Something in the Walls

by Daisy Pearce

Then the villagers, linked in circles hand-in-hand, danced round the bonfires to preserve themselves against witchcraft, and when they burned low, one person here and there detached himself from the rest and leaped through the flames to insure himself from some special evil. —Cornish Feasts and Folklore, M. A. Courtney, 1890

That’s how Horace, the man who led the group, referred to grief. Sometimes small and quiet and shallow, sometimes a tsunami, cold and frightening. But inevitable, just like the tide.

Oscar stared at me, eyes glittering with expectation. I didn’t know what to say. He wanted me to say the same thing he would, which is that it made him feel like a god.

Side eye...

I frown at the sudden swerve in conversation. Sometimes I think he does it on purpose.

He does.

“I met a journalist who’s working on a story for The Herald. They need a child psychologist.” “So why have they asked you?”

What a dick

Then, I see it. The flicker of a smile on his face. This isn’t the first time he’s mentioned Lucy, the dark-haired undergrad who joined his laboratory in March.

Of course.

“I’m going to do it, Oscar.” He leans in the doorway with his arms folded, a look of puzzled amusement on his face. Humoring me. “You’re not serious?” “Yes, I am. I bloody am. I leave tomorrow.”

Good, screw him.

Did you know heat waves are linked to a rise in violent crime?

Probably because people are trapped with twats like him, and they're on their last nerve.

I notice something else, too, as we make our way through the village—stacks of pebbles with holes worn right through them, strung on beads and ropes and string and hanging in doorways. “What are the stones for?”

“I was wondering, Stevie, do you know what all the funny-looking stones are for? The ones hanging outside the houses?” “Hagstones.” She sniffs noisily and wipes her nose on her sleeve leaving a silvery trail of snot. “To keep the witches out. Witches can hurt you.”

I have a frightening feeling that I have made a terrible mistake coming here.

how could I explain that the thought of having a baby with the man I am due to marry fills me with anxiety?

That’s how it felt inside that house. Slow moving, suffocating. Like drowning in tar.

“Because you can’t predict what fear will do to people. You don’t know which way it will send ’em. Some people don’t have the stomach for it and it drives them mad.”

“He doesn’t have the stomach for it, see? You do though, Mina. You’ve been standing here for half an hour like it’s nothing. What does that tell you about yourself?”

Paul smiled unpleasantly when Sam had told him his idea, eyes pricked with a bright gleam. He said, “Whatever you need to do to make it work, Sam,” and patted him on the shoulder with something like fellowship.

“Ha! Bertinis! That’s right. Pineapple and orange slice on the rim. I thought I was so sophisticated with my straw and my cocktail glass. It was so sweet it hurt your teeth but at the time it tasted like sunshine. Mary would doze off in the sun and me and Bert, we’d—” She smiles, puzzled. “What?” “It’s funny, but I’m struggling to remember.

Tf is up with Bert?

“Then you’ll forgive me for saying that you don’t know what it’s like to be broke. To be so desperate for money that you dent tins in the supermarket so they’ll sell them to you cheap. To bring home the meat that no one else wants eating—offal and chitterlings and bones to make broth. Desperation makes you inventive, Mina. I just think it’s important you know that.”

He would have been careful not to put too much in. He would have done his research, made sure of everything.

Clocked it.

Because he’s right of course. The pyromaniac, the pregnant teenage mother, the girl hearing voices? Who would have believed these feral young teens? Who would have listened? And who would have cared enough about them to do anything?