Submersion Read online

  Then one day Jessie and I unearthed something at the laboratory that shattered any sense of peace we had recovered. Elinor had been missing almost three months by then.

  ‘Who is it that told you about this place again?’ I asked him, as we stood before our discovery, astonished and sickened by what we had exposed. ‘Jessie, who is it that paid us to find this?’

  And so, as we stared at the tiny, pale corpses we found hidden under sacking and rotten floorboards, he finally told me.

  ‘Monty,’ he said, spitting out the word as if ridding a bad taste from his mouth.

  Monty Harrison.

  PLAY

  ‘Did you hear that?’

  ‘What?’

  ‘A noise? Something. Listen.’

  A pause.

  ‘No, couldn’t hear a thing.’

  ‘There it goes again. When you were talking. Breathing, or something.’

  ‘You’re paranoid. No one is there.’

  ‘You can’t be sure.’

  ‘No, you can be sure, but you can’t be too careful. How about I go and check?’

  ‘Yes. Thank you. Thank you so much.’

  PAUSE

  Billy

  After we left Aunt Agnes’, Mother wouldn’t let me return to school, not straightaway. Despite my miraculous recovery, she was still frantic about my health, terrified that whatever was in the water lay dormant in my system and, sooner or later, would launch a surprise attack and finish me off.

  The day after we left Aunt Agnes’, it rained. Mother kept me home and stayed with me, using the weather as her excuse to put her return to work off for a little longer. In truth, the rain always made her anxious; it made a lot of us anxious.

  What if it doesn’t stop? I’d curiously asked Tristan, one day when we were trapped at my aunt’s, a ceaseless deluge forcing me to seek extended shelter there. I recalled what Old Man Merlin had said about the trees catching the rain and counted how many were growing nearby – none. Will we all have to move up to another floor?

  That had been a year or so ago and Tristan had simply shrugged – he didn’t have an answer. So I’d asked Elinor instead and she had laughed, as if it was a stupid question and I was stupid for asking it. Yet, I saw the concern in others’ eyes - in Mother’s, in Great-Aunt Penny’s - and a nagging unease remained.

  As the rain came down, rippling the river roads with its gentle patter, Mother decided to stay at home with me. But her plans were soon changed.

  On our second day home, Mr Harrison, Mother’s boss – ‘Call me Monty, little man,’ – sent one of his other workers round to see us.

  Mr Harrison says you’ve not returned his calls.

  We’ve not been here, family emergency.

  He’s expecting you back.

  I’ll be back soon.

  I’d once commented to Mother that Mr Harrison seemed like a nice boss, keeping an eye on her and that, and she’d answered yes, but not like she’d really meant it. It was a distracted yes. There’s something else I’ll tell you about Monty Harrison – he was a secret. Not a complete secret – not like the business with my father – Monty Harrison was a shared secret: Great Aunt Penny knew about him too. But he was a secret that wasn’t to go outside these four walls, which I interpreted as our house.

  Why? I’d asked, thinking it odd. No one else I knew had a secret job or employer. What was special about Monty Harrison?

  Because I say so, was Mother’s reply, stern enough to hint at a sharp smack with a flat hand, so I did as I was told.

  On the fifth day of the rain, Monty Harrison sailed up to our front door in person.

  Mother answered the door and spoke in distorted, urgent tones through her gas mask. I couldn’t quite work out the words, but I knew she wasn’t entirely happy about him turning up. She wouldn’t have said this outright – he was her boss, after all – but the way she spoke was enough to determine this. Plus, she had the door pulled to as much as possible, with just her head sticking out. I was watching from the top of the stairs – unprotected, this was as far as Mother would allow me.

  Later, once he was gone, I caught her on the telephone in her bedroom, talking to Aunt Penny.

  ‘I have to go back,’ she was saying, a little teary. ‘Monty is insisting now.’ She listened for a bit and then responded with: ‘Oh, thanks. That would be great. Tomorrow at 8:30?’

  Which meant two things: Mother was returning to work and Aunt Penny was going to keep guard over me.

