Edie did another spin. Tess jumped into the room and started skipping from side to side, trying to copy Edie.
Mum came in from the kitchen just as Uncle Ray was changing tracks. He put down the single he was holding and swapped it for another.
‘This is “You Didn’t Say a Word” by Yvonne Baker,’ he announced.
‘My favourite,’ Mum said.
She pushed the sofa as far as it would go against the wall and moved the coffee table into the alcove by the fireplace.
She began to dance, singing along to the track. Edie hadn’t seen Mum dance in this way. She was good, better than Edie, despite all her practice. Not as good as Uncle Ray, but nearly. Tess was now bouncing up and down, oblivious to the beat.
Auntie Becca came back and stood at the door, looking as if the entire family had gone mad. Dad stood behind her and stared at Mum.
‘Come and dance, Dad,’ Tess said.
‘Not just now, Tess,’ he said.
‘But Dad,’ Tess pleaded.
She grabbed his arm and pulled him away from the door.
‘Come on, Dad.’
He danced a few steps, just moving from side to side before looking over at Mum and Uncle Ray with their coordinated jumps and spins. He moved back to the door.
‘I’ll leave it to the experts,’ Dad said and left to go for a smoke out the back.
*
They danced until it was dark and Mr Vickers banged on the wall and told them to shut up. Then they ate cold sausages from the barbecue and more cake. Uncle Ray let Edie sit on his lap and sip his beer, which she pretended to like but it made her screw her face up and she vowed never to touch it again. By the time Uncle Ray and Auntie Becca left it was gone midnight and Tess was half asleep on the sofa.
‘Come on, you two, time for bed,’ Mum said.
‘Not tired,’ Tess said as her head flopped on Mum’s shoulder.
‘I know you’re not,’ Mum said and propped Tess against her arm.
Edie followed them up the stairs. She wasn’t tired either, but she wanted the day to end now, when it was perfect. She was ten years old. Double digits. Nearly grown up.
Tess: June 2018
It’s nearly midnight by the time I reach Aspen Close, the street lamps’ pooled light hinting at the neat lawns and clipped hedges in the shadows. From the end of the road I can see Dad leaning against the door frame, his cigarette a tiny glow against his silhouette. Once he sees me he throws it to the ground and runs to meet me. He puts both arms around me and squeezes hard. When his grip relaxes I look at his face. It’s gaunt, the artificial light exaggerating the shadows under his eyes.
‘It’s not her, Dad,’ I say. ‘I’m sure it’s not her.’
He looks around, as if someone’s watching, picks up my case and walks back to the house without answering. Once inside, he turns and slumps onto the stairs and leans his head against the banister.
‘Dad?’
He closes his eyes.
‘The police seem pretty certain,’ he says.
‘But there’s still a chance…’
Dad sighs.
‘No, Tess. There’s no chance.’
‘They’ve made mistakes before. It could be anyone.’
His certainty frightens me.
‘I’ve just got a feeling. A bad feeling.’
He opens his eyes; they’re red with tiredness.
‘I’m sorry, Tess,’ he says.
He takes my suitcase and drags it upstairs.
It’s never been like this before. He’s always been the one to reassure me, when I’ve been frantic, terrified that all my instincts telling me Edie is still alive are wrong. The fight has gone out of him this time, maybe it’s just been going on for too long. Maybe he wants it to be her, so he has a definitive answer to what happened to his daughter. The only answer I want is that she’s been found alive. I won’t believe this girl is Edie.
I go into the lounge and slump on the sofa. The new chocolate brown leather looks out of place against the faded abstract-patterned wallpaper and scuffed laminate floor. When we first came to Aspen Drive the rooms seemed enormous and the newness was intimidating compared to our tiny terrace on the Limewoods Estate, which was, and still is, a byword for unemployment and minor criminality. Now, the house’s décor is more than a decade out of date. In a Victorian house, it would be charming shabby chic. On a nineteen-nineties executive housing estate it’s just shabby.
Edie would like this sofa, it’s minimalist with clean lines. A spasm grips my stomach. What if she’s not around to like anything any more? Whenever I shop, I consult Edie’s aesthetic. Whether she would choose the music, clothes or homewares I’ve selected. When would she play it, how would she wear it, in what way should it be arranged? I try to do that with the sofa but can’t push away images of the cold dark water and the sailing dinghies circling above her, engrossed in their sport on the reservoir’s surface, just a few feet away. But it can’t be her. She ran off with her boyfriend to London or Tuscany or Marrakech.
I take a cigarette to calm myself. Dad thuds down the stairs.
‘I’ll make you some tea,’ he says.
‘Nothing stronger?’
‘I keep some whisky in the sideboard for Ray. Don’t know how much is left. Or there’s cooking sherry in the kitchen.’
I go to the sideboard. Dad’s not much of a drinker. It interrupts his smoking. But tonight he lets me pour him a glass of Laphroaig and sits down in his armchair.
The whisky burns my throat. It’s bitter and smoky, but better than nothing.
‘What did they tell you about…’ I’m not going to say Edie. ‘The girl in the reservoir?’
Dad manages to grip the whisky glass with both hands and hold his cigarette at the same time.
‘She’s a teenager, been down there for years.’
My fingers feel hot. I look down to see the cigarette’s burnt to its butt. I stub it out and reach for another.
‘How can they be sure?’
‘Dunno. Tests.’
We fall silent. Dad switches on the TV, it’s showing a football match. He sits back and stares at the screen, chain-smoking. I’m sure he has no more idea of what’s going on in the game than I do. It’s just his fear of silence and what I might choose to fill it with.
A girl, a teenager, dumped in a reservoir thirty miles away. She’s been down there for years. How many explanations are there?
*
After the match, I pour another large glass of whisky and make an excuse of an early night.
‘Alright, love, sleep well.’
Dad sounds relieved and opens a new packet of cigarettes.
I take a look at Edie’s room before I go to bed. It was never a shrine, though when she first disappeared, I used to go and curl up on the bed, willing her to come back. I’d smell the clothes that held onto her scent and try them on; they were too large and looked dull and sexless on me.
Later, the room