Thursday Night- Cousin Jacob

There had been a bit of an argument over whether or not Sandy should spend the night at Cousin Jacob’s.  Gran had said that, if he wanted to see her, he was perfectly capable of staying round Caroline and Anthony’s on the same night she was there.  Sandy didn’t know what Aunt Caroline had said about that, but she had overheard Grandad say, “If it’s because you think it’s unseemly for a twelve-year-old girl to stay with a single bloke…”

“It’s nothing like that, Arnold Copstick,” Gran had said sharply, “He’s the last person I’d…  I’m just not sure I’d trust him in an emergency.  That’s all.”

“You don’t need to trust him in an emergency as long as you trust Sandy,” Grandad had pointed out.

Sandy thought she knew why Gran was worried.  Jacob hadn’t lived on his own for that long.  He was going to be twenty-eight in December, but sometimes Sandy found it hard to believe he was that much older than her.  It wasn’t a bad thing, at least not from Sandy’s point of view.  When you were twelve years old, it was hard to find adults who you could trust to take everything you said seriously.

They sat cross-legged on either side of the weird little table that was basically just a cushion with a board on top, drinking herbal tea.  “There’s an old superstition,” said Cousin Jacob, “They used to say that red-haired people would automatically become vampires when they died.”

Sandy thought about this.  “Cool,” she said with a nod.

“I just thought you’d like to know.”  Jacob picked up the little yellow teapot and refreshed their cups.  He was the only person she knew who used a teapot as an everyday thing.  He was also the only person she knew who didn’t have a TV or a computer (he had a mobile phone, but only at Aunt Caroline’s insistence).  “Also, if you were born with a caul- you know, a bit of dead skin across your face- or if you were born on Christmas Day, you’d be able to see ghosts.”

“Well, that’s me out.  My birthday’s in February.”  She sipped her tea.  It was like getting a mouthful of perfume.  “Unless, wait, would that cancel it out?  If I had red hair and a birthday on Christmas?  I mean, you couldn’t be a vampire and see ghosts, could you?  It’d be too over-the-top.”

“I don’t think it cancels out,” said Jacob thoughtfully.  He took a couple of pistachios from the bowl, then pushed it towards Sandy.  “If anything, it would double it up.  Your connection to the supernatural.”

“Is that how folklore works, then?  All mathematical?”

Jacob laughed, eyes screwed up and looking down at the floor.  He did that a lot, when Sandy was around.

They’d had a good afternoon.  Jacob had taken her to a craft fair round the back of St  David’s, stopping at each stall and having fascinated conversations with the people running them.  He hadn’t gone there for Sandy’s benefit- that was just the sort of thing Cousin Jacob did with his days off.  That was probably why his flat was full of odd-looking things- old records (instead of CDs), paintings of unicorns and dragons, a wall of cactuses, a stuffed ferret in a glass case.  It was as if Jacob had turned his flat into a big cocoon by padding the walls with stuff he liked.

“I heard,” said Sandy, “that they used to say that babies would grow up to act like the first person who kissed them.”

“But, wait, wouldn’t that just be their parents?  They’d be the one with the earliest opportunity…”

“Dunno.”  Sandy thought about it.  “Maybe if a woman died in childbirth and her husband wasn’t there, the midwives would have to have a debate over which one of them was most qualified.  Maybe that’s where the fairies giving gifts in Sleeping Beauty come from.”

Jacob went quiet.  Sandy wondered if he was thinking about her parents.  Caroline said he’d always got on well with her mum.  He hadn’t known her dad for as long, even though he was Caroline’s brother, because Anthony and Caroline had only adopted Jacob a year and a half before her dad had died.

Sandy waited for as long as she could, then broke the silence.  “OK, if you could give magical gifts to a baby, what would they be? Say, three things?”

Jacob laughed.  “OK…  Um, three things?”  He stared at the wall opposite him, and thought.  “Well, not beauty.  I don’t think that helps as much as people think.”

“It helps Ewan McGregor,” said Sandy with a grin, “He’s gorgeous.”

“He’d probably be just as happy if he wasn’t.”

“I wouldn’t!”

