Mud Girl (28 page)

Abi hardly says goodbye to Amanda. She climbs out of the van quickly, and goes into the house with a half a wave. She's pushing at the door before she's turned the knob all the way, and for a second, just a second, the thought comes that the door's been locked. Then she turns and pushes and almost falls in.

Dad is standing near the back window, looking as if someone just kicked him in the seat of the pants. He has one hand resting on the back of a hip, and the other hand is scrabbling vaguely at his temple. “What is it?” he says. “What's all the racket about?”

“It's a storm, Dad,” says Abi.

“A storm,” he says. “Is it trying to tear our house apart again?”

“Something like that, yeah, Dad.”

He scratches his head. “I wish it'd stop that,” he says. “This is a good little place, ours.” He reaches out to brush his fingers over the wall.

“Dad,” Abi says – but she speaks gently – “Dad, it's a
house
.”

He looks at her and there is confusion in his eyes. “I thought it could be a home for us.”

Abi's not sure who exactly is “us.”

The house goes dark, power out.

In the back corner of a cupboard is the emergency lantern. Abi gets it, lights it, sets it on the table. Dad standing there looking lost bothers her, and she motions to him to take a seat. He does, stares at the light for the longest moment, and then lays his head down on his arms.

“Dad,” she says. No response. “
DAD
!” She pushes at his shoulder.

The house sways and she can feel the river suck at them, but no. It spits them back out before they're in. In the front of the cutlery drawer, there is a small flashlight. She takes that and, leaving Dad at the table, head-on-his-arms-old-man, she makes her way to the back door, struggles with the wind to open it, and steps out, follows the railings on the walkway wharf, glad for the extra nails in them now. Water sloshes over her feet, as she moves onto the hinged dock, and the whole thing sways. There it is, the greenhouse, rocking, one corner
right out of the water for a moment, then the other. She holds tight and watches, a sort of prayer tumbling through her head.

She'd like to be in that greenhouse one more time, in the middle of a sunny afternoon, surrounded by tomato smell. Maybe that was all her mother wanted: that smell. Now, in the deep blue-black of the world around her, and the dark grey churn of the water, she can almost see the figure of Mum inside the frame of the thing, bending over those stupid tomatoes.
Those damned stupid tomatoes.
Abi grips the railing and moves hand over hand down to the end of the dock as the water foams and clutches at her. The greenhouse thrusts toward and away from the dock. There's a boom sound, then a wrench, then boom, a splash with every boom, then that sucking sound, liquid yawn with hidden teeth. Then a last sickening wrench, and the dock under Abi's feet moves so fast. She screams as her feet scramble, slide, and scramble back.

Just in case. Just in case.
Mum had those extra chains on
just in case
. But it's gone now. The chains have broken free, a board has come loose from the dock where Abi stands, and there goes the greenhouse. Lightning makes the last bits of glass silver-white. A deadhead strikes the side, makes it bobble as it goes. Abi imagines she can hear the breaking of more glass – but she can't really have heard in all that fury. Thunder. Rain sluices over her, and she realizes that her arms are aching from
hugging the railing. In the same moment she realizes the very dock she is standing on is attached to the wharf nearer the house with hinges as old as the greenhouse chains. And she should move. She arm-over-arms back up to the house, pulls the back door open, slips inside before the wind hammers it closed behind her, and she stands there, forehead against the window, breathing as if she's just been beaten. It's gone. In her there's an ache.

“Dad?”

Dad is still at the table, unmoved. Abi sits on the nearby chair. She can hear the wall clock still ticking with its battery. But the
TV
is silenced with the power out. The phone won't work either.

She leaves the table to search in the kitchen drawer. She'd thrown that card from Colm in it. Must still be there. There it is. She pushes it into her pocket. Colm will help Dad; she can't. There's something else she has to do.
Just in case.

She pulls a long raincoat from the hook by the front door, over her wet clothes, and she takes up the bicycle by the front door.

