I close my eyes. Had I imagined that? As I do, the ring finds its way onto the ring finger of my left hand, which goes cold. I can feel the blood in my wrist freezing. I yank it off before ice reaches my heart.

  “Where did you get this?” My voice is shrill. “Pippa?”

  “Crows,” she says.

  I force myself to go into Dad’s room. It’s stifling. Being north facing and a dull day, the poor quality light brings out the green undertones in the patterned gold wallpaper. The dark, heavy furniture makes the room crowded and drab.

  Everything’s an effort. There’s something about being back here that’s put me in a stupor. I’m procrastinating about everything.

  Looking through Dad’s things should hurt but it doesn’t. It’s like rifling through a stranger’s personal effects for clues. He was an unknown entity to me because I didn’t care enough to want to find out who he was. Shouldn’t blood call out to blood? Mine didn’t. I felt more for Pip, my dead mother, and for Elsa. Dad’s love was smothering and distant all at once as if I was something to be feared and guarded closely.

  I pile his clothes in bin bags to take to the charity shop. I pause when I find box files full of football programmes. I never knew he was a fan. It looks like he went regularly before we were born. It crosses my mind that they might be worth something, but then I chuck them on the pile to get rid of.

  It’s only when I’m clearing out the second wardrobe that I find something that piques my interest. There’s a steel box at the back with his initials on it, under a pile of moth eaten scarves. It’s locked. I spend the next hour gathering together every key I can find, searching drawers and cupboards for them. Nothing fits.

  I carry the box downstairs and put it on the kitchen table. It’s too late in the day to take it to a locksmith. I’ll go tomorrow.

  Who knew that death is so bureaucratic? I’m relieved there won’t be a post-mortem but there’s still the registering of Dad’s death and meetings with the undertaker, bank and solicitors. Elsa’s a brick, taking Pip to the day centre or over to her place if I have things to arrange.

  The future leaves me in a stupor of indecision. I stare out of the kitchen window at where the pond used to be. Now it’s a rockery in the same kidney shape.

  What sort of people would have a pond with young children in the house?

  The pond was where I found Mum’s body, looking boneless as it slumped over the stones at the water’s edge. I was four. I thought she’d just fallen over. I ran out to help her get up. A jay sat on her back. The bird is the shyest of all Corvids, flamboyant by comparison to its family, in pink, brown, and striped blue. It normally confines itself to the shelter of the woods.

  I paused as the wind blew up her skirt, revealing the back of her thighs. Her head was turned to one side. The jay hopped down to look at her face, then pecked at one of her open, staring eyes.

  The jay turned as I approached and let out a screech, blood on its beak. Or maybe I was the one screaming. I’d put my hands over my ears.

  A shriek comes from the sun-room, next door. I drop my coffee cup, imagining Pippa has conjured the same image. She’d followed me out that day and seen Mum too. By the time my cup smashes on the floor and sends hot coffee up my legs and the cabinets I realise something’s actually wrong.

  Pippa’s pressed against the window, shouting and banging with her fists.

  “What is it?”

  I grab her shoulders but she twists around to look outside again. From here we have an interrupted view of the back garden.

  A magpie deposits something on the crow palace, then starts to make a racket. Its blue -black -white colouring reveals its affinities for the living and the dead.

  Only then does the sudden whirring motion draw my gaze down to the lawn. The cat’s bright pink collar contrasts with its grey fur. A second magpie is pinned by the cat’s paw on its spread wing. Its other wing is a blur as it struggles. The magpie’s mate flies down and the cat breaks its gaze with its prey and hisses.

  I know it’s the natural order of things but I’m sickened and trembling. I open the patio door and clap my hands as if such a banal gesture can end this life-and-death struggle. Pippa’s more decisive, stumbling out and I hold her back for fear she’ll be scratched.

  Flat black shapes with ragged wings darken the sky. Ravens. One swoops, catching the cat’s ear with its bill as fierce as pruning shears as it passes over. The cat contorts, blood on its fur, releasing the magpie which makes an attempt at broken flight.