Jacob laughed again, leaning back in his chair and looking up at the ceiling, as if asking the heavens what on earth he was going to do with Sandy.  “I don’t know,” he said, “What would you pick?”

&&&

They’d just finished dinner (pizza delivery) when Jacob realised that the pottery snail was missing.  It had been the first thing he’d bought at the craft fair- a chunky, ten-times-life-size snail statue painted in glistening green and brown- and it had been packed in a white paper bag that Jacob had been carrying around for most of the afternoon.  Except that now, neither Jacob nor Sandy could remember where he’d had it last.

“You definitely had it when we left the fair,” she told him, when he’d paused for a moment in between looking through the cupboards, “I remember asking you if you wanted me to carry the bag.”

“Yeah…” said Jacob, gently biting one of his knuckles.  Sandy had seen him do that a few times before.

“And we walked here, so you definitely wouldn’t have put it down anywhere.  It’s definitely somewhere in the flat.”

“Yeah…” said Jacob.  He didn’t sound as if he believed it.

Sandy wanted to help him look, but she didn’t know where to start.  If she just started pulling at the nearest pile of things, she’d probably end up breaking something without meaning to.  All she could do was stand around and try to say encouraging things.

Jacob was still biting his knuckle.  It made Sandy think of the time she’d broken her glasses and got stuck in the tunnel during the Adventure Weekend her Year Five class had gone on- wanting to scream or cry, but knowing that it would make everyone think she was a stupid little kid and wouldn’t even get her rescued any quicker.  Maybe he was asking himself why he cared so much about a snail statue that had only cost five pounds.  But asking that didn’t stop him caring.  It had been his.  He’d bought it because he liked it.  And he hadn’t even been able to keep it for an hour before it disappeared.

“Maybe I put it over here,” said Jacob, turning round to look down the side of the table.  As he did that, Sandy closed her eyes.

She thought about the pottery snail, the way its horns went up at a funny angle, the way its scales had felt when Jacob had handed it to her, the little white chip on its tail.  She thought about it, and the world moved and shifted around it, as if it was the only real thing falling through a black vacuum.  It was somewhere open.  Somewhere quiet and grey.

“Hey, Jacob?”  Sandy opened her eyes.  “I think you might have left it down by the front door.”

That’s where it was, alright, down in the foyer, just where they’d come into the building, halfway between the front door and the steps.  If Jacob had left it any closer to the door, it would have been smashed the next time someone had opened it, and if he’d left it outside instead of inside, there was no telling what might have happened to it.  But here it was, down on the speckled grey lino, still in its paper bag and still in one piece.

“I think you put it down when you opened the door,” said Sandy, as Jacob took the snail out of its bag and sighed with relief, “Then you must have picked all the other bags up, but left that one behind.”

“Yeah.”  Jacob put the snail back in the bag, and smiled at Sandy.  “Sorry for scaring you.  I know I freaked out a bit.”

“Nah.  I’m just glad we found it.”  Jacob started up the stairs back to the flat, and Sandy followed him.

As Jacob opened the door to his flat, he paused and looked at Sandy.  “Hey, when you closed your eyes just then…  When you were trying to work out where it was…”

Sandy felt as if she’d been caught doing something shameful.  “Yeah?” she replied, not meeting his eyes.

“Were you…  Um…”  Jacob fidgeted with the door handle.  “Well, my mother…  Not Caroline, the other one…  When she lost something, she used to pray to Saint Anthony to help her find it.  Is that what you were doing?”

Sandy had never heard Jacob talk about his biological parents before, and the surprise chased away her embarrassment.  She didn’t know if he’d never talked about them before, or just not while she’d been around.  She’d have to talk to Caroline about that.  “Something like that, yeah.  Not exactly, but similar.”

Jacob nodded, and unlocked the door.  “Do you want some more tea?  I’ve still got half a box left.”

Sandy shut the door behind her.  “Sounds good to me, yeah.”

Wednesday Night- Uncle Simon and Aunt Libby

Uncle Simon had said, “Libby, I don’t think the world is going to collapse if a twelve-year-old girl likes to listen to Westlife now and then,” but it was too late.  Aunt Libby had already turned the car radio’s dials away from Radio One and towards the Classic Rock station.  She was determined to improve Sandy’s mind.

