The Astonishing Return of Norah Wells (11 page)

‘Fay?' Ella bursts through the front door.

Since Mum's come home, Ella's felt like she's been dangling upside down on one of those crazy rides at Alton Towers. Fay, calm, dependable, what-you-see-is-what-you-get Fay. That's what she needs.

‘Fay!'

A plan, a timetable, a list, a family meeting. Something to make sense of all this.

All the lights are on. The smell of raw dough and pepperoni and cheese and tomato sauce from the kitchen.

‘Fay!' Ella calls out again.

Dad puts the car keys down on the table in the hall. Mum takes off her shoes.

Louis bounds out from under the stairs.

‘Hey, Louis.' Ella kneels down, and puts her arms around his thick, shaggy neck. It's the first time she's thought about it but, at this moment, it makes complete sense: they're the same, Louis and Fay. They can be counted on to be there.

Louis thumps his tail.

‘Buddy?'

He looks past Ella at the front door. He probably thinks he's dangling off a rollercoaster too.

‘Willa!' Ella calls out.

Ella looks under the stairs; Willa spends more time in there with Louis than in her bedroom. She blinks at the dark space. Louis's Friday bone. His water bowl. But no Willa.

‘Willa!' Ella calls up the stairs.

Still no answer.

Ella turns to face Mum and Dad.

‘Where the hell are they?'

 

Ella slams the front door behind her, runs down the front steps, down the path, through the gate and across the street.

‘Ella?'

A girl stands in front of her, head to toe in black, eyeliner so thick that her eyes shrink into her face.

@darkislight.
Was she really here? Standing on Willoughby Street?

The girl steps forward – expecting what? A hug? A handshake? A kiss?

‘Hello dear!' Rose Pegg comes out of her house and joins them on the pavement. ‘This young lady came to see you.'

Lily follows Rose out and adds:

‘She's from our tweet group.'

‘Some tea, my dear?' Rose Pegg holds out a mug. @darkislight smiles and takes the mug between her skinny fingers. The mug, covered in yellow roses, looks all wrong against the rest of her.

‘You must be delighted that your mum's returned,' says Lily Pegg.

‘I've got to go,' says Ella.

‘Why don't you stay, dear? For a cup of tea. Get to know Monica.'

Monica? Ella had never thought of @darkislight having a name.

‘I'm in a hurry, Miss Lily Pegg.'

Ella starts running.

‘She went the other way —' Rose Pegg's voice follows Ella as she runs.

Ella stops.

The other way?
 

She turns round. Rose Pegg smiles and points at the bus stop.

How do the Peggs always
know
?

Ella turns and runs up the other side of the road.

Where's Fay taken her?

Her head swims. It's happening again. The person who means more to her than anyone in her life, the people who mean more to her than anything, are disappearing.

As Ella runs to the bus stop she says to herself,
You're going to find her.
She says it over and over:
You have to find her.

‘Are we nearly there?' Willa's looks out of the bus window

Fay strokes her hair. ‘Nearly…'

Willa nods her head and closes her eyes.

Only they're not nearly anywhere. They're on the second loop of the 147 bus, which is lurching up the high street, empty except for Willa and Fay.

Willa's breathing deepens, her sleepy body heavy against Fay.

They'll get off in a minute. Once she's decided what she's going to do.

Fay catches a reflection of her face in the bus window. She doesn't recognise herself.

The bus swerves into the stop outside The Great Escape travel agent's.

A fist thumps on the bus door.

‘Hang on, hang on,' says the driver. He shakes his head and presses a button. The doors clatter open.

Ella runs past him.

‘Hey!' he yells after her.

Her cheeks red, a line of sweat on her top lip, breathing so heavily the windows steam up beside her.

Ella bends over and holds her hands to her waist, and breathes in. ‘What the hell are you doing on a bus?'

The bus driver shakes his head at Ella. ‘You have to pay for a ticket.'

‘We're getting off in a minute,' Ella throws over her shoulder. Then she turns to face Fay. ‘You're really fucked up, you know?'

Willa sits up with a start. ‘Ella?' She rubs her eyes and blinks.