  Our house was just two streets away from Elinor’s, but it took a good ten minutes or more to row there in our tiny wooden boat. In contrast, Aunt Penny and Uncle Jimmy’s house was just five minutes away, in the opposite direction. Ours - 36 Chapel Lane - was a mid-terraced red-bricked house that once had five functioning storeys – a cellar, a ground, first and second floor and an attic space. Now we used just the first two floors and the attic, which was my room. The ground floor was flooded, like all ground floors along our street and those adjacent, but our cellar had a slightly unusual arrangement. It was accessed from the first floor by a staircase that descended from what was by then our kitchen and living room, by-passing the ground floor entirely. Mother said my father and Great Uncle Jimmy restructured this years ago, before the flooding, in case of such an event. On the occasions I questioned her, she gave little away – this in itself would be a rare reference to my father – but I knew the stairwell was reinforced and the cellar treated and sealed from the inside, preventing any water getting in. I wasn’t allowed down there, though, and the door was locked.

  It’s an emergency place, Uncle Jimmy reassured me. We’ve stored things in there should things get worse. Things we don’t want getting damaged or taken. So, there’s no going down there for you. You understand?

  So, I kept away from it, despite its intrigue and promise of adventure. Besides, it was locked and I didn’t have the key.

  The rest of our house was similar in layout to Aunt Agnes’, if a bit smaller. Aside from the kitchen and living area, there was my mother’s bedroom on the second floor and a small bathroom. The stairs that led up to my attic room were in Mother’s bedroom too, so I had to pass through hers if I needed the toilet in the night. Mother thought this was a good thing, that she’d always know where I was, keeping me safe. But I didn’t see it that way and felt a bit silly, a bit trapped. Elinor said it was babyish, too, which made me feel worse.

  There are three obvious differences between our house and my aunt’s: one is how clean it is; two, the decoration; and three its population. I’ll start with the last two first.

  Our house was light. The walls were painted white and kept white, too, and the furnishings were pale – cream or light-green covers on everything, our cupboards painted white, tables and chairs made from light coloured wood. My aunt’s house looked as if it hadn’t been painted in years, or as if the lights were on low and everything was in half shadow. Her walls had an old, yellow look about them and her furniture was dark, with colours that hid the dirt. Whereas, ours meant the dirt had nowhere to hide – should there have been any dirt, that is.

  Ours was a quiet house, too. It wasn’t the family hub, the place where we all assembled – that was Cedar Street, Elinor’s place. At my house, it was just Mother and me. Great Aunt Penny and Great Uncle Jimmy came by on occasions, but rarely together and they never stayed any length of time. And I didn’t have friends round. Mother wouldn’t have wanted that, so I didn’t invite any. Not that I had many friends - a few from school, but apart from Elinor, my only friend outside of school was Old Man Merlin, and Mother would never, ever have allowed him across our threshold. He wasn’t clean enough, to start with.

  And that takes me to my first point – our house was significantly cleaner than Aunt Agnes’. Not that hers was dirty – far from it, and especially not after Mother had been round it during our stay. But our house was immaculate. Despite the wash of dirty water that polluted our lives, our house gleamed like it was other-worldly. Mother made it he
r mission that every tap sparkled, every surface was clear and sanitised, and that every crumb or speck of dust was swept away. Everything had order, too: from our belongings on show – chairs, cushions, blankets, the few ornaments we owned – to the items tidied away – tinned food, cups and plates, clothes, rare items of toiletries. All was tidy and everything had a defined place.

  Mother claimed this order meant she could keep on top of the cleaning, but it didn’t seem to restrict the time she spent on it. It’s one reason I liked going to Aunt Agnes’ so much – my mother had to curb her obsession. She had to pull off her rubber gloves and force herself out of her habit.

  But if she was at home, she was constantly at it. Folding, tidying, puffing up, laying out, reorganising. Scrubbing, wiping, sweeping, drying, bleaching. We had a special cupboard – out of reach, with a lock – where Mother kept her bottles of various fluids and cloths she used for this purpose, bottles she brought back from her job with Monty Harrison.

