Thorn in the Flesh

by Anne Brooke

  More soft laughter. His. Then his voice.

  ‘Oh no,’ he whispered. ‘Your friend, she’s saying nothing.’

  ‘Why not?’ Kate almost shouted, any concept of personal danger suddenly left behind. ‘What have you done to her? You bastard.’

  ‘Me?’ he said, cutting across her flurry of words as if they were mere puffs of air and nonsense. ‘I’ve done nothing. You don’t have to worry about that. It’s you I want, not her.’

  ‘Then why won’t you let her talk?’

  ‘Shut up. If you just shut up, then I’ll let you know. Your friend can’t speak because of one simple fact. Because I’ve told her not to. If she does speak, or make any kind of sound at all, no matter what happens, then …’

  He paused, but Kate knew enough not to interrupt him. His answer when it finally came was both a relief and a threat.

  ‘… then I’ll really make you suffer,’ he said.

  All right, she thought. That was how it would be. She could accept it now. He would attack her, kill her perhaps, and Nicky would have to let it happen. Well, Kate knew what his body and hands were like, what they could do; she’d borne it once, she could bear it again.

  ‘All right,’ she said, before he could fill the slow silence, and turned in the direction she thought her friend might be in, the direction of that sharp drawn-in breath. ‘Nicky, whatever he does to me, say nothing. It’ll be all right. Please understand, it’ll be all right. We can get through this.’

  Another short burst of laughter, this time mocking, and then he was in front of her, the shape of him blocking out the faint square of light, his finger running down the side of her face and touching the soreness there.

  ‘You assume a lot, don’t you?’ he whispered. ‘Even after what I’ve done. What you made me do.’

  ‘What do you mean?’ she said, and was surprised by the steadiness of her voice. From nowhere, words echoed in her mind: keep him talking, Kate, keep him talking. If he’s speaking, then he’s not doing anything.

  ‘Don’t be stupid. You know.’

  She swallowed, trying not to flinch from his hand and cursing the fact that she couldn’t see him. ‘No, I don’t know. And I’d like to. Why don’t you tell me what I made you do and why you did it?’

  A slight change in the air in front of her told her he was moving, but in which direction she couldn’t tell. For a long time, he said nothing.

  When he spoke again, he was close, but not as close as he’d been before. ‘Bitch. I can hurt you. Really hurt you.’

  ‘Do you think I care about that?’ she gave a short laugh, and was surprised to hear the bleakness of it. ‘Do you think I’d have come after you here if I thought you could frighten me? Listen, I don’t care if you kill me and, yes, I think you’re capable of that, but I don’t care. Because what I care about most is knowing why. Why you’ve chosen to do what you’ve done, both before and now. Why does hurting me, and those I love, mean so much to you?’

  This elicited a grunt and then nothing. He was still close. Taking her cue from his breathing, ragged now, she reached out for him as far as she was able to, and her fingers made contact with skin, nails digging into the flesh of what she realised was his arm so she felt him wince. He gasped but didn’t pull away. Neither did he strike her, a reaction she’d been prepared for. He was trembling, but her hand was steady. Second by slow second then, she continued to hold him.

  ‘Look at me,’ she said. ‘Are you looking at me?’

  He gave no answer, but she knew without being told that his eyes, shadows of blue, would be taking her in. He would be looking at her, his slim, emaciated face, his hair, greasy and curling a little where it touched his neck. It made her shiver.

  And then it was as if nothing and no-one else was in the space they shared but the two of them. No Nicky, no David, no pain, no danger. She knew then what her next words would be; they came to her crystal-clear, like a sharp spring morning. With that knowledge came the harsh understanding that later, because of this, there would be a long reckoning for her. Later, but not now.

  ‘I can’t see you, but I know you look a little like your father,’ she said. ‘Stephen. Song.’

  Her words triggered an explosion. He wrenched his arm from her grasp and struck her in the face. She went down, gasping and spitting out blood.

  ‘How do you know, bitch? You never really knew him.’

  ‘That’s where you’re wrong,’ she panted. ‘I did. Not enough perhaps, but enough to understand that he would not want to know you today.’

  ‘Shut the fuck up.’

  ‘Why? Is what I’m saying hurting you? Is it? Is that why you’re so angry, Stephen? Is that why you’re doing this? Because you never knew us?’

  He screamed something incomprehensible right into her face so the stench of his breath washed over her. She refused to move or even to flinch.

  Two heartbeats thudded by and then she said, ‘I want to ask you a question. When you’re ready for it, Stephen.’

  ‘Stupid cow, I …’

  ‘Be quiet. If you want to hear it. And I think you do.’

  With another curse, he spat at her, so she could feel the drag of his saliva on her face. But he didn’t strike her again. In the silence, she thought she could hear the sound of Nicky’s harsh breathing and feel the waves of her shock across the room at what she’d revealed. To draw his attention away from her friend, Kate cleared her throat. The effort ripped at her flesh.

  ‘I want to ask you this,’ she said. ‘Have you always hated me from the beginning, even before you knew who I was, or is it something that grew within you later?’

