Hold Your Breath (14 page)

After a while she fell asleep. She dreamt she was wrapped in chains at the bottom of the lido pool. Someone was smiling down at her and she knew she was going to die soon. Then the face became a
stone angel. It had Melodie’s cold, pretty features and it gradually began to topple towards her.

She woke up and found she was crying again.

Why wouldn’t it all just stop? She shook her head, trying to clear away the memories of what had happened earlier. The knife. The threat about something happening. On Friday? This
Friday?

‘STOP IT!’ Her voice sounded shockingly loud in the slumbering house.

Her mouth was bone dry and she took a long drink from the water bottle at the side of her bed. The pale glow of her alarm clock showed four a.m. The house was quiet, apart from the sounds of
ticking pipes and the comforting rumble of Sammie’s snores from outside in the hallway. She got out of bed and tiptoed out the door. The dog woke up instantly and sleepily thumped his tail
against the base of his basket in greeting. She tapped her thighs and he groaned to his feet, ambling towards her, ever hopeful of an impromptu meal or walk. The dog wasn’t allowed in any of
the bedrooms, but Tara’s was the only one on the ground floor. No one needed to find out. She doubted she was going to sleep now and she’d push him back to his own bed before anyone
else got up.

She couldn’t be alone tonight. Even the smelly old dog was better company than none.

A few minutes later, Tara lay wrapped in a blanket on her bedroom floor. She’d placed her bedroom lamp on the other side of the bed so it cast a gentle glow. The room was wreathed in
shadows. The dog’s heavy warmth next to her was a comfort and she stroked his velvety head until he gave a blissed-out sigh and then resumed his gentle snores.

It was the first time she’d dreamt about the statues in this house. For a time, this had happened every night. And not just dreaming of them. Seeing them in her mind’s eye like
flash-carding photographs. The cold, expressionless eyes raised up. Headstones with stark dates carved into the marble. And the deep cold feeling in her bones that spoke of dead things.

She should have been drifting to sleep and remembering Leo’s lips on hers. Instead, she was fighting off images of death and pain. It was so unfair. Why couldn’t she just be
normal?

Tara snuggled closer to the dog, closed her aching eyes and began the long wait for morning.

At breakfast, she tried to force down some cereal and a cup of coffee. She didn’t even like coffee but needed some form of chemical help to get through today. Luckily,
Mum was distracted, talking excitedly about a proposed shopping trip for her weekend away.

She didn’t notice her daughter’s red-rimmed eyes and the pale violet semi-circles beneath them.

At school the hours dragged slowly by until eventually the bell went to signify the end of the day.

Tara sagged with relief.

Mr Christos had told her off in biology for ‘being dreamy’ and she’d noticed Karis watching her a couple of times, but she’d somehow battled the dizzy nausea and stinging
eyes of her terrible night. Stumbling towards the school gate, she looked at her phone and saw that a text from Leo had come earlier.

C U soon?

A pleasant warmth began to seep through her and then faded again. How could she possibly have a boyfriend and behave like anyone else when this was going on? Leo would dump her the minute he
found out about it anyway. Was she really going to be able to keep it from him?

Miserably, she went to put the phone back in her bag without replying when it started to ring. The number ringing was unfamiliar and she realised it was the same person who’d tried her
twice before. Persistent, whoever they were.

‘Hello?’ she said, holding the phone to her ear.

‘Is that Tara?’ The nasal voice made Tara’s scalp prickle, even though it was unfamiliar.

‘Um, yes, who’s that?’

A pause. ‘Tara, it’s Siobhan Evans.’

Tara’s footsteps came to an abrupt stop. Someone crashed into her from behind, stepping painfully on her heel.

‘Watch out!’ snapped a huge Sixth Form boy.

But Tara barely heard him. Her mouth went dry and her stomach lurched as though she had gone over a bump in the car at speed.

‘Are you there? Tara?’ said Siobhan.

‘Yes.’ Tara’s throat felt so tight she could barely summon enough air to force the words out. ‘What do you want?’ she whispered. ‘How did you get my
number?’

‘My cousin works in the office at your school,’ said Siobhan. ‘Your old one, I mean. She got it off one of your mates.’

Anger surged up inside her. Wasn’t there supposed to be confidentiality about stuff like that? And what did Siobhan Evans want? To torture Tara a bit more about what she’d done?

