by Nina Milton
I slammed the front door shut and leaned against it. I was trembling as if I’d contracted some ghostly infection. From my coat pocket, my phone let out a crow. I jumped as if it was Kissie and Pinchie, keen to have another ghoulish conversation. “Get a grip,” I hissed. Nevertheless, my voice was a hoarse crackle as I put the phone to my ear.
“Hello?”
“Sabbie? You okay?”
“Ivan,” I said, breathing out.
“Still all right for tonight?”
“Oh, tonight.” Meeting for a drink had been my idea. Now it looked like a really bad one. “Sorry, but I don’t feel up to it anymore.”
“’Course you do.”
“No, I’ve got to—”
“Sabbie, can I come in?”
“What?” I turned round.
“Just let me in, babe,” said Ivan, and I heard the words echo from my phone and through my door. Ivan was outside, his phone still to his ear. “You’ve been gone a long time.”
That was when the enormity of my day hit me. A feeling of chill went through my body and black spots filled my vision. I took whooping gulps of useless breath. I felt Ivan grasp me under my arms. He got me out of my coat and boots and onto the sofa. I let my head fall back and noticed with sudden intensity that there was a dirty great crack in one corner of the ceiling. I laughed at the absurdity of it all, bellows of laughter followed by whoops of breathing in.
Ivan found the half bottle of white wine in the fridge and poured two glasses. I should have asked for water or chamomile tea, but once the wine was poured I couldn’t resist the first slurp. Or the second, or the third.
“You shouldn’t be allowed to work with the sick or wounded,” I said to him. I was proud to be making weak jokes, but my flaky voice gave me away.
“What the fuck d’you mean?”
“Wine in the afternoon. Enough to flatten me.”
“That looks nasty,” he said, touching the cut on my hand. “Was that the fox again?”
“No, it wasn’t a bloody fox!” I didn’t realize I was crying, until I tasted the salt in my mouth.
Ivan found the kitchen towel roll and sat down beside me. He dabbed my hands and face with it, kissing each place as he worked. The kisses felt wet on my face, as if he didn’t really want to dry my skin it at all. “You’ve got to tell me what is wrong,” he said. “You’re my baby now.” He drew a lock of my hair away from my eyes. “So, what’s this all about?”
“Oh, I stumbled across a derelict cottage. I’ve always had a thing about ruins.” That bit was true, at any rate.
“Sabs,” said Ivan, and I scowled at the diminutive. “You didn’t go somewhere you could have got hurt, did you?”
His tone grated, but I ignored it. Blokes need to think they’re protecting their women. It’s part of the knight errant image. Tamper not with it, or you tamper with their egos, and then where are you? I decided to leave out the bit where I was swinging from the ceiling by my coat zip.
“There were loose floorboards. Something underneath. Put there.” A convulsion passed through me.
“What d’you mean, put there?”
“It was a corpse, I think.”
“What?”
“Sorry—that makes it sound like rotting flesh and a pool of blood. I saw what might have been the rib cage, you know? Just white bones.” I didn’t mention the fact that there had been two rib cages, side by side, like cathedral effigies. I caught his eye, feeling reticent now. “It was probably an old basket or something. I didn’t wait to take a closer look.”
“Baby!” He rubbed his cheek along my neck. “You really freaked yourself.”
“Okay. I admit that.”
“Did Gloria see it?”
“Gloria?”
“She must’ve been there.”
“Uh—no. She wasn’t with me by then.”
“She never was, was she?” said Ivan. “I could see she was lying. Covering up for you. It’s that detective, isn’t it? He’s dragging you into trouble.”
“No, Ivan. This has nothing to do with Rey. I was on my own. That’s why I’m kind of jittery.”
He turned away from me, as if thinking about things. “I should have been with you,” he said, at last. “I could’ve taken care of things, called in the right authorities.”
“And what are they, for Old Mab’s sake? The County Council Department for the Removal of Skeletons?”
“We ought to report it. What if some kids go exploring and see what you saw?”
If I was honest, I hadn’t thought much about the practical steps of what to do with my discovery. “I’ll report it in the morning.”
“Come on, babe, I want to help.” He thrust something at me. It was his mobile.
“You want me to ring the police now?”
“Yeah. And while you’re on the phone, tell that dickhead copper you want nothing more to do with him.”
I choked on my second glass of wine. “I don’t have to do that. He’s already told me.”
Ivan frowned. “Did you come on to that prick?”
“Stop it, Ivan. I’ve had enough today.”
He leaned into me again. His retriever fringe brushed my skin. I put the flat of my hand on his arm and felt the gym-pumped muscles under his shirt, but nothing sparked in me—no sensation of attraction at all. Blonde and hunky though Ivan was, he no longer turned me on.
“Ivan,” I began. “I’ve got a client in a bit. You’ve been really kind, but you have to go now. I need to get my head together.”
“That’s all you ever say. Go, go, go.”
“You shouldn’t be here at all. We were supposed to be meeting tonight.”
“What d’you mean—supposed?”
I knew I had to tell him. There was no time like the present. I slid my wine glass onto the coffee table. “This isn’t working, Ivan.”
