Girls like her.
She stepped in, looking around. The music seemed to engulf her.
“With the lights out, it’s less dangerous One or two of the occupants of the place glanced at her.
‘Here we are now, entertain us… .’
She had no idea what she was looking for in this place.
Was it help she sought?
‘I feel stupid and contagious
Standing beside one of the motor racing games, a tall man with a barrel chest and neck as thick as chopped oak watched her from behind his sunglasses.
‘Here we are now, entertain us….’
Shanine heard rattling behind her as money spilled from one of the machines and the happy winner scooped up his bounty.
Money.
She looked at it as a starving man would look at food.
The tall man watched her.
Shanine wandered slowly around The Crystal Room, the music still thundering in her ears.
‘A mulatto, an albino, a mosquito, my libido Some of the faces in here were pale and gaunt like her own.
Lost. Afraid.
She walked towards the exit.
No help in there.
The tall man watched.
The music blasted on. A deafening litany.
A denial. A denial. A denial
It swept her back out into the night.
Thirty-seven
He couldn’t remember the last time he’d cried.
Fifteen years.
Twenty.
Longer?
James Talbot sat in his armchair, the glass of whiskey clutched in one hand, his head lowered, his cheeks streaked.
He took a sip of the whiskey, feeling it burn its way to his stomach.
How many was that?
He’d lost count.
He’d drink the entire contents of the bottle if he had to. All he wanted was oblivion. At the moment he was even being denied that.
Fuck it.
He looked across at the TV set, the screen blank. His own reflection was the only thing that showed there; slumped in the chair gripping the glass.
Just like his father used to be.
His father.
That fucking, stinking, drink-raddled piece of shit.
‘Cunt’ hissed Talbot, sniffing back more tears.
From the top of the TV set, the photograph of his mother gazed back at him.
He couldn’t hold that blank gaze, and downed what was left in his glass rather than face her stare.
Accusing. Denouncing.
It’ll be your fault if she dies.
He shook his head.
You left her to rot in that place. You said you did it for her sake but you lied, didn’t you? It was for you. You couldn’t cope with her. You didn’t want to cope with her. You couldn’t be bothered. Your career came first. You discarded her like a dirty tissue.
‘No,’ grunted Talbot. He reached down the side of his chair and pulled up the bottle of Jameson’s, pouring a large measure into his glass, swigging it.
She’ll die there now. Because of you.
He shook his head, felt more tears pouring warmly down his face.
The tears used to come afterwards, didn’t they?
How long since he’d cried? Twenty years?
Try thirty-two.
That was when it had first started, wasn’t it?
He’d been four years old when he’d first smelled that whiskey stink in his face, felt those hands on his body, felt them touching him, forcing him to touch too.
Four when he’d felt that agony for the first time.
Penetration.
Talbot took another hefty swig.
It made him cough. Choke.
Remember that sensation too. Choking. Gagging as it was forced into your mouth. That salty, bitter taste, then the oily, tingling sensation in your
throat and the smell of the whiskey. The rough hands.
Talbot sat forward in his chair, hands pressed to his temples as if he feared his head would explode, so full of memories was it.
Vivid and painful like cuts across his consciousness.
Jesus it was all fucking pain.
It was then and it was now.
But she’d been there to help sometimes. She’d tried to help. To help you.
She’d fought with him. She’d fought with your father until he’d beaten her bloody, then he’d returned to you, her blood on his hands. Your blood on his hands, too.
Christ, the fucking pain!
Penetration.
But you’d stopped crying after the first half a dozen times.
You’d learned to endure it, in silence.
No tears. No tears for thirty-two years.
Until now.
Talbot gripped his glass in one fist, squeezing more tightly. His body was racked by sobs.
He looked across at the photo on top of the television set.
‘Mum, I’m sorry,’ he whispered.
Too late for apologies.
She was dying.
Leaving you.
Alone with your pain.
He squeezed the glass more tightly, tears scalding his cheeks.
The glass shattered in his hand, lumps of crystal slicing into his palm, splitting the skin effortlessly. Blood spurted from the cuts, gushing from a particularly deep wound at the base of his thumb, dripping to the carpet, mingling with the whiskey.
Talbot turned his palm and stared at it, the burning sensation of the liquor in the wounds agonising.
He stared at the ravaged hand, pieces of glass sticking out of the torn flesh.
Blood was running down his arm.
Fuck it. Fuck it.
Who fucking cared?
He hurled what was left of the glass at the wall, watching as it exploded into hundreds of tiny beads of crystal, spraying all around the room like transparent shrapnel.
Frozen tears.
‘You fucker!’ he roared at the top of his voice, his head tilted backwards, then he slumped in the chair once again, his bleeding hand dangling uselessly at his side.
Pain. Rage. Guilt. Anger. Memories.
He didn’t know what had brought these tears, but as Talbot sat sobbing in the chair he wondered when they would stop.
Or even if they could.
Thirty-eight
When Cath walked back into the room she noticed her brother was holding something, gazing down at it.
As she sat down opposite him she saw that it was a small, pink teddy bear.
‘I found it the other day when I was tidying up’ Reed told her, still looking at the stuffed toy, seeing his own distorted reflection in its blank eyes. ‘It must have been the only thing of Becky’s that Ellen didn’t take when she left.’
Cath watched him silently for a moment as he ran a thumb over the bear, ruffling its smooth fur.
‘You still haven’t heard from her, then?’
He shook his head.
‘If she’s hurt Becky, her or that fucking arsehole she lives with,’ he rasped, still staring at the teddy. ‘If either of them has hurt Becky, I’ll fucking
kill them, I swear to Christ, I…’
Cath frowned, leaning forward in her seat.
‘Frank, what are you going on about?’ she said in bewilderment. ‘Why would Ellen want to hurt Becky? She loves her as much as you do.’
‘Then why the hell did she take her away from me?’ Reed snarled.
‘Just because she took her away doesn’t mean she’s going to hurt her, Frank.
What makes you think that?’
He dropped the teddy onto the sofa beside him and rubbed both hands over his face. ‘Shit, I’m sorry, Cath,’ he murmured. ‘There’s two kids at the school -
I’m worried about them. The boy in particular. I think he might have been . .
.’ Reed was struggling for the words. ‘Roughed up, knocked about or something.
It made me think of Becky.’
‘You think it’s the parents?’
‘It looks like someone’s given him a bloody good hiding.’
‘Could it be one of the other kids?’