Libby listened for a moment or two, then let out an excited yelp.  “Steely Dan!  One of the great songs of our time!”  As she said this, she glanced behind her, as if to make sure that Sandy was taking notes for the test later.

Sandy listened to the song, which was about a guy playing Blackjack.  It was OK, but she’d really rather have been listening to Westlife.  Try telling that to Aunt Libby, though.

“Listen to the lyrics, Sandy,” said Libby, “They’re real.  Not just I-love-you-baby nursery rhymes.  This is poetry.”

“Yes, this song is much more relatable than I-love-you-baby,” said Uncle Simon, “We’ve all gone on the run after shooting a man.  I did that twice last week.”  He could say things like that in the car, because it meant Aunt Libby couldn’t kick him under the table.

Beside Sandy in the back, Cousin Finn was asleep in the car seat.  Sandy wondered what kind of music he’d like when he was older.  Maybe he wouldn’t really care one way or another- most of the boys at Sandy’s school were more into football than music.  Sandy wondered what would horrify Libby more; that, or Finn being into Britney Spears or something.  But you never knew- maybe she’d be lucky.

“Listen to the chord progressions, Sandy,” Libby instructed.  Sandy pretended to do exactly that, even though she didn’t exactly know what chord progressions were.  She’d have to ask her Music teacher when she got back to school.

The Steely Dan song ended, and, before Simon could put in any requests, another one started up.  “Nirvana!” yelled Libby, turning up the volume.

“Oh, God…” muttered Simon, not quite under his breath, “Can’t we listen to something a bit more cheerful?”

“No,” said Libby firmly.

Sandy listened.  “Hang on, I think I know this song.  We used to sing it at school, back at St Margaret’s.”  It was about a little bird who couldn’t find a warm place to sleep.  The version playing on the radio definitely made it sound less mournful and sinister than the school choir had.  The way they’d sung it, you knew for a fact that the little bird would be frozen to death by morning.

Aunt Libby nodded.  “It’s traditional” she said proudly, “They’re reinterpreting it.”

“Like a cover version?”

Aunt Libby frowned.  “Not exactly…”

“Well, what’s the difference?” asked Uncle Simon, a big grin spreading across his face.  Aunt Libby didn’t take the bait.  She glanced backwards at Finn, then turned the volume down a couple of notches so as not to wake him up.

Uncle Simon drove on in silence until they hit a red light.  He tapped his fingers on the steering wheel, looked out at the pavement next to them, and tutted.  “God!  Why are there so many leaves on the road?”

“Because it’s autumn,” said Libby patiently.

“Well, why don’t they clean them up, then?”

Libby raised an eyebrow.  “‘They’?”

Simon turned to her.  “You know what I…” Unfortunately, by taking the time to say this, he missed the lights changing, and the drivers behind him began to beep their horns insistently.  Simon went pink and stepped on the accelerator.

Libby could probably have dropped it, but that just wouldn’t have been her.  “You think the council should pay somebody to clean up after the trees every year?”

“I don’t see why not!” said Simon, sounding a little hurt.

“They can barely afford to have the roads gritted when it snows.  They’re not going to pay someone to, I don’t know, stand under the trees with a sack.”

Simon shook his finger at her.  “That’s not what I was talking about, and you know it.”

“Then what were you talking about?  Chopping down all the trees in town so that you don’t get offended by the sight of leaves lying around?”

“I just think somebody should clean them up, that’s all.”

“God, yes,” said Libby, with a smile, “They’re covering up all the litter.”

Simon let out an annoyed grunt, fixed his eyes on the road, and said nothing else.  After about a minute, Libby turned the volume up again.

&&&

Sandy had found out that Cousin Finn got very concerned when you pretended to cry.  All you had to do was cover your face with your hands and make sobbing noises, and he’d make an alarmed noise and pat your shoulder until you stopped.  This was a very useful tactic to stop him from pinching you or pulling your hair, as toddlers sometimes did.

