‘All right.’
Whatever I’d thought of Flo, I couldn’t fault her courage. She stood for a moment in the hallway, and I could see her hands shaking. Then she took a deep, shuddering breath, and flung open the kitchen door so hard it crashed back against the tiled wall.
There was no one there. But the glass kitchen door was standing open in the moonlight, and a light dusting of snow blew across the tiled floor.
Clare was across the room in a moment, her bare feet soft on the cold tiles. ‘There’s footsteps, look.’ She pointed out across the lawn: big shapeless prints, like those made by wellies or snowboots.
‘Fuck.’ Tom’s face was pale. ‘What happened?’ He turned to me. ‘You were out of that door last. Didn’t you lock it?’
‘I— I’m sure I did.’ I tried to remember. Nina offering to help, Flo’s angry crashing. I had a clear memory of my hand on the lock. ‘I did. I’m certain I locked it.’
‘Well, you can’t have done it properly!’ Flo rounded on me. In the moonlit dark she looked like a statue, her face as hard and unyielding as marble.
‘I did.’ I was beginning to feel angry. ‘Anyway, I thought you said Clare checked?’
‘I just rattled each door,’ Clare said. Her eyes were huge, with shadows like bruises in the sockets. ‘I didn’t check every lock. If it didn’t open, I assumed it was shut.’
‘I locked it,’ I said stubbornly. Flo made a small furious noise, almost like a growl. Then she tucked the shotgun under her arm and stalked upstairs.
‘I locked it,’ I repeated, looking from Clare to Tom. ‘Don’t you believe me?’
‘Look,’ Clare said, ‘it’s no one’s fault.’ She walked across to the door and slammed it hard, twisting the key as she did. ‘It’s damn well locked now, anyway. Let’s get up to bed.’
We trooped back up the stairs, feeling the spent adrenaline in our systems fading to sour jitters. Nina was at the top of the stairs as I rounded the landing, scrubbing her eyes confusedly.
‘What happened?’ she asked as I drew level. ‘Why did I just see Flo stamp past holding that fucking shotgun?’
‘We had a scare,’ Tom said shortly, coming up from behind me. ‘Someone,’ he glanced at me, ‘left the kitchen door unlocked.’
‘It wasn’t me,’ I said doggedly.
‘Well, whatever. It was open. We heard it banging. There were footprints outside.’
‘Bloody hell.’ Nina was as wide awake as the rest of us now. She passed a hand over her face again, rubbing the sleep out of her eyes. ‘Had they gone? Was anything missing?’
‘Nothing I noticed.’ Tom looked at me and Clare. ‘Anything you can think of? Telly was there. All the obvious stuff like that. Did anyone leave their wallets lying around? Mine’s in my room.’
‘Mine too,’ Clare said. She turned and glanced out at the drive. ‘And all the cars are still there.
‘My bag’s in my room, I think,’ I said. I put my head round the door to check. ‘Yup. It’s there.’
‘Well … looks like it wasn’t robbery they were after,’ Tom said uneasily. ‘If it wasn’t for the footsteps you could almost think it was just a faulty lock.’
But there were the footsteps. There undeniably were.
‘Think we should call the police?’ he asked.
‘We can’t, can we?’ Nina said acidly. ‘No landline and no bloody reception.’
‘You had a couple of bars yesterday,’ I reminded her, but she shook her head.
‘Must have been a blip. I’ve had nothing since. Well, look on the bright side, there’s no smell of petrol so with luck, it’s not the crazed locals with their jerry cans come back for a second bonfire.’
There was a silence. Nobody laughed.
‘We should go back to bed, try to get some sleep,’ Clare said at last. We all nodded.
‘Want to pull your mattress in with us?’ Nina said unexpectedly to Tom. ‘I wouldn’t want to be by myself.’
‘Thanks,’ Tom said. ‘That— that’s very kind. But I’ll be fine. I’ll lock my door, just in case anyone’s after my virtue. Not that I’ve got much left.’
‘That was nice,’ I said to Nina after we had said goodnight to Tom and Clare and were huddled up in our own beds. ‘What you said to Tom, I mean.’
‘Nice, schmice. I felt sorry for the poor guy. Plus he looks like he’d have a mean right hook if anyone did break in.’ She sighed, and then rolled over. ‘Want me to leave the light on?’
‘No, it’s OK. That door’s locked now – that’s the main thing.’
‘Fair enough.’ She clicked off the light and I saw the glow of her phone. ‘Gone two. Bloody hell. And still not a single bar of reception. How about you? Got anything?’
I reached for my phone.
It wasn’t there.
‘Hang on, I need to put the light on. I can’t find it.’
I flicked the switch and looked around, beneath the bed, beneath the bedside table, then inside my bag. No phone. No phone anywhere, in fact – just the unhooked charger trailing across the floor. I tried to remember when I’d last had it. In the car maybe? I remembered using it at lunchtime. But after that, I couldn’t be sure. I’d got out of the habit of checking it here – with no reception it seemed pointless. I thought I remembered taking it up here to charge it before supper, but maybe that was Friday. Most likely it had slipped out of my pocket in the car.
‘It’s not here,’ I said. ‘I think I must have left it in the car.’
‘Never mind,’ Nina said. She yawned. ‘Just remember to find it tomorrow before we leave, yeah?’
‘All right. Night.’
‘Goodnight.’
There was a rustle of duvet, as she huddled down. I closed my eyes. I tried to sleep.
What happened next …?
Oh God. What happened next. I’m not sure I can …
I am still sitting there, trying to put my confused tumble of thoughts in order when the door swings wide and the nurse comes back in pushing a trolley.
‘The doctor wants to have a wee look at your scans but he says very likely you can have a bath after that. And I’ve got some breakfast for you here.’
‘Listen,’ I try to sit up against the sliding shifting pillows. ‘Listen, the police outside the door – are they here for me?’
She looks uncomfortable and her gaze slides off to the small square of glass as she sets out Rice Crispies in a little carton, a jug of milk and a single clementine. ‘They’re investigating the accident,’ she says at last. ‘I’m sure they’ll want tae speak to you, but the doctor has to sign you off. I’ve told them, they’re not barging into a hospital ward at this hour. They’ll have tae wait.’
‘I heard …’ I swallow, hard, my throat hurting as if something is trying to escape – a sob or a scream. ‘I heard them say something about a d-death …’
‘Och!’ She looks annoyed, banging the locker drawer shut with unnecessary force. ‘They shouldna be worriting you, with your poor head.’
‘But it’s true? Someone died?’
‘I can’t say about that. I cannae discuss other patients.’
‘Is it true?’
‘I’ll have tae ask you tae calm down,’ she says, and spreads out her hands in a professionally soothing gesture that makes me want to scream. ‘It’s not good for your head to be getting upset like this.’
‘Upset? One of my friends is probably dead, and you’re telling me I shouldn’t be upset? Who? For God’s sake, who? And why can’t I remember? Why can’t I remember what happened before the accident?’
‘It’s quite common,’ she says, her voice still in that strange soothing cadence, as if she’s speaking to a small child, or someone hard of understanding. ‘Following a head injury. It’s tae do with the way the brain transfers short-term to long-term memory. If something interrupts the process you can lose a bit of time.’