The Tens

by Vanessa Jones

  Sophie looked down at her wearied body and pitied herself, her heart and face sinking. Here she was, away from home and alone, in a circle of utter weirdos who were shouting at trees. But her despair wouldn't last for long because the weird legend about the imaginary woman in the woods was the least she had to worry about.

  CHAPTER TWENTY THREE

  Sophie woke up the next morning but was too exhausted and weak to move, her eyelids too thick to open fully. Weary distress kept threatening to drag her under as she tried to shout for help which came out no louder than a cat's meow.

  Through her half-open lids, she spotted two weathered bronzed feet appearing underneath her eyesight, toes dancing on the Persian rug. Each toe bore a faded tattooed number, from 1 to 10. The ink, far from fresh, had turned mossy and softened around the edge of the number. Clive bounced forward at her, his enthusiasm comical. He punctuated each word with a forward jump of his shoulders. 'Just peeking in to check on you, dear. Some of the girls said you had a few funny turns. That's no good, is it?'

  'I think I should see someone. Is a doctor coming? The nurse? Is she back?'

  Something, maybe irritation, flashed through Clive's wise face. The sinewy webbing between his fingers spoke of manual labour and extending himself in a way that just had to be self-flagellation.

  'Yes, on their way, dear. In the meantime, feel free to nap. Perhaps one of the girls can get you something to eat or drink? A nibble, would suit you, yes?'

  He poked his head outside. 'Everley, Abigail... could you, someone, grab Sophie some refreshments. Much obliged.'

  Turning back to Sophie, he said 'I'll be sure to send the nurse in the second she gets back. Still delayed, I’m afraid.' He looked anything but regretful.

  'Look, I think I really should go. I'll try and walk to my car and see my regular doctor.' The last few words came out in a mumble, her lips rolling across each other like slugs.

  'You really shouldn't go anywhere.' He laid his hand on her arm which felt menacing but his cheerful smile counterbalanced it. His face held a glowing euphoria that looked a little like makeup. And whether it was her feeble mind acting up again, feeding her with the poison of paranoia, suddenly Sophie felt like she had to flee.

  Trying not to let her anxiety show, she struck back the heavy blankets that were pinning her to the uncomfortable makeshift bed. 'Actually, I need to go because I'm meeting someone this morning and they will be so confused about why I'm late!'

  Clive's smile vanished as if Sophie had insulted him. He put his hand on her sternum and steadily pushed her back to laying down. 'No.'

  It wasn't her mind tricking her. Sophie was in real trouble.

  CHAPTER TWENTY FOUR

  Comfortingly mousey, Abigail gently pushed her way into the tent with a heavy book in her hand and a small, hand bashed copper bowl. Timidly, she approached Sophie and knelt beside her, her back as straight as it had been witnessing the sermon the night before.

  'If you're about to read me passages of the fucking Bible you can fuck right off.' Sophie aimed at the woman.

  'It's not The Bible,' she said softly.

  'Unless it's a phone so I can call a doctor, you need to turn the fuck around and get out of these shambles of a freakshow camp and get me some help. My legs aren't working! I am too exhausted to move. Do you want to be responsible for this?'

  'I bought you some food.' She carefully lay the bowl on Sophie's chest. The tang of orange segments sprinkled with tiny violets and rosemary sprigs sprang up at her. Unwilling to admit it, she was starving and incredibly thirsty.

  After Abigail tenderly slid the segments into her mouth, Sophie decided to reason with her. 'Please. I think I'm going crazy. Having psychosis or something. Everything feels wrong. Can I see a doctor? Or speak to my therapist?'

  'I'm sorry madame. That's not possible right now. But I want to assure you that everything is okay. You're going to be okay.' The earnestness in her eyes actually aggravated Sophie more than soothed her.

  'That is absolutely not true. I need to take some Valium or something, my mind is going to split apart. I thought I heard a baby before!'

