The Bone Dragon (26 page)

She leans forwards, hunching over her mug, and I know that what’s coming next is the thing that’s really bothering her. ‘I’m worried that my dad’s going to get like that too,’ she says, running the words together so fast it takes me a moment to grasp what she’s saying. ‘I’m worried that he’s going to keep forgetting me and . . .’ Her face screws up and the next words jerk with the hiccups of suppressed sobs. ‘And I know I’m b-being s-silly because it was j-just once and it w-was only p-picking me up from school but . . .’

In my pocket, my hand closes around the Dragon.

‘Your dad’s not going to be like that, Phee. He loves you.’

‘I know,’ Phee says, screwing her face up even further and licking snot off her lip.

I pass her the tissue box, taking her mug while she blows her nose then mops her face.

‘I know my dad loves me but your grandparents loved you too and I know old people are a bit dippy sometimes but . . .’

I lean forward and press the mug back into her hands. She frowns at me as she sips. ‘Your dad isn’t anything like my . . . like Fiona’s family,’ I say.

Phee doesn’t get it of course. She frowns, and draws in a breath, and her shoulders go up as she prepares to get angry at me for being confusing.

‘I didn’t hurt my ribs in a car crash,’ I tell Phee. ‘One day . . . one day I’ll tell you about it. You and Lynne. But you’ll have to promise you won’t tell anyone. I mean, I won’t care if you tell your parents, but you’ll have to promise not to tell anyone at school. Not anyone at all.’

‘What do you . . . ?’ Phee starts, looking even more confused.

It makes me smile, even as I ache. But I’m glad that Phee doesn’t get it. She’ll probably guess later, but it’ll take her a while. And I love that it will, even though it makes me feel . . . I don’t follow the thought any further.

How I wish I could un-know all the things that make me so very different from Phee and Lynne. Sooner or later, they’ll have to learn about those things too – at least learn about them through other people’s stories. But not yet. And I wish that even though I
can’t
un-know any of it, I could at least remember what not-knowing was like.

‘Anyway, that’s not important now,’ I say. ‘It doesn’t matter today. The important thing is that it wasn’t my . . . it wasn’t Fiona getting ill that stopped them from taking me to the hospital. It wasn’t an issue of what they realised and what they didn’t.’

Phee has gone rather still. ‘Evie . . .’ she says.

‘Not today, Phee,’ I say, and find that I’ve pushed aside my envy and my longing and that it’s not as hard as I would have thought to say what Phee needs to hear. ‘I know you’d listen, but not today. You can ask me all the questions you want about Fiona being sick, but I’ve told you all you need to know about the fact that your dad will notice if you come home ill or hurt: if anything happens to you, he’ll notice. He might forget to pick you up a few more times, but you can always just come home with me or Lynne a bit more often.’

Phee leans forwards then and puts her hand on mine, weaving our fingers together.

‘I need you to remind me how lucky I am, Evie,’ she says in this strange tone that’s all urgent and soft at the same time. ‘I need you to remind me that my parents are great and so are my aunts and uncles and my grandparents. I’ve got lots of people who love me and would give me a new home if I ever needed one. And I’m not even going to, because my mum’s going to be fine and anyway I’ve got my dad.’ She gives me a smile that is weary with tears, but her eyes are calm and wise. ‘I need you to remind me, Evie. Lynne will fuss when I need someone to, and God knows my aunts will smother me. But I need you to remind me.’

I don’t think I can speak.

For a moment, the relief is scalding:
I’m not so different and distant from Phee and normal people after all.

Then it runs cold.

Because I
am
different. Or I was, until a few minutes ago.

All I meant to do was help Phee to understand: to give what was in my gift . . . But Phee didn’t know what she was asking. And I did. Because
that
is the difference between us. Or it was.

People get it wrong when they talk about innocence: they think it’s something to do with ignorance about the facts of sex and all the nasty things that happen in the world. But facts don’t change people: it’s understanding how the facts
feel
that does.

