Glimpse (16 page)

The graveyard – seriously? I had one single, solitary memory of having been to a graveyard before – for the funeral of Dad’s aunt when I was eleven. I had refused to get out of the car, because a pair of Glimpse-hands had been knocking on the windscreen. Since then, I’d done my level best to avoid even walking past a graveyard. If by mistake or misfortune I did, my skin would creep and crawl for sickening hours afterwards.

Looking back, it was obvious my Glimpses had always been ghosts. But I’d convinced myself it was the closeness to death that set them off; that it was some abstract reminder of the car crash that killed Mum, a trigger in some messed-up part of my brain. Now I knew better.

Dad had given me his phone since mine was broken, so I called the inn on my walk to the graveyard to let him know I’d be late.

Susie and I turned a corner, and the village church loomed up ahead, dark grey stone against a grey sky.

‘Are you all right?’ Susie asked, her pencilled eyebrows pulled together in concern. ‘You seem kind of agitated.’

‘Do I?’ I pushed a curl behind my ear. ‘It’s nothing, I’m just . . .’ I sought for a good answer. I couldn’t think of anything. ‘I’m fine.’

Susie nodded, and kept silent as we walked through the cemetery’s huge iron gates.

Immediately, the tingling spread across my skin like static, growing stronger with each step we took towards the graves. Headstones stretched ahead of us, regular as shark’s teeth. The sky was dull and moody, doing nothing to alleviate my fear.

‘I think the oldest ones are in that corner.’ Susie pointed to the back of the graveyard, where the headstones disappeared into a line of trees.

I nodded. I didn’t trust myself to speak. My skin felt hot and cold, rippling like something alive. I knew exactly why.

Even with my eyes narrowed, I could see at least three different Glimpses. To my right, a pair of legs strolled between the headstones. To my left, a woman’s disembodied face sang a breathy, high-pitched song. Ahead of us, a pair of hands tried, and failed, to rearrange a bouquet of grave flowers.

It took all my effort to keep calm. It was like being covered in ants and being powerless to swipe them away; it was a nightmare.

I had to concede that Project Normal was not going at all well. Twenty-four hours ago, I’d have been as likely to ask Scott on a date as to come to a graveyard voluntarily. But I kept Zachary’s moonlit face in my mind, his heartbreak and his hope, his longing for peace – mine too – and forced myself to keep moving forwards.

The ghosts can’t hurt you, I told myself. It didn’t help.

We’d almost reached the trees that marked the end of the graveyard. The graves were oldest here, their mossy stones crumbling into the grass.

‘Ann Barton and Bess Richards, right?’ Susie asked. I nodded. She set off between the rows of headstones, obviously expecting me to follow.

I eyed the limbless torso hovering on the path ahead of her. ‘I . . . think I’ll go this way,’ I said, pointing in the other direction.

‘Okay.’ She shrugged.

I scuttled off between the headstones, cursing under my breath. I could tell Susie thought I was acting weird. She didn’t know the half of it: even I was impressed with my own heroic restraint in the face of abject horror.

I clasped my locket in my fist, my amulet, breathed in slow and scanned the crumbling headstones as fast as possible, working methodically so I didn’t miss one. No Ann. No Bess. I already knew there wouldn’t be a Zachary.

‘Over here!’ Susie called, excitement in her voice.

I weaved between the graves towards her. Susie stood in front of a headstone set flat in the grass. ‘Look.’

I read the words written on the grey, mossy stone.

Here was interr’d the Body of Ann Barton of Hulbourn, who departed this Life August 13th 1789 in the 18 Year of her Age.

‘It’s her,’ I said.

‘Do you think she really haunts your inn?’ Susie pulled her phone and a notepad from her bag. ‘So weird. You’re standing over her bones, and yet she could be spying on you in the shower every morning and you wouldn’t know.’

I shuddered.

I pictured Ann’s snarling face, in my bedroom and at Meg’s house. Keep your distance from her, Zachary had warned. As if I needed telling.

‘Any sign of Bess’s grave?’

Susie shook her head. ‘I haven’t looked over there yet—’ she gestured further down the rows ‘—if you want to.’

I nodded, and left her taking photos of Ann’s headstone.

It only took a few minutes to confirm that as far as Bess was concerned, I was putting myself through this for nothing. She wasn’t here.

