The Family

Again that lump in my throat. I’d tell Mum I’d walk home. But when I removed my earbuds I heard Anwyn scream, ‘You’re not family and neither is that daughter of yours.’

If I wasn’t family.

If I wasn’t a friend.

Who was I?

I stepped into the hallway and Mum came barging out of the kitchen, just as Rhianon sauntered through the front door with her overnight bag. Her silent yawn shouting she’d had a brilliant sleepover.

I pushed my way past Mum and her, running out towards the car. I never got to tell Aunt Anwyn that even without Dad around to tie her to Mum, I was still her niece. Somehow, even then, I knew I would never be back.

I would never see her again.

Chapter Eight

LAURA

Tilly thundered upstairs as soon as we got back from Anwyn’s. I didn’t follow her, knowing I had to make the call straight away before my courage drained away. I sat in the kitchen still wearing my coat. My knee jigging up and down as I conjured up the keypad on my mobile. This wasn’t a number that was stored in my contacts, instead it was stored in the dark corners of my mind where cobwebs hung, and memories that were too painful to revisit gathered dust.

Acid rose in my throat as my shaking finger pressed the digits slowly. Through the stretch of time I could see the phone vibrating on the mahogany table with the vase of fake flowers with their too-shiny leaves. I could hear my mother’s voice reciting the number every time she answered, in the unlikely event the caller was unaware of who they were trying to reach.

A soft click.

‘Hello.’ The voice was bright and breezy. Too young to belong to my dad. Too cheerful.

‘Hello. I… I’m trying to reach Donald or Linda?’

‘You’ve got the wrong number.’

‘Sorry. I… I don’t suppose that line is still connected to fourteen Acacia Avenue is it?’

‘Yes. But we’ve been here eight years—’

Numb, I ended the call. Stupid that I’d expected everything in my childhood to have remained the same. Stupid that I’d ever thought my parents would help me, even if they still lived there.

‘Laura, you’ve made your own bed. You’re not family to us anymore,’ my father had spat after he’d ordered me out of his life. I had hefted a black bag crammed with my possessions over my shoulder, my duvet rolled under my arm, as my scared and confused seventeen-year-old self had stumbled out into the cutting night air. The door slammed behind me but I didn’t move. Couldn’t co-ordinate my legs and brain to work together. Minutes later I had been flooded with relief as there was the sound of unlocking, my mum framed in the doorway, honeycomb light spilling out into the porch. ‘Mum!’ Slowly, uncertainly, I had stepped towards her but she had shaken her head, creating an invisible barrier between us, before stretching out her palm.

‘Give me your key,’ were her last words to me before I handed over my keyring and my identity as a daughter. The door closed once more, leaving me standing alone on the step, my breath coming too fast, white clouds billowing from my mouth like mist, instantaneously disappearing like it had never existed. The kitchen light brightened the garden. I had crouched in the flower bed and peeped through the window as Mum stuck a couple of pork chops under the grill while Dad laid the table for two, and as I turned away I knew – for my parents – it was as if I had never existed.

Still, I couldn’t believe how much it hurt to learn they had moved, and I had no idea where they were. If they were alive even. My eyes cast around the tiny kitchen as though somehow I might find them there, coming to rest by the back door. The pencil marks made by Gavan as he balanced a ruler on Tilly’s head while she asked, ‘How tall am I now, Daddy?’ We’d outgrown this house years ago, but I always had an excuse not to move. It was too convenient for Tilly’s nursery; for her school. Later, we’d spent the deposit we’d saved to buy our own house on setting up Gavan’s business. We’d saved again, but that time our hard-earned cash went on the florist shop. Gavan never complained. Now and then he’d grumble about renting being a waste of money, and that it was ridiculous we didn’t own a home when he built them for a living, but he knew that deep down the reason I didn’t want to leave was because there, my parents knew where I was. We’d sent them a photo of Tilly asleep in her pram after she was born, with our address scrawled on the back. How could they resist her sweet face? Somehow they did. The void of loss had never fully left me, but gradually over the years I had filled it with a new family: Gavan, Tilly, Iwan, Anwyn, Rhianon; but I always retained the tiniest sliver of hope that one day they might come for me and if that day came I wanted them, I needed them, to be able to find us.

And now they’d moved.

