By then Scout had started to wriggle and exercise his littlelungs. That had been a relief, although I hadn’t felt it then. I’d barely felt anything outside the circle of cold horror and the creeping, awful certainty that all of this was my fault. The snow had started falling heavier then, lighting up the cellar with a ghostly lunar light, and Andrew was hugging Maria to him, and her hand was gory and shattered, hanging limp. So, no, thinking about it, I wouldn’t have done the same. I am a coward. I cannot face the dark.
“When Andrew took me upstairs to find the medicine box, I told him, real quiet. Just whispered it into his ear. I said that if he carried on hurting that little boy, then next time I would climb into her mouth and let her chew me up ’till I was dead.”
“Wow. I bet he didn’t like that.”
She laughs again. The codeine must be kicking in. “He didn’t quite know what I was talking about, but he knew I meant it because he went quiet for a long time. I could tell he was thinking really hard because he started grinding his teeth together. I hate it when he does that. The sound makes me want to pull off my ears. Then he said, ‘You must really want Hazel to stick around, then, huh?’”
A beat. I sit with my knees drawn up to my chest, clothes still damp from holding Scout so close to me. I’m trembling all over.
“What did—what did you say?”
“I said yes.” Maria’s voice is slightly slurred.Yesh.I think she will sleep soon.
“Why?”
“Because you helped me. You made me remember my blue rabbit so that the monster couldn’t hurt us. You’re the best mother.”
An ache in my chest, like heartburn. I remember holding her thin, bony body beside mine, the soft peach fuzz of her scalp under my chin. She’s fading in this place, like a light slowly dimming. I don’t think Andrew will kill her—not like those poor discardedwomen buried out there in the woods—but he will hold her here until all that light burns out of her eyes. All her bright, easy intelligence will fade, unnourished. A slow, rigid life followed by a slow, rigid death, with nothing learned or lost or gained. What a waste.
“Do you trust me, Maria?”
“Uh-huh.” I think that’s in the affirmative. Without seeing her, it’s hard to tell. She sounds like she is fighting to stay awake.
I can picture her outside the door, curled up like a baby bird, head tucked into scrawny shoulders. Hand cradled against her chest, heavily bandaged. Bloodstains on her clothes.
“Good. Because I have something else I have to ask of you—and Iknowyou’re tired and you’re hurting. I know you probably just want to let your body rest and turn off your brain so you can forget all about what happened here last night, but I think you have to do it today. I think it might be the only chance we have.”
Another yawn. “What do you mean?”
“I mean I might have figured out a way we can get out of here. It’s not a great plan, but—”
“We?Both of us?” She sounds surprised.
I twist round so I can press my lips against the gap. “Yes, both of us. I thought that’s what you wanted. ‘To travel is to live,’ you said. Remember? You could make friends out there, maybe even take a few classes. There’s people out there who can help you, Maria, and you’d never have to watch another sunset through boarded windows again.”
I wait for her response, growing troubled and more than a little frightened as the silence drags. Early this morning, her brother had stuck me with a hypodermic needle while my back was turned before plucking my wriggling baby nephew right out of my arms. He’s kidnapped and killed at least three women that he’s admitted to, and sometimes when he turns his eyes on me, they are filled witha cold fury which makes me think of shaded, lightless caves. He’s a monster, and she doesn’t seem to know it.
“But you might like being a mother here, Hazel. You might want to stay. You haven’t even given it a chance.”
Not sulky, not petulant. Those are childish behaviors, and this girl knows nothing of being a child. She doesn’t know the world outside these four damp walls, has never ridden a bike or climbed a tree or taken a selfie with her friends grinning in the background behind her. No pictures, no family photographs. All those empty spaces on the walls where glass frames had once hung. The windows, boarded on the inside. I’d bet my life that there isn’t a single mirror in this whole horrible place.
There’s one, I remind myself, the voice a quiet little jolt in the fog of my head.
“Maria, in my bag upstairs is a compact. It’s plastic and shaped like a clamshell, you’ll know it when you see it. There’s a mirror inside, it’s only small but it’ll do the job, I think. I want you to open it up and see yourself. Look for the scar on your top lip where you had the operation. Look at the color of your eyes and the roots of your hair.Reallysee who you are. If you can do that and still want to stay in this house, then I won’t ask anything else of you. But if you decide that you do want to get out of here, then I promise, Maria—Ipromise—that I will help you. I just need you to do one last thing.”
Another silence, shorter this time.
“Hazel?”
“Yes?”
“I don’t want to hurt my brother.”
“Neither do I, Maria. What I’m about to suggest isn’t going to hurt him, I promise.”
There’s no hesitation this time. Just her voice, frightened sounding but steady. Curious. “What do you want me to do?”
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