She drains her coffee, shoves the scarf into the pocket of her coat, which is hanging on the back of the door, and proceeds with the pastry for the mince pies. She’ll wash it one day. A scream reverberates around the house. Heather stops kneadingabruptly. The rolling pin falls on the floor with an ominous thump.
‘Georgia? Georgia?’ she shouts. Because cries like that can only come from one source.
The screaming persists.
Upstairs.
Heather rushes up the stairs and reaches the landing area to find the loft ladder lying on the floor, the loft hatch open, and Georgia’s legs beating wildly from the opening.
Heather’s eyes bulge. ‘What are you doing up there?’
‘Get me down. Get me down. Mum! Mum! Mum! Hurry. Hurry. Hurry.’
Heather recognises blind panic when she hears it. She grabs the ladder, positions the top end through the hatch, and wedges the bottom in place with her foot. Georgia’s feet take purchase the moment the ladder is in position. She climbs down and clings on to Heather as soon as her feet touch the landing area and stands, shaking in her arms.
‘What were you doing up there, Gee? I told you we’d get the loft things down after lunch.’ She uses her most tender voice.
‘You know I want to make this holiday extra special for Brianna, Mum. I want to do the whole lot for her,’ she says. ‘But whatisup there?’
Georgia’s eyes flit towards the loft hatch but quickly return to the safety of the hall space and Heather.
‘What do you—’ but Heather suddenly knows the answer. ‘You found your Grandad’s taxidermy.’
‘Taxi-what?’
This conversation was inevitable. Heather just imagined she could choose the time and place. She holds her daughter’s shoulders.
‘You know what taxidermy is, right?’
Georgia nods, the fear in her eyes slowly morphing into curiosity.
‘It’s that gross stuff with dead animals.’
Heather can barely contain the smile, because Georgia has summed up her own attitude to her father’s all-consuming hobby in five succinct words.
‘It is. And when I was living at home around your age, my dad did it as a hobby.’
‘So, the stuff up there is dead things from ages ago?’
‘Yes.’
‘So, it’s not haunted?’
‘No.’
‘Those eyes.’
‘I know.’
‘I dropped my phone. I was using it as a torch.’
Heather can only imagine the shock of seeing those shiny dead eyes staring back at Georgia in the confines of the dark and cobwebby loft space.
‘That must have been terrifying for you,’ she says.
Twenty minutes later, with Georgia’s phone retrieved and two of her father’s prized specimens positioned on the table in the lounge, Heather is forced intothatconversation.
‘I get Grandad did taxidermy and loved looking for dead stuff when you were a teenager, and it grossed you out and you hated it. So, then, why do we have it? And why is it in the loft?’ Georgia asks.
