I hid it in my treasure box when I was in my room. I held my photos of Mum for a little and had another small weep, but then I put the box away. I just lay on my bed with my head buried in my pillow.
I wished I could start the day all over again. I’d wake up in a sweet mood and be kind to everyone, even Elsie, and when Dad came home he’d put his arm round me and say he was really proud of me.
I heard him come in downstairs. I stayed in my room. I wondered if he’d come up and see me. I planned to fling my arms round his neck and try to explain – but he stayed downstairs.
‘Well, see if I care,’ I said to myself. I did care dreadfully. I could go running down the stairs, of course, and tell him I was sorry. But I’d have to apologize to Izzie too, and I couldn’t bear to do that.
So I stayed where I was, even though I could hear everyone in the kitchen, obviously starting lunch. Then when I did hear footsteps it was only Clover, bringing a tray of food for me.
‘It’s tomato soup and a cheese sandwich,’ she announced. ‘And Izzie’s made a giant chocolate Swiss roll too, but she says you don’t deserve a slice. I tried to smuggle you half of mine, but Izzie saw.’
I said a very rude word to describe Izzie.
‘Hmm!’ said Clover, giggling.
‘Is she still going to stop me going swimming?’
‘I’ll try to get round Dad,’ said Clover. ‘Surely going without yummy Swiss roll is punishment enough?’
‘You sound like Dorry!’ I said.
I ate my soup and sandwich and tried not to care that I didn’t have any cake. The children downstairs were quieter now, and I heard Dad’s voice talking and talking. I realized he was telling them a story. I felt horribly left out.
Then at last, while the kids were rushing round grabbing old towels from the airing cupboard, Dad put his head round my door.
‘Ah. The child doing penance! Dear goodness, what am I going to do with you, Katy?’ he said.
‘Can’t I really come swimming, Dad?’ I asked.
‘No, I don’t think so. Not this time,’ he said.
‘Just because I went to the wretched park! I thought you liked us going out and having fun,’ I wailed.
‘I do, but not when you’ve been expressly forbidden to go out. Surely you can see how silly that is. You can’t go waltzing off whenever you feel like it. It’s a very bad example to the others. You might be fine trotting all over the town, but imagine if little Elsie took it into her head to copy you and go out by herself.’
‘I wish she would,’ I mumbled.
‘That’s not funny. I’m tired of your silly attitude and your hostile remarks. That’s the main reason I’m not letting you come swimming. I can overlook your going to the park, but I’m not having you being so incredibly rude to poor Izzie.’
‘She’s rude to me,’ I said defiantly. ‘She’s forever nagging at me and telling me I’ve done things wrong.’
‘She’s got every right to tell you what to do. She’s your mother.’
‘No, she’s not!’ I shouted. ‘She’s only my horrible stepmother and I wish, wish, wish she wasn’t!’
Dad shook his head at me and walked away. They all went swimming. They didn’t even say goodbye to me.
I sprang up and thumped our bedroom wall in fury, but I just hurt my hand. I prowled round and round the room, muttering wretchedly to myself, and nearly tripped over the big coil of rope in the corner. Then I knelt down beside it, thinking about my tree in the secret garden. I felt instantly calmer.
That was where I was going to go while they were all off enjoying themselves without me! I’d have just as good a time all by myself. I’d make myself a swing.
I wound the rope round and round me in a business-like fashion and strode purposefully downstairs. I seized one of Izzie’s sharp kitchen knives in case I needed to cut the rope to the right size. I went out into the garden, down the lawn, past the apple tree to the special burrow under the hedge.
It was hard to wriggle through while all bound up in rope, but I made it. I held the knife carefully, blade away from my body. I could be incredibly careful when necessary. Then I staggered to my feet in the secret garden.
I felt better immediately. I liked being there by myself. I didn’t have to sort the littlies out and deal with Elsie. I didn’t even have to share with Clover. I could just be myself. I could make up anything I wanted. I could lie in solitary splendour under the willow or dance about the tangled flowers or climb my own huge tree.
