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“Wait.” He put his hands on my chest and held me in place. “Why Wales? Even if what you’re saying is real, there’ll be nobody left. They’ll all have died years ago. What’s there for you now?”
“Answers,” I said. “I want answers.”
“Fine, let’s go,” he said, moving from the doorway and grabbing his coat off the back of the chair. “I’m coming with you. You’re not running off again.”
“What?” I looked at him puzzled, unsure if this was some sort of joke or test. Was he about to get in the car and drive me straight to my mother, or the hospital or some sort of psychiatric unit? Or would he actually come with me?
“If you’re going, I’m coming too. If you want me to believe you then show me. He grabbed his car keys from a bowl near the front door then opened it and pointed outside. “After you.”
Even with hardly any traffic on the road the midnight drive to West Wales took nearly five hours and was painfully silent. I was angry with my brother for not believing me, and I was angry at the stupid road map that I’d found wedged under the passenger seat that got us lost three times along the way.
In his defence he’d at least tried to make conversation with me as we drove, but I remained sceptical of his intentions. Every question he asked about my time away felt like a trap to find holes and inconsistencies, or he’d tell me about how our mother had struggled to cope with my disappearance, which only filled me with guilt. I preferred the silence.
The sun had long since risen by the time we found our way to somewhere that I recognised. I sat forward in my seat, a sudden wave of excitement coming over me as we passed some old farm buildings that I recognised on the road that led towards Cwm Newydd.
“It’s down there,” I said, pointing to a turning that Lee had just driven past.
“You’re supposed to mention that before we pass the junction.”
He slammed his foot on the break and spun the wheel, pulling onto a verge at the side of the road in an effort to turn. The roads were no wider now than they had been in the past and the village still sat in the middle of nowhere, modern life having not encroached on the rolling hills and fields like it had in so many other places. The only hints of change along the whole stretch of road were the modern signs and the addition of road markings.
After several tight manoeuvres we were finally facing back the way we came. Lee edged the car forward and took a left in the road, beginning the descent down the hill into the village.
“I promise, you’ll see. Everything I’ve said is real.” I grabbed his arm excitedly and flashed him a smile. My anger had dissipated, replaced with an excitement and a warm feeling of returning home, even though I knew my friends would no longer be there.
“It’s going to take some convincing,” he said, putting his hand on my shoulder. “Tom, it’s not that I think you’re lying. It’s just…” he paused, slowing the car down to a near stop. “I just don’t know how to believe it. You understand that, yeah? What you’re saying is just…”
“You’ll see,” I said.
We came to the junction at the bottom of the lane next to the pub. It had been painted white and a new modern sign hung over the door, but it was unmistakably the same place. Whoever owned it now had put picnic benches outside and every window had a flower pot on it, giving it a far more welcoming look than the brown stone and dark windows that I was used to.
I stared back at it through the passenger window as Lee pulled along the street and parked outside the church. I bolted from the car and stepped into the middle of the road, circling on the spot to take it all in.
“That was the post office shop,” I said, pointing to the building that Mrs Hopkin would send me to for the week's supplies. It was gone now, converted to a house, and the second door had been bricked up and replaced by a window.
“And down here is the school,” I said, motioning to the far side of the church. The building remained exactly the same but the playground had been fenced off and the ground was adorned with paintings of hopscotch and other children’s games. It had a new roof, too. Probably several since I last saw it, but the main building was unaltered.
Only two other cars were parked in the street and they sat outside the row of cottages that faced the church. The whole row of houses looked exactly how I’d left them. Some had new doors and one had been painted pink, but otherwise little had changed.
I ran up to one of the small buildings along the row. “This was where Mrs Wilkes lived. The Jones’ lived there. And up here,” I said, rounding the corner near the pub, “is the lane up to Mair’s house.”
I stood at the edge of the road waiting for Lee to catch up to me. He’d been slowly walking around, taking in the village and listening to me excitedly pointing out all the different buildings. I felt like a kid dragging my parents through a theme park pointing out all the attractions while he pondered what was so exciting about a couple of houses and a pub.
When he caught up to me, we walked up the lane towards Mair’s cottage. A bungalow had been built where some old pens used to be, though it looked like it had been there for many years and fit well amongst the older buildings.
“This is it,” I said, as we rounded a small bend and the cottage came into view. I ran to the door but it was boarded up with a padlock on it. I pulled at it but it wouldn’t budge, so I moved to the window, brushed away some dust, and put my face up to the glass to see inside. It was bare except for a few planks of wood thrown on the floor. A hole in the roof let some light in, shining against the fireplace that looked like it hadn’t been used in years. The door to Gwyn's room was shut, but the one to Mair’s room was missing entirely. There was still a bed in there, but it had no mattress on it and there was nothing else in the room that I could see. It was completely abandoned.
“Can I help you?” a voice called out, pulling my attention from the window. A woman was heading towards us from down the lane wearing overalls and wellies and her curly red hair hung loosely around her shoulders.
“What happened to this place?” I asked, sad to see it in such disrepair.
“Condemned,” she said. “They’re tearing it down soon once all the planning comes through.”
“Who owns it?”
“I do. Who’s asking?”
She looked at me curiously, an obvious stranger to her, probably wondering why I was hanging around her property peering through windows.