‘You don't think you'd have got away with this, do you?' Ella says to Fay.

Fay shrugs.

‘You don't have the right. Willa's not…'

‘I'm not what?' Willa asks.

Ella goes over and snatches Willa's hand away from Fay's arm.

‘Ow!' Willa yanks her hand away, and her fingers curl around Fay's.

‘Come on Willa, we're going home,' says Ella.

Willa shakes her head. ‘No. We're going on a Big Adventure.' She leans over and pulls her case out from the footwell. ‘Mummy's taking me.' Willa looks at Fay, waiting for her to speak. ‘Aren't you, Mummy?'

Fay looses her fingers from Willa's.

‘A Big Adventure, hey?' Ella laughs.

‘You can come with us if you like,' says Willa. ‘Mummy wouldn't mind, would you?'

Taking the girls, leaving Adam and Norah to it – for a second, that doesn't sound so crazy.

‘You have to come home, Fay,' says Ella, her voice softer.

‘Why?' Willa asks. ‘Why does Mummy have to come home? And why are you being weird? And why —'

‘Willa, give the questions a rest,' Ella says.

‘But I don't understand…'

Fay keeps staring out of the window. The nights are getting longer; there's still a hint of light in the sky.

Ella holds out her hand. ‘Fay —'

‘Are you going to pay for a ticket, or what?' the driver barks from the front of the bus.

‘Just give us a minute,' Ella yells back.

‘Come on, Fay.' Ella's voice is shaking.

Does she really want her to come back?

‘Willa needs to eat. And to go to bed… She needs to be with us. All of us,' Ella says. ‘And you have to speak to Mum, tell her she can't just come back like this and expect to pick up where she left off. She'll listen to you.'

‘Are you talking about No One Woman?' Willa asks.

‘What she's done, it's not fair,' Ella goes on. ‘Not on any of us.'

‘No, it's not.' Fay gets up and brushes down the wrinkles in her raincoat. She lifts Willa into her arms. ‘It's time to go back, my darling.'

‘What about our Big Adventure?'

Fay feels her little girl's heart hammering in her chest.

‘The best adventures take place at home,' Fay says.

‘If you're getting off, hurry up,' yells the bus driver.

Fay catches his eye and nods.

Once Ella, Fay and Willa have walked down the aisle and out onto the pavement, the driver thumps a button to shut the doors, yanks the bus into gear and pulls away.

For a second, the three of them stand on the pavement looking out at the empty high street.

Willa stands between Fay and Ella. She takes each of them by the hand.

‘Ella?' Willa asks. ‘Can I ask a question now?'

‘Just one,' Ella says, kissing Willa's hand.

‘Why did you call No One Woman Mum?'

Adam stops on the landing and looks into Willa's room. Fay's sitting on the edge of the bed, smoothing down Willa's knotty hair.

She's the only one who can get Willa to sleep when she's wound up.

He looks at Fay. Dark shadows streak the pale skin under her eyes. She hasn't slept for twenty-four hours now. And then taking Willa out for a walk in the dark, an adventure to get her mind off all the chaos. Even now, Fay put everyone else first.

He goes and sits beside Fay and takes her hand in his.

Willa beams.

It's important for her to see that we're close. That we love each other,
Fay had told him in the early days.
It's what gives children secure attachment.

Now he thinks that maybe it's better if children learn not to get too attached.

‘Is No One Woman staying, then?' Willa's voice is thick with sleep.

‘We'll see, my darling,' Fay says.

‘Daddy?'

‘Like Mummy said, we'll see. You need to sleep now.'

‘Will she still be here for my birthday?'

Fay doesn't answer. Adam holds her hand tighter.

‘We don't know yet, Willa,' he says.

‘Is she Auntie Norah?'

‘You need to sleep, my darling. It's late. We'll talk in the morning.'

Willa sleeps on her tummy, her arms tucked into her sides. Fay rubs her back gently until Willa's eyes drop closed.

‘Will Ella be okay…?' Willa's voice drifts away.

‘She'll be fine,' Fay whispers.

