Unspeakable by Caroline Pignat

start of his journal, before we’d even met. Whoever he was writing about, it wasn’t me.
    I didn’t want to know about her . Why torture myself ? Why read Jim’s private thoughts about someone else? But there had to be something in there, some answers to all my questions. Something I’d missed. I gripped the page with both hands, forcing myself to read it once more.
    I close my eyes and there she is—her hair a thick rope hanging over her shoulder, black against the white of her nightdress. She had a red ribbon knotted at the end. I remember how a few curls stuck to her cheek, framed her haunting eyes. They never left me. Not for a second that night. I still feel them on me. Pleading with me .
    The yellowed sheet trembled in my hand. I thought I might be sick. Had I eaten anything, I probably would have retched. But this was sickness of the heart, really. Not the stomach.
    I flipped the page, feeling that familar sense of dismay and relief to see that was all he had written.

    Who was she? Was he with her now? Was he thinking of her then, on our last night together?
    Was he thinking of her when he kissed me?
    I SPENT THOSE LONG DAYS waiting for Steele’s return from Ireland with both hope and dread, swinging between extremes like the brass pendulum of the mantel clock. I did not care to go out—for where would I go? And no one cared to come over—for who had I left? And so I sat in my chair listening to the tick of the clock until I thought I might explode. Lily and Bates went about their usual routines, structuring their days by duties. Dusting. Driving to market. Dinners. Dishes. Delivering me cup after cup of tea that sat unsipped on the side table until it was stone cold. I envied them their chores, actually. As mundane and monotonous as servants’ duties were, they provided purpose. Something to occupy the hands and mind, at least for a little while. A reason to get up in the morning, even if only to grumble about it. I missed that.
    â€œWould you like to come to market with Lily and me?” Bates asked from the hall. “It’s a fine afternoon. Perhaps a stroll around the park after?”
    â€œNo, you go on ahead. I have some things to do here,” I lied, for the only thing I could do was wait. Wait and worry.
    WHEN STEELE FINALLY ARRIVED on Thursday, a week since our last interview, I made him wait. I sat at the vanity table in my bedroom as Lily showed him to the front room. Shetold me he was waiting downstairs. Truth be told, I wanted to rush down and get the door myself, I was that eager to have someone else to talk to, even if it was Steele. But on the other hand, my stomach churned over what he would ask today—about why I was on that ship, about how I survived, about that night. It amazed me how the man could both pull and repel me. And how I was starting to feel the same way about information on Jim. I wanted to know everything Steele knew about Jim, I wanted more journal entries, I wanted the truth—and yet, it terrified me.
    I stroked my hair a few more times before setting the silver-handled brush on the vanity. A part of me wondered if Steele left me waiting on purpose. Was it part of his plan? Some American swagger.
    He’s a journalist , I said to myself. You are a source. Nothing more .
    I stared at myself in the mirror, the dark circles under my grey eyes, the lines worry had etched into my stony face, like dates on a headstone—a marker to commemorate that someone under here had lived, once. Eighteen years old—I nearly laughed. More like eighty. What did I have but solitary days rambling around in this empty old house like Aunt Geraldine? At least she had her writing.
    I pulled back my thick curls and twisted them into a bun, tightly pinning it down. If only I could restrain my anxious mind as easily.
    The music caught me by surprise. It bounced up the stairwell like an unruly child, lively, full of rabble-rousing fun—a