Jessica's Ghost (11 page)

Roland’s mother went to see Mrs Parsons the next Monday and she agreed that Roland could join the school. There was a slight delay while they waited for his uniform to arrive but, by the third week of the summer term, he was ready to go and, once he started, it was all easier than he could have imagined.

Francis was right. Nobody commented on his size. When he came into a classroom, nobody said anything. Most people didn’t even look at him. They glanced up when he arrived and then got on with their work or whatever they were doing. The teachers seemed to know who he was and to be expecting him, so there were no long embarrassing introductions to make. They told him
where to go, let him sit down, and got on with the class.

Roland even enjoyed the lessons. Being with his friends was a lot more fun than sitting at home in the kitchen with his mother. It was good to sit beside Andi and Francis, watching Jessica float up and down through the floor, and it was very good to stroll out with them at break and sit on the bench on the far side of the playing field in the sun.

Mrs Parsons had arranged for Roland to be in the same class as Andi and Francis for most of his lessons, but in one subject this had not been possible. Roland did Spanish as his foreign language – his parents had a house in Andorra – while Francis and Andi did French, and it was this that led to an unfortunate incident on his first day.

The lesson itself was no problem. Jessica had gone with Roland to make sure he knew where to go and to keep him company, and the work was, if anything, a little easier than he remembered from St Saviour’s. But at lunchtime, as Jessica was showing him the way back to the bench where they had all arranged to meet for lunch, someone shouted at Roland to wait.

Roland stopped and turned round, as a boy came over and stared at him.

‘You are enormous,’ he said. ‘I mean we’ve got some fat people here but you are … huge!’

‘Walk away,’ said Jessica. ‘Come on, walk away!’

But Roland did not walk away. He stood there, staring at the ground as the boy reached out and lifted his jacket.

‘Look at that!’ said the boy. ‘You’ve got rolls of you pouring over the top of your trousers!’

Jessica opened her mouth to say something, then changed her mind and disappeared. An instant later, she was standing by Francis on the bench by the playing field.

‘Where’s Andi?’ she asked.

‘Gone to the loo, I think.’ Francis looked up. ‘Why?’

‘It’s Roland. Dermot’s poking fun at him. Over there.’

She pointed across the field to where Dermot was quite literally poking Roland quizzically in the stomach.

‘It feels a bit like a water balloon, doesn’t it?’ he was saying. ‘I mean you can actually lift it right up and then …’

‘Stop that!’ Francis was racing across the field towards him, shouting at the top of his voice. ‘Leave him alone!’

Dermot looked round in surprise.

‘What do you think you’re doing?’ Francis was panting as he ran up to stand by Roland. ‘Leave him alone!’

‘I’m not
doing
anything!’ Dermot let go of Roland’s blazer. ‘I’m just looking.’

‘You’re making fun of him,’ said Francis, ‘and you’ve no right!’

‘Why don’t you mind your own business!’ said Dermot. ‘It’s nothing to do with you.’

‘It
is
to do with me,’ said Francis angrily. ‘He’s my friend and even if he wasn’t my friend it’d still be my business.’

At that moment Mr Anderson, one of the PE teachers, appeared.

‘What’s going on?’ he asked.

‘Dermot was laughing at Roland for being fat,’ said Francis.

‘No, I wasn’t!’ said Dermot. ‘I wasn’t laughing. I never laughed.’

‘He told Roland he was enormous,’ said Jessica, ‘and he said we’ve got some fat people here, but you’re huge.’

‘He told Roland he was enormous,’ said Francis. ‘And he said we’ve got some fat people here, but you’re huge.’

‘Oh, for goodness’ sake!’ Mr Anderson gave Dermot a look of exasperation. ‘Don’t you ever listen? Didn’t you
hear
what Mrs Parsons said in assembly?’

‘What assembly?’ said Dermot. ‘I’ve been away.’

‘Right …’ Mr Anderson took a deep breath. ‘Go and stand over there and wait.’ He turned back to Roland. ‘I’m sorry you had to put up with that on your first day. Are you all right?’

‘Yes,’ said Roland. ‘Yes, I think so.’

‘I shall go and explain some of the rules of good manners to Master Dermot,’ said Mr Anderson, ‘and I promise he will not trouble you again. Now, if you want to make a formal complaint …’

‘No, no,’ said Roland. ‘It’s all right.’

‘OK …’ Mr Anderson nodded. ‘Well, if you change your mind let me know.’ And he walked across to Dermot.

Andi was waiting for them by the bench on the playing field.