  Is that what you do? I asked her once.

  What? she asked in return, thrown by my query.

  Is that what you do for Mr Harrison? I’d expanded.

  Is ‘what’ what I do?

  Clean! I exclaimed, like it was obvious beyond reason and she had acted strangely – for Mother, at least. She’d exhaled a sudden laugh and smiled at me, almost joyfully.

  Yes! she had said, her voice still flooded with odd elation. That’s exactly it. And these…’ She pointed to her rows of cleaning fluids. ‘These are just leftovers.’

  I wanted to ask her if it didn’t just get too much. Cleaning at work all day, and then cleaning at home in between, but something stopped me – the something that usually appeared over Mother’s face when I asked about work. A little cloud of fear and doubt.

  The day after Mr Harrison’s visit, Mother dropped me off at my great-aunt and –uncles’ house at just before 8:30. This was often our arrangement when Mother had to work and I was away from school. Sometimes, when Aunt Penny and Uncle Jimmy had business to attend to, I had gone to Aunt Agnes’ and spent the day with Elinor. Mother wasn’t over keen on this and it was always the last resort, but I was never left in our house alone. Not under any circumstances.

  Is it because of what’s in the cellar? I had asked Uncle Jimmy one time. Or is it because my father might come back and take me?

  Uncle Jimmy had simply instructed me not to worry, not to ask questions and definitely not to repeat any of my questions in front of Mother.

  Let’s just say she likes to know someone is keeping an eye on you, okay?

  Even if that’s just my cousin? I had asked, an indulgent question that went unanswered.

  My great-aunt and –uncle’s home was different from ours and Aunt Agnes’ – it wasn’t a house at all, but a flat.

  A high-rise, Tristan called it, making it sound grand, like a monument to something, like something that reached up beyond the clouds in celebration.

  A disaster waiting to happen, Mother called it, a statement she would always follow up with a shudder.

  The building they lived in was called North Courts and there were twelve storeys in total. Aunt Penny and Uncle Jimmy lived on the tenth floor and you had to take a lift to the top. It wasn’t safe to take this from the flooded ground floor, so you took a dark, windowless staircase to the first floor and got in the lift from there. The lift was made of steel, covered in rude words and even ruder drawings that Mother asked me not to look at or ask questions about and it smelled of urine.

  Mother usually only travelled as far as the first floor with me. She was terrified of the lift. If we ever visited properly, she would take the stairs all the way to the tenth floor, arriving out of breath some minutes after me. I think it was probably the smell and dirt she was more terrified of, but I kept this thought to myself.

  Mother’s comment about North Courts being a disaster waiting to happen wasn’t entirely unjustified. There had been four high-rises in total at one point – courts North, East, South and West. Grandad Ronan told me that all four buildings had been condemned, deemed unfit and unsafe to live in. A year after the floods, South- and West Court had both been demolished. Grandad Ronan said the people that lived there couldn’t afford some of the changes that were required and that the building had been neglected. The tenants in the remaining towers had managed to raise the funds needed and the high rises had been salvaged as best as possible. They were now surrounded by steel girders, holding the foundations and the walls together.

  Why don’t they just pull them down and start again? I asked him.

  Grandad Ronan had shrugged. In these times, we need to make do, Billy. Preserve what we can. Housing is limited in some places. With all those homes in the city no longer habitable, difficult choices have to be made. These homes might not be as safe as we’d like, but at least they are homes. Your aunt and uncle needed somewhere after what happened to them. And if these buildings were destroyed and rebuilt, it would be they who’d have to pay for it, and I can’t see that happening, can you?

  Grandad Ronan was making a reference to the collapse of Aunt Penny and Uncle Jimmy’s business. Collapse is how Aunt Penny refers to it, dramatically, as if one day it had simply imploded; been flattened and washed away in the flood.

  It might as well have done! Mother chided me, when I made the mistake of voicing my thoughts one day. Don’t let them hear you speak about it like that!

  And so, hard times hit them and they moved to the tenth floor of North Courts, with the stinky lift and the wobbly walls. They still had the shop, though it wasn’t habitable – still went there, with a faint hope of restoring it to its former glory, I guess. At least, that’s what I guessed back then.

