by V. C. Linde
Her whole body was aching and she was blinded by the tears that kept re-starting. Most of all she was so tired of it, of hurting and falling apart and of feeling too broken and of wasting everything.
For years she had hidden how much pain and sadness she carried around, she hid all of the disgusting pain. She had thought that people would judge her and view her differently if she let them see all of the scars, or the scar tissue that had grown up and around the pain. Then she started to tell people, friends and relatives, people she had worked with. One by one they had shown what they thought, actions not words. And value shone through with some, while others drifted away. So often she had heard that she should try to get better. People offered her advice and pity, not knowing what she was up against: that the things that triggered it were too small to avoid, as if she was trying to avoid one stone in a yard full of gravel. She tried and tried but sometimes she just couldn’t help it because she had to cross the yard or she’d never move at all.
Trying to look after her brain took so much energy that she forgot to look after her body. She stopped eating properly, didn’t exercise or get out in the daylight. All the strength she had left was being used up in desperately trying to hold her brain together.
She didn’t dream of a holiday, just a good day. She didn’t dream of meeting famous people, just of being able to talk to her own friends. She didn’t dream of an expensive car, just of being strong enough to leave the house. She didn’t dream of being rich, just being well enough to earn enough money to look after herself. She didn’t dream of a phone call that would change her life, just of knowing that she would be able to pick up the phone when it rang.
Scarlet spent the next forty-eight hours sleeping most of the day and night. Occasionally she still burst into tears, but she had exhausted herself so much that she managed to rest even when her mind was raging. She ate when she could get to the kitchen, never anything fancy and nothing cooked. She couldn’t cope with boiling water or turning the hob on, but still she was eating and she recovered. After several days she managed to get into the shower. When she stripped her clothes off she could see how ravaged her body was and how much damage she had managed to do. Most of her scratches were starting to heal, although a couple were deep enough to still be bleeding. Her hair was a mess, her scalp torn and clumps missing. There were wide gaps in her eyelashes and her eyelids were swollen. Her hands were cut and all of her nails were gone. She was pale and bruised, weak and unsteady, but she had survived. Again.
And somewhere outside a dog was still barking.
The voices got louder and louder as Jas walked down the stairs towards the basement. Even without his Da there they had let him and Yassin in. Thatch was looking after Jas and his Mum, so now Jas could get into the Phoenix whenever he wanted and he could go to whatever fights he chose. His Dad being sent to prison trying to get the Palmers’ dogs back had ruined his Mum’s life, but it had turned Jas into a prince. He was being looked after and he was being groomed. He’d lost weight and gained muscle. He had lost the soft edges and Yassin could barely find the shaking boy who had cried over Whiplash only a few months earlier. Jas strolled into the basement and men clapped him on the shoulder, he was introduced and shook hands with everyone. Jas looked around at one point to see where Yassin had gone, but he was lost in the crowd. He thought he saw him by the far wall where the rest of the dogs were kept, but he couldn’t be sure. Jas turned his full attention back to the gambling that was going on before the fights started. He watched money ebb and flow, learned what the codes meant and remembered who owed what.
The world had changed in twenty years. Most of the sportsmanship had been leached away by fear and by money. The dogs rarely walked away now, and often the winners had to be killed as quickly as the losers. Now young lads rolled their dogs in chain fights in the parks, trying to keep a step ahead of the police. Thatch was old school. Bets had a strict ceiling. Dogs were checked over and weighed carefully and the rules had to be followed at all times. The rituals mattered. The refs he had chosen for the four shows were all foreigners. A Russian, a Finn, a Spaniard and an Irishman. Roy had always been his main ref and, much as Thatch could take or leave everyone else, he missed his best mate. Not just down the pub, but in the fights. Roy had come up with him and no one else knew just how much had gone in to making it all work.
A bucket of water was placed between the dogs and they were washed, making sure there was nothing harmful on their coats, the owners getting as wet as the dogs but not as clean. As they were held in the corners, the ref yelled over the crowd, now baying and screaming themselves hoarse. Claws dug into the scratch line as fingers gripped the edge of the pit. The blood rushed and adrenaline pumped through the crowd. Animal instincts took over and the smell of testosterone and sweat made the air thick and clung to the walls.
Scarlet lay her head gently down onto the floorboards, she had spent so long not moving that her limbs were weak and every small effort exhausted her, but she had to know what the sudden noise was. There was a new set of sounds to drown out the voices that had been so loud lately. The whistling snarls and snapping of the crowd thrummed through her ears at the gap in the wall. She knew the dogs were still in there. She could hear them, whimpering, such a human-like sound.
There was no one in the warehouse that night that Thatch hadn’t seen before. No one that he’d not seen at fights half a dozen times or bought dogs from before. It shortened the profits but a little money was better than losing it all to an undercover pig. A young lad had approached Thatch in the Phoenix earlier that week, saying he was looking to buy a fighting dog for his girlfriend, who had been assaulted. It was a decent story but not worth going to jail over.