  The woman hesitated and ran her fingers over the cover of the book. She opened it to a page, scanned it and looked back up at Sophie, her finger holding the place in the book. 'We don't have Valium here. I can get you a relaxing tea, a herb, if you like?'

  'I don't want any tea from you whackjobs.'

  The woman flinched. 'It's temporary.' She tugged her sleeves down and tucked her chin in. Her eyes darted to the opening of the tent and then back to Sophie.

  'What?'

  'It's temporary. The legs.'

  'How do you know that?' Sophie hissed at her which made her recoil a little.

  'It's in the tea.'

  'Are you kidding me?' Sophie felt a rage that was new to her.

  All the anger that had been asleep inside her, from Alex leaving, from the resentment of having to go to therapy, from not being in the familiarity of her own home... all arose. 'You all ought to be arrested.'

  'It's not what you think.' Abigail’s face glumly fell.

  'Well, what I think is that you've drugged and paralysed me and now you're keeping me hostage in the middle of...' Sophie gestured about the place with her screwed up face '...nowhere. And you're going to end up on the news and then in jail.'

  'You did hear a baby,' she said quietly.

  'There are babies here? That's inhumane.'

  'Of course, there are babies here. They are so loved and taken care of more than anyone can believe. You, of all people, should see that.'

  'Well if drugging someone is taking care of them, then you've got it twisted and the police should be called. The babies should be taken away. Where are their parents?' Sophie stared hard at Abigail, as if her eyes could coerce her into getting up, leaving the tent and sourcing help.

  'I know where to find your husband.'

  'I beg your fucking pardon? How do you know him? Where is he? Take me to him!' Sophie’s eyes bulged. Her speech had become crystal clear with outrage.

  'I can't... just please trust that this is all happening for good.'

  Sophie reached toward her throat with a dense arm. But as she connected with the woman's skin, she got an electric shock which made her pull back.

  'I don't know! I don't know where he is exactly. I just wanted to give you some hope. I’m sorry, it was the wrong thing to say. I shouldn’t have said anything.’ The woman leant back a little from Sophie, her hands raised and fright on her face. She bowed her head lower so that Sophie could see her meticulous part, slicing from her forehead to the back of her head. 'Please,' she whispered, pushing her hands, which had sandwiched the book between them, towards Sophie.

  Sophie slid it out and frisbeed it towards the tent wall. 'I told you that I don't want to read the fucking Bible,' she hissed at the woman, who looked horrified and scrambled after the book. She picked it up and smoothed its cover to make sure it was okay, hugging it back towards her chest like it was a kitten. Sophie's legs of lead were both a saviour and a frustration. If she were mobile, she would have held a lithe hand to Abigail's buttery neck and squeezed the sides, pressing on the tendons to make her squawk.

  'I thought you would understand once you read it.' The woman's eyes and tip of her nose had reddened from crying. At that moment, Clive burst his way through the tent flaps and unflinchingly told the woman to get out. She obeyed, hanging her head even lower, dropping the book in front of her crotch. 'I'm so sorry, I just thought once she saw the book...'

  'Get out.' Clive repeated stonily which left a motionless chill in the tent. He followed her out and Sophie sucked in so much air that her jaw strained and screamed and screamed for help, causing Clive to rush right back and bring his pointy nose up to her face.

  'I want to get the fuck out of here Clive. Can't you see that? Can't you see that it's beyond insane to keep me here?'

  'Insanity is... well a peculiar thing. As you know.'

&nb
sp; ‘I don’ know what you mean but I’ve had enough.'

  'You've watched yourself go slowly insane recently. It's been like an unfurling that you cannot control. You cannot wind the thread back up inside itself once it has been snagged and left behind everywhere you tread. There's nothing or no one left that is safe to believe, especially not yourself. That must be... well, terrifying.' He gave a little shudder of glee when he said “terrifying”.

  'What the fuck do you know about all of this?' Sophie's wrath forced spittle out of her mouth and on to her chest.

