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  I stopped and my heart stopped too, my fists balling. There was my bright purple rug, rolled up neatly; two glossy black chairs laid down on the back seat; and, when I peered inside, I saw there was a pillow case filled with Ray Ban sunglasses. I bit my lip so hard it nearly bled.

  I half–ran, half–hobbled up the stairs to my flat and found the door was already open. When I burst in, my man was helping two others haul the recording system through the hallway.

  ‘What the hell are you doing?’ I screamed. Three faces looked up. In the light of day, in my drab hallway, it dawned on me that I didn’t recognise any one of them — not even the one I’d brought home.

  The man I thought resembled Peter was much, much older than I’d thought, and his eyes were red in the corners, his body starved and dotted with red scabs. Needle marks, I realised. A drug addict.

  ‘I’m gonna call...I’ll...’ I stuttered, feeling afraid for the first time in a year. It was the first time I’d felt anything in a year.

  Peter — no, Stephen, was it? — looked at the other two, and they looked back at him. Both were gaunt and rancid and pock–marked; all filthy addicts. He shrugged and let go of the system, but they kept a hold of it, pensive.

  I blocked the door, but that didn’t stop them. Hurriedly, they came at me and shot by, carrying the system with them. I was shoved against the wall, my head smacking it, while they carried it away.

  I rubbed my head, seething, yet weakened. I realised I had no idea where I was, or who these people were, or who I was either.

  ‘Why are you doing this?’ I said, looking at the pocky man with the matted afro hair and smeary jeans. When he didn’t answer, I screamed and made for his face with my hands clawed. He grabbed my wrists, my wasted bones, and threw me aside. I came back at him and was faced with the butt of a lamp; cold, hard metal impacting my temple.

  I was muted mid–howl as my head collided with it, my neck snapping back and my crown meeting the banister. I was knocked out of the light and into darkness.

  When I awoke, they were all gone.

  My head sore and bleeding, I crawled to the stairs, helped myself to my feet, and stumbled into the living room. Everything was gone; they’d taken the lot, even the stuff still wrapped up in plastic. The kitchen contained empty boxes, their contents hastily snatched and dumped in pillow cases just like the glasses.

  I made my way back to the sofa and rested my oozing head. I’d never been robbed before, and yet somehow I felt as though I hadn’t lost anything. None of it mattered.

  Within moments I was crying, clawing my face in anguish. All the while I was thinking, I should have killed you. I should have stuffed that pillow over your face.

  Just the thought of it excited me, but the feeling was snuffed out as quickly as it came. I had missed my chance to own him and, now, he’d run away. I laid there for hours, buzzing, imagining all the things I should have done if only I’d been strong enough to kill the bastard.

  He wouldn’t have been Peter, but he would have been something of my own; flesh, blood, a life taken for my own use. I could wrap him in plastic and he would be priceless; it would be as if his heart had never been beating at all.

  I wondered if I should go out and find somebody else.

  Through my tears, I gazed about the empty room and asked myself what I was doing here, when I didn’t belong? I’d had so much passion back home, even wheelchair bound. I was safe, a volcano confined to wheels and a seat; a pot boiling over, a bomb waiting to go off.

  Now I was the fuse, limp and unlit, and the fuel had drained away from me.

  97% of women say they cannot live without a spark in their lives; something to drive them forward.

  Cathy, a PA from Hemel Hempstead, said, ‘When a relationship goes bad, I spend a bit of time being me, and then I go out and find the next big adventure. I’m always dating new men. Life without passion would be boring.’

  I checked my coat pocket and found the money was gone, envelope and all. Never mind, I thought; there was always more where that came from. Other things, though; other things weren’t so replaceable.

  My old life, for instance; the simplicity was something I still longed for, even if I’d hated my father.

  Back at the halfway house, we had discussed my father. Julie once told me that most victims of abuse blame themselves, and that’s why they don’t ask for help. She said this is because the victim has participated in the events, and therefore feels partly responsible.

