The Memory Collector: The emotional and uplifting new novel from the bestselling author of The Other Us

Heather shakes her head, her neck so stiff that the side-to-side movement is only barely perceptible. ‘I can’t play hide-and-seek,’ she whispers.

Alice folds her arms. ‘You promised,’ she says, with the air of someone producing a winning card.

Heather shakes her head again. ‘Sorry, darling. It’s just that I hate… I just can’t…’ She looks helplessly at Faith, who has now turned her head and is watching the exchange, frowning. Her sister just tightens her jaw and says nothing. ‘I’ll play anything else you want,’ Heather adds. ‘As many times as you like. For hours and hours!’

It’s then that Alice’s eyes fill with tears. Her bottom lip wobbles impressively. ‘But you promised!’

Heather’s eyes threaten to fill too, but she manages to squeeze the tears away. Who knows what Faith will say if she has a total meltdown this afternoon, on top of everything else? ‘Sorry,’ she whispers.

Alice runs off crying, followed by a bemused-looking Barney. Heather catches Faith’s eye. ‘Everything has to be on your terms, doesn’t it?’ she says in a low voice, thick with disapproval. ‘Always by your rules and within your boundaries.’

‘That’s not true!’ Heather blurts out, surprising herself.

Faith just looks back at her. ‘Then go and tell the little girl who’s sobbing her heart out on her bed you’ve changed your mind.’

Heather stares back at her, unable to respond.

Faith huffs and stands up. ‘Exactly,’ she says. ‘Like I said: on your terms or not at all. I honestly don’t know why you bother coming to these Sunday dinners if you’re going to be like this.’

One tear slides down Heather’s face, but it doesn’t melt her sister’s frosty expression at all. Faith marches towards the door and, just before she leaves the room, she rests a hand on the jamb and turns round, shaking her head in both disgust and pity. ‘You know, sometimes you’re just like Mum.’

CHAPTER FOUR (#ulink_389005e2-b489-5b42-a6ae-3216b1ea8ca0)

CASSANDRA

The doll is queen of this house. She stands on the corner of the highest bookshelf, surveying her kingdom. The stuff climbs like a mountain towards her, a worshipper reaching for its god. Her eyes are clear and blue, haughty, her glossy brown ringlets perfect, her miniature faux-Victorian dress pink and delicate. Who can compete with the cold porcelain skin of her face and arms? Who can match the rosy cheeks and coral painted lips?

THEN

‘One… Two… Three… Four…’

Heather runs as Faith starts counting, her heart jumping in her chest. She has to find the best hiding place this time, one her sister will never guess, because Faith always wins at hide-and-seek. She always catches Heather quickly, shaking her head and telling her younger sister she’s an ‘amateur’, even though Heather isn’t really sure what that is. Someone who’s really bad at playing hide-and-seek, she supposes. She just hopes she knows as many big words as Faith does when she’s ten years old.

Heather thinks hard about a hiding place as she runs away. She can’t just race around giggling, like she did last time. She makes herself slow down. It’s not hard, though, because no one can run really fast in their house. There’s too much stuff in the way.

As soon as Faith started counting, Heather set off down one of the ‘rabbit trails’. Heather’s not quite sure why her sister calls them that – she’s never seen any bunnies in their house.

The trails are the paths between the stuff. They have lots of stuff. There are books and papers, plastic containers full of things Heather’s mummy doesn’t like her to touch. There are clothes, lots and lots of clothes. They’re piled high on the armchair and the table where the family used to eat their dinner. There are toys too, some old and broken, which Heather’s mummy says she’ll fix one day, and some still with tags on that Heather couldn’t play with even if she wanted to, because they’re so high up she can’t reach them. Some of the piles of stuff are so big that sometimes, when she looks up, they seem to lean over and look at her, trying to decide whether they should fall on her or not. She doesn’t like it when they do that.

There are also lots of things Heather’s mummy says she’s going to get around to throwing away when she’s not so tired. Maybe that will be when Heather’s daddy stops working so much and spends more time in the house. She overheard her parents arguing about that the other night. She also once overheard Aunty Kathy joke their house was like an Aladdin’s cave, only full of crap instead of treasure.

Heather’s not allowed to say that word Aunty Kathy said. Patrick Hull said it once at school and Miss Perrins made him sit in the corner then had to have a quiet word with his mum when she came to collect him.

Miss Perrins has had quiet words with Heather’s mummy quite a few times too, but not because she says anything naughty. Heather’s not exactly sure what the quiet words were, because Mummy and Miss Perrins were talking in the hallway, but it looked important and Miss Perrins’ face wasn’t smiley like usual.

She thinks it was about her school uniform one time (Mummy lost it under all the other clothes in the house and Heather had to wear her denim pinafore dress to school instead), and another time was when Heather was really itchy and the little insects from Fluffy the cat kept biting her tummy so she kept scratching instead of doing her spellings. Sometimes they hid in her jumper and came to school with her, and then they bit the other children too. Faith called them ‘bloody little hitchhikers’ but her teacher didn’t hear her say that so she didn’t have to sit in the corner. There were more quiet words after that, because the boys started calling her ‘Hobo Heather’ at playtime and wouldn’t stop chasing her.

