TAINTED LOVE

by Anna Chilvers

‘Well, if you need any help with anything,’ Peter was speaking for both of us and I was glad. I didn’t trust myself to say anything nice. She and Dad seemed so far away, sitting at the other side of the table, as if I was looking at them down a tunnel.

  Dad leaned forward. ‘Lauren, thank you for being here this evening.’

  I smiled at him but I couldn’t speak.

  ‘I know everything is strange at the moment. It’s hard for you.’

  I parted my lips. ‘I’m tired now. Do you mind if I go to bed?’

  Dad looked at my wine, which I hadn’t touched, then he shrugged. ‘Ok, school day tomorrow.’

  I stood up and tugged at Peter’s hand. ‘Come with me?’

  He stood up and said goodnight to both of my parents. I kissed my Dad on the forehead, something I did every night. He ruffled my hair and said ‘night, sweetie,’ and I noticed my mum looking at us.

  ‘Goodnight,’ I said to her.

  She nodded but she couldn’t say anything because she was crying.

  Upstairs Peter undressed me and kissed me at the base of my throat and his breath was warm. His hands ran down the sides of my body, leaving a trail of heat, and he pressed the length of his body against mine. His haunches were soft against the skin of my legs. I held on to him, my arms wrapped round his back and my face pushed into his shoulder.

  ‘Lauren, it’s ok.’

  He stroked my hair and ran his fingertips down my spine.

  We stood like that for ages. He was so warm and so perfect I wanted to stay there forever. Outside of this moment everything was uncertain. Peter put his hands on either side of my head and lifted it so he could look at me. He licked the tears off my face and kissed my wet eyelids.

  ‘I love you, Peter.’

  I wanted to say it.

  He kissed my lips then, and one of his arms slid down my back. He pulled me hard against him and his excitement passed into me as we opened our mouths to each other. He nudged me backwards towards the bed and we tumbled on to it, laughing for a second before grasping again for each other’s bodies. We made love and I forgot everything that had happened and everything I knew. Afterwards, I held on to Peter with my legs wrapped around him, ankles crossed behind his thighs, unwilling to let him go. His face was above mine and it looked naked. I was so happy that he let me see him like that.

  ‘I love you too, Lauren,’ he said.

  I let him go after that, and we curled our bodies up together and fell asleep. I slept heavily and well and woke up in the morning with his arm across my body and his knees pressed into the back of mine, his breath in my hair. I reached up with my left arm and touched his horns. He was still sleeping and didn’t stir. There were seeds in the bed that had fallen out of my pockets when we undressed. I gathered them and slid out from under his arm and went to the bathroom. Peter had a free period first thing this morning, so he could lie in a bit longer than me.

  I showered and dressed and went downstairs to make tea. Dad’s shoes and coat were in the hall, but my mum’s weren’t, so I guessed she’d gone home. Nobody else was about. Mr Lion would be out with Beauty, as they always went out really early, even in winter when it was dark. I walked silently across the kitchen in my woolly socks and felt the tiles against my feet. I filled the kettle and the sound of the water was loud in the quiet kitchen. I got a cup from the cupboard, trying not to clink it, not to let the cupboard door bang. But when I opened the fridge it burst into life with a loud rumble, and pressure in the kettle built up until it began to sing. I could feel it in my head.

  I poured water onto a teabag and stirred it, fished it out with a spoon and added milk. It was five minutes until the school bus.

  Peter was sleeping. I put the cup on the chest of drawers next to my bed, leaned over and kissed his face.

  ‘Peter.’

  He reached out with one arm and grabbed me. He didn’t open his eyes. He pulled me down to the bed, my face next to his, and nestled against me.

  ‘Peter, I have to go to college.’

  I drew away and he opened his eyes. He needed to shave.

  ‘I’ve brought you some tea.’

  ‘Thank you.’ His voice was thick with sleep.

  I kissed him again. ‘Bye, see you later.’

  ‘Bye.’ He lifted his arm again and touched my face, and I left.

  The kitchen was quiet again. I grabbed my bag from behind the door and let myself out of the house. The earth was nearly bare. If I wanted roots from the garden I’d have to dig them up.

