Oh God. What if I can’t get out again?
I hear the panic in my heartbeat.
Deaf with the drumming of an ear.
But I can escape my body easily, just slipping out into the dark ocean and then struggling upwards towards the light.
Mum is putting her arm around Adam, magicking a smile onto her face for him, making her voice sound cheerful.
‘We’ll come back later, alright, my little man? We’ll go home now, then when you’ve had a bit of a rest, we can come back.’
And she’s mothering me by mothering my child.
She leads him away.
A few minutes later Jenny joins me.
‘Have you tried getting back into your body?’ I ask her.
She shakes her head. I’m an
idiot
. She can’t even
look
at her body let alone try to get into it. I want to say sorry but I think that would just make it worse.
Klutz!
A Jenny word.
She doesn’t ask me if I’ve tried getting back in. I think it’s because she’s afraid of the answer – either that I couldn’t; or that I could, but it made no difference.
No difference at all.
That ghastly poem I’d once thought so clever echoes still in our silence.
…
with bolts of bones, that fettered stand
In feet, and manacled in hands.
‘Mum?’
‘I was thinking about the metaphysical poets.’
‘God, you
really
still want me to do retakes?’
I smile at her. ‘Absolutely.’
You’re having a meeting with Sarah’s boss in an office downstairs. We go to join you.
‘Aunt Sarah’s normal boss is on maternity leave,’ Jenny says. ‘Rosemary, remember, the really quirky one?’
I don’t remember Rosemary-the-really-quirky-one. I’ve never heard of a Rosemary.
‘Aunt Sarah loathes this guy, Baker. Thinks he’s an idiot,’ Jenny continues. She’s been fascinated by the flashing-lights-and-sirens side of Sarah’s police life since she was six years old. And I get that. How can my part-time job writing an arts review page in the
Richmond Post
compete with being a detective sergeant in the Met? What film, book or exhibition is going to out-cool directing a helicopter during a drugs bust?
Bust
. You may as well throw in the towel at the start on that one. But joking about fellow workers, that’s what Jenny and I do. OK, so Sarah didn’t
joke
to Jenny about quirky-Rosemary and Baker, whoever he is, but she clearly tells her the gossip.
We reach the office they’ve allocated for this meeting at the same time as you and Sarah.
Why on earth are you holding a newspaper? I know that I have a go at you at the weekends for reading the papers rather than
engaging with the family
, and we’ve done the whole ‘It’s the caveman looking into the fire to have time to let the week settle’ thing. But now? Here?
We follow you and Sarah in. The ceiling is too low, trapping the heat. There’s no window. Not even a fan to shift the stale heavy air around.
* * *
Detective Inspector Baker introduces himself to you without getting up from the chair. His sweaty, doughy face is unreadable.
‘I want to fill you in on a little of the background to our investigation,’ DI Baker says, his voice as stodgy as his physique. ‘Arson in schools is extremely common. Sixteen cases a week in the UK. But people getting hurt in arson attacks on schools is
not
common. Nor is it common for fires to be started during the daytime.’
You’re getting irritated –
get to the point, man
.
‘The arsonist may have thought that the school would be empty because it was sports day,’ DI Baker continues. ‘Or it may have been a
deliberate
attempt to hurt one of the occupants.’
He leans forward, his sweaty polyester shirt sticking slightly to the back of his plastic chair.
‘Do you know of anyone who may have wished to harm Jennifer?’
‘Of course not,’ you snap.
‘That’s ridiculous,’ Jenny says to me, a shake in her voice. ‘It was just a fluke I was in there, Mum. Pure
chance
, that’s all.’
I think of that figure last night, going into her room, leaning over
I hear the panic in my heartbeat.
Deaf with the drumming of an ear.
But I can escape my body easily, just slipping out into the dark ocean and then struggling upwards towards the light.
Mum is putting her arm around Adam, magicking a smile onto her face for him, making her voice sound cheerful.
‘We’ll come back later, alright, my little man? We’ll go home now, then when you’ve had a bit of a rest, we can come back.’
And she’s mothering me by mothering my child.
She leads him away.
A few minutes later Jenny joins me.
‘Have you tried getting back into your body?’ I ask her.
She shakes her head. I’m an
idiot
. She can’t even
look
at her body let alone try to get into it. I want to say sorry but I think that would just make it worse.
Klutz!
A Jenny word.
She doesn’t ask me if I’ve tried getting back in. I think it’s because she’s afraid of the answer – either that I couldn’t; or that I could, but it made no difference.
No difference at all.
That ghastly poem I’d once thought so clever echoes still in our silence.
…
with bolts of bones, that fettered stand
In feet, and manacled in hands.
‘Mum?’
‘I was thinking about the metaphysical poets.’
‘God, you
really
still want me to do retakes?’
I smile at her. ‘Absolutely.’
You’re having a meeting with Sarah’s boss in an office downstairs. We go to join you.
‘Aunt Sarah’s normal boss is on maternity leave,’ Jenny says. ‘Rosemary, remember, the really quirky one?’
I don’t remember Rosemary-the-really-quirky-one. I’ve never heard of a Rosemary.
‘Aunt Sarah loathes this guy, Baker. Thinks he’s an idiot,’ Jenny continues. She’s been fascinated by the flashing-lights-and-sirens side of Sarah’s police life since she was six years old. And I get that. How can my part-time job writing an arts review page in the
Richmond Post
compete with being a detective sergeant in the Met? What film, book or exhibition is going to out-cool directing a helicopter during a drugs bust?
Bust
. You may as well throw in the towel at the start on that one. But joking about fellow workers, that’s what Jenny and I do. OK, so Sarah didn’t
joke
to Jenny about quirky-Rosemary and Baker, whoever he is, but she clearly tells her the gossip.
We reach the office they’ve allocated for this meeting at the same time as you and Sarah.
Why on earth are you holding a newspaper? I know that I have a go at you at the weekends for reading the papers rather than
engaging with the family
, and we’ve done the whole ‘It’s the caveman looking into the fire to have time to let the week settle’ thing. But now? Here?
We follow you and Sarah in. The ceiling is too low, trapping the heat. There’s no window. Not even a fan to shift the stale heavy air around.
* * *
Detective Inspector Baker introduces himself to you without getting up from the chair. His sweaty, doughy face is unreadable.
‘I want to fill you in on a little of the background to our investigation,’ DI Baker says, his voice as stodgy as his physique. ‘Arson in schools is extremely common. Sixteen cases a week in the UK. But people getting hurt in arson attacks on schools is
not
common. Nor is it common for fires to be started during the daytime.’
You’re getting irritated –
get to the point, man
.
‘The arsonist may have thought that the school would be empty because it was sports day,’ DI Baker continues. ‘Or it may have been a
deliberate
attempt to hurt one of the occupants.’
He leans forward, his sweaty polyester shirt sticking slightly to the back of his plastic chair.
‘Do you know of anyone who may have wished to harm Jennifer?’
‘Of course not,’ you snap.
‘That’s ridiculous,’ Jenny says to me, a shake in her voice. ‘It was just a fluke I was in there, Mum. Pure
chance
, that’s all.’
I think of that figure last night, going into her room, leaning over
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