‘Jessica’s told me what happened,’ she said. ‘Don’t worry, I’ll be having a word with that little worm and …’

‘No,’ said Roland. ‘Please, don’t. You’ll only get into trouble and …’

‘I don’t care about that,’ said Andi. ‘He’s not getting away with it …’

‘No, please! Really!’ Roland insisted. ‘I’d rather you didn’t do anything. It didn’t matter. It really … didn’t matter.’

And it was only when he said the words, that he realised they were true.
It didn’t matter!
Someone had come up and told him he was fat and … it just wasn’t important. A few months before, an incident like that would have left him crying in the toilets until it was time to go home, but now … now all he could think about was why on earth he hadn’t told Dermot to push off, or simply walked away.

The thing he had most feared would happen,
had
happened but, for some reason, it had been OK. Perhaps it was because there were people around him who said it was not OK, perhaps that was what made the difference. Or maybe it was simply the realisation that someone telling him he was fat wasn’t that important. It didn’t mean anything. And if the same thing happened tomorrow, it wouldn’t mean anything then, either.

‘You’re sure you’re OK?’ asked Francis.

‘I’m fine,’ said Roland.

He took a deep breath and grinned.

‘Really, I’m fine!’

After a day with her friends, Jessica would return, as she did every evening, to the room at the hospital where she had first discovered she was dead. The time she returned might vary a little from day to day, but it was usually somewhere between eight and nine o’clock. She still had no idea why she went back there, but the need to do so had the same sort of compulsion that makes some people keep washing their hands or avoid treading on cracks in the pavement.

Francis was the first to notice that the time at which she went back seemed to be getting earlier. As the summer term progressed, he noted that she was usually gone before eight, and that sometimes it was closer to seven.

Jessica tried, when this was pointed out to her, to make herself stay a bit longer, but whatever the force was that drove her to return to the room on the third floor, it was quite impossible to resist. When she had to go, she had to go.

She asked Roland if he knew of any reason why all this might be happening, but he said he didn’t. Nor, when he enquired, did his friend in Australia.

‘She said you’ll just have to hope it doesn’t get any worse,’ he reported, ‘and that you don’t find you’re stuck at the hospital all day as well as all night!’

It was an alarming thought.

‘I’m quite sure that’s never going to happen,’ said Francis firmly. ‘We’re only talking about an hour or so, aren’t we? I’m sure it’s nothing to worry about.’

It might only be an hour or so, but Jessica
did
worry. Quite apart from the prospect of it getting worse, there were already occasions when it could be inconvenient. At the weekend, if they were watching a movie or Andi’s mother was taking them out for a meal, she could suddenly find that everyone around her had disappeared and
she was back at the hospital. It would happen without warning and was oddly disconcerting.

And of course it meant she missed out completely on things like Mrs Boyle’s trip to the theatre.

Roland’s mother had organised the theatre trip to celebrate her son’s successful return to school. She had bought tickets for a revival of the
Rocky Horror Show
down in Southampton. She had heard it had some wonderfully off-beat costumes that she thought Francis would enjoy, and he was indeed looking forward to it, but he was disappointed when, shortly before leaving, Jessica announced that she would not be coming.

‘No?’ Francis looked up from the seam of the shift dress he was tacking. ‘Why? Is something wrong?’

‘Not really, no, it’s just … I have to get back to the hospital,’ said Jessica. ‘Now.’

‘Oh.’ Francis had known that Jessica would not be able to see all the show, but she had been planning to see at least the first half. Glancing at the clock, he saw it was barely six o’clock. She had never had to leave this early before.

‘OK.’ He did his best to look unconcerned. ‘Well, I’ll see you tomorrow. Tell you all about it then.’

‘Yes …’ Jessica opened her mouth to say something else, but before she could speak, Francis’s mother called up the stairs to say that the car had arrived and Mrs Boyle and the others were waiting.

Francis went to the top of the stairs to tell her he was on his way, but by the time he turned back to hear whatever it was Jessica wanted to say …

… she had gone.

Several hours later at the hospital, Jessica wondered for the umpteenth time what could possibly be making her return there with such regularity and such insistence. It wasn’t as if she did anything when she got there. Except stand and look out the window at the multi-storey car park on the other side of the road. She didn’t mind being there exactly – it was a little tedious perhaps, but you got used to it – she just wondered what could possibly be the point?

And she wondered, too, what would happen if what
Roland’s friend in Australia suggested came true. What if the urge to return to the hospital
did
grow to the point where she needed to be there most of the day, as well as all of the night? How would she manage if she could no longer be with her friends? What would she do if …

A movement in the road beneath her interrupted her thoughts. There was someone she recognised walking up the hill. It was a girl from Francis’s class at school – Lorna, Lorna Gilchrist – and Jessica wondered what she was doing.

