A Monster Calls (6 page)

“Conor?” Lily said, startled.

“Your mum doesn’t know
anything
,” he said. “And neither do you.”

He walked away from her, fast, leaving her behind.

– • –

It was just over a year ago that Lily had told a few of her friends about Conor’s mum, even though he hadn’t said she could. Those friends told a few more, who told a few more, and before the day was half through, it was like a circle had opened around him, a dead area with Conor at the centre, surrounded by landmines that everyone was afraid to walk through. All of a sudden, the people he’d thought were his friends would stop talking when he came over, not that there were so very many beyond Lily anyway, but
still
. He’d catch people whispering as he walked by in the corridor or at lunch. Even teachers would get a different look on their faces when he put up his hand in lessons.

So eventually he stopped going over to groups of friends, stopped looking up at the whispers, and even stopped putting up his hand.

Not that anyone seemed to notice. It was like he’d suddenly turned invisible.

He’d never had a harder year of school or been more relieved for a summer holiday to come round than this last one. His mother was deep into her treatments, which she’d said over and over again were rough but “doing the job”, the long schedule of them nearing its end. The plan was that she’d finish them, a new school year would start, and they’d be able to put all this behind them and start afresh.

Except it hadn’t worked out that way. His mum’s treatments had carried on longer than they’d originally thought, first a second round and now a third. The teachers in his new year were even worse because they only knew him in terms of his mum and not who he was before. And the other kids still treated him like
he
was the one who was ill, especially since Harry and his cronies had singled him out.

And now his grandma was hanging around the house and he was dreaming about trees.

Or maybe it
wasn’t
a dream. Which would actually be worse.

He walked on angrily to school. He blamed Lily because it
was
mostly her fault, wasn’t it?

He blamed Lily, because who else was there?

This time, Harry’s fist was in his stomach.

Conor fell to the ground, scraping his knee on the concrete step, tearing a hole in his uniform trousers. The hole was the worst part of it. He was terrible at sewing.

“You’re such a spaz, O’Malley,” Sully said, laughing behind him somewhere. “It’s like you fall every day.”

“You should go to a doctor for that,” he heard Anton say.

“Maybe he’s drunk,” Sully said, and there was more laughter, except for a silent spot between them where Conor knew Harry wasn’t laughing. He knew, without looking back, that Harry was just watching him, waiting to see what he would do.

As he stood, he saw Lily against the school wall. She was with some other girls, heading back inside at the end of break time. She wasn’t talking to them, just looking at Conor as she walked away.

“No help from Super Poodle today,” Sully said, still laughing.

“Lucky for you, Sully,” Harry said, speaking for the first time. Conor still hadn’t turned back to face them, but he could tell Harry wasn’t laughing at Sully’s joke. Conor watched Lily until she was gone.

“Hey,
look
at us when we’re talking to you,” Sully said, burning from Harry’s comment no doubt and grabbing Conor’s shoulder, spinning him around.

“Don’t touch him,” Harry said, calm and low, but so ominously that Sully immediately stepped back. “O’Malley and I have an understanding,” Harry said. “I’m the only one who touches him. Isn’t that right?”

Conor waited for a moment and then slowly nodded. That did seem to be the understanding.

Harry, his face still blank, his eyes still locked on Conor’s, stepped up close to him. Conor didn’t flinch, and they stood, eye-to-eye, while Anton and Sully looked at each other a bit nervously.

Harry cocked his head slightly, as if a question had occurred to him, one he was trying to puzzle out. Conor still didn’t move. The rest of their Year had already gone inside. He could feel the quiet opening up around them, even Anton and Sully falling silent. They would have to go soon. They needed to go
now
.

But nobody moved.

Harry raised a fist and pulled it back as if to swing it at Conor’s face.

Conor still didn’t flinch. He didn’t even move. He just stared into Harry’s eyes, waiting for the punch to fall.

But it didn’t.

Harry lowered his fist, dropping it slowly down by his side, still staring at Conor. “Yes,” he finally said, quietly, as if he’d worked something out. “That’s what I thought.”