  Just like the insanity that forced her to come undone, she could not control the fury that threatened to overpower her. And what’s more, is that she didn’t care to. 'When I get out of here— and I will because how exactly do you think this will end?— you will be the first person I tell the police about and I will goad them into believing you did abhorrent things to me. And it will break you apart even more than I've been broken.' Sophie delivered her threat with an evenness that would have chilled even a long-serving school principal.

  And then the anxiety came rushing up to her. The gritty feeling of yesterday that she had been introduced to since just before her thirtieth birthday. She felt like she had been washed in a wave of sand and prickles.

  'Ahh yes, Alex. Where could he possibly be Sophie?' Sophie watched Clive's eyebrows sharpen into peaks.

  'How do you know his name? Do you know my husband?' Sophie's imagination started unravelling and telling her things that she didn't want to hear. For better or worse, Clive obviously knew where Alex was. 'Where is he?' She screamed at him, pushing her elbows into the bed.

  'Let's get very clear here Sophie, my dear. Nothing was happening when you were home, right? Alex wasn't coming back and you weren't even getting better?'

  'Your fancy charlatan tricks may work with the rest of the fools here but I can smell your chicanery a mile off.'

  Clive ignored her. 'In fact, if you take a look, an actual close look, weren’t things getting objectively worse? The nightmares are increasing, you've lost your ability to trust your own judgement, you've been hearing things that are possibly not there. And then, just notice, where is Alex?' His hand fluttered across the air, like a stage magician.

  Sophie gritted her teeth and roared at Clive's torment. The screams had left Sophie's ears ringing and her throat tingly but she could understand what he was saying. Again, she thought she heard the stifled cry of a baby but it could have easily been a magpie.

  'No one can hear you out here. No one. So, stop screaming.' He sighed.

  It wasn't until she heard herself say 'where is Alex?' again that she crumpled inside and the heat of grief burst through her stomach and chest. The unforgiving reality was nothing more than the fact that Alex, was indeed, not there. All the other was just irrelevant noise that Sophie had filled her head with to distract her from her Alex-less reality.

  The tent breathed with her. Closing in on her with every breath, as Clive and Sophie stared at each other wordlessly. Just then a tiny sparrow flew into the tent with purpose. It soared in a small circle, trying to find its way out but failed, knocking itself into the tent wall and falling to the ground. Flipping itself onto its feet, it shook its tiny head three times, so quickly that it looked like once, and hopped out through the small opening at the bottom of the door flaps. Sophie and Clive watched it, bemused by the absurdity of the timing.

  'You know what that means, don't you Sophie?' Clive asked smugly. 'That means that a death is imminent.' He twirled on his heel and flicked his hand dismissively at her and stalked out of the tent.

  CHAPTER TWENTY FIVE

  Sophie thought about the Wild Woman all afternoon as she lay uncomfortably in her tent, drifting into gossamer-thin sleep that stripped her of any rest. The chirping alarm of birds was a relief and pulled her out of the frightening visions of the Hecate like being that she imagined existed in the depths of either side of the woods.

  Suddenly, two hands dove between the tent flaps and were followed by a mess of cocoa coloured hair. Curls that she knew too well and was never more glad to see.

  'Carla! What are you doing here?'

  'Hello, Sophie. Abigail thought perhaps I could help. I hear you're quite unwell. What are you doing here is the real question?'

  Sophie was right. Carla did live nearby! 'Oh, Carla! Thank you, thank you, thank you for coming to find me. You don't understand how relieved I am to see you. Please! You have to get me out of here. These people are full-blown nutjobs. And that's coming from someone on the brink of insanity. You have to get me out of here and I need to find Alex.'

  'Okay, I can see that you're still back in this headspace of wanting to find Alex again. He left you Sophie and I think it's time you started to accept that.' Carla’s eyebrows and mouth pulled away from each other.

