You Need Me, page 8
For two hours Susan had busied herself around the house. She plonked Lily in front of her favourite TV programme with crisps and snacks, while upstairs she gathered their stuff together. She had not dared leave until after his first phone call, which he had scheduled for eleven in the morning, then she would have time to make her escape. He would be caught up in his ego trip until dinnertime.
At eleven on the dot, the phone went. His voice gave her the shivers, even safe in the knowledge he was over a hundred miles away.
“Remember what I told you, bitch. Don’t leave the fucking house. And get it tidied up while I’m away, it’s in as much of a mess as you are.”
He had laughed as though it were all some big joke, but there was nothing remotely funny about his warning. Colin was deadly serious.
As soon as she had put down the phone, she had run upstairs and grabbed hers and Lily’s bags. She had not packed much, just a couple of changes of clothes and a few of her daughter’s toys. She had stuffed them all in a small suitcase they had stored away for rare family breaks. She went to the bathroom and prised back the bath panel, reaching in and ignoring the spider’s webs, she snatched the pile of money she had squirrelled away. She counted it quickly, just under three hundred pounds, enough to get them away and to buy a cheap untraceable phone. She had taken her mobile out her bag and put it in her bedside drawer. He would search for it and find it but at least without it he could not track her down. She had found the app he had installed on her phone to monitor her. Well, she calculated, if it’s in the house, then he will think I’m still here, for a little while anyway.
Susan had gone downstairs to get her daughter. Using the remote control, she turned off the television, causing Lily to turn round.
“Come on. Get your jacket on, we’re going out,” she urged her.
Lily’s mouth had dropped open, aghast at the idea of betraying her father.
“But Daddy said we were not to go out. He told me to make sure you did as you were told.” The look on her face had been just like Colin’s—the mean sneer and screwed up eyes.
“I just spoke to Daddy. He said I could take you on an adventure. A special treat because you’ve been such a good girl.”
Lily hadn’t looked convinced, but had allowed Susan to help her on with her jacket.
“Are you sure Daddy said it was okay?” She had huffed as Susan quickly zipped her up.
“Yes, I’m sure. Now come on Lily. Quickly now love, we’re in a hurry.”
The child looked at the case by the door and gazed at her suspiciously. “Why have we got the holiday case? Are we going on holiday? Why’s Daddy not coming?”
“Stop asking so many questions and just do as you’re told,” she had snapped, losing her patience, terrified they would miss their only chance to escape.
Lily screwed up her eyes and took a deep breath. Susan sensed a tantrum brewing and she certainly couldn’t deal with that. She said the first thing that came into her head in an effort to appease the child.
“Daddy is going to come and join us tomorrow. It’s a surprise for him. I’ve booked us all a holiday as a surprise… okay?”
She almost crumbled as the child peered up at her, her eyes wide with uncertainty. She could sense her desire to obey her father’s wishes fighting against her childish desire to go on an adventure.
“Are you sure?” Her voice sounded little now.
“Yes, I’m sure sweetie. Now come on. I’m going to call him later and tell him. He’ll be so happy, just you wait and see.”
Apparently satisfied, Lily had smiled and allowed Susan to lead her out the house and into the waiting taxi. A taxi she could ill afford, but she couldn’t risk getting a bus and having anyone see her and report back to Colin. As Susan locked the door and slipped the key through the letterbox, she had muttered under her breath. “Goodbye, you bastard.”
Now, she cast her eyes around the living room again, taking in the stark differences from where she had come from and found herself questioning it all again. Had she done the right thing leaving Colin, after all? Had moving here been stepping out of the frying pan into the fire? Her head was a mess. She thought about Morag, and the friendship she had shown her and Lily. And then the girl from the café this morning—she had been kind too. Maybe she should confide in one of them? Maybe they could help her? But how could she ask for help? What would she say? How could she tell them she had even considered doing what he wanted?
Her phone pinged an incoming message, she did not need to read it, she already knew who it was from.
14
Ronnie
Gasping for air, Ronnie slammed the front door behind him. He sunk to the floor clutching his head in his hands and thumping it rhythmically against the door, trying to rid himself of her voice, but her words played on a loop inside his head. He could feel himself being sucked into a dark hole as he fought his rising panic. He didn’t want this to happen again. He didn’t want to be sent away.
You should have known. You knew it was there in the garden the other morning. She brought it here. That bitch upstairs.
“Noooooooo!” Ronnie began to scream. He crammed his fist into his mouth, trying to stop the noise escaping, terrified his mother would hear.
She’s been planning this all along. Thinks you’re stupid, Ronnie, thinks you’re crazy, Ronnie. Just like the rest of them do Ronnie. They want to lock you away Ronnie.
He leaned forward and threw his forehead against the banister. The loud crack only made the voices in his head clearer.
You need to kill the bitch, Ronnie. Kill her before she kills you. We’ll look after you, Ronnie. We’ll always be here for you. Kill her, Ronnie. Do it. They bounced around incessantly, taunting him.