It didn’t look as if she had been in an accident, and it was too late to be attending one of the clinics, so she was probably visiting a relative or a friend, Jessica thought. Except that, at the top of the road, instead of entering the hospital, Lorna turned left and walked across the tarmac to the entrance to the multi-storey car park.

It was an odd place to go on her own. It was past ten o’clock, the sun was setting, and the car park at night was not a place that Jessica liked to walk through alone, even as a ghost. There was supposed to be a security guard at
the entrance but he wasn’t always there … and why
was
Lorna on her own?

Jessica found herself drifting out of the window and through the air above the road. Maybe she was meeting someone. Maybe the person she was meeting had a car parked there and was waiting … But no, that couldn’t be right, because now Lorna had emerged from the staircase on to the top floor of the car park, and there wasn’t a car or a soul in sight.

The fact that she was alone did not seem to bother Lorna. She was carrying a small bag and she walked straight over to the parapet at the far side and looked out over the town. In the deepening twilight the lights of the city spread out below her, sloping down to the floodlit cathedral, with its huge central tower. In one quick move, Lorna pulled herself up on to the parapet, swung her legs over and sat there, staring out at the view.

It made Jessica a little nervous. The car park was built on a hill and the drop on that side was six floors, straight down to an area of concrete paving. If Lorna were to slip, or if she lost her balance for any reason, she could
kill herself. But Lorna clearly wasn’t worried. She took out a worn, stuffed dog from her bag, sat him on the parapet beside her, then leaned forward and peered down to ground below.

It was only then that Jessica realised what was happening.

She knew exactly why Lorna was here, and what she was planning to do.

She was going to jump.

Lorna was going to jump.

Jumping from the roof of the car park was something Lorna Gilchrist had been planning for some weeks and both the time and the place had been carefully chosen. She had worked out the height required for someone of her weight to kill herself in the fall – she was a clever girl, and good with numbers – and she had calculated that, as long as she fell head first, the forty odd metres to the ground were more than enough to break her neck.

She was not quite sure when she had made the final decision. It had crept up on her in the last few months, but there was no doubt in her mind that it was the right one. She could not carry on with things as they were, and there was no other way out that she could see. In the
circumstances, jumping headfirst from the top storey of a car park seemed not only reasonable, but absolutely the best thing to do.

Eight months before, Lorna’s father had gone missing. Mr Gilchrist was a solicitor who went to work one morning and didn’t come back. No one knew what had happened to him. Mrs Gilchrist did not know if her husband had been run over by a car, kidnapped, or suffered a memory loss. Nor did anyone else until, after five months of uncertainty, a policeman arrived at the house to say Mr Gilchrist had been found, and that he was working as a waiter in London, living with a girl he had met at a bus stop. Since the day he left, Lorna had not seen or heard a single word from him.

It was a shock, a terrible shock, but Lorna might have coped if, at the same time, things hadn’t been so bad at school. She never knew why Denise Ritchie and Angela Wyman had decided to tell stories about her – she supposed that, for some reason, they didn’t like her – but, whatever the reason, it was very painful.

It was Denise who spread the story that Lorna wet her
pants at school and had to bring in clean underwear and change twice a day. She would say it as if she felt sorry for Lorna, but when in class she put a hand up and asked for the window to be opened because there was a smell, everyone knew what she meant, including Lorna.

Angela, not to be outdone, started the story that Lorna stole things from the local shops, though she always insisted, as she passed this on, that she was sure it wasn’t true. Then, if something ever went missing from someone’s bag at school, she would sigh and tut and make it clear that, sadly, she knew who was probably responsible.

There were literally dozens of such stories, each of them more cruel than the last, and although at first few people believed them, over time they gathered a certain strength. Then Denise came in one day with the story that Lorna’s father had run away with a girl not much older than Lorna, who he’d met at a bus stop. And when it turned out that
was
true, people wondered if some of the other stuff might not be as well.

A doctor, if she had seen one, could have told Lorna that she was clinically depressed, and explained how this
affected the chemistry of her brain. But Lorna had not spoken to a doctor. She had not spoken to anyone about how she was feeling. Instead, she had come to the lonely conclusion that it would be simpler for everybody if she climbed to the top of a multi-storey car park … and threw herself off.

So this was why she was here, Jessica thought. This was what had been drawing her back to the hospital each night. Suddenly it all made sense. She was here to stop Lorna from jumping. To stop her making the mistake she had made herself, but … there was a problem.

