Deviant

by Helen FitzGerald

  “MY NAME IS ABIGAIL Thom. My mother, Sophie Thom, died here last night. Apparently she left something for me.”

  The receptionist tapped away at the computer before directing her up the stairs to the second floor and then to the nurses’ station in Ward B. There, Abigail repeated the above sentence, word for word.

  “Can you spell that?” asked the pinched-faced nurse.

  “Of course I can.”

  The nurse didn’t find this funny. She was Scottish, after all. Scots didn’t find funny things funny. Scots liked to be miserable. Why else did they play the bagpipes? Why else did they drink and smoke themselves into early graves? Why else did they pledge undying love to crap soccer teams that failed at everything but religious bigotry?

  “A-B-I-G …”

  “Not you, your mother.”

  “Oh. D-E-A-D.”

  The nurse had typed three of the four letters into her computer before raising her eyebrows and looking up from above her cheap glasses. “I’m very busy.”

  “It’s Sophie. S-O-P-H-I-E.”

  “Last name?”

  “Thom. T-H-O-M.”

  “Just a moment.” The nurse tapped into the computer.

  Abigail looked around her. Ten beds lined each side of the room, curtains in between, some drawn, some not. The beds were all occupied. All the women looked the same: withered, yellow, and 173 years old. Her mother had probably been in one of those beds. Which one?

  “Follow me.”

  The smell of antiseptic was even stronger in the private room than in the ward. Perhaps they doused the rooms of the dead with an extra bottle. There was a window at one end overlooking the murky River Clyde and its ominous ship-building cranes. There, below it, was a single bed under a buzzing fluorescent light and a sheet-covered body.

  As if in a dream, Abigail walked to the head of the bed, lifted the sheet, and looked down at the face. She felt a flicker of the faintest recognition from the photo. But this woman was old, a stranger. Her eyes were closed. Her lashes were thick and black, no mascara. Her eyebrows were full, nice shape. Abigail stared. Her mother had plucked a little, yes, but not much. No need.

  Hmm, so that’s where my tiny pinned-back ears come from. Had she tattooed lip liner onto her lips? They were full, and defined at the edges. Not thin Scottish lips at all. Exactly like Abigail’s, in fact. She could see from the shape of the sheet that her mother’s once-slim build was now emaciated, dead-thin.

  She’d imagined meeting her mother many times. Never like this. Was she beautiful? Can a dead face be beautiful? Her hair was still a lovely, raven black. But mostly, she was dead, and, no, dead cannot be beautiful.

  After gazing at the face for another ten seconds or so, Abigail turned and walked toward the door.

  “Wait!” the nurse called, replacing the sheet. “She left you something, remember?”

  Abigail stopped but didn’t turn around. The nurse retrieved a plastic bag from the bedside cabinet and handed it to her.

  “Thank you,” Abigail choked out. And then she was hurtling through the corridor and down the stairs so fast that she had to lean against the brick wall of the hospital when she finally made it outside. Her breath came in heavy gasps. She realized she was clutching an old, thinning Tesco supermarket bag. There was something square and heavy inside.

  Calming herself, she walked down the hill and across the road into the park. The rain had stopped, but she didn’t notice. Climbing over a fence into the woodland by the river, she found a spot under a tree and emptied the Tesco bag of its contents: a thick padded package about twenty centimeters square. Abigail laid the plastic bag on the wet grass, sat down on it, and examined the package. It was inscribed with a thick, black marker.

  For my daughter Abigail Thom: URGENT!!!

  She picked at the sticky brown tape and tore it off.

  Money. Jesus. Abigail’s eyes widened. Her heart fluttered. British Pounds, lots of them, bundle after bundle after bundle of twenties.

  One of the bundles fell to the ground. She glanced around the shadowy park, afraid that someone may have seen her—then scooped it up with trembling fingers and shoved it all back in the supermarket bag. She scrambled closer to the river and knelt in the mud, no longer worried about getting wet or dirty. The park was deserted. She unfolded the typed letter that had come with the package. Inside the letter was an American Airlines e-ticket. She gripped it as she read.