Finn’s bedtime was in about ten minutes, but until then, he was sitting in the kitchen, keeping Sandy company while Simon sorted out some bills upstairs and Libby talked to whoever that was at the door.  This suited Sandy just fine.  It was always really fascinating to talk to a kid Finn’s age, and wonder which bits of what you were saying would be things they’d remember when they were older without knowing why.  For example, Sandy just spent the last few minutes explaining all the plots going on in Eastenders at the moment, in the hope that ten years from now, he’d still see Grant Mitchell as some kind of mythological hero.

Sandy heard the front door close, and an unfamiliar voice echo down the hallway.  “…wouldn’t want to put you out at all.”

“No, no,” said Libby’s voice, “God, no.  Stay as long as you like.  Did you say it was…?”

“Jaeger, love.  Like the rum!”

Libby laughed.  She opened the kitchen door, and came in with the other woman.  “Right!”  She looked at the able to check that Sandy and Finn were still sitting where she’d left them, and continued.  “Sandy, this is Mrs Jaeger, from down the road.  She’s been locked out of her house, and I said she could use our phone.”

“You’re too polite,” said Mrs Jaeger, “I locked myself out of my house- that’s the sad truth.  Let the door slam shut behind me and realised I’d forgotten the key!”  She smiled at Sandy, whose blood froze.

She knew that face.  Those yellow teeth.  That straggly grey hair.

“Sandy, was it?” asked Mrs Jaeger.

“My niece,” explained Libby, “She’s staying for the evening.”  She winked at Sandy.  “Needed some help with the baby, didn’t I, San?”

“Yeah,” said Sandy, “Hi.”  She’d forgotten that Finn was there until Libby had reminded her.  As quietly as she could, she moved her chair closer to his.  If Mrs Jaeger came anywhere near him, she’d…  Well, she didn’t know what she’d do.  Scream a lot probably.

Mrs Jaeger had turned away from them, for the moment.  “Now… Libby, wasn’t it?  I don’t mean to trouble you for more than a minute or two.  Just enough time to phone my husband, and I’ll be out of your hair.”

“Aw, don’t be like that.  Where does your husband work?”

“Macadam and Gould Furnishings, just around the corner.  He won’t be more than about five minutes, really.”

“Well, that’s enough time for a cup of tea.”  Libby turned away to put the kettle on.  “Come on, I’m not just going to let you make the phone call and then turf you out to wait on your doorstep.”

“Oh, well…  If you insist…”

So Aunt Libby made a cup of tea, Mrs Jaeger phoned her husband (who may or may not have actually existed), and then they talked.  They chatted like old friends about their husbands, about the news, about people they knew.  And all the time, Sandy sat at the table, next to Finn, staring into her own cup of tea and wondering exactly when Libby would have to leave the room and leave them alone with the old lady.

Finally, it happened.  Libby went outside to watch for Mrs Jaeger’s probably-made-up husband, and, as soon as she closed the door, Mrs Jaeger grinned.  “Hello, Alexandra Faith.  We didn’t get to talk last time.”

Sandy shifted up closer to Finn, who gave her a confused look before going back to playing with a spoon that somebody had left on the table after dinner.  She could have asked the old lady a million and one things- who she was, what she was up to, how she even knew where Sandy was tonight- but the question she actually ended up asking was almost boring.  “You don’t really live down the road from here, do you?”

Mrs Jaeger shrugged.  “I live wherever I like,” she said, with a touch of swagger.

Sandy looked down at the old lady’s hands.  There was that long, sharp thumbnail again.  “What do you want?”

“Well!”  The old lady grinned.  “You see, to me, you’re competition.”

“What?  Why?”  How could Sandy possibly be a threat to a woman fifty or sixty years older than her?  Especially when she hadn’t even known that woman existed until last Sunday?

Mrs Jaeger tapped her fingernails on the table, and looked thoughtfully around the room.  “How many people do you think there are like us?” she asked eventually, making eye contact with Sandy again, “Honestly?  What are the chances of any given baby being born with the gifts we have?”

(At the word “baby,” almost without realising it, Sandy shifted her chair so that she was blocking Finn from Mrs Jaeger’s sight.)

“One in a million,” the old lady answered her own question.  She paused, then added with a laugh, “So there’s about six thousand of us worldwide, give or take.  So tell me, Alexandra Faith, is there room for two of us in this kitchen?  Can I afford to take that chance?”

