Disappeared, page 2
She took a left at the next slip road from the motorway, going where they’d never find her.
4
In the end, Cerys didn’t have to walk the whole way to the sea but she did walk for four hours without stopping. Somehow she’d once again found that loping country pace she’d had as a child. Though it made her legs ache from disuse and the atrophy of middle age, it still ate up the miles until she came to a village with a bus stop. It wasn’t somewhere she’d ever been but typical of the area with a few scattered farms, a collection of terraces along a main street and a small post office in the middle. She checked the bus times on the board in the shelter. There was one due in twenty minutes, which was good timing because then there wasn’t another for three hours.
She pulled the cords on her hood so it tightened around her face and went into the post office.
‘Bore da,’ the shopkeeper called.
‘Bore da,’ she replied and the woman smiled, recognising her accent as local despite the time that had passed since she’d used her Welsh. She quickly bought a chocolate bar before the woman tried to engage her in further conversation. After all, she didn’t want to be remembered.
Cerys wolfed the Snickers bar down at the bus stop while she waited. She was the only one there in the shelter, which was a relief. She counted the money in her purse. Fifty-six pounds and eighty-two pence. She’d thought she had less, but then she’d found a twenty-pound note jammed down behind some receipts. Goodness knows how long it had been there. Not that it would get her far.
The sugar in the chocolate hit fast on an empty stomach and it lent her a glimmer of warmth until the bus pulled up. The driver was deep in conversation with a man on the front seat and they obviously knew each other, so she was able to pay without either of them paying her much attention and take a seat near the back. There were only a couple of other people on the bus. One was a teenager with headphones in and her eyes glued to her phone and the other a man in labourer’s work gear who was reading a newspaper. Neither looked up at her.
Good. Nobody to notice her here either.
She watched the hills speed by through the bus window. They cut off onto another road to travel through the mountains on a route she dimly remembered going on as a child on an occasional treat to the seaside. She made her mind stay empty – no thoughts to trouble it, just noticing the clouds over the mountain peaks, the bare skeletons of the trees and the little silver streams that ran down the mountainsides. She shut out everything else.
Her mind felt still in a way it hadn’t for so long.
Dod yn ôl at fy nghoed.
It was a Welsh phrase, meaning to get back to a balanced state of mind. What it literally meant was ‘to return to my trees’.
Tears sprang suddenly and unexpectedly in her eyes and she focused determinedly on the view outside and blinked them away.
Not now, not here.
She concentrated on the trees until the bus rolled out of the mountains and climbed down the coast road. The grey Irish Sea lay ahead, white horses riding the choppy waves. She used to say that to Katie when she took her to the beach when she was small – ‘Look, white horses riding.’
A barb of pain, swift as a dagger under the ribs, penetrated her careful shield.
She turned her eyes from the cold sea. A harsh sea, that stretch. Always had been, always would be. Maybe she shouldn’t have come here.
Or maybe she should.
Maybe this sea was the answer for her.
The bus pulled into a lay-by and drew to a stop. On impulse she got up quickly and alighted. She didn’t want to travel this road any longer. Time to get off. Her thoughts were illogical, and she was a creature entirely of impulse now. It had been so long since she hadn’t had to consider anyone else in everything she did, that getting off that bus – just because she felt like it – was an act of rebellion.
The rain was falling heavier here and she all at once felt very cold and old and tired. Her stomach growled, reminding her how long she’d been going, fuelled only by one small chocolate bar. She looked around her. Houses stretched down the length of the road opposite the sea but there was no sign to tell her what this place was called. It looked as if she could be on the outskirts of a small town but she couldn’t see far enough to be sure. The wind whipped up sea spray and drove it into her face and she blinked at the salt sting.
She couldn’t see anywhere she could buy food so she guessed she’d have to walk again. She set off down the road, a long straight stretch that bent to the right a mile or so further along. The pavement was separated from the sea by a short section of pebbles and guarded by a white railing that ran the full length of the road as far as she could see.