He had gone to the park as the letter had instructed him. He had even been there ten minutes early. Never ever be late, Ronnie. The warning had run through his head all the way there. He had sat on the bench and waited. Seven o’clock had come and nobody had appeared.
He’d wanted to leave then, wanted to run away, but he couldn’t. He couldn’t move. Not until it came. Look what had happened to Alan. It had got him, hadn’t it? Alan was dead now. Dead because he didn’t do what he was told?
That’s what happens to bad boys, Ronnie. Dead. Dead. Dead. And so he had sat on the bench and waited.
He had sat rooted on the spot for what seemed like hours. A soft rustle in the leaves behind him indicated a presence. He had turned his head but a warning was hissed.
“Don’t look round, Ronnie. Just listen.”
“U-u-huh,” he stuttered
“If you look, it will know and it will come for you. It can see you everywhere, Ronnie.”
He grabbed onto the bench, his knuckles white. “I-I-I won’t l-look r-round.”
“I need you to listen, Ronnie. I need you to pay attention. You know how important that is? You know how important you are to me, don’t you, Ronnie? You know how much you mean to me, don’t you? How special you are to me, Ronnie?”
He had nodded. The voice sounded familiar He relaxed a little, feeling safer now. It was going to be okay.
And so Ronnie had listened.
The disembodied voice told him to wait for five minutes before moving.
“I’ll know if you move, Ronnie. I always know what you have done. It will know too.”
He had stared at his watch. Five minutes slowly ticked by. He had slowly raised himself from the park bench.
And then he had run. All the way home from the park, not stopping for a breath.
Now, he glanced towards the stairs leading up to his mother’s room. Shadows danced on the walls, whispering in the silence. He tried to convince himself he would be safe.
You will never be safe, Ronnie, not while I’m here, the voice whispered in his ear.
Ronnie started to fall, slipping further into the black hole that existed inside his head. The one where IT lived—the monster from his childhood nightmares. The nightmares had become his reality. The monster wanted to take over, the monster made him do bad things. Ronnie closed his eyes, searching for his safe places, clinging onto the pictures in his head—the library, the café, Jess, Morag. He reached out to touch them, to cling on to them, but still he kept falling, spinning round and round as they disappeared into nothingness. Nobody could help him. His heart tore at his chest, hammering its way out, and the voice inside his head screamed. He put his hands over his ears. His lips mouthed, “Shut up… shut up… shut up.”
“Ronnie, is that you?”
He opened his eyes and looked around him wildly but there was nobody there. It had gone quiet again. Safe again.
“Ronnie!” This time the loud screech bounced off the walls and into his head.
“Yes mother,” he whispered “It’s me.”
Slowly he clambered up and stumbled up the stairs to his mother.
He stepped inside the room and the stench instantly hit his nostrils. Mother had soiled herself… again.
“Where have you been? You left me here half the day on my own. You bloody halfwit. You know I can’t be left on my own. You are an ungrateful little bastard. What are you?”
“I’m an ungrateful little bastard mother,” he repeated, not daring to lift his eyes to hers.
“Well, stop standing their like a useless prick and get me cleaned up,” she snapped.
Ronnie reached under the bed and grabbed the cleaning supplies. He took a deep breath and pulled on the rubber gloves. His heart sank when he saw the look of grim satisfaction on her face. He knew she took some sort of perverse pleasure in this.
She beckoned him over, her bony finger sticking out of the covers like something wicked from the fairy tales she had read him as a child. She’s the monster Ronnie. His feet moved of their own accord, slowly edging him closer.
He trembled.
She smiled.
He tried not to gag as he began the task of cleaning her up.
Finished, he watched her hand dart under the covers and pull out a cigarette. He took a step backwards.
“Come closer,” she hissed
She nodded towards the lighter on the bedside cabinet.
Ronnie shook his head.
“Light it, you little fucking bastard.”
His hand reached out and picked up the lighter. Three times he tried to spark it, three times he failed—his hands were shaking too much.
She hoisted herself up from the pillow and snatched the lighter from his shaking hands.
Putting the cigarette into her filthy mouth, she took a draw as it lit and smiled a smile of grim ecstasy.
He moved backwards. She shook her head and patted the side of the bed.
Liquid trickled down the inside of his leg, its warmth comforting until it turned cold and the stench hit his nostrils.
“Put your hand out,” she snapped.
“P-p-please…” The trickle became a stream.
“Dirty little bastard. HAND! NOW!”
Ronnie thrust his hand forward and squeezed his eyes closed as tight as he could.
The acrid tang of singed hair hit his nostrils as the cigarette hissed down on the back of his arm. It would leave a small bullet like hole next to the rest of them. He bit down on his lip to capture his screams.
“Now clean yourself up, and fuck off out my sight,” she snapped as she flopped back down on the bed.
Half an hour later, and Ronnie was back downstairs. His mother fast asleep. The sleeping pills he had crushed up into her drink had knocked her out. He tried the front and back door repeatedly in a bid to reassure himself he had locked them. He then went round drawing closed all the curtains and shutting off the lights. It would not know he was here in the dark. Darkness is safe. He repeated this over and over, trying to convince himself it was true.
