by Jo Meadows
Chapter 7
‘Damn!’ shouted David. ‘How the hell did that get there?’ he complained loudly, after falling heavily, face-first onto the concrete slabs of the patio. As he sat up he felt a warm trickle of blood coming from his nose and a sharp pain in his left leg. Getting a handkerchief out of his pocket and dabbing at his nose to stem the flow of blood, he knew straight away that it was almost certainly broken. Feeling down his leg he could feel wetness on his shin; more blood. Pulling up his trouser leg, he saw a nasty graze that looked worse than it probably was and, after standing up, and testing his leg by gingerly putting weight on it, he decided that, thankfully, the graze was the worst of it. Standing there in the dark, he suddenly felt a little dizzy and realised that he’d given his head quite a knock and thought he’d better sit down for a while until his head cleared.
Sitting on one of the patio chairs he took a few deep breaths. When he started to feel better, he got up and went slowly round to the door in the garden fence to make sure it was locked and bolted. This was what he’d set out to do when he’d first stepped out onto the patio. It was part of the night-time routine he’d adopted years ago when they’d first moved in. They lived on the edge of an estate that overlooked an area of parkland to the rear of the house, and although the house was in a very quiet little cul-de-sac, they’d felt a little vulnerable until they’d had a tall fence put up to provide better security.
As he sat back down on the chair to take another few minutes, he wondered if Georgina had heard anything with all the noise he’d been making. As she’d gone to bed about an hour earlier, he thought she was probably fast asleep and that was a good thing. The last thing he needed right now was her fussing and giving him a hard time.
As he slowly calmed down, his thoughts turned to what had just happened. He’d noticed that the outside light hadn’t come on when he’d opened the patio door but he’d not given it any thought; he’d just assumed that the PIR hadn’t been triggered. The next thing he knew he’d cracked his leg and was falling over. Looking over by the door he could now see why. Standing immediately outside the door, was the large stone bird bath pedestal that normally lived in the centre of the patio. What on earth is that doing there? What a silly place to leave it, for goodness sake. Perhaps Georgina was planning to paint it in the morning, he thought. But why hadn’t she asked him to move it for her, she normally wouldn’t move something that heavy without help. In fact, she wouldn’t move something like that, period; she would just tell him where she wanted it.
Oh well, he thought, no doubt I’ll find out in the morning; I’d better get myself cleaned up and off to bed. By this time, his nose had stopped bleeding and he thought he may have overreacted in thinking it was broken. I’ll see how it is tomorrow, but I’d better stuff it with tissues and put a dressing on my leg, it wouldn’t do to get blood everywhere. Finally, on his way into the house, he checked the switch for the outside PIR light and found that it was turned off. That’s odd; he thought as he turned it back on, we never turn that off.
The following morning, David woke up with a blinding headache and felt quite sick. When he looked across at his bedside clock his heart dropped to the pit of his stomach. It was ten minutes past seven! ‘Good god,’ he said under his breath. Just then, a wave of nausea hit him and he had to lie back on the bed. He was wondering what could be wrong with him, when he remembered what had happened the previous night and quickly realised that he must have a bit of a concussion from his fall. I feel awful, he thought. I’d better see to Georgina’s tea sharpish and then I suppose I ought to take it easy for today and see how I feel.
He stepped out of his bedroom just as Georgina emerged from her own room. ‘Morning, Georgina, sorry I’m a bit late this morning, I overslept. I’ll have your tea ready in just a few minutes.’
‘Don’t trouble yourself,’ she said, ‘I’m up now. I’ll have it in the conservatory with my toast, when you get around to it.’ And with that, she went into the bathroom without even giving him a glance.
A few minutes later, he took tea and toast for both of them into the conservatory. As he stepped through the door, Georgina looked up; he could see by the look on her face that she was just about to berate him for being late, when suddenly, her expression changed from one of anger to a look of surprise and then she burst out laughing. ‘David, my god, what have you been doing? Have you seen the state of yourself?’
‘Sorry, what are you talking about?’ he asked, bemused.
