Free Alarm Girl by Hannah Vincent

didn’t know was that she recognised the dullness that hung like a mist all around. Mostly, she could pick her way through it. With Robin as her guide and the green and red and yellow of his Lego pieces like Hansel and Gretel’s breadcrumbs, she was able to find her way. Sometimes, though, it descended so thickly it was impenetrable. Everything was cloaked and she too was cloaked and veiled in a mist of her own, that might lift at any moment or might remain in place, obscuring her from the worldand removing the world from her. She had never found words sufficient to explain this veiledness to him, never when she was under it and not even at times like now when she was more free of it. Perhaps it was better for him not to know.
     
    I WOKE UP THINKING the worst because I drank two Cokes at the restaurant but I was dry. I put on my elephant pattern dress to celebrate. Today was what Dad called a Chilling Day. He was on the phone loads so he said we could just hang out. I was glad. It reminded me of when he lived in England and he was at work and you would say Today is a Pyjama Day. I asked him if Beautiful was coming round but he said she was working. He said it in his annoying gentle voice. I said What is her job and he said she was a seller of houses. I wanted to know if she sold Dad his house but I didn’t ask.
    I was getting really good at the drawing game. I kept guessing Eleanor O and CatladyUK’s pictures. I thought Picasso might be you because I could guess Picasso’s drawings straight away and Picasso could guess mine. We never didn’t guess and the drawing of a baby was exactly how you would draw one – all chubby with a wiggly line on top of its head for its hair. I thought maybe you weren’t dead and instead you were living somewhere with a new family and new children playing the drawing game with me while they were at schooland not having Pyjama Days. Maybe you found a new boyfriend and had a baby and Dad thought we would be so sad to find out that he told us you had died instead and had a fake funeral and sent us to live with Nan and Grandad.
    Another possibility was if Dad wanted to live in South Africa and be girlfriend and boyfriend with Beautiful maybe you weren’t living with a new family. Maybe Dad killed you. People get money when another person dies. Maybe that’s why Dad is so rich. When I look at him I am wondering if he could do it and how he did it if he did it. On the news in England there was a man who killed his wife by driving her car into a river. If I think about the car sinking and the water coming in if you open the windows I feel like I’m drowning and my legs and arms start swimming even though I’m on dry land.
    Zami said he would take us into the village if we wanted. Robin said Are we allowed? I went indoors to ask Dad but he was on the phone. I heard him say The kids don’t know yet and I wanted to know what we didn’t know so I hid in the corridor to our bedrooms and I heard him talk about an airport pick-up. He didn’t know I was listening but the front door was open and Tonyhog came tip-tapping in so Dad got up to shoo him out and saw me. He laughed and said What are you doing lurking around here, Indy? I thought you were outside. I could tell he was nervous that I would find something out.
    I went back outside and I told Robin that Dad said we could go to the village even though I didn’t ask. We walked along with Zami like he was our proper friend and like we lived in Africa instead of being on holiday. He taught us some of his language and when people said hello we said hello back and when they asked us how we were we said we were cosy. Zami was going to see his sister on a bus and I wanted to see her too so that meant Robin had to come. I bought us all Cokes with my own money and I told him Dad said we could, which served him right.
    The bus journey took ages and there were no seats free so we had to stand up. When the bus went around corners we fell over. It was hot