Chapter 6

• I leant against my car and dialled my dad’s number, staring sadly at the house.
• How had we let it come to this?
• Had we been so wrapped up in our own lives that we’d forgotten about this part of it?
• I knew the answer to that one.
• “Hello,” Dad said. “Is everything okay?”
• “Uh, I left the keys on the coffee table,” I replied.
• He barked out a laugh. “Do you want me to bring them down to you?”
• “If you can. You wanted to come anyway. But only if Mum’s okay.”
• “Mum’s fine. She’s still sleeping. I think that sleeping pill knocked her right out,” Dad said. “Give me fifteen minutes, Lottie, and I’ll be there.”
• “Christ. You’d think this place had been abandoned for four hundred years, not four.”
• I took the keys Dad held out with a grimace. “I’m kind of scared to go inside, honestly. I’m worried it’s not all cosmetic and that those loose tiles are going to mean a roof repair.”
• He backed up a few feet and looked up at the roof, then shook his head. “I don’t think so. You’ve got a couple of loose ones that have come down, but I think your biggest issue up there is going to be broken tiles. Looks like more broken ones than anything.”
• “I hope you’re right. They don’t need fixing right away, do they?”
• “No. And if we can find any of the fallen tiles intact or mostly intact, you can save money by having those put back.”
• I blew out a breath. “Okay, that helps.”
• “I bet you’re glad I’m here now, aren’t you?”
• “Well, if I’d known it was this bad, I never would have come alone,” I reasoned. “I don’t even know where to start out here.”
• “The grass. Let’s get rid of that fallen tree, cut the grass, and trim back these bushes. That won’t be a lot of work, and we can probably find a pair of hands or two to help us out,” Dad said. “That’ll help a lot. Right now, you’re trying to see through overgrowth, and that’s hard. You’d be surprised what mowing a lawn can do.”
• I nodded slowly. He was right. Now that the initial shock of seeing the state of this place had worn off, I was able to look at everything much more rationally. Part of that was the landscaping.
• Or, rather, the lack of it.
• If we cut the grass, removed that fallen tree, and trimmed the bushes back to a regular size, it might not look quite so overwhelming.
• Maybe.
• It couldn’t look any worse than it did right now.
• I unlocked the front door and took a deep breath as I pushed it open. It smelt old and empty, like a strange mix of stale rainwater and dead grass, and there was an underlying bitterness that told me there probably was somethingactuallydead somewhere in this place.
• God, please let it be a rat and not a person.
• “Blimey,” Dad muttered. “I guess the local wildlife have taken to living here.”
• I looked down at the rat poop that was scattered all over the floor. “That explains the smell.”
• “Leave the door open, let some fresh air in. I doubt this place has been aired through in years,” he said, stepping into the foyer.
• The front desk was to the right, and the wall behind it was made of built-in shelves with a singular door I remembered leading to the office. To the left was a living area, and it truly was a relic of years gone by.
• The sofas, chairs, and tables were all covered with white dust sheets—or, rather, whatshouldhave been white dust sheets. In reality, they were either yellowed or greying and coated in a thick layer of grime and dirt that made me more than a little afraid to look under them. One of the glass panes in the bay window was completely boarded up, and I winced at the sight of the others cracked to either side of it.
• “Come on. Let’s see if we can find the source of that smell,” Dad said, motioning for me to follow him.
• I snapped pictures of the foyer, then followed his footsteps through the living room. I was determined to take pictures as I went, if nothing else, then just to document a before and after.
• Not that I was sure it was possible for there to be an after in this situation. It was feeling quite hopeless.
• The living room lead to the sunroom, where the bottom of the stairs was. It was the most gorgeous octagonal room that would have been gloriously lit up through the incredible floor-length windows if it weren’t for the dirt on them. One of the glass panes had a giant crack running through it, but Dad nodded.
• “That’s good. It’s cheaper to replace that one small pane than the entire window, especially in this style.” He looked back at me. “I know it’s hard, Lottie, but try to look on the bright side of things.”
• “What bright side? There’s an inch of rat shit on the floor, the windows look like they need a gallon of white vinegar per square inch, and there’s so much dust in here that I half-expect a living dust-bunny to appear from under that couch with a relic from Ancient Rome.”
• Dad looked at me. “At least if there’re ghosts, you’ll see them coming with all this dust.”
• “Very funny,” I deadpanned. “Can we just keep going?”
• The sunroom lead through into the larger dining area. There was a nook off to the back with smaller breakfast tables, but this area was centred by the extravagant fireplace on the wall to my left. Large sliding doors allowed us a peek at the back patio, an area that looked completely fine, save for the debris and dirt there.
• Like the bird’s nest in the rusty hanging basket.
• That was one use for it.
• I peered through into the breakfast area. It had large windows that overlooked the back of the property and the patio, and I winced when I saw one smashed at the bottom. “That’s how wildlife has gotten in, then.”
• Dad looked over at it. “You’d be surprised how they get in. One thing is for sure, you’re going to need a pest company in once we’ve cleaned it out. I don’t want to think about how many rats and mice are making this place home.”
• A chill went through me, and I shuddered as horror bubbled over my skin. “Is it even possible to get rid of them?”
• “Yes,” he replied, but he didn’t sound entirely certain. “It’ll likely be something you’ll have to keep up—extermination practices, that is, and you might have to get used to setting traps and disposing of dead rats.”
• “How about I hire you instead?” I asked, stepping forwards and opening the kitchen door. “The kitchen doesn’t look—never mind.”
• Dad peered over my shoulder. “That’ll be the smell, then.”
• I’d never seen the rotting corpse of a badger before, and I was absolutely certain I never wanted to see one again in my life.
• Bile burned my throat on its way up, and I gagged, turning away from the kitchen. I had to get outside before I threw up, but the patio doors were locked, so I turned and ran through the hallway, cutting past the downstairs toilet and linen closet to the front porch.
• I made it just in time, grabbing the veranda fence. It probably wasn’t the best thing to give me stability, but it seemed to be holding up just fine under my weight as I leant over the side and hurled onto the grass.
• “Well, that gives us something to do first on our list,” Dad said from the doorway. “Find out how to dispose of a dead badger. I think that might be a job for the local council.”
• “It’s definitely not mine,” I muttered.
• “Are you feeling better?”
• “I’d feel better without seeing that badger again.”
• “I closed the door. Do you want me to keep going, or are you feeling up to coming back in?”
• “I’ll come back in,” I said, pushing off the fence.
• I followed him inside and took the shortcut through the main hallway. We swung a right at the kitchen, and instead of going back into it, we poked our head into the laundry room. It was much the same as everywhere else, but completely empty. The pipes for the machines hung lamely on the old tiles, and it was probably in the best shape of everything so far.
• To the right of us was a door that led to the private living quarters. It was the only interior door that was locked, and I sighed and turned for the stairs.
• “I guess we have to go through that box of keys, huh?” I asked, leading Dad upstairs.