THE HAUNTING OF BEA NEVILLE

Chapter 2

Thud. Bea threw her fist at the punch bag. Her glove connected with the padded surface with full force. It swung back, missing Lisa Ashby by millimetres.

"Hey, Bea! Watch what you're doing!"

But instead of remorse, a smile played out on Bea's lips as she caught the bag swinging back at her in her gloved hands, hugging it to the side of her body.

"How about you move your fat arse out of the way?"

The gym stank of sweat. Blood pumped and muscles throbbed. But there was not anywhere else on this earth that Bea would rather be. Brushing back dampened strands of hair out of her eyes, she looked around the gym. Two girls, who she didn't know, sparred in the ring. One of the muscle-defined trainers barked instructions at them. Bea narrowed her eyes at the group of girls stood giggling near the water fountain. What were they even here for?

As though the other members of the gym were clockwork creatures connected to the same ticking time piece, all at once they were checking watches or phones and muttering words about it being 'time to go'. Bea glanced at the simple, white clock on the wall that probably adorned every public place and school classroom in the country. The morons did have a point. It was the end of the session and time to leave. Bea released the punch bag and pulled the gloves from her hands. Tucking them under her arm, she headed over to the lockers to grab her bag, then straddled one of the benches to take off the wraps that protected her hands. It felt good to let the cold air hit the sweat-coated skin.

"Bea Neville?"

"Yeah?"

"Good session today." The instructor didn't look at her but studied a clipboard gripped in his hands.

"Thanks."

"How long have you been coming here?"

"Four years."

"Okay. There's a National Kickboxing competition coming up for sixteens and under and we can enter one more person. Think you'll be interested?" Jason stood in front of her, shapely muscles glistening, poised with pen in one hand and clipboard in the other, ready to add her name to the list. "Unless you need to ask your mum first."

"No!" she snapped before composing herself. "Who else is going?"

Jason scanned the paper in front of him. "Melissa, Katie, Emma and Maryam."

"Count me in." If the gym thought that they were really the best, then Bea would walk her way to the final. She was way better than all four of those girls. Maryam was the best out of the four he had named but some of her moves were sloppy. She needed to remember how to hold the positions correctly so that she could get the full power behind her punches, behind her kicks.

Jason handed her a glossy leaflet with the competition details. She folded it and thrust it into the side pocket of her gym back. "See you next session."

Her phone buzzed in her pocket. It was Sam.

Outside.

Bea grabbed her kit and headed out to where Sam sat waiting for her in his car. After throwing her gym bag into the back seat, she slid in at the passenger side. A man stared at her through the windscreen, his head sat at an ugly angle where it hung onto his neck by a scrap of bloodied tissue. His mouth bobbed like a fish in water.

"You ready to go, babe?"

"Huh?" She struggled to tear her eyes away.

One arm lounged on the steering wheel. He looked like a rock star, a rock star from the eighties, that is. A tight, black t-shirt clung to his slim frame with self-ripped jeans barely covering his legs. Arrow straight blond hair hung past his shoulders, even longer than Bea's own dark brunette locks.

"Yeah, can I get a shower at yours though? I stink." She kept her eyes down, deciding instead that the food-stained car mat was better than a dead man.

Sam wrinkled his nose. "I think that's a good idea." He twisted the key in the ignition, listened for the roar of the engine and screeched away, unknowingly through the decapitated ghost.

"Do you love me?" Bea asked in a small voice. It was hours later, now approaching the early hours of the morning.

Sam's text alert on his phone sounded. He jumped up out of bed as though something had bitten him on the arse and started pulling on his trousers. He searched the floor. " Have you seen my socks?"

"Next to the desk. Did you hear what I asked?"

His head snapped up, eyes wide. "What? Oh yeah, I show you, don't I?"

"Yeah, yeah you do," she pulled the covers up to her neck, suddenly feeling cold, exposed.

"Listen, you don't mind letting yourself out do you? It's just that I've got band practice and I'm going to be late if I don't get a move on." Not once did he look at her. He just swept his hand through his long hair and continued searching his room for items of clothing or stuff he might need to take to rehearsals.

"At this time? It's a bit late for rehearsals."

"Yeah, I've had a text from Mike. We've got that gig coming up in York and he's worried that we sound shit."

Mike had a point, Bea thought. "Erm, yeah sure," she began looking for her own clothes amongst the debris that covered Sam's bedroom floor. "When will I see you next?"

Sam shrugged. "I dunno. I'm really busy. How about I drop you a text and we'll sort something out?"

"Okay," No goodbye, or I love you or even get out of my house. Nothing. She lay back, accidentally banging her head on the headboard. "Ouch!" she rubbed the spot where it hurt. I show you, don't I? The words wouldn't leave her alone. Did he show her that he loved her? What did that even mean anyway? To show someone you loved them. Was it picking her up from kickboxing so she didn't have to walk? Was it having a word with the bouncer so she could get into clubs she was too young for? Should she know? Or did the fact that she didn't know meant that he hadn't shown her he loved her at all. If that was the case, Bea was feeling pretty used right now.

With one hand clutching the thin bed sheet around her body, she got up and collected all of her clothes, tugging them on as best as she could with one hand. Sam's friends had a tendency just to barge in at all times, day or night and she wasn't risking flashing anyone.

Closing the front door behind her, she threw her bag strap over her shoulder and zipped up her jacket. The numbers on her phone showed 12:44. She sighed knowing Helen would be up waiting for her when she got home. Putting her phone back in her bag and thrusting her hands in her pockets, she set off for home.

It was bitter out. Billowing clouds formed around her breath and a thin layer of fresh frost crunched beneath her boots. She hated the journey home. From Sam's house, it was a matter of ten minutes but something about being alone in the dark made her vulnerable. It made them come.

She refused to look ahead and when shadowy or moonlit pale fingers reached out to curl around her wrists, she brushed them off, kicking her legs up a gear to hurry home.