Kim

Lou

 

Hannah rolled onto her back tugging the quilt up to her chin. This quilt was not as warm as her duvet at home. It felt rough under her fingertips where Aunt Ethel had carefully top-stitched over the pattern when crafting it. The old alarm clock said it was 1:20. Hannah wasn’t sure what had woken her, but she wished she was still asleep.

 

The moon was bright and its luminescence crept between the gap in the faded curtains hanging at the window. It created moving silhouettes of the Oak tree outside. Its branches and leaves dancing on the wall, The breeze occasionally shuddered the peeling wooden window frame.

 

She hated this musty cold room with it’s mattress lumpy like it had potatoes stored under the sheet. It must be nearly as old as Aunt Ethel and she had to be nearly 300 years old. Hannah sighed. This room was her prison whilst Mum and Dad were at an award ceremony up the road at a posh hotel. She wondered crossly why she couldn’t have gone too. Instead she was at her Mum’s Great Aunt’s cottage. She had wanted to go to her friend Amy’s house but Mum had said it was rude to invite yourself to someone else’s house. Usually Hannah stayed comfortably with her grandparents, but Aunt Ethel had offered and lived close to where Mum and Dad were going. Mum said Aunt Ethel would like the company. Hannah didn’t think Aunt Ethel really wanted hercompanionship though. They’d spent the evening in silence reading books. The TV in the corner of the front room remained firmly switched off.

Aunt Ethel was a ‘local character’ known by all. Despite her age she cycled everywhere on her bicycle with a brown, sprung seat and a large basket at the front. She wore bright zany leggings for whatever the season. A cobweb design at Halloween or candy canes at Christmas. She made quilts and jam to sell at the WI events she regularly attended. She was warm and charming to everyone she met outside but once in the house her mask slipped. She seemed to Hannah much colder and rarely smiled. Aunt Ethel had not had children of her own and was a little awkward around them. But Hannah could almost forgive her frostiness for the apple pie she had cooked for dessert. She licked her lips and her belly gurgled just thinking about it again. She wondered if Aunt Ethel was the kind of person who would allow apple pie for breakfast. Somehow she doubted it.

 

Hannah thought back to yesterday when she’d arrived. Aunt Ethel had pushed open the solid wooden door of the room.

“Here we are!” she’d declared, “You’ll be comfortable in Lou’s room!”

Hannah had slipped her Roblox rucksack off her shoulder onto the bed with a clunk and surveyed the room. The faint smell of TCP lingering. The curtains were open and the sun highlighted small diamonds of dust floating in the air. The faded pale green floral wallpaper was scattered with rectangles where pictures must have once hung. A thick layer of dust on the narrow windowsill had collected a couple of dead flies.

“This is Lou!” Announced Aunt Ethel in a proud tone, the lines on her face softened by a rare smile on her lips, her watery grey eyes remembering a distant time as her hand touched the blushing, china cheek of a doll seated on a shelf.  Hannah reached up to feel the fabric of her faded peach dress, scattered with small white flowers. Aunt Ethel suddenly snapped out of her reverie and barked “Don’t touch her!” Hannah recoiled, her reaching hand dropped to her side. Seemingly to regret her harsh tone Aunt Ethel added “Lets go downstairs and have a biscuit!” before turning back to the doorway and leaving the room.

 

Hannah glared up at Lou, now illuminated by moonlight on her high shelf. She could still feel the uneasiness in her chest from that earlier exchange. Aunt Ethel was so proud of that doll. Obviously a favourite toy from back in the day, but she had no idea why it deserved such reverence. She had a round cherub face with tiny pursed rosebud lips that held no trace of a smile. Her eyebrows had been hand painted the same colour as her hair. but it was the glass eyes which fascinated Hannah. The doll looked sad, those shiny glass orbs no longer lined up properly, giving the doll a slight squint. A solitary dimple marked the middle of her chin.

Her real human waist-length hair shone. She imagined her dress was silky but as she wasn’t allowed to touch it to know for sure, she sulked. The lace at the hem of her dress had gone yellow with age. A pair of matching peach shoes, the laces ended with pom poms, were perched on her feet. The sole of her left shoe hung loose from years of play. Her chubby jointed arms made her small, delicate hands seem out of proportion.

 

She heard the crunch of distant tyres outside. A car was travelling down the lane, the headlights bobbed up and down before smoothly travelling across the floral wallpaper and onto Lou’s face. She glanced at the clock again; 1:40 and yawned, grateful that she would be in her own bed tomorrow night.

 

She stretched her legs out as she rolled onto her side, shifting her hips to avoid the potato bumps. Her bare toes explored the smoother side of the quilt. The pillow was a bit too flat and hard to be comfortable. It had a rose water scent clinging to the fabric. The tick tick tick of the clock beside the bed was suddenly all she could hear. She pulled her own rag doll up to her face and inhaled the comforting scent of home. Her doll’s soft smiley, stitched face in contrast to the grim china one on the shelf. Hannah squeezed her eyes shut, her rag doll clutched to her chest as sleep finally called to her.

 

She heard a strange, chilling rattle and her eyes opened with a start. Immediately she sat bolt upright in bed. She looked at Lou, her heart beating so fast she could hear it. Lou had turned her back to Hannah and was slowly climbing down from the shelf with stiff jerky movements. Her plump arms reached upwards to lower herself down to the floor, her hair swinging. Hannah held her breath before releasing a shrill scream into the cold air.