Read Online The Shadow Year by Hannah Richell - Free Book Online Page B

place. ‘We’re here.’
    Tom reaches across to flick a light switch on the wall – more from habit than expectation – but they are both amazed when the bare light bulb overhead flickers, fizzes and then stays on. ‘Electricity,’ he says, ‘well I never.’
    Lila doesn’t comment. She just stands there in the centre of the room, looking around at her surroundings, cast as they are in the light of a low-watt bulb. She sees a long stone hearth with its iron grate full of cold, white ash and beside it a wicker basket, presumably once filled with logs and kindling. Above the mantel is a dusty collection of candle stumps jammed into the necks of empty glass bottles, each melted into its own uniquely twisted form. There’s a stack of old books and a curled pack of playing cards, a mildewed box of Scrabble, a chess set and a copy of Thoreau’s Walden still splayed upon the surface, as if its owner has just put it down for a moment and walked out of the room to make a cup of tea. In the centre of the room is an upturned wooden crate. It forms a makeshift table and on its surface Lila spies a dusty oil lamp, empty beer bottles and a grimy ashtray. She lifts one of the bottles and holds it up to the dim light, sees the husk of a black beetle lodged at the bottom, long dead. Surrounding the crate are a low-slung brown velvet couch, several musty beanbags and one wingback armchair, stuffing bursting from its seat cushion.
    ‘Mice,’ says Tom, following the direction of her gaze. ‘Probably using it for their nests.’
    Lila nods and gives a little shudder.
    ‘So here we are,’ he says. ‘It’s kind of basic, huh?’
    ‘I think the word you’re looking for is rustic ,’ she says. She rubs her hands together, trying to get warm. ‘If we had some matches we could light a fire.’
    ‘I wouldn’t. The chimney is probably clogged with birds’ nests and soot. We’d set fire to this old place within minutes.’
    ‘Oh,’ says Lila, disheartened, thinking of her cold, wet jeans, clammy against her skin. The room gives off a strange, illicit air. She wonders if local kids have been gathering here, although judging by the thick layer of dust coating everything and the stale, damp quality of the air around them, it’s obvious they haven’t been back in a while. The only footprints visible are their own as they move about the room. She bends down and smooths her hand across the surface of one of the filthy floorboards and reveals a beautiful honey timber below the dirt. They could be polished, she thinks, restored. And those thick stone walls painted white again, to enhance the low-hanging wooden beams above. New curtains. New furniture. She can’t help it. Even in the half-light of the rainstorm Lila’s design instincts kick in and she can see the potential.
    They move on into the second room where they discover a rundown kitchen with an old cast-iron range, one solitary saucepan still sitting on the hob. Opposite stands a long wooden table with two rickety benches drawn up and even more candles stuffed into the necks of old beer bottles. Three mugs are positioned on the table next to an empty rusting tin for a brand of powdered milk Lila knows is no longer available. There are more chipped mugs and a few dusty pint glasses lined up on a shelf, and above these, running the length of the ceiling, another low, exposed beam. Lila stares at it and notices a deep, splintered hole in the timber, an almost perfectly round indentation with the faintest trace of scorch marks at its edges. Could it be a gun shot? Inside the cottage? The thought makes her uneasy and she is just about to ask Tom to take a look when he calls out to her. ‘Here, catch.’
    A flash of colour wings through the air and Lila grabs at the object tumbling towards her. ‘A Rubik’s cube,’ she says, holding it out on the palm of her hand.
    ‘I haven’t seen one of those for years. It’s probably a collectors’ item now. You should stick it on