Sliver Moon Bay: The Looking (6 page)

The boots are facing each other
off. Chris has his steel caps on. Drake doesn’t. I see how this is
going to pan out. There will be blood. But first.

‘Look at this, dad. You know
where I found it? — Look at it, man!’

‘Calm down, son. This has
nothing to do with me.’

‘Doesn’t it? You know where I
found it.’

‘No. I really don’t so why
don’t you tell me.’

‘In your shed. In. Your. Shed.
This. How do you explain it?’

‘I don’t have to explain
anything to you, son. I didn’t steal this or anything else from
you, which is more than can be said about you.’

‘Don’t go there, man. This shit
here is what we’re talking about. Are you telling me that you
didn’t take this and hide it in your shed?’

‘That’s what I’m saying,
yes.’

‘I don’t believe you.’

‘I don’t care. I know where
you’re going with this and you’re way off, Chris. Way off. Let me
ask you something, son. What were you doing in my shed?’

Chris makes a sound, an
impatient sound, the sound he makes when he’s telling you that
you’re talking shit, that you’re skirting around the important
issues and basically wasting his time. I know he’ll not answer old
Drake.

Old Drake gets it, after three
elephants’ worth.

‘I think we’re done here, son.
Go home and take this thing with you. I don’t want it around.’

‘I can’t take this home. Look
at it!’

The boots are tapping a little
jig now. Some bodies are nervous. Don’t know about Drake but it’s
always a good sign, to see Chris tapping. Still, this isn’t going
how I thought it might. A lot of useless time is passing passively
by. Why aren’t they fighting? Chris should be beating old Drakey
into a pulp. Instead, they’re talking. Continuing to talk.

‘Don’t do anything stupid, son.
This has nothing to do with me. You need to look elsewhere to find
answers.’

Chris’s boots are dancing up a
storm. Oh goodie, he’s rearing to go.

‘I’m warning you, man. I know I
owe you but this is too much. I’ll see you near my place, my kids
again, I will kill you.’

Chris turns and walks, across
the living room, right in my line of vision, towards the front
door. His boots are angry. They stomp across the floor, making it
groan. But now he’s out the door and the boots can vent their anger
on something out there. RIP Assassin. The fool. This can’t have a
good ending.

16

The old man hung about in the
kitchen for a bit and then he left out the back door, shuffled off
grunting, back to the shed, back to his dope. I bolted home right
after. Starling was still asleep and Lilian and Chris nowhere in
the house. Just as well.

Lilian returns, eventually.
She’s hiding her pictures somewhere on her person. Probably behind
the bunch of flowers she’s picked along the path, on the beach. She
tells me she had a lovely walk but I can see she’s nervous. She
goes inside and calls Chris. I’m not hearing a word but I can
imagine, I
know
, what she’s going on about. You’ve got to do
something, Chris! He’s been spying on our children. Taking
photographs. Of the girls, when they’re alone, playing on the
beach. WHAT — THE — FUCK — FOR? I see her mouthing it from here.
She, of course, is hiding in the kitchen, smoking a fag and pacing
up and down, looking out the window, surreptitiously, on the brink
of a momentous decision. It’s a bad movie she’s in. I’ll bet my
life she’s thinking about doing something stupid, something Chris
and her will regret later. Ah, well, at least she knows what she’s
doing, for once. She’s feeling it, for sure. The sense of
deja
vu
must be overwhelming. Yes, she’s been in this moment before
and now it’s happening again. But she has a hero and he’ll sort
everything out. He thinks. She hopes. I know.

17

She slaps the photographs on
the table.

‘Take a look at this! This is
how your father spends his time!’

He’s looking at them but he’s
not pleased with the tone of her voice, I imagine. I’m shut up in
my room, as usual, when this sort of thing goes on, late at
night.

‘I’ll talk to him.
Tomorrow.’

‘Tomorrow might be too late.
You want to wait until he’s noticed that some of these have
disappeared? You want to give him time to get rid of the rest? What
if he hides them somewhere? Tomorrow you might not be able to prove
anything.’

She’s looking at him
accusingly, I’ll bet. Challenging him cause she’s a mummy tiger
today.

‘Do something, for Christ’s
sakes! We can’t allow him to continue with this! Don’t you want to
know why he’s doing it?’

