Mirrorland by Carole Johnstone (books for 6 year olds to read themselves txt) 📕

rust and barnacles. They smell of the sea, of the things that lived and died in it. I shiver. And when I hear something too close behind me, I whirl around, the knuckles of my hand smacking loudly against the nearest boat. I go down hard and fast, dizzy and sliding against the slick concrete, ending up spread-eagled on my back. I turn my head, straining to hear anything over the rain – and then, through that narrow space under the raised hull, I see boots. Leather with steel-cap toes. And above them, jeans.

I scramble backwards, struggling for purchase on the slick ground. By the time I manage to get back onto my feet, I’m breathing too hard, too loud. But I don’t run. I want to run – I always want to run – but instead, I inch around the boat, and then launch myself into its black shadow. And when I come up against movement, solidity, I punch and I kick and I shout. And I scream.

Hands reach for me, and I scratch at them, punch them away. A greater weight pushes against me, but it isn’t as angry, as desperate, as prepared to fight dirty. I stab with my nails, kick up my knee again and again and again.

‘Stop! Stop.’

Vik lurches into the little remaining light, holding up his palms.

‘You!’ I shout, and the loud, outraged fury in my voice – the authority – hides the relief.

‘Cat, please. Stop!’ The last he shouts as I come towards him again. He’s soaked to the skin, his jacket plastered against his torso, rain dripping into his eyes and off his chin. He looks wretched.

I stop. It takes about all the energy I have left, but I do. We stand staring at each other in the shadows and the rain, both breathing hard and too fast.

‘How long have you been following me?’

‘Cat, I—’

‘How long, Vik?’ I shout. Because now that all the rage inside me has finally escaped, not even the promise of an explanation – of any possible end to all this not knowing – is enough to call it back.

He looks down at the ground. ‘Since you came back from America.’

‘How the fuck did you know I was back?’ I ask – before it occurs to me that the question I should be asking is Why? And then a sudden suspicion turns me in a new direction. ‘Do you know Mouse? Is she – are you—’

But although Vik is already shaking his head no, the weariness in it, his lack of confusion as to who Mouse is, only makes my suspicion more certain. ‘You know her. You know her! You’re both—’

‘Cat. I need to—’

‘Wait. Is Marie in on whatever the hell this is too? Is that what your bloody phone call yesterday was about? You have to get out of that house. Are all of you—’

Vik steps forwards. ‘There’s something I need to tell you.’

‘Then tell me.’

I can hear him swallow, even over the hammering rain. And then he looks at me without blinking. ‘I’m Mouse.’

‘What?’

His gaze slides away. ‘I’m sorry. I’m Mouse. At least, I’ve been pretending to be her. I’m the one who’s been sending you those emails.’

I step back, shake my head. ‘I don’t – I don’t understand. Why?’

‘Because El asked me to,’ he says.

‘Show me your phone.’ I’m still shaking my head. I can’t seem to stop. ‘Show me your phone, Vik. Now.’

He reaches into his jeans pocket, brings out an iPhone, and keys in its passcode before reluctantly handing it over.

I open his inbox with trembling fingers, smearing rain across the screen. And right at the top:

Cat Morgan

No more riddles, Mouse. This isn’t a game. This isn’t Mirrorland.

‘Oh, God.’

He lets out a long sigh. ‘She said it was to keep you safe. She said if something happened to her, you’d come back and … when I agreed, I thought she was being paranoid, I didn’t believe anything would happen. I knew she was scared of Ross, but I never thought …’ He stops, closes his eyes. ‘And when she went missing, I felt like – I felt like I had to do what she’d asked. And now – now – she’s dead, and I—’

‘Are you trying to tell me that in the event of El’s death – in the event of her being murdered by the big bad brute of a husband she just couldn’t bring herself to leave – she asked you to start stalking and threatening me? To keep me safe. From him. Is that what you’re saying?’ It’s better to stay angry. Better not to think or feel anything else.

‘I never threatened you.’

‘Were you having an affair?’ Because I can’t think of any other reason on earth why he would do any of this.

‘I loved her.’ And there is such affection, such adoration in his eyes that I want to punch him again.

‘Is that a yes?’

‘I already told you, no. Nothing ever happened.’

‘What exactly did she ask you to do?’

‘To follow you, make sure you were okay. To email you messages that she’d already sent me before she … disappeared. To send them in a specific order at specific times.’ He clears his throat. ‘To answer any of your questions with the same replies. That El was dead. That I was Mouse. That I couldn’t meet you. That you had to remember what happened on the fourth of September. I didn’t – don’t – know what any of it means. I promise you.’

‘Right. So you don’t know what she wanted me to remember? What the fuck she wanted me to do?’

He shakes his head, miserable again. ‘She just kept on saying it was about the end of your first life. She kept saying, He knows.’

A chill works its way down my spine, but I refuse to feel it. I hear the rattle of the Clown Café door, the dress-up cupboard. The rusty scream of the Satisfaction’s lantern. A sound no longer hard and short and white, but soft and long