God only knew where she was. But He probably didn’t care any more than she did.
It was mid-afternoon as Lily parked up in a side street opposite the sea front. This was their third stop now and she was tired of driving. She’d laid the false trail though, heading across from the South West as far as Kent on the motorways, making sure that if she was seen at all on CCTV it would appear that she’d be on the other side of the country completely. Then she’d left the motorway and the cameras, and wound her way through the B roads to head into Wales and the North. It had taken forever to get here, longer than she’d thought, and Sammy was fretful and desperate to get out of the car.
She zipped up his coat. She didn’t have a hat for him. Of course not – she was too stupid to have thought of that. She pulled his hood up and tried to fasten it closely enough that the rough wind wouldn’t yank it off. They walked back over the road to the burger van parked at the sea front. There wasn’t much else there except the small toddler playground Sammy had spotted as they went past. He tugged at her sleeve but she led him on towards the food van. ‘Later, if you eat all your food,’ she told him.
She bought burgers and chips and cans of fizzy drinks and they sat down at a battered picnic bench by the side of the playground. Sammy picked at his food and she felt her irritation growing. Why couldn’t he just eat it up? It was freezing here and the light levels were dropping as if it would rain torrentially soon. It had been drizzling steadily until recently and although she’d tried to wipe the bench seat with some napkins from the burger van, she could feel the wet seeping through her jeans.
‘Mummy!’ Sammy wailed and she looked up to see he’d tipped all of his food onto the floor.
‘Oh, for God’s sake!’ she yelled. He flinched back away from her, his mouth trembling in a way that betrayed tears were on the way. At the sight of that, she beat him to it and broke into sobs herself. She was a shit mother. She didn’t know what she was doing. She’d dragged him here. It was freezing and wet and they had nowhere to go. And she just couldn’t do this, and now she’d made him cry. She was shattered from the driving and the endless feeling of being afraid, as if at any moment he’d find them and she’d tried so hard to prevent that. ‘Just no more, please,’ she sobbed, ‘I just can’t do this …’
Cerys walked tiredly along the sea front. Her eyes were on that grey, chilled sea. Waiting for it to tell her. Wanting a sign that here, that now, this was what she should do. A cold pull from the waves, taking her towards them, would be all it took.
The smell of fried onions wafted through the damp air from a nearby burger van, making her mouth water. She passed a picnic table as a small boy accidentally tipped his food tray onto the floor with clumsy, still-baby hands. The young mother with him, who Cerys judged to be no older than Matt – early twenties – snapped at him in that worn-out and desperate way Cerys remembered feeling when her own were that age. As if your every last nerve was shredded and you just couldn’t carry on any more. Then the girl burst into tears and a second later, predictably, the little boy followed suit.
Cerys swooped down under the table and scooped up his food tray. Most of it had gone into the lid and little had been lost or in contact with the muddy grass. She discarded anything that looked as if it had touched the floor and placed the tray back on the table. The little boy sniffed as the tears rolled down his cheeks and he looked up at her with big green eyes. ‘See, everything’s fine,’ she said, automatically smiling at him as she would have done at Matt when he was this age.
His mother didn’t hear, her face still covered by her hands and her shoulders shaking with her sobs as if her heart was breaking.
Exhausted, Cerys thought. She put her hand lightly on the young woman’s shoulder.
The girl jumped, startled, revealing her tear-stained face. Eyes just like the little boy’s, though her hair was more dark blonde than nut brown.
‘It’s okay.’ Cerys smiled at her too and nodded at the boy poking a chip into his mouth and watching them curiously. ‘No harm done.’ She patted the thin shoulder reassuringly. ‘Sometimes they just wear you out, don’t they? I know mine did.’
Fresh tears sprang in the girl’s eyes and she bit her lip and nodded.
‘No harm done,’ Cerys repeated.
Lily stared up at the woman through her tears. A middle-aged woman with a capable face, the sort that meant she’d never been as hopeless as Lily was. The sort that put a roast dinner on the table every Sunday and thought nothing of it. The sort of woman Lily would never grow up to be in a million years.
