The Casual Vacancy

it down under the kid’s legs, hide it under the bags in the basket under the seat.Sometimes Terri would go on tandem shoplifting trips with the sister she spoke to, Cheryl, who was married to Shane Tully. Cheryl and Terri lived four streets away from each other in the Fields, and petrified the air with their language when they argued, which was frequently. Krystal never knew whether she and her Tully cousins were supposed to be on speaking terms or not, and no longer bothered keeping track, but she spoke to Dane whenever she ran across him. They had shagged, once, after splitting a bottle of cider out on the rec when they were fourteen. Neither of them had ever mentioned it afterwards. Krystal was hazy on whether or not it was legal, doing your cousin. Something Nikki had said had made her think that maybe it wasn’t.
    The bus rolled up the road that led to the main entrance of South West General, and stopped twenty yards from an enormous long rectangular grey and glass building. There were patches of neat grass, a few small trees and a forest of signposts.
    Krystal followed two old ladies out of the bus and stood with her hands in her tracksuit pockets, looking around. She had already forgotten what kind of ward Danielle had told her Nana Cath was on; she recalled only the number twelve. She approached the nearest signpost with a casual air, squinting at it almost incidentally: it bore line upon line of impenetrable print, with words as long as Krystal’s arm and arrows pointing left, right, diagonally. Krystal did not read well; being confronted with large quantities of words made her feel intimidated and aggressive. After several surreptitious glances at the arrows, she decided that there were no numbers there at all, so she followed the two old ladies towards the double glass doors at the front of the main building.
    The foyer was crowded and more confusing than the signposts. There was a bustling shop, which was separated from the main hall by floor to ceiling windows; there were rows of plastic chairs, which seemed to be full of people eating sandwiches; there was a packed café in the corner; and a kind of hexagonal counter in the middle of the floor, where women were answering enquiries as they checked their computers. Krystal headed there, her hands still in her pockets.
    ‘Where’s ward twelve?’ Krystal asked one of the women in a surly voice.
    ‘Third floor,’ said the woman, matching her tone.
    Krystal did not want to ask anything else out of pride, so she turned and walked away, until she spotted lifts at the far end of the foyer and entered one going up.
    It took her nearly fifteen minutes to find the ward. Why didn’t they put up numbers and arrows, not these stupid long words? But then, walking along a pale green corridor with her trainers squeaking on the linoleum floor, someone called her name.
    ‘Krystal?’
    It was her aunt Cheryl, big and broad in a denim skirt and tight white vest, with banana-yellow black-rooted hair. She was tattooed from her knuckles to the tops of her thick arms, and wore multiple gold hoops like curtain rings in each ear. There was a can of Coke in her hand.
    ‘She ain’ bothered, then?’ said Cheryl. Her bare legs were planted firmly apart, like a sentry guard.
    ‘’Oo?’
    ‘Terri. She din’ wanna come?’
    ‘She don’ know ye’. I on’y jus’ ’eard. Danielle called an’ tole me.’
    Cheryl ripped off the ring-pull and slurped Coke, her tiny eyes sunken in a wide, flat face that was mottled like corned beef, scrutinizing Krystal over the top of the can.
    ‘I tole Danielle ter call yeh when it ’appened. Three days she were lyin’ in the ’ouse, and no one fuckin’ found ’er. The state of ’er. Fuckin’ ’ell.’
    Krystal did not ask Cheryl why she herself had not walked the short distance to Foley Road to tell Terri the news. Evidently the sisters had fallen out again. It was impossible to keep up.
    ‘Where is she?’ asked Krystal.
    Cheryl led the way, her flip-flops making a slapping noise on the floor.
    ‘Hey,’ she said, as they walked. ‘I ’ad a call fr’m a journalist about you.’
    ‘Didja?’
    ‘She give me a number.’
    Krystal would have asked more questions, but they had entered a very quiet ward, and she was suddenly frightened. She did not like the smell.
    Nana Cath was almost unrecognizable. One side of her face was terribly twisted, as though the muscles had been pulled with a wire. Her mouth dragged to one