I'll Never Tell by Casey Kelleher

Author:Casey Kelleher [Kelleher, Casey]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781800199965
Published: 2021-12-03T00:00:00+00:00

28

THEN

The doll’s house is even worse now than before. The walls rickety and crumbling. Closing in, it feels so much smaller than usual. Claustrophobic. Thick mould sweeps across the walls and ceiling. The smell, musty and stagnant, so much worse than either of the two girls can remember. Lingering, forcing them both to hold their breath. His body is dead weight, heavy like lead. And they are exhausted from dragging him across the cold concrete floor. They drop him now – thud – before both slumping down on to the cold floor next to him. Emma-Jayne looks down in horror at the smears of mud and bloodstains on her clothes. Long thin streaks and splashes. The two colours merging, almost undistinguishable from the other. And there is so much blood. How is there so much?

‘Now what?’ she asks as she stares around the bare shell of the cottage. She closes her eyes tightly and opens them again as if adjusting her gaze. As if suddenly seeing these four walls and the thin roof for the very first time. Has it always been so small here? Just the two tiny rooms?

She eyes the hole in the wall where the window used to be. Past the curtain of cobwebs that drape down from the ceiling and swing gently against the draught of the breeze. Outside, the brambles climb and twist their way up the brickwork, blocking out the light in place of where the glass used to be. And beyond that, the woodland. Thick and dense and overgrown. Sinister looking now, as the light of the day fades to evening. Emma-Jayne shivers as the feeling of something eerie, sinister hangs in the air around her.

Death.

‘Why was he here? At the doll’s house. How did he find us?’ she says, shaking her head, still trying to make sense of what happened. To piece it all together. Because her head feels groggy again and she can’t keep her focus.

‘You know how!’ Sarah says bluntly. And she stares at him. Her gaze unwavering, as if she’s wary to drag it away from him, as if she’s wary that he’s not really gone.

But he is dead. Emma-Jayne knows it. And part of her isn’t sure why they are both still sitting here, just staring at him, watching silently as the pool of blood seeps further out on the floor around him. Why haven’t they called for help? Because they should tell someone, shouldn’t they? The police, her mum. Someone. He’s dead. They should tell somebody.

‘He found the doll,’ Sarah says, taking the doll out from where she’s hidden it, carefully buried between the folds of her oversized cardigan.

Clutching the doll to her side, as if it is her most treasured possession.

Emma-Jayne instantly recoils, her blood running cold at the sight of the thing. It is bad, isn’t it? The doll.

‘But you put it back. I told you to. I saw you do it,’ she says, shaking her head, as if she’s seeing things. Because the doll couldn’t be here.

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