  On the day that Mother returned to work, she left me at the entrance, sailing as close to where the stairwell began as possible. I popped out and took myself up the first flight and into the grubby lift by myself.

  ‘I’ll pick you up later,’ she called out, her voice mask-muffled.

  Within minutes, I was seated with my aunt in her poky lounge, my protective gear dripping dry in their bathroom, drinking weak unsweetened tea and wondering just how I was going to occupy myself over the next few days, hoping that somehow I could convince Mother to allow me to return to school.

  Their flat was tiny and cluttered, over-populated with furniture, ornaments and other things they had doubtlessly brought with them from their previous residence and more affluent times. Unlike some of Old Man Merlin’s rusting relics from the past, my aunt and uncle’s possessions were not obvious junk. They were items of great pride – family heirlooms, items handed down over the years and well cared for: clusters of delicate glasses in a glass-fronted cabinet, collections of china ladies on shelves, lacy lampshades, two handmade tapestries hanging on the hallway walls, a display of Sunday best china in the kitchen, a velvet-lined box with a silver cutlery set that Uncle Jimmy polished vigorously but no one ever ate with. There were other things to fascinate us too: jars of colourful buttons made from all different types of materials that Aunt Penny kept in their box room alongside an ancient sewing machine that you worked with a handle; Uncle Jimmy’s collection of family medals from wars long forgotten and even longer finished; and in their bedroom, a wardrobe with sliding mirror doors that was crammed with glamorous, dazzling, flowing dresses that Elinor loved to try out. These last items obviously belonged to our great aunt, but I had never seen her wear them; we never seemed to have the occasion to, either.

  The layout of their flat was simple: once through the door, a long, narrow oblong hallway stretched in front of you, with an ornate mirror and small table facing you at the far end; this was where they kept their telephone. To the left was a kitchen, bathroom, separate toilet and their box room; to the right was the lounge and their bedroom.

  Other than the sewing machine, their box room held one other point of interest; at least, it did for me. On the occasions that both Elinor and I were visiting, she would occupy herself by ferreting through
Aunt Penny’s wardrobe, dressing up in her abandoned evening gowns and parading up and down the hallway, admiring herself in the long mirror at the end. Whilst she did this, I would be in the box room, looking through the cupboard in there. The cupboard was fitted with shelves and tightly packed with tins of food. There were no labels on the tins, just initials in black ink on them – CS, BS, CC, VR, SK. Uncle Jimmy had expanded their actual names for me on numerous occasions – Chicken Supreme, Beef Stew, Chicken Curry, Vegetable Ravioli, Steak and Kidney – but, as a younger boy, I could never remember them all and would entertain myself with a simple guessing game or counting up how many there were in each category, wondering which had the most, guessing the winner ahead.

  Where did they all come from? I asked him on several occasions.

  The old factory, he told me, explaining that Mother, Aunt Agnes and, when necessary, Aunt Penny had all worked at a place called Simpsons, a food factory that had produced tinned and jarred goods. Closed now, so those tins are antiques. He had grinned at that comment.

  Won’t the food be all mouldy now?

  He had grinned at that, too.

  All nicely preserved inside the tin. All sealed up. We keep them just in case of an emergency.

  Given what had happened to them so far, I wondered what kind of emergency my great -aunt and –uncle were waiting for.

  There was another point of interest in that box room cupboard. Under the shelving, on the floor, pushed to the back, were several boxes containing toy cars and lorries from my great uncle’s childhood. Like the tins of curry and stew, they were immaculately preserved. Their boxes were still shiny and hardly worn or creased, as if they had very rarely been taken out. I loved lifting off the lids that were slotted on snugly, unfolding the tissue paper that was wrapped over each item and revealing the vibrant colours – bright reds, greens, blues and yellows. I was allowed to take each one out and roll their wheels lightly along the carpet, but Uncle Jimmy always supervised, nervous my clumsy hands might cause damage. But I was equally nervous and very gentle in my handling.