‘Why are you ringing me?’ Tara marched across the road in the opposite direction to the flow of students leaving the school.

‘Look, I know it’s a bit of a surprise, me getting in touch,’ said Siobhan with staggering understatement, ‘but I’m visiting down the road from you. And I wanted to
. . . see you. Can you meet me?’

‘No!’ gasped Tara. The very thought filled her with horror. ‘There’s nothing to say. I already said I was sorry. I’m more sorry than you can ever know.’ Her
voice hitched on the words.

‘No, no, I know that,’ said Siobhan, more gently. ‘I really don’t want to have a go at you, Tara. There’s something I need to say. I’d sooner do it in person
though.’

‘I can’t.’ Tara was almost surprised at her own strength now. ‘I’m really sorry, but I . . . I just can’t. Say whatever it is now. Please.’
And then
leave me alone
, she added in her mind.

Siobhan sighed. ‘Well, okay, if it has to be like this,’ she said. ‘The thing is,’ she went on, ‘it’s been on my conscience and I feel bad. Some harsh things
were said about you and, um, some of them harsh things were said by me. I blamed you, you see.’

Tara squeezed her eyes tight shut at these words. Siobhan made a sucking sound and Tara pictured the cigarette clamped between her thin lips. ‘I know you was only trying to
help.’

Tara remained silent, listening hard despite the desire to fling down the phone and run away from Siobhan’s words.

There was another long pause.

‘The thing is, something has come up and I felt you should know. It’s been on my conscience, as I said.’

Tara’s whole being focused around the voice that came into her ear.

‘What has?’ She spoke so quietly, she wasn’t sure if Siobhan even heard.

‘The thing is,’ Siobhan repeated, ‘the police came to see me last week. Said what they had to tell me was confidential. But sod that for a game of soldiers. I think you have a
right to know. And it’s going to come out soon anyway. Bound to, innit?’ She sucked on her cigarette again, as though drawing in courage. ‘Anyway, this woman went down the
station. Said she was planning to steal . . . a baby.’ Siobhan coughed before speaking again. ‘She’s cracked, from what I could tell. Lost her own kid a few years back. Anyway,
the thing is, she confessed it was her what took my Tyler.’

Siobhan’s composure crumbled. Tara listened to the snuffles on the other end of the phone. After a few moments, Siobhan spoke again, her voice bunged up and thick.

‘Had him for a day but he got away, clever little bugger,’ she said and gave a high-pitched sob-laugh. ‘Tried to come home and that must have been when he got into
difficulties.’ Her voice skidded to a squeak at the end of the sentence. Some loud nose blowing followed, amplified by the phone so Tara had to hold it back from her ear for a moment or
two.

Tara squeezed her eyes shut. She didn’t want all these details.

‘Look, Siobhan, I’m sorry but really it’s nothing to do w—’

Siobhan cut across her.

‘Tara, listen to me. That woman . . . her husband is a
stone mason
.’

‘What?’

‘Her hubby,’ Siobhan pressed on, ‘he makes statues and whatnot for graveyards. The police think she kept my Tyler in the workshop for the twenty-four hours he was missing.
So,’ she said emphatically, ‘don’t you see, Tara? Do you understand? It means you were right all along. You were right about those statues.’

Tara didn’t notice much around her as she walked home. One foot went in front of the other and after some time, her house came into view. She managed not to step out in
front of any buses or cars, but that was more down to luck than the attention she paid to her surroundings.

‘
You were right about those statues.
’

The words repeated inside her head over and over again. When she got to her house, she fumbled with her keys and then Beck opened the door, a doorstep sandwich in his hand.

‘What’s up?’ he said but Tara pushed past him.

‘Gonna be sick,’ she said, running towards the bathroom.

‘Oh. Right-oh. I’ll leave you to it then.’

Once inside the safe cocoon of home, the nausea subsided. But when she sat down on the lid of the toilet, she began to shake so hard that her teeth chattered. She was icy cold
and a pulse throbbed with a steady beat in her temple.

Leaning forwards, she rested her head in her hands, her elbows on her knees. Emotions churned inside her. She couldn’t think straight. How was she supposed to react to this news from
Siobhan Evans? Be grateful? Be relieved? She didn’t know what she was supposed to feel. It was too complicated to feel any one emotion.