Only stupid people think innocence is some weird state of not-knowing that children grow out of once they start to understand innuendo. Or maybe it’s not that they’re stupid: maybe it’s just that in some weird grown-up way they
are
still innocent. Because otherwise they’d know better: they’d understand, even if they couldn’t really explain it, that innocence is so much bigger. It’s every aspect of the life you have before you know how precious and wonderful it is to be ignorant. It’s all the time you spend rushing, rushing to
know
, never expecting to find grief waiting beside knowledge.

I just wanted to help.

But suddenly Phee and I aren’t quite so different any more. I’ve closed the gap between us – at least a little – in trying to be kind.

I don’t know why I am drawn back to the graveyard tonight of all nights, but I’m not even halfway across the golf-course green opposite when I hear shouts and see torch beams darting in the darkness. I hurry to the wall. Peering past the yew tree, I wonder if I dare move closer to find out which grave they’re celebrating over. I’m almost tempted to go and ask . . .

No
, commands the Dragon, breath warm on my ear.
We must not be seen
.

Still, I creep over to the gate and stare down at the mechanism, trying to figure out if I can open it without being heard. Only I realise then that the other people are in a different bit of the graveyard from last time. A completely different bit from where Adam and Aunt Minnie and Grandad Peter and Nanna Florrie’s graves are . . .

Flash!

Flash! Flash! Flash!

I’m crouching behind the cover of the wall, gripping the edge of the gatepost with one hand and staring through the bars, before I’ve even registered the need to move. The Dragon’s claws prick the skin over my collarbone.

The shouting is panicked now, fearful and angry.

Flash! Flash! Flash!

Camera flashes, I realise. Someone’s taking pictures.

But it’s not part of the group who were shouting earlier. They’re running now, those people. Running and cursing. One of them has dropped his torch. In its light I see a man in a red bomber jacket snatch at the sleeve of a man in a black hoodie.

‘There’s only two of ’em! Come ’n’ help me get them cameras!’ the man in the red jacket is yelling, the beer bottle in his hand streaming glowing liquid as he gestures.

‘We’ve called the police,’ someone shouts from the darkness.

The man in the black hoodie curses, shrugging off Red Jacket’s hand, and lumbers away across the graveyard.

Red Jacket stands swaying for a moment, then flinches away as the cameras flash again. He hurls the beer bottle wildly into the darkness. I hear it smash against a gravestone between the curses Red Jacket screams into the night. I watch him turn, slipping in the mud and falling to his knees before he finally scrambles away. The gate on the other side of the graveyard clangs.

The men with the cameras have turned their torches on now and are playing them across the ground as they move closer to where the group was sitting.

Flash! Flash!

A sigh. ‘Doesn’t look like that bottle’s done any damage at least,’ one of the cameramen calls.

Flash!

‘Just the torch and some spray-paint cans here. They obviously didn’t have time to really get started,’ says Uncle Ben.

I can see it’s him now in the light of the torch the vandals dropped.

I watch, frozen, as Paul joins him and together they stare down at the mess between the graves.

‘Let’s go, just in case they decide to come back,’ Paul says after a moment. ‘We don’t want to lose the photos now.’

But they don’t make any move to go.

‘I don’t like to leave it like this, even for the police,’ Uncle Ben says, casting his torch about the ground. ‘When you call the vicar to tell him not to clear up until the police have been, make sure you say I’ll get them down first thing when I go to drop off the cameras. And tell him I’ll stay after to put everything to rights.’

They sigh in unison.

‘Right then,’ says Paul.

I watch them turn away, the light of their torches fading. I listen for the sound of car doors slamming, an engine starting up. Only then do I set off down the path. My feet went numb while I was crouching by the gate and now, although I know I should hurry – should be sprinting back home as fast as my legs will carry me – the best I can manage is a shambling trot.