‘I’m sorry, I can’t help myself. You look ridiculous!’ laughed Georgina. Despite how he felt, David couldn’t help but smile at the way she was acting, but he noticed that although she was laughing, there was an odd look in her eyes; a look he couldn’t fathom.
He went into the bathroom to look at himself and when he looked in the mirror, he was shocked at what he saw. He had a huge bruise on his forehead, one eye was black as though he’d been punched and his nose was so swollen that he looked like Rocky at the end of his first movie. Crikey, I do look a mess, he thought. He looked down at his leg and found that fortunately, it wasn’t too bad at all, but then he realised that he was pretty much aching all over. Once again he felt sick and had to take a minute or two taking deep breaths until he felt he was getting back to normal.
Going back into the conservatory, Georgina looked up and said, ‘Go on then. Tell me what you’ve been up to,’ still chuckling away to herself.
‘Well, it’s nice to see that you’re concerned for me. I hope you’re having a good time at my expense.’
‘Oh, don’t be such a baby. I suppose you think that whatever it is that you’re going to tell me will be a good enough excuse for you to have been late with the tea this morning. If you wanted a lie-in, you only had to ask. You didn’t have to smash your face off the wall, although I do appreciate the laugh.’
Once again, Georgina burst out laughing so hard she almost spilled her cup of tea. When she’d finally calmed down, David told her what had happened the night before. As he finished, she rounded on him immediately. ‘I suppose you’re going to blame me now aren’t you? Granted I moved the bird bath to outside the door and, I may have forgotten to say anything about it. But, only an idiot goes out in total darkness without looking where they’re going! What do you think is going to happen when you blunder about in the dark? You’re not an owl or a cat; you’re bound to bump into something.’
‘Thanks for all the heartfelt sympathy,’ said David, having had enough. ‘I really don’t feel very well. I’m going to lie down for a while.’
‘Yes, you do that, you poor thing. The breakfast dishes will be ready for you when you feel up to it.’
***
David threw his uneaten toast away and went back into his bedroom. Feeling a bit depressed, he lay down on his bed and thought back over the last couple of months or so. After he’d spoken with Georgina about his medication and told her what the doctor had said, for some reason, she’d seemed really angry. He hadn’t understood why and when he’d tried to discuss it, she’d shut him out. She’d gone into one of her phases of silent treatment, one of the many weapons in her armoury. This wasn’t new of course, she’d done this on many an occasion in the past when he’d apparently done something to upset her. While this was going on, they hardly said more than a few words to each other all day and, if David tried to kick-start conversations, he was met with a tirade of abuse or he was totally ignored.
Over time he’d come to enjoy the early stages of the “silent treatment” because it usually meant he had plenty of time to himself, not having to worry about what she was dreaming up, or standing on his shoulder, picking fault with whatever he was doing. After a while though, if anything it became boring. He was so used to her getting at him, that he sometimes strangely missed it when it wasn’t happening. I must be a bit of a masochist, he thought.
Within a week of starting to take the stronger antibiotics the doctor had given him, his hand had really improved. In no time at all it was prett
y much healed. He’d recently been back to the doctor’s for a follow-up blood test and the results had shown his cholesterol to be coming back down to a normal level.
When he thought about it, when Georgina ended her period of silent treatment, after about two weeks, things went pretty much back to the way they usually were, although he would hesitate to use the word normal; what was normal these days. Georgina had been in a pretty good mood for her, for most of the time and they’d been getting on pretty well. Why then, had he been feeling uneasy recently? Perhaps he was psychic and didn’t know it, but for some reason it felt like the calm before the storm. David remembered the strange look that had been in Georgina’s eyes when she’d been laughing at him just now. It was as though she wasn’t actually looking at him but thinking of something else while she was laughing; odd, he thought, odd.