  He muttered something Kate couldn’t hear.

  ‘Say that again,’ she said.

  ‘Why should I listen to you? You abandoned me, didn’t you? You deserve everything you got, bitch. Yeah, and more, if you’re ready to take it.’

  ‘Do you think I care about that? Really? Do whatever you want to me – God knows I’ve been through that before, there’s nothing about you I don’t know – but before you do, you’ll listen to what I say.’

  ‘What the fuck …?’

  ‘Be quiet and listen.’ She paused, trying to marshal her thoughts before they sprang out to fill the desert of silence between them. ‘Listen. This is what I want you to hear: I don’t believe any story you might tell about being an abandoned child and nursing your bitterness over the years. It’s too simplistic. And besides, from what I hear, your parents were always good to you. They loved you, no matter what you did. Whereas I never could. You should have accepted that, not come looking for me. But whatever you are, you’re not a fool. Oh no. I think you enjoy your anger and you enjoy seeing others suffer because of it. I learnt that on the night you raped me. On the night you committed incest with me. And what exactly did you think that would do? Did you think I wouldn’t find a way to get through it, that my life would be ruined? I was depressed for a while, devastated, yes, but I recovered. And I’ll go on recovering. Whatever happens, everyone does that. Everyone, it seems, but you. And you should have known that is what I would do, Stephen. You should have looked to your own character to understand something of mine. Determination, bloody-mindedness. Oh yes, I accept you’re my son, but I don’t love you and I’ve never loved you. Both of us will have to come to terms with what that means and what we’ve done to each other – abandonment, violence, whatever – but there’s no returning, no “might have beens.” This is it. And whatever you do now, that is what you, and I, will have to live with.’

  ‘I’ll kill you, bitch, I’ll kill you.’

  ‘No, you won’t,’ she said. ‘If you were going to kill me, you would have done it on the night you came to punish me for what I’d done. Or not done. But you didn’t. I’m alive. I’m alive and now we’re here.’

  Something in the air changed again. Kate couldn’t have put into words what it was, but she knew, as clearly as if someone had shouted a warning, that the strange advantage she’d carved out of chance
and blindness had somehow turned against her.

  He cried out, the sound more like an animal than a man. And in the scream came words, of a sort.

  ‘I didn’t mean to … that night … I just wanted to make you … know me.’

  There was a sudden rustle of movement from Nicky’s direction.

  ‘Kate? Kate? Be careful. He’s …’ her friend whispered in the space between Stephen’s sobs, her voice unrecognisable, rising.

  Another rush of air, the return of the pale square of light, and then Nicky too was screaming, a sound filled with pain and terror.

  ‘You spoke, you spoke, you stupid cunt,’ he snarled. ‘Didn’t I tell you what would happen if you spoke? Didn’t I? You should have kept silent.’

  ‘Leave her alone, you bastard,’ Kate pulled herself onto her knees, struggling to find a way to stand upright, trying to free her hands, trying to understand what was happening. ‘Leave her alone or ...’

  ‘… or what? What will you do, eh? What can you do, the both of you, stuck in here with me? I’m in charge; no-one can hear you. So do what I say, do you hear me, bitch?’

  The silence that descended after Stephen had finished was broken only by Nicky’s harsh and ragged breathing.

  ‘Yes,’ Kate said, pressing her fragile regained advantage. ‘I hear you.’

  ‘So shut up. She spoke, she knows what I’m going to do about it, and you just have to shut up and take it. Understand?’

  ‘Yes, I understand,’ she hissed her reply, trying to make her words send daggers into his hated skin. ‘So why don’t you do it then? Why don’t you rape me again and have done with it? Do to me whatever crazed punishment you’ve got in mind and then get out and leave us alone. What’s stopping you?’

  From her hunched position, Kate turned blindly in the direction of his voice, daring him to do whatever he needed for this to be finished.

  For a moment, the air shivered menace and then he laughed. ‘Oh yes, I’ll do what I’ve said I will, but you haven’t got it, have you? You stupid cow. Because what I’ve got in mind to make you pay isn’t what you think. Is it?’

  A second outside time. Then another. Kate’s mind was blank, all her pathways folded in on themselves. Then Nicky started to scream again.

  No.

  The air smelt of dust and fear. It wasn’t Kate her son was going to attack; it was Nicky. That’s what he’d wanted to do all along. That was why he’d tricked her here. And listening to what was happening, unable to help or stop it, unable even to see, was more than any punishment she could take.

  Kate launched herself towards the sound of struggle, but was pulled up by the rope around her hands and waist still attached to something behind her. She had to get free. She had to. Her wrists were burning.

  And all the time her friend was shouting, shouting something Kate couldn’t hear. ‘See… Kate, see…’

  ‘Nicky! Please. I can’t see. What? What is it?’

  ‘Says … says. Kate, the see …’ The rest of Nicky’s words were cut off, the sense of what she meant lost, by the sound of Stephen’s cursing and blows being struck, clothing ripped.

