These last few weeks seem to have passed so quickly. The temperature has dropped sharply, the leaves have all fallen, leaving the trees skeletal and naked, and it now truly feels like winter here. I have continued to meet up with Stephomi regularly and there have been no more distressing or disturbing revelations; and, much to my pleasure, I’ve found myself very much enjoying his company once again. I’ve also seen Casey several times and she’s always greeted me warmly. We are real neighbours at last. A familiar face right next door to me.
That’s why I’ve neglected the journal these past few weeks — because I’ve been happy. Looking back through these pages, I realise that I tend to write in here when I’m unhappy. But lately I have been too involved with actually living to spend all my time whining about life in this book.
It’s strange but the pages and pages of my writing in this journal really do comfort me. The paper has a different feel to it once it has been written on. The pages curl a little and do not stick together any more. And the paper becomes heavy with ink, taking on an uneven, crackly kind of texture. A book full of my words, my thoughts, my life. Perhaps that’s why I’m so fond of this journal — even now, I’m scared that I might forget everything again and this book is a safety net against that, for everything is here and written down and permanent, not to be lost again.
But something upsetting happened last week. I’d been dining late in the city and was walking from the metro station back to my apartment block. I was almost at the entrance when I stopped short in amazement. A woman had just walked out the doors of my building. The street outside was not very well lit so I couldn’t see her clearly. All I could make out was that she was wearing a dark evening dress with black gloves that reached up to her elbows. I couldn’t help but notice that she wore no coat, and it occurred to me how cold she must be, this late at night. Her long black hair was piled up on her head, and what looked like diamonds glittered at her throat and on her wrist. The stiletto heels of her strappy evening shoes clicked smartly on the sidewalk as she walked towards me.
She should surely know better than to come out on such a night with no protection from the cold, I thought. It was past midnight and no time for an attractive woman to be wandering around on her own. Streets that would be safe during the day could become dangerous at night. But there was something about the way she walked and held herself that suggested she was not afraid of the dark or what might be waiting in it for her. I drew breath anyway to ask if she had far to go, with the vague idea of offering to accompany her if her destination was very far. But as she passed me, she looked up, and weak light from a nearby streetlamp fell across part of her face, and the words died on my lips as she smiled slightly and carried on walking past me. For I was sure that this woman had been the Lilith of my dreams. Even as I turned and watched her striding away, I told myself I must have been mistaken. Stephomi had said that Lilith haunted places by the sea. Legend said that she flew though the night in search of her infant-victims. She would not have emerged from my shabby apartment block, dressed in all her evening finery, to walk the streets of Budapest.
But I had to know. I had to be sure that it wasn’t her. So I turned back with the idea of catching up with her, but a frightened female cry from within the apartment block stopped me. I stood rooted with indecision for only a moment, watching the woman walk off into the darkness, listening to the click click of her heels, before I turned and ran into my apartment building, stopping short in the doorway in horror.
Casey was stood in the dimly lit lobby surrounded by three young men pressed in around her. One of them had hold of her bag and was trying to prise it from her grip but she was hanging on to the straps with both hands, pleading with her attackers while they laughed at her, delighted that she was making this so much fun for them.
Just give them the bag, I thought. What does it matter?
But the month’s worth of rent she had in her purse meant that she wouldn’t willingly be giving it to anyone. Was she really so naive that she didn’t think they’d hurt her if they had to? What good was a grotty old apartment if you were dead? Or if your baby was dead? What good would it be to you then? I could see tears running down her face as one of the men grabbed and twisted her arm, pulling it back roughly and tearing the bag from her hand while another mugger cupped a hand round her neck in a mocking caress, running his fingers through the dark strands of her hair.
‘How about some sugar for Daddy, pretty lady?’ he murmured greasily. Leaning towards her, he forced a kiss to her mouth, but then drew back sharply, his lip bleeding from where Casey had bitten him.
‘You fucking bitch!’ he snarled, spitting bloody spit into her face and then hitting her hard with the back of his hand.
And the desire to kill them all where they stood rose up within me, shaking me from the inside, and it took everything I had to fight the urge down. It is wrong to kill people. It is wrong.
‘ Hey! ’ I shouted, drawing their attention away from Casey. Rage boiling up inside, I strode forwards into the room and the three youths turned mockingly towards me, one of them still casually swinging Casey’s bag from the straps twined round his arm. ‘That was a mistake,’ I said quietly, enjoying the promise for what it was.
I don’t believe I seriously hurt them… Well, there were no fatal injuries, anyway. They were cowards, so it didn’t take much for them to turn and run. And I was prepared this time for the shocking, powerful surges of exhilaration that swept through me as soon as I hit the first attacker full in the face, relishing the feel of his nose crunching beneath my fist. I didn’t let myself get carried away, even though hurting them filled me with such savage pleasure. This was even easier than it had been last time, for there had been five men then and they had been much bigger than these three teenagers.
The first mugger staggered back whimpering, blood pouring from his broken nose, while the other two came at me at once, one of them with a knife in his hand. But the problem with weapons is that they make people over-confident. It was so easy to take it from him that it almost seemed like he was giving it to me. If he’d just been another mugger, I would have thrown the knife down, but this was the kid who had hit Casey after kissing her and before I knew what I was doing I was pinning him to the wall, about to slice the knife straight through his throat.
His two friends had gone completely still, like statues, staring at us in the lobby. The blade was right there at his neck — one movement of my wrist and he would be dead. This was justice. He was despicable. He was prepared to steal from a pregnant teenager and then assault her. He didn’t deserve to live. Cut the throat — nice and quick. I prepared to do so. And then suddenly caught myself.
He was looking right at me — brown eyes shocked and terrified. I stared at him, taken aback. How had I got here like this? What was I thinking? Casey was crying in the corner and it was this sound that at last snapped me out of it. I dropped the knife like it was burning me. Then I grabbed the boy’s arm and gave him a shove towards his two friends. All three of them were staring at me like frightened rabbits and suddenly the three muggers were gone and I saw three children in their place, barely older than Casey was herself. I ran my eye over them anxiously but apart from the one with the broken nose they didn’t seem too badly hurt.
I took a step towards them and they shrank back in unison. I stopped and when I spoke my voice sounded low and frightening even to myself. ‘If you ever touch my friend over there again, if you ever look at her, if you ever come anywhere near her, I promise I’ll track you down and I’ll kill you.’
I could tell from their expressions that they knew I meant what I’d said. They knew it wasn’t an empty threat. They knew I would kill them without even a second thought. Indeed I had almost done so just mere seconds ago. It terrified me. Perhaps, in that moment, I was even more scared of myself than they were. They were all still staring at me in silence as if too afraid to move but I needed them gone. The boy’s brown eyes felt like they were boring into my soul.