The settee was shattered into pieces beyond counting. Every wooden leg was broken, the upholstery ripped to shreds, hunks of stuffing strewn across the floor, along with the remains of the clock, flung from the wall and broken to almost unrecognizable bits. So too were the lamps and both small tables that had sat at the ends of the settee, as well as the bookcase under the front window, every book of which was torn from cover to cover. Even the wallpaper had been ripped back in dirty, uneven strips. The only thing left standing was the display cabinet, though its glass doors were smashed and everything inside hurled to the floor.
Conor stood there in shock. He looked down at his hands, which were covered in scratches and blood, his fingernails torn and ragged, aching from the labour.
“Oh, my God,” he whispered.
He turned round to face the monster.
Which was no longer there.
“What did you do?” he shouted into the suddenly too quiet emptiness. He could barely
move his feet from all the destroyed rubbish on the floor.
There was no way he could have done all this himself.
No way.
(... was there?)
“Oh, my God,” he said again. “Oh, my God.”
Destruction is very satisfying, he heard, but it was like a voice on the breeze, almost not
there at all.
And then he heard his grandma’s car pull into the driveway.
There was nowhere to run. No time to even get out of the back door and go off on his
own somehow, somewhere she’d never find him.
But, he thought, not even his father would take him now when he found out what he had
done. They’d never allow a boy who could do all this to go and live in a house with a baby– “Oh, my God,” Conor said again, his heart beating nearly out of his chest.
His grandma put her key in the lock and opened the front door.
In the split second after she came around the corner to the sitting room, still fiddling with her handbag, before she registered where Conor was or what had happened, he saw her face, how tired it was, no news on it, good or bad, just the same old night at the hospital with Conor’s mum, the same old night that was wearing them both so thin.
Then she looked up.
“What the–?” she said, stopping herself by reflex from saying “hell” in front of Conor. She froze, still holding her handbag in mid-air. Only her eyes moved, taking in the destruction of the sitting room in disbelief, almost refusing to see what was really there. Conor couldn’t even hear her breathing.
And then she looked at him, her mouth open, her eyes open wide, too. She saw him standing there in the middle of it, his hands bloodied with his work.
Her mouth closed, but it didn’t close into its usual hard shape. It trembled and shook, as if she was fighting back tears, as if she could barely hold the rest of her face together.
And then she groaned, deep in her chest, her mouth still closed.
It was a sound so painful, Conor could barely keep himself from putting his hands over
his ears.
She made it again. And again. And then again until it became a single sound, a single
ongoing horrible groan. Her handbag fell to the floor. She put her palms over her mouth as if that was all that would hold back the horrible, groaning, moaning, keening sound flooding out of her.
“Grandma?” Conor said, his voice high and tight with terror.
And then she screamed.
She took away her hands, balling them into fists, opened her mouth wide and screamed.
Screamed so loudly Conor did put his hands up to his ears. She wasn’t looking at him, she wasn’t looking at anything, just screaming into the air.
Conor had never been so frightened in all his life. It was like standing at the end of the world, almost like being alive and awake in his nightmare, the screaming, the emptiness– Then she stepped into the room.
She kicked forward through the rubbish almost as if she didn’t even see it. Conor backed away from her quickly, stumbling over the ruins of the settee. He kept a hand up to protect himself, expecting blows to land any moment– But she wasn’t coming for him.
She walked right past him, her face twisted in tears, the moaning spilling out of her again. She went to the display cabinet, the only thing remaining upright in the room.
And she grabbed it by one side–And pulled on it hard once–Twice–
And a third time.
Sending it crashing to the floor with a final-sounding crunch.
She gave a last moan and leant forward to put her hands on her knees, her breath coming in ragged gasps.
She didn’t look at Conor, didn’t look at him once as she stood back up and left the room, leaving her handbag where she’d dropped it, going straight up to her bedroom and quietly shutting the door.
Conor stood there for a while, not knowing whether he should move or not.
After what seemed like forever, he went into his grandma’s kitchen to get some empty bin liners. He worked on the mess late into the night, but there was just too much of it. Dawn was breaking by the time he finally gave up.
He climbed the stairs, not even bothering to wash off the dirt and dried blood. As he passed his grandma’s room, he saw from the light under her door that she was still awake.
He could hear her in there, weeping.