He’s looking at her, seriously
studying her as if to decide how to handle her, in this very
delicate situation.

‘Okay. I’ll deal with it now.
Go to bed, Lilian.’

He gathers the pictures, I
imagine, locks them into his desk drawer. He’s putting his boots
on. Next, he’ll get a knife from the shed, the big one he takes
with him when he goes fishing, and he’ll set off to see the old
man.

Well, that’s how I figured the
conversation might have gone; I really don’t know cause I slept
through it. It had been a trying evening long before this took
place.

It started early when Starling
had a fit at dinner. She wanted her pink dress. Lilian had no
answers so Starling played her a tune. Chris blamed Lilian. Said
she was a sloppy housekeeper, didn’t know where her head was half
the time. He was right of course but he shouldn’t have said
anything. Anyway, Lilian took Starling and put her to bed. I had to
clean up the kitchen. Chris went outside to think. He smoked the
old man’s dope and watched the Moon rise until it sat like a big
fat cotton ball on the top of the trees. I saw it through the
kitchen window and wished I was down at the beach. If I were lucky,
it might have fallen on me.

Later on, they talked about the
old man in the kitchen after I went to bed. I heard them despite
the elephants between us cause they didn’t keep their voices down.
Lilian was drinking and Chris smoked, inside, so they were pretty
upset about everything that’s happened. Chris thought the old dude
was going off the rails, for real this time, and they conspired
against him and planned something stupid that would teach him. To
take pictures of little girls. To kill little girls’ pets. To—I
don’t know what. But this can’t happen, whatever it is they’re
planning. I don’t want to move from this house, leave the beach or
Cuckoo Island. I can do what I want here. Even school’s bearable
here. So I’m gonna have to get involved.

I put my plan into action as
soon as those two clowns are gone to bed. Sneaking out of the house
at this hour is exciting and I’m thinking it’s my lucky day. I got
hold of Chris’s key to the old man’s house. He’s had it for a long
time but he never said how it came to be. I guess he has his
secrets too. He carries the key in his jean’s pocket. And he left
his jeans on the bathroom floor. Go figure. It’s meant to be.

It’s a calm, starry night. The
Moon’s up, an enormous gigantic marble sitting quite low, looking
down at me, egging me on. He’s keen to see me do my thing tonight.
I get to the house. It’s dark and quiet and I imagine old Drake,
snoring in his bed. He’ll have the window open and I’ll be able to
hear it. Of course, the bedroom window is closed. Well, never mind;
the key won’t make a sound. I’ll sneak in, undetected, and take all
the pictures. I’ll leave, undetected, and nobody will ever know.
Tomorrow, Chris and Lilian won’t find nothing. Not. A. Thing.
Neither will the old man. Everybody will have to kiss and make up.
And we’ll all stay put.

It’s a good plan and it works.
The key turns in the lock noiselessly. RIP Assassin under his tree,
also noiseless. Old man—nowhere to be found. From the bedroom
doorway I can see the bed’s made up; it’s not been slept in this
very night. So where is old Drake if not in beddy-byes? He’s not
here at all. His crossbow is. And that’s a good thing. He’ll not be
killing little girls’ pets tonight.

18

The pictures weren’t there. The
cookie jar was empty, completely utterly empty. So the old man
knows they’re onto him. He’s done the right thing cause now I won’t
have to steal his pictures to keep him out of trouble. Tomorrow,
when Chris shows up, he’ll be too late. The evidence is gone.
Except there’s still the pictures in Chris’s desk drawer. Ah, well,
that problem can easily go away. But first things first. I’d better
leave before the old goat gets home and finds me here. All alone.
Defenceless. What would happen to me then, huh? —Exactly.

I got home, put the key back in
Chris’s pocket and went to bed. I fell asleep, eventually, which I
shouldn’t have. But you know how it is. Shit happens. And not just
in my dreams.

And so she comes to me.

‘Sarah! Sarah!
Saraaaaaaaaaah!’

I hear her. She’s appeared, as
always, come to haunt me. But she’s different tonight, not herself.
There’s no Emily here tonight. No Fairy either. Tonight she’s a
banshee, screeching. Her wings are flaming red and she’s blind. In
the dark, she can’t see a thing.

‘Sarah! Where are you?’

