Page 5 of Only a Monster

Joan closed her eyes, hoping the world would right itself when she opened them again. That it would be morning. That Nick would be walking toward her, up the road. But when she opened her eyes again, the sky was still black. The shops of Kensington High Street were still closed for the night, their windows dark. And it felt like night. The temperature had dropped at the same moment that the world had gone dark.

Joan pinched her arm. It hurt. The air was cold. The ground under her feet was firm. She wasn’t dreaming.

But if this was real . . . Joan turned back to the dark windows of the shop behind her. There was a sign there with the café’s hours: seven a.m. to nine p.m. If this was real, that meant there was a gap in her memory at least thirteen hours long.

Joan pushed down a surge of panic. She reached into her pocket for her phone, needing to talk to Nick—to tell him she was here—and then remembered again that her phone was gone.

Another surge of panic hit her. And then it was too much. She was alone in the dark with no memory of the day. She suddenly wanted to go home to Gran. She felt like a little kid again—like she’d fallen and hurt herself. Like if she could just get home, Gran would give her a hug, and then everything would be okay.

Joan stumbled back down Kensington High Street and then Earl’s Court Road. All the familiar streets looked different in the dark. The shops were like empty shells. What time was it? It felt late.

What had happened? Had she been knocked out? Had she been drugged? Had she imagined it all? Each possibility scared her more.

In a rush of panic, she stopped and patted at her clothes. She was still fully dressed, she discovered in relief, still dressed for her date with Nick—sundress and sandals.

Could she be sleepwalking? She’d never done that before.

But underneath all her speculation, there was another question—one that she was afraid to think about too much: What did Mr Solt do to me?

Mr Solt’s house loomed near the corner of Lexham Mews. Joan cringed away from it, afraid Mr Solt might come out the door. She broke into a run, tripping on the uneven path outside his house. And then she ran the rest of the way back home, tumbling onto Gran’s doorstep in the dark.

She got the door open and then locked it behind her. She checked the lock and then checked it again. When she turned, she expected to find the house dark and quiet. But to her surprise, there was a well of light coming from the kitchen. Someone was still awake.

Gran was at the kitchen table, drinking cocoa. More cocoa bubbled on the stove. Joan hesitated in the doorway, not sure if she was in trouble. The clock said it was just past one a.m. Dad would have freaked out if Joan had stayed out that late without calling him.

‘Hello, love,’ Gran said without looking up. ‘Come and sit down.’ There was another mug of cocoa on the table, Joan saw now. It was steaming.

‘I—’ Joan didn’t know what to say. Gran, I think maybe I was drugged. Or maybe I hit my head and got knocked out. Neither of those things seemed true. ‘Something happened,’ she managed. ‘Someone did something to me.’

‘Sit down, my love,’ Gran said, more gently. She slid the cocoa over to Joan.

Joan sat slowly and put her hands around the mug. It was very hot.

Gran looked softer than usual in the dim light. She was in a flannel dressing-gown, and her hair was a curly grey halo. She waited for Joan to sip the cocoa and then she asked: ‘What happened? Tell me exactly.’

Joan tried to remember, and panic bubbled up inside her again. The whole day was missing from her memory. There was just nothing there. ‘Mr Solt did something to me,’ she said. ‘He did something. He—he pushed me against the wall. And then . . .’ She hit the blank place in her mind again. ‘And then I don’t remember.’ The words blurted out of her. ‘Gran, I don’t remember anything that happened since this morning.’

‘He pushed you.’ Gran sounded reassuringly calm. ‘Did you push him back?’

‘What?’ Joan said. It was such an unexpected question that for a moment she didn’t know how to answer. ‘No.’

‘But you touched him.’ Gran put a finger against the nape of her own neck. ‘Here.’

Joan started to say no again and then remembered how she’d flung her hand up to keep her balance. She had a vivid sense memory of the edge of her hand knocking against Mr Solt’s neck.

‘It was day,’ Gran said. ‘And then it was night, with nothing in between.’

Joan stared at her. That was exactly what it had been like. ‘He did something to me,’ she whispered.

‘He didn’t do something to you,’ Gran said. ‘You did something to him.’

‘What?’ Joan said.

‘My love, I told you what you were when you were six years old.’

Joan shook her head. She couldn’t take her eyes off Gran’s face.

Gran leaned closer. ‘You’re a monster, Joan.’

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