Stormclouds scudding in fast, low over the Tempest Bay horizon. Turning a small cottage at the edge of the woods nearly black.
Jessica’s house. You could feel somehow that a long time ago, perhaps before the street grid even, this had been the centre of town. Yet now, between the housing development and the crossroads and the ebb and flow of commuter traffic through the tunnel to the outside world, it was off to one side. A memory or an afterthought. Or a warning.
The garden reminded him of the mess up on the clifftop. But an ordered, controlled, intentional mess. Flowers planted in subtle curving patterns. Whisper fingers, of course but also chrysanthemums, begonias, many others. A life’s tending.
On the way from Tomorrow Shines the man and the girl had argued perhaps worse than they ever had. One of those hot, frustrating fights. The pissy shoes dangling round her shoulders with their laces tied together.
I can do things myself, Lucia said. You’re so suffocating.
You don’t know what’s out there, he said. What’s coming. What we’re dealing with.
You always talk about the world as though it’s full of monsters. Only monsters I ever see are people.
That’s the whole point, you fucking brat. The whole bloody point of it all.
• • •
Angela was at the cottage door when they arrived. The bookstore owner fussed over the pissy shoes and insisted on helping Lucia find a towel and get cleaned up and shot a scared look at the man over her shoulder as she pointed him to the old drawing room.
But it was Jessica he’d come to see, and Jessica who was waiting for him. Sitting in a faded armchair with chintz patterns and a mobile tea tray by the armrest. She gestured to the sofa opposite and he took it.
Angela seems to constantly need your approval, he said by way of opening.
Angela knows what’s good for her, Jessica said.
Silence.
Up closer Jessica was astonishingly old. Perhaps a hundred or even more. But her eyes were sharp and hard amid her ancient body.
She gestured towards the drawing room sideboard. Slices of pink biscuit cake neatly arranged.
Baked fresh this morning, she said. It’s always good when the whisper fingers are up.
But he had a strong feeling that he shouldn’t eat it.
I’m here to fix all this and then be on our way, he said. There’s a one o’clock bus I intend to be on.
And where’s young Hedy, now?
I’ll speak for her, he said. I’ll speak for everyone.
How noble of you.
Not a word people often use about me.
• • •
Lucia returned with a cleaner face and no shoes, Angela just behind her. Lucia reached into her pocket and placed the ring on the coffee table in front of the armchair. Jessica surveyed it.
You’ve been nicking things all over town, Jessica said to Lucia. Marking trails, getting in people’s business. Stirring up the ants.
I was trying to understand things, Lucia said softly. They don’t always line up for me. Besides, ants like being stirred up. Stops them getting eaten by wasps.
So what do you understand, now? Jessica asked with genuine inquiry in her voice. About these insects.
That there’s something they can’t see, Lucia said. And something watching. Waiting.
Jessica grinned. Rictus.
I like you, young Miss Lucia. You’ve the feel of someone who’ll make their own path in the world. But one doesn’t steal secrets, dear. One buries them. Just like corpses.
• • •
A buzzing somewhere in the cottage. The man thought at first it sounded like a phone ring, but it was a different tone. One that bored into your ears.
Jessica ignored it. Angela got up and left the room. A few moments later the buzzing stopped. Angela didn’t return.
Jessica looked straight at him.
Can I make a suggestion? Jessica said. You should all stop hiding away up on the clifftop. That place has never done anybody any good. You’re outsiders looking in, looking down. But the whole point of being here is that you can’t just observe. Tempest Bay is a participatory experience.
I like my privacy, he said. And as I said, we’re only passing through, that bus comes soon—
On your way to the bunkers down south, she said. I know who you are, of course.
She giggled as she said it. A strange sound coming out of her. It felt as though you could see the young girl she’d once been inside. A girl who had perhaps been very, very cruel.
You have me at an advantage, then, he said, just wanting to finish and get out now.
She smiled. Reached forward, took the emerald ring back. Clutched it hard.