Sandy swallowed.  There were certain bits of what Mrs Jaeger had said- the gifts we have, about six thousand of us worldwide– that Sandy knew would seem important later, but right now, she didn’t care.  Right now, the only things she could think about were those long, dirty nails, inching closer and closer to her and Finn.

“You and your hailstones…”  The old lady leaned towards Sandy, so close that she could smell her breath.  “You’re more powerful than I thought.  But maybe not as powerful as you think you are.”

There was nothing else for it.  Sandy shut her eyes as hard as she could, and prayed that it would work.

She didn’t know how long she kept them shut.  Long enough for the muscles in her eyelids to ache with the strain of keeping them screwed up so tight.  When she finally dared to open them, Mrs Jaeger was lying with her head on the table, fast asleep.

She checked on Finn, and saw that he’d nodded off, too.  For all she knew, she’d sent Simon and Libby to sleep as well.  For all she knew, she’d managed the whole street.

Gently, she lifted Finn from his seat, and carried him out of the room.  She’d take him upstairs and put him to bed, and not come back down until it was safe.  With any luck, before Mrs Jaeger had a chance to wake up and look for them, Libby would find her and deal with her.

(Two months later, I’ve finally finished the next bit!  Sorry it took so long.)

Tuesday Night- Great-Grandma and Great-Aunt Pauline

Great Aunt Pauline was Gran’s younger sister, and her arch-nemesis.  Gran’s snide comments about Aunt Caroline were nothing compared to the grudges that could be nurtured by spending the first eighteen years of your life cooped up in the same house.  “Goes to pieces when she runs out of eyeliner,” Gran would say whenever Pauline was mentioned, “Can’t cook without a frying pan.”  Gran complained about everything Pauline did, from her perfume (“smells like a bloody bordello”) to the way she walked (“attention-seeking.”)  Luckily, their relationship had improved a bit since Great Grandma had moved in with Pauline last year, because Great Grandma took delight in winding her daughters up, and Gran and Pauline usually had to join forces to get her to stop.  So she was kind of a peacemaker, in her way.

At the moment, though, Great Grandma was behaving herself.  It was just after dinner (which, alright, had involved a lot of olive oil and burnt bits), and she was introducing Sandy to the newest cat.  “This is Billy,” she said, tickling the ginger ball of fluff under his chin.  “He’s my little boyfriend, aren’t you, Billy?”

Sandy might have been more weirded-out by that if she hadn’t heard it before.  Great Grandma referred to a lot of people and things as her boyfriends, including various actors on TV, the waiter at the Chinese down the road, and Sandy’s Cousin Finn, who was two.  Nobody else thought it was as great a joke as she did, but they all tended to smile and nod.  When you were ninety-two, you were allowed to make people feel uncomfortable.  “He’s very cute,” said Sandy, scratching the top of Billy’s head.

“He’s a lot friendlier than that one,” said Great Grandma, nodding towards Pepper, the little black cat, who was staring at them from under the table, “Won’t come near you unless you’ve got food in your hand.”

“Well, there’s only one solution to that,” said Sandy, getting up and going over to Pepper so she could stroke her.  Pepper gave her a long-suffering look, in the way that cats did, but didn’t bother to move out of the way.

Great Grandma laughed.  “Now, where’s Gus got to?” she said, looking around for the third cat.  Sandy shrugged, and turned back to Pepper.

Pepper had always been her favourite, but lately, Sandy had really started to wonder about her.  She was a black cat, after all.  Those were the kind that witches had.

Sandy had first noticed the… things that happened… just over a year ago, around the time she’d left primary school.  She’d noticed, but back then she’d still been able to tell herself that it was just her imagination.  Yeah, it had seemed like she’d known what the guy on the news was going to say before he said it, but that could have just been a lucky guess.  Yeah, it had seemed like that boy in the park had tripped over and twisted his ankle just after swearing at her, but that could have just been a coincidence.  Yeah, it had seemed like that power cut had happened just as she’d lost her temper with Gran… or that her friend Amy’s stomach cramps had eased off as soon as she’d patted her shoulder… or that all the spiders in the house seemed to turn away at the threshold of whatever room she was in…

She’d finally had to admit that something was going on last Easter, after that thing with the tree.  She still couldn’t think about it without shuddering.