Adam watches Fay lean over and kiss his little girl –
their
little girl.

‘I'll stay with her for a bit,' Fay whispers to Adam.

If they leave Willa too soon after she's gone to sleep, she wakes up frightened, so they take it in turns to sit with her. They listen for her breath to deepen, for her head to sink into her pillow, for her eyelids to stop fluttering.

‘Of course.' He kisses Fay's forehead and climbs up the stairs to their bedroom.

 

As he stands by the window, looking out at the dark, spring night, Fay comes in carrying Willa's clothes.

Fay turns the jumper inside out and puts it in the laundry basket.

‘Willa okay?' he asks.

Fay nods. ‘For now.'

Couldn't Norah have given them a bit of warning? Time to prepare the kids? He wonders why he ever found this unpredictability attractive.

Fay changes into her nightdress, closes the curtains and pulls back the duvet.

Adam catches her hand.

‘Stop that for a second.' He takes her palm to his lips and breathes in the smell of soap.

She rests her head against his chest.

It took him a while to get used to Fay's body, softer and fuller than Norah's.

‘I'm sorry,' he whispers into her hair.

‘It's not your fault.'

He was surprised that Fay, who used to be so critical of Adam when Norah was around, hadn't once blamed him for Norah's departure.

‘I'm still sorry,' he says. ‘You don't deserve this.'

Fay draws away from him gently. ‘I need to get some sleep.'

She climbs into bed and switches off her bedside lamp.

As he watches her head sink into the pillow, her eyes closing, he whispers:

I won't let you down. Not after all these years. Not after everything you've done for us.
 

The world is trying to go to sleep.

In the main bedroom, the father wakes from a dream. Her name sits on his lips…
Norah
…
Had he said it out loud? It's been years since he's dreamt about her.

He leans over to The Mother Who Stayed and kisses her brow.
I love you
, he wants to say, but the words get lost in his throat.

He gets up, puts his glasses on, takes a packet of cigarettes from the chest of drawers.

In the lounge, he finds the big dog asleep next to The Mother Who Left. The dog opens his eyes and follows him into the garden.

As he blows smoke at the stars, he looks at the big dog.
You're not afraid to show it, are you?
That you're happy she's home. That you want her to stay.

He hears the glass doors open, her soft tread across the grass; he turns and looks at The Mother Who Left, her pale skin glowing white under the moon.

Can I have one?
she asks, nodding at the cigarette in the father's hand.

They sit beside each other on the bench under the peach tree. She shifts closer to him and her thigh brushes against his. He leans over and kisses her bare shoulder, and then he stubs out his cigarette and gets up.

The big dog wakes and follows him across the garden back to the house.

I missed you,
she calls after him, but he keeps walking.

The little girl tiptoes into her parents' bedroom. Her father's missing. She goes to the window and lifts the curtain and sees him sitting on the bench with the strange woman who turned up on their doorstep this morning. Their heads are bowed, both smoking, Louis at their feet.

She goes over to the bed and climbs in beside The Mother Who Stayed.
What about our big adventure,
she thinks as she drifts off to sleep.
The one you said was going to start when we got home.

The Mother Who Stayed stirs and puts her arm around her little girl.
I'll never let you go
, she thinks.

The big dog climbs to the top of the house and sits outside the attic door and listens to the teenage girl tearing at her old life.

The teenage girl rips posters from the walls, drags the clothes from the wardrobe, yanks the vinyls from their rack, smashes the bottle of perfume on the wooden floor and stuffs the black bin bags until the room is bare.

The little girl hears a bark. She slips out from her mother's arms and walks up to the attic. The teenage girl flings open the door and throws bin bag after bin bag onto the landing. She's crying.

Do you need some help?
the little girl asks.

But her sister doesn't answer. She throws out the last bin bag and closes the door.

Down in the bedroom, The Mother Who Stayed feels the rush of cold air under the sheets as the father comes back to her. She smells smoke and perfume.

At the top of the house, outside her sister's room, the little girl lies down beside the big dog. She puts her arms around his neck and leans her head into his fur.
I love you, Louis,
she whispers as she drifts off to sleep
.