Glass Eels

I stood there and tried to make her breathe again. Tried to make her chest move.

Nothing happened.

So I reached out and pulled her eyelids up, to get her to open her eyes and look at me. But her eyes had rolled back and there was just the whites.

I tried to pull the lids back down but they had stuck.

I had to go upstairs and into my dad’s room. I had to tell him to come with me, to see what I’d done.

He followed me down and I showed him.

He saw and then he turned and grabbed my arm, too tight.
He shook me and screamed at me, told me I shouldn’t have gone in. And then he hit me. Here. (Touches face.)

Some things that happen to you, you get them in here. (Touching head.) And you can’t get them out.

I wish you could take it out so I didn’t have to remember it.

I started going down at night and if we had one in I’d lift the sheet from their faces.

KENNETH: Did he know?

LILY: No.

I used to think if I looked at them long enough I could bring them back to life, make them breathe again.

One night there was a new one there. I took the sheet and peeled it down. Stood and stared.

It was my mother.

KENNETH looks.

No. Don’t look at me.

It had happened late at night and no-one had woken me to tell me. That’s how I found out.

Her skin was streaked with mud. Her hair still damp from the river. A piece of weed in it.

Pause.

I started going down at night and if we had one in I’d lift the sheet from their faces.

I want to tell you this thing. But I don’t want you to look at me.

Look away. That’s it.

If you look at me I’ll stop.

I used to think everyone had dead bodies in their houses. I’d go in the room where he got them ready. He caught me one day, looking at the powder he used on their skin to tighten it. I was gonna use it on me but he took it from me, said it was only for dead skin.

I think I’m like my mother.

She came down here at night.

I know I shouldn’t come, but I can’t stop myself.

I know she came here. Sat here. Swam in there.

She’s not in the house anymore.

I used to look for her. I found things she’d touched. I found a piece of paper with her handwriting. I found a shoe in the garden. A dress she’d worn.

It hadn’t been washed.