Scare Me by Richard Parker

together in her head. She’d also told her that Will was supervising the installation of the security cameras.
    â€œSorry, Mrs Frost… I don’t mean to ruin any surprises, but is Will not taking you and Libby to Cawley Manor?”
    So, a surprise trip had been planned. “No. He has had to make an alternative business trip.”
    Nissa seemed mortified to have been left out of the loop. “Business?”
    â€œUrgent family business.”
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    Tam couldn’t sleep. He listened to the circulation in his ear scratching at the pillow. Across the narrow passage between his room and the kitchen he could hear his mother and father at the sink and the muffled impacts of plates and cutlery as they put them away.
    Nine storeys below nighttime kick-started like his father’s bike. Taxi motors buzzed, horns beeped and he could hear the low murmur of adults and occasional words he recognised bubbling up like his mother talking in her sleep. There were yells and screams, but none of them sounded anything like what he’d heard today at the grille. These were mixed with laughter and chatter – voices that were supposed to be heard.
    If he didn’t get to sleep in the next hour he knew he’d be lying awake listening for Songsuda. He hadn’t seen his older sister since his fifth birthday. It had been almost a year ago. His mother and father had told him she’d gone to live with his aunt and uncle in Kampung Keladi. He’d seen her once after when he was making deliveries with his father. Tam had pointed her out to him. She’d stood under an umbrella with a man he didn’t recognise, but he knew it was his sister. His father had scarcely glanced in her direction, told Tam he was mistaken and ridden on.
    On the night of his fifth birthday she’d come to visit with a present for him. She’d looked strange, suddenly older. His father had dragged her out of the block and he’d heard her screaming to be let back in. She’d returned the following evening, but he hadn’t even been allowed to go to the window to see her. He remembered how they’d all sat in the kitchen like statues and the way his mother blinked every time Songsuda screamed up at the window. That night his father had said she’d been given enough chances, told Tam she was lazy and didn’t want to work honestly.
    Tam remembered when she’d worked at their father’s hotplate in the night market in Batu Ferringhi. He used to sit at her feet, watching her painted toenails, while she chatted and served the customers with his mother and father. Yum pla dook foo and moo satay for 25 baht each. He made himself sick on Catfish, red pork and dragon hair sweets.
    He missed being at the market. He hoped if his father decided to let Songsuda in they could go back to the way it used to be. He knew it wouldn’t happen. He dreamt of her out there and had as many nightmares about what had happened to her. His father had pointed out the bad, nighttime men as they drove round. Those were the men that cast a net over Songsuda when he closed his eyes.
    His father had explained it to him, but it still didn’t make any sense. Why couldn’t they let her back in? He often woke because he thought he’d heard her down in the street.
    If he heard her again he’d let her back in whatever his father told him.
    He listened to the rhythm of the inside of his body and sank his head deeper into the pillow to try and dampen the throbbing in his ear. Tam thought about what had happened to him that afternoon as he’d stood by the grille. He knew what he’d heard. Would he be a statue again?
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    â€œI’ve landed.” Will clasped the mobile to his ear as he walked unsteadily along the familiar, polished concourse of Orlando International. The air smelt overpoweringly of sun lotion. He’d cleared passport control and been fingerprinted. In a golf store he’d quickly