The Room Beyond by Stephanie Elmas Read Free Book Online

enthusiasm.’
    I burst out laughing and then swallowed hard to stop myself as Eva
actually turned her face away despondently.
    ‘I’m bored. Can we go to the park?’ said Beth.
    ‘Yes, although shouldn’t you be having some lunch?’
    I looked at my watch, it was nearly one o’clock.
    ‘I don’t like lunch.’
    ‘What does Beth usually eat for lunch?’ I asked Eva.
    ‘I don’t know,’ she replied with a blank look. ‘I thought she just
said that she didn’t like it?’
    Beth slipped out of her chair and dragged me away by the hand. I
felt a warm, grateful rush at her acceptance of me.
    ‘Have fun!’ said Seb.
    ‘We will.’
    I felt his eyes watch me leave and fought hard not to return the
glance. Eva Hartreve was quite clearly the last person I wanted to get on the
wrong side of.
     
    I took Beth to Holland Park. We went to the playground first but she
only looked bored there, kicking her heels around in the sand nonchalantly and
eventually sitting down on a bench by herself.
    ‘What would you rather do?’
    ‘I’d like to go over there and look for insects.’
    We flopped down under the large tree she’d singled out at the edge
of the park. It was a secluded spot, cloaked in mottled sunlight that filtered
down through the canopy of the tree. A subtle breeze teased the leaves above
our heads.
    ‘Sounds like silver foil, or new clothes wrapped in pink tissue
paper,’ she said. I looked at her face and noticed that her eyes were closed,
tightly wrinkled up in fact. She seemed to be feeling the sounds around her,
tuning herself to the environment. A dog whined in the distance.
    ‘What does that sound like?’ I asked.
    ‘A bear in a cave, or maybe an unhappy ghost.’
    She opened her eyes and they lit up suddenly.
    ‘Look Serena, there’s a ladybird on your arm!’
    We placed it carefully on a leaf and counted its spots as it waved
its antennae furiously at us: a small conductor with two batons. And when
eventually it flew away, scooping pools of sunlight up into its wings, Beth’s
face was a picture of delighted fascination.
    ‘Does Eva bring you to this park?’
    ‘No, she doesn’t really do parks. Raphael does sometimes.’
    ‘Ah yes, I saw a photograph of him.’
    ‘He’s Eva’s twin brother,’ she added, pulling her dress over her
knees and resting her chin on them. ‘Grandma and Grandpa have three children:
Eva and Raphael, and then Robert, the musician I told you about. Oh and then
there’s Seb, who’s like a sort of family member. Raphael’s not around very
much, he lives abroad mainly.’
    ‘You must miss him.’
    ‘I do. He buys me nice presents, beautiful interesting things. And
he tells good stories about his travels.’
    Yes, stories. I’d forgotten how important they were to childhood. My
parents must have told me stories when I was a little girl but I couldn’t
remember a single instance. I blinked hard at the sky: didn’t all children have
some sort of memory of sitting on their mother’s lap being read to? I could
remember Jessica reading to me, from a large hard backed edition of Alice in
Wonderland , her favourite book as a child. Perhaps she’d wanted to share
her feelings of nostalgia for it with me. But as a ten year old I’d found it
rather juvenile and actually quite distressing. I couldn’t really grasp the
charm of a small girl all alone, constantly changing size and running into
weird characters who wanted to chop her head off.
    ‘What sorts of stories do you like?’
    ‘Spooky ones.’
    ‘What, ghost stories?’
    ‘Yes. I have a large collection of them at home.’
    Was this normal for a four year old? But this was Beth, and although
my knowledge of young children was limited even I could tell that she was
unusual for her age; a small eccentric in the making.
    ‘Have you ever seen a ghost?’ she asked, cautiously.
    She’d picked up an ant and was watching him circumnavigate her bent
knee.
    ‘Not really. I might have heard one once,