Coraline

silly, dear,’ said the other mother. ‘I love you. I will always love you. Nobody sensible believes in ghosts anyway. That’s because they’re all such liars. Smell the lovely breakfast I’m making for you.’ She poured the yellow mixture into the pan. ‘Cheese omelette. Your favourite.’
    Coraline’s mouth watered. ‘You like games,’ she said. ‘That’s what I’ve been told.’
    The other mother’s black eyes flashed. ‘Everybody likes games,’ was all she said.
    ‘Yes,’ said Coraline. She climbed down from the counter and sat at the kitchen table.
    The bacon was sizzling and spitting under the grill. It smelled wonderful.
    ‘Wouldn’t you be happier if you won me, fair and square?’ asked Coraline.
    ‘Possibly,’ said the other mother. She had a show of unconcernedness, but her fingers twitched and drummed and she licked her lips with her scarlet tongue. ‘What exactly are you offering?’
    ‘Me,’ said Coraline, and she gripped her knees under the table, to stop them from shaking. ‘If I lose I’ll stay here with you for ever and I’ll let you love me. I’ll be a most dutiful daughter. I’ll eat your food, and play Happy Families. And I’ll let you sew your buttons into my eyes.’
    Her other mother stared at her, black buttons unblinking. ‘That sounds very fine,’ she said. ‘And if you do not lose?’
    ‘Then you let me go. You let everyone go – my real father and mother, the dead children, everyone you’ve trapped here.’
    The other mother took the bacon from under the grill and put it on a plate. Then she slipped the cheese omelette from the pan on to the plate, flipping it as she did so, letting it fold itself into a perfect omelette shape.
    She placed the breakfast plate in front of Coraline, along with a glass of freshly squeezed orange juice and a mug of frothy hot chocolate.
    ‘Yes,’ she said. ‘I think I like this game. But what kind of game shall it be? A riddle game? A test of knowledge? Or of skill?’
    ‘An exploring game,’ suggested Coraline. ‘A finding-things game.’
    ‘And what is it you think you should be finding in this hide-and-go-seek game, Coraline Jones?’
    Coraline hesitated. Then, ‘My parents,’ said Coraline. ‘And the souls of the children behind the mirror.’
    The other mother smiled at this, triumphantly, and Coraline wondered if she had made the right choice. Still, it was too late to change her mind now.
    ‘A deal,’ said the other mother. ‘Now eat up your breakfast, my sweet. Don’t worry, it won’t hurt you.’
    Coraline stared at the breakfast, hating herself for giving in so easily; but she was starving.
    ‘How do I know you’ll keep your word?’ asked Coraline.
    ‘I swear it,’ said the other mother. ‘I swear it on my own mother’s grave.’
    ‘Does she have a grave?’ asked Coraline.
    ‘Oh yes,’ said the other mother. ‘I put her in there myself. And when I found her trying to crawl out, I put her back.’
    ‘Swear on something else. So I can trust you to keep your word.’
    ‘My right hand,’ said the other mother, holding it up. She waggled the long fingers slowly, displaying the claw-like nails. ‘I swear on that.’
    Coraline shrugged. ‘OK,’ she said. ‘It’s a deal.’ She ate the breakfast, trying not to wolf it down. She was hungrier than she had thought.
    As she ate, the other mother stared at her. It was hard to read expressions into those black-button eyes, but Coraline thought that her other mother looked hungry, too.
    She drank the orange juice, but even though she knew she would like it she could not bring herself to taste the hot chocolate.
    ‘Where should I start looking?’ asked Coraline.
    ‘Where you wish,’ said her other mother, as if she did not care at all.
    Coraline looked at her, and Coraline thought hard. There was no point, she decided, in exploring the garden and the grounds: they didn’t exist, they weren’t real. There was no abandoned tennis court in the other mother’s world, no bottomless well. All that was real was the house itself.
    She looked around the kitchen. She opened the oven, peered into the freezer, poked into the salad compartment of the fridge. The other mother followed her about, looking at Coraline with a smirk always hovering at the edge of her lips.
    ‘How big are souls anyway?’ asked Coraline.
    The other mother sat down at the kitchen table and leaned back against the wall, saying nothing. She picked at her teeth with a long