These first two extra scenes will be inserted into the story at the ends of chapters 1: Megan and 5: the Clock Shop. The aim with these scenes is to establish the Sirens a little earlier – I do reference them in other scenes but it feels like they are plonked in out of nowhere with the “Aunty Carol” chapter and I wanted to show them as part of the story sooner. The last bit “Tea and Biscuits” is a new scene that will come much later in the story but I had the idea to write it this week and couldn’t resist it! J x
1: Megan
With a singular thought The Many vibrate through the door, atom danced past atom. The Many slip past the living room, where a snoring human lays sprawled on the sofa, then they are up the stairs in an instant standing in front of the final threshold. A relief of carved wooden balloons is stuck to the door’s cheap veneer, each balloon a different pastel colour, with a letter painted in soft white – M, E, G, A, N.
The child’s human name is of no consequence now for The Many had marked their Prize.
As the old woman closed her eyes and sang three notes softly the atmosphere inside the tiny car changed. The warm air and hazy light slowly faded and a bone chilling cold replaced flooded in, rain thundered on the roof the car. Whenever The Many leave a place, the woman mused as the rain bounced off the paving stones and the cars and made the gutters sputter and groan. The rains come down to scrub the world of any trace of them.
The woman watched the figure slide down the street and round the corner; she gasped as she saw bundle of blankets the figure cradled. The elderly woman shivered and pulled her ill-fitting cardigan tighter across her chest. She flexed her hands, tried to rub some life back into them through the fingerless gloves, and blew on her finger tips. Reaching forward she fumbled to get the old mobile phone from among the multitude of packets of tissues and cough sweets and other stuff in the glove compartment. Her fingers slowly worked the keys on the old Nokia, desperate to send the message off as quikly as possible.
13 Moira Terrace
10:49 p.m.
The Many
They’ve taken a child! A NEWBORN!
What do we do now?
5: The Clock Shop
“They knew who I really was,” said The Human. “That is why they did not concede.”
Jynn looked up into the human’s dark eyes, “Who are you?”
“My name is Emyr,” his smile fading at the sound of police sirens getting closer. “Where do we go then?”
The Sister grinned, “I know a place.”
Shards littered the road and reflected the flashing blue lights that seemed to move in counterpoint to each other, sending pulsing ribbons of blue light and shadow careening across the street and into the abandoned clock shop. One police officer stood at the corner of the shop window, peering into the dark interior, torch in hand. The other stood by the open door of the police car, talking rapidly into a radio.
Two women looked on from a shadowy doorway someway down the road. The taller one cracked her knuckles and stared hard at the shop as if willing the police to abandon the derelict old shop. The woman with the wiry hair held her phone close to her chest, she kept an eye on the screen checking that the old shop and the officers were in focus.
Eventually, the officer by the car put the radio back in the car and waved to his companion. They fought to put police tape across the broken window, blocking the hole as best they could. As they returned to their car one of the officers started to push the glass shards toward the shop with her boot then seemed to realise the size of the job and, with a shrug to her colleague, abandoned her efforts almost as soon as they had started.
As the police car sped away, the tall woman rolled her shoulders, yesterday’s message about the stolen child had settled in the pit of her stomach like a lump of cold sick. From all the recent reports, not just from the sisters in the city but across the country and beyond, things had been getting worse but to snatch a child was desperate and unforgivable. The tall woman nodded to her wiry haired companion and together, they strode over to the abandoned shop.
Tea and Biscuits
“Do you know what day this is?”
“Yes,” Emyr looked out of the small window at the bitter sky, grey clouds clung to the hills across the valley threatening more rain later. A delivery van parked up outside one of the houses opposite, a group of middle-aged cyclists, in garish Lycra, puffed their way up the road. A crisp frost still clung to the shadows along the low garden wall. Aunty Carol and a couple of Mum’s closest friends had met him here first thing ready for the hearse and the family car to arrive. This was the end of the day, a taxi was outside ready to take him back to the city, he had just wanted a moment alone. “Today was your funeral.”
The living room was cold, pale damp light filtered in through the windows, past the dusty knick-knacks. Emyr hadn’t lived in the house for years, hadn’t set foot in the house for days, he looked at the phone nestled in its cradle on the sideboard and burned with guilt.
“One more call, eh?” Anwen followed his gaze. “Love, it would’ve made no difference. I still would have died on the same day.”
“I know, but still…”
He knew this place wasn’t real. It couldn’t be, just as this couldn’t really be his mother standing in front of him dressed in the familiar dungarees and baggy sweat shirt, her hair falling untidily across her shoulders in dishevelled glory. It all looked real, it smelt real but a moment ago he’d been stood in the Circle watching the Herald argue with the Coruscation. So, that couldn’t be the ugly coffee table that Mum had rescued from a skip. Those weren’t the good bookshelves she kept the nice hardbacks on, Aunty Carol’s watercolours couldn’t be hung on the wall by the door and those weren’t his graduation photos gathering dust on the mantel by the old clock.
