The Courier & Advertiser (Angus and Dundee)
Floss appears like magic, and as I bend to pat her head, a heavy splash startles me. The noise reverberates through my system
Bone Deep: Episode 26
Lucie
I stepped out into the moonlight, and something came over me. I was entranced.
It made me think of that Christmas poem, the one where the moon gives the lustre of midday to objects below.
The wildness beyond the cottage was illuminated, a ghostly imitation of daytime. I had the world all to myself.
I didn’t even pause to grab a torch, buoyed up with a strange sense of something burgeoning.
I stuffed my bare feet into cold wellies and set off, pyjama legs flapping and robe tight-belted against the chill.
The pond, blackberry-dark, glints juicily under the full moon.
Something prickles in the undergrowth behind me, and bird-like creatures swoop low over the water. I’m pretty sure they’re bats.
It occurs to me that the nocturnal world is just a mirror of the daylight one, but less complicated, with everything following its natural course.
It is complete, and getting by just fine without me.
Hopefulness
I shiver and pull the neck of my robe tighter, horribly aware that I’m sitting on a bench in the dark in my pyjamas, writing poetry in a notepad I found in the kitchen drawer.
Folk have been locked up for less.
I’d set out with a sort of hopefulness – maybe I can get past this, be the sort of sister Jane thought I was.
It’s okay to be alone. The sky won’t fall in. You just need to make sense of it all.
Opening the book again, I ready my purple gel pen and look to the sky for inspiration.
“I see the pale underside of the moon; a faint seeding of stars.”
See... there’s a whole big universe out there. You can’t move on until you kick Reuben into touch. You know you have to.
You can’t keep waiting for – what was it Jane had been waiting for? Circumstances to change? Only you can change them.
The truth has been hooked. From the dark-berry waters of the pond the slippery fish has landed. You have to make a decision.
“I look up, but looking up exposes the soft parts of yourself.”
You started it. You’re to blame. You have to end it before the guilt destroys you.
A bird sets up an agitated calling on the far bank, making me jump.
End it... end it... end it...
What sort of bird sings at night? One who can’t sleep. I shouldn’t be out here.
I stuff the pad back into my pocket and get to my feet.
Floss appears like magic, and as I bend to pat her head, a heavy splash startles me.
The noise reverberates through my system, but when I spin towards it, there is nothing to be seen but the water spreading slowly in neat circles.
What the hell was that? What size of fish would you need to make that kind of noise? Floss whines.
I hold my breath and wait, all my senses straining. I’m never at my most comfortable near water, but the added dimension of something unknown lurking beneath the surface makes me want to run screaming for home.
Explanation
There’s nothing to see but faint circles in the water, the gentle slop against the bank.
I search for a rational explanation.
Maybe there are pike in there? You read about people netting monster pike all the time.
I have an image in my head of some weird prehistoric-looking fish, lurking in the muddy deep.
The moon slinks behind a cloud and everything is swallowed up.
Only sparkles remain – glints and droplets and the paleness of leaves.
My eyes are fixed on the spot where the thing disappeared. That splash, such a heavy weight...
My vision blooms in the dark; my eyes grow wide. Out there, something surfaces.
A glimmer of yellow. Something yellow, floating just beneath the surface. Then it sinks slowly out of sight.
Not everyone can float.
I run. I run all the way back to the cottage, skidding on mud, tripping over the thorny snakes of brambles, with Floss galloping at my heels. I have no idea what I’ve just seen in the pond – that heavy splash, the glimmer of yellow – but all I can think of is Jane and that stupid yellow cardigan.
I run straight to her bedroom, crumple outside the door, my breath coming in short gasps and my heart thudding with terror.
I know it’s not her.
Didn’t I say goodnight to her just an hour ago? But I’m afraid to open the door.
I am so afraid to see an absence of Jane, when for all these months I’ve been praying for just that.
All those times I’ve wanted my sister to disappear off the scene...
My head is filled with that yellow cardigan, imagining it saturated with pond water, weighing her down...
I burst into the room.
Jane is asleep, as I knew she would be, breathing deeply and evenly.
Relief washes through me until I feel weak from it. I retreat silently and close her door.
Mac
April
“Other gifts arrive from the young Lord Musgrave: love tokens, lockets, even a pony, white as new milk.
“It is unusual for the younger sister to wed first, and Father pretends to be angry, perplexed and put out in equal measure.
“There are long discussions in secret between the two men, and much ale is consumed.
“Eventually the deal is struck, and a wedding date set. Elspeth has never been thwarted, after all.
“Bella can’t bear to be in her mother’s bower any more, as the talk turns to flowers and dresses and bairns.
“They even discuss the wedding night, making Bella turn crimson inside and out.
“She begins to dread that she will never know such a night, that no man will ever come to her father’s castle to seek her hand.
“Maybe she will die here, unloved, with just the old hound standing guard over her body. The hate seed burrows deep, and germinates.”
More tomorrow.