It was a piece of lilac paper, and a handful of brown feathers. Bile rising rapidly at the back of her throat, Heather hooked the paper out of the sink before it could absorb any more droplets of water. Turning it over, she saw the little printed wren at the top of the page—the same paper, she realized, her mother had written her suicide note on. There was a small note written on it in black ballpoint pen, printed carefully in block capitals.

“So?” she said to the room at large. “Just a bit of paper she left lying around. And the feathers are from that bloody bird. That’s all.”

Even so, her stomach was churning before she read the words.

I KNOW WHAT YOU ARE, AND I THINK YOU DO TOO

And underneath that, a tiny black heart.

CHAPTER

18

BEFORE

MICHAEL GREW TALLER and stronger at a tremendous rate, putting on a layer of muscle and shooting up to be almost as tall as the man. If he was starved of human contact, he did not mind, or even think about it very much—he spent his days outside in the woods, or in the man’s library. He did drawings sometimes, although he was very careful to hide them, slipping them under his mattress in the early hours of the morning. Sometimes the woman who cleaned the big house came, and he would stay out of her way, listening for the sounds of her hoover or the faint sigh as she polished some piece of silver, and every now and then other men would come to the house; big, brash country men who brought a trail of cigarette smoke and the faint sour smell of beer. When they came around, Michael made sure to leave the house entirely, staying out in the woods all night sometimes, watching the lilac dawn light filter through the trees and tending his graves.

One afternoon, he returned to the house to find it filled with a new presence, something he couldn’t name. He hung in the doorway, sniffing carefully—there was a scent, something floral and exotic, and a different energy. The dog appeared across the hall and then was gone, and a second later he heard the man call out to him.

“Michael! We have guests. Come and meet them.”

It was summer. The living room was hot and still. Motes of dust hung in the air, making Michael think of old water moving slowly in a forgotten fish tank. The man was sitting in one of his wooden chairs, leaning forward eagerly to see Michael’s face. On the large green sofa two women were sitting—they were both older than Michael, but not as old as the man. One had chalky white skin with glossy pink lips, and her eyebrows looked as though they had been drawn on with a pen. She wore a tight blue dress with holes in the side; her pale flesh poked through like uncooked bread. The other had a lot of yellow hair that she had pinned up on top of her head and somewhat incongruously she was wearing a thick white fur coat over a short black skirt and a top with spots on it. Michael could tell from looking at it that the fur wasn’t real; it fluffed up around her as though she were sitting in the arms of a big white bear. This one smiled at Michael, revealing small neat teeth.