I wandered back the way we came. I glanced over at Susie. She was still at Ann’s grave, but had switched from taking photos with her phone to talking on it, presumably to Matt. Her black skirt with its rag-like strips floated around the headstones; if anyone looked like they should be seeing ghosts here, it was her. But she was completely oblivious to the stiff-backed torso that floated just inches away from her gesticulating hands.

I clutched my locket and took a deep breath. A new determination gripped me. I hadn’t told Susie, but there was one more grave I wanted to find, since I was here.

I walked up through the rows, scanning the death dates. Ten years ago, nine years ago, eight years ago . . . seven.

I had only seen her headstone once, in a photo Dad kept separate from all the others.

I caught sight of it between the rows. Pure white marble, slightly sparkling, the heart carved at the top as clean as if crafted only yesterday.

Mum’s grave.

I walked towards it. I glanced at Susie to make sure she was still on the phone, then lowered myself to my knees in front of the stone.

‘Juliette Rathamore’, I read, ‘died, aged 30, leaving a husband, Paul, and a daughter, Elizabeth. Forever in our hearts.’

I put my locket to my lips, and waited to feel something. I emptied my mind, and gazed at Mum’s name; pictured the smiling woman in Dad’s photos, imagined her buried far beneath me.

Feel something, I urged myself. Remember.

I bowed my head – that’s what they do at gravesides on TV – and strained for a memory. I couldn’t get any physically closer to Mum than I was now. If I was going to feel something, it should be here.

But all I felt was a familiar frustration, and the same detached melancholy I felt when I looked at any of these graves.

Frowning, I rearranged the fresh roses in the graveside urn. Dad had been here recently, maybe even today. That made me feel sad. The blank lower half of the headstone, clearly intended for him, that made my throat tighten.

But everything else about Mum’s grave . . . nothing.

I became aware of something floaty and black in my peripheral vision a moment before Susie spoke.

‘Is that your mother?’

I shot to my feet, the blood rushing to my face as if I’d been caught doing something bad. I nodded.

‘I didn’t know.’ Her voice was quiet. ‘You should have told me. I could tell you were weird about being here. I could have come on my own, if you’d said.’

‘No.’ I shook my head, managed a flash of a smile. ‘It’s okay.’

Susie looked at the headstone, her face solemn. ‘God, you must have only been ten. You must really miss her.’

Tears sprang to my eyes. ‘Actually, I didn’t know her.’ The words came out before I knew I was going to say them.

Susie looked confused. ‘You didn’t know your mum?’

Good one, Liz. But the fear I’d felt when faking my past in English last week didn’t come. After everything that had happened in the last twenty-four hours, it seemed pointless to keep such secrets when I had so many others chewing away at my heart.

I felt I could trust Susie.

‘We had a car accident in the village when I was ten,’ I told her. ‘My mum died, and I . . .’ I waved a hand at my head. ‘I lost some memories. I don’t remember her.’

I waited for the secret, now unleashed, to do something. I had always feared ridicule, feared that by speaking the truth out loud I would invoke some disaster.

But nothing happened. I spoke, and the words just . . . floated away, light as mist.

Susie was silent for a long moment.

‘Liz, I don’t know what to say, but I think that is the saddest thing I’ve ever heard. And I’m sorry.’

And that was it. It was over. And it hadn’t hurt at all.

‘Thanks.’ I smiled.

Susie mirrored my smile. Then she bent to the grass, picked a daisy, and pushed it in amongst the roses.

‘Come on.’ She tugged gently on my arm and turned towards the exit. ‘There’s this place in the village called the Cocoa Pod that does the best hot chocolate, and you deserve one with whipped cream and sprinkles.’

Scott was tinkering under his car bonnet by the outbuildings when I got back from the village. He stopped what he was doing to watch me approach, holding a spanner in his fist.

‘Hey,’ he called.

I kept walking, ignoring him. My stomach was warm with hot chocolate and a blissful hour spent chatting to Susie about ‘normal’ girl stuff like homework and TV. I didn’t want Scott to bring me down. My policy on staying out of his way had become law since his weird antics with the painting on Friday.

‘Hey,’ he called again. He marched across the gravel, blocking my path. ‘Didn’t you hear me?’

‘I heard you,’ I said, ‘but I have nothing to say. So let me through.’

He brandished his spanner at me. His T-shirt was flecked with oil and sweat. ‘You owe me an hour’s worth of petrol for last night’s shenanigans.’

