Bone by Bone (20 page)

LAURA

L
aura hadn't been able to concentrate on her lectures today. She'd left the university even earlier than last week to make sure that no matter what the traffic was like, she wouldn't be late. Autumn, though, was one of the last children to leave the school. Laura had been on the point of going inside to search for her when she came running out across the empty playground.

Laura felt her chest tighten. It was the shock of seeing her look like a child from the seventies, instead of the image she carried of her daughter: laughing, her grey eyes sparkling, her plaits tumbling down her back. Laura wasn't sure the hairdresser was going to be able to do much with her hair.

Just before Autumn reached her, the child stopped. She was staring straight ahead with a fixed expression. She reached out and seized her mother's hand.

‘What is it, sweetheart?'

Autumn didn't reply. Laura looked behind her to see what she was staring at. Blocking the entrance to the school gates was a man. He was dressed in a long, black coat. As they paused, he lifted his head and stared at them. She couldn't see his eyes but a thin bead of light from the street lamp ran down his cheek, curved under the bone. His jaw was clenched tight. Laura stiffened and felt her pulse race, the hand holding Autumn's grow slippery with sweat.

Nothing can happen to us here; the head and some of the teachers are still in the school, cars are going past, there are people all around.

She gripped Autumn's hand tighter and strode forward to meet Aaron.

‘How dare you?' he shouted as they approached, immediately on the offensive.

Autumn half hid behind her mother.

‘You are fucking unbelievable. You hired a soldier to beat Levi up!'

‘I did not,' said Laura. ‘He is not a soldier and I did not…'

‘A fucking Marine! You paid a Marine to assault my boy!'

‘He isn't… I didn't…'

Laura's bravado disintegrated now that he was only a few feet from her, so much taller, leaner and more threatening than she remembered him from their evening together. The whites of his eyes glistened and the tiny charm angled on his wrist bone flashed as he spoke. She felt queasy as she remembered how she'd almost fallen for him the evening he had come to her house and softly spoken to her about a planet born from the sun's remains. How close they had been to each other in the confined space of her office. What might have happened if… She pushed the thought away.

‘I've reported you to the police for the original assault. I'm considering giving them a further statement about your latest crime. I can only tell you one last time: stay away from my son.'

He turned and flung open the door of his car, illegally parked facing the wrong way on the zigzag lines outside the school, and drove away with a screech of tyres.

Laura was trembling. Did that mean, she thought, that there was a chance, even the slightest of chances, that he was not going to go to the police about Jacob speaking to Levi? Jacob would back her up; he was innocent, after all. But it would be awkward and embarrassing for both of them if Aaron did report her. And it would make the police case against her even more damning. It looked as if he was going to hold this as a threat over her for now.

Autumn let go of her hand and Laura felt her palm fill with cold air as if an icy ball had been pushed into her skin.

‘Levi had a black eye today,' she said quietly.

‘You don't seriously think Jacob did it, do you?' Laura said quickly. ‘We were there, remember? He must have got into a fight with one of the other boys.'

‘But then I ran off. You followed me. You didn't see Jacob leave.'

‘Jacob wouldn't have touched him, let alone hurt him.'

‘You did,' said Autumn.

Laura bit her lip. ‘Come on, we're going to be late,' she said, opening the car door.

The hairdresser's was an expensive salon in Cotham, but it was the only one Laura could find at short notice. From the darkened street the windows glowed and were garlanded with strings of fairy lights. There were velvet sofas and a giant chandelier, sparkling with cut glass hanging above a semi-circular desk in the centre of the room. A white waxy orchid in a gold pot stood next to the till and against one wall was a tall, thin mahogany set of shelves with hair products in minimal and tasteful packaging.

She expected the hairdresser wouldn't be able to do anything with Autumn's hair. She felt guilty although she knew that was ridiculous – it was not as if she could have prevented a malicious boy from chopping Autumn's plaits off at the roots. Autumn was still refusing to say that Levi had done it.

