Josie was looking out to sea, with Meg leaning on her, half asleep, when Clem grabbed her by the wrist and tried to pull her up. She resisted, and fought Clem off, but everything felt so confusing without sleep that she wasn’t sure what was happening.
Clem’s face was strange. She was blocking out the sun, filling Josie’s field of vision. She didn’t look like normal Clem. She wasn’t happy Clem, don’t-care Clem, hedonistic, sunny Clem. Her face was twisted so she was almost snarling.
Josie wrenched her arm away and fell back down. She saw Meg waking up.
‘What?’
‘What’s going on?’ said Meg.
‘You have to come with me. I need to show you something. You too, Meg.’
They looked at each other, but Clem was on a mission. Martha had drowned; the police were digging up bones – no wonder Clem’s façade had shattered. No wonder she needed them.
‘You OK, Clemmie?’ said Meg as the two of them stood up and followed.
The end corner of the garden where they’d found everything was shut off with tape, and the birds were singing. It was weird and other-worldly, like the Garden of Eden just after the apple or something. They walked over the wet grass towards the house, and Josie had the strangest feeling that she was out of all time and space, the way she’d felt when she’d snuck in on her own, except that now she had Meg. She reached for Meg’s hand. She loved the way it was smaller than hers; she held it tightly to warm Meg up. Meg squeezed back.
Clem led them into a room Josie hadn’t seen before. A sitting room, big and comfortable, with rugs on a wooden floor, three sofas and a huge television. There were people here: Gareth (looking as confused as they were), Treve and Dan, the policewoman, a couple of parents. No Rik and no Senara.
‘I didn’t know this room was here,’ said Meg.
‘We didn’t need it,’ said Clem. ‘Now we do. Sit down. Right, everyone! Thanks for coming. I just wanted to show you all something. We can talk about it afterwards, but it speaks for itself.’
Josie and Meg squeezed on to a sofa next to Gareth.
Josie saw the look Clem flashed to the two of them and realized what she was doing just before it started playing.
Her stomach flipped over, and she felt as if someone had dropped a sheet of bubble wrap over her. She could see the world through it, but distorted, insulated. She couldn’t breathe. No no no no no.
They all looked at the huge TV. Josie saw herself on the screen, with her long hair. Meg, who had no idea what this was, put her hand on Josie’s head.
‘Cute,’ she said.
‘This is awful,’ Josie whispered. She half stood up.
‘Turn it off!’ shouted Gareth. He was on his feet now. ‘Clem, you stole this from my house! I can’t believe you did that! Give it back. This is private.’
Clem had clicked pause.
‘Let everyone see it, and then I’ll give it back.’ She waited a few seconds. ‘I’ve made copies, so sure – you can have it back.’ She pressed play again.
Josie wanted to go and grab whatever it was that was playing it. Clem was probably screen mirroring from her phone, though, and her phone was in her hand, so Josie would have to tackle her and wrestle it away. She knew she couldn’t do it, and anyway everyone was going to end up seeing it. Clem had probably emailed it out by now.
She stared at herself on the screen.
‘Above us stands Cornwall’s most haunted house.’ Her voice sounded stupid. ‘It is poised, empty and cursed, on the cliff … Should I say on the edge of the cliff? It is poised, empty and cursed, on the cliff edge. No – the first one.’
She watched herself tying back hair that she no longer had and found that she didn’t miss it. Life was much easier like this, and she liked the attitude that it gave her. She liked not looking feminine. Not conforming.
‘No one knows what lurks in its grounds … No one living, that is.’
There was a flash of January beach, and Gareth started speaking. ‘Even the people who own it – and remember these are people who –’
Real Gareth jumped up again. Clem paused her video. He stood in front of the screen. ‘We were messing around! It wasn’t –’
‘Sit down, Gaz,’ ordered Clem. ‘I just want everyone to see how you three repay the enormous amounts of hospitality you’ve accepted from me over the past week. That’s all.’
‘It’s not repaying,’ said Meg, ‘if it happens first.’
‘Shut up, Meg.’