There is almost no traffic on River Road, not in these conditions, with all the lights out, and the blinding rain, and she can ride the bike on the concrete. Cars are actually stopped, waiting for the worst to pass, as she makes her way along. The wind is behind her, though at times it buffets from her left,
pushing her toward the water.
Just in case
. That is the rhythm she pedals to.
Just in case.
Seems like a long time before she reaches town, and she pedals on from where she'd turn off to Horace's. She pedals to the yellow and orange house. There's only one crack of light between the curtains of the front room, and there is no truck.
No – he's taken him with him. It's all okay. He won't be here.
But behind all those words that Abi tells herself, there's still the
just in case, just in case…

She climbs off the bicycle, her knees stiff with damp, and goes to the curtain opening.
Just in case
. There on the couch is Dyl, huddled under a blanket, his knees up to his chest. He has a thick flashlight in his hands. He's been holding it long enough for the light to be waning, yellowing.

She raps gently on the window. She doesn't want to scare him. Though the sound is not loud, he hears it immediately, as if he's expecting her. He gathers up his blanket and goes to the door, where she meets him. As ever, he stands back when he first sees her, and she resists the urge to grab him and wrap her arms around his little body.

She kneels. “Where's your dad, Dyl?”

“Hopital,” he says. He's frowning.

She finds a candle and matches with the light that is still in the flashlight. And she finds a cell phone left on the coffeetable and calls the hospital, asks if a Jude Arden is visiting Lily Arden.

The voice on the other end is a careful one. She won't give anything away when Abi says, no, she isn't family. But she does say that Jude left at dinnertime. So he hasn't been back to the hospital since before Abi was there. Abi doesn't ask about Lily: the woman's voice tells her, and she has to fight a sob as she hangs up.

“Did your dad make you something to eat?” she asks Dyl.

“Peanut butter,” is all he says. So it could be that he's made his own food. She pours a glass of milk and finds a banana for him, and they sit at the table. Her mind shivers with questions, her body with cold.
What to do?
Dyl is shivering, too, with his blanket off.

“I have something for you,” she says suddenly.
Of course.
She goes to the bicycle just outside the door and grabs the plastic bag, brings it in and unwraps Ernestine's apron. “A sweater.” She holds it up. It feels chilled, but not wet. She warms it in her hands.

Dyl stands close beside her and touches the green wool.

She pulls it onto his arms, does up the buttons.

He puts his arms around her.
Bring on the Velcro,
she thinks.
Oh yeah, this is how it should be – none of this keeping to the corners. There's too much feeling scared. But now what is she going to do? Wait until Jude comes back…from wherever? Then he'll just yell at her and tell her to go away. And if she leaves…alone…she knows the answer to that…
Dyl's still holding onto her, and she
to him.
Velcro-kid
. She holds him tighter, fiercely, then frees him, and sits back on her heels, wondering what to do.

She looks at the phone again.
Manda.
Abi dials her cell number.

“You'll have to speak louder!” Amanda shouts. In the background, there are party sounds. “My phone's gonna die. Are you okay?”

“I'm okay, but…”

In the background now, there is a flurry of greetings, laughter. “Oh my,” Abi can hear Amanda saying, then there are snuffly sounds as if a hand is over the phone, and Amanda's voice is low and muffled. “I can't believe who just walked in – Abi, it's Jude.”

Abi cuts her off. “He just got there? Is he planning on being there a while?”

“What's that? I can hardly hear…a while? Yeah, looks like. He's got a half sack he's putting in the cooler. Look, the phone is dying. Do you want me to come and pick you up?”

“No, I'll stay here for now.”

“I can come and get you…anytime.”

Her friend's kindness chokes Abi. “Thanks,” she manages to get out, and then she hangs up.

“Dad?” Dyl is standing right behind her.

“Uh…no,” says Abi, uncomfortable with even half-truths with him. “I was talking to my friend Amanda.”

He nods, so solemnly, and she looks at him. She feels the greenhouse ache again, and recognizes another. The ache that she's carried for the past year, the ache that's been a part of her. The greenhouse ache is nothing more than that one coming loose – Abi looks at Dyl and it all swells inside her with the surging push of river water.
My mum isn't coming back. And your dad will – eventually – maybe too late – but then he'll go away again, won't he?

