The River Turned Red

The River Turned Red

KATE

Kate was only 8. One summer’s day she went outside to play in the meadow and
chase butterflies - she never came back. The police searched, the villagers looked,
the rabbits sent each other messages - but no one could find her. The village lost
its heartbeat that day, the jackdaws went silent and all the flowers turned away
from the Sun.

Everyone cried so much that a puddle of tears formed in the centre of the village.
The puddle became a lake on which the village ducks began swimming. then the
lake became an ocean, with crashing waves, sailing ships and whales the size of
sailing ships.

Kate’s mother was sat on the corner of the bed, her grief so heavy that she
couldn’t move, lift an arm, or even blink. Kate’s father couldn’t penetrate his
wife’s grief. Even though they had been married for ten years he couldn’t console
her. They were both alone.

In a cottage down the village road, Kate’s grandfather sat in his chair, mouth
slightly open, his liver-spotted hands resting on his knees. Ash from his cigar had
fallen, unnoticed, on his left trouser leg. The blue-grey smoke folded into the
empty corners of the living room, His wife had been taken, now his beautiful
Kate. It was too much to bear.

“Dear Kate - where are you?! Tell the Green Man, spirit of the wood. He can tell
the old woman who lives on her own at the edge of the village. She can hurry to
the village church and let everyone know by ringing the church bell…”

Kate was lying under an old Beech deep in the wood. Low heavy branches which
bowed to the ground hid her from the sight of humans. A dark-brown wood ant
scurried across her face, too busy to stop. A bumblebee bumped into her left

cheek, “so sorry!” and went on its way, bumbling about. A warm breeze stroked
Kate’s milk-bottle white skin - “there, there”. She was slowly being reclaimed by
Nature.

It was Kate’s time to leave her parents, too young, too early, I know - but that’s
how the world is, full of magic and sorrow. Scientists discovered that when
someone young dies, the world turns a tiny bit slower (not so much that you would
notice). They worked out the only way it could be speeded up is if all the world’s
fish started swimming in the same direction. Unfortunately, this is not likely to
happen as fish don’t always agree with each other. In fact, they argue quite a lot.

For Kate’s parents it seemed as if the world had stopped completely. Life had
stopped. Sunny days and the ripening berries on the Hawthorn made things worse.
In time, long walks in the country would lessen their sorrow, but not right now,
it was too early.

But what is taken away is given back. The moment Kate disappeared another
Kate was born. This Kate would grow strong and courageous, and have children
of her own. She would live long, and die old in her bed, surrounded by all the
people who loved her, as well as the spirits of every Kate who had ever lived,
including our little Kate.

TARA

Two summers after Kate disappeared, Tara, who was only 9, went out the back
door of her house to run up One Tree Hill - she never came back down. The police
searched, the villagers looked, the swallows sent out teams - but no one could
find her.

The black cats in the village were so upset that they curled-up tightly on top of
the garden walls in the full sun, their fur getting so hot you could fry a sausage
on them. They stayed like that for a cat year, not speaking, eating or drinking.
The village mice would have had a party but they were too sad.

Tara’s father was so heartbroken, he never got over it. During winter three years
later, he said to his sister, “I’m going out for a walk. Love you”. That was the last

anyone saw of him. Every winter after that, when it snowed there was a single
tree deep in the wood on which the snow never fell.

“Dear Tara! Please come back. It doesn’t matter you didn’t tidy your bedroom,
we’re not angry with you. We miss you!”.

Tara was lying in the arms of infinity. Infinity turns all the world’s cities and
armies to dust, yet comforts a small dying bird in its hand. It has no start, no end,
no middle, no up nor down. It’s what you see when you stare into the eyes of a
wild animal. Beams of light began to shine from Tara’s body like rays from the
sun. Trapped in the beams were a million particles of dust slowly swirling this
way and that; mostly flower pollen, grass seeds and the powder that rubs off
moths’ wings. All the energy that Tara had gained during her short life was being
released into infinity.

A few weeks after Tara’s disappearance, a fox walked into the village. The fox
made his way to the old church. There, he told the vicar’s dog he had seen Tara
two days earlier in the wood by One Tree Hill. The fox recounted that when he
got nearer to Tara, she turned round and looked at him. What he experienced he
will never forget. Tara had the face of a young woman. In her arms she cradled a
lamb. Her bare feet were bloodied with thorns. She was surrounded by a golden
glow. Tara opened her mouth but no sound came out, just a slow pulse of pressure
which made the trees bend and the flowers wave. The pulse carried round the
Earth. In its wake fields of wheat sprang up, millions of fish appeared in the
oceans and flocks of birds appeared in the sky. The fox, crouching close to the
ground, watched it all, gasping in amazement. He turned back to Tara, but she
was gone. The fox couldn’t believe what he had seen, he rushed back to his den
and hugged his wife and cubs. He didn’t let go.