I peered up at the tree, holding the rope in both hands now. Yes, there was a long, straight, high branch which would be perfect. I just had to work out how to fashion my swing. I needed some sort of seat, didn’t I? I peered round hopefully, looking for a flattish log or a broken piece of fence, but could find nothing suitable. Still, if I were to let any of the others share my swing they might fidget on this sort of seat and end up with splinters in a very uncomfortable place.
I wasn’t sure how to attach the rope safely to a seat anyway, and I didn’t have anything to drill holes. Dad had a box of household tools but he kept it locked, with the key in his own pocket. I knew, because I’d tried to borrow the odd screwdriver or pliers in my time.
I decided my swing had better have a more elementary design. I could tie one end of the rope to the branch and then let it dangle. I could grasp it and swing backwards and forwards like Tarzan, King of the Apes. Oh yes! I felt myself flushing with excitement. It would be marvellous.
The branch was quite high up of course. I’d have to hang on tightly. It would probably be too difficult and dangerous to let the littlies have a go. I couldn’t even trust Elsie not to let go and fall. This would be a swing reserved for Clover and Cecy and me.
I wound the rope back round me and started climbing the tree. It was hard work trussed up like the Michelin Man, but I was good at climbing. I got to the biggest branch and straddled myself across it. I felt deliciously dizzy looking down. I was really high up. I was going to have the most fantastic swing. I realized it might be a bit tricky climbing back up again, but I knew how to climb a rope. I’d manage it, easy-peasy, but maybe Cecy would struggle. Clover definitely would.
Well then, this was going to be a swing just for me. I wound the end of the rope round the branch and then set about tying a good firm knot. I knew it should be a reef knot, but couldn’t quite remember how to do it. Was it left over right or right over left? But how could you do a reef knot with just one end? I did the best I could, tying one knot, then another, and then another. I tugged hard and it held perfectly.
I breathed out happily, my arms all goosebumps with anticipation. I edged back along the branch to the main trunk, hanging on to the rope. I climbed down just a little bit. My hands were slippy with sweat so I took turns wiping them one at a time on my jeans, then clasped the rope tightly in both hands – and pushed off.
Ooooooh! I swung gloriously swiftly through the air, taking off as if I were flying, further and further, and then I jerked all the way back again in a fantastic swoosh. I went forwards, backwards, higher and higher, learning how to push with my knees and propel myself. It was such a wonderful feeling, soaring and swinging, as free as a bird. I remembered Mum pushing me on the swings in the park when I was very little.
Look, Mum, I’m swinging again! Come and swing with me!
And then suddenly I was jerked sideways, the rope horribly loose, and I screamed as I realized it had somehow come untied. I was flying through the air for real, tumbling over and over, and then I landed with a terrible bone-shaking thud.
13
I woke up and stared up above me in total confusion. The ceiling of my bedroom had disappeared. The entire roof of the house had blown away. I was staring up at blue and green and brown. My eyes were blurred, but after several blinks I sorted out these colours into sky and leaves and tree trunk.
I gazed at them for several seconds, trying to make sense of my surroundings. I could hear something strange too. Something raspy a
nd scared, like some small creature caught in a trap. Was it Tyler?
I tried to call him. The panicky little sobs stuttered and broke. It was me. Why was I crying? Was I hurt? Then, immediately, I was aware of the most terrible pain in my head, my neck, my shoulders, my arms, the whole of me. It was as if a hundred giants had marched all over me, smashing and squashing every little piece of me.
Giants? I knew they were only in storybooks. So what had really happened to me? I tried very hard to remember, but there was a roaring in my head and I couldn’t manage to grab at any facts. I clenched my fists, trying to will myself to think straight, and realized I was clinging to something. It was long and snake-like and I couldn’t make sense of it. I knew it wasn’t a real snake because it was lifeless and dry. I felt little fibres with my fingertips and palms. It felt like rope.
Rope! I suddenly remembered flying through the air while clutching the rope. It was my swing. My swing – and it had broken. And now I seemed broken too.
I lay still, feeling my heart thudding violently. I needed help. Why was I on my own? Where were all the others? Had they run to fetch Dad?
‘Clover?’ My voice worked now, but it came out like a whispery croak. I tried again. ‘Clover?’