  When I turned the corner at the end of our road I saw Richard walking up ahead. I ran to catch up with him.

  ‘Morning.’

  He smiled. ‘Morning Lauren.’

  We walked along the street in step with each other. The sky was brightening into day, the sun just appearing over the horizon.

  ‘I’m going to the library,’ he said. ‘Want to walk with me?’

  ‘I’ll be late.’

  ‘Not much.’

  ‘Oh, why not? It might wake me up.’

  But I didn’t need waking up. Red and yellow chrysanthemums were loud in window boxes and the trees rattled their remaining leaves. We walked down to the canal path. The new sun was sending shivers of light across the water and frost clung to the grass at the water’s edge.

  23. Ali

  I hadn’t spent any of the money. Hadn’t had the chance to. First time in my life I’d cash to spend and I was hiding away in the hills, only going out at night when the shops were closed. I’d buried it under a loose tile in the corner of the cottage. Sometimes I wished I hadn’t taken it, then I wouldn’t need to hide. I wondered if Smith and Jeannie were still looking for me. It was a lot of money, but they would want to get back to Leeds. They wouldn’t spend forever wandering the country. I’d been here for nearly a month – I could tell by the moon.

  Some days I thought I was being stupid. They wouldn’t still be in Hawden. I could just come out of hiding, walk down the street in daylight and see what happened. But it had become a habit. I’d got used to being nocturnal. The daylight seemed a bit crude and brash, especially when the sun was shining. I sometimes ventured out into the fields for a bit at dusk, but I felt very exposed. My eyes were adjusting to the dark and I could see much more than I used to at night. I was learning the subtleties of different degrees of grey, varying depths of blackness.

  Maybe it was the moon, but I felt restless. I took out the roll of notes. It had a satisfying weight in my hand. I took one of the twenties from the outside and slipped it into the back pocket of my jeans, put the rest back under the tile. I hadn’t any plan. I wasn’t short of food and it was Friday, a day I never went into town. It was a long time since I’d had any human company. I’d been reading Hannah’s notebooks but they weren’t enough.

  The moon was still low in the sky when I got to Hawden. I was used to it silent and empty – sometimes the odd straggler walking the night streets, but otherwise only cats, once a fox. Tonight there were people standing smoking outside pubs and restaurants. Groups of drunk girls teetered down the middle of the road in fits of giggles and high heels. Lads shouted at them from the corners and couples scurried past hand in hand in their weekend clothes. I stopped in a shop doorway and looked down at my clothes. Jeans and t-shirt both filthy, jumper now an indeterminate colour with a hole beneath one arm, jacket carrying dust from nights on the cottage floor and newspaper blankets. I could see my reflection in the shop window and I was a fright. Hair sticking out anyhow and dirt on my face. I couldn’t just walk into a pub like this – I’d be thrown out.

  I’d walked most of the streets on my night visits by now. I knew how to get across the town using back alleys. I made my way to the back of my favourite charity shop, the one where they often put bags of stuff out the back – clothes that weren’t good enough for them to sell. Luckily there were a couple of bags. I u
ntied the first, rummaged about and found a black hoodie. It was a bit on the small side – probably a child’s – and it had a mark on the bottom at the back as though someone had dropped bleach on it. But the zip up the front worked, and the arms were just long enough. I hid behind the bags, slipped off my jumper and t-shirt and put the hoodie on over my bra. It hugged quite tight. I stuffed my clothes and my jacket down by the wall. I hoped they would still be there later.

  My jeans would have to do. I needed the pockets. I had the twenty, and also some bits of change from the last time I’d spent any money – that day back in the coffee shop when I arrived in Hawden.

  I fished out a twenty pence piece. When no one was looking I dashed across the street and into the market square to the public toilets. They were individual self-contained cubicles opening onto the road. Inside was grey and smelled of piss and chemicals and on the wall above a tiny sink was a square of mirror. There was no soap.