When Tilly thumped downstairs hours later, proclaiming that she was starving, I was still sitting at the kitchen table.

Still wearing my coat.

The following day, I was rifling through the fridge, seeing which withering vegetables from the Oak Leaf Organics bag I could salvage for Sunday lunch, when the doorbell chimed.

‘Iwan!’ My eyes darted left and then right. He was alone. ‘Come in.’ I stepped back and gestured for him to go into the lounge as I returned to the kitchen to make tea, putting some space between us. I gathered my thoughts as I gathered the milk and the sugar. I needed to repair my shrinking family. Iwan was my last link to Gavan. Their dad had passed from cancer two years ago, and their mum followed six months later. A cardiac arrest, the young doctor had said, but privately we thought that grief had broken her heart in two. There were no other relatives.

My breath caught in my throat as I carried the mugs through. Iwan was filling Gavan’s chair, his elbows resting on the arms, fingers steepled together in front of his mouth the way Gavan used to sit when I’d laugh and tell him it looked like he was praying.

‘Praying for a kiss,’ he’d say and I’d roll my eyes but kiss him anyway.

I’d never noticed before how similar their fingers were, their mannerisms. Iwan cleared his throat. The brothers even had the same husky undertone and I had a crazy impulse to close my eyes. To ask him to whisper ‘I love you,’ just to hear it one more time.

‘Laura, I’m sorry about yesterday, about Anwyn,’ he said and the spell was broken.

‘I’m sorry too. I should never have slapped her.’ Just the thought of it made my palm sting.

‘She has a knack of bringing out the worst in people sometimes.’ It was a strange thing for him to say about his wife. Again, I wondered what they had been arguing about before we had arrived. The silence stretched. He spoke first. ‘I miss him too. It was never… It should never have ended that way. He was my brother and I let him down.’

‘He understood.’ I told him what he needed to hear. ‘That night… He was excited about the business.’

‘There was a deal agreed in principle,’ he said.

‘And now?’ Iwan couldn’t meet my eye. He didn’t speak. ‘You’ve taken the deal to your new firm haven’t you?’ There was a sour taste in my mouth.

‘It’s not that, it’s… complicated. Look, I’ll make some enquiries. See if there’s anything I can do. If I can get you some money, Laura, I will. You know what Tilly means to me, what you both mean to me.’ He rubbed his fingers over his lips the way Gavan used to whenever he felt uncomfortable. Trying to press the words back inside.

‘Thank you.’ The pressure on my chest eased.

‘Don’t thank me yet. Even if I can do anything, it will be a slow process. Months if not longer. There’s a situation.’ He sipped his tea which was still steaming and I knew it was a delaying tactic.

‘Anything I should know about?’ I asked.

‘Laura.’ His eyes met mine. ‘Sometimes there are things you’re better off never knowing.’

‘Sorry, there’s nothing we can do.’

That was the phase I heard over and over that week. Each day was a battle. After I’d drop Tilly at school there were endless phone calls and visits. The benefits office was sorry but there was a backlog and they couldn’t process my claim for weeks. My landlord wouldn’t accept housing benefit tenants. There were some flats which would but they were in a rough area and quite far from Tilly’s school. The insurance company smothered me with terms and clauses and legalities I couldn’t understand. Citizen’s Advice couldn’t fit me in until the New Year. The landlord of the shop was sorry, but in light of the arrears he’d found a new tenant and he’d be keeping my deposit to cover some of the rent I’d missed.

Sorry. Everyone was sorry.

It was Friday that finally broke me. Although I’d applied for every job going, from cleaning to waitressing, it was the position in the flower department of my local supermarket I had pinned all my hopes upon. I knew it would only be unpacking cellophane-wrapped bouquets from boxes and dumping them in plastic buckets but I was certain I’d get the job.

The white envelope imprinted with the shop’s logo dropped onto the doormat. I pounced on it eagerly.

We regret to inform you…

The rejection punched the back of my knees, tore sobs from my throat. I slid to the floor, curling myself as small as possible. The hessian doormat bristled against my cheek as I cried for the things I didn’t have; a job, money, a home, but most of all I cried for Gavan, his name rising from the pit of my stomach, spilling out into the cold empty hallway where he would never again kick off muddy boots and trail brick dust over the carpet.