‘Clementine,’ said the policewoman, ‘I didn’t realize we were here for some kind of personal vendetta. Stop this. It isn’t necessary. Sort it out between yourselves. Believe me, we’ve got enough to be dealing with here without this kind of nonsense.’
‘It’s only another minute.’
The policewoman stood up to leave the room, but actually waited in the doorway. Clem pressed play and turned the volume right up.
‘… literally call locals “peasanty scum” – stay away. Such is their fear of the evil that lurks within …’ said past-Gareth.
This was terrible.
‘Peasanty scum’ and ‘evil’ in the same sentence. Clem was right: their acceptance of her enormous hospitality, their consumption of her food and drink, their swimming in the pool – it was terrible in the light of this.
They had been so easily bought.
‘… no one has set foot in the grounds of this house for over three hundred years. And today, my friends, we are going to find out why.’
‘Gareth! Why did you say three hundred? It’s three years. And that’s only a guess. It’s probably less. Plus, you can’t include any of this.’
Josie watched old-Gareth kissing her past self. She cringed and looked away, making sure to keep her eyes away from now-Gareth. Meg gave her a little smile and squeezed her hand.
‘Sorry, babe. I got carried away,’ said then-Gareth. ‘Three hundred sounds better.’
It played on. The damage was done. Now everyone knew they had flown a drone to look into the Cliff House gardens, and no one cared about the cover story, that it was for Gareth’s coursework. The only thing left was the bit where they made their predictions, and that was, Josie knew, the worst bit of all.
Senara came into shot, because Gareth had taken the camera. She shouted: ‘Zombies!’
In a way, she hadn’t been wrong.
‘I think it’s ghosts,’ called past-Josie. ‘But hopefully ghosts that are visible to the camera.’
If only she’d stopped there, with something stupid and meaningless.
Gareth turned the camera on himself and said, ‘Senara says zombies. Josie says ghosts. I say bodies. The family who live there murdered each other, and that lawn will be strewn with old corpses. The old lady did it. Last one standing.’
There was a gasp in the room, a sharp intake of breath, but no one spoke.
‘The girl who hates us was the first to die,’ said then-Josie.
Now-Josie felt Clem doing something in her peripheral vision. She was probably pointing to herself.
‘The vultures have taken all the flesh,’ said Senara’s voice, ‘and all that remains is bones. The lawn is littered with the bones of the Roberts family. And that girl who went missing. Lucy’s sister. You’re not putting this bit in, are you?’
Gareth had his head in his hands. Josie wanted to go home, to take Meg with her, never to come anywhere near Cliff House ever again. Why had Senara mentioned Rachel? When they were pulling bones right out of the ground, right now?
‘Course not.’ The footage was playing on. The drone rose up to the top of the cliffs and set off across the garden, while no one watched.
Clem was grimly triumphant. ‘So this is what I’ve got to say to the three of you. First, I never called anyone “peasanty scum”, and neither did anyone in my family. That’s a fact.’
‘You called us “peasants” actually,’ said Gareth. ‘A few years ago.’ She ignored him.
‘Josie – Senara’s shut herself away somewhere, so you’ll have to pass on a message from me. Please leave my house. Get out and never speak to me again. That’s why I didn’t go and find her for this: because I can’t bear to look at her weaselly face. I can’t believe you wormed your way in and said that about my gran, who’s actually dead, and about the rest of us, who are paying for your lifestyles. So it turns out Gran is not the last one standing. Fuck off. All of you, leave.’
The policewoman took two steps back into the room. She sounded exhausted. ‘Clementine, I had no idea you were doing this to pull us all into your own drama. I couldn’t care less what your friends said about your family before they were your friends. Or who said what to whom. You implied this had something to do with the excavation in the garden. In spite of your wishes, Gareth, Josie and Senara can’t leave at the moment, though I’m sure they’d like to.’
She looked at Josie, who gave a little nod. ‘Stay for the moment. Plenty of space for everyone to keep away from each other.’
Meg took Josie’s hand with one of hers and reached for Gareth with the other.
‘Come on, guys,’ she said.
‘Not you, Meggy!’ said Clem. ‘You’re on my team.’
Meg didn’t even look back.