I’ll never forget what he said as I walked out of the restaurant, or the expression on his face when I turned back to look at him. I don’t think it was just the drink talking, he looked as if he meant it.
“I’ll ruin you if you leave me.”
I head upstairs, pull off my running clothes, and take a shower. The water is too hot, but I don’t bother to adjust the temperature. I let it scald my skin, as though I think I deserve the pain. Then I head into the bedroom to get dressed for work. I open the wardrobe slowly, as though something terrible might be hiding inside. It is. I bend down and remove the shoebox I found in the attic, then sit on the bed before lifting the lid. I stare at the contents for a while, as though touching them might burn my fingers. Then I remove the stack of plain vintage postcards and spread them out over the duvet. There must be more than fifty. The white cotton provides a lackluster camouflage for the yellowing rectangles of card, so that my eyes are even more drawn to the spidery black ink decorating each one. They are all identical: the same words, written in the same feminine scrawl, by the same hand.
I know who you are.
I thought we had thrown all of these away. I don’t know why Ben would have kept them. For evidence I suppose … in case the stalker ever returned.
I put the cards back in the box and slide it under the bed. Hiding the truth from ourselves is a similar game to hiding it from others, it just comes with a stricter set of rules.
Once dressed, I head back downstairs and stare at the huge bunch of flowers on the kitchen table, accompanied by the tiny card reading, Sorry. I pick them up, needing both hands to do so. My foot connects with the large stainless-steel pedal bin and the lid opens obediently, ready to swallow my rubbish, but also revealing its own. My hands hover above the trash while my eyes try to translate what they are seeing: two empty black plastic bottles that I’ve never seen before. I pick one up to read the label. Lighter gel? We don’t even have a barbecue. I put the empty bottle back and push the flowers down on top of them inside the bin, a mess of petals and thorns hiding everything that lies beneath.
Sixteen
Essex, 1987
I wake up in the pink-and-white bedroom with a terrible tummyache. I can see daylight behind the curtains covered in rainbows, but when I pull them back, there are bars on the windows and a big gray sky. I’m hungry and I can smell toast, so I creep over to the door and listen. My fingers reach up for the handle; it’s higher than the ones at home. As I slowly open the door, it makes a shh sound on the carpet, so I try extra hard to be quiet.
The walls in the hallway all look as if they have peeled, and it’s cold. Something bites my feet when I take a step forward, and it hurts. When I look down, I see that the floor out here is also covered in the green spongy stuff I saw in the kitchen last night. Thin orange strips of wood are all around the edges, with little silver spikes sticking out of them. When I bend down to touch one, a bubble of blood grows on my finger, so I put it in my mouth and suck it until the pain goes away.
I follow the smell of toast, careful not to tread on any more little spikes, and stop when I reach the first door. It’s locked, so I carry on. The next door is slightly open and I can hear a television behind it. I try to peek through the crack, but the door tells on me by squeaking.
“Is that you, Aimee?” asks Maggie.
My name is Ciara, so I don’t know what to say.
“Come on in, no need to be shy, this is your home now.”
I push the door a little harder and see Maggie sitting in bed next to the man with the gold tooth. His smile has holes in, as though he has worn it too often, and he has little bits of white toast stuck in the black hair on his face. I see the television reflected in his glasses, and when I turn to look at the screen, it says TV-am, before changing to a picture of a man and a woman sitting on a sofa. The walls in this room are like the walls in the hall, all patchy and bare, and there is no carpet in here either, just more of the springy green stuff.
“Come and get in with us, it’s cold. Move over, John,” says Maggie, and he smiles, patting a space on the bed between them. I’m shivering, but I don’t want to get into their bed.
“Come on,” she says when I don’t move.
“Hop in,” he says, pulling back the covers.
Bunny rabbits hop. I am not a bunny rabbit.
I can see that Maggie is wearing a nightie, her skinny legs sticking out from beneath the sheets. Her long black curly hair is hanging down over her shoulders, and I wish mine was still as long as that. I climb in next to Maggie, but only because her happy face looks as if it might change into her cross one if I don’t.
Maggie’s bedroom is a mess, which seems strange to me, because she looks like such a neat and tidy person. Dirty cups and plates are everywhere, piles of newspapers and magazines lean up against the walls, and clothes are thrown all over the floor. The duvet smells, I’m not sure what of, but it isn’t nice. We all sit and stare at the TV, then my tummy rumbles so loud I’m sure everyone hears it.
“Do you want some breakfast?” Maggie asks when the adverts come on.
“Yes.” Her face changes and I add, “Please,” before it is too late.
“What do you fancy? You can have anything you want.”
I look over at one of the dirty plates with crusts on. “Toast?”
She pulls a pretend sad face, like a clown. “I’m afraid your dad ate the last of the bread.”
I’m confused at first, then remember that she means the man with the gold tooth.
“Don’t worry that pretty little head of yours. I’m going to make your favorite, back in a jiffy.”
I don’t know what a jiffy is.
Maggie leaves the room and I’m glad she doesn’t close the door. I don’t want to be on my own with John. He looks as if he is wearing a rug on his chest, but up close I can see it’s just more hair. He seems to have an awful lot of it. He reaches past me, and I lean out of his way. Then I watch while he picks up a packet of cigarettes and lights one, tapping the ash into an empty cup while he laughs at something on TV.
Maggie comes back with a plate, which is strange because she said she was going to make my favorite breakfast, which is porridge and honey. My brother used to make it for me at home, and I always ate it in my favorite blue bowl, even though it was chipped. My brother said it could still be my favorite bowl even when it wasn’t perfect anymore. He said things that are a little bit broken can still be beautiful.
“There now, get that down you,” says Maggie. Her cold, bare legs touch my feet as she climbs back under the covers.
I look down at the plate. “What is it?”
“It’s your favorite, silly! Biscuits with butter. Make sure you eat them all, we need to fatten you up a bit, you’ve gotten far too skinny.”
I think I look the same as yesterday and the day before that.
I look from Maggie to the plate and back again, unsure what to do. Then I pick up one of the round shapes and can see that it has its own name written underneath it, just like my new name is written on my pajama top. I whisper the letters inside my head: D I G E S T I V E.
“Go on, take a bite,” Maggie says.
I don’t want to.
“Eat. It.”
I take a small bite, chewing slowly. All I can taste is the butter, and it makes me feel a bit sick.