Once the vicar’s dog heard this, he ran to his master and told him what the fox
had seen. On hearing the story, the vicar fell to his knees, clasped his hands
together and began praying. The small girl he had known as Tara had given him
something he had been waiting for his whole life.

FAYE

Three years after Tara left, Faye, who was only 7, set out to the local playground
to meet her friend, taking the route by the river. She never arrived. The police
searched, the villagers looked, the dragonflies zipped about like helicopters – but
no one could find her.

The red poppies in the village loved Faye, they cried dark purple tears which fell
onto the stones and pavements. The whole village turned purple, and everyone
got purple on their shoes when they went for a walk. The cows in the fields
stopped producing milk, and the bread in every cupboard went mouldy. All the
children cried because they couldn’t have bread and butter pudding for six weeks.

“Dear Faye! Why did you go away? Did we do something wrong? Come back
and you can have some vanilla ice cream with hot chocolate sauce, that’s your
favourite”.

Faye’s parents searched for her for one thousand days. They searched when it
snowed and they searched when it rained, and they searched when the freezing
wind cut them like razors, making their lips bleed. They hardly slept. They lost
their jobs and most of their friends. They ran out of money, so they moved to an
old shed which didn’t have electricity, hot water, a floor, a door, or a roof. Every
day ended in misery and disappointment. On day one thousand and one they both
turned into wood, and never spoke again.

Faye was lying in a cool place, flashes of silver appearing and disappearing.
Sunlight shimmering on her face. The soft rumble of water and moving pebbles
around her. A freshwater oyster rested in her open left hand. A ribbon of river
weed wrapped itself gently around her neck. Her long hair swirled and glittered
with hundreds of scales from tiny fish. Faye had always wanted to be a Queen,
now she was getting her wish, ‘Queen of the River Bed’, crowned by nature!
Water voles, on hearing the news, brought Faye gifts of waterlogged acorns and
empty snail shells – jewels of the river. Fish arrived from up and down river and
blew bubbles around her. After one day and one night, one hundred young river
eels took Faye out to the open ocean to visit lands she had only dreamt about.

In every tragedy there is beauty and out of every broken heart an angel is born.
This is a fact of life; as certain as a dog licks your face and a pet budgerigar flies
out the window.

Faye’s short life had given birth to angels and created beauty for everyone who
knew her. The day she was born, every droplet of summer rain had the image of
her face. Millions of Faye’s splashing on the ground, watering the grass and
renewing the woodland streams. Imagine that!

HANNAH

Seven years after all this happened, Hannah, who was 15, decided to write a short
story. Hannah liked writing. She was a lonely child and didn’t speak much. She
had started writing to occupy her time and to take her mind off terrible things.
Hannah had cuts on her arms and burns on her legs. Her eyes were dark and she
was thin. Her story would be about three young girls who disappeared. She named
them Kate, Tara and Faye. She would let the story develop by itself. Whatever
came to her mind she would write.

Halfway through writing the story Hannah began to get a headache, so she silently
left the house to get some air in the fields at the back of her garden. She never
returned (you knew that by now). The police searched, the villagers looked, the
grass snakes tasted the air - but no one could find her.

The sky went dark and the river turned red. The children in the village started
bleeding from their noses. A deep distant rumbling sound got louder and louder,
scaring all the birds. No one knew where it was coming from. The vibration made
all the windows shatter and the drainpipes burst. The rabbits fled the village in
terror and the sheep went blind.

“Hannah! Where are you? Come back! The village is being destroyed!”

Hannah was somewhere far away. A voice said to her, “you have suffered
enough”. She felt a warmth wash over her that she hadn’t experienced since she
was small. The marks on her body began to fade. All the pain she had endured in
her life dripped from her eyes and ran down her cheeks like melting ice lollies on

a sunny day at the beach. She could see her grandmother’s face. Fear turned to
love and her past was forgotten.

Meanwhile, the village church collapsed and the village hall crumbled into dust.
Six of the village cottages fell into huge holes which suddenly appeared.
Hannah’s father’s heart exploded in his chest, killing him instantly.

The next morning, the Sun rose, the birds began singing, the cats stretched and
yawned, and things slowly returned to normal. The rabbits came back and the
sheep could see again. The villagers realised something important had happened,
something which was connected to Hannah. They all got together on the village
green. They brought flowers, homemade cakes, and cloudy lemonade for the
children. They held hands and were silent for two minutes. Whatever had
happened in the village, it was gone.

---------------------------

Hannah never finished writing the story (obviously), so it doesn’t have a proper
ending. But here’s what you should know. Inside every child there is innocence
and inside every child there is power. When an innocent child dies the pain can
be too much to bear, but beauty springs from tragedy and flowers appear on the
Earth. But when a child’s innocence is stolen, the power unleashed can destroy
empires and will crush those who stole it.