Anna

by Sammy H. K. Smith

  Staring around the small room I searched for something Will had missed; a shard of metal, a piece of glass, anything. I moved quietly and deftly: two boxes, a pile of newspapers, a broken vacuum cleaner and a hat stand. There was nothing. Fuck.

  I exhaled and opened the door. He was there.

  Gracious. There was a small sliver of space to his side and I considered running. Just running, but in the nanosecond it crossed my mind, it disappeared. No, I would wait, there would be other chances, better chances. I had to make it count. If I was to escape, I had to make it count. He locked the cuff and kissed my cheek. I looked past him into the distance. I probably could have made it.

  “Are you in pain?” He sounded concerned, and that made me uneasy. Another weakness perhaps? Or worse still, a sign that he had emotions, that he was human? No, I didn’t want to think that, a human who cared could never treat another person this way. I nodded. Yes, I was in pain, not just from my stomach, but my eye, my lip, my wrist and then my heart and soul ached. He handed to me two small white tablets. “For your pain.”

  I looked more closely at the tablets: para500 was printed on the side. I didn’t know if they were still in date, and I didn’t much care. I swallowed them dry and worked the saliva around my mouth, swallowing again and grimacing.

  On the morning of day fifteen Will took me out from my cell again. He hadn’t demanded affection from me again and I stopped often when we walked through the town as he ran errands, feigning agony and rubbing my stomach. I wouldn’t tell him it was nearly over, I wanted him to think I suffered. He passed me tablets and I swallowed them: of course. My eye was no longer swollen and I could see clearly, and the soreness of my lip was nothing more than a memory. Strangely, though, my back started to ache and itch for the first time in days. I found myself touching the brand and tracing the thick, hard scab that had formed. I couldn’t see what he had done to me and was glad. He was a butcher and I was a piece of meat, nothing more.

  I stopped again and grimaced.

  “It still hurts?” That soft, deceptive voice cut through me and I nodded. He handed me pills and I swallowed them dutifully, just like Anna. “How long does it last?”

  My chance to lie and I took it: liars never prosper. I beg to differ, the longer I was unobtainable, the longer I had to gather up my scraps of strength and wits, and then the better chance I had to work out a way to escape and regain my freedom. I was good at lying as well, which made Anna a master.

  “Another few days at most.” I didn’t want to exaggerate too much, and to my relief he nodded.

  “It’s so much better when you don’t fight me, Anna.”

  I nodded. If only you knew. Without reason his expression changed, I don’t know how, but it was as though he read my thoughts, saw my defiance and strength through the shields and disguise I had built up. I noted the now familiar tensing in his jaw and the deepening of the lines of his face. He didn’t blink, and his dark gaze unnerved me. “You have stopped fighting me, haven’t you Anna?”

  I nodded again and held his gaze. I would placate him, and so gently I stroked his arm through his jacket. Gracious and subservient. He leant in and kissed me, he opened his mouth and I stepped back. My mask slipped. I couldn’t keep the horror or disgust from showing. Idiot! He didn’t do anything for a moment, and then he slapped me across the face, four times in quick succession and, as my head snapped to the side with each blow, the burning grew stronger and hotter until it was as though it touched my skull. I bit my lip hard enough to draw blood. It swilled around my mouth. I refused to shed tears, refused to cry when he beat me, and today I was strong, I absorbed the pain and allowed it to work into the constant rage I held inside. They were only slaps though, they didn’t have the aggression and force of the beating in my cell.

  “You make me so angry, Anna.” He was apologetic again, and tenderly grabbed my face with both his hands. “I just want to protect you, to take care of you.” I had no reply and instead ran my tongue across my lip to taste the blood. I was Anna, wasn’t I?

  There was silence again and as the heat dissipated from my cheek I allowed myself to recall another time, another slap to the face; a slap more painful than any of the blows from my captor. Even now, years later, the hate and anger of his face was as clear as the day it happened. It shocked me then, it still shocked me now, but I understood why he had reacted that way; I had deserved it, hadn’t I? Absently I rubbed my bare ring finger.

