Chapter 9 Kier

9

Kier

Devon, July 2018

‘Bloody hell,' Penn says as I show him the map I've made for him and Mila. ‘This is why I always got you to paint them.'

I smile, wishing I could see what he could. It's hard to be objective with your own work. Months, even years after I've finished something, I can still pick holes in it. Especially the maps. No matter how much time I work on them, it never seems like I've quite captured the locations as they feel inside me.

‘You like it?'

‘Love it. It's … us.' Penn's voice catches as he runs his finger over the canvas, the different locations. The coast path where they hike. Their favourite dive bar and their go-to bookshop.

My maps are a little abstract, impressionistic in feel, but with recognisable elements, and with theirs, I've amplified that. I want Mila to feel an instant sense of coming home. I've tried to capture not just the essence of a place in time, but their bond. Their map is one of the few I've painted here that's all love: light, bright colours, softer shapes and lines. No shadows.

Penn's quiet for a minute, then looks at me. ‘Do you ever think about why you're still drawn to doing these?'

‘I like travelling, recording places. Sharing them with you.' I gently knock his arm with mine. ‘It's our thing.'

‘But the fact that you've kept it up all these years. I've always wondered if there's something underlying.' A pause. ‘You know, about …'

I pretend not to hear him, looking through the window at Mila and Zeph.

They've just reached the river beach. I can see that the Zeph of a few moments ago is gone, so quickly that for a moment it makes me doubt it even happened at all.

He's dipping his fingers in the water, looking up at Mila. I imagine he's asking her which fish you can catch. Telling her how he'd cook them. Lemongrass. Chilli. Coriander.

She's nodding, a smile playing on her lips.

I know in this moment that she'll get why I love him. How he can make food from words, conjure it from the very air.

Penn looks at me. ‘Quite the charmer, isn't he?'

‘He can be.'

‘And the rest of the time?'

Shrugging, I pick up the map and put it back in my bag. I walk over to the stack of dirty plates by the sink, pick up the one on top.

‘Look,' he says, when I don't reply. ‘The last thing I want to do is judge, but how he was back then, is that normal?'

‘What do you mean?' I scrape the leftovers into the food recycle bin.

‘How he was when we were talking about you?' His mouth makes a funny hard line as he takes the plate from me, puts it into the dishwasher.

‘And how was he?' I ask flatly.

‘He didn't like it. It made him … uncomfortable. And at the end, when we got up from the table, how he looked at you.'

A bead of sweat trickles down my back. ‘He's had a rough ride of it the past few years. Everything that went down with his job, it was hard for him. He's used to … being someone, the shining light. Not being that … he's struggling.'

‘I get that,' Penn says carefully, ‘but you're sure he's right for you?' He smiles, but it's all wide and weird.

‘I wouldn't be with him if I didn't think that. He loves me, Penn, absolutely.'

‘But what he said, the other day, about not calling it a relationship—'

‘He isn't into labels.' I shrug.

‘I just think if you have doubts, it's not worth it, not at our stage of life. I want you to find someone you can settle down with.'

‘Like you, here?' Smiling, I raise an eyebrow.

‘Yes,' he says seriously. ‘I'd love you back here, you know that.'

‘I can't.' I falter. See the blood again in my mind's eye. Winding a path across the floor.

This is what coming home does: dredges it all to the surface. Everything I've worked so hard to escape.

I've only been back a week and already it feels like I'm on a precipice. I go one way, I get to leave unscathed; the other, and it all comes crashing down.

Counting to ten in my head, I tell myself: Only a few more weeks. Once the wedding's over, I can go. Run.

Penn looks at me. ‘Think about it, that's all I want, and if you can't settle in place, at least in person. You deserve that.' He pauses. ‘I just worry that what happened … it's made you vulnerable.'

‘Vulnerable?' I laugh. ‘I'd hardly be travelling if I felt vulnerable .'

‘Physically no, but emotionally.' He shrugs. ‘Sometimes, I think, K, you can't separate yourself from what Mum did. It's like …' There's a small silence, as if he's struggling to find the right words. ‘Like you've taken it inside you.'

My head is pounding suddenly.

‘I could separate myself,' I say finally. ‘It was other people who couldn't. Don't you remember what they used to call me?' The next-door neighbour's kids used to shout it from their yard outside our grandparents' house.

The monster's daughter.

Penn's face looks pained as I mimic the words in a singsong voice. I can tell he wants to put his hands over his ears like he did as a kid. Put his hands over his ears and wish it away.

‘But I think you believe it too,' he says after a beat. ‘That you're tainted somehow by what she did. Not worthy of being loved.' He meets my gaze. ‘But you are, Kier.'

Penn's wrong. It goes deeper than that. It's not that I think I'm tainted by what Mum did, it's that part of me wonders if they're right.

If I am my mother's daughter, if the monster's there, lurking, after all.

Isn't that anyone's biggest fear? That the dark inside will find its way to the surface.

For most people, it's a hypothetical, but I'd seen it happen. Seen the person I trusted the most become a monster.

There's a lot of reasons I can't settle, but that's the biggest one.

I'm trying to outrun it. Trying to outrun the monster.