And then, once more, came the voice of doom.

“You boys!” Miss Kwan called, coming across the yard towards them like terror on two legs. “Break was over three minutes ago! What do you think you’re still doing out here?”

“Sorry, Miss,” Harry said, his voice suddenly light. “We were discussing Mrs Marl’s Life Writing homework with Conor and lost track of time.” He slapped a hand on Conor’s shoulder as if they were lifelong friends. “No one knows about stories like Conor here.” He nodded seriously at Miss Kwan. “And talking about it helps get him out of himself.”

“Yes,” Miss Kwan frowned, “that sounds entirely likely. Everyone here is on first warning. One more problem today, and that’s detention for all of you.”

“Yes, Miss,” Harry said brightly, with Anton and Sully mumbling the same. They trudged off back to lessons, Conor following in step a metre behind.

“A moment please, Conor,” Miss Kwan said.

He stopped and turned to her but didn’t look up at her face.

“Are you sure everything’s all right between you and those boys?” Miss Kwan said, putting her voice into its “kindly” mode, which was only slightly less scary than full-on shouting.

“Yes, Miss,” Conor said, still not looking at her.

“Because I’m not blind to how Harry works, you know,” she said. “A bully with charisma and top marks is still a bully.” She sighed, annoyed. “He’ll probably end up Prime Minister one day. God help us all.”

Conor said nothing, and the silence took on a particular quality, one he was familiar with, caused by how Miss Kwan’s body shifted forward, her shoulders dropping, her head leaning down towards Conor’s.

He knew what was coming. He knew and hated it.

“I can’t imagine what you must be going through, Conor,” Miss Kwan said, so quiet it was almost a whisper, “but if you ever want to talk, my door is always open.”

He couldn’t look at her, couldn’t see the care there, couldn’t
bear
to hear it in her voice.

(Because he didn’t deserve it.)

(The nightmare flashed in him, the screaming and the terror, and what happened at the end–)

“I’m fine, Miss,” he mumbled, looking at his shoes. “I’m not going through anything.”

After a second, he heard Miss Kwan sigh again. “All right then,” she said. “Forget about the first warning and come back inside.” She patted him once on the shoulder and re-crossed the yard to the doors.

And for a moment, Conor was entirely alone.

He knew right then he could probably stay out there all day and no one would punish him for it.

Which somehow made him feel even worse.

After school, his grandma was waiting for him on the settee.

“We need to have a talk,” she said before he even got the door shut, and there was a look on her face that made him stop. A look that made his stomach hurt.

“What’s wrong?” he asked.

His grandmother took in a long, loud breath through her nose and stared out of the front window, as if gathering herself. She looked like a bird of prey. A hawk that could carry off a sheep.

“Your mother has to go back to the hospital,” she said. “You’re going to come and stay with me for a few days. You’ll need to pack a bag.”

Conor didn’t move. “What’s wrong with her?”

His grandma’s eyes widened for just a second, as if she couldn’t believe he was asking a question so cataclysmically stupid. Then she relented. “There’s a lot of pain,” she said. “More than there should be.”

“She’s got medicine for her pain–” Conor started, but his grandmother clapped her hands together, just the once, but
loud
, loud enough to stop him.

“It’s not working, Conor,” she said, crisply, and it seemed like she was looking just over his head rather than at him. “It’s not working.”

“What’s not working?”

His grandma tapped her hands together lightly a few more times, like she was testing them out or something, then she looked out of the window again, all the while keeping her mouth firmly shut. She finally stood, concentrating on smoothing down her dress.

“Your mum’s upstairs,” she said. “She wants to talk to you.”

“But–”

“Your father’s flying in on Sunday.”

He straightened up. “
Dad’s
coming?”

“I’ve got some calls to make,” she said, stepping past him and out of the front door, taking out her mobile.

“Why is Dad coming?” he called after her.

“Your mum’s waiting,” she said, pulling the front door shut behind her.

Conor hadn’t even had a chance to put down his rucksack.

