Well

With a flick of her thumb, Caroline tossed the coin into the deep well. It tripped, then fell through the metal grid. She waited for the inevitable splash. She waited and waited, but no sound came. A frown creased her brow. How disappointing. Standing on her tip-toes, she rested her hands on the stone and peered into the opening. The damp smell reminded her of the copse back home after the rain, when the leaves on the trees looked like sleek leather and the mud squelched beneath her feet.

Overhead, seagulls circled and squawked in the sunny, cloudless sky; in the distance, an ice cream van jingle-jangled along the Cornish roads. The image of a ‘99’ flashed in Caroline’s mind. How long had it been since her last? Two hours at least. That was respectable. They were on holiday after all.

‘Did you make a wish?’

She turned to see her mother. She had one hand on Lizzie’s wheelchair, the other shielding her eyes from the sun. She was wearing the ‘No 1 Mum’ baseball cap that Caroline gave her for Christmas.

‘I can’t tell you what it was,’ Caroline said, rejoining her mother and sister. ‘Or else it won’t come true.’

Not that it was difficult to guess what she’d wished for since her wishes had been the same for the last ten years.

Caroline looked at Lizzie, a scarf protecting her sister’s bald head from the sun. Her eyes were so sunken that they looked like two spoon scoops in snow, and her usually pallid skin looked even greyer here in the country; here where everything was so fresh and lush.

Caroline took the wheelchair from her mother and the three of them made their way towards the picnic benches on the other side of the cliff top.

‘Why did that well have a grate over the top, Mammy?’ Caroline asked.

Her mother took a moment to answer. ‘I suppose in case someone fell down by accident. Are you girls hungry? I’m starving. I can’t wait for my sandwich. Doesn’t it look nice over there? I hope we can get a table.’

‘How would they fall down by accident?' Lizzie asked. Her voice was so thin that Caroline strained to hear. ‘Someone couldn’t fall down a well by accident.’

Their mother made a show of shaking her head and shrugging her shoulders. ‘I don’t know. Maybe it’s in case an animal or something fell down. You know, like a cat or a dog. You know what it’s like on the farm. Animals can’t be controlled. It’s probably for some reason like that.’

They reached the picnic area and took one of the benches in the shade, ‘so that Lizzie doesn’t get too hot in the sun.’

‘Will you girls be alright here?’ their mother asked. ‘I’ve to go to the loo. I’ll be back in a minute. Start eating if you like, but make sure to save me some cake!’

Their mother laughed a laugh that sounded forced.

The girls watched their mother make her way towards the wooden block of washrooms.

When she was out of sight, Lizzie said, ‘You know why there’s a grate over the top of the well, don’t you?’

‘No,’ Caroline replied, unwrapping her clingfilmed celery sticks. ‘Why is there a grate over the well?’

Lizzy rolled her eyes. ‘Jesus, Caroline, you’re so silly. You don’t know anything.’ She leant forwards in her wheelchair. ‘It’s to stop people throwing themselves down there. It’s to stop them killing themselves.’

Caroline’s breath caught in her throat. She stopped unwrapping her celery sticks. What did her sister mean?

She had heard of people killing one another, but she’d never imagined that someone would want to kill themselves. Sure, why on earth would they?

‘Do you think Mammy knew that?’ she asked.

‘She did indeed.’

‘So why didn’t she tell me?’

‘Because she doesn’t like to talk about death, does she?’

‘What do you mean?’

‘Because of me. Because of me being ill.’

This made no sense to Caroline, and the expression she wore must have communicated this to her sister for she said, ‘She thinks the mention of death upsets me.’

‘And does it?’

Lizzie looked away. ‘Not at all.’

‘Honestly?’

‘Honestly.’

Lizzie looked back and Caroline could tell from the tears in her eyes that she was lying. She rested her hand on her sister’s, but said nothing. What was there to say?