Chapter 26
Ashden watched the scenery blur from the train window, relieved to be out of the Sanatorium, although the antiseptic stench clung to his clothes and kept his eyes itching. Mr Johnson promised him a week and he’d be out. Of course he would need that time to organise a break out from an asylum! But if getting out was that easy, why hadn’t he done it before? Why stay in a place like that if you had the means to leave? Ashden rubbed his eyes. There was something he wasn’t seeing right, but what was it? Thoughts of Elanora returned, wiping Mr Johnson clear from his mind for the rest of the ride home.
There was one final detour Ashden wanted to make before going home and he hurried along the street towards it. It was the first time since leaving the Timefold that he’d had the chance to check this one place and he was as nervous now as he had been staring up the driveway of the sanatorium that morning; only more so, once he finished rubbing his eyes.
The sign Lacey and Lacey Business Services and Accounting still hung above the door. The extensions still groaned and yard was still weedy. Ashden stepped up to the door, noticing the absence of animals. It was the only change. He took a deep breath and was almost smiling when he knocked on the door.
Mrs Lacey answered looking relaxed with her hair caught up in a towel.
“Oh, hi, I’m...from down the road. Um, I was wondering if…everything was okay here?” He could barely stop himself shouting Elanora’s name and running to her bedroom.
Mrs Lacey turned down the corners of her mouth and stuck her bottom lip out, unattractively. “Yes, why wouldn’t it be?”
“Oh, it’s just that....we don’t have any power and we wondered if it was the same everywhere.”
“As you can see, there are lights on and we’re fine.”
He shuffled his feet caught between staying and bolting, wondering how to spit out the next question. “Mrs Lacey, is your daughter home?”
“Kid, none of our daughters have been home for nearly seven years. Not to stay, anyway.”
Ashden’s skin froze. His tongue shaped each word as if mixing through wet cement. “Um, Mrs Lacey, I was wondering if you knew anyone called Elanora?”
She screwed up her eyes and shouted over her shoulder, “Kevin, do we know an Elanora?”
There was a rustle from the inner rooms, “Who wants to know?”
“Sorry, sir, I just wondered,” said Ashden as Mr Lacey appeared in his tracksuit.
“No we don’t know any Elanora’s,” he said. “Funny question. Why do you ask?”
“Oh, no reason. Mum and I were just talking about people who used to live in the area. Anyway, thanks.”
“Hope your power’s back on soon,” Mrs Lacey said as he left.
“We did know an Ellen Watersley, I think that’s as close to an Elanora as I know,” Mr Lacey called to his retreating back.
Ashden responded with a robotic wave as his throat set hard.
So that was it. Elanora Lacey had been wiped out of existence.
Lost in his daze, Ashden nearly tripped over a clump of weeds at the bottom of the driveway and stopped to steady himself. A rusty shape caught his eye and he looked to his left. Standing shakily was Elanora’s old ridgeback. “Cooper?”
Cooper stepped forward, tail wagging low and eyes round and full.
“Come here boy,” he said, meeting the dog half way and squatting to hug his neck.
“She’s gone, Coop, she’s gone and it’s my fault. I got her into danger ‘cause I didn’t tell her anything. I didn’t tell her a single thing!”
Cooper licked his face and positioned his head to stare eye to eye.
“I know. What did I really know to tell?” Ashden rubbed Cooper’s head and rose to standing. “Want to come home with me, old boy?”
Cooper’s jaw opened in a doggy grin and stepped in front of Ashden to lead the way.
Consumed as he was by the reality that Elanora was gone, Ashden didn’t notice his mother staring blankly at a worn and faded photograph. She stared and stared, circling her index finger round and round her temple, as the picture of her two year old son cuddling a baby on their lounge tried to tell her something important.
Chapter 27