  The cat crouches, a growl in its throat. Its ears are flat to its head, its fur on end, doubling its size. The birds are coming down in black jets, from all directions. The cat raises a paw, claws unsheathed, to swipe at its assailants. The ravens take it by surprise with a group attack. One lands, talons clutching the nape of the cat’s neck. It writhes and screams. The sound cuts through me. The birds are like streaks of rain. I can’t see the cat anymore. It’s been mobbed by darkness.

  Pippa and I clutch one another. The cat’s silent now. The ravens lift together into the sky and all that remains on the grass are steaks of blood and tufts of fur.

  I remember later that the magpies left us a gift, a task which made them careless of their long collective memory of their past persecutions by gamekeepers and farmers.

  The key they left on the crow palace shines as if calling to me. The metal’s so cold that it hurts to hold it, as if it’s just come out of a freezer.

  I have the queasy feeling that I know what it’s for. It slides into the padlock on the steel box with ease and I feel its teeth catch as I turn it.

  Everything I know about Mum is distilled from scant memories. I’m shaking at the prospect of something concrete. I open the lid. Here’s where Dad buried her significant remains.

  It contains a random assortment. A lady’s dress watch. A pair of pearl earrings. A silk patterned scarf. An empty perfume bottle. I open it and the stale fragrance brings Mum back to me on a drift of bluebells. I wipe my eyes. I’d forgotten she always wore that. There’s a birthday card signed With more than love, Karen.

  What is there that’s more than love?

  We weren’t a photographed family. There aren’t any happy snaps that feature Pip and me. This pile of photographs are of Mum and Dad when they were young, before we were born. I shuffle through them. Mum and Dad at the beach, on bicycles, another in formal dress. Their happiness grates. Why couldn’t they saved some of it for us?

  The last thing out of the box is a handkerchief. Whatever’s knotted within clinks as I lift it out. It’s a pair of eggs. They’re unnaturally heavy, as if made of stone. And they’re warm.

  I can’t resist the impulse to crack one of them open. Fluid runs over my fingers. I sniff it. Fresh egg white.

  A baby’s curled up within, foetal like, her tender soles and toes, her genitals displayed. She’s perfect. I don’t know what she’s made of. Something between rubber and wax that’s the colour of putty.

  I break open the second one. Another girl. This one’s different. She has massive, dark eyes that are too wide set to be normal. There are sparse, matted feathers on her back. Faint scale cover her feet.

  I carefully rewrap the pair, trying not to touch them, and put them back in the box.

  My phone rings. Then stops. Starts again. There’s nothing for it. I answer it.

  “Chris.” I try not to sound irritated.

  “How are you?”

  “Busy. You know.”

  “No, I don’t. Tell me.”

  “Stuff to sort out. Dad and for my sister.”

  “You have a sister? What’s her name?”

  “Phillipa. We call her Pippa.”

  “What’s she like?”

  Pippa? She likes birds, me, the colour turquoise, chocolate, having a routine, crow gifts, sunshine. She gets frustrated when she can’t make herself understood. Her eyes are hazel brown and she has eczema.

  “She has cerebral palsy. My dad took care of her.”

  “Will I meet her at the funeral?”

  I’m about to say Of course she’ll be at the funeral but then I realise that Chris is assuming he’s invited.

  “Why do you want to come? You never met him.”

  “Not for him, for you. Tell me your address.”

  “I don’t need you here.”

  I don’t understand. It feels like an argument, full of unspoken baggage that I didn’t even know we were carrying.

  “Julie, what are we doing?”

  His tone sets off an alarm bell in my head.

  “You must know that I—” Don’t say it. Don’t say I love you. He falters, “You must know how much I care about you.”

  I feel sick. I thought we were alike. Just my luck to find a man who falls in love with the one woman who’s not chasing him.

  “I’m not talking about marriage or children.”

  Children. For all the carelessness of my affections there’s never been a child.

  “I told you at the start that I’m not like other people. You promised me that you understood completely.”

  “There’s more to us than just sex.”