Tara got up and ran water into the sink. She threw some over her face and then dabbed it dry, looking at her reflection. A washed-out girl, skin the colour of porridge, looked back at her. The
whites of her eyes were tinged with pink. Her hair hung inky-black against the pale oval of her face. How could Leo ever have been interested? She looked like a ghost. But even thoughts of Leo
couldn’t distract her from what she had just learnt.

Oh my God . . .

Those pictures . . . they weren’t from a graveyard at all. They were from the stone mason’s workshop. Like Siobhan said, she’d been
right
.

A smile crept over her face. She couldn’t help it. A sort of savage pleasure mixed with fury welled up inside and she began to laugh. She couldn’t stop. She laughed and laughed,
quietly and then turning the taps on full blast to drown the sound as the laughter got more hysterical, her control loosening and slipping in a way that was liberating and frightening all at once.
She didn’t know where the tipping point came but now she was sobbing into the hand towel, shoulders violently heaving. She felt as though she would never be able to stop crying.

A knock on the door brought her back to her senses with a jolt.

‘What?’ She sounded as though she had the world’s worst cold now.

‘You still barfing? Want me to call Mum?’

Yes, yes, yes
, she thought.
I want Mum and I want Dad and I even want insensitive YOU, Beck. I want all three of you to hug me and tell me it’s all going to be all right. I
want my family to make it go away. I don’t want this. I don’t want it. I don’t want it . . .

‘Tar?’

‘No, I’m all right!’ she called thickly. ‘There’s no need.’

There was a pause.

‘Tar?’ Beck repeated.

‘
What?
’

‘You haven’t got yourself knocked up, have you?’

Tara gave a tired sort of laugh. ‘No, Beck. I haven’t
got myself
knocked up.’ How typical for a boy to put it like that.

‘Okay . . . well, I’ll leave you to it then.’

Tara sighed and stared at her reflection again. The evening with Leo at the pool felt like something from another lifetime. What was she supposed to do now?

Because if she had been right about Tyler Evans, that meant only one thing.

She was right about Melodie.

T
ara convinced her parents she had a stomach bug and spent the evening in her room, curtains drawn like a weak barricade against the outside world.
She picked up her mobile to text Leo about five times but each time the necessary combination of words failed her and she threw it down again with a frustrated growl. What could she say to him?

Hello, I think your sister is in terrible danger. A man with a knife is cutting her and says you have till Friday before he does it again. Okay?

She tried to work it all through in her mind. What did they want? A ransom? But if Melodie had been kidnapped, how could Leo not know if this was happening? Wouldn’t it even be on the
news? Maybe the police hadn’t been called. And maybe Leo didn’t even know. Which raised the big question: was it Tara’s job to tell him?

Perhaps those images might help track her down. Save her
life
, even.

All these thoughts ultimately led back to one place though. Leo finding out that Tara wasn’t who he thought she was. She wasn’t just an all-right-looking girl who liked a swim.
Instead, she was a freak who saw freaky pictures in her freaky mind.

Tara squeezed her nails into the palms of her hands as she pictured the confusion and then the distaste in Leo’s eyes. She knew she had to do it.

Tyler Evans was dead. Tara couldn’t help him any more.

But Melodie didn’t have to die too.

She, Tara, might be the only person who could save her.

At ten-thirty p.m. she snatched up the phone, and brought up Leo’s name. Hesitating for a second she jabbed the call icon with a shaking fingertip. Her heart beat hard as
it rang once, twice. And then she heard his voice.

‘It’s Leo.’

‘Oh, uh, hi it’s Tara, I . . .’

But the voice continued. ‘Leave me a message and I’ll call you back.’

She hung up. This was something she was going to have to do in person.

In the morning, Tara debated staying off school but Mum was home today and she knew she’d never get out of the house. She had to somehow put one foot in front of the
other, getting through to half three when she could go to the pool and find Leo. What she would say when she got there was anyone’s guess.

The temperature was cruelly high today. Everyone wilted, even Jada and Chloe who usually never broke sweat. But today, people gave little puffs of distress as they sank onto the grass, fanning
themselves with books and magazines. The boys threw bottles of water over each other’s heads and then shook like dogs.