“Get yourself a nice feisty German Shepherd bitch if you want a babysitter. We can’t help you. Have a look in there.” Thatch tossed the day’s newspaper at him, open at the classifieds. The lad muttered under his breath, smart enough not to let them hear what he said but still stupid enough to say it. He got a cuff on the way out for his trouble. Nice enough guy if the story held water, but it wasn’t the time to be taking risks.
He’d already lost Roy and though he knew his mate wouldn’t give anything up all, of Thatch’s men were on high alert. Too many undercover cops and RSPCA shits were wandering the streets. Thatch understood why the lad had wanted to get a dog for his lass. He knew all too well the need to circle the wagons. He’d made sure that Roy’s missus and his boy were okay. He’d known them as long as anyone and wasn’t going to let them get put out on the streets because Roy had got nicked helping out his mates.
Thatch was distracted, paranoid and nervous. It wasn’t like him to be worried, but he was jumpy now he no longer had Roy watching his back. The crowd cheered at a particularly ballsy attack by one of the dogs. It was a good match and he’d made a fuck of a lot of money. An hour later, another dog was dragged out of the pit to be quickly electrocuted before the next show was set up. Thatch usually loved hosting the fights, but now it was all worry. Yet he was almost the only person there who was worried. There were more people than usual, the police had simply forced everyone off the streets rather than putting a stop to anything. The Palmers’ dogs that they’d rescued had been sent out of the country to breed in Finland and because Roy wouldn’t say anything the cops were having trouble tying the two cases together. It was seen only as a random theft, not a rescue. Thatch was still making money and ruling over his small empire within the city. People had come from as far away as Kentucky and Spain to watch the shows tonight. There was plenty of betting and Thatch had made sure that every time a penny changed hands he saw a share of it.
Teeth bit down deep as the bite force punctured through fur and skin. Claws scratched for purchase on the carpet, pushing backwards and forwards. One caught the back of the other’s head, working his jaws hard and using the muscles in his back to shake slowly, pushing deeper into the wounds. The crack and pull, push and shove moved a
round the square pit. One show, then the next and another. Heads were thrown back and up to try and release the grip, leaving only an exposed throat ready for attack. Dragged down and out. Blood soaking the carpet and smeared along the walls. Half limping, half dead. The night was a success, not dampened by fear of raids or traitors or infiltrators. It felt like the worst had happened and life was carrying on.
And all around them cheers and laughter echoed up to the stripped lights and exposed pipes. Scarlet put her hands over her ears and as she slept she dreamt of the Doberman.
CHAPTER TEN
June
In the middle of the day a supermarket delivery arrived, brought right to the door. Scarlet unloaded it while still in her pyjamas; she hadn’t left the house in ten days. Everything she needed could be delivered and she didn’t have to see anyone. Before she even got close to going outside, she starting going backwards. She imagined what was going to go wrong from missing the bus, to being mugged. She would faint, her legs would collapse and people would stare. She was not going to waste her time and her money by going outside when she should stay inside, there was nothing out in the real world that was worth it. Her heart pounded as she unwound herself, the relief heavy as she decided that today was another day she allow herself to stay inside. She knew that it was more important to stay inside and work, that was what she needed to do, not to go out there.
The wall next to Scarlet’s sloped desk was covered with sketches and paintings of the Doberman. They covered all of her food sketches and left-over ideas from her previous freelance work. She had small ink sketches, huge pencil drawings and watercolours pinned in overlaps across the wall.
One of her sketches showed a large black dog standing in the middle of a road, surrounded by forests, highlighted in headlights. Scarlet stared at the dog, at the headlights, at the road that she hadn’t yet forgotten. And the lights flashed back into her eyes. Her arms broke and glass cut deep into her skin. She felt a metal bar hit her thighs as she spun forwards and hit her head, was wedged close to the floor and then thrown, high and wide as the sliding door slammed open. She fell, her ankle shattered as the bus rolled over her, not being driven any longer. Her body didn’t stop moving until there was enough ground pulling at her skin that the friction tore her to the earth. Blood stuck her to damp foliage, kept wet away from the sun. She could smell the damp forest around her as she stopped, face down, hard. She was breathing in her own blood. It circulated in the hot air. Gas and skin, burning and bleeding all around her. She tried to count the voices but she couldn’t tell them apart. How similar we all sound when we scream. The voices rose higher and then fell, rolling down and away. She blinked and was gone. Then she opened her eyes and out of the corner of her vision she could see bone through skin, ragged as though someone had chewed through their own flesh. Her teeth were smashed so that her mouth was filled with blood. Something warm was dripping onto her. A boy, a name she didn’t know, lost to the forest, one tree of the crowd. They were so close to her. She closed her hands and felt something inside her fist. A memory. Scarlet tried to stand up and shake herself, but there were too many bones holding her back, skeletal fingers gripped her ankles and held her closer to their burial ground. Her breath was catching on every pull, her ribs re-broken, the wounds torn again, time wasn’t healing her. It was killing her more slowly than a crash ever could. She looked at the world and saw the past, she woke up and felt nothing, she remembered and remembered.