I listened. Nothing. I couldn’t believe they’d leave me on my own. All by myself. The words echoed in my head. Maybe there was a reason? But my head ached so badly I couldn’t remember. I hurt so much. I wanted to crawl back to my own house and lie down in my own bed. I tried to sit up but I couldn’t move. I couldn’t move!
Was it the rope, tying me to the ground? Was something else lying on me? What was happening?
I strained again. My arms flailed but I couldn’t get a grip on anything. I tried to dig my elbows into the grass beneath me and lever myself up that way, but my head was too heavy. I started sobbing again, even though this slight drawing of breath made me hurt even more.
I remembered all the times in the past when I’d played dead with Clover and the littlies. It was generally when I’d had a fall like this one, a way of coping with the embarrassment of it all. Instead of groaning and crying I’d lie very still, eyes shut. They’d run to me, calling my name, begging me to wake up. I’d wait until their screams got a little too high-pitched and then I’d suddenly bob up, making them gasp and then pummel me in delighted fury.
I shut my eyes now, pretending to be dead, hoping that when I willed it I’d be able to leap up laughing, but when I tried I was still stuck fast. I seemed stuck in time too. My head hurt too much to think logically, but I knew I was very cold and I certainly seemed to have been lying here on my back for a very long time. Was I dead already? Perhaps this was what death was like. No bright lights or beautiful heaven. I’d fallen from the tree and killed myself and now I was going to have to lie here forever, reliving the moment of my death for all time.
But that would mean Mum was trapped in no-time too, but she was a free spirit, watching over me at all times, able to keep me company whenever I badly needed her.
Mum? I don’t know whether I said it out loud or simply cried it in my head. She’d been with me while I was swinging through the air. Why hadn’t she caught me? Why hadn’t she stopped me when I was tying those stupid knots? Why had I done such a stupid thing when I knew I wasn’t making a proper, safe swing?
Perhaps this was all some terrible dream to help me see the consequences of my actions, a dream that might have been manufactured by Dad and Izzie to teach me a lesson. I’d had really convincing nightmares before, when I’d been left in charge of the children and I hadn’t taken care of them properly and awful things had happened to them. I’d wake up sweating, so convinced it was real that it was only when I crawled into bed beside Clover and held her tight that I’d calm down and realize it had just been a bad dream.
This was the realest dream I’d ever had, and yet maybe it was simply my overworked imagination and guilty conscience. Perhaps I was really in my own bed, dreaming after I’d cried myself to sleep. If I only willed it hard enough I could wake up and be back in the ordinary afternoon, and I’d run downstairs the moment I heard footsteps and the children’s clamour and I’d be back being Katy again.
I squeezed my eyes tight shut, counted to a hundred, and then made a supreme effort to open them properly. Not to see this static dream world of sky and tree. I must strain back to the real world of my bedroom. I knew I could do it if I just tried hard enough. I strained and strained, feeling the sweat spring out on my forehead, but the leaves stayed rustling above me.
Please! Please, help me!
Then someone said, ‘I’m coming. I’m coming!’
It was a strange, whispery voice, the sort of voice we assumed when we were trying to scare each other playing ghosts.
I listened, wondering if I’d imagined it. Then I heard a weird scraping, tapping, scraping sound, slow but constant: tap s-c-r-a-p-e, tap s-c-r-a-p-e. What was it? It was getting closer and closer. I tried to move my head again to see what was coming for me. I saw nothing for a few seconds – and then a metal leg, several legs, and feet, old-lady feet in very old tartan slippers, the sides cut out to accommodate the twin bulges of bunions.
It was such a homely detail I knew once and for all that this had to be really happening.
‘Oh my dear!’ It was Mrs Burton next door. Well, I was next door, trespassing in her garden. I needed to get up and run away, but I was pinned on my back like a butterfly in a glass case.
She was gasping, her paper-white face almost comically horrified. She swayed as she clung to her Zimmer frame, as if she were about to fall herself.
‘I’m sorry, Mrs Burton. I didn’t mean to frighten you,’ I gabbled. ‘I’m Katy Carr from next door. I know I shouldn’t have been in your garden.’