  Dear Abigail,

  I don’t know where to start, so I won’t tell you the beginning. I’ll just tell you the end. There are five things I want you to know:

  Your father is alive. His name is Grahame Johnstone. He lives in Los Angeles. I was going to wait until you turned eighteen to tell you about him but I will be dead. Very soon, I think. I only told your father about you yesterday, the 18th July. For everyone’s sakes, you need to know him.

  You have an older sister called Becky. Please show her this letter. Please tell her I love her, as I love you, that I still remember her beautiful face, and that I have thought about you both every day. She was an inquisitive and determined baby. Ask for her help.

  The ticket in this envelope is a one-way ticket to Los Angeles. Your father is expecting you. He will collect you from the airport. He is a clever man, Abigail.

  I saved £25,000 each, for you and Becky. Please don’t tell your father about the money. It is your and your sister’s inheritance, from me. Please accept your father’s kindness. He will be kind to you. Use this money to be happy, use it to be free.

  No matter what you and Becky think of me now, I know with all my heart that you will feel differently one day. I do love you, Abigail. I have always loved you.

  Her mother signed a squiggle at the bottom of the letter. A signature, in black pen. No wonder she typed the letter, Abigail thought. Her handwriting! It was terrible, almost illegible, with little flecks of ink everywhere. She must have been very sick. With all the shaky markings, it almost looked more like Stophie Them than Sophie Thom.

  For a very long while, Abigail sat alone by the river. She read the letter once, twice—over and over. Each time she had a different reaction.

  Her mother had loved her.

  Her mother was a junkie, or a drunk.

  Her mother made no sense.

  Her mother was dead.

  Her mother was crazy.

  Her mother was a liar.

  Her mother had obviously NEVER loved her.

  The e-ticket was American Airlines flight number 3846, leaving Glasgow Airport at 10 P.M.

  Tomorrow.

  Abigail looked at her watch. Nine thirty P.M. She grabbed the bag of money with her free hand, gently clutching the ticket and the letter to her chest. She scurried up the riverbank, through the woods, jumped the fence, and ran all the way back to the hostel.

  The care-worker was talking to a friend on the phone. “Oh hi, Abi,” he said, returning to his conversation. His concern over her bereavement had obviously run its course, or else he’d forgotten. She didn’t have time to argue with him about her name. She ran into her room, slammed the door shut, and sat on the bed to get her head together. Could she trust her mother? This letter? Did she really have a father and a sister in Los Angeles? She glanced around. The window was painted shut and so filthy she could hardly see through it. There were no pictures or posters on the walls, only the marks where previous residents had placed theirs. Camelia’s narrow bed was unmade, the cheap nylon sheets stained from years of God-knows-what. Staff didn’t bother nagging residents to launder their sheets or make their beds. But Abigail didn’t need to be nagged; she washed her linen once a week and made her bed first thing every morning.

  Routine was all she had. This grotty hellhole was all she had.

  Right. Even if the letter was total shite, she had to get out. A crap situation in America was better than a crap situation here. And, the money was real.

  What would she need? Her thick jacket? No, not for LA. Her books? Since arriving at No Li
fe, she’d borrowed three books every week from the local library to keep her brain from rotting: two serious, one lighthearted. This week they were The Principles of Biochemistry, The Silence of the Lambs, and Funny Physics Problems. She stuffed them inside her backpack. (She loathed stealing on principle, but the library could replace them; besides, the staff always gave her dirty looks whenever she hung around the stacks too long.) What else? The Shining DVD, of course. Her black Fly boots? They were full-on winter wear. But she loved them! She’d wear them on the flight, even though it was midsummer. She’d wear her dark grey combats, her STUFF THE MONARCHY T-shirt, and her cropped black leather jacket. Her favorite outfit.

  She threw some underwear, spare T-shirts, and socks in the back, then tucked the money, letter, and e-ticket into the side pocket beside Nieve’s photo. She checked the chest of drawers and the tiny sagging rail in the wardrobe she shared with Camelia. Nothing important there. No personal effects. Nothing sentimental. What was the point in gathering things when she knew she wouldn’t be staying anywhere for any length of time? Abigail’s essentials, her whole world, couldn’t even fill a backpack. Last, she went to the bathroom and added her toothbrush, toothpaste, and Fibre Putty hair product.