I have everyone at an advantage in certain ways, Jessica said. I remember this place before it all changed. We used to go on such lovely picnics. Picnics and the movies at the Starlight cinema.
Gesturing out the window. Through the forest trees on that exact angle you could see the old cinema building perhaps two hundred yards away. Long abandoned, its signage in disrepair and the roof starting to sport holes.
There are places, you see, Jessica said. Even within our tight little geography. Locations that respond particularly strongly to the weather. The cinema. The frisky trails. The wreck out in the bay.
And the clifftop? he said.
All sorts of history and dreaming up there, Jessica said. I’m sure you’ve felt it. But that tower’s been ruined since before I was a girl, and everyone who’s plonked themselves down there has ended up regretting it. That clifftop’s a canker on the arse end of Tempest Bay. No good for sex. Or art. Or even growing things, not really. A place for broken souls to throw themselves off. And your young woman Hedy, who keeps trying to hide from herself what happened to her mammy, well, she’s not going to be the one who grows a garden up there. That silly device of hers is broken and scattered. I gave the last piece to the ocean yesterday morning. Believe you saw me do it.
Jessica leaned forward.
I’ve seen five of the big Tempest Bay storms, she said. This next one that’s upon us will be the sixth. I believe I’m the only person who has ever lived can say that. You may think our little weather here is an echo of something larger in the world. You may have grand imaginings about all sorts of things, being who you are. Running away with all those rich folk. And maybe the rest of the world will find some things out soon. But let me tell you, Tempest Bay is Tempest Bay. Either lash yourself to the mast or abandon ship.
• • •
Her words hung in the air. Even Lucia was silent, absorbing. The man felt exposed, as though once again the guilty knowledge of the plan to go south was playing against him, hurting his sense of what he kept telling himself he was doing for the good of Lucia.
Jessica clapped her hands suddenly, and the mood changed with her smile.
But enough of all that, she said. You’ve returned my sister’s ring and I’m right grateful. Though, of course—
(And here her whole face changed)
I’ll also need some kind of punishment, she said.
Lucia shrank back into the sofa. The man on instinct put a protective arm in front of her.
Not going to happen, the man said. Ever.
Oh you misunderstand me, Jessica said. Angela!
Angela returned. Looking pensive. But just as she entered the room, the buzzing sounded again.
Let it ring, Jessica said. Come here, Angela.
Angela sat down at Jessica’s feet like a child.
BZZZZZZZZ.
I heard that sound in one of the houses on the hill, Lucia said. When I was out stealing.
That’s the sound of a 1912 local loop telephone exchange, Jessica said. One with a very limited number of connections.
Who’s calling? The man said.
Oh, everybody, Jessica said. They want me to make sure you never leave this house. But I disagree, and I’m still calling the shots. Lucia, dear, I need you to eat this cake. Don’t worry, it’s nummy.
Sitting right there on the sideboard, that innocent little plate with its cargo.
Don’t eat the cake, the man said.
I do what he says, Lucia said for the first time ever.
Well, Jessica said. Well. There’s only punishment, then, isn’t there. Angela.
Angela shuffled forward on the floor, an unexpected carving knife in her hands—
The man tensed himself and made ready for war—
Angela plunged the knife into her own forearm. Deep. Blood spurted dark black and red. Angela screamed. Dragged the blade slowly along to a spot just below the wrist, just below the suicide point. Wriggled the handle. Screamed and screamed and writhed.
His mind reeling. Lucia watching in horror.
Jessica grinned.
It’s not about bargains and fairness, dear, Jessica said. Not Tempest Bay, not the world. Take it from someone who’s seen a lot of both. You need a better map.
Angela in agony. Staring at him, eyes like a wild horse tangled in barbed wire. But staying there, needing it, something she couldn’t escape or bargain.
• • •
Outside the cottage in clouded sunlight, sucking in air. Looking across the bridge he saw the bus trundling along, leaving Tempest Bay after its one o’clock turnabout. He started to run after it, his feet heavy, his ankles numb. Yelling. But the driver wouldn’t look at him, and the bus accelerated away into the tunnel and the moment was lost.