"Katie Chapman. Aged 6. Last seen…" by Scott Wilson

Katie Chapman. Aged 6. Last seen…

by Scott Wilson

 

Katie had been six the last time she’d been at school. 

It was also the last day that she had seen daylight.

She didn’t know how old she was now, Katie had never been great with numbers and not being able to see outside, each passing week, season and year felt the same.  

Her aunt had collected her early with a promise that her mother would come and get her soon.

“Where is she? She’s been an awful long time” she pondered, the loneliness and sadness she had once felt had been left behind along with losing three baby teeth and growing taller, so her aunt had needed to give her more clothes. 

In the first weeks Katie had wondered if she had done something wrong and being sent to live with an aunt, she had never met before was punishment, but the spider that she shared her attic room with told her that wasn’t true and that she was a lovely little girl.

The spider was her only friend but sometimes he would tell her terrible stories of things he had witnessed before her arrival. 

Katie didn’t want to listen, and her young mind found it hard to understand when the spider spoke of such violence that had been inflicted on the boy who had stayed with Auntie before.

Katie thought his name was Jacob or Joseph after discovering some letters scratched onto one of the rafters.    

But her aunt wasn’t all bad, Katie was often allowed downstairs where the lights were and allowed to dress up in pretty dresses where the pair would play with a tea set or colour with crayons. Auntie always looked so happy to see her at the start of the games, but it wouldn’t be long before her mood changed and she would begin to cry, then it would be back up the loft ladder to her room, her safe space, and the bolt to the hatch secured.  

Katie found this very confusing, and she would often hear her aunt wail another girl’s name as she sobbed.

The spider didn’t like her very much and Katie knew that if he was discovered, then she would likely kill him. The same way she did when she found a pair of nesting birds in the eaves. She had crushed them and their eggs underfoot.    

It had made Katie cry but she had been told that it was so they wouldn’t keep her awake or bring their friends back. 

“This is your room little one, I don’t want the birds pushing you out, or where would you stay?”

Auntie always had a good way of explaining things.

The spider had told her to get away, to strike her aunt with her dinner bowl the next time she climbed the ladder, but she couldn’t do that, she might hurt her aunt, then she would be in real trouble.

“Where would I go? I don’t think my mum wants me anymore?” she had whispered to the spider, but he had just sat in his thick web watching, judging.

As she grew, her home began to shrink, and her aunt brought her down to play a lot less often.

She could no longer fit in the dresses and was too big for the little chairs. 

The spider told her that she would be replaced soon and this worried Katie. Her aunt had aged over her time there and she now found it harder to bring her food and her meals became less frequent.

“You will die up here!” her friend told her, he too had aged and could no longer run like he used to but was still inundated with flies to feast on. Her tummy rumbled and had previously been gifted a fly or two, but they never eased the hunger pains.

It felt like days since she was handed a piece of bread so the sound of the padlock being opened was a huge relief and she almost cried.

“She won’t let you leave” the spider said “The house won’t let you leave!” 

Auntie was now climbing the ladder, the dim light below illuminated all the wrinkles on her face and Katie couldn’t help thinking of Rapunzel, a story her mother had read to hear once.

“Its filthy up here!” she grumbled as she steadily got to her feet. Auntie looked around in disgust at all the low hanging webs and the toilet bucket was nearly full and, unknowingly to Katie, the loft stunk.  

“Filthy rat!” she snapped as she approached, the pair now almost the same height.    

She picked up a piece of broken eave and Katie flinched as she expected to be struck. But the stick was used to swipe at the low webs. She muttered as she knocked them down, each swipe getting closer to the spider. 

“Please, wait—” Katie implored but it was too late, the spider, her only friend, was knocked to the ground where he and his imprisoned future meals were crushed underfoot. 

“No-o-o-o!” she cried

“Filthy rat!”

“She will never let you go!” the spiders words echoed in her mind, as if he was on her shoulder whispering them. 

Katie stepped forward and pushed. 

It was an act of defiance, she was mentally only six after all.

It was also an act of self-defence, and she could only watch as Auntie disappeared through the hatch with a cry and a bone splitting crunch.

All was quiet.

Katie didn’t dare to call out, she had been trained not to do that from day one.

“I should let her sleep” she thought as she crept to look down through the hatch. Auntie was resting at an odd angle, but Katie was still able to pull the ladder back up and then the hatch.

She knew the darkness well.

It was her safe place.

Besides, she had nowhere to go.

Her home was full of trapped flies, and she was starving.

She knew the house, her safe space, wouldn’t let her die.