Fragile Minds Page 0,72

I thought I’d married, I realised that now, though it had been a painful journey.

‘Can I offer you a drink?’ I said politely.

‘Go on then.’

The front door was slightly ajar, which was annoying. The young Polish guys who lived beneath me often forgot to shut it; they were always in a rush, and I was always politely reminding them, to no avail.

I pressed the light switch in the hall, but nothing happened. The stairwell was shrouded in complete darkness. ‘Bloody hell.’ I tripped over the hall rug.

‘You want to have a word with the landlord.’

Halfway up, on the first landing, I dropped my keys through the banister. I had a sudden urge to run away; I didn’t know what Will was doing here and it was beginning to spin me out.

‘You go on up,’ I mumbled, making my way back down.

As I opened the street door, unsure where I was going, there was a cry from above me, followed by a massive crash. Heart pounding, I was rushing back up the stairs when a hooded figure came flying past, knocking into me so that I smashed backwards into the wall, hitting my head hard, passing so close I could smell garlic on their breath.

‘Hey!’ I shouted, grabbing instinctively at the figure’s hood, breaking my nails in the process on the rough fabric of their top. But they didn’t falter, pushing out into the night. I staggered up and out onto the street but whoever it was had already disappeared into the dusk. As I turned, the glint of silver struck me from the hall’s rush matting. I picked it up; a broken chain with a tiny dove. Where had I seen this before?

I heard a groan from above.

‘Will – are you OK?’ I called frantically, pocketing it and running up the stairs.

By my front door, my husband was staggering to his feet.

‘Yeah I’m fine,’ he mumbled, rubbing his head. ‘Who the hell was that?’

My front door was wide open, and I reached inside and switched the lights on, baffled by the foot-high black letters scrawled on the wall beside the upended book cabinet that lived on the landing. Next to a badly drawn flower was written:

ATISHOO! ATISHOO!

WE ALL FALL DOWN

‘God, I’m bleeding,’ Will groaned.

I saw the blood on the hand he held out before him, and I felt sorry, knowing it was my fault. ‘Oh God,’ I said.

‘I’ll live. It’s a nursery rhyme isn’t it?’ He indicated the wall.

‘I guess so.’ Tentatively I pushed open the door. ‘I’ll fix you up, Will.’

‘Wait, Claudie.’ He pulled me back urgently. ‘I don’t think you should go in there.’

‘Whoever it was has gone.’ Gently I tried to free my arm. ‘It’s OK.’

‘I’m going to call the police.’ Will looked shocked and pale.

‘No!’ I said firmly. ‘I don’t think we need to.’

‘Are you mad?’ He stared at me. I stared back.

‘Maybe.’

‘Some guy’s just punched me in the head, defaced your property and possibly burgled you. I’m calling them.’

‘It’s probably just kids, messing around.’

‘That wasn’t a kid,’ Will snapped. ‘That was a proper punch.’

‘Please, Will.’ I thought about that horrible policeman who’d come here to tell me about Tessa. I thought about being dragged into the back of a police car after I’d sat on the wall outside Ned’s nursery school in the snow for a straight five hours without moving, a month after he’d died; of the policewoman who had eyed me suspiciously when I’d sat alone in the park once watching the children play in the sandpit. I was bereft, not menacing, but she couldn’t see that. No uniforms, not yet. ‘Look. Let me just check if anything’s been taken, OK? Then we can decide.’

Will glared at me for a moment and then he sighed deeply. ‘OK, I won’t call the police if nothing’s been touched. But if even a hair’s out of place, then—’

I turned all the lights on and together we walked through the flat. When we came to the small room where I kept Ned’s things, I let Will look inside alone. Everything was untouched as far as I could see, exactly as I had left it earlier.

‘I think it might have been someone after the Polish boys downstairs.’ I went through to the bathroom to find Will some Savlon.

‘Why?’

‘They keep such funny hours and I’m sure they’re growing weed in there.’ I rummaged in the half-empty medicine cabinet. At the back I found a packet of Tigger plasters I’d kept. Tears pricked my eyes and I swallowed hard. ‘I