The sort Sammy should really have as a mother.
‘Thank you,’ she said tremulously, realising the woman had rescued her son’s food for her.
‘Is it any good?’ the woman asked, nodding at the burger in front of Lily. ‘I was just going to go and get one.’
Lily grimaced. ‘Not great but there’s nothing else round here. I drove round and round this place looking for somewhere to get him something but this was all I could find.’
‘Oh well, it will do,’ the woman said and gave her a last smile before she went to the van.
Lily shifted uncomfortably as she saw the woman get her food and then stand to one side, trying to balance the polystyrene tray and her can of Coke at the same time. On a reluctant impulse born solely out of gratitude to a stranger who hadn’t needed to help her, Lily called out to her. ‘The seat’s wet, but you’re welcome to sit here.’ Sammy waved at the woman and grinned, still eating his chips.
She came over hesitantly. ‘I don’t want to intrude.’
‘It’s fine,’ Lily replied. ‘Sorry it’s so wet.’
‘That’s not your fault,’ she said, sitting down. She ate as if she was very hungry. Lily noticed that – she knew how it felt.
The stranger didn’t ask any questions and Lily was relieved.
‘My bum is wet,’ Sammy said, squirming around.
‘I’ll get you some fresh clothes when we get back to the car,’ Lily said hastily. At least she’d managed to bring a few changes of clothes with her. She hadn’t been able to carry much though, or risk packing ahead and being caught out.
‘Occupational hazard of living in Wales, having a wet bum,’ the woman said to him, and Lily finally registered she had a soft Welsh accent. ‘It rains a lot here, especially on this coast.’
She’d taken them for tourists, Lily realised, and that was no bad thing.
Sammy was still eating, slow as only a four-year-old can be, and he wouldn’t hurry up for all the weather conditions. Lily shivered in the wind. She wasn’t sure how far they had left to go and it was getting late. She had to find somewhere to stay and that probably wouldn’t be easy.
She cursed herself silently. Why couldn’t she have thought about that earlier? Why couldn’t she have planned? Instead of bolting blindly as she had done. He was right – she was useless. She’d sorted the car and the money. Why hadn’t she finished the job properly and booked somewhere to stay?
Because courage and sense had deserted her when she’d got that far. She’d managed this much but more had proved beyond her.
Her hands began to tremble with the familiar fear and she could feel her eyes beginning to well up again.
‘When will we get there?’ Sammy asked, chewing a bite of burger with frustrating slowness.
‘I don’t know,’ Lily answered, trying not to snap, ‘but a lot quicker if you hurry up and eat.’
He huffed at her and carried on chewing at exactly the same speed. ‘Where are we going?’
Which was exactly the question she hadn’t wanted him to ask in front of this woman. She didn’t want anybody knowing where they were headed but she couldn’t not answer or it would look suspicious. ‘There and back,’ she said, which was something her dad used to say way back when she was Sammy’s age. Before he cleared off and left them.
The woman beside them finished her food and dusted her hands off, getting up. ‘Thanks for letting me sit here. I must be off.’
‘Us too,’ Lily said with a sigh. ‘I think I’ll just wrap this up and he’ll have to eat it in the car. It’s starting to rain again.’ She’d been trying to be a good mum and give him a break from the car seat after he’d been cramped up in it all night and day, but this was ridiculous. He wasn’t even halfway through his food yet.
‘I want the playground,’ he said with a wail, recognising he was about to lose freedom.
The woman hid a smile. ‘Better finish that super-fast then,’ she said. ‘Quick as you can.’
Sammy began to gobble and Lily could have screamed in frustration. Why couldn’t he have done that for her?
‘Sorry,’ the woman whispered to her, looking guilty. ‘I shouldn’t have interfered. It just came out, like an instinct. My daughter was a slow eater too, you see.’
‘It’s okay,’ Lily said, through clenched teeth. Yes, an instinct – one she didn’t have and never would.