Eventually, I exhausted myself. I shuffled on my knees to the bottom of the stairs and unhooked my handbag from the bannister. It was while I was rooting around for a packet of tissues that my fingers brushed against the piece of paper Saffron had given me.

‘If it weren’t for Alex I honestly don’t know where I’d be.’

Was there such a thing as a truly altruistic person?

I had nothing to lose by asking, but still it was gargantuan to tentatively dial her number, not allowing myself to hope.

‘Hello.’

‘Saffron, it’s Laura. From the florist.’

‘I was just thinking about you! The shop’s been locked all week. Are you okay?’

‘No,’ I whispered. The rivers I’d cried had dried my throat. ‘No, I’m really not.’

‘We can help,’ she said.

And those three words were enough for me to drive to Gorphwysfa the following day.

It’s easy, with the benefit of hindsight, to realise that taking Tilly was my second mistake. We may have been broke, homeless, longing for support, but nobody had died then.

Nobody had killed.

Chapter Nine

LAURA

What sort of people shun society and build their own community? I tried to discuss it with Tilly during our scenic journey to Abberberth but the further out of town we drove, the quieter she became. Tufts of grass sprung in the centre of the unfamiliar road that twisted and turned as it led away from the coast towards Mid Wales. We dipped into a valley, the rolling hills swallowing the car, the tips of their peaks hidden by mist. Free from the buildings that crowded our town, it seemed we were driving into the vast slate-grey sky.

Tilly had her face turned away from me, staring absently out of the window at the bleak and empty fields, her mood as low as the clouds that threatened rain. I wanted to ask her what she was thinking, what she was feeling, but I didn’t know how to reach her. I was seventeen when she was born, little more than a child myself. My best friend at the time, Natasha, told me it was really cool I had a daughter. ‘You can go shopping together, hang out, you’ll be mates.’ But I didn’t feel like Tilly’s friend right then, and with all the ways I was letting her down I didn’t feel quite like her mum either. Gavan was always the calmer parent, right from when she arrived red-faced and squalling into the world. He had held her against his bare chest, as he’d read about the importance of skin-to-skin contact, while I was mopped up, stitched up. I fought against climbing down from my cloud of pethidine into reality, where I was responsible for this tiny creature with fisted hands and a furious cry. I wondered how we’d cope, but Gavan was the perfect balance of discipline and fun at each and every stage, coaxing Tilly to finish her vegetables without the onslaught of World War Three. Effortlessly moulding papier-mâché into a castle for her history project, throwing together a fancy dress costume with things he plucked out of the airing cupboard. Although there had been a definite shift in their relationship before he died, a tension which wasn’t there before, I put it down to the changes she was going through. Seventeen was impossibly difficult. For me it was an age full of memories I’d locked away.

We’d been driving for forty-five minutes when, almost too late, I noticed the opening between the trees. I swung a hard left, bumping down a rutted track that tapered until hanging twigs scraped against my paintwork. I thought I must have taken a wrong turn. Slowly, I edged forward, looking for a place to turn around. The track widened again. A weatherworn sign speared the ground, a crow perched atop so still at first I thought he was a statue. ‘Tresmasers yn Ofalus’ in black peeling letters, and then almost as an afterthought, the English translation, ‘Trespassers Beware’. A second sign shouted ‘Ffens Trydan’, ‘Electric Fence’, and a third, newer sign, ‘Oak Leaf Organics’. I’d found it. Gorphwysfa. Resting place.

An ominous thunder cloud hung suspended over the impossibly tall fences spiked with razor wire. Padlocked chains twisted around the metal gate.

Apprehensively I sat, engine ticking over. In the shadows, a movement. A figure dressed in black strode out of a small wooden cabin and moved towards us. His head shaven, tattoos wrapped around his neck; a snake, barbed wire, something written in sharp letters that I didn’t recognise.

He flung open the gates. Timorously, I cracked open my window. He was younger than I’d initially thought, late 30s I would guess. Shadow fell across his chin that could equally have been bruising or stubble.

‘You must be Laura.’ He was well spoken. I chided myself for being so judgemental as we shook hands. ‘Saffron told me you’d be coming. I’m Reed. Can I just say, we’re all very happy that you’re here.’

‘Umm, thanks.’