Heather’s mummy has never been cross with her about the quiet words, though. Afterwards, she just comes home, lies on the sofa in front of the TV, and cries. She hugs Heather and tells her she’s a good girl, that it’s not Heather’s fault and that she’s going to do better from now on.

Heather is trying her hardest to move silently through the dining room when she hears Faith stop counting. It’s difficult to stay completely quiet, because of all the old plastic cartons and scrunchy cellophane that seem to collect on the floor in their house, and her feet slip on bits of paper and clothes that fall off the top of the piles.

‘Hea-ther!’ Faith calls in a sing-song voice. ‘I’m coming to get you!’

Heather starts to move faster. She’s not even thinking about giggling now and her heart is beating extra-hard. She’s got to find somewhere, somewhere small, somewhere Faith won’t expect.

Heather turns and heads up the stairs. Her feet are smaller than Faith’s and she finds the gaps in the piles of books and papers lining each step without making them fall over. When her foot hits the clear patch of carpet where the stairs meet the landing, she turns left and darts into the room there. This used to be her bedroom until the stuff filled it up. Once upon a time, the stuff was only downstairs and in her parents’ room, but it started to spread. Somehow the piles just kept getting bigger and bigger. Heather wonders if the big piles have babies. She asked Faith this once and her sister told her not to be stupid, but it makes sense to Heather. How else do new ones keep appearing?

So now the pile babies sleep in her room and Heather sleeps on the armchair downstairs.

She looks around the room for a good spot. She remembers that Daddy took his guitar out from under the bed and sold it to a man down the street. There’s a hole where it used to be that’s just big enough for her to climb into. Once inside, she pulls a bit of blanket down from the edge of the bed to cover herself.

Something on top of the blanket, maybe one of the piles balancing on the bed, comes crashing down and Heather freezes. Faith goes quiet too, and Heather hears footsteps coming closer and closer. Faith’s coming up the stairs! Heather holds her breath and closes her eyes, wishing she could turn herself invisible.

‘Hea-ther,’ Faith sings again. ‘You know I’m going to find you, don’t you?’

Heather wants to giggle so badly. She presses a hand over her mouth to hold it in. She can see Faith’s feet. She can just about make them out from under the edge of the blanket. Her sister is standing in the doorway.

Go away, go away, go away, she wishes inside her head.

Just as Heather thinks Faith is going to yank up the blanket and say, ‘Ha! Found you!’ her sister’s feet move. They turn and walk away. Heather’s so surprised she doesn’t breathe out again for ages, not until her chest starts to feel funny and then she gulps in air.

She can hear Faith walking around, calling her name, but her voice sounds different now. Not so pleased with herself. More fed up. Heather smiles to herself and curls up even tighter under the bed. Today she will win hide-and-seek and Faith will be the amateur!

Heather stays there for ages. Faith looks in all the other rooms upstairs and then she goes back down to the ground floor. Even when Mummy calls to say lunch is ready, Heather doesn’t move. It could be a trick and, even if it isn’t, she doesn’t want Faith saying she gave up. She’s not coming out again until Faith does what she makes Heather do when she can’t find her: stand in the middle of the house and shout that Heather is the queen of hide-and-seek and Faith is the loser. Heather wants that way more than a ham sandwich, even if her tummy is starting to rumble.

A long time later, Heather starts to feel cold and she opens her eyes. Did she fall asleep? The sounds of the bedroom, and then the rest of the house, come back slowly. She strains her ears. Somewhere downstairs, someone is crying and someone else is shouting.

‘Heather! Heather? Where are you?’ Faith’s voice has lost its taunting tone. Heather wonders if it is a trick to make her come out.

‘Oh, my God! Oh, my God!’ their mummy is saying in between sobs. ‘I can’t lose my baby! I can’t lose my baby! It can’t be happening again!’ There’s a pause and she hears her mother shout at Faith. ‘You were supposed to be watching her!’

There is thunder on the staircase after that and lots of shouting. Heather starts to feel scared. Something tells her this isn’t a game any more, that she needs to come out, but she’s too scared to move. She can’t even open her mouth to shout out.

Eventually, she manages to shuffle forward a bit. At the same time, feet appear behind the blanket. Heather tries to say ‘I’m here!’ but her voice comes out all croaky and quiet, like she’s forgotten how to use it.

The pounding feet and loud voices stop. The air goes very still.

‘Here,’ she squeaks, and then the blanket is wrenched away from the entrance to her hiding place and, at the same time, everything else that was on top of the bed comes crashing to the floor, sealing her in. That’s when she starts to panic. She pushes at the things trapping her with her hands and feet, and starts to shout ‘Mummy’, over and over and over again.

There’s more crashing, and she can’t hear what the others are saying, but eventually she hears her mother yelling, ‘Stop! Stop, Heather! Stop!’

Heather goes still.

After a few moments, air comes rushing into her hiding place and she sees her mother’s face. ‘Are you okay?’ she asks shakily.

Heather nods, but then when her mother starts to look worried, Heather realises it’s too dark under the bed for her to see her properly so she adds, ‘I’m okay. This is my hide-and-seek spot. Did I win?’

From behind Mummy, there’s a huff. A Faith kind of huff. Heather smiles to herself.