***
That went better than I’d planned, thought Georgina. Leaving him pretty much alone for these last few weeks must have given him the false sense of security I’d hoped for. Another good thing is that he doesn’t seem to suspect anything; he hasn’t mentioned the light switch being off. She got up and saw that it was now switched back on. He obviously checked it then, she thought. Thinking about it; why should he be suspicious anyway? It’s not as though he has any reason to be, perhaps I’m getting paranoid. The little traps I’ve set have all been fairly well planned and I’ve been doing it for so long without getting caught out that he probably thinks they were all accidents or that he’s just clumsy. No, I have no need to worry.
She didn’t really know why she did the things she did and she couldn’t remember when it had first started. What she did know was that when he fell into one of her little “traps” as she liked to call them, she got a great sense of satisfaction. It wasn’t just because the trap had worked the way she’d planned; it was the fact that David was left so confused and bewildered every time. Sometimes, if he was hurt in some way as a result of whatever she’d done, the feelings of satisfaction she got increased to almost a sense of euphoria. It was like having power and total control over him.
Controlling him and keeping him in his place in every aspect of his life had become like a mission to her. She found that she couldn’t let him make a simple statement without correcting him. She couldn’t allow him to do anything without ensuring that she’d given her permission and instructions on how it was to be done. If he suggested going out or even something simple like watching a particular programme on the television, she would come up with some reason why they shouldn’t do whatever he’d suggested or why they should watch something else.
It had become automatic; it was as though she didn’t actually think of her responses to his questions or suggestions, they just came out of her mouth; just tripped off her tongue. This had all been going on for so long that David just went along with whatever she said almost without question. If at any time he did hesitate to do what she’d said or didn’t agree with her on some point, her first reaction was to cajole him into compliance in a nice way, after all she didn’t like conflict. If the nice approach failed, she would fly into an almost uncontrollable rage, which nearly always worked. Finally, her last resort was to play the victim and show him how much he had hurt her. David loved her and always had, that was obvious, so if she found that she needed to play the victim to get him to go along, then she knew she would win every time.
The only problem she now faced had first become apparent on that occasion a few weeks ago, when she’d hit David for the first time. Up to that point, she’d been happy to give him grief verbally and arrange for the odd little incident every now and then, when he needed an extra reminder of who was in charge in their relationship. The feelings she experienced just after she’d slapped him, were on a level that she’d never experienced before and she’d been amazed at how much it had affected her. David on the other hand had almost just accepted what had happened as par for the course and unfortunately for him, that left the door wide open for more of the same.
Shortly after hitting him, she’d come to realise that she’d got so much pleasure out of it, that she felt she wanted more. Over recent weeks, in her mind, the desire to replicate those feelings had started to become like a drug; an addiction. She found that she would sit there in quiet moments and contemplate ways in which she could fulfil this desire. She knew she would need to be very careful, but her needs were starting to outweigh her fear of the consequences of what she may do.
It wasn’t that she didn’t care for David, this wasn’t about him, she did feel some kind of affection for him, but if she thought about it and was honest with herself, she’d never really loved him, although she had told him that she did many times in the early years. What she’d needed in her life was adoration and to be the centre of attention. She needed to be loved and she needed to feel that she was in control. With David, she knew the love was there and would remain so. He’d adored her since the first day they’d met and from that point in time she’d started to exert control over him. Unfortunately, this love and adoration now served to make him the perfect target.
Thinking about the previous evening’s events, she thought how easy it had been to come up with the idea of moving the bird bath; innocent enough in itself and a perfectly reasonable thing to do. Switching off the PIR light had been the key to what had then transpired. She knew that in his rush to check the gate, David wouldn’t bother to investigate why the light hadn’t come on and he would carry on regardless. After all, he knew where he was going in the dark and, unfortunately for him, he failed to see the bird bath - Oops!
When she saw him this morning, she’d had mixed emotions. Her laughter had been genuine, she couldn’t help herself, but at the same time, she was a little annoyed that she hadn’t been able to witness everything for herself. Somehow, that diluted her satisfaction. I must be a monster, she thought to herself, smiling inside, although she felt no sympathy for David; he’d become a means to an end, something to be used to satisfy her ever-increasing needs.
Chapter 8
‘Hi, it’s only me,’ called Leo as he came through the front door.