His father was coming. His
father
. From
America
. Who hadn’t come since the Christmas before last. Whose new wife always seemed to suffer emergencies at the last minute that kept him from visiting more often, especially now that the baby was born. His father, who Conor had grown used to not having around as the trips grew less frequent and the phone calls got further and further apart.

His father was coming.

Why?

“Conor?” he heard his mum call.

She wasn’t in her room. She was in
his
, lying back on his bed on top of the duvet, gazing out of the window to the churchyard up the hill.

And the yew tree.

Which was just a yew tree.

“Hey, darling,” she said, smiling at him from where she lay, but he could tell by the lines around her eyes that she really was hurting, hurting like he’d only seen her hurt once before. She’d had to go into hospital then as well and hadn’t come out for nearly a fortnight. It had been last Easter, and the weeks at his grandma’s had almost been the death of them both.

“What’s the matter?” he asked. “Why are you going back to hospital?”

She patted the duvet next to her to get him to come and sit down.

He stayed where he was. “What’s wrong?”

She still smiled but it was tighter now, and she traced her fingers along the threaded pattern of the duvet, grizzly bears that Conor had outgrown years ago. She had tied her red rose scarf around her head, but only loosely, and he could see her pale scalp underneath. He didn’t think she’d even pretended to try on any of his grandma’s old wigs.

“I’m going to be okay,” she said. “I really am.”

“Are you?” he asked.

“We’ve been here before, Conor,” she said. “So don’t worry. I’ve felt really bad and I’ve gone in and they’ve taken care of it. That’s what’ll happen this time.” She patted the duvet cover again. “Won’t you come and sit down next to your tired old mum?”

Conor swallowed, but her smile was brighter and – he could tell – it was a real one. He went over and sat next to her on the side facing the window. She ran her hand through his hair, lifting it out of his eyes, and he could see how skinny her arm was, almost like it was just bone and skin.

“Why is Dad coming?” he asked.

His mother paused, then put her hand back down into her lap. “It’s been a while since you’ve seen him. Aren’t you excited?”

“Grandma doesn’t seem too happy.”

His mother snorted. “Well, you know how she feels about your dad. Don’t listen to her. Enjoy his visit.”

They sat in silence for a moment. “There’s something else,” Conor finally said. “Isn’t there?”

He felt his mother sit up a little straighter on her pillow. “Look at me, son,” she said, gently.

He turned his head to look at her, though he would have paid a million pounds not to have to do it.

“This latest treatment’s not doing what it’s supposed to,” she said. “All that means is they’re going to have to adjust it, try something else.”

“Is that it?” Conor asked.

She nodded. “That’s it. There’s lots more they can do. It’s normal. Don’t worry.”

“You’re sure?”

“I’m sure.”

“Because,” and here Conor stopped for a second and looked down at the floor. “Because you could tell me, you know.”

And then he felt her arms around him, her thin, thin arms that used to be so soft when she hugged him. She didn’t say anything, just held onto him. He went back to looking out of the window and after a moment, his mother turned to look, too.

“That’s a yew tree, you know,” she finally said.

Conor rolled his eyes, but not in a bad way. “Yes, Mum, you’ve told me a hundred times.”

“Keep an eye on it for me while I’m away, will you?” she said. “Make sure it’s still here when I get back?”

And Conor knew this was her way of telling him she
was
coming back, so all he did was nod and they both kept looking out at the tree.

Which stayed a tree, no matter how long they looked.

Five days. The monster hadn’t come for five days.

Maybe it didn’t know where his grandma lived. Or maybe it was just too far to come. She didn’t have much of a garden anyway, even though her house was
way
bigger than Conor and his mum’s. She’d crammed her back garden with sheds and a stone pond and a wood-panelled “office” she’d had installed across the back half, where she did most of her estate agent work, a job so boring Conor never listened past the first sentence of her description of it. Everything else was just brick paths and flowers in pots. No room for a tree at all. It didn’t even have
grass
.

“Don’t stand there gawping, young man,” his grandma said, leaning out of the back door and hooking in an earring. “Your dad’ll be here soon, and I’m going to see your mum.”

“I wasn’t gawping,” Conor said.