  Kate struggled to her feet now bent almost double by the rope’s tightness. In the effort to stay upright, she stumbled against the sink and something sharp jabbed against her arm and dropped, metal clattering against tile. She fell again to her knees and grabbed after it, blindly.

  The scissors. The scissors. That was what Nicky meant. Her friend’s words now made sense. The scissors. They’d been here when she first came into the kitchen. On the draining board. She remembered.

  Fingers scrabbling on the floor, she touched cold metal. Touched and clung. And still Nicky was shouting. The scissors jabbed her hand, slipping out of her grasp. Cursing, she found them again. The handles. Holding them towards her, seeing what to do only with her fingers, pulling the handles as far apart as she could, the blade towards her, quivering against the rope. She made a cutting movement but nothing happened. Nothing. Beginning to sob, her breath hissing through her teeth. She did it again. And again. And this time something began to give. The rope eased its hold.

  Yes.

  Two more jabs and she was free.

  At last.

  Pushing the blindfold away and with the rope still dangling from her wrists, Kate flung herself in the direction of her son, his body now lowering itself onto Nicky’s. ‘No!’

  Stephen turned a little to meet her as Nicky squirmed underneath him. His anger must have made him blind to what Kate had been doing. The scissors still clasped in her right hand tore into the exposed flesh of his throat, just below the Adam’s apple. His eyes widened and he opened his mouth but no sound came out. There was a gush of blood that covered her hand and face, but she spat out the redness and plunged the scissors into his throat more deeply.

  Her hands were slippery and after a few seconds there was no movement from him. Nicky was shaking, her breath coming in harsh gulps. She was drenched in blood, but she wasn’t crying.

  ‘It’s okay,’ she panted. ‘It’s okay, Kate. He didn’t … I think he’s …’

  Finally Kate let the scissors drop.

  Then she pushed the body away from her friend and knelt between them both.

  It was over.

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  Time held itself poised in the moment. The darkness rushed in around her and she closed her eyes. From outside, she could hear the growl of a motorbike starting up, revving into life and then roaring away. The sound of it continued to echo in the air for several minutes before at last it was swallowed up by distance and the intervening walls of houses and roads, trees and hedges, people and dreams. Now, as if continuing the dream, she left Nicky, stumbled out of the kitchen and into the main room.

  David was breathing, more easily now. His eyes flickered open.

  ‘Kate?’

  She touched his head, feeling ready to cry or laugh out loud at the fact he was alive. It seemed to be a miracle she couldn’t have expected in the midst of all this. A miracle she didn’t deserve. ‘Hush, it’s fine. Everything’s all right. Nicky is all right. She’s not been harmed. The danger’s gone. Sleep now.’

  He stared at her for another second, then his eyes flickered shut. After she was sure his breathing was still regular, Kate limped back to the kitchen and knelt beside her friend again.

  ‘David’s fine,’ she said. ‘He’ll be fine.’

  Nicky began to cry, sobs of relief and the release of fear. Through the window, as Kate turned and looked up, she could see the sky had become a little darker. Perhaps it would rain. And later the horizon would spin its way from yellow and rose, to deep blue and finally to black.

  I killed my son, she thought. I killed him. More than that, I wanted to do it. Because of it, I’m free now. Because of it, I can face the way everything has changed. Even, perhaps, between Nicky and me. Perhaps, yes, even that. Steeling herself, she found her dead son’s mobile phone, wiped off the blood that somehow had smeared a path over it, and rang the police.

  She found she was calm. Calmer perhaps than she’d ever been in her life before. All things had been experienced, all could now be endured. In the end it had been simple.

  Time gathered itself up then and moved on, taking with it the two women, and the man who was left. When Kate could hear the distant sound of sirens approaching, she opened her mouth to speak and found she was ready.

  ‘Nicky,’ she whispered. ‘Nicky, it’s time for you – for you and David – to go home.’

  ###

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

  Thorn in the Flesh

  Copyright © 2015 by Anne Brooke

  Book cover by James, GoOnWrite.com

  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in
any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system without the written permission of the author, and where permitted by law. Reviewers may quote brief passages in a review. To request permission and all other inquiries, contact Anne Brooke at albrooke@me.com .

  Third edition

  March 2015

  With thanks to Untreed Reads, where this novel was previously published.

  About Anne Brooke

  Anne has been writing contemporary fiction and fantasy since Y2K. She is the bestselling author of thrillers Maloney’s Law and The Bones of Summer, both available at Amazon. Her websites can be found at www.annebrooke.com, www.gayreads.co.uk, www.gathandria.com and www.biblicalfiction.co.uk.

  More Books from Anne Brooke

  For gay and lesbian fiction please visit: http://bit.ly/zg1DtO

  For short stories please visit: http://bit.ly/NVku9w

  For biblical fiction, please visit: http://bit.ly/PF2aSu

  For fantasy fiction please visit: http://bit.ly/R25o13

  Anne’s Amazon page: Author.to/AnneBrooke

  Any questions or comments, please email: albrooke@me.com

  One Last Thing …

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  All the best

  Anne Brooke