‘What do you think the mark is?’
‘It’s a burn, and it looks as if it happened some time ago, probably when you were a child.’ She hesitated and Matt nodded her on. ‘I saw a mark once that was exactly that shape, when someone accidentally burned themselves with the tip of an iron. I may be wrong...’
‘You’re not wrong. And it wasn’t accidental.’
Her eyes filled with tears. ‘I’m so sorry, Matt. I know you don’t want to talk about it.’
Suddenly that was all he wanted to do. Hannah had reached in and found his secret, and she’d had the courage to tell him that she knew. The heart to cry for him. Matt curled up on the bed, laying his head in her lap.
‘I want to tell you about it...’
She held him, giving him the strength to haltingly begin the story. His father’s rage and his mother’s tears. The more he talked, safe in Hannah’s arms, the easier it became.
‘My mother took it all. Until I was eight years old.’
‘What happened then?’
‘He came home early from work one day. I was in the kitchen with my mother, she was doing the ironing. When she heard the front door slam, she told me to go and play in the garden, and went out into the sitting room. But I didn’t. I listened at the door, and heard him shouting at her, about something that had happened at work. I knew what it sounded like when he hit her, I’d heard that often enough before...’
He couldn’t go on. Hannah waited, holding him. It would be quite okay if he stopped here, she’d understand. The knowledge gave him the strength to continue.
‘For the first time, I didn’t try to hide. I ran into the sitting room and attacked him, but of course he was far too strong for me. He picked me up, and took me into the kitchen, locking the door behind us. I could hear my mother, begging him to let me go and promising she’d do anything he wanted if he didn’t hurt me. He told me he’d give me something to help me remember that I was never to do that again...’
‘He burned you. With the iron.’
‘He branded me. It hurt so badly that I struggled and screamed and he yanked me up by my arm and threw me across the room, that’s when my shoulder dislocated. Then I heard the sound of glass breaking. My mother had smashed the kitchen door, and she was standing over me, with a spade from the garden in her hands. She told him she’d kill him if he ever laid a finger on me again. She was so different, like...’
He felt Hannah’s arms tighten around him. ‘Like a mother protecting her child.’
‘Yes.’ He could imagine Hannah like that if anything or anyone ever threatened Sam. Flaming with rage, like a lioness defending her cub. The thought that what had happened to him would never happen to Sam comforted him.
‘That was the last time I saw my father. He walked out of the house, and my mother picked me up and took me straight to the hospital. She was bleeding from the broken glass, and she told them some story and they patched us both up. Then she took me back out to the car, and told me that we were never going back. She left me with a neighbour while she went back to pack a few things, and then we left.’
‘It must have been...’ Another tear escaped from Hannah’s eye. ‘I can’t imagine how you must have felt.’
‘I felt as if we’d escaped. We drove for hours, all the way to London. We came to this hotel, she had family here but she was too afraid to go to them in case my father found us. We stayed here for two weeks, and I thought that this would be the beginning of a new life for us. I’d have friends, and a nice school. Everything was going to be all right.’
It had been just like now. Everything would be all right, if he just stayed here in Hannah’s arms. Matt knew he couldn’t, that they had serious work to do tomorrow, but he could still believe it for a while.
‘It wasn’t, of course. My mother’s family helped her out,
and we weren’t short of money. We moved from hotel to hotel, until we got a little house, and then after a few months we heard that my father had found us. We ran, and then he found us again, in the cottage in Wales. After that, we just kept running, never really knowing if he was following or not, but never staying in one place for more than six months.’
‘Where is she now?’
‘When I went to medical school, she decided to go to France for a year. She loved Paris, and settled there for a while. She wrote a book, loosely based on her own experiences, and to her surprise it sold. That gave her a lot of confidence, and she came back to England and started to get involved with a charity that helps battered women. She got a job as a columnist for a newspaper and... I don’t know if she’ll ever really mend. But she has a good life now, and she’s happy.’
‘That’s wonderful. I wish you’d tell me what the book’s called, I’d love to read it.’ Hannah paused, as if she wanted to ask a question but wasn’t sure how.
‘What?’ Matt moved, taking her in his arms. Now that he’d told her everything, she was the one who needed his comfort.
‘Will you ever mend? You seem to still be moving around.’
‘I’m not all that sure how else to live. I’ve mended my own life with my work.’
‘But you won’t stay, will you?’
He knew what she was asking. Matt’s departure might be soon, if the job in London came through. But that wasn’t certain yet, and this wasn’t the time for uncertainties.