As Scarlet turned quickly away from the images, her arm caught on the mug that had been holding her pens and it crashed to the ground.
“Fuck!” she screamed and swore until her throat ached, “Motherfucking shitting bollocks. Fucking, pissing hell. God-fucking-damn everything.” Her face burned hot and she was sweating all over, her blood boiling her from the outside in. Her eyes were swollen from tears she hadn’t noticed and her hand was red from slamming it into the desk too often. She stopped almost as suddenly as she had started and bent down, begging silently that nothing else would go wrong. If one more pen fell to the floor, if the mug had been cracked when it fell, if she bumped her arm when she was straightening up, she knew it would all start over again. She couldn’t stop it. The rest of the day she moved carefully, treading gently so that the bomb inside her brain had time to diffuse. So she had time to get to safety, carefully hidden away. How could anyone expect her to let people into her life when this was her day-to-day experience? She never knew what would trigger it and she couldn’t explain or stop it. If she let people into her life she would spend too much time ashamed and apologising.
The cracks in her were too bright for anyone to stand looking at. Once she was on her own, she knew how to cope with herself. She spent her days with the television on, not watching it or seeing anything, just using the noise as a pretence that something had happened that day. Every day she went to bed knowing that the day had been wasted: all she had done was keep breathing. Nothing had been achieved, she was no smarter, no richer, no better, she’d done nothing important.
The Other City was rebuilding. All of the walls that she had spent months knocking down were re-formed. All of the pathways that she had blocked up were open again and the new roads were gone. Every time that something happened a new house was put up inside the City. Emotions were stacked on top of each other, responses and situations were scattered through buildings. There was no real system in place, things were just thrown in all together. The cracks in her were cemented over by building up the barriers inside her head. Each flaw was papered over with a smile and a blank look. The reality long lost.
She was living almost completely inside The Other City and rarely venturing out into the real City that was just outside her apartment door. She heard people coming and going; she heard cars pull up and pull away. She knew that there was a lot going on in the warehouse next door, but she had tried to stop listening to the voices, blocking out everything that seemed a little too much as if other lives were carrying on around her.
Every moment was fight or flight. She had lost control and perspective had gone with it.
Scarlet lay down on the floor, a blanket tangled around her feet. She had lost the battle and forgotten the war. She looked around, but had trouble focusing on anything in the apartment. Her eyes wandered and her mind was blank. She was so disconnected from herself that she hadn’t noticed anything about the days: they had all bled into each other. The months had passed without her making any note of them. She ran through a routine that wasn’t routine. She changed and adapted to the world built inside her mind, allowing the rhythms of it to dictate how she moved and when she woke. She questioned each thought that she had, never sure if it was a learned response, a practised emotion or something that was a little scrap of her real self, punching through the fogs. She couldn’t feel anything. The empty wash of day-to-day life carried on. She cooked and cleaned, bought groceries and struggled through work. But anything which meant connecting to an emotion, a thought or another person was impossible. She didn’t know what she wanted, had no clue which parts of her thoughts made her the person she was supposed to be.
The doorbell rang. Scarlet panicked. She didn’t know if it was a delivery or someone trying to visit. She peered round the corner to the front door; all she could see through the frosted glass was blurred red. Probably a delivery. Scarlet reached out for the handle as a voice called through the door.
“Come on, girlie, open the door. I’m freezing my bloody arse off out here.”
Rachel.
Rachel had blown into her apartment, talking fast and then she stopped and turned back to Scarlet, looking around the place.
“Shit. Is it okay that I’m here?” Rachel asked. She knew, actually, really knew and could tell what had been going on.
“Yeah.” Scarlet shifted uncomfortably, pulling at the shorts she was wearing.
“Come on.” Rachel stripped off her coat and threw it next to her bag, jum
per and then skirt on the sofa. She walked into Scarlet’s room and cleared everything off the bed.
“Got new sheets anywhere?” Rachel asked, sending Scarlet to fetch them while she stripped the bed. When you’re seven and the nightmares won’t stop the only safe place is underneath a duvet. It was still their safe place. They got into bed and lay on their backs staring at the ceiling, Rachel occasionally tilting her head to look at Scarlet.
“Where’s your boyfriend?” she asked after a while.
“Not here.”
“Right.”
Over the course of the day Rachel, managed to get most of the story out of Scarlet. She arranged a new therapy appointment, telling Scarlet she could always just cancel it again. She went through the post. She put the bins out and ran errands that Scarlet hadn’t been able to do while confined to the house.
Bills were stacked in a pile on the kitchen counter, opened and read, the envelopes recycled. She needed to respond to tax forms and call the gas company. Both had contacted her two months ago. How could she explain that she hadn’t been able to manage it? That the thought of having to explain her bills froze her and she knew the longer she left it the worse she was and if it had been more than a week the people on the other end of the conversation would be judging her and she’d hear it and cringe so deeply that she wouldn’t be able to move. Stuck. If you can’t pay your bills people think you’re lazy, forgetful or broke. They laugh or roll their eyes. Another set of judgements.