  Stick to the routine. Invent a new one. Abigail could see herself as if looking into a mirror. She snapped into a kind of robot mode under stress. She became methodical, neat, diligent. Most people found it creepy, which also suited her just fine. They left her alone.

  Now, she made a mental list to make sure everything was in order. She retrieved the e-ticket from the backpack pocket.

  Ten P.M. tomorrow. Yep, plenty of time.

  The length of the flight would be eleven hours. The books would keep her busy.

  Was her luggage the right size and weight? No way could this flimsy backpack weigh more than thirty-five pounds, even with the books.

  But when her eyes reached the bottom of the e-ticket, her heart froze: VALID PASSPORT REQUIRED.

  Why had her mother not thought about this? Why on earth would Abigail have a passport? As if kids who are abandoned by their mothers get to go on skiing holidays in Switzerland and summer camps in France! As if she’d ever had the opportunity to get out of this godforsaken country! Sunnier, wealthier, happier Edinburgh was only fifty miles away, and she’d never even made it there. (Once, the care workers at Netherall House organized a trip to Loch Lomond. Abigail was excited. It turned out to be a twenty-minute drive. In a minivan. Normal schoolchildren in full-sized buses laughed at them en route. The minivan full of “special” children eventually parked in a deserted lot. The ten children got out and threw stones into the lake. It rained. They drove home.)

  She had been nowhere, done nothing. She’d be stuck nowhere if she didn’t find a passport. Shite. She couldn’t snap out of robot mode. Now she had to focus.

  Abigail poked her head in the hall. Camelia was in the television room. Several other girls were sprawled on the frayed, red-fabric sofas, watching a twenty-year-old soft-core porn show called Eurotrash. The teenagers watched the ten-ton television set all day here—hungover from drinking and drug-taking, comatose with bloodshot eyes. Staff never questioned it. It kept them quiet. Camelia had put makeup and a coat on since Abigail had last seen her, and was standing at the window.

  “Camelia, can you come here?” Abigail called.

  Her roommate flinched and blinked, then quickly rushed over to the door. Unlike the other residents, her eyes were alert. She was new, thank God: a junk and misery virgin. She still had hope.

  “Have you heard from Billy?” Abigail asked.

  “Billy is coming here to get me.” Camelia’s English was stilted but understandable.

  “When did he say that?”

  Camelia looked at the clock on her phone. “Five hours ago.”

  “Do you know where he is?”

  “His text say he caught up in a meeting in town?” she answered, as if posing another question. Her accent thickened with her uncertainty.

  “A meeting, right. He’ll be at the Solid Bar.”

  Camelia’s eyes brightened. “You take me to the Solid Bar? You know where it is?”

  Abigail said simply, “No, I’m not going to take you to see him. Billy does not love you. He is not your boyfriend.”

  She blinked again and tried to smile. “What do you mean?”

  “Exactly what I said,” Abigail stated.

  “I don’t understand you. Billy and I, we are together, you understand? He pays for my ticket here—”

  “Come with me,” Abigail interrupted. “Come and talk.”

  Closing the door behind them, Abigail sat Camelia down on her bed. She tried to offer a smile, but her heart was pounding. “Listen. I don’t have much time. But I want you to know: when I look at you, I see girls who have died. Please listen to me, Camelia. You’re not the first girl Billy has done this to. He targets girls who have nothing to lose. The girls who end up here. He gets them hooked on heroin. You know what heroin is? Smack? And then he gets them to sell their bodies.”

  Camelia’s heavily made-up face darkened. “I know what heroin is. But you are not right. Billy helps me get a job and brings my family over here. My mother is very sick.”

  Abigail shook her head as patiently as she could. “He’s not. He’s a bad, bad guy.”

  “No,” Camelia snapped. “I heard the other girls say you’re strange. Leave me alone.” She stood and reached for the door.

  Abigail chewed her lip. “Okay,” she blurted out. “You want to see him? Fine, I’ll take you there.”