  I’d never understood that in my case, though I didn’t tell Julie that. How could I ever explain it to her?

  How could I explain that I was a victim who relied on those events occurring — those disgusting, vile, intrusive events in my bedroom since I was a child — in order to feel safe in the world?

  How do you explain to someone that the participation is all that reminded you that you were alive?

  How do you explain that it was necessary to survive?

  It dawned on me that there was nobody in London who could ever really understand me, or help me, or make it all right again. This wasn’t freedom. I was lost. I needed to get back home again. I needed to get rid of it all and start anew.

  By the time I got to Paddington, I was stinking of smoke and lighter fluid, my fingers black at the tips. People gave me odd looks; others veered away in disgust. I thought nothing of it as I, quite elated at the thought of returning home, paid for my ticket with a smile.

  The journey was long. I seated myself at a table for four, and was surrounded by three middle–aged men wearing suits.

  None of them could take their eyes off me. I crossed and uncrossed my legs; even undid the top button of my blouse and gave them a wink. They turned away, one blushing, another frowning, one delving into a newspaper.

  Finally, the one next to me leaned in and spoke. I was laughing inside, thinking, now I know I’m coming home!

  But what he said confused me. ‘They’ve got CCTV of you, you know. I shouldn’t think you’ll make it out of the station after what you did.’

  ‘What?’ I said, shaking my head. Doing what? Picking up a man and letting him back to my flat? He was the one who robbed me, after all. He was now a bad ex. ‘What I do in my own house is my business,’ I said.

  ‘You’re the one who burned that flat down and set those shops on fire. It’s been all over the news this morning. I’ve a mind to call the police myself.’

  ‘No, don’t,’ I said, grabbing his elbow. ‘Just let me sit, okay? I’ll be quiet as a mouse. I promise. You just...you...you just stay out of my affairs.’

  The man shrugged me off, ruffling his newspaper. He muttered something that sounded like ‘crazy’, but I couldn’t be sure. He looked at the other two men, and they all swapped a look of unease. When some people got off at the next stop, they moved to different seats, leaving me alone. I sprayed some perfume to cover the smell of lighter fluid. It was giving me a headache, and I supposed the smell clinging to my clothes wasn’t all that attractive after all.

  I leaned my head against the window and watched the scenery go by until we reached St. Austell.

  Chapter Twenty–Nine

  The bus pulled into the harbour, but even before the driver put on the breaks, I’d seen it there on the hill. The charred, boarded–up remnants of my cottage, abandoned and left to rot like an old husk.

  Even the water, grey and listless as it tossed against the harbour wall, seemed fixed in time; as if peering hard enough into its depths would reveal the tips of Peter’s fingers, himself still swaying underwater, cradled in the sea’s mouth.

  I huddled up in my coat as I got off, the breeze immediately sweeping my breath away. I choked, the salt like fire on my tongue, the brine stinging my eyes. That slight, niggling irritation had remained in the atmosphere all this time. It was like sandpaper to the skin; cloying and impertinent as a lover, both painful and necessary.

  I took a deep, deep breath and held it in my core; kept it close behind my protruding, fleshles
s ribs. I swallowed it whole. I was home.

  Though the cottage was so close — so close I could feel it pulling me, as if magnetised — but there was somewhere I needed to go first. I turned and headed in the other direction, towards the footpath to the cliffs. Scaling it was difficult on my knee, with the ground being so crumbly and uneasy underfoot. I gripped tufts of grass jutting out of the rocks to keep balance, and as the wind swept up from the sea it felt as though I was tipping, and I had to cling on to ensure I didn’t fall.

  I imagined Peter with me, his arm around me, guiding me. When I made it to the very top I walked right to the edge and peered over, my chest tightening in fear. Just one gust of wind could knock me forward, and if it did then I would meet the sea once more, just like old times.

  Only this time, someone would be waiting for me.

  I thought about it. Dusk was creeping in, and it was getting colder. I stood there, rocking back and forth, waiting for the wind to take me up like a feather, but it never did. Instead I was left waiting, waiting, waiting — just watching the sea, waiting for my turn to come, as always.