He sat on the sofa and rocked back and forth, clutching his arm. It hurt. Will the scars go green like the others? He fought back the compulsion to roll up his sleeve and start picking.
He tried to block out the pain by thinking about her. The voice had gone now but he could not stop worrying. What if they had got to her? What if he couldn’t trust her anymore? He had to trust her though. He had no choice. She was the only one who could keep him safe. She had promised him she would, as long as he did what she told him to.
He sat there, rocking, until the night turned into morning. Only when daylight broke did he sleep. A dark tortured sleep.
15
Jess
Jess let herself into the flat. She kicked off her shoes, ignoring the muddy footprints and leaves she had trailed in with her. Housework was not high on her list of priorities. The steaming hot chips warmed her hands, causing her stomach to growl as her hunger made itself known. It had taken much longer to get home than she had anticipated and she was starving. Working in the café had ruined her eating habits. By the time she had cooked and cleaned for everyone else, she had little appetite left. Caffeine and nicotine tended to be her staple diet these days, although she had to ration the nicotine intake given the cost of a packet of fags. Still, Ronnie was usually good for a loan of a roll up when she was desperate.
Back home, she was buzzing for the first time in a long time. The evening had turned out far better than she planned, and the light was finally starting to shine at the end of the tunnel. Just the boost she needed. Things were going to work out, she was convinced of it. Okay, perhaps not quite how she had envisaged it at first, but hey, closure was another step closer. She had a little dance to herself around the flat. Today had been the first step in what felt like the rest of her life.
She didn’t bother with a plate for her chips—she ripped open the paper and savoured the hot steam carrying the aroma towards her, the tang of vinegar making her mouth water even more. A picture of her mum popped into her head. Both of them, on the beach. A day out to the seaside. It might have been Ayr. She couldn’t remember. But what she did remember was the chips wrapped in newspaper, the seagulls attacking them both, her mum’s hair blowing in the strong gusts of wind, her mum’s head thrown back as she laughed at something she had said. Her mum’s arm thrown round her, protecting her, and the promise their life wouldn’t always be like this.
Jess reached into her handbag and dug out the small photograph album she carried everywhere with her. Flicking through the pages, her smile was wistful. She ran her finger over the photos, lingering on her mum’s face longing to feel her for real again. She ignored the jagged edges where she had carefully ripped out the others, erased them from her mind, from her history.
“This is what it’s all for, mum. It’s all for you, I promise I’m going to put everything right. I’m doing it all for you.”
She lifted the album to her face and kissed the photo of her and her mum on the beach, the wind blowing their hair, their smiles wide, caught in that moment forever.
Mum was right when she told me life would not always be like that, thought Jess bitterly. Life had changed alright, but not in the way her mum had promised her.
Her mood plummeted. She pushed the chips away from her and balled her hands into her eyes in an attempt to stop the tears. She did not want to remember—the memories made it all harder. No, she had to focus on the here and now. On her future. Her plans.
Come on Jess, get a grip. You can do this. You can bloody well do this.
She threw the chips in the bin. She couldn’t face them now—the taste spoiled by the memories they had invoked. Instead, she grabbed a packet of crisps from the cupboard and a can of diet coke from the fridge. Throwing herself on the sofa, the books she had borrowed from the library caught her eye. Two true crime books and a police procedural, she smiled at the irony of her choice of reading material.
The sight of the books distracted her from her melancholy enough to find her thoughts returning to the library. She had not felt out of place when she had gone in earlier. The girl behind the desk hadn’t looked much older than her. She had been really chatty too. Jess had probed her about Morag, referring to her as the ‘old woman’. The girl at the counter had rolled her eyes and made a face, making Jess laugh.
“Old?” she had replied to Jess’s question. “Morag isn’t really that old. Well, she is in her fifties but, seriously right, what woman in their fifties goes around dressed like that these days? I mean, my gran is nearly seventy now and she has more style than Morag has. She’s a right weirdo her. Always walking about with that bloody stupid bag of hers, looking down her nose at the rest of us… and her hoity toity voice, grinds my gears.”
The girl would have gone on forever, if Jess had not interrupted.
“It’s fine,” she had replied. “I only wanted to know because I know she runs that group and it’s just because I’m kinda new around here, I thought…” She’d let her sentence tail off, realising how lame she sounded. The look on the girl’s face said she agreed. She had bombarded Jess with questions about where she had lived before Lennoxhill and what had made her move here. Jess had managed to be as vague as she could—the less folk knew about her the better.
Jess had made her excuses and wandered away from her, not wanting to draw much further attention to herself.
Now alone in the flat, her thoughts wandered back to Ronnie. Jess knew it was a shitty thing to do, to let him think he was in with a chance with her. She wouldn’t normally do stuff like that but sometimes in life the end justified the means.
It hadn’t been her fault Ronnie had placed himself firmly in her sights. He had latched onto her when she first started working in the café. Used to everyone avoiding him, he had clearly taken her empathy as a sign of something else. In the beginning she had tried to put him off, but he was like an eager little puppy, always hanging around her.
