Blueeyedboy (53 page)

Authors: Joanne Harris

Tags: #Fiction, #General, #Thrillers, #Psychological

Post comment
:

JennyTricks
:
YOU WAIT HERE. I’M COMING HOME. I’M COMING TO TAKE CARE OF YOU.

She’s bluffing, of course. She has no idea. But if I didn’t know better right now, I might even feel a little afraid. She has Ma’s voice down so accurately that I can feel my hackles trying to rise, and the back of my shirt is clammy with sweat. But all the same, it’s just a bluff, based on what she knows of me. She knows it’s a weakness of mine, that’s all. She’s shooting in the dark. I’ve won, and there’s nothing she can do about it –

Post comment
:

JennyTricks
:
THINK YOU’RE SO SMART, DON’T YOU? YOU SHOULDN’T HAVE TRIED TO CHEAT ON ME. AND IF I FIND THAT YOU’VE LAID AS MUCH AS A FINGER ON ANY OF MY CERAMICS I’LL BREAK YOUR FUCKING NECK, OK?

OK, game over,
JennyTricks
. I think I’ve exhausted my tolerance. Places to go, people to see, crimes to commit, and all that jazz. There are plenty of opportunities for a man of my skills in Hawaii. Plenty of places to explore. Perhaps I’ll message you from there. Till then, Jenny, whoever you are –

You are viewing the webjournal of
blueeyedboy

Posted at
:
05.32 on Friday, February 22

Status
:
restricted

Mood
:
scared

Listening to
:
Abba
: ‘The Winner Takes It All’

OK. Joke over
, thinks
blueeyedboy
. This isn’t funny any more. She knows too much about him, of course; it’s almost beginning to get to him. He stands up, though it hurts terribly. The room does one of those choppy swoops. He holds on to his desktop to keep from falling over.

Bip!
That mailbox sound again. This time he ignores it. He slings his bag across his shoulder, still leaning on to the desk for support.

Bip!
Another message.
Someone has posted on badguysrock!

But he’s halfway across the landing now, leaning on the banister.
Badguysrock
is an island from which he is suddenly desperate to escape. Each step he takes is an effort, but he’ll walk out if it kills him. No crawling for
blueeyedboy
. He’s going to make that fucking plane –

He’s concentrating so hard that the sound of the car hardly registers, and when it stops on the driveway it takes him some seconds to react.

Police, here already?
thinks
blueeyedboy
.

A car door slams. He hears the crunch of footsteps approaching in the snow. A door key ratchets and turns in the lock. The front door opens quietly. He hears the sound of boots on the mat. A double thud. Then the sound of bare feet across the parquet hall floor.

They found the keys. That’s all
, he thinks. They let themselves in. Two detectives. He can see them in his mind’s eye: a man and a woman (there’s always one). He will be plain and businesslike; she will be kinder, more sensitive. But – why did they take their boots off, he thinks? And why on earth didn’t they ring the bell?

‘Hey!’ His voice is rusty. ‘Up here!’

No one replies. Instead, a scent of cigarette smoke winds its way up the stairwell. Then comes a small and slithery sound, like a snake – or a long piece of electrical cord sliding across a polished floor.

Panic wrenches at him now. He falls against the banister. He tries to get up, but his legs are on strike. Cursing, he crawls back into his room. Not that
that
will protect him now; the door is off its hinges. But there’s always his computer, he thinks; his refuge; his island; his sanctuary.

He logs back on to
badguysrock
. Two messages await him.

He reads them as the room spins dizzily around him. His eyes are streaming; his head sore; his stomach filled with razor blades.

From the stairs, relentlessly, comes the sound of footsteps.

‘Who’s there?’ His voice is raw.

‘Ma, please? Is that you?’

No reply but those feet on the stairs, coming up so steadily. With shaking hands, he begins to type. The footsteps reach the landing. A slithery sound on the carpet.
Blueeyedboy
types faster. He cannot,
dare
not, stop typing. Because if he stops, he’ll have to turn round, and then he’ll have to
look at her
–

But of course, this is only fic.
Blueeyedboy
doesn’t believe in ghosts. Even as he types the words he knows that this is
Albertine
. She couldn’t leave him after all; she stopped to read her mail, then turned back, knowing that he needed her help. And the phantom reek of Marlboros is only in his mind, he thinks, and the scent of L’Heure Bleue is so powerful that it cannot possibly be real. No, it’s only
Albertine
, who has come to save him –

‘I knew you wouldn’t leave me, Beth.’ His voice is weak and grateful.

Albertine
makes no reply.

‘You gave me a hell of a scare, though. I thought you were my mother.’ He tries a laugh, which sounds more like a scream. That slithering sound comes closer.

‘I guess that makes us even now. I’ll even admit I deserved it.’

Still no reaction from
Albertine
. Behind him the footsteps come to a stop. He can smell her now, a rose in the smoke.

She says: ‘I brought your medicine.’

‘Ma?’ he whispers.

‘Ma?
Ma?
’