The door to my room bursts
open. Behind her, flames. F. Lames.

‘Sarah! The house’s on
fire!’

Lilian grabs hold of me and we
both stagger out just as Chris kicks Starling’s door open.

‘Starling!’

He’s frantic. Starling!
Starling! Starling! Starling!
Staaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaarling!

But she’s not there. Starling
isn’t in her bed, under it, above it, under the desk or on it,
isn’t hiding behind the curtains or the desk and the wardrobe is
gaping open too. Empty. Empty. Empty. Our baby Starling has flown
the coop.

The fire takes hold of
everything, uniformly. But we all cope differently. I’m burning.
Burning from the inside out, I’m scorched from my intestines to the
tips of my fingers. Lilian’s unconscious; she’s floating about the
space like an astronaut disappearing into blackness. Chris is high
on fear, adrenaline and pure energy. He splits himself into a
hundred, thousand, million rampaging men, performing feats of
courage and strength everywhere at once. But Starling has flown the
coop and left us burning in hell.

Chris tears through the house
like a fireball, diving into Starling’s room once again. The
ceiling gives, the space explodes. Outside, I put my arms around
Lilian. She’s in her silk bra and panties. Oh, so they’ve been
busy. That, of all things, on a night like this. Poor Lilian. She’s
on the ground, unaware. She knows nothing of this great bonfire
swallowing her life. It’s a big fire; it’s lit up the sky, shamed
the Moon. He’s gone somewhere, to sulk, leaving me here alone,
remembering Chris. He’ll always be orange to me now. And I don’t
know how I’m going to tell Lilian.

It turns out I won’t have to.
Chris staggers out, smouldering but alive. Old Drake appears, dives
into the house that is now freely collapsing around him. The man
doesn’t seem to care. He’s looking for his granddaughter. This is a
proper nightmare.

19

One elephant, two elephants,
three elephants, four elephants, five elephants, six elephants,
seven elephants, eight elephants, nine elephants, ten elephants…
Ready or not, Emily, here I come!

Quiet. Mummy’s looking.

Emily? Emily-darling, where are
you?

Shhh…Mummy’s looking. Mummy’s
here.

Ah! There you are! I see you! —
Good job hiding, sweetheart. Your turn to find Mummy now. Put your
hands over your face, now, sweetie. Remember? And count ten
elephants. Okay? Go.

One elephant, two elephant,
three elephant, seven elephant, TEN! — Ready or not, Mummy, here I
come!

—

‘Sarah. Sarah, can you hear
me?’

I do. I hear her. I sense she’s
hovering over me so I must have fainted, again, during gym. And
when I open my eyes, the whole class will be looking at me. She’ll
be right there, close to me. Stinking. And worried. So maybe I
won’t open my eyes. Not until they’ve all gone away. I’ll just hold
my breath.

But it’s too quiet. Nobody’s
laughing.

‘Sarah? You feeling okay? Can
you talk?’

Oh, my God. Starling!

‘Starling?’ I croak, open my
eyes.

Silly Bitch says nothing for a
bit. She sits close by, wedged in a plastic armchair, her massive
body spilling out of the gaps under the chair’s arms. Her hands are
clasped in her lap and she’s leaning towards me. Though she’s
pretty much blocking the daylight coming in through the window I
can see that she’s anxious and that I’m in a hospital room, lying
in bed.

‘Starling?’

Silly Bitch wells up. She’s
shaking her head.

‘We haven’t found her yet. But
she isn’t in the house so we’re hopeful.’

She tries to smile. To look
hopeful. But she’s not pulling it off.

‘Where’s my mum?’

I’m having trouble speaking. My
throat hurts.

‘She’s in the room next door.
She’s okay but sedated. Your dad is out, with the firefighters,
looking for your sister.’

Now I see the connection. Silly
Bitch is married to a fireman, Captain Josh he’s called, who comes
to school to show the fire truck to pre-schoolers. He’s a good guy
to have in charge of the rescue cause he’s also a policeman, one of
the two guarding law and order in Sliver Moon Bay.

‘They will find her, Sarah.
She’s not inside. The fire is out. They’ve saved most of the
house.’

I see. The house is still
standing and Starling’s not in it. That means that she’s out
somewhere, safe from the flames.