‘I know you’re Katy. Oh my Lord! Have you hurt yourself badly?’
‘I – I think so. I know it sounds so stupid, but I can’t seem to get up.’ I struggled again, but she stopped me with a cry.
‘No! No, lie still! They always tell you to lie still after a fall. It’s was on Holby City. I saw you fall. I was so worried when I saw you fixing the rope. I banged on my window but you can’t have heard me,’ said Mrs Burton. She was so agitated a little froth of saliva gathered in each corner of her mouth and then dribbled. ‘Oh dear, oh dear, I should have stopped you! You poor, poor child!’
I was terrified by her reaction. I wanted her to clap her hands and shout at me, tell me to stop play-acting and get up at once. She was behaving as if I’d done something dreadful to myself, something far worse than a few bumps and bruises.
‘I must run and fetch your father,’ Mrs Burton said.
Poor Mrs Burton couldn’t possibly run anywhere, but she manipulated her Zimmer frame with painful slowness to face the other way, and then set off, dragging it at each step. Tap s-c-r-a-p-e, tap s-c-r-a-p-e.
‘No!’ I shouted hoarsely, suddenly remembering. ‘Dad’s at the swimming pool, with all the others. And Izzie. There isn’t anyone at home.’
‘Then I will phone for an ambulance,’ said Mrs Burton. ‘That’s what I have to do. Ring 999 – that’s the number. Now don’t you move a muscle, dear. Keep still as still and I’ll go and phone for help.’
‘Then will you come back?’ I begged her. I knew she was just a sick, helpless old lady but I was so frightened of being left by myself now.
‘Of course I will,’ said Mrs Burton. She pressed her lips together determinedly, and set off for her house.
I started to shiver, which surprised me because I could feel the sun hot on my face. Perhaps it was because I was scared. Had I really, really hurt myself? I’d always got better before. Dad said I was like a cat with nine lives. I’d had countless falls. I’d sprained my wrist once, broken my ankle another time. It had hurt a lot, but not like this. I’d been able to hobble back to the house. Couldn’t I really move at all now? I was desperate to have another attempt at getting up, just to see if I could, but Mrs Burton had been emphatic that I should lie
still.
My nose was running because I was crying, but I didn’t even dare raise my arm to wipe it. I just lay there, and endless hours seemed to go by. I wondered if Mrs Burton had forgotten all about me by the time she got back to the house. I tried to work out when Dad and the others would be back from swimming. How would they know where I was? Clover would guess, surely. Oh how I wanted Clover now, to hold my hand and tell me I was going to be fine.
I thought of her swimming up and down in the pool, gliding on a float when the wave machine was switched on, turning somersaults in the shallows, with Elsie and all the littlies. And I could have been with them, larking around.
I moaned out loud.
‘Oh dear, does it hurt so badly, you poor girl?’ It was Mrs Burton returning – tap s-c-r-a-p-e, tap s-c-r-a-p-e – calling out to me anxiously. ‘The ambulance is on its way. I’ve left my front door open and told them to come out into the garden.’
‘Oh, thank you, thank you,’ I said weakly.
‘I wish I could sit down beside you, dear, but if I get down on the grass I’ll never get up again. My silly old arthritis! If only I could have stopped you swinging on that rope! I’ll never forgive myself if you’re really hurt. I’ve always loved to watch you and your sisters and brothers playing all your games in the garden.’
‘I didn’t know you knew we were there.’
‘Mr Burton and I never had any children. All that big house and long garden and no one to play in it! So it was delightful when you kiddies started coming. So many little ones! I get them a bit mixed up, but of course I know you and Clover. You won’t remember, but you used to come to tea with Mr Burton and me.’ She went on and on, talking about those long-ago uncomfortable visits, telling me what she used to give us to eat, remembering the pink and yellow fancies they gave us for a treat.
It was weirdly surreal, lying flat on my back with rockets still going off inside my head while she stood swaying above me, talking about cake. It was too much effort to keep murmuring politely. I shut my eyes and then I was swinging again, up in the air, and Mum was with me …