  When my legs got tired I sat down, pulled up a clump of grass, and chewed it. My stomach was growling, but I’d been ignoring it for weeks. Soon I would be lighter than air, invisible, a ghost of my very own making. I chewed the grass up to a paste and swallowed, before wiping my chapped lips. I shuffled away from the edge and helped myself up.

  I put a hand to my brow and peered out over Mevagissey. Lights were coming on now, and it was almost dark. My cottage remained in shadow, a square, dark smudge on the chocolate box picture. Soon I’d have no light at all to see by. I turned and left.

  By the time I got back down to the harbour and made my way up the hill, a sickness overcame me. I couldn’t tell if it was the grass, or my swelling knee, or the anxiety of returning home again, but it came upon me so fast I had to vomit over the sea wall. Green slush came out and pattered against the algae atop the water, and for a few minutes I spat and dry–heaved, before wiping my mouth and resting my hand against the cold stone wall.

  I felt old again. The town aged me, withered me; it always had. This place had eaten away at me since the first day we’d arrived years ago, and it was swallowing me up now. Well, I thought: it could finish me off for all I cared — by all means, swallow me; but I was staying.

  ‘Do you hear me?’ I whispered to the air. ‘So cut it out.’

  I staggered the last few meters to my cottage and wept to see its remains. The roof was black and burned out, with shards of wood jutting out like spikes. The front was blackened too, the white stone clouded in soot. The door and windows were boarded up with sheets of metal.

  It felt as if the house was me, with sheets of metal pinned against my eyes and mouth, shutting me out of the world forever. I supposed I was the house, and always had been — a vessel, visited, intruded upon, used, filled, adjusted, and then sealed shut like an old relic.

  I went upon the doorstep and ran my hand over the cool metal. There was a creaking sound which made me flinch. I caught my breath, stopped, and listened very closely. Another sound. What was it?

  I glanced up and down the street and found nothing stirring. I pressed my ear to the metal, holding my breath. The wind tickled my hair, the nape of my neck. I held up a finger and silenced it. There it was, just delicately...a sound. Something.

  Not a creaking sound anymore.

  A hissing. A whispering.

  I followed it, pressing both hands to the sheet of metal as I slid myself all around the door, searching for the source of that whispering sound. There were little holes in the metal, letting the house vent. I kept very still and very close and, as I waited, the whispering grew louder.

  Louder? No, sharper, more frantic. It was like the hissing of a kettle, only there were words uttered, I was sure of it. I listened, and listened, and listened hard.

  No sooner did I let out a long breath than the whispering became a long, sharp whistling noise, so high pitched I had to cup my ears. Still the sound penetrated my hands, my skull, making me curl up against the door.

  ‘Stop it!’ I hissed.

  My pitiful weight fell against the sheet of metal and made a grunting sound, followed by a long, whining creak. I opened my eyes, un–cupped my ears and shivered as the metal sheet door swung open, revealing the blackened hallway beyond.

  Without hesitation, I let myself in and was consumed by the darkness.

  The stench was awful. The smell of smoke embedded in the charred remains of the building’s structure engulfed me, making me wretch. I pulled up the sleeve of my coat and covered my nose and mouth, letting the fabric filter the air. The fire had long gone out, but nothing had been replaced. I picked my way through the debris and the darkness, the floor piled high with bricks, wood and burnt paper.

  Looking up, I could see through part of the roof; the part where the fire had begun, I guessed, in the loft. I remembered plummeting out of the attic and onto the landing, but I could only imagine what had happened once we’d been evacuated. It looked like fire had collapsed the attic floor, leading to where we’d fell, and had burned right through there too.

  Most of the banister had collapsed and yet, skeletal and awaiting me in its usual place, was something I hadn’t thought I’d ever see again.

  My stair lift.