‘Really. I came here when I was in need and…’ He shook his head. ‘Anyway, I know you’re in a bit of a bind and if anyone can help, Alex can. Carry on straight.’ He pointed down the track and his sleeve fell back exposing his forearm, the skin barely visible under his inkings. ‘You can’t go wrong.’

Still, I didn’t move. Wondering how he knew I was in trouble, and wishing he hadn’t said anything in front of Tilly. The last thing I wanted was for her to find out just how bad things were. Just what was I driving us into?

‘It’s okay.’ He caught my worried expression. The way my eyes flicked to the rear-view mirror at the signs. ‘The fence isn’t electrified. Don’t be afraid.’

‘Mum! What are you waiting for?’ Tilly asked.

Flustered, I put the car into gear and released the handbrake. We bunny-hopped forward and I tried not to flinch as the gates creaked shut behind us.

Trapped. I hated feeling trapped.

Out of the cover of the trees it was lighter. In the far distance I spotted smoke spiralling from a chimney, and even without the sun smiling down, the stone farmhouse surrounded by a scattering of outbuildings looked chocolate-box idyllic. I left my sense of foreboding behind with the flattened undergrowth and the worrying amount of security.

That just made it safer, didn’t it?

One snowy Sunday afternoon last winter, I had curled up with Gavan on the sofa after too many roast potatoes and herb-crusted pork loaded with apple sauce, and watched a documentary on the Amish.

‘It must be lovely to live without technology.’ I’d thrown a sideward glance at Tilly. She was tucked up in the armchair, mesmerised by her phone. It was nice to have her in the same room as us, but I doubt she registered we were there, let alone what we were watching. The modern day Pied Piper wouldn’t need a magic pipe, he could just wave an iPad. Through my 42 inch flat screen, fingers of tranquillity reached out and caressed me, and as I drove into Gorphwysfa that day there was the same sense of being transported back in time. I wouldn’t have been surprised to pass a horse and cart. Men in hats and braces. Women in capes and aprons. Children playing with hoops and sticks. Free-range chickens dipping their beaks for seed. Instead Saffron leaned against a Land Rover, waving as she saw us approach. I slotted my car next to a battered old minibus.

‘Laura!’ The second my feet touched the ground outside the car I was swept into a hug. Momentarily I stiffened. I didn’t like being touched, particularly by strangers, but then I relaxed into her embrace. It had been so long since I had been held. Besides, after she’d witnessed me twitching and writhing on the floor last week, the kindness she showed, it seemed churlish to try to maintain a distance between us. ‘I’m so pleased you’re here,’ she said. ‘I’ve been so worried. I’ve a feeling everything’s going to be all right now.’

The energy buzzing from her lifted me.

‘Saffron, this is Tilly, my daughter.’

Tilly muttered something incompressible and I shrugged a teenagers – what can you do to Saffron who melted my embarrassment with her hundred-watt smile. ‘Tilly I can’t tell you how good it is to meet you! You’re genuinely very welcome here. Now, Laura, I’ll take you across to Alex.’ She gestured away from the farm house, towards a woodland. ‘Did you want to wait here, Tilly? I’d hate for you to ruin those suede boots. They’re fabulous!’

Instead of giving a proper answer, Tilly shook her head. I threw her a where-are-your-manners glance.

We all set off, striding across the open field, the first spots of rain blowing into my eyes. My head bowed as I pushed against the blustery wind that snatched my breath. The bitter breeze biting my nose, the tips of my ears.

‘Not far now.’ Saffron led us into the woods where it was sheltered. I pushed down my hood, breathing in the scent of pine.

Sticks snapped underfoot as we weaved in and out of the autumn stripped branches and the evergreens. Trees towered above us, blocking the already receding light. Tilly was walking so close to me, our arms brushed.

‘I hope you know where you’re going,’ I said in the tone people use when they’re seeking reassurance, but pretending not to.

‘You see these?’ Saffron pointed to the bright white stones snaking through the gloom. ‘They’re kind of a path. It does all look the same here, particularly at night.’

A shudder ran through me at the thought of being out there in the pitch-black with the scuttling animals and the rustling bushes.

‘We have to be careful.’ She gestured with her hand over to the right. ‘There’s a ravine over there. Don’t want anyone falling down it. Hey, what do you call a nun lost in the woods? A Roamin’ Catholic. Geddit?’

I groaned.

‘Not one of my best! Anyhoo, we’re almost there.’

