Free The Broken Ones by Sarah A. Denzil

particularly tumultuous period, and things will start to seem brighter.”
    “You think I’m going to get through this?”
    She meets my gaze with her deep brown eyes. They’re so kind, I would believe anything she says. “I know you’ll get through this. You’re pretty strong, you know.”
    We make our way towards the school. “Hey, maybe this is what you should do,” she says. “You should set up some sort of recording device in your mum’s room. Maybe it’s not a ghost. Maybe there’s a mouse in the attic or a loose floorboard. It could be frightening her so much that she’s making up this shadow thing.”
    “You’re a genius, ’Lish!”

Chapter Eight
     
     
    It takes a bit of digging around in the attic to find it. I’m covered in cobwebs by the end, and my nostrils are clogged with dust. At the back of the small space is a box of Mum’s old belongings. There are old clothes, broken jewellery boxes, and some notebooks she used when she was a secretary in the late eighties before computers became the norm. Right at the bottom of the box is an old jumper. I pull it out, and a few strands of light mousy-coloured hair fall from it. I pick them up and examine them.
    My heart beats faster, and I toss the hair onto the attic floor. A light sweat breaks out on my forehead. What’s the matter with me? They’re just hairs from when I was a child. I lift up the jumper and remember its itchy feel against my skin. It seems like an odd thing for her to keep. Mum could never be accused of sentimentality. She threw away all my baby teeth, my school projects and Mother’s Day gifts. Why would she keep this horrible, itchy thing made from cheap wool?
    I set it aside and rummage deeper into the box. My hands find cold metal in a familiar shape. This is what I’ve been hoping to find. The device is in the shape of a small USB stick with a hidden microphone that can record for up to twenty hours. It was Jamie who bought it. He wanted to catch Mum out when I wasn’t in the room. He tried recording her saying nasty things to him. I was gobsmacked when I found out what he’d done. I threw it in a box of old stuff and forgot all about it until my conversation with Alisha.
    I slip it into my pocket and climb down the ladder onto the landing. Later, I experiment by leaving it in the kitchen as I’m making dinner for the two of us. After dinner, while Mum is sat watching her soaps, I put the USB stick into my laptop and listen to the MP3 file through a pair of headphones. There I am, chopping away, humming along to the radio. It works.
    “Mum, you okay?” I call through to the living room.
    “What do you want?” she snaps back. “I’m watching Eastenders .”
    “All right, Mum. I’m nipping upstairs for a shower.”
    There’s no reply. She’s probably lost in her drama by now. I collect the recording device and take it upstairs. Going into Mum’s room without her there feels weird, like I’m a teenager breaking a boundary. Mum was always very private about her room, not that I ever wanted to go in there. I heard the noises that came from her room and they frightened me when I was little. First there were the strange sobs at night. Then there were the boyfriends who came for dinner and left before dawn. Now I’m older, I understand everything. I know why there were nights when she left me tucked in bed at night and didn’t come home until the morning. At the time, I thought it was because she didn’t love me. Perhaps it was both.
    I need a good hiding place so that she won’t find it, and where the microphone won’t be obscured. I choose to place it behind a photograph frame on a high shelf. I can’t imagine why Mum would want to look up here, so I think it should be safe. The photograph is a black-and-white picture of my grandparents and great-grandparents. They’re stern and straight-backed, standing in front of a brick wall. An old dog lies at their feet, on top of what seems to be a pavement. It has to