Chapter 4
It will be several years before anyone sees the strange boy again. Every year Peter and Charlie spend a few weeks in Maple Cottage, and they always see Carol, Emma and Liam when they come down. Sometimes Peter brings a school friend down for a week. As Peter grows older Charlie finds it harder to find things to do with him, but Peter seems to be happy to be on his own. Occasionally they go to watch Brighton play football, but there isn’t much around to interest a teenager.
And then one year things change. Peter has just turned 18. Charlie is going to spend the whole of July in Shingle Beach but Peter has finished his A levels and spends two weeks with some friends in Spain lying on the sand. He arrives back in London and gets the train down the next day, getting off at Hastings and taking the bus along the coast. He stops first at the shop in the village and is surprised to find Emma working there. Peter walks in, and then stops and just looks at her. He feels himself blush. He hasn’t seen her for a couple of years and she has suddenly grown up. She is taller, rounder, her breasts have developed. Her hair is longer, tied back, her smile is wider, her eyes deeper. Peter feels he is seeing her for the first time.
“Hi.”
“Hello you.”
“How long have you been working here?” Peter says.
Emma smiles. “Since exams finished. They were advertising a holiday job.”
“Cool. Is Liam about too?”
“No, he’s on a school camping trip. He’s back next week. I’ve seen your dad in here a few times, he told me you’d be coming down. Are you here for the rest of the summer?”
“I don’t know, it depends whether there’s anything to do. I’m hoping to go to uni and I’m waiting for my A level results. I need a job really, and the chances are better in London. But I’m here for a couple of weeks at least. Is there anyone else around?”
“No, just tourists.”
“What time do you finish? We should catch up. Probably not today, tomorrow?”
“I finish at 5.00. I’ll see you then.”
“OK, see you.”
The next day Peter is waiting for Emma when she finishes work, and they walk down to the beach. And over the next few days they explore the area around the village, up onto the downs, and to the old town up on the hill. They visit the old church and the pub there. You can see across past Rye towards Dungeness in the distance. At the weekend Charlie lets Peter take the car and they drive to Hastings. They buy fish and chips, and walk along past the old fishing huts, black painted and selling fish to the visitors. They take the little train that goes up the cliff and walk over the top over-looking the sea and the town. There are more walkers here, some following the path, some daring the crumbling cliff edge. They find an empty bench and sit for a while just talking looking out over the sea.
Emma says to Peter, “I’ve seen the ghost boy again.”
“What do you mean?” says Peter.
“The one we saw on the beach. I have seen him a couple of times this year. Not in the shop, just on the beach. Always on his own, looking the same, looking for something. Or someone.”
“What does he do?”
“I don’t know. He just appears. I see him when we are walking along the beach path. Sometimes digging in the shingle, sometimes just standing there. I think he is haunting the place.”
“What do you mean?” says Peter.
“I tried to talk to him once. It wasn’t on the beach, he was further back behind the sea wall, just standing looking towards the sea. There was a dog barking, and I saw him move away from the dog. I walked up to him, he just stood there looking sad. It was hot but he was pale, his skin looked grey. He looks just the same as when we saw him before, the same jeans the same blue T shirt, the same age. I slipped and looked down to avoid falling, and when I looked up he wasn’t there. There wasn’t anywhere he could have gone, it was like before. He just disappeared.”
“He must live here somewhere. Ghosts aren’t real, and people don’t just vanish.”
“I know it sounds mad, but there’s something wrong with him, you can feel it.”
“I wonder what he is looking for?”
“ I think he has been here for years. It must be something from long ago.”
They spend the rest of that summer together, Emma working in the shop, Peter spending the days walking or sitting on the beach, waiting for Emma to finish work. They eat fish and chips, drink cans of lager, sit at the back of the cinema in Hastings. Peter has kissed girls before but they were not like Emma and for a short time she is his world, he can’t see anything beyond her. His other plans for the summer fall away with the passing weeks. They look out for the boy, and Peter thinks he sees him again once, but it is a distance across the beach and he can’t be sure. They walk over but there is no one there.