuffing them in. ‘Let’s get going, Kitty. Time to say goodbye.’
I looked up at him, confused. ‘Goodbye?’
‘Yes, goodbye.’ He seemed impatient. ‘To Amanda and Father Tobias.’
My stomach churned and twisted. I didn’t know my place in all of this; I didn’t know what I had done and what I had helped to happen. But I did know one thing. I said it to Dad, in no uncertain terms, with my head raised a little. ‘I don’t want to say goodbye to them.’
I heard Dad let out a short breath. ‘Come on, Kitty, we’re leaving. Please, just do as you’re told.’
I shook my head. ‘I don’t like them and I’m not talking to them. Ever again.’
He had his angry face on now. ‘Kitty, of all the days to test my patience, you’re picking the wrong one.’
My arms remained folded. He lunged forward towards me and grabbed my shoulder. ‘Come on! Get in the car.’
‘Get off me!’ I shrieked.
I heard footsteps and Amanda walked through from the lounge. ‘Kitty, dearest, what’s all this racket?’ She had her leather jacket on again, although didn’t seem to have found the time to do her lipstick and nail varnish this morning. The sight of her made me want to scream. And so I did. But not just one, loud sound. I screamed words.
‘Where is Adah?’
Something collapsed in her face, taking with it any colour or appearance of control. Her eyes widened, her lip trembled, and then, after giving me one horrified glance, she left without saying another word.
‘Come on, Kitty,’ Dad said, pushing me, almost carrying me, forcing me to walk out of the kitchen, through the lounge, the hallway and out the front door.
Father Tobias was standing outside, although he no longer had his normal black-and-white church clothes on. He was wearing an old-person’s jumper, dark brown and patterned, and a thick, dark red coat. Dad handed something to him, and from the little jingle, it sounded like keys. Father Tobias nodded, and then looked over at me. He didn’t say anything, but I did. I screamed it again. The same words, leaving my body with a rush and exploding into the air around us. ‘Where’s Adah?’
‘In the car, now!’ Dad bellowed. I saw him throw a glance at Father Tobias, before pushing me into the back seat, amidst all the stuff. It took me a second or two to realise Mum was there already. She was asleep, her head pressed against the car window, her breath misting up a little patch.
I realised I had started to cry, and Dad told me to be quiet, please, for the sake of everyone, would I just be quiet, and although I tried, I couldn’t properly say words any more. I couldn’t shout like I wanted to shout; I couldn’t ask again where Adah was; what they had done to her. I could only cry, and writhe about in my seat, looking around at the trees through the windows as the car started to move.
My last memory of the cottage – that terrible, terrible place – was of Amanda, picking up something long and thin that had been leaning up against the wall. It was a shovel. She put it in a large bin bag that Father Tobias was holding open. Then he dropped it into the boot of his car.
My view was hidden as we turned round a corner. And I found that I was all cried out, so I let the hum of the engine and the pale light through the trees fill my head. And before long, I was asleep too.