I pulled an exasperated face. ‘Fine. Tell me how much. But you’re not going to intimidate me, Scott, so just leave me alone.’ I sidestepped, and shoved my way past him.

He caught my arm. ‘You should be intimidated by me,’ he said, his voice low.

I shook my arm free. ‘What?’

‘I didn’t mean that.’ Scott wiped the back of his hand across his face, leaving a smudge of grease on his cheek. ‘But, God, Liz, you’re making this really hard for me.’

‘I haven’t done anything to you.’

‘Oh, yeah? Do you have any idea the bollocking I got on Friday night because of you?’

I raised my eyebrows. I was so sure that Crowley had taken Scott’s side. ‘Well, good,’ I said.

He glared at me, his blue eyes hard and cold as ice cubes. ‘You’re so dumb sometimes. No wonder you had to be in all the special classes in your last school. You really are clueless, aren’t you?’

My face hardened. ‘Just leave me alone,’ I said, marching off before my anger could turn to pain.

My alarm went off at 1.45 a.m. Within seconds, I was awake, my eyelids heavy with sleep, but my limbs fuelled by adrenaline. I switched on my bedside lamp, climbed out of bed then pulled on one of my warmest long dresses, twisted my hair into a plait and went to the window.

I barely had to wait for Zachary. The moment I stuck my head out into the cold air, he stepped from the shadows of the tree. Even through the darkness, I could see his smile. I waved hello, pointed at the tree and stepped back from my window.

The tree rustled and creaked outside as he climbed. My hands started to tremble in anticipation. Though I’d thought of little else but Zachary and what he’d told me the night before, it still felt incredible that he existed, that he was here again, this secret boy who nobody but me could see.

He landed inside my room with a soft thump and a rush of cool, tree-scented air.

‘You were waiting for me?’ I asked.

‘Ever since the sun set.’

‘You should have woken me up.’

‘I was tempted.’ His eyes smiled, then grew serious again. ‘What happened last night, after the caretaker stole you away from me?’

I pulled a face. ‘Nothing worth repeating. But I have something else to tell you . . .’

I trailed off. Zachary had gone as still as a standing stone. I followed his gaze to the painting of Bess on my dresser.

‘That was one of the things I wanted to tell you,’ I said.

He took a slow step forwards. Then a faster one. He made it to the painting in four strides. ‘Where did you find this?’ He stared at the painting, like he couldn’t believe it was real. He lifted a hand to the canvas; his fingertips went straight through the layers of paint and dust. ‘I haven’t laid eyes on this for years.’

‘It’s Bess, isn’t it? I found it in my granddad’s closet.’ It was easier than explaining the truth.

His cheeks were flushed with emotion, but with pain or elation I couldn’t tell.

‘She’s beautiful,’ I said, my voice soft. ‘Is that what she really looks like? Is she who I’m looking for?’

‘It’s a close enough representation.’ He considered, stared at the painting. ‘Though Bess never approved of it. Her opinion was that it made her look vulnerable, comely but fragile. She was not fragile. She jumped out of that window as many times as I jumped up to her.’

‘Really?’ I was impressed.

‘Admittedly, many of those occasions were after . . . 1789. I wouldn’t recommend you try it.’ His gaze drifted back to the painting.

I gave him a few minutes to just look at it, to be with Bess, even if it was only her image and his memories. But I had so much more to say. I twisted my dress sleeves around in my hands until I couldn’t contain my words any longer.

‘So, I went to the village graveyard today.’

That got Zachary’s attention. He turned fully to me, his eyebrows shooting upwards. ‘What for?’

‘To look for Bess’s grave. I figured since you stay near your . . . um, body . . . she might do too. I found Ann’s grave—’ Zachary flinched at her name ‘—but not Bess’s. What’s the deal with Ann, Zachary?’ I glanced at the door, half expecting the tap-tap-tap of her footsteps on the other side. ‘I’ve seen her a few times, and she seems . . . scary. Is she bad?’

His face darkened. ‘Yes.’

‘Why?’

‘She believes she’s in love with me.’

Surprise twisted my face. ‘I thought you were going to say something awful.’

‘She is awful. She plagued Bess for being with me, both before and after our deaths.’

I raised my eyebrows, more sympathetically this time. ‘You’ve known her since you were alive?’

‘Ann was a barmaid at the inn, alongside Bess. They died on the same night. The redcoats managed to kill a number of the inn staff while they were waiting for me.’ Guilt and resentment flashed in his eyes.