Clare Houston: An Unquiet Place

‘Hi…’ She smiled, her lips feeling dry and stretched.

‘Hi yourself. Are you sore? The doctor said to call if you need more pain meds.’

‘A bit. Alistair?’ He looked up from her hands to her tired smile.

Placing her hand against his cheek, he turned his mouth to kiss her palm. ‘I thought… In that moment when I spoke to Kathryn, I thought I’d lost you.’ His voice choked. ‘It doesn’t matter what you say or if you don’t… I love you, Hannah.’

Hannah’s eyes filled, and all she could do was cup her hand to his cheek. He loved her. Emotion welled up, but words wouldn’t come.

Alistair sat up and dashed the tears from his eyes, composing himself. Her silence seemed to have brought him crashing back. ‘I don’t mean to put any pressure on you. I just wanted you to know.’

She nodded and cleared her throat. ‘Is it morning?’

He checked his watch. ‘It’s five-thirty in the morning. You went into surgery at one am.’

‘And you haven’t slept all night?’

‘Don’t worry about me – I’ll sleep later. I wanted to see you wake up. Make sure that you did wake up… It sounds silly now.’

‘No.’ She linked her fingers through his.

He nodded, though she could see his eyes fill with tears again.

The door swung open and Joseph raced into the room. He skidded to a halt next to her bed, breathing harshly. ‘Hannah! What happened? I’m such an idiot! I got carried away last night… Shit! I only turned on my phone forty minutes ago and then I raced here. Hannah! I should have come back to your place last night. Shit! Look at you. I’m so sorry!’

Hannah smiled at the jumbled barrage. ‘Josey, it’s fine.’

Alistair rose and pushed Joseph into his chair. Joseph leant towards Hannah. ‘Shit, Hannah, I stuffed up so badly last night.’

‘You didn’t know what was going to happen. It wasn’t your fault.’

‘Still, I was feeling sorry for myself, drank too much, and let myself be persuaded by one of the girls… I only looked at my phone when I was trying to sneak out of her room.’ He rubbed his hands over his face. ‘I can’t believe I let it happen and then I didn’t pick up Kathryn’s message from the ambulance.’

Hannah smiled at her brilliant brother, now hungover, anxious and full of remorse. Leliehoek had changed him too. She had never thought she could like him so much, and she found herself reaching for his hand, the tight squeeze of his grip moving her with a sudden flood of affection.

Joseph looked across at Alistair. ‘What happened? I only know what Kathryn messaged me last night.’

‘I don’t know much more. We were all waiting for Hannah to wake up.’ Alistair looked quickly at Hannah. ‘But you don’t have to say anything until you’re ready. Maybe now is not the time.’

‘I’m really okay, I promise.’ She looked over the edge of the bed and managed to find the bed control, pressing a button to raise herself to more of a sitting position. ‘I don’t know if Esme was outside while you were there, Alistair, but a few minutes after you left, she was at the door. She was…’ Hannah paused, looking for words. ‘She was out of it, seemed drugged, her eyes glassy and her face completely expressionless. She looked dead.’ Hannah frowned and drew a deep breath.

‘You really don’t have to do this now,’ said Alistair, concern edging his words.

‘She smashed a pane of glass in the door and unlocked it. Didn’t seem to feel the glass cut her hand. Then she started shooting at me. A shot hit me and my leg collapsed, but I got out the kitchen somehow and hid in the passage, and then when she came through the door, I hit her with that damned doorstop.’ Hannah’s voice caught and she turned to Alistair. ‘And then it was like my vision cleared for the first time, and I saw this scared little girl curled on the floor. Then Kathryn called… ’ Hannah frowned in confusion. ‘Like she knew something had happened. And she told me to stay on the phone. When I eventually looked around, Esme had disappeared, so I went back into the kitchen to find her and she had…’ Hannah’s breath came in a sob. ‘She’d cut her own throat and there was so much blood… everywhere. A great big pool of it on the floor. I tried to stop it. She was still alive and she looked at me. So lucid and sane. Like I could see the real Esme for the first time, and she was so beautiful…’ Hannah’s brows drew down. ‘I said a psalm over her.’ She looked up at Alistair. ‘I don’t know any psalms. Then Kathryn arrived with other people and I don’t remember much, just voices and lights and a strong sweet smell, like the scent of lilies.’ She raised her hand to her nose to smell her skin. ‘It’s gone…’

Hannah looked across to Joseph, whose eyes were brimming with tears. He cleared his throat and swiped a hand across his eyes before turning to Alistair. ‘Did she have surgery?’

‘The bullet fractured her femur, but missed the femoral artery. She was exceptionally lucky. She would have been dead on the floor before Kathryn got there if the bullet had been a centimetre to the side.’ Alistair shook his head, fatigue casting a pall over his features. ‘The surgeon put in a titanium nail. She’s got a long road ahead of her, but he said she’ll recover full use of her leg by the end.’

Joseph let out a sigh. ‘Thank God for that.’ And, as Hannah turned her head to him, he added, ‘And I really mean thank God this time. Shit, Hannah, there is more than one little miracle in that story and, before right now, I didn’t believe in them.’

Hannah looked at Alistair. ‘When can I go home?’ She frowned, thinking of her little house, smashed and blood-soaked. ‘I’m not sure I want to go back to the house right away.’

‘You aren’t allowed out of here for a while. The surgeon wants to keep an eye on you for a bit still, and then you’re coming to Goshen.’ He raised his hand to stop her protest. ‘When my mother hears what happened, she will insist on your staying with her – and good luck in saying no to her. I think it’s for the best, unless you want to go back to your parents in Cape Town?’ Hannah shook her head, and Alistair let go the breath he had held for a second.

‘What about the shop?’

‘Your house is being cleaned up today and then I’ll ask Barbara to stand in until you’re ready to go back to work. You don’t have to worry about anything. Just rest, okay?’

Hannah nodded. ‘Alistair? Esme died, didn’t she?’ Alistair, taking her hand, nodded, and Hannah’s eyes filled with tears for the first time. ‘She was so terribly, terribly sad. For all her damage, she really just loved her child.’

Alistair visibly struggled to hold himself together and just managed a nod. Hannah squeezed his fingers; it was over. After eight horribly slow years, Alistair’s torture was finally done.

Hannah settled into the cottage on Goshen and spent large portions of her days on the veranda. Sarah fussed over her and Neil brought her treats from town. Alistair’s dogs adopted her and usually lay around her chair, making it tricky for her to manoeuvre herself on her crutches. Sarah insisted on chasing them away, but Hannah liked having the dogs near, and would welcome them sneaking back onto the veranda when Sarah had gone. Neil, Sarah, and Joseph took turns driving her to Bethlehem for physiotherapy appointments, and slowly she began to put weight on her leg, though she kept her crutches for support.

Kathryn came to see her, bringing her pink boxes of pastries until Hannah eventually had to ask her to stop. ‘I’m doing no exercise and getting fat on all of these. You’re not helping me,’ she had said laughing. So Kathryn shifted to bringing smoothies, and they sat most afternoons looking out at the view, sipping from their oversized paper cups. She had told Hannah about Matthew’s lady at the door, and Hannah often thought about her – wondered who she was and why she should care about Hannah.