“It’s chilly,” Anwen moved to the door. “Why don’t you see if you can get the wood-burner going? I’ll make a cup of tea. Do you think there’ll be any biscuits in the kitchen?”
By the time she returned with the two mugs of tea and a packet of milk chocolate Hobnobs in her pocket there was a fire going, the warm glow had started to penetrate the room. Emyr sat at the cold end of the sofa, away from the burner, Anwen hovered at the other end.
“You should be closer to the fire,” she put the mugs down, turned one so the handle faced him and then she ripped open the packet. Pointing at him with a biscuit she said, “You’ll feel the benefit more than me.”
Emyr picked up his mug, it was his Paddington mug, the one he’d got as a birthday present years ago, the warmth hit his finger tips like an unexpected surprise. He blew on the tea and took a sip then wrapped his hands around the mug, pulling it closer to him, the steam curled gently past his chin. The smell of the sweet builder’s tea, brought back memories of Saturdays on the sofa watching Pop Idol together. He looked at her and smiled.
“I’m okay, for now.”
“Do you remember that day?” Anwen gestured to the photos by the clock. “My little boy, look at you! All grown up and in cap and gown to boot! I was so proud, my heart nearly burst.”
Emyr choked on his tea.
“Sorry, my bad!” Anwen bit into a Hobnob. “Still, I was so proud of you. My boy graduating, going off into the world to make a life for himself. You had your first teaching post already sorted.”
Emyr looked at the crumbs on the coffee table. Something stirred in his head, swirling round like a pair of mad dragons about to hunt. To one dragon the crumbs looked real, the packet of biscuits looked real, the over sweet builder’s tea and the ticking of the clock all felt too much, too perfect to be real. As his Mum talked about the graduation the other dragon twisted and turned, flying round and round in erratic circles but, no matter how fast this dragon flew, Emyr’s thoughts always came back to the same point: What do I say to her?
“Well, I just knew you were going to be wonderful. I said so, didn’t I? I said to anyone who would listen that you were going to be a magnificent teacher. Creative. Talented. Inspiring. I bored Carol to tears; in fact, she told me to shut up on a number of occasions! You know what she can be like. I really – “
“Mum!” Emyr put the mug down hard, tea split on the table. He placed his hands on his lap. “Please! This is all fucking ludicrous. Just stop pretending that this is just another day. Stop pretending that any of this is real.”
Anwen looked at the top of her tea, she pulled the cup closer to her lips and blew across the surface. The wood burner crackled behind her as she took a slurp, the old clock ticked and chimed the half hour. Outside the house, the clouds had moved across the valley, the frost melted into the rain and soaked into the dark earth.
“What would you prefer? The chapel? The graveside? The taxi ride home? Those days in your bedroom when you could hardly move?”
Emyr closed his eyes, drew in a breath. He had tried not to dwell on this day. If everything before the funeral had been a blur of paperwork and platitudes the actual day stood out in crystal clear clarity. Standing in front of the cold chapel, the hard sunlight streaming through the bare branches, the coffin lifted out of the hearse like a final cadence. Inside the cool chapel, a photograph perched by the side of the coffin, his mother smiling, eyes half closed in bright sunshine, a beach receding in the background. Then the service itself, the priest’s calm authority, the hymns and Aunty Carol’s voice ringing out across the chapel like a bell at dawn, Emyr’s faltering words not quite able to express how he really felt. Then the hands to shake, the nods and the well wishes, then pints in the pub and the long, slow slide into emptiness.
“I would wish it anywhere but here. Anywhere but now.”
“Why?”
“Why?” he looked around the living room at what had been his childhood. “Why? This is the day it all became real, where I couldn’t hide from your death anymore. There was no more paperwork, no more forms, no more formality. Once the ceremony was done there was nowhere left to hide.”
They sat in silence, neither looking at the other till the clock chimed the hour.
Outside the rain beat a steady rhythm on the window sill. The wood burner crackled and popped; the warmth of the fire had finally filled the room. Emyr shuffled down the sofa, closer to his mother. He took her hand in his and squeezed it gently; it felt cool and light, insubstantial but there was a pulse below the surface that felt welcome and familiar. Maybe this wasn’t his mother, not the flesh and blood version he so desperately needed in his life but, whatever it was, it contained her spirit, her vitality. Holding her hand Emyr realised how he had missed that more than anything else.
“I’m sorry,” he looked into her eyes. “This is odd though, isn’t it?”
“Yes!”
“Odd and wonderful and weird and I don’t want to waste my time on arguing with you! There are more important things to talk about.”
Emyr,” Anwen placed her other hand on his. “There is nothing more important than you, not to me.”
“Thank you,” he stood up, walked closer to the wood-burner. Looking into the diminishing flames he said, “We don’t have much time, do we?”
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