  He met with an Enforcer that day, and to my surprise uncuffed me, locking me in a small windowless room for hours. I had nothing to do but plan my escape and lament my failures. I needed to be strong – not only physically but mentally. I recalled my time alone, the speed and silence as I moved. I could be that person again. I had to be. A plan formed in my mind whilst I sat in the dark and as I pondered on the last few details the door opened.

  “Come on, Anna.”

  Disorientated I stood, the light piercing my eyes and making it hard to focus. He cuffed us back together before I could gather my senses and leading me out the building in silence, we walked. I hadn’t recognised this area of the town when we first arrived, but the route started to prick at my memory. There was a small tree-lined playing field further up and we walked that way slowly. The sea of green in a landscape so bereft of nature was a welcome sight.

  Stopping by a tree he lifted several rocks and placed two small bottles and cigarettes under leaves and dirt before moving further on and doing the same again in different locations.

  Suddenly, he stopped and held up a finger to his mouth. I didn’t know what he had heard and when I started to speak, he clamped a hand over my mouth. His eyes went dark.

  “I saw them come here, I swear it.” A young voice, male. My eyes widened and Will backed us slowly into the hedgerow, moving me behind him, my wrist twisted.

  “There’s no one here.” Another voice, male again, older, a city accent.

  “There is! That man, and a woman!” The young one again, he sounded… excited. I recognised that tone.

  “Wishful thinking you dickhead, desperate to pop that cherry aren’t you?” Louder now, they had to be close. Will’s grip loosened and he withdrew his knife. I remembered the sharpness of the blade and the coolness of the steel and started to shake. I grabbed his wrist and shook my head. Surprise flittered across his face but his dark eyes narrowed and he jerked my touch away. My back itched and I found myself holding onto his jacket to balance me. The gun was close, but I wasn’t ready. I felt sick, dizzy, a memory of a wanderer leaning over me, his hands on me. I dry retched.

  “Where the fuck are they then?” The older one spoke again and mumbled something to his companion. Will gripped the knife tighter in his left hand and, as the man behind the voice stepped into view, he dragged me around and grabbed the stranger with his right hand, holding the knife to his throat and leaving me hanging like a broken doll. My cuffed arm raised high, I stood on my toes to stretch but my shoulder clicked and a white hot pain shot down my body. I screamed.

  It was the scream that made Will react and at once he pressed the knife closer to the man’s throat. Agony blurred my vision, but I made him out: small, five foot six at the most, and slim. Like all the others he smelt of sweat, dirt and that smell that no one can ever identify, that grimy, all-encompassing smell of degradation and decay.

  “Are you following us?” demanded Will. Still quiet, still soft, but his voice held an authority that demanded answers.

  “No, no, the boy, he heard voices, saw you, we just wanted to see.”

  “You wanted her, didn’t you?”

  My arm ached, it hurt so much that I had difficulty remaining upright. There was another tug on the cuff as my captor grabbed the chin of the man tighter and pressed the knife into the soft flesh of his neck. I stared at the boy: he looked no more than fifteen and he was terrified and reminded me of a scared rabbit, wide-eyed and shaking and even his dirty brown hair looked like the colourings of a bunny. Why was I thinking of ra
bbits? I tried to pull myself together, but it was as though I was stuck in ice, a coldness was spreading from my shoulder down and from my feet up, encasing me.

  “No, no, we didn’t.” He begged and struggled, Will pulled tighter, the pain grew stronger and I muffled another scream. I kept my gaze on the boy. Don’t do anything stupid, please. But I knew that look on his face, I’d had the same expression. It was that moment when sense left you and all you had was fear and adrenalin. No rhyme, no reason, just the primal response, and the boy had chosen wrong. He had chosen to fight.