  I can’t believe he’s doing this.

  “Don’t you get it?” I should be angry but a column of coldness is solidifying inside me. “There is no more. I’m not broken, so you can’t fix me. I don’t love you because I can’t love anyone.”

  “Julie, please . . . ”

  I hang up and bar his number.

  There’s never been so many people in the house. I don’t like it. I wanted it to be just us, but Elsa went on so much that I relented. I wish I hadn’t now.

  I forgot to pack a black dress so I had to buy one in a hurry. I took Pippa with me, there being nothing suitable in her wardrobe either. The shop assistant stared at her while she touched the expensive silks. The woman’s tune changed when it was clear that I didn’t have to look at the price tags.

  I picked out a neat black dress myself and a black tunic, leggings and ankle boots for Pippa. On impulse, I took her to a salon to get her hair dyed and styled. She was more patient than I expected. She liked being somewhere new. My favourite part was Pippa’s smile when the shampoo was massaged into her scalp.

  It was a nice day.

  Today isn’t. When we went out to the funeral car, Elsa said, “Look at the two of you. Pippa, you look so grown up. And Julie, wonderful. Black suits you more than any other colour. You should wear it more.”

  Grief fucks people up.

  The mourners come in, folding up their umbrellas like wings, dripping rain on the parquet floor.

  “Elsa, are any of the neighbour’s coming?”

  “God, no. All the one’s you’d know are dead or moved away.”

  I don’t know the people here. Some used to work with Dad, apparently, others knew him from Pippa’s day centre or through Elsa. They all greet her like she’s long lost family.

  It’s unnerving that they line up to speak to me, something more suited to a wedding than a funeral.

  The first is a tall, broad man, dressed in a shiny tight suit and winkle pickers. Spiv’s clothes but he’s gentle, paternal even. He takes my hand and looks right into my eyes, searching for something.

  “My name’s Charlie.”

  “Thank you for coming.”

  “I’m so very pleased to meet you, my dear. You’re as lovely as I thought you’d be. I understand you’re a smart lady too.” Then as if he’s just recalled why we’re here, “I’m sorry for your loss.”

  A pair of elderly ladies are next. They’re twins. Both have the same bob, cut into a bowl shape at the front, hooked noses and dowager’s humps that marks their identically crumbling spines.

  “Do you have children?” says the first one, which isn’t the opener I expected.

  The second one tuts and pushes her sister along. They’re followed by a couple who call themselves Arthur and Megan. A first I think they’re brother and sister as they’re so alike, but the way he hovers around her suggests their relationship is more than familial. Her arm’s in plaster.

  “How did you know Dad?”

  “Through my father.” The man waves his hand in a vague gesture that he seems to think explains everything.

  Young men, a few years younger than I am, come next. They’re all in designer suits. Each is striking in his own way. They stand close to me as they introduce themselves. One even kisses my hand. The last one interests me the most. He’s not the tallest or best looking but I like his quiet confidence and lively face. There’s a yearning in his voice when he says my name that tugs at me. To smile at him seems weak, so I nod.

  “My name is Ash.”

  “Ash.” The word coats my tongue with want.

  A woman edges him along.

  “I’m Rosalie.”

  She has the manner of entitlement that only certain hard, beautiful women have. Her fingernails are painted black. The lacquer’s like glass. She looks me up and down as she passes.

  I sip my drink as more people introduce themselves, then go off to decimate the buffet and the wine boxes. I try not to look at Ash’s every movement. It’s a lovely agony. I close my eyes, the tannin in the red wine shrinking the inside of my mouth.

  “How is Julie settling back in here?” It’s Charlie.

  “Well, she’s here for now.” I don’t like Elsa’s tone. She must be drunk too.

  I open my eyes. Charlie’s suit can’t settle on a single shade of black.

  “I’m sorry Elsa. You must be missing Michael.”

  I turn away a fraction, not wanting them to know I’m listening. From the periphery of my vision I see him embrace Elsa.