  Sophie was shocked. This was the first time that Carla had pulled her up on Alex leaving her. She had always remained impartial during their sessions, rarely passing opinion. 'Maybe we can talk more about that in our next session. Can you lift me? I can't walk. I think they've poisoned me.'

  'It looks to me, that it’s quite important that you need lots of rest Sophie. Do you agree?'

  'Yes, I agree. I will do nothing but rest as soon as I get home. I see that is what I need now. And I'll even stop looking for Alex.' Sophie's neck twinged as she heard herself lie to the one person that she felt she could be honest to.

  But as Carla gently nodded her head at Sophie, she felt like she was sinking further down a staircase, her shoulders forcing the rest of her body to the ground, her face sagging and her thoughts coming through slower, with longer gaps in between.

  Sophie let tears worm out of her eyes. 'I'm so fucking tired Carla.'

  'Yes, I see that.' Carla forgot herself for a moment and went to reach across to pat Sophie's head but hesitated and let her hand thump on the blanket. 'Okay, my best advice is to stay here for a little bit. You don't need to move just yet.' She looked at her delicate gold watch. 'I have... patients. I'll attend to them now and, in between, I'll arrange for a doctor or maybe an ambulance, to come and see you. Collect you perhaps. Hopefully, you'll be home in your own bed, resting, by dinner time.' Carla's smile lifted her cheeks and Sophie felt the same reassurance that she felt when she slid into her warm room for her sessions.

  But she panicked, she didn't want to stay any longer than she had to, even if it was only an hour or two. 'Oh no, Carla please take me now. You must. Who knows what they will do to me here?'

  'You're perfectly safe Sophie. I have known Clive for years and, although their methods seem a little... antiquated... they will look after you until I get someone to collect you.'

  'Oh Carla, no. Please,' she begged pathetically.

  'Enough,' Carla said sharply which cut off Sophie's wails. 'I simply cannot carry you and you might need medical attention.'

  Carla was a good person. She was on her side. She was her therapist, for fuck's sake. Of course, she wasn't having an affair with Alex. Of course, she was only interested in helping Sophie get better and getting her back home. She probably had a duty of care that meant she wasn't even allowed to touch her patients. I must have been so exhausted that my mind was playing absolute havoc on me! Carla isn’t hiding Alex from me. The keyring is just a coincidence, Sophie thought. She'd read about people who even only went two days without sleep and how they had such intense perceptual distortions that it changed them.

  The cool relief ran through the blood of her arms. It was just her mind telling her stories because she was so tired. Bone tired. What else had she been telling herself about Alex? Sophie let her mind drift back to a foggy half memory of Alex’s co-worker. How the work he'd been doing, coupled with some bullying from his boss, had stressed him out to the point where he decided to stay up most nights and keep working. After the fourth, or was it fifth— or did it even happen at all?— night his wife found him squatting over their toilet, his hand covered in creamy excrement as he tried to extract a rob
otic bug out of his arse. He had, somehow, cottoned on to the notion that aliens had implanted something into his anus and they were going to come back down to earth to collect him. He screamed at his wife that he had to get it out and flush it into the sewer system and that the '... bitch didn't understand and never understood him.' Sophie recalled the wife (did Alex tell her this or did she dream it?) saying that it wasn't even that he believed in aliens or the stress or delusions that had encouraged her to leave. It was just that she had seen his own shit on his hand that had so severely repulsed her that she couldn't evoke the initial love for him that she felt. Sophie squeezed her memories to recall where "shit hand guy" was now. Didn't he recover and end up marrying someone he worked with? Or did he kill himself? Perhaps this was all just an episode of The X Files that she once watched.

  As she sorted and sifted through her memories and thoughts, putting them into neat little piles, she considered what she would do when she got home. Rest, as she had promised. Enough to get the strength to start searching for Alex again. But this time, she'll be more prepared. She'll eat more, maybe pack a bag and a spare phone. But as she waited and planned, the ambulance didn't come and neither did Carla.