Free The Broken Ones by Sarah A. Denzil Page A

be outside some terraced house in London. The women are all boxy and tough, with their arms folded and their feet planted apart. I’m from strong stock, Mum would say. I believed her.
    Perhaps I got all Dad’s genes. I got his eyes. I got his habit of delving inwards and thinking too much. My only memories of him revolve around him never sticking up for us against her.
    I pause.
    Why would I think that?
    Never sticking up for me .
    I shake my head. I’m overtired.
    The microphone is hidden. Now I wait to see what it picks up.
     
    *
     
    While Erin is downstairs with Mum the next morning, I remove the recording device and slip it into my handbag. There’s no way I can wait until later tonight to listen to it. I’ll have to find a few hours at work. There’s a test I’ve been meaning to give the children.
    “Sophie?” Erin calls from downstairs.
    I hurry down the steps. “What is it?”
    “There was a call, but they hung up without saying anything. Didn’t you say that’s happened before?” she asks.
    “It’s okay. I think it’s that guy I met up with for a date a few weeks ago. He’s been calling me a lot, too.”
    “What? Oh my God, is he stalking you?”
    I pause. I guess I hadn’t thought about it like that. Not with everything that’s going on with Mum. “No, it’s not stalking, is it?”
    “If he’s calling you, it’s stalking. Does he know where you live?”
    “I don’t think so.” I think back to our conversations online. Did I ever mention the area I live in? The street? How hard is it to track down where a person lives? I know that people who are much more competent at using Google than I am can figure things out on the internet. Maybe Peter has found out where I live. A cold sensation spreads over my skin. “If he figured out the phone number, maybe he figured out my address, too.”
    “Maybe you should go to the police,” she says. “These things can escalate. Didn’t your mum complain about something in the house? The shadow thing?”
    My flesh crawls at the mere mention of it. “Yes, she did. Listen, don’t tell Mum, but I put a recording device in her room last night. I want to make sure that there’s nothing there. She’s been so spooked about sleeping at night. I’m almost 90% sure that this shadow thing is her imagination running wild, but I thought I’d check.”
    Erin frowns. “So, you’re worried too. Should I be worried about being here in the house all day? What if this Peter guy is stalking you?”
    “If I hear anything on the recording that sounds suspicious, or if anything else happens here, I’ll go to the police, I promise. And you can call me at any time and I’ll come home.” I glance at the time on my phone. “I’d better get to work. Call me if Mum gets agitated.”
    “I’m going to watch her all day,” Erin promises. “I still can’t believe what she did with the bleach. I know she’s deteriorating, but it still seems so out of character.”
    Hearing her say it only highlights the grim reality of the situation. Mum is losing her mind. She’s coming undone, and her character is slowly slipping away. She’s nothing like the person she used to be.
    “I’ll see you later. Bye, Mum.” I wave to her, but she’s lost somewhere in her mind, staring out of the kitchen window.
    “Bye, Becca.”
    “That’s a new one,” I say with a laugh.
    “Sophie, not Becca,” Erin says, pronouncing each word as though she’s teaching a child to spell.
    “That’s what I told them. They got it wrong, and I paid for it.” Mum shakes her head.
    I bite back tears as I leave the house. Now she doesn’t even know who I am.
     
    *
     
    A collective groan swells across the room.
    “It’s a two-hour test,” I tell the children, raising my voice over the squeaking of chairs, the shuffling of pencils, the whispers between friends. “And it’s only going over all the subjects we’ve covered so far.”
    “But, Miss, it’s boring,” exclaims Noah. There