It must have showed in her face, because the woman’s expression turned to concern. ‘Are you okay though?’ she asked. And on receiving no answer, she reached out and put her hand on Lily’s coat sleeve. ‘You know, being a mother is the hardest job in the world and there’s no manual for it and, most of the time, nobody to tell you if you’re doing a good job. And it’s the most terrifying job you’ll ever have because all you want is to do the best for them and ninety-nine per cent of the time you won’t know for sure what that is.’
How did this woman know? How did she know how exhausted and useless Lily felt? Was she so bad at hiding it? Or was she just so hopeless that it was obvious to everyone?
The woman smiled at her and patted her arm again. ‘We’re all winging it.’
And oh god, she wanted to believe that. For it to obliterate all the crap in her head. All the failure. All the fear. She wanted someone to help her, to tell her how to do it right. To be her mum.
Her mum. Yeah, right – like that would help.
Lily sank to the ground on her knees and covered her face and sobbed. She had nothing left. No reserves. And she didn’t know what to do next.
She was down to empty. And inside was that fear he’d been right all along about her.
5
Cerys stared, appalled, as the young woman slumped to the ground. She glanced quickly at the little boy whose face had crumpled at the same time as his mother’s legs.
‘Oh dear, Mummy’s a bit tired. Don’t worry, she’ll be fine. Why don’t you pop over onto the playground before the rain comes in proper? Mummy just needs a cup of tea and she’ll be all better.’ The child nodded hesitantly. ‘Off you go then – the gate’s open and we’re right here.’
He scampered off and Cerys crouched down beside the sobbing girl. ‘Oh cariad, what’s wrong?’ Because there was something very wrong here. She hadn’t been a mother for twenty-seven years without knowing that.
‘I can’t do it,’ the girl sobbed and Cerys recognised that she was only being told this because she was broken down to nothing. She knew that place herself.
‘What can’t you do?’ she asked as if it were Katie she was dealing with. She rubbed circles on the girl’s back.
‘I’m a crap mother. I can’t do it. I can’t,’ and the girl sobbed even louder.
‘Of course you can, now tell me – what’s your name?’ Cerys put her arms around the girl, enfolding her.
There was a pause before the girl answered. ‘Lily.’
‘You listen to me, Lily. We all think that. Sooner or later – and usually sooner in my experience – we all think we’re useless. We all break down and we all realise how weak we are in the face of the magnitude of looking after a little person whose whole life and spirit is so dependent on us.’
Lily looked up at her, her face red and puffy with tears. ‘You don’t understand. I really am rubbish. I don’t have any mother’s instinct. I get everything wrong. I don’t know how to be a mother. Not at all.’
Cerys looked at her, trying to read what lay behind this. ‘Who told you that?’ The girl shook in her arms as she tried to suppress breaking down again. ‘Never mind, now,’ she soothed. She somehow knew not to push any further. This girl had had enough. ‘I’m going to go to the van and get you a hot cup of tea. And we can watch your little boy play. Trust me, that’ll cheer you up.’
She helped Lily to her feet and went to get the tea. When she got back with two Styrofoam cups, she was standing by the playground gate watching the little boy rocking on a car on a spring. ‘Thanks,’ Lily said, taking the tea, her voice still thick with emotion. ‘I don’t know why you would help me. I don’t even know your name.’
‘Cerys,’ she replied because it didn’t occur to her to lie in time to think of another name. ‘Why wouldn’t I help you?’ she found herself asking because it struck her as a curious comment for Lily to make.
The girl looked at her as if she didn’t understand the question, or rather she found it unfathomable, then she shook her head and took a too hot gulp of the tea.
‘Have you got far to go?’ Cerys asked because the afternoon light was fading fast.
‘I don’t know,’ Lily said miserably. ‘I think so. I think I’ve messed up.’
‘Why?’
‘I didn’t sort anywhere to stay and it’s going to be dark by the time we get there and I don’t know where to try.’