  I wet my hands and ran them through my hair, smoothing it out and flattening it down. I managed to get the worst of the dirt off my face and neck using water. I wished I had an eyeliner. I used to borrow stuff like that from Jeannie or one of the others back in the squat. I looked so young without it, but I would have to do. It was time to stop hiding.

  I left and walked into the middle of the high street. I felt very aware of the way my legs moved, wasn’t sure what to do with my arms. There were a couple of people up ahead, no one watching, but I felt as though I was walking a catwalk. Actually no, I can’t even begin to imagine what that would be like. But I felt on display and as though I had to get the walk right – pass some sort of test which made me ordinary.

  There were a few pubs and I wondered about going in, but couldn’t quite push past the groups of smokers by the door. Outside the working men’s club there were more people, dressed in short skirts and long skirts, garish make up, tight tops, jeans. Three girls came tumbling out of the door with drinks in their hands and sweat on their faces. From inside I could hear the thump of music. And someone nearby was smoking a spliff.

  I slid through the door and up the stairs. The music got louder. On the right was a side bar full of people sitting and standing, shouting conversations over the music. I hesitated, but pushed forward, past the queue for the toilets, to the main part of the club. There was no one on the door, although there was a stamp on a table. I stamped my own hand and went in.

  I was swallowed by a room packed with people dancing like a single moving organism. I let it draw me in between sweating bodies, avoiding flailing arms and stamping feet. I swayed a bit to the beat so I didn’t stick out, looked around the room. It was draped with fabrics from ceiling to walls, drawing down the roof and bringing in the sides of the room, making it look like a Bedouin tent. The ceiling was strung with netting filled with enormous fake flowers and pieces of plastic fruit. Lights flashed on and off, red, yellow, green, casting strange masks on the faces of the dancers. This was anonymity. I let myself be carried along and the sweat beaded up underneath my stolen hoodie.

  The music changed from a fast dance beat to reggae and the crowd changed tempo, became less frantic. I decided to spend some money and wove myself between bodies to the bar. The wait was two or three deep and I wormed myself forward, slid between larger, drunker bodies until there was only one person in front of me.

  Someone touched my shoulder, shouted in my ear.

  ‘Hello Ali.’

  As I turned I registered the distance to the door on my left, the number of people blocking my way, the fact that this person was on the other side of me and wasn’t blocking my exit. My feet were ready to run.

  It was Richard.

  ‘I went up to Old Barn to see you, but you’d gone.’ He put his mouth right next to my ear to make himself heard.

  I nodded.

  Someone left the bar with two drinks in each hand, and Richard slid into the space he’d left.

  ‘Drink?’ he mouthed, miming tipping alcohol down his throat.

  I nodded again and leaned forward to shout in his ear.

  ‘Lager please.’

  He bought two drinks, one for me and a vodka and Coke for someone else.

  ‘I’m with Lauren,’ he told me as we moved away from the bar. ‘Do you know her?’

  I shook my head. We made a path across the dance floor, Richard holding the drinks high, turning sideways as someone spun out in front of him. A girl was leaning against a table at the side of the room watching. She was blonde and pretty, wearing jeans and a silky silver top which clung to her skin. Richard handed her the vodka and spoke in her ear. She looked at me.

  The look was quick and sharp, not the bored, appraising glance you might give someone you don’t know and probably don’t want to. My muscles tensed again. What did she know about me?

  It was impossible to talk, though.

  The lager was cold, and in that hot room it slid down as easily as water. A new DJ came on, a guy with a long black hair and a face like a cat. The music changed and Lauren shouted, ‘Let’s dance.’ She grabbed Richard’s hand and took him into the crowd. I stayed with the drinks.

  They were both good dancers, despite there not being room to do anything much with the bodies hemming you in on every side. Lauren lifted her arms and used the space above as well as around her. It was old music, Motown or Northern Soul or something like that. Richard moved from the hips, in tune with the beat, following every nuance. I wasn’t a dancer. I always felt conspicuous. I’d be ok in a crowd like this because you’d melt in and no one would notice you. But I’d never get up and dance unless there were already loads of people dancing.

  After a couple of songs they came back and we all went outside for some air. Lauren kept giving me sideways glances. They asked me where I was living now and I mumbled something non-committal about staying with friends.

