at once that it came from some anonymous good Samaritan who only had everyone’s best interests at heart, even if it led to the shit hitting the fan.
Entering the front yard of the rectory, we snuck up to the front door as quietly as we could. We pushed the letter through the letter box. Just to make sure, we took turns peeking through the flap to see if it had landed squarely on the mat, in full view.
We ran all the way home, elated. There would be bangers, mash and kale for dinner tonight—it was that kind of weather—and maybe our dads would give us a few euros as a reward for the excellent report card Miss Joyce had sent home with us today.
The next day was Saturday, so we had the day off. There was a stiff breeze; it was just the day for playing Titanic. We were standing around on the village green, in the process of casting the different roles, when Lucy came storming out of the rectory, her plaits blowing straight up in the wind. Cupping her hands to her mouth like a megaphone, she bellowed, ‘Crisis! Crisis!’
We immediately stopped what we were doing.
She flopped down on the bench over by the thorn bushes. ‘I’m cooked.’
‘You don’t say,’ we said evenly, poking each other meaningfully in the ribs.
She raised her hands. Her mum! Her mum was having such a hissy fit! Miss Joyce must have phoned her yesterday afternoon to prepare her for that shitty report card, because she’d been in a terrible state when Lucy got home. She’d been apoplectic, practically purple in the face. No one had felt like cooking; there’d been nothing for dinner.
It wasn’t until late at night that Lucy screwed up the courage to show her the report card. When she read it, her mother suddenly went icy calm. Or rather, it seemed to energize her. ‘I’ll tell you one thing, Lucy,’ she said, in the tone of someone who has just had an idea that’s been a long time brewing, ‘I’m not going to sit back with my arms crossed and watch your future be jeopardized at that backward village school. You belong in a better school, in the city. Right away! We can’t afford to waste any more time, with you not learning a damn thing. I’m going to look into it at once.’
Lucy jumped down off the bench and started kicking the bushes right and left. ‘She says we’re going to move!’
We stared at her, nonplussed. ‘But she’s got the flu,’ we objected, ‘and there’s the Ten of Swords, too. Don’t tell us she …’
‘That only proves how serious she is,’ cried Lucy hoarsely. ‘But I’m not leaving, you hear? I’m going to stay here, watch me. I’ll just go into hiding. I’ll run away and go hide over at Thomas’s.’
We hastened to offer her our own basements, and then our attics, where it would be nice and snug for her because of the boiler being up there. We said we would sneak upstairs three times a day with a plate of sandwiches and a tangerine for her. We made it sound as comfy as we could, guiltily aware of the fact that Thomas’s house would be the first place they’d go look for her, thanks to our brilliant anonymous letter. Except that it was possible her mother might not have read it yet, with all this other stuff going on.
‘Lucy!’ Ludo called, standing on the rectory’s gravel path. ‘Come inside, I’ve made you a sandwich!’ With his hair blown back and his shirt collar flapping in the breeze, he cast a worried look up at the old chestnut trees in the front yard, which were creaking in the wind.
Lucy said in a low voice, ‘I’m running away tonight. When my mother thinks I’m asleep.’ Then she turned and ran inside.
-
D is for Death
The wind picked up even more toward evening. In the gardens the bamboo swished back and forth. Rain exploded against the windows like water bombs. ‘It’s nasty out there,’ said our mothers, closing the drapes and lighting candles. They padded around in stocking feet, neatly folding the scattered newspapers, plumping the sofa cushions, and rearranging the chrysanthemums in the vase on the table, to show the elements they weren’t scared.
This had a contagious effect on our fathers. They got up to inspect the window sashes and door hinges. They opened the fuse box and peered inside a while. Then, rubbing their hands, they poured themselves a well-deserved beer and a glass of sherry for Mum. ‘Come on, love, come and sit down here.’ They were always at their best as a couple in what they considered an emergency.
They were so clueless that it took your breath away. They hadn’t the faintest idea of the real dangers lurking everywhere, all the time. They were like Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden, ignorant of evil. But we had long ago decided there was no point disabusing them of their illusions. It would be as mean as picking up a defenceless kitten by the scruff of the neck and dangling it out the attic window. If we shared with our parents what we knew about life and the universe and all that, they wouldn’t know what hit them.
It was endearing, but annoying too, at times.
We sat down next to them on the couch. We sipped our hot chocolate. We agreed that the new Honda in the shiny brochure was really something. We talked about the sales coming up. We whined a bit when it was time for bed. But our thoughts were with Lucy the whole time.
Once under the covers, we anxiously listened to the howling wind. It was a wind that never died down, an angry, stubborn wind. We pictured the wind tugging at Lucy’s hair as she clambered out of her attic window. Arms akimbo, she balanced in the gutter, her plaits whipping around her face like snakes, her clothes flapping in the gale.
We jumped out of bed, grabbed the first stuffed animal we could reach from the sill, and dove under the blankets again. Suddenly, the thought of Mum and Dad sitting downstairs, chatting about trivialities without the foggiest notion of what was happening, gave us a safe feeling, as if there really was nothing to worry about. But their innocence wouldn’t stop Lucy from sliding down the gutter spout. It wouldn’t prevent the wet ivy from slapping her in the face, making her lose her grip on the slippery downpipe and land on the ground with a crash.
‘Ouch,’ she squealed, scrambling to her feet in the rectory garden. Her face drawn in pain and apprehension, she shook her wrists a few times and then bent down to feel her knee.
Just then a thin wedge of light flashed across the lawn; someone pulling back the living-room curtains a crack. Lucy promptly pressed her back up against the wall. Was it her mother looking out the window, squinting into the darkness? Or was it one of the Luducos, wondering what had fallen off the roof? It could have been anything. A dead limb ripped off a tree by the wind. The lid of a dustbin careening through the yard. An exhausted crow tumbling out of the bruised sky. Going out to inspect the damage really wasn’t a very appealing prospect in this filthy weather. The curtain was drawn shut again.
Just to make sure, Lucy waited a while longer. Over the howling of the wind she could now hear the voices in the living room, that’s how loud and angry they were. She listened, aghast. There was a huge fight going on in there, an argument that matched the storm in its ferocity and made the walls quake. The whole house shook like a nuclear-power plant about to blow. Why were her mother and the Luducos screaming at each other, when normally they were the most conciliatory people in the entire world? It sounded as if things were being said that were better left unsaid, sour recriminations that had been pent up for so long that they’d begun to ferment and were now being spewed out in one big belch. The harsh words just kept coming; Lucy couldn’t make head or tail of what they were saying, it was all just a great barrage of fury. Maybe she should go back inside and tell a funny joke or something. But just as she was considering that option, she heard, clear as a bell, her own name yelled