  The light coming through the gaps in the ceiling and roof allowed just enough light to see by, from the streetlamp outside and the moon. A shiver rippled all over me, making me huddle up in my coat as I approached the chair, curiosity taking over. It had been my chair, after all — a gift from my father. I’d hated it then, and I hated it now. At the time, it was a chair that denied me even the privilege of steering myself; forced me to sit, to wait, and to comply.

  The old thing was still attached to the rail, and still lead to the upstairs landing. I took a chance and, very carefully, seated myself on the blackened chair. It creaked but supported me, as if it had saved its strength for this moment. I laughed, then, and with my breath I sent up flakes of dust and charred wallpaper, dancing about my head, as if I were made of the stuff and was shedding it.

  Perhaps I hadn’t made it at all. Perhaps I was dead, and had been a wandering spirit until, in answering an ethereal call, I came back to the place I belonged — my own death place.

  The chair shuddered, and I squealed, drawing my legs up. It didn’t fall, but rose and kept going, groaning loudly like the pipes. The stair lift was moving, taking me upstairs, over the soot and rubble and debris. I gripped the cold metal skeleton of the chair’s arms and braced myself, shutting my eyes tight, until it grunted to a halt.

  I dared open one eyelid, and then the other. I breathed deeply, in and out. The moon illuminated the remains of the top floor, or what was left of it. Parts of the floor had collapsed in other places; a great hole in the centre of my room, the bathroom, and of course the landing.

  The old tub was still there, though, having missed the fall, and stood proudly on the remaining section. The walls had burned away, leaving skeletons of beams and structures, or piles of bricks in others.

  The old cottage had put up a good fight, but it had lost. Now we were two skeletons together, standing, though hunched and crumbling, despite the little we had left.

  I dismounted the stair lift and got down on all fours so I could crawl around amongst the rubble, praying that the little weight I had wouldn’t send me crashing through the floorboards. All at once I felt a distant, familiar coldness enveloping me. I welcomed it as I straddled a beam and shimmied — not with confidence, but more of a numb complacency — to my father’s old bedroom.

  The attic had all but disappeared, but I didn’t feel the chill. I was wrapped in ice; transfixed, now, as I moved through the remnants of the house. I crawled through my father’s wall into my old bedroom, where my favourite window seat survived before the metal shutter. My bed sagged in the centre where the mattress had melted, but my old armoire remained proud.

 
I pried it open and found some ragged clothes still hanging there, blackened by smoke. I fingered the hem of my old party dress, the netting beneath the skirt still stiff, and smiled.

  All of a sudden, a close, adamant weariness came over me, and my eyelids became almost too heavy to keep open. I crawled, on my belly, around the gaping hole looking down into the kitchen below, and slithered beneath my bed. I laid my head down on the remains of the mattress, the springs bent and warped. I dry coughed as the stench of burned wood filled my senses once more, and huddled up close inside the bed.

  From here I could see right down into the kitchen, small and concealed as a worm in the crevice of a wall, writhing out of site.

  Something glinted in the moonlight; something on the only remaining wall of my bedroom, next to the old armoire. It was the oval mirror of my dressing table, almost entirely blackened, barring one section right at the bottom.

  I could see myself peering out in the only piece of reflective glass left undamaged. My eyes were hollow, dark, my face a shard of white. I tucked myself back under the bed and shot odd glances up at myself, then down at the kitchen, and back again.

  I wondered what time it was, and then forgot about it. I thought of roaming my father’s room, and then I forgot about that too. Instead I rested my head and fingered one of the old springs until my hand stopped moving, while the waves hit the harbour down below, keeping up the battle. At least one of us was.

  Soon everything quietened, and my body was consumed by the tiredness, the cold numbness, whatever it was. I forgot everything, almost everything, as quickly as it came to me. My body stiffened, and no longer cooperated with my mind. It became impossible, even, to lay a different way, or reposition my head.

  I laid there, silently, for a long, long time. As far as I could tell, I never left.

  And nor did I want to.

  Chapter Thirty

  A man came. Someone I recognised. He came frequently, or regularly, or several times. I couldn’t tell. I hadn’t moved for a long, long time.