Chapter Seventeen
‘Help!’ I yelled, hammering on the door. ‘I’m trapped in here! Can anyone hear me?’
Strangely enough, there was no response from the completely empty house. I didn’t know if Elsie had gone with her parents and Callum or she was working on the farm but, even if she were around, she was just as likely to leave me here to freeze to death as help get me out.
Without too many options, I trudged back up the stairs, whimpering by the time I got to the top, practically on my hands and knees.
‘Hello?!’ I was screaming now, the back of my throat scratching with the effort. ‘Hello!’
But the boats on the loch were too far away, any farm workers out of earshot. Even the cows in the closest fields ignored me when I shouted in their direction.
‘Don’t panic, no need to panic,’ I chanted to myself, pulling out my phone and searching for the spot of reception.
I would simply call Callum and he would come home.
He’d already been gone a couple of hours, his aunt couldn’t live that far away, he wouldn’t mind cutting the visit short.
I scrolled through my contacts, looking for ‘Callum Landlord’, and jabbed at the call button with shaky fingers.
The phone rang.
And rang.
And rang.
‘Answer your bloody phone!’ I sobbed, leaning further out the window as the connection began to cut in and out. ‘For fuck’s sake, Callum, I swear—’
‘Hello?’
The sound of his voice soothed me instantly and I heard myself burst into tears.
‘Callum,’ I said, breathing a shivery sigh of relief. ‘It’s me.’
‘I guessed that from your name on the screen,’ he replied. ‘What’s up?’
‘Oh, not much,’ I laughed not at all hysterically. ‘Don’t panic but I’m trap— argh!’
A massive black bird, possibly the same massive black bird as before, swooped down from the sky and into the tower, brushing past my face with a nightmarish caw.
I stumbled to the side, arms shooting up to protect me from its talons but as my hands covered my face, my phone slipped through my fingers, sailing through the air.
I watched with horror as it landed on the solid stone ledge of the window, bounced twice, then settled, balancing right on the edge.
‘Hello?’ I heard Callum’s tinny voice reverberating through the tiny speaker. ‘Laura, are you there?’
And then my phone fell from the top of the tower, crashing all the way down to the ground.
‘Well, fuck,’ I said flatly.
On the opposite side of the window, the bird cocked its head to one side and stared at me with one shiny eye.
‘If I die up here, you have to promise not to eat me,’ I told it, my back pressed against the wall as I slid all the way down onto my arse. It cawed again, flapped its wings and launched itself out the window with considerably more grace than my phone.
And that was it.
I was done for.
Shivering in earnest, my clothes offering no respite from the weather, I wrapped my arms around myself and huddled into a ball.
Even the glorious blue sky had turned on me, turning almost white with a chill wind that cut through to my bones.
In the worst possible conditions, a human being could die from hypothermia in fifteen minutes.
These were not those conditions but there were variables to take into account.
My lack of proper outerwear for example, not to mention the fact I was a big giant baby.
My final outfit was not flattering. My final Instagram post, the one all my friends would flock to and leave their heartbroken condolences, was of me sitting in a lecherous Santa’s lap at the work Christmas party, three sheets to the wind and, if you zoomed in, showing my knickers.
And in my final conversation, I’d instinctively chosen sarcasm over immediately asking for help.
Being a smartarse was literally going to be the death of me.
As far as last meals went, I couldn’t complain there, but what I wouldn’t give to have a Terry’s Chocolate Orange to soothe me through these dark final hours, as was right and traditional on Christmas Eve Eve.
I moaned sadly as a list of all the things I would never eat again ran through my head.
Fresh French bread, a hunk of sharp cheddar and a bowl of baby tomatoes.
Joel’s spaghetti Bolognese. Dairylea Lunchables.
I would never find out what shape was in the final window of the Galaxy advent calendar I’d squished in my suitcase rather than leave behind for Desi to plunder.
Dozens of patients had told me stories about their lives flashing in front of their eyes in life-or-death circumstances but all I could think about was the Costa Coffee melted snowman gingerbread biscuit and how I’d never taste its like again.
‘Unless there really is a heaven,’ I sniffed.
If there was, heaven probably had a Costa. I couldn’t see them going for a Starbucks.
No, I decided, wiping a tear away from under my eye before it could freeze to my face.
I was not going out like this. Not when I had an unopened bag of Cadbury Snowballs in my backpack.
No, they weren’t as good as Mini Eggs but damn it, they were the best we could do.
