Close Your Pretty Eyes by Sally Nicholls Page A

house was totally the sort of place you could hide in – there were loads of cupboards and wardrobes and even whole bedrooms that were never used. Someone could have been hiding in my wardrobe or under my bed, waiting to leap out and kidnap me when everyone was asleep. Once I’d thought that, I was even more determined not to let Jim leave me on my own, ever. I wasn’t just worried about being forgotten – I was worried about something coming to get me. I didn’t know if the person making those smells was someone real, or dead old Amelia haunting me from beyond the grave. Both sounded terrible.
    Jim kept trying to send me to my room when I’d done something bad, and I hated it. I kept trying to get out of it.
    â€œOlivia, this is important,” he said, after I’d come downstairs for about the fourteenth time. “I understand that you get angry sometimes. But you can’t throw a screaming fit in the living room when you live with other children. You have to find somewhere safe to do it.”
    And if you don’t, I’ll chuck you out. The words hung there, unsaid.
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    The Saturday after Jim said that, Liz took me to watch Bristol City play. Liz was a massive City fan. So was I. I didn’t used to be. I used to say all sorts of rude things about them, just to annoy Liz. It didn’t work. But then she took me to a couple of games and I changed my mind. Football matches are brilliant. They’re loud and shouty and full of grown-up people swearing at the other team, and calling the players all sorts of rude names. Liz does it too. Normally Liz is very calm, but at football matches she turns into angry, sweary Liz and we have a great time jumping up and down and screaming. Football matches are the only place I’ve ever been where lots of grown-ups all sing, “You’re too fat to referee, you’re too fat to refereeeee.” It’s fantastic .
    Anyway, after the football we went and got pie and chips and sat in the café talking about the match. Liz said, “What’s this about you not going to your room, Olivia? You were so good at that with me.”
    I was good at that with Liz because I felt safe at Liz’s house. If someone had ever tried to kidnap me, she’d have karate-chopped them before they could say “free lollipops”.
    I said, “I dunno. Can I have a football scarf? All the other kids have one.”
    Liz didn’t even bother to answer me. “Come on, Olivia. You’re not stupid. You know how this one is going to end.”
    I wriggled. Parents shouldn’t chuck you out because you won’t go to your room. But they do.
    â€œI don’t. . .” I said. Then I stopped. Liz waited. “I don’t like being on my own,” I said. “There are all these rooms in Jim’s house, and weird smells, and I think there are people hiding, and I don’t want them to kidnap me. And there’s this weird Victorian dead lady, Amelia Dyer, and if it’s not people then it’s her haunting the house, and I don’t want her to catch me on my own. I don’t know what she might do to me.”
    â€œOlivia,” said Liz, “you know there’s no such thing as ghosts, right? And you know people can’t just walk into Jim’s house. He’s very careful. He keeps both doors locked all the time.”
    â€œBut there’s noises !” I said. “And smells! They can’t just come from nowhere !”
    â€œOK,” said Liz. “So what can we do about it?”
    After that, instead of sending me to my room, Jim started sending me to the dining room. The dining room was across the corridor from the kitchen, and it had this door with glass in it, so I could see Jim and Jim could see me, but no one ever used it except at mealtimes, because it was big and cold and didn’t have a telly.
    I still didn’t much like being on my own in the dining room.