We followed our Hansel and Gretel trail for a few more minutes until we rounded a corner and there it was. A small whitewashed cottage. Smoke curling from the chimney. Storybook perfect. Gingerbread House enticing.

‘This was a weaver’s cottage,’ Saffron said as she pushed open the latched door. ‘It’s over a hundred years old.’

She kicked off her boots onto the mat in the porch. Tilly and I wobbled as we pulled off our footwear in the confined space. Elbows jabbing into walls. Into each other.

In the lounge, a fire crackled and hissed. The smell of wood smoke was comforting. Dark beams striped the low ceiling. A battered black leather sofa with a cross of duct tape over one cushion was angled by the cracked window. To its side, a coffee table stained with white rings. Two faded, mustard armchairs flanked the fireplace.

‘Wait here, Tilly,’ Saffron said. ‘I’ll take your mum through and then I’ll show you around the farm.’

Tilly’s gaze met mine, a don’t-leave-me expression on her face, but it was better that I talked to Alex in private. I didn’t want her to know how bad things really were.

‘You’ll have a lovely time, Tilly.’ I dragged myself away from her pleading eyes.

‘This was a dining room but it’s more of an office now,’ Saffron said as she pushed open the door to the adjoining room, and there he was.

Alex.

Dark hair curling over the neck of his cream fisherman’s jumper. A beard framing lips that spoke my name as if he’d said it a million times before.

‘Laura.’ His voice a soothing balm on a sting. ‘Nice to meet you.’ He was only around thirty but he carried the sense of confidence you’d expect from somebody older. He took my hand, his skin rough. His nut-brown eyes, flecked with gold, held mine. I was barely aware of Saffron saying goodbye. Her footsteps receding. The slamming of the front door. Hers and Tilly’s voices growing fainter.

‘Hello.’ It seemed rude to pull my hand away, and if I’m honest, I didn’t want to. Instead, I squeezed his fingers, not wanting to feel them slip away from mine. He released me first. Embarrassed, I did what I’d always done in uncomfortable situations; I babbled, cramming the tiny gaps of silence with words, but my voice trailed away when I noticed the shotgun propped against the desk.

In the far depths of my mind a memory slithered to the surface.

There’s nowhere to run to.

I couldn’t tear my eyes away from it. Panic rising as I remembered the fences, the wire, the locked gate.

‘I… I’m not sure I should be here.’ I hated weapons of any description. I knew how it felt to be on the wrong end of one. ‘I’m going to go.’

‘No you’re not,’ Alex said softly as he reached for the gun.

Chapter Ten

TILLY

It had been a shit week at school.

On Monday I’d gone into the sixth form common room. Rhianon was there, alone.

‘Hi.’ I grabbed a plastic cup and poured water from the cooler.

‘Hey.’ Her voice was flat. I noticed how pale she was.

‘So, the weekend? What was that about?’ I tried to act casual as I leant against the wall, uncertain whether I should sit next to her.

‘Like, I literally have zero clue. Mum and Dad basically fight all the time at the moment.’

‘Your mum told mine we’re not family anymore.’ I shrugged feigning nonchalance.

Before she could answer, Katie burst into the room. ‘You’ll never guess what Kieron said?!’ She noticed me and sat next to Rhianon, cupping her hand against Rhianon’s ear and whispering in the way five-year-olds did.

‘See you later then,’ I said snarkily.

‘Yeah. Whatever.’ She didn’t even look at me as I left.

I hadn’t had the chance to speak to her again, spending my free periods in the library. I had only missed six weeks but there was mountains of coursework to catch up on.

And then it was Saturday. I should have been writing up my notes on Othello but I was so bored. Mum asked if I wanted to go with her and visit a friend who lived on a farm. I said yes. I’d pictured somewhere pretty with animals I could feed, but we stopped at these massive gates with threatening signs and everything. Honestly, it was as creepy as hell. The man who let us through started talking about how if anyone could help us Alex could, a bit like we were off to see the wizard. I almost expected there to be a road paved with yellow bricks.

We got out of the car. Mum hugged this woman who was stunning. It’s so hard to pull off white in the winter but she managed it, with skinny jeans disappearing into black Uggs. She turned to me. I immediately felt six sizes larger than I was, and I wanted to put a paper bag over my head.