At least until the first of January when the shops put all the Easter sweets out.
So help me God, I would live to eat another Creme Egg.
Forcing myself to my feet, I rubbed my runny nose, sniffing the razor-sharp air and letting it cut through my panic like a knife.
There were people around, they just couldn’t hear me.
All I needed was another way to get their attention, like a flare gun or a flag.
A bright red flag. With grim acceptance, I looked down at Desi’s skirt. Desi’s bright red skirt.
‘She doesn’t like it anyway,’ I told myself as I wriggled out of the flimsy fabric, letting it pool around my feet on the floor. ‘She never wears it. She probably hasn’t even noticed I borrowed it. She’d rather have me alive than one random red skirt hanging in her wardrobe.’
I hesitated for a moment. Was that true? Hopefully. Hell hath no fury like a Desi who wasn’t asked permission. If I was wrong, she’d likely drive all the way to Scotland to march me back up here and throw me over the side with my phone.
It didn’t matter. All that was important now was attracting someone’s attention with my holly-berry-red satin flag.
I leaned out of the window as far as I dared, starting on the side of the loch, waving the skirt wildly, my half-bare backside exposed to the elements.
It was a long jumper but it wasn’t quite long enough.
None of the boats made any attempt to move so I switched sides, angling myself sideways in the direction of the farm.
Maybe one of the bulls would see and charge all the way across the fields.
That would get someone’s attention. Or it would crash into the side of the ancient tower and bring it down, and I would die that way instead.
Either/or, at least I wouldn’t be up here on my own, freezing to death.
‘Hello!’ I yelled again, rubbing my legs together as I jogged on the spot. ‘Anyone? Can you hear me? I’m going to die in about ten minutes!’
No response.
‘Oh, for fuck’s sake,’ I screamed. ‘I’ll even take help from Elsie if she’s around!’
‘Christ, things must be bad.’
I howled with delight at the sound of another voice, gripping the edge of the window and peering down to the ground. It was a man, not Callum, although they looked similar from all the way up here.
‘Hello!’ I shouted down, still waving my skirt-flag. ‘I’m stuck. The door blew shut behind me and I can’t get out. Can you help me?’
‘And you are?’
It was a fair question.
‘Lau— Caroline,’ I corrected myself, lightning fast. ‘Yourself?’
‘Rory,’ he said with a salute. ‘Did Elsie lock you in there?’
‘Not as far as I know but I wouldn’t put it past her.’
Of course, the youngest McClay, home from university in Glasgow. He laughed to himself, muttering something I couldn’t hear.
‘Where is everyone?’ he called up.
‘Out? Visiting family?’
‘What about Mal and Fi?’
‘Also out,’ I replied. ‘Can you open the door?’ I asked again. ‘I’m literally freezing my arse off.’
He nodded, patting himself down for a set of keys, the same as his dad, the same as his brother. ‘Aye, LaCaroline, can do. I haven’t got the upper body strength to climb up your hair, so we’ll have a crack at the door instead.’
I let go of my skirt with one hand to give him a confirmatory wave as he disappeared inside the house, only for the wind to snatch the slippery fabric from my frozen fingers and whisk it away out of reach.
‘Perfect,’ I groaned, all the colour draining from my face as I watched it settle in the top branches of a very tall silver birch, winding itself around the slender branches. ‘Just perfect.’
Because nothing said nice to meet you, thanks for rescuing me and Merry Christmas to your boyfriend’s brother like missing the bottom half of your outfit.
Even if it was considerably more than Callum had been wearing when we first met.
Opening the door took a lot more effort the second time around.
‘It’s wedged tight,’ Rory shouted through the wood. ‘What did you do? Solder it shut behind you?’
‘I managed to open it,’ I exclaimed, trying to jostle the latch from my side. ‘And I’m weak as a kitten.’
‘I’ll have you know I work out five times a week with special emphasis on the vanity muscles and they’re the ones I’m trying to tear off the bone right now to get you out.’
‘Maybe you should go and get help,’ I suggested, rubbing my palms up and down over my bare thighs, trying to chase away the goosebumps. ‘Or call your brother?’
‘And have everybody rip the piss out of me all Christmas? I don’t think so,’ he scoffed. ‘Give it a shoogle from your side.’
‘I’m shoogling!’ I shouted, shaking the rusted iron as best I could. ‘I’ve been shoogling! I’m all shoogled out!’