7:00 PM, Midnight (Chapter 1)

Friday, December 13th, 2024

We finally moved house today.

When Dad told me we were moving a few months ago, I didn't really know what to feel. Sad? Scared? Excited? I just assumed I'd need to process it and then I'd know. Now, waking up after my first night, I still have no clue. I don't particularly like it, but I don't really have any reason to completely hate it; although I still don't know why we had to move in the first place. I asked Dad about it a few weeks before we left, and he just mumbled something about bills and work. That didn't help. All he ever does nowadays is mumble about bills and work. He told me a couple days before we left that we were moving to a village by the coast called Thurton Quay. Apparently it was the only place that could take us. I asked why. He didn't answer.

We didn't really need to pack anything. Dad said the bare essentials were already waiting for us: a fridge, a lounge chair, an old telly and two beds, so we just left ours behind. The only things we packed were my notebook and pen, the kettle, a handful of cutlery and a few pots and pans, not to mention a bin bag of various clothes that we couldn't be bothered to assort and fold. Then we slammed shut the boot of our beaten up Ford, revved up the engine and left our old lives behind. I still felt nothing.

The drive to the house was uneventful until the very end; long grey motorways that occasionally turned into tricky country lanes with sharp bends and narrow roads. Dad didn't seem to need any help, even though none of the road signs I could see actually read "Thurton Quay" on them, or even a beach of any sort. Toward the end, any road signs just gave up entirely, the road itself all but joining them. I was convinced we'd made some sort of wrong turning, but Dad powered through anyway, a determination on his face I hadn't seen for years.

We eventually broke through into a field of dead grass, with no road or path in sight. Not knowing at all where to go, we parked the car and got out, deciding to have a look around for a road that could take us there. That's when I immediately noticed two things. The first thing I noticed was the heat. It beat down on my neck, unforgiving and unapologetic. It wasn't necessarily the heat that bothered me, it was the fact it was supposed to be winter; not to mention it was getting dark. It wasn't this hot when we left, and that was around midday. The second thing I noticed was the smell. The field stank, like raw sewage and rotten meat. I held my breath, not wanting to take it in. This wasn't the best start to my new life.

I noticed a steep decline in the field a slight distance away, so I decided to go over in the hopes I could see anything useful. The ground was boggy and muddy underfoot, staining my trainers with a colour that made me feel queasy to look at. As I walked over, I stepped on a loose shoelace and fell face first in the mud, painting my whole front a sickly brown-green hue. Whatever I'd been smelling was obviously coming from the mud, because the smell got about ten times worse, clogging up my throat and making my eyes water. As I held back the urge to vomit, Dad mumbled something about not believing it. I got up, the mud on my front sliding off my torso, and left him to it. He often got into moods like this, and it was usually easier to leave him alone than interfere with his temper. Besides, he wasn't going to help me clean it off.

After regaining my composure, I tied my laces and looked out from the field, sweat prickling across my back. I fidgeted in the warmth, and in my doing so I noticed the heat-haze of a simple tarmac road at the bottom of the field, leading to a small disorganised cluster of buildings about a mile away. Thurton Quay. I couldn't see much of it through the wobbling heat, but it looked tiny from this distance. Further along, another patch of fields travelled across to the sea, a thick line of dry dirt separating them. The sea was grey, the still waters lapping against a shingle beach covered in sickly black seaweed. One of the fields had a tall building standing in it, ivory white and distinctly menacing. I couldn't quite figure out what it was, but it gave me the shivers. I turned away almost instinctively, feeling the mud on my clothes crack as I moved.

I decided to go back to Dad and tell him about the road at the bottom of the field. He didn't even check to see, he just hurriedly told me to get in and we raced off again, tearing up the boggy ground as we went. Brown grass and grubby clumps of dirt wedged themselves into the wheels until we could hardly hear the engine. The car spat out mud as we tried to make our way through, torrents of sickly green muck flying out from behind us as we crawled along the field. After an agonising while of grinding gears and petrol smell we managed to join onto the road, dragging half the field behind us. There was no sign to greet us.

The smell didn't seem to get any better as we drove along the unmarked road, but that was probably due to the leftover mud still clinging to my clothes. Dad didn't seem to notice it; I think he was just preoccupied with finding the house and getting some rest by this point. The wind blew against the car as we drove, moaning as it made its way through the cracked windows. I looked out, hoping to see something that could help us find the house, but was instead greeted by a grim black cloud slowly crawling across the village, crackling with electricity and sending down a thin film of drizzle. It hung close to the floor, shrouding our vision and masking the street in total black; if there was any light left in the day, this would make sure there was nothing left.

Dad tried to flick on the full beams, but either nothing happened or they made no difference. We shuffled along at a snail's pace so as to not crash into anything we couldn't see, only moving at the rare moments when the cloud would shine with lightning and soak the village in a white glow, letting us see what was going on for a few precious seconds. Dad turned into a solitary road, almost clipping the corner as he tried to remember how far away it was. Then it was a long slog down a bumpy driveway, the car rattling along before letting out a dreadful screech as Dad suddenly slammed on the brakes, flinging us both forward. A last crackle of lightning revealed a thatched cottage standing before us, just moments before the car. I have no clue how he knew when to stop or even how he knew it was the right one, especially considering I didn't see any sort of name or number on the front of the house. But he seemed certain he was right, and I wasn't going to argue with him.

We jumped out of the car and quickly bundled our things together before running in. What was a light drizzle had now evolved into a full downpour, and even though we took about ten seconds to get through the front door, we were both totally soaked. But we had made it. Although, standing on the doormat and dripping mud onto the floor, I couldn't say I was particularly happy about it. And deep down, something told me that wasn't the last unhappy thought I was going to have.

The house was pitch black. We managed to find a light switch in the dark, but the storm must have blown the fuse because nothing worked. Fortunately Dad had his lighter on him, and was able to get a small flame going so we could see around. And I was blown away by how little there was here. The front room seemed to be a sort of lounge area, a beaten up CRT telly sitting idly in the corner and a tattered bookshelf facing away from the door. An old rocking chair sat in the middle, facing us as we looked around. To our right there were two more doors, one at the end leading to the stairs and the other near us leading to a corridor which gave us the downstairs bathroom and the kitchen. The upstairs had two bedrooms and a toilet. And that was it. Nothing else except the splattering of a leaky drain from outside and the stifling heat I'd almost gotten used to by this point. 

I looked at my watch; 8:54 PM. Almost time for bed. I left Dad downstairs and felt my way to the room I was sleeping in. I found it and entered, instantly getting hit with a wave of stuffy air. I threw open the window and stripped down, putting my notebook under my pillow and climbing onto bed. Then I grabbed my stinking clothes from the floor and threw them into the corner so they could be washed tomorrow. The bed was warm, and the mattress was nicer than I thought it'd be, especially when lying on top; the duvet added some extra cushioning and I wasn't going to sleep under it in this heat. But the pillow felt thin, and I could feel my notebook pushing against me from underneath. That didn't bother me though; I was used to it by now. The open window had now cooled the room down enough to be slightly comfortable, and it let me hear the rain outside as it chucked down. I lay there, in the dark, for a few more minutes, not sure what I was feeling, before steadily drifting off to a light and weary sleep.