Lorna could not hear her. Jessica called across the car park, then shouted and waved and finally moved over to the figure sitting on the parapet and floated in the air in front of her, urging her to move back to safety, begging her to think again. But Lorna could neither hear nor see her. Why this should be so – why the one person who most
needed
to hear her could not – Jessica did not know. But Lorna clearly had not the least idea that she was there.

Jessica thought of her friends. If she could tell Francis,
Andi or Roland, what was happening, they would be able to call for help. Or they could come up here and talk to Lorna themselves. Tell her that they knew, better than most people, how she felt.

But her friends were still in a car somewhere on the road, travelling back from the theatre. She quickly thought herself to Roland’s house, to see if they had returned early, then checked at Alma Road in case Mrs Boyle had gone there first, but there was no sign of them and Jessica returned to the car park. She sat beside Lorna on the parapet and wondered desperately what else she could do.

Who else might be able to help?

And suddenly, without thinking, she found herself back in her old bedroom in Aunt Jo’s house. One moment she was sitting with Lorna in the car park, and the next she was standing in the corner of the room where her bed used to be, while opposite her, Aunt Jo was sitting at the desk by the window, writing a letter on the computer.

‘Auntie?’ said Jessica. ‘Auntie, can you help?’

Aunt Jo did not answer and the only sound was of her fingers tapping at the keys.

‘Auntie!’ Jessica found herself shouting. ‘It’s an emergency, please! You have to help!’

But shouting made no more difference here than it had in the car park with Lorna. Aunt Jo could not hear her, and Jessica felt a rising frustration. ‘You’ve
got
to hear me!’ she yelled at the top of her voice. ‘I need you to help! She’s going to kill herself!’ She stepped forward and tried to grab her aunt’s shoulders, but of course there was nothing to grab. Her hands slid straight through her body …

… and Aunt Jo stopped typing.

With her hands frozen above the keys, she lifted her head to one side, as if she thought she had heard something.

Jessica moved her body very close to her aunt’s so that the two of them almost merged.

‘Listen,’ she spoke directly into her aunt’s ear. ‘You have to go to the hospital. Do you hear me? Lorna’s going to kill herself and you have to go there. You have to go there
now
!’

Aunt Jo still did not move.

‘Oh, come on!’ In a gesture of frustration, Jessica swept her hand through the computer and, with a brief
plink
, it turned itself off. ‘Listen to me! You have to go to the hospital. The hospital! You have to go there. There’s no one else. You have to stop her …’

There was a bemused look on Aunt Jo’s face as she turned in her chair and looked carefully round the room.

‘The hospital … You have to go to the hospital … You have to go there now …’ Jessica was repeating the same phrases over and over again, half of her body still merged with her aunt’s.

And Aunt Jo, still with that slightly puzzled look on her face, stood up. Jessica followed her as she left the room and walked slowly downstairs. She stopped in the hallway, to put her head round the sitting room door.

‘I’m just going out, George,’ she said, and without waiting for a reply, picked up a set of car keys, and walked out of the front door.

Lorna was exactly as Jessica had left her, sitting on the parapet with her bag and her stuffed dog, staring out over the town.

Jessica sat down beside her.

‘It’s going to be OK,’ she said. ‘Aunt Jo’s on her way. She’ll know what to do. She’s done training in this sort of thing. You just have to wait till she gets here. Fifteen minutes, that’s all.’

She hoped that she was right. She had followed her aunt down to the front door and watched her climb into the little car parked in the driveway. She had sat in the passenger seat while Aunt Jo had set off on the road to the hospital, but then decided to return to Lorna.

Not that there was much she could do now she was here. Lorna still gave no sign of being able to hear what she was saying, but Jessica kept talking anyway. She told Lorna about her own experiences, about her mother and her grandmother and about coming to live with Aunt Jo and Uncle George. She told her about dying and being a ghost and being stuck and, as the minutes ticked away, she began to think it might be all right.

Then, with the hands on the big clock on the hospital tower behind them showing five to eleven, Lorna took a deep breath and stood up. She stood on the parapet, the warm breeze riffling through her hair and clothes, stared down at the concrete below, and took a half-step forward.

‘No!’ Jessica cried out. Aunt Jo would not be here for another five minutes at least. ‘No, you mustn’t. You mustn’t. You have to wait!’ She floated up to stand in front of Lorna, pushing her back with hands that disappeared into Lorna’s chest. ‘You’re not going to make the same mistake I made. I won’t let you …’

Lorna could not hear her, but as Jessica continued to shout and plead, she could see in the girl’s eyes the same puzzled expression that had been on her aunt’s face. As if some tiny part of her was aware of what was being said, though her conscious mind had no idea what it was.