A young man led Autumn to a chair in front of a mirror and pulled another over for Laura. She assumed he was an assistant but, after he'd wrapped a gown around Autumn, he ran his hands through her hair a couple of times.

‘You have beautiful hair,' he murmured, and Autumn almost smiled.

The man, who introduced himself as Sam, was thin and pale with floppy, dark hair in a rumpled quiff.

He nodded a couple of times and then looked at Autumn's reflection. He had light-blue eyes with a dark ring around them and a lopsided smile.

‘I think you'll look really cool when we're finished,' he said quietly. He glanced at Laura and added, ‘I'll just tidy up these ends and shape it a little, shall I?'

Laura nodded. Sam sprayed Autumn's hair so that it was damp and then bent his lanky form over her daughter. For the next twenty minutes, he worked with the utmost concentration, before spraying her hair again and blow-drying it.

When he'd finished, he handed Autumn a hand mirror and twirled her around so that she could see the back of her head. Laura, watching Autumn looking at herself, felt tears well up. All that lovely, long, thick hair. Autumn had an elfin cut now. It accentuated her sharp chin and wide cheekbones, highlighted the fragility of her neck, the bones standing out, the hollow at the nape. She looked like a changeling-child, immortal, ageless. It made Laura feel uncomfortable, as if her daughter's innocence had been stolen.

Autumn nodded and smiled up at Sam. At least it was better than it had been before.

‘If you want to grow it again, leave it for a couple of months and then come back for a trim,' Sam said to her.

Laura winced when Sam told her how much it was going to cost. She'd thought about asking if he could trim her hair too, but at these prices she could barely afford Autumn's haircut. She swallowed. They'd have to economize somehow. She handed him her credit card. She'd phoned the bank about her debit card and the woman she'd spoken to had said the password had been altered and she'd need to come to a branch with some ID to reset it, but Laura hadn't had time so far. She dug her fingernails into her palms as Sam put through the extortionate amount and then they both waited.

‘It's been rejected,' he said.

In the mirror Laura saw Autumn's face fall. Sam seemed almost as nervous as she was. He wiped his hands on his trousers and said from under his curly ruff of hair, ‘I've got dyslexia, I'm no good at this kind of thing. Hang on and I'll get someone else instead.'

A couple of minutes later, he returned with a bored-looking girl whose platinum-blonde hair was interspersed with pink streaks. She popped gum loudly as she put Laura's card in the machine again. Laura wondered what she could do – she might have to go home and find her cheque book. A cheque would take a few days to clear and give her time to unlock her current account.

There was a whirring sound and the girl tore off the receipt and handed it to her.

Thank God,
she thought, smiling brightly, as if nothing had been wrong.

They were late returning home after the hairdresser's and the van with the security company logo was already waiting outside for them. Laura had called the company yesterday after the police had spoken to her. She had to face up to what was happening. It wasn't simply that Autumn was being bullied in a particularly brutal way, it was everything: the destruction of her bike, the vandalism of Ruth's garden, the corruption of her emails and Skype, her bank account, which had been hacked into, her passwords for Netflix, Amazon and the Internet all reset, her laptop destroyed. There was no question about it, she felt increasingly unsafe.

A man, seeing them approach, opened the van door and climbed out.

‘Who's that?' asked Autumn.

‘He's going to fit a burglar alarm,' said Laura.

She hadn't told Autumn in case she felt worried about them needing a security system, but when she glanced back at her daughter, who was unclipping her seat belt, she didn't seem concerned.

Steve, from Cannongate Security, worked quietly and efficiently as Laura cooked dinner for herself and Autumn, fitting the alarm and also a panic button. When he'd finished, he called downstairs to her.

He showed her how to set the code for the alarm. The high-pitched beeping, signalling the alarm was about to go off, made her pulse elevate.