  The young men congregate by the hearth. Rosalie’s berating them for something. I catch her final words: “I don’t see what’s so special about her anyway.”

  I know she’s talking about me because Ash looks over and keeps on looking even though he’s caught me eavesdropping. “Don’t you?” he replies with a smirk.

  “I’m Stephanie.” A woman gets in the way, just when I think he’s going to walk over and join me. “You’re Julie, yes?”

  “Hello.”

  There’s a long pause. I sigh inwardly. I’m going to have to try and make conversation with her. She’s in her fifties. She’s only wearing one earring and most of her hair’s escaped from her bun.

  “Where are you from?”

  “From?” she says.

  “Your accent . . . ” Her pronunciation’s off kilter, her phrasing odd.

  “I’ve lived in lots of different places.” She glances around the room. “I think Elsa would rather I hadn’t come.”

  She reaches out and swipes a sandwich from a plate, gobbling it down in two mouthfuls. “These are delicious.”

  The volume of the chattering around us bothers me. I’ve drunk too much on an empty stomach.

  “This place hasn’t changed since your mother’s funeral.”

  “You met her?”

  “Tennis club.”

  Tennis. How little I knew about her.

  “Such a gracious, joyous woman.” Stephanie twitters on. “Want and need. How they undo us.”

  “Pardon?”

  Stephanie blinks.

  “There are so many crows in Fenby now. They’ve quite pushed out the cuckoos.” She speaks in a comedy whisper, getting louder with each word. “Your mother guessed that they’d double-crossed her.”

  The chatter’s dying. Everyone’s watching us now.

  “You know how it works, don’t you? They laid one of their own in your mother’s nest . . . ”

  Charlie comes over and puts an arm around her.

  “Stephanie, what are you taking about? Julie doesn’t want to hear this rubbish.” He pulls a face at me. “It’s time for you to go home.”

  “You can’t push me around. I have a right to be here. We had a deal.” She breaks away from him and seizes me in a hug.

  “I’m sorry. For all of it,” she whispers in my ear. “It’s true. Look under the crow palace.”

  I want to ask her how she knows that’s what we call the bird table but Ash comes and takes her arm.

  “Aunt Steph, I’ll see you home.”

  “I’m not your aunt.”

  “No, Ash, you should stay.” Elsa joins us.

  “It’s fine.” Ash kisses my cheek. My flesh ignites. “May I come and see you again? Tomorrow?”

  “Yes.” It’s as easy at that.

  “Until then.” He steers Stephanie towards the door.

  The noise starts up again in increments. Ash’s departure has soured my mood.

  Pippa can’t settle. As the mourners gathered around Dad’s grave she cringed and started to wail as if finally understanding that he’s gone. Now she’s wandering about, refusing to go to her room but flinching when any of our guests come near her. She stands, shifting her weight from foot to foot, in front of the twins who are perched in her favourite armchair.

  “Oh for God’s sake, just sit somewhere will you?” I snap.

  Pippa’s chin trembles. The room’s silent again.

  Elsa rushes over to her but Pippa shoves her away. Elsa grabs her wrist.

  “Look at me, Pippa. It’s just me. Just Elsa.” She persists until Pippa stops shaking. “Better? See? Let’s go outside for a little walk.”

  Pippa’s face is screwed up but she lets Elsa take her out onto the patio.

  I lock myself in the bathroom and cry, staying there until everyone leaves. I’ve no idea what I’m crying for.

  I wish this humidity would break. It’ sticky, despite yesterday’s rain. I feel hungover. Lack of sleep doesn’t help.

  I wave goodbye to Elsa and Pippa as they go out. Elsa’s keen to be helpful. I’ll drop Pippa off, I’ll be going that way to the shops. Why don’t you go and get some fresh air on the lawn? You’ll feel better.

  I can’t face sorting out the last of Dad’s clothes. The thought of the hideous green-gold wallpaper in there makes me want to heave. Instead, I take boxes of papers out to a blanket I’ve laid out on the lawn. It’s prevarication. I’m pretending that I’m doing something useful when I should be sorting out our future.

 

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