A Door To Nowhere

Days left: 35

The house phone rings loudly as I stumble downstairs, trying to shrug my jacket on. The sound is grating, piercing the silence like a wailing alarm. I grab the receiver with both hands, nearly wrenching the cord from its socket.

'Hello?' I say, still sounding half-asleep.

The voice is far too bright on the other end. 'Is this Mrs Keleman? My name is Patricia Blackwell. I'm calling from the Dewington Post.'

I jerk slightly at the name of the newspaper, and frown. 'What do you want?'

'We've received some information about your mother-in-law, Dorika Keleman, and we'd like to run a story on her if that's possible.'

Disbelief floods through me. 'Excuse me?'

'Can you confirm whether she correctly predicted the date of her own death?'

I hang up abruptly. How the hell did the local news find out about this?

Mum scurries out of the kitchen, drying her hands with a dish-cloth. 'Who was that?'

I sit down on the bottom step, and begin to tug my shoes on. 'A woman from the Dewington Post. She knew about Dorika – she wanted to run a story on her.'

Mum's jaw tightens. She steadies herself against the doorway. 'That's just what we need. The whole of Dewington talking about this family.'

I shrug, and throw my bag over my shoulder. 'Someone must have told them.'

'Those damn church friends of hers,' Mum suddenly says. 'I bet it was them.'

She darts back into the kitchen, and I hear her tell my Dad what just happened. In a matter of seconds, they're shouting, and I roll my eyes at the wall. Oliver tumbles out of the living room, still bleary-eyed. His school tie hangs undone around his collar, but he yanks open the front door anyway.

'Coming?' he says, squinting in the sunlight. I nod, and we exit the house, letting the door slam shut behind us.

Will's already waiting for me, his red Nissan pulled up on the side of the road. Saffron has the radio blasting, and I can hear her singing – or rather, shrieking – along loudly in the passenger seat.

'We can always give you a lift, you know,' I say to my brother. 'I'm sure Will won't mind.'

Oliver gives the car a dubious look, and starts to walk backwards up the street. 'I think I'm okay.'

'Suit yourself,' I say, and climb into the back of Will's car. He lowers the volume almost immediately, and turns to face me.

'I'm really sorry, Rory,' he says. His eyebrows pull together. 'I hope your family's okay.'

'They're fine,' I say. 'Guess we should have saw it coming.'

'But how could you?' Saffron bursts out. 'No-one can guess their own deathday!'

Will glares at her across the car, and she sinks back into her seat.

'I mean, I'm really sorry about Dorika,' Saffron says, but I can tell she's sincere. 'She baked the best cakes. That Hungarian shit was awesome. And she told me I was going to be rich when I'm older. The woman knew things.'

'It still doesn't feel real,' I say, gazing out of the window. 'I can't believe it's happened.'

As I speak, a furious tornado of fear crashes through me. I couldn't believe Dorika was ever going to die when she said she would. But now I'm not sure if I'm going to die when she predicted too.