Rob Ewing - The Last of Us

A track takes us to the end of Leideag, to the radio mast and Message Rock. Calum Ian worked out it’s the best place to launch bottles: because it’s the bit of land sticking out, it’s outside the bay, and also, the island Orasaigh stops the bottles coming back in again. He even put out two markers – yellow wellie boots – at the best launch-off.

But now he won’t come, because he got cross last time we all came. The argument began with Alex:

Alex: ‘Don’t want to throw mine in.’

Elizabeth: ‘But you’re not losing it. You’re telling your wish to the sea by sending. That’s the rule.’

Calum Ian: ‘A lot of rubbish, making wishes. Seadh , I bet they won’t come true. I bet we all end up wishing for the same thing. That would be dumb.’

Elizabeth: ‘We might not.’

Calum Ian: ‘So what’d you wish for? And you? And you? Aye: you all wished for everyone to come back, didn’t you?’

Me: ‘How did you know?’

Calum Ian: ‘Stupid fucking rubbish, wishes.’

But this morning it’s just us three. For my message I draw a picture of me with realistic hair standing beside our house. The house is a deliberate kid’s version (lots of square windows, a pig’s tail of smoke from the chimney) for extra impact. Alex has drawn himself holding a black lightsaber. No details. Elizabeth has done all the details of herself: address, age, name, family name, class at school, hair colour, cos she’s like that.

We get to the sticking-out edge of Message Rock and chuck them in. My one seems to wait for a bit – then it hurries off. It always seems to be mine that gets washed back up on the beach, which makes Alex gloat. He says he has a better throw than me, but I think it’s just luck.

At school we learnt about St Kilda. The people there ran out of food and they got tetanus and anyway there was no TV so they sent sea-mail. Sea-mail from St Kilda doesn’t get to America, it gets to the mainland. It’s a law of nature for all time. When the rescuers finally got to St Kilda the men had waited so long they’d grown beards. No one wanted to stay after, so that was the end of St Kilda.

We watch the tide as it starts to cover the rocks guarding the bay. There’s seals on the rocks, curled up like black bananas, not caring about what happened.

Me: ‘To the seals it’s all normal. Except for the rubbish, and the oil slick, which anyway didn’t last.’

Alex: ‘I used to think there was a plughole and the sea was a sink. That’s why the tide went up and down.’

Elizabeth: ‘It’s a good idea.’

Me: ‘It’s eejit-talk.’

Alex: ‘ You’re an eejit.’

Me: ‘Do whales not hibernate?’

Elizabeth: ‘I don’t think so. I never heard of that.’

Alex: ‘Why don’t people hibernate? Bears do. And squirrels. And birds.’

Me: ‘Birds don’t hibernate you eejit!’

Elizabeth: ‘ Nobody’s an eejit, OK? It’s a good question. I don’t know why people don’t hibernate. We’re mammals after all, and some mammals hibernate.’

Alex: ‘Do you think my mum and dad might be hibernating?’

Elizabeth looks away to the wrecked trawler.

If the sun’s low we can watch the bottles bobbing and shining for a bit, until they pass over to the sound. This morning it isn’t long before they disappear, which makes me think about how big the sea is.

Big enough for the nearest island to be blue. The mainland, to be gone.

Back when we used to take the ferry it was five hours to Oban. It never seemed too far when there were TVs and DVDs and games and dinner and showers and friends to run around with. But now the sea goes on for ever.

Alex: ‘Goodbye bottle.’

Me: ‘It can’t hear you, it’s a bottle.’

Alex: ‘Are you sure there’s no ghosts on that ship?’

Elizabeth: ‘Positive.’

Alex: ‘My bad dream is when everyone starts to come alive. I see them coming from the boat. They walk along the bottom of the sea. Then they start to come up the beach and I’m running and crying. But I’m not proper running – my legs are too slow. Are you really sure?’

Elizabeth: ‘Yes.’

Alex: ‘How sure?’

Elizabeth: ‘Listen: Dad said there was no such thing as ghosts. He said ghosts were just a figment of the imagination.’

Alex: ‘What’s a figment?’

Elizabeth: ‘A part that’s not real. A part you ignore.’

There’s no hazard tape on the door. Elizabeth’s rule for this is: Be aware anyway. Someone was digging in the back garden: there’s a pit, lined with tatty plastic. There’s no broken windows, and the door’s unlocked.

Elizabeth goes in first. ‘Hullo?’ she shouts.

No answer.

The carpets are red and gold in patterns like a king’s robes. No smell. So far. Stairs with a metal chair for going up and down on, for someone old, or with a bad back, or broken legs. Elizabeth signals us in.

Downstairs there’s a front room, kitchen. It’s very untidy. The walls are golden from smoking. Out the kitchen window we see a back garden with gnomes. Some of them are fallen over, sleeping. Windchimes trying to wake them up.

In the kitchen cupboards of old people you’ll usually find golden syrup, gravy powder. Good finds today: oatcakes, digestives, lemon curd. Hot chocolate to add to our hot chocolate supply back home.

The fridge: shut. I wear my perfume-hanky and open it. Instant pong. The food inside gone slurpy black. Elizabeth works away behind me, collecting all the worthy stuff I can’t be fashed getting: hand-spray, mousetraps, gloves, hats, scarves, clothes. Alex comes back from the cupboard under the stairs with new bedsheets.

‘This is good – we’re working as a team,’ Elizabeth says. ‘See? It isn’t so bad, is it?’

Alex: ‘It is so bad. I’m never wearing those. That’s a scarf for an old dead lady, it’s poisoned.’

‘You won’t be saying that when it gets cold.’

‘It’s summertime. It won’t get cold.’

‘It will in winter.’

‘But we won’t be here in winter. We’ll be rescued by then, won’t we?’

Elizabeth doesn’t even answer, just packs her New Shopping into plastic bags.

Upstairs, there’s a bathroom, two bedrooms. The bath and sink are unfilled. The main bedroom has one enormous TV. Nobody in the bed, but we knew that because there was no smell. Pill packets, dried-out cups, plates. A cross on the wall. Loads of old-fashioned DVDs, which Elizabeth says are of a type called westerns. Shane. High Noon. The Magnificent Seven. It smells of dust. There’s a dressing table with loads of pairs of crinkled tights hanging from its mirror.

The bed feels warm where the sun was on it.

Alex: ‘Dust is skin. Every single second skin is falling off you. But how does dust fall when nobody’s home?’

Elizabeth: ‘Dust is other things as well.’

By the end, we’ve got a good haul. Elizabeth finds creams called Elocon and Eumovate and Liquid Paraffin, which she says are good for skin. Alex finds a ship in a bottle, plus the bedsheets. I find another clock to add to our collection. The clock is called a barometer. Elizabeth says it measures air. Right now the air is Fair.

We almost go right into next door. But Alex stops us.

‘That’s my auntie’s house.’

‘Are you sure?’

‘’Course I’m sure! I always came here. That’s her name if you want proof.’

We read the doorplate. Then Elizabeth finds a scrumple of tape by the step.

Then I notice a Bsprayed in gold on the doorframe.

Me: ‘I think… Calum Ian’s been in.’

Alex: ‘He can’t do that! He shouldn’t be going into my auntie’s house!’

Elizabeth: ‘Look… let’s just move on to the next house, all right?’