‘Hi yourself,’ said Lynnette. Just then Emily rushed past her and jumped up into her Dad’s arms.
‘Whoa there Gorgeous, you nearly sent me flying. Good job I saw you coming,’ Leo laughed.
‘Hi Dad, did you have a good day at work?’ said Emily as she planted a kiss firmly on his cheek.
‘Yes thank you, I had a great day. Working is one of my great pleasures and I wouldn’t miss it for the world. What was your day like?’
‘I went to the same old school, did the same old sums and had the same old English. Yes, thanks Daddy, I had a great day too,’ she laughed, climbing down and going back to the living room and her television programme.
‘Hey, we need to have a talk later,’ said Leo quietly to Lynnette. ‘I found out some things today that I think you’ll find really interesting.’
‘And what would these interesting things be? And why are we whispering?’
‘It’s about the way your Mum was with Emily and the problem she caused but I’d rather wait until Emily’s gone to bed if that’s alright.’
‘Okay, sure. You know we agreed that we weren’t going to do anything about that for now, especially as Emily’s alright and we’re not planning to visit them any time soon?’
‘Yes, I know, I remember. It’s not about doing anything; it’s just interesting stuff that’s all.’
‘I’m intrigued,’ said Lynnette, ‘What’s so interesting that it’s got you all excited.’
‘Just wait, you’ll see.’
Leo went off to get changed, jibing Emily on his way past the living room about how rubbish her favourite programme was. Emily responded by saying that it was far better than the police and crime programmes that he seemed to be obsessed with. Laughing, he left her alone and went upstairs.
‘So, what is so interesting?’ asked Lynnette. Emily was all tucked up in bed and Lynnette and Le
o had sat down together with glasses of wine.
‘Well, I was talking to Steve at work today and somehow we got around to talking about what had happened with Emily.’
‘I’m not sure I like the idea of you discussing Emily with your work mates,’ said Lynnette, a little concerned.
‘Don’t worry, he’s a great guy and it will stay just between us. Anyway, when I told him that your Mum had said those things to Emily and had made her promise to keep a secret from us, he told me about a similar thing that had happened with his Dad a long time ago. Apparently his Dad had been left alone with Steve’s sister’s little boy when they were staying with him and he’d said things to him that turned out to be a bit unpleasant. Like your Mum, he’d told the little boy not to say anything to his parents.’
‘Yes, but I imagine a lot of grandparents do similar things. It’s just a shame that nasty things have been said in that case and in ours. What makes all this so interesting?’
‘Well I got to talking about the way your Mum was with your Dad sometimes and the unusual way she behaved generally, especially the way she was with you when you were growing up and some of the things she’d said and done.’
‘What? You were talking about me? Come on Leo, I don’t want people knowing about my private life.’
‘I know, of course not. I didn’t say it was you, I said it was someone else, my fictitious sister.’
‘I’m still not too sure about that.’
‘I’m sorry, I know, but what came out of all this is really interesting I promise. Apparently Steve’s Dad was a real pain when Steve was growing up. Nothing was ever good enough for him and he constantly made derisive comments about Steve and his sister. Steve’s Mum was a timid woman, totally dominated by his Dad; he was never physically abusive towards her but verbally he was awful. She wasn’t allowed any friends and he had very strict rules about how things were done in the house. If she ever made a mistake, she was usually punished in some way. Steve’s Dad, to anyone outside the house, was the life and soul of the party and was everybody’s best mate. Apparently at home, he could be as nice as pie some days, and then if anyone disagreed with him or went against what he wanted, he would go mad. As with their Mum, he never actually hit them, but they were made to feel as though they counted for nothing. If they bought him presents for Birthdays and at Christmas, whatever they gave him was criticised and most likely thrown away. They couldn’t do right for doing wrong and the only way to keep him happy was to bend to his will and make out to his face that he was the best Dad ever. If they remembered to do that all the time, life was bearable. Steve said that all three of them walked on eggshells around their Dad for as long as he could remember and like you, when he finally left home, he felt that at that point he was starting a new life.’ Leo paused and then said, ‘Do you see some similarities there?’