  Richard said ‘There were some people asking about you, that night of the party, remember?’

  I looked at him and his face was bland, as though it were something inconsequential.

  ‘Oh,’ I said. I had a drag on the spliff someone handed me. ‘Did you tell them where I was?’

  ‘No. I remembered you’d said you weren’t allowed visitors up there. I said I’d look out for you and let you know they were looking.’

  ‘Thank you.’

  ‘Did they find you?’ asked Lauren. Her face was pinched with curiosity. She obviously knew more than she was letting on.

  ‘No they didn’t.’

  We went in and danced some more, had another couple of drinks. When it was my turn to buy, Lauren offered to go for me and I handed her the twenty from my back pocket. I saw her at the bar studying it intently. When she came back with the drinks I shoved the change in my pocket and downed my lager quickly.

  I leaned against Richard and lifted my mouth up to his ear. ‘I’m going.’

  He frowned. ‘Wait, we’ll come too.’ He leaned over to Lauren and spoke to her and she nodded, knocked back her vodka and Coke in one swallow.

  This wasn’t really what I intended. Were they hoping to come back to mine?

  Outside, Richard said ‘Fancy coming up to Hough Dean?’

  And suddenly I was sitting on my gran’s lap in her big armchair wearing pyjamas and she was telling me a story before bedtime.

  ‘Little Red Riding Hood went on her way through the forest, skipping in the sunshine and humming a little song, until she arrived at Hough Dean.’

  ‘What’s Hough Dean?’ I asked.

  ‘That’s the name of Granny’s house. Unbeknownst to Little Red Riding Hood, the Big Bad Wolf has got there first.’ And I snuggle against Gran because I know this story, and I know that Gran tells it differently to the storybook in my classroom at school. I know that in her version the wolf gets away to live another day and all the woodcutter gets is a handful of fur and Red Riding Hood’s eternal gratitude,
which in time he turns to his advantage and makes her his child bride.

  ‘What’s Hough Dean?’ I asked Richard.

  ‘It’s where I live,’ he said and, despite Lauren’s eager face which made me want to turn tail, curiosity got the better of me.

  It was quite a walk. On the way Lauren told me that Richard wasn’t her boyfriend. Her boyfriend was called Peter, but he had a chemistry exam next week and he was busy revising. She tried to ask me questions about myself but I fobbed her off.

  The road took us out of town along the valley bottom and it was really dark. I’d got used to living in the night time, but my cottage was up high where you could make the most of any light from the stars and the sky. Down here we were shielded by trees and by the hills themselves, rising up black and solid on either side. After a mile or so we turned right onto a rough track.

  We didn’t talk much. The track wound uphill and we were walking at a fair pace. I could hear Lauren’s breath catching and I could feel my own tightening my chest. Richard didn’t seem to find it an effort and kept slowing down for us to catch up.

  When we reached Hough Dean the lights were on and there was music. Richard opened the front door.

  ‘Hiya, it’s me,’ he called out.

  We walked into a wide, brightly lit entrance hall. The music, which I think was jazz, was coming from a room to our left. A woman walked through the door and turned to greet us. I gasped.

  ‘Meg!’

  She smiled her beautiful smile.

  ‘Ali,’ she said, ‘I wondered when I was going to see you.’

  Part Three: BLOOD

  24. Peter

  Peter lay on a bed of straw at the back of the cave. The place smelled of his dad, but Peter was alone. The night sky was lighter than the cave’s interior and he could see the mouth quite clearly – a black shape filled with indigo, its edges jagged.

  He wished his dad was there. Not that they tended to talk much, but he felt his dad understood the difficulties. Lauren acted as though it didn’t matter, as though his difference in horn and foot could be accommodated as easily as different hair colour or longer-than-average legs. She said nobody cared, and that she loved him for who he was. His dad said there were different ways of looking at the world, and Peter had told him about the polarization of light: how because of the angle of vision, you could only see the light vibrating in a single horizontal plane, but that there are infinite planes if only you knew how to look. His dad had nodded and smiled.