Dyl's such a little person, he could fit scrunched in her bicycle basket, for God's sake. He's got to be missing his grandma so much.
It's just not right…it's just not right.
Abi makes her decision. She scoops him up, grabs the blanket from the couch, wraps it around him, and takes him outside. He does fit inside the basket. She puts her floppy rain hat on his head, and they go, the rusty bicycle slow at first.

Now if we could just fly up in the air and ride the face of the moon!

This night there is no moon.

The wind isn't so driving; the rain is steady, but is no longer biting into her face. But where to go. She turns to her house on the river, when she stops.
Not there
. She turns back. Amanda's is too far, though she could call. No, she can't involve them. She's crazy.
I'm crazy – what am I doing?
Running: that's the answer. She's running away. Some people run away successfully, with no one knowing where they're
gone.
But they don't take a child with them, especially someone else's child.
Abi hadn't quite thought about it like that before.
Kidnapping.
Is it kidnapping when you're taking a child no one seems to want? At least, no one alive.
The ache is for Lily, too.
She doesn't want to think about Lily right now.

She's pedalling back toward town. If only Horace was around – to think that the one time he leaves town… Wait a minute.
His house is empty.
She takes a wide turn, and pedals faster, faster. It's different, pedalling with weight, and she has to hold onto the handlebars tightly because the front of the bike wants to turn.

Dyl hasn't said anything more. Maybe he doesn't ask too many questions. Maybe he's learned just to accept. Aren't two-year-olds supposed to question everything? Maybe he did the Velcro thing extra well because he didn't get to do the other.

She rides the bicycle down the driveway. Somehow – and it shouldn't be – the dark house is a shock. She hadn't realized that the warmth of Horace's home was Horace. She climbs off the bike and carefully wheels it in behind the house, glad for the tall hedges that guard the property. She wonders if he had time to tell his neighbours that he was going away. She's never done anything like this: this sneaking around, this…
scheming
. She lifts bundled Dyl out of the basket and carries him up to the back porch and settles him on the
wicker loveseat there. “This is where my friend Horace lives,” she tells him.

Earlier that day, she noticed Horace locking up a door in the basement. The door is set in a step, in a recess under the porch, and there are nine small panes of glass in it. It'll be easy enough to break the one closest to the door handle. Not easy, to find a rock in the dark, but she does. One edging the garden by the back wall. She wraps Ernestine's apron around it, makes it so that she can swing it and keep her hand away from the glass. She misses the first time – pulls back on it – and then the second, there's a shattering, and she can't reach right away for the inside knob because, just for a second, she sees the greenhouse. It's what she's always going to associate with breaking glass, isn't it? Then she reaches in and unlocks the door, opens it.

Now
this
is dark. She's never been in this part of the house, so she doesn't have the slightest idea where anything is. She can reach up and feel ceiling studs right over her head, so she knows it is one of those old-house basements, more like a cellar. If there are windows, they're small and they let in no light whatsoever. She feels around the doorway for a switch, but there is none. She wonders if the power is out in this part of town too. She gropes forward, her thoughts with the bundled Dyl up on the porch above her.
Please don't follow me.
She trips over something. A large brick? She moves her
feet forward very slowly after that, feels ahead of her. Before she finds anything of a light, she reaches the bottom stair.
Yes.
Up, holding the narrow railing. Another doorknob, pull. It's locked! From the other side. She pulls hard. Harder, as if it's going to help. Kicks. Just on the other side of that door, inches away, is a kitchen with the most beautiful table in the world, is food, is a stove for hot chocolate. Just a few feet from all that, is a porch door, with Dyl curled up waiting for her.

She sits on the top step.
No.
She wants to cry, but she can't.
You've got to think, Abi.
How long has it been since she talked with Amanda? An hour? Jude is going to go home eventually, and he's going to find Dyl not home, and he's going to call…the police. What is she going to do? Run away forever?
What if she takes him and finds her mother?
The thought hardly crosses her mind and she's stomping on it, putting it out.
Is she crazy?
At this point, she could take him back, wait for Jude to be there for him, then just pedal home, go to bed…