Читать книгу The Book of Rapture - Nikki Gemmell - Страница 10

Your youngest is crumbling. Here comes Mouse’s scream and your body flinches as he opens his mouth but Soli, your daughter, your eldest, holds her hand high, stopping them all quiet. ‘Sssh,’ she hisses in a voice she never shows to you. You press close, trying to will your love into them, spine them up. Mouse pushes into his big sister, needs her authority close. You know his heart, that little boxer inside him jabbing away at his skin — punch-punch punch-punch. Mummy, he mouths and your palm slams to your lips and you will them all strong, trying to solder calm into their skittery, swivelly backs. But little Mouse, his heart’s ramming so hard, it’s like when you forced him into swimming lessons too young and he screamed at the water’s edge and as you held him tight you could feel his terror battering your chest; it was like some wild unearthly thing in his ribcage, so huge, vulnerable, fast. My God, you thought, he could die here, his heart might just … freeze. With fright.

The doorknob turns. All their breathings stop, as crisp as an orchestra they stop—

Then … nothing.

The door doesn’t open. Doesn’t do anything. The person on the other side is … gone.

A vast, pluming silence. And your three children: ppfffft, like wilting tyres softening down.

Now they’ve got to work out how to get away from this place. Fast. Can they do it without you?

‘Trust me.’ Motl’s last words to you and you had to surrender to them.

Will see your children if you resume the project? Will you see your husband if you give over your secrets? Will you be freed from this room to eat them all with kisses? You hold the key. You do not know what is going on. No one talks, no one answers your questions. They hand you food through a hatch with eyes as dead as models’ on a catwalk. You don’t know who they are, what side they’re on, what authority they’re working for. Or where your children actually are. Or your Motl. All you have to touch, to smell, kiss, are his books; his secret missives in a thumbnail scratch.

Do not be afraid; you are with them.