I need to know what you are, that old lady had said on Sunday, but Sandy had a nasty feeling that they both knew already.  It had to do with black cats.

Pauline strode into the room, clearly on a mission.  She was wearing a leopard-print top that Sandy kind of wanted for herself, and a whole lot of gold jewellery that she didn’t (it looked heavy).  “Mum, why are there three paintings of cocker spaniels in the dining room?”

Great Grandma smiled innocently.  “They’re not all of cocker spaniels…”

“Has that salesman been to the door again?”  Pauline put her hands on her hips, trying to cut an intimidating figure.  But you couldn’t intimidate Great Grandma if your life depended on it.

“What, Alan?  Lovely young man.”

“Mum, how much did you spend on those?”

“Did you know, he spent three years in the army?  He was telling me…”

“Mum…”

Sandy stroked Pepper’s back with one hand, and lifted her chin with the other. She looked into her eyes (bright green- probably something supernatural about that, too), and thought about what she wanted to ask.  She wasn’t going to say anything out loud- Great Grandma and Aunt Pauline were still in the room, and they weren’t too busy arguing to hear.  She was just going to… think it really hard.  That would have to do.

OK, Pepper.  Go up to my room, and bring me…  Sandy thought through the things she’d brought in her suitcase.  Her pink gel pen?  No- cats were colourblind, weren’t they?  Pepper wouldn’t be able to tell which one she meant.  Alright, then, what about one of her books?  No- the last thing she wanted was a book covered in toothmarks and cat saliva.  She thought through the rest of her things, and finally came up with something.  Bring me my necklace.  The one with the red heart on the chain.  It’s on the bedside table.

Sandy let go of Pepper, and she sprang away from her and out of the room.  Even though that was exactly the result Sandy had been looking for, it made her shiver a bit.

Sandy went back to her chair to wait.

“Look, Mother,” said Pauline, rubbing her temples, “just because somebody comes to the door doesn’t mean you have to give them all your money.”

“And I don’t, dear!” said Great Grandma, maintaining a benign, sunny tone of voice because she knew that was what annoyed Pauline most, “I just thought they’d brighten the place up!”

“How?  Where were you planning to put them?  Because they’re not going in here.”

Great Grandma frowned.  “I don’t see why not.”

After a few minutes, Pepper still wasn’t back, and Sandy began to feel a strange sort of relief.  She didn’t know why.  Even if she didn’t have some kind of bizarre hold over black cats, all that other stuff had still happened.  The old lady and the hailstones on Sunday, for a start.  But at least it meant that this particular thing wasn’t happening.  At least it meant that Great Aunt Pauline’s cat was still just a normal cat, instead of a familiar out to do her bidding.  She didn’t have to deal with that, at least.

Great Grandma looked up from her crossword.  “Were you thinking of making a cup of tea, Pauline?”

“Nope,” said Pauline decisively.

There was a pause as Great Grandma considered her options.  “Sandy, were you…”

“Oh, for goodness’ sake, Mother, she’s our guest!” snapped Pauline, “I’ll make it in a minute, alright?”

Great Grandma nodded.  “Take your time, dear,” she said sweetly.

Sandy felt a movement near her ankles, and her heart sank.  Sure enough, when she looked down, she saw Pepper standing at her feet, with her heart necklace in her mouth.  Sandy leaned down to take it… and felt a nudge at her elbow.

She looked around, and saw Billy, Great Grandma’s little orange boyfriend, standing on the arm of the chair, holding her pink gel pen.  And as she turned, she saw Gus on the windowsill, with… yes, that was definitely the Goosebumps book she’d been reading last night.  He was holding it gently by one corner, as if he’d been warned to be careful with it.

Great Aunt Pauline looked up, and saw.  “Oh, you thieving little buggers!” she said, standing up and waving her hands at the cats, “Drop it, now!  All of you!”

Pauline and Great Grandma fussed around the cats, picking up the things they’d taken, apologising to Sandy and blaming each other for not keeping an eye on them.  Sandy barely noticed.  It was all she could do not to scream.