Finally, finally, I can see the garden through the woods and . . . Yes! The kitchen light is off! No Paul and Uncle Ben at the table under my window . . .

I’ve just reached the edge of the trees when the side gate opens. I throw myself to the ground in the shadow of the berberis, heart jolting against my ribs.

Footsteps on the paving stones. Two sets of footsteps on the paving stones. The dull scrape of chairs being pulled out from under the garden table. The jangle of keys, the click-putt of the lock and the faint squeak of the back door opening. Then footsteps again and the zisht-phut-scurr of a bottle opening. And another. A clink of glass against glass.

‘To success against the odds!’ Uncle Ben crows.

‘And the triumph of hope over experience,’ Paul adds ruefully, though the pride in his voice renders the words exultant. ‘The police will be able to use the photos, won’t they? You’re positive there won’t be any trouble with it, right?’

‘You’re really going to start worrying about that
now
?’

‘I just don’t want to get all excited over nothing and then . . .’

‘You, my friend, have been married to my sister for far, far too long. It is obvious that whatever she has is catching. I can only hope that Evie takes after me in terms of resistance to this fantastical ability to worry over every possible thing under the sun.’

‘So you still don’t think we should tell Amy, even now it’s over?’

Uncle Ben groans.

‘No, be serious a minute, Ben,’ Paul snaps. ‘What if a police officer calls up about it?’

‘That’s why we’re going to give them
my
number. Look, Paul, I know you’ve got this whole adrenalin-rush thing going on,’ Uncle Ben says without a trace of deprecation, ‘but please just sit there quietly drinking your beer and enjoying this.’

‘It just doesn’t feel right to keep it from Amy. She’s got as much right . . .’

‘Of course she does. That’s not the point, Paul. The point is that you don’t honestly believe any good could come of telling my sister that the graveyard where Adam is buried, where our parents and my Minnie are buried, is a target for vandalism. That it has actually
been
vandalised. If you want your wife camping out every night over the graves to guard them, you be my guest, but you can’t expect me to like it since she’s my sister too and I’d rather she didn’t get pneumonia, or have any more things to obsess over.’

Paul sighs. I lift my head just enough to see him drink deeply from his bottle. ‘You know I agreed with you while we didn’t have any certain way of stopping it, but now that we have the photos and the police can identify those . . . those
delinquents
. . . Now, it just feels like something I’m keeping from her.’

‘For good reason. For God’s sake, Paul. I was married too, you know: I get it. But keeping the odd secret from Minnie – especially about stuff that was only going to upset her – well, it didn’t seem like anything more than what a sensible person should do to protect someone he loves. Secrets aren’t bad in themselves, Paul. People don’t need to know everything.’

‘But it’s our
son
, Ben. Ours. Not just mine.’

‘See, this is exactly why I said you should talk to Evie. You have to know she’d tell you exactly the same thing. You just might believe it from her. And you know she can keep secrets. Evie can keep secrets better than both of us put together.’ His voice trails off into a sigh. ‘You need to be able to talk to someone about Adam, Paul. And if Amy’s still not ready, then maybe you should consider the fact that Evie might like to know a bit about her brother.’

Paul makes a funny noise then: something I can’t identify.

‘Maybe she really would see him that way if you let her, Paul. If you told her about him, made him alive to her: let her help keep him alive for you.’

‘Don’t, Ben,’ Paul says then, so softly I can barely make the words out. ‘Don’t.’

Uncle Ben reaches out to grasp Paul’s shoulder. ‘Amy’s not the only one who lost him. And, yes, she needs to do what she needs to do. But you need to think about what you need too. Evie’s a smart girl, Paul. Smart and brave and strong.’

‘Evie has enough grief of her own . . .’

‘Telling her about yours doesn’t necessarily mean saddling her with it, Paul. Maybe it would do Evie good to see that you recognise how strong she is. Stop trying to protect her from everything.’