  He charged towards my captor, drawing his own knife. I felt it first, a warm spray hit my face. The older man dropped to the floor and blood seeped into the ground. My legs started to give way, but before I had a chance to fall Will dragged me forward and he lunged at the boy. It could have been no more than a handful of seconds, but it seemed an age. I don’t know why I watched but my eyes wouldn’t respond and the lids wouldn’t close. My captor dwarfed the boy and he struck out before the kid knew what was going on. The blade disappeared into his side. He cried out in disbelief and wailed. I saw Will’s cruelty then: he twisted the knife and withdrew it sharply. No blood came to start with; for a moment I thought I had imagined the blow, but then it rushed to the surface and gushed from him, trickling between his fingers like water. Red water.

  The boy staggered back, his face ashen and his lips so pale like the lips of a corpse. I was crying. The look he gave me made me crumple, the desperation, disbelief, fear and terror all mixed into one grotesque image which overrode and dominated my mind. I hit the ground heavily, throwing up as I did.

  Chapter Five

  “Anna, Anna, it’s okay.” Will’s voice roused me and opening my eyes I found him rubbing my face with his red stained hands. I could smell the sweetness of the blood. I don’t know why I hadn’t considered the fact that my captor was capable of murder before: he had, after all, beaten me, cut me and chained me like an animal. The boy’s face flashed in my mind again and I sobbed loudly, wiping my face. Never had I had such an urge to be clean before, not even when he kissed me did I feel so wretched. In panic I rubbed harder, unwittingly smearing the blood across my cheeks and nose. My shoulder burning as though I had been stabbed. Will knelt by my side, watching me with his expressionless face: of course.

  “Get it off me, get it off me!” I was hysterical now. The blood wouldn’t come off, my hands were tacky and I could feel it clogging up my pores. As my tears fell they carried blood and I could taste it each time I sobbed. “I can’t get it off.” I continued to wipe using the sleeve of my jacket. “Get it off me.”

  “Shhh, Anna, shhh.” He grabbed my hands and squeezed them tightly. I didn’t want him touching me. Murderer. Why hadn’t he killed me? Why did I have to suffer this? He tortured me, every moment was torture and I would never be free from it. It was foolish to think I could ever escape him.

  He held both my hands in one of his and wiped my face slowly and methodically with a small handkerchief. That immobilising feeling that trapped me like ill-fitting armour. Two lives gone. It was my fault. They had seen and wanted me. If I hadn’t been here then they would be alive. It should be me. I should be the one lying on the ground with my throat cut.

  I crawled to my knees, ignoring the pain from the cuff as it dug into my wrist, ignoring the sharp ache in my left shoulder. I’d seen dead bodies during the two years, who hadn’t? There were thousands, millions of corpses in the cities and towns, and in the Unlands some of those who found it impossible to cope had taken their own lives. I had never seen someone murdered before though, never looked into the eyes of someone as they were dying and never seen their desperation or plea for help. He was a child.

  “Anna, oh my Anna.” His voice made me ill. I tried to scramble away. It was pointless, futile, we were joined and I’d never be free. He grabbed my jacket and pulled me closer. Twice my size, his grip was relentless. “I’ll protect you, it’s okay, Anna, it’s okay.”

  Protect me? I needed protecting from him, not by him. I fought his embrace, pouring everything I had into it. I behaved just like the boy had, I couldn’t flee so I had to fight. I clenched my fists and hit him. It was pathetic. My punches barely connected and I had no strength in my left arm. He was so very quiet throughout while I grunted and snarled through sobs. I don’t know how many times I struck him, I didn’t count, but eventually they became nothing more than cursory slaps. I needed to do it, needed to show him that there would always be a fight in me, even when broken. When I finally stopped he grabbed both my wrists and pushed me back down to the ground and onto my back, leaning over me and sitting on my pelvis, those lifeless eyes boring into mine. I tried to move my wrists, to dig my nails into his hands and arms, anything to cause him even the tiniest amount of pain.

  “Enough.” One word, that’s all he said and it worked. I stopped. Why? I wanted to be free, I wanted him to end this once and for all. I wanted the peace and silence – didn’t I? I had been so sure that I wanted to die, but I never actually had the strength to pull the blade across my throat, or across my wrists, something had always stopped me. Why? I was breathing heavily and the weight of him made it impossible for me to move.

  “They would have hurt you.”

  “You killed them.” I replied in disbelief, not thinking before I spoke, not behaving as he expected me to, how Anna would.

