The House on Fever Street

Celina Grace

© Celina Grace 2012

For Chris, who always believes in me

Prologue

It began down in the tunnels. He was walking, coughing, half-blind; stumbling through the dark over the sleepers, the air a wall of heat and thick, choking dust. The muscles of his shoulder were aching from the drag of her weight on his arm. Even over the shuffle of their steps and the distant moans and screams of the people who had been in that carriage of the train, he could hear her breath sobbing in and out of her lungs. He coughed again; he couldn’t stop coughing, spitting blindly into the darkness. Once he stumbled and fell to his knees, cutting his hand on the protruding edge of a metal bolt. Above the flash of pain in his palm, he heard her panicked gasp as their hands were wrenched apart.

“It’s all right,” he said. ‘I just fell down. It’s all right.”

“It’s not.”

He heard the tremor of tears in her voice and groped for her in the darkness. She came to him silently and they held each other for a moment; she thrummed in his arms, her heartbeat a fast gallop beneath the soft swell of her breasts. Then one of the others behind them stumbled against them both and cursed and they let go of each other, reluctantly.

“Don’t leave me. Don’t let go of me, please.”

“I won’t.”

He tightened his grip on her hand. He was very frightened, trembling on legs that shook with the backwash of adrenaline. He kept walking. He held onto her like a lifeline, their palms slipping against one another’s and he thought this is punishment for what I’ve done. This is the start of it.

They came out into daylight and watery sunlight, walking into a frenzy of noise and confusion. Sirens chopping at the air, camera crews and police tape, someone shouting, a staring crowd rigid with tension. He turned to her and looked her in the face, for the first time. Her blue eyes were bloodshot. He cupped her dirty jaw with his dirty hands, his fingers smoked black with soot, but he didn’t kiss her, not then. For the first time since the explosion, he thought of the others. Were they trudging through purgatorial tunnels, far beneath the city? Or were they dead? He tightened his fingers against her face and looked again, into her eyes. Save me, he thought, and bent to put his blackened mouth against hers.

PART ONE

Chapter One

Bella lay awake. She put a hand up to her face, feeling the thin film of sweat overlaying her skin. Her eyelids fluttered and she dropped back into sleep for a second, just for a moment but then she was back there, in the tunnels, in the dream, in the dark. She heard herself moan a little and pressed her hand more firmly against her forehead, feeling the minute jerks of her fingertips as her hand shook. She concentrated on breathing in and out, staring up at the familiar cracks of her bedroom ceiling, glad of the sunshine coming through the window.

Gradually, her heart rate slowed. She blinked away the tears that had come back again, hot and unwelcome, and tried to breathe normally.

When her legs were steady enough, she got up, wrapped her dressing gown around her shoulders and fumbled her way downstairs. She paused in the kitchen doorway, one hand on the wall, and her mother, busy at the sink, looked up sharply.

“Are you all right?”

“I’m okay. I’ll survive.”

She could feel her mother’s gaze intensify, and she looked away, down at her bare feet. Her toenails still bore the remnants of the pink polish that she’d applied on the very morning of the bombings. She remembered doing it; admiring her summer feet neat in her best high-heeled sandals, ready for her interview.

“Have you been crying?” said Mrs Hardwick.

“I’m okay.”

“Bella –“

“I’m fine.” She took a deep breath, swallowed. “Sorry. It’s just - I keep having bad dreams.”

She shuffled into the kitchen, belting her dressing gown more tightly about her waist. She’d lost weight; even in the short space of a week, she’d lost weight. Her mother was looking at her again, the same look she’d had ever since they’d left the hospital – anxiety, anguish and glorious relief all vying for precedence on her face.

“Nightmares? Well, that’s understandable.”

Mrs Hardwick reached for a tea towel and wiped off her hands with brisk efficiency. Something about the movement made Bella feel tired. She stood for a moment in the middle of the kitchen floor, staring dumbly across the room.

They sat down to breakfast in silence. Bella looked at the square slices of toast on her plate, veiled in melting yellow grease.

“Come on, eat something. You’ve not had a square meal since it happened.”

“I’m not very hungry.”

“Come on, love,” said her mother, in a softened tone. “You have to try and get on with things, you know. It’s no use giving in.”

Bella took a reluctant bite and jumped as, behind her, the phone rang suddenly. Mrs Hardwick answered it, spoke, frowned, turned to her daughter.

“It’s for you.”

Bella struggled with her mouthful of toast and managed to swallow it. She took the receiver from her mother.

“Hello,” she said.

“It’s Jake.”

For a split second, the bright, sun-filled kitchen darkened as, in her head, the explosion thundered once more. She gripped the receiver.

“Jake?”

“It’s me. From the – the tunnels.”

He’d kissed her in the street, the two of them locked together at the mouth, locked together at the hands. He’d looked like a boy then, a young smooth-faced boy, pale with fright under a black mask of soot. When their lips had parted, she’d begun to say something; she could no longer remember what. The paramedics had descended, rustling with foil blankets. There had been a chorus of soothing, no-nonsense voices. Bella and Jake were separated, gently prised apart by well-meaning hands. She’d felt the loss of his fingers, the sudden departure of his warmth, as if a part of her had been torn away.

And here he was, on the end of a phone line. Bella closed her eyes for a moment, listening to his breathing. He’d been, to this moment, someone almost mythical, a guardian angel who’d appeared in the murk of that tunnel to guide her to safety and light. She’d felt his warmth, felt the touch of his mouth against hers, all so physical and real – and then he was gone, pulled away from her. Leaving her in the tumult of the streets, leaving her to travel alone to the makeshift hospital. She hadn’t cried until she’d seen her mother’s face, pulled tight with anxiety.

He rescued me, she thought. And then he was gone. And now here he was, on the end of the phone, resurrected.

“How are you doing?”

Bella considered for a moment. How was she doing?

“I’m okay.” She felt shy with him, even though he couldn’t see her. She had to struggle to keep her voice at a normal conversational level, fought not to let it drop down to a silly little whisper.

“Are you having bad dreams?” said Jake. “I’m having awful dreams. Fucking horrible. My brother says it’s just my brain trying to make sense of bad memories. Whatever…. It’s awful. Are you sleeping badly?”

He was chatting to her so easily, as if they’d known each other for years. Bella felt herself begin to unbend, opening up under the spell of his easy talk. She was suddenly aware of her mother in the room, listening to every word. She shook her head at Mrs Hardwick’s lifted eyebrows. Her mother shrugged and moved away, out of earshot. Bella shifted the handset against her ear and turned away, pressing herself against the kitchen wall.