  THE BUS SHELTER HAD no glass and no roof, and the rain had started up again. Camelia’s mood soured significantly by the time she and Abigail reached the Solid Bar an hour later, soaked to the skin. The warm wind had turned the rain horizontal, obscuring the view of the tenement flats on Argyll Street and the long, dreary queue of shops on Sauchiehall Street.

  As suspected, Billy was sitting with a young girl at the back of the dark, narrow pub. Rock music blared from television screens in the dark corners. The place stank of booze. Billy rubbed the girl’s arm, looking completely wasted. If he’d been brought up somewhere different, maybe he would have been handsome. The basics were there, certainly: dark hair, deep brown eyes. Abigail imagined his Facebook profile pic might seem quite appealing. But he’d grown up in Glasgow. It had muddied him, made him ugly.

  Camelia stiffened a little.

  “Don’t get upset,” Abigail whispered as she pulled her toward him. “What you’re learning now might save your life.”

  Billy’s glassy eyes zeroed in on Abigail. “Well, look who it is, Mother Theresa!” His pet nickname for her ever since she refused to inject. He blinked and tried to straighten, noticing Camelia. He stopped rubbing his companion. “Hello! What are you doing here?”

  “She’s been waiting for you,” Abigail snapped. “You were supposed to collect her, remember? You were supposed to help her because you love her?”

  “Sorry I got waylaid, sweetheart,” Billy slurred, his bloodshot gaze still on Camelia.

  “I told her everything about you, Billy,” Abigail continued evenly. “What you do with your girlfriends. She doesn’t believe me.”

  He sneered. “What you on about?”

  Abigail turned her attention to the girl sitting beside Billy. The bags under her eyes matched her thick, badly applied eyeliner. Another three weeks, maybe two, and Camelia would be in the exact same place. But this girl was even younger than they were. Fifteen, maybe.

  “Get out of here,” Abigail snapped.

  The girl rolled her eyes dramatically. Then she took some money from her bra and handed it to Billy, planting a sloppy kiss on his cheek. With that, she raised a finger at Abigail and Camelia. They watched as she staggered out in the rain.

  Billy just laughed. “Now get out, Mother Theresa. I want some time with ma bird.” He ushered Camelia to sit beside him. “C’mere, Amelia.”

  “Camelia,” the girl corrected, her voice s
haking. “You bou … carule … Bagate-as in mormant.”

  Abigail placed herself in between them in case Camelia was tempted to smash Billy in the face. “He’s not worth it. Go and wait for me at the door. I won’t be long,”

  Eyes blazing, Camelia stomped out. Once the door swung shut behind her, Abigail turned back. “I need a passport. It’s urgent. I have to have it by two P.M. tomorrow.”

  “Wit!” Billy laughed as he exhaled smoke. He peered over her shoulder, trying to spot the girl who’d trotted off into the rain. “It takes days to get those sorted. And it’s expensive. Talking money, you owe me for that girl. Her ticket cost nearly two hundred quid.”

  “If you get me the passport, I’ll give you a thousand.”

  “Hmm.” Billy took a long drag and said, “Uh-uh, cannae do it for that. No way.”

  Abigail turned and reached into her bag, shakily counting out £2,000 with only her back as protection. “This is all I have,” she lied, making sure to keep the other wads of cash hidden from him. “Two K, if you get it to me by two P.M. tomorrow. I’ll meet you here. And if you disappoint me, I swear I’ll come back here every night and day, scaring your girlfriends away until you’re broke or dead—whichever comes first.”

  He stubbed out his cigarette and looked at the cash. He smiled at Abigail, then at Camelia’s back in the rain-soaked window. Finally he nodded and extended a hand to shake.

  She did not reciprocate. Instead, she divided the money into two piles, pushed one toward him, and said, “Half now, half tomorrow. Here. Two o’clock.”

  Before he could protest, she strode from the bar and took Camelia’s arm, hurrying back to the bus stop. It was no bluff, her threat. She only hoped it was enough to scare Billy into coming through. But it probably was. He knew she made good on her promises.

  THE HOSTEL WAS EMPTY when they returned, except for a night shift worker Abigail had never met before. Coincidentally he happened to be flipping through her orange file. He put it down nervously, embarrassed to be caught.