Just Before I Died. S. K. Tremayne

car.

      Kicking open the door, I see Randal, his tongue lolling, smoking cold breath in the dimmity. He jumps casually into the car, and on to the back seat, to be fussed by Lyla, and nuzzled by Felix. He does not seem frightened. He does not act like a dog that was chasing, or being chased. It’s Randal. Our dog. Behaving normally.

      Lyla’s face is blank now, the terror gone.

      ‘Let’s go,’ I say.

      She nods, and shuts her eyes.

      I work it through; and I work it out. It really was a simple panic. We panicked. It’s what people do in woods. In the dark, as the cold and the night kicks in. They panic: they see the Great God Pan. The fabled monster. But the monster is always your imagination, conjuring terror out of rowans and frost and little dead birds. And it was an average plastic hairbrush, iced with frost. Could have been anyone’s.

      I turn the key and the lights illuminate our drive home. Shadows of trees line the route as we unbend the narrow road and reach Huckerby. We open the door to a warm kitchen, I turn all the lights on and make a pot of tea. Neither of us speaks. The dogs are fed. Lyla is subdued, can’t even look me in the eye. It is as if she feels guilty, or is still scared. She sits at the kitchen table, nibbling a biscuit, drinking a glass of milk. I feel a need for one of Andy’s hag stones, to hang on the lintel of the door. To keep the witches out, the evil influences of Dartmoor that creep their way along the thorny hedgerows, trying to find a way into your home.

      At a beam of car lights, Lyla looks up. I hear the familiar sound of an engine, which is turned off.

      Adam has returned.

      He opens the door, brushing snowflakes from the shoulders of his fleece. As he shuts the door behind him his expression says it all as he looks at us.

      We have mud on our hands and faces. I have scratches on my neck from the twigs and brambles.

      ‘Jesus. What happened to you two?’

      I don’t know quite what to say. ‘Well, there was this load of crap in Hobajob’s, rubbish and tissues – anyway, we got a bit scared, and probably it was a joke, or coincidence, but it was frightening—’

      Without warning, Lyla bursts into tears. She waves a hand at me, angrily. ‘I don’t know, I’m sorry, Mum, I thought I heard him, saw him, I thought he was coming to take you away again.’

      Adam steps toward Lyla, but she turns and shakes her head and says,

      ‘Sorry, Daddy. Sorry. I want to go to sleep.’

      And with that, she leaps to her feet, and runs up the stairs.

      The dogs, as always, rise and follow, cantering noisily up the wooden steps to join her in her bedroom. We hear her bedroom door slamming shut.

      Adam looks as if he wants to go after; I raise a hand. ‘Wait, please – let her be, for now. She’s frightened because, you see, there really was a scare. There wasn’t any man, but there were these dead birds—’

      ‘It’s freezing, it’s Dartmoor, it’s winter.’

      ‘Yes, but all the rubbish, strewn everywhere – it looked like it was from our bathroom.’

      He regards me, sceptically; I press on.

      ‘And I wondered if Lyla is taking it there, likes she takes stuff to her den? Making patterns. But she’s too embarrassed to admit it. And yet, I don’t know, because she seemed as freaked out as me.’

      ‘Tell me the whole thing,’ he says. There is real anger in his expression, or some other emotion I cannot discern. ‘Tell me everything, Kath.’

      And so I tell him the whole story, as he pulls up a wooden chair. I tell him about the day at Grey Wethers, the stones and the forest, and the trip to Hobajob’s; then the accelerated sequence of the yowling dogs, the tissues, the birds, and pattern of familiar household rubbish made so evil by the setting. My blood, my lipstick, my hair, arranged in lines and circles. In a ring of fine frost. And I admit the panic, the manic fear that gripped us, the sense of an imaginary man. A predator.

      Adam stays silent as I explain, he is still in his damp Ranger’s fleece, as if he is a passing visitor.

      ‘So that’s it,’ I conclude, wearily, wanting his understanding, his sympathy. ‘Everything freaked her out, I mean it freaked me out, a used tampon? Someone’s hair, someone’s blood? Possibly mine?’

      He gazes my way, his expression undecipherable. ‘You can’t know it was yours. We get fly-tippers all the time.’ He offers me a shrug. ‘Probably kids from Princetown. Bunch of tossers.’

      ‘I know,’ I say, unsurely. ‘Yes, I know all that. But in the middle of Hobajob’s, why there? And Lyla is really scared of something happening, to me, all over again. She’s not herself. So what do we do now?’ I want him to come over and hug me. To sort this out, be my husband, to help, to hug, to kiss. ‘Will she get over it, Adam? Will we be all right? When she sees I’m not going anywhere, will she stop imagining things?’

      His expression is tinged with proper anger now. ‘No,’ he says. Firmly, coldly. ‘No. She won’t simply get better.’

      Rising, he walks to the sink, and takes down a Plymouth Aquarium mug from a hook under the cupboard. His voice is low and sombre, darker than ever. ‘All this lying isn’t helping, it’s making things worse.’ He turns to face me. ‘Kath. It’s time. The time has come. There’s something you need to know. About your accident.’

       Huckerby Farm

       Thursday morning

      Adam is getting Lyla ready for school. He’s said nothing more since last night, nothing to explain his cryptic words. He’s told me I need to meet someone, and she will explain. Later yesterday evening, I heard him make a series of muffled phone calls, outside in the freezing yard, where there is sometimes better reception. It sounded as if he was arranging something.

      Now he stands here in the kitchen, helping Lyla into her winter coat. We all turn to the sound of a car, squelching through frost and mud, into the farmyard. Adam goes to the door.

      And there she is. Tessa. My brother’s wife. My thirty-eight-year-old sister-in-law. The woman we once sought out, for advice on Lyla’s suspected Asperger’s: because she is a psychologist, teaching psychology at Plymouth University.

      Tessa walks into the kitchen and stands next to my fridge, with its magnets spelling Love You Mummy from Felix, a joke by my daughter, who likes to pretend Felix and Randal can read and write, as if they are real friends who can talk with her, and understand her.

      ‘Hello, Kath,’ says Tessa.

      I don’t say anything in return. I glare at my husband. He looks back at me carefully, yet rather coldly.

      Why has he brought Tessa Kinnersley to Huckerby? If he has something to say, why can’t he say it himself? Why involve Tessa, a psychologist?

      As if I am mad.

      In the distance I can hear the dogs barking happily. The normality makes me angry.

      I am not mad. My memory is fragmented and I have odd panics but this was all anticipated. Mild to moderate brain injury, they said. Expect mood swings, sudden anxieties or depressions, difficulty with daily tasks, insomnia, nerves, prickliness, but you should also expect a slow and steady recovery.

      Tessa comes a little closer. ‘Kath, I know this must be weird, and I’m really sorry, but I’m here to talk. That’s all. Adam thought it might be better if you heard things from me.’

      ‘What things?’

      She flashes a glance at my husband. He responds with a subtle nod as he chats quietly with Lyla. Making sure she has everything