  “They would have hurt you.”

  “But you murdered them you fucking monster, he, he was a boy, just a kid.”

  Something changed, his face held a flicker of an emotion and he gripped me tighter, grinding into my pelvis as he leant closer. “They were animals, you heard them.”

  His face was inches from my face and his chest crushed mine. How I loathed him, how he terrified me. The fluttering in my stomach, the irregular beating of my heart, the palpitations: this was terror, pure terror. I couldn’t let Anna be frightened; she had to be docile, gracious and subservient. I forced my body to relax, sag into the soft earth and I nodded meekly, swallowing my aversion to him.

  “Are you hurt?” The gentle, concerned Will was back as he moved off me. How his moods changed. Like the wind, does the wind change that quickly? I nodded, I wouldn’t tell him about my shoulder. He helped me to my feet, pulling on my shoulder. It took all my willpower – and there wasn’t a lot left – not to cry out. Something crunched like a footstep on salt as the socket rotated.

  I couldn’t look behind me. I could feel the accusatory, dead eyes staring at me and I didn’t want to see what I’d caused. He pulled his backpack on and tried to lead me past the bodies. I froze.

  “Anna…” he started, but I shook my head desperately.

  He took me the long way around the field and we bypassed the fallen men. I couldn’t stop thinking about the boy’s face, the touch of blood, my sudden comprehension that I did in fact want to live.

  The pain from my injuries – the injuries that he had caused – flared up again. My shoulder, my back, my eye, I had suffered more in the days of his captivity than I ever had during my two years of freedom in the Unlands.

  The boy’s face haunted me. I’d never understood how someone could say something haunted them; it seemed such an odd expression. I understood now. Every time I closed my eyes the memory of what happened repeated on a continuous loop, it gave no peace, and it was my fault.

  I allowed Will to touch me, to hold me close and embrace me when it pleased him as we walked. Why would I not? He stopped, pausing and staring at a patch of Sweet William flowers. Picking one, he tucked it behind my ear, his smile not reaching his eyes. Sweet William, the irony was not lost on me. He had finally shown me the extent of his brutality and I was too scared to stop him, too weak, but it no longer bothered me, nothing mattered anymore. He held me against his chest, stroked my hair, and whispered his promise to take care of me over and over again. I cried more tears. This time I didn’t cry for me, but for the dead boy with no name.

  There was a time when I never stop
ped talking; I’d use a thousand and one words when most people would use a hundred. My granddad would often smile at me and tell me to slow down and I’d laugh and grin at him with an inexplicable feeling of happiness bubbling inside. I was always happy, always laughing and joking; it was tiring, very tiring always being so happy. There were those days I felt like crawling into a hole and never coming out, but I forced myself to smile, to bounce into work and flirt outrageously with my friends – why? Because it was expected of me. All that time I spent pleasing others, precious time I should have been with Stephen. If I had poured as much into our relationship as I did my friendships perhaps things would have been different… But what did that matter anymore?

  “Anna.”

  I looked up and he cradled me again, his hand on my head as he crushed me. Why did he play these games of false affection? As his hand brushed my ear the flower fell to the ground. I watched the purple petals curl as they hit the hardening mud. Staring down I moved my foot slightly and crushed his gift, grinding it into the dirt. I wanted nothing from him. The inevitable was coming. I wasn’t stupid. It was a matter of waiting, a matter of time.

  “How are you?”

  Why ask? He didn’t care: it was a failing of society, our never-ending politeness. ‘Are you well?’ ‘How are things?’ ‘Hope you’re okay.’ Perhaps we should have been more honest, more transparent, no hiding behind banal conversations that, if we were truthful, we cared little for, things would have been different.

  “I have a headache.” I didn’t, but I had to reply, part of me had got used to the routine of tablets. And I wanted something to take my attention away from the memory of the boy.

  “I only have a few left; I’ll get some more.” He passed me the two little white tablets and I swallowed them and then let him kiss me the way he wanted, all the while staring at his face. He closed his eyes as he kissed. I hadn’t expected that.