‘If someone breaks in then we and the police will automatically be notified,' he said calmly as she put in the code, her fingers trembling. The beeping silenced immediately. ‘We'll call you and if you don't answer, the police will be sent round. To set the alarm, you punch the code in when you're leaving the house and you'll have forty seconds to get out and shut the door behind you. When you re-enter the house, you'll have forty seconds to put the code in before the alarm goes off. You also have another option,' he said, turning to her. She noticed how patient he was, taking care to make sure she had understood. ‘At night, before you go to bed, use this code.' He showed her on the key pad and then wrote it down on the Cannongate contract. ‘Now you can go to your bedrooms and the bathroom – basically anywhere from the bottom of these stairs to the attic – but if someone breaks into either the sitting room or the kitchen, the alarm will be triggered. It means that you'll need to cancel the code when you get up in the morning – or if you want to go downstairs during the night.'

Laura nodded. ‘Thank you.'

‘If that's everything, I'll need to take payment from you now and set up a monthly direct debit for the alarm,' said Steve.

Laura sat on the stairs to fill in the forms. Autumn, who had been hovering behind her, disappeared back to the kitchen. She hesitated once the form was completed and only required her signature to validate the contract. She wasn't sure she could afford the extra expense. Still, since she no longer had access to her bank account, thanks to Aaron, she'd have to pay for it using her credit card. She'd worry about it later. She signed the form, pressing harder into the paper than she normally would.

After Steve left, she found Autumn sitting silently at the kitchen table, staring at the wall. It was as if some vital spark had been extinguished; her silent rage against her mother had turned to limp apathy. There was a blankness behind her eyes. She hung her head over her dinner. To Laura, this abject resignation – in spite of the new haircut, which Laura had thought would cheer her up – was more frightening than the anger Autumn had previously directed towards her. As soon as they'd finished eating, Autumn walked away from her, leadenly climbing the steep stairs towards her bedroom.

Thursday 8 November

LAURA

A
utumn did not appear that morning. Eventually Laura tiptoed into her room and saw that she was still sleeping. She looked so peaceful, her pale face smooth and free of her perpetually anxious expression. Laura couldn't help smiling but then she noticed that her daughter's hands were twisted into her duvet, her fingers white from gripping so tightly. Laura laid out her school uniform on the end of the bed and, when the child still did not stir, she kissed her on the tip of her nose and whispered her name as she used to do when her daughter was young enough to have naps during the day. Autumn frowned in her sleep and then sat bolt upright, her eyes wide with fright. Laura put her arms around her to soothe her. Autumn remained rigid for a moment before pushing her mother away.

‘How are you feeling?' she asked as she knelt on the floor in front of her child.

Autumn looked at her school uniform with disbelief. ‘I don't want to go to school.'

Laura thought of the call Dileep George had made to Social Services. She couldn't risk keeping her at home – and she couldn't annoy Barney even more than she already had. She silently handed the uniform to Autumn, who snatched it out of her hands and stalked out of the room, slamming the door behind her. She refused to eat anything before they left. Laura didn't push her. There was almost nothing in the house anyway and she thought that at least Autumn would be able to have a decent lunch at Ashley Grove. She wondered if her daughter was eligible for free school meals; she made a mental note to look into it once this was all over.

Autumn neither spoke nor made eye contact with her as they drove in. After she'd dropped her off at the school gates, Laura drove recklessly fast to reach the garden she was working on with Barney and Ted. It was as she was approaching the blind bend on Frenchay Road that she saw the flowers. She slowed down. There were three bunches tied to the wall, still wrapped in cellophane: carnations and chrysanthemums, harsh, cheap flowers, garish in the grey light, already frost-bitten and wilting. A few metres further on was a yellow road sign asking for information about the accident.

Sweat pricked her palms. The young girl she'd seen the week before – the one with the blue nail varnish and long, unblemished white legs, lying on the pavement – she must have died after she was hit by the car. Laura was now crawling at ten miles an hour. The car behind her hooted its horn. There was a homemade banner fluttering from a lamp post, the stitching uneven. Ribbon had been sewn on to create words:
We love you Joanna
.

Laura's eyes filled with tears. She put the car into second gear and slowly accelerated away.