Seven for a Secret Never to be Told

Mia left the wooden token on the mantel piece and after a few days other things began to take precedence. There was her weekly drama class with her friend Eloise and then she stayed with her grandad for a couple of days as most weekends her Nan worked a nightshift at the old people’s home. It wasn’t until Monday when she got back from school that she looked for the wooden disc with the magpie carved into it, but it was gone. She searched everywhere but couldn’t find it.

Mia’s Nan said she hadn’t moved it and after taking everything off of the mantel piece she decided it must have fallen off. She checked Bear’s bed and under all the furniture just in case it had rolled out of sight but she couldn’t find it.

‘I’ll have another look while you’re having your bath,’ said Mia’s Nan, ‘it can’t be far,’ she smiled. ‘When you’re out of the bath we’ll see if we can Skype mummy.’ Mia felt a wave of excitement and forgot all about the strange wooden token.

In the bath she began thinking about all the things she wanted to tell her mum. The part she’d got in the school play, the after school dance class, the dens she’d made with Safi. It was hard not having her mum around for months at a time. She didn’t know anyone else whose mum lived away. Grown-ups always said ‘Mia’s so easy, she just gets on with it…’ but inside it didn’t feel easy. No one really understood and Mia tried not to think about it too much. What was the point? She couldn’t do anything about it.

Mia led in the rose smelling bubble bath with her eyes closed listening to the hypnotic drip of the tap. The water was cooling down quickly and her thoughts were beginning to drift. In her mind she went back to when she and Safi were in the field. There they were in her mind’s eye playing on the old tree trunk. She could hear herself laughing and Safi suggesting they make a circle of stones. Then Bear barked and she watched her dream-self scrabble in the soil for the wooden token. But where was Safi? Was that him on the other side of the copse looking at her? Was that boy Safi? He was looking at her feet. Mia looked down too, to see what he was looking at. There was water bubbling up through the ground, it was freezing cold. It quickly reached her ankles. Suddenly a dark cloud cast a black shadow across her. The water was rising. It was like ice. It reached her knees.

Mia felt herself going under the water, struggling for breath but it wasn’t a day dream any more. She thrashed around and managed to pull herself out of the bath spluttering, coughing and dragging air into her lungs with huge gulps. Suddenly back to reality she stood up shivering. She could feel her heart hammering in her chest. That’s when she realized the sound of dripping water had stopped. She looked at the tap and there hung a slender icicle.

The bathroom door opened and as it did the icicle dropped into the bath.

‘Mia you’ll catch your death of cold. Come on lovely.’ Mia’s Nan took a fluffy towel from the cupboard and put it on the toilet seat. ‘Out you come.’ She didn’t notice anything was wrong and went off to get the hair dryer.

Mia shivered. She bent down and reached into the water and retrieved a small sliver of ice. She held it in the palm of her hand and watched it quickly melt away. The tap began to drip again.

While Mia had been in the bath Mia’s Nan had found the small disc of wood carved with the letter T.

‘It was in the hollow bit at the back of the mantle-piece,’ she said handing it to Mia. Brushing her damp hair Mia wondered what the T really stood for. Trouble she thought…