“God yes, baby, yes it is. You’re the most amazing thing that’s happened to me in ages.” His voice was muffled because he’d buried his mouth into my hair.
“Ivan, please stop that.”
“You’re beautiful, Sabbie. A beautiful, sexy dream, all for me.”
“No, I’m not.” I hate rose-coloured compliments. I never believe them. I know I’m not the least beautiful. Sometimes, mostly if I look at myself at the end of the day (decidedly not the start of it), in a subdued light, when I’m wearing my prettiest nightie (the only bit of silky stuff I own), I can see that I am better than I was when I was a kid. My face seems to have settled now that it’s fully grown, and I like the way my hair is—long and kinked but glossy enough to shine when I’ve brushed it. But I am not beautiful. I am not even cute. Interesting is the most I’ll admit to.
I gave Ivan a push, and he shifted off me. He pulled a comb out of the pocket and ran it thought his hair, James Dean style. “I’m going to arrange it so we can spend more time together.”
“Ivan, that’s not possible. I’m afraid it’s not what I want at all.”
“Don’t be afraid, babes.”
“Please, Ivan—”
“It’d be excellent if I had a key.”
“Not to this house.” I hadn’t realized Ivan was anywhere near that serious about me. “We don’t have that sort of relationship. In fact, I don’t want us to have any kind of relationship.”
Ivan didn’t seem to be listening. “I hate hanging around, waiting for you to get back from God knows where. And God knows who.”
I didn’t bother to deny his suspicions. I was too busy watching the light dawn inside my very slow brain. “D’you mean you’ve been lurking outside my house? Is that why you’re always here when I arrive back?”
“That’s the point, Sabbie,” he said. “Arrive back from where, exactly? From finding dead bodies? I don’t think so.”
I stood up. To my horror, I wob
bled slightly. The vino was having an effect. “I want you to go now, Ivan. I’m finished with you.”
“Hell, Sabbie, we’ve only just got going.”
“No, Ivan. I’m sorry, but it has to be over.”
He grabbed my arm while I was still off balance. I toppled onto the sofa and in a blink he was on top of me, his weight pressing against my body. “No?” He cocked his head to one side, as if humouring me. “No? C’mon. I know what a woman means by no.”
I felt my jaw tighten. Ivan really had to learn to listen to people, or he was going to be selling the wrong hedge fund or something. “I’m not going to argue, Ivan. It’s over. I was going to tell you so anyway.” I kept my gaze on him, so that he’d know I meant it.
Ivan brought his face down onto mine, heading for my lips. “Poor baby, all shook up,” he said.
I gave him a shove. He wasn’t expecting it and rolled off the sofa onto the floor. He looked so startled and ludicrous that I couldn’t help but laugh. The wine mingled with the earlier shock of corpses. I dissolved into hysterical giggles.
Before I realized what had hit me, Ivan had pinned me down. His body pushed me into soft upholstery. I wriggled like a beetle on its back. “Get off me,” I said. He’d already pulled my jumper up above my bra and started sucking and biting at my breasts. I felt a pain across my back as he tried to yank my bra off, his fist knotted in the lace between the cups.
I fought back, my hands ramming into his chest. He lifted his head and stared at me. “No one pushes me around,” he said. His voice was cold and a chill shot down my spine. I stopped thumping his shoulders and stuck my fingers directly into his eyes, like you’re taught at self-defence classes. He didn’t like it. He cried out, something akin to the argh! noise you see in strip cartoons.
“I want you out of my house now,” I yelled at him.
I should have said that a lot earlier. I should have told him to go instead of laughing at him. It was too late now. He knocked my hands away from his eyes as if they were skittles. He forced his palm onto my forehead and leaned his weight on it, so that my head crushed painfully into the hard arm of the sofa. I felt him yanking at my jeans, pulling at the button. The zip scratched as they shifted down my hips. I felt the rush of air on my skin and his hand delving down into the bit of lace I call knickers.
For several precious seconds, I could only think about how I’d managed to get myself into this position. I had no defences left. He was heavy on me, and hurting me. He didn’t look at me as he ground at my jeans and dug his knee into my thigh. His wine breath felt like the heat from an exhaust. I could not understand why he should force me to have sex with him when only last week we’d been passionate lovers. But when I managed to twist my face, I saw that his eyes were unfocused and his mouth was a grim line, as if he was concentrating on something important that obliterated reason.
He was branding me, as if I was a newly acquired mare. He was making me his own.
While all this had been going on in my head, I had automatically made myself limp. I waited until his hand began to grope for his own zip, then coiled my muscles and put every particle of fear and disgust into my next move.
I sprang at him, using the back of the sofa as support. I wrenched at his shoulders and kicked with my feet. Thanks to the miniature size of my two-seater, Ivan slid towards the floor and I wriggled out from under him, all flailing arms and banshee wails. I ran to the other side of the breakfast bar, where I stopped, gripping its edge. I was no longer afraid. The clatter of my heart was due to white-hot anger.
“Get out.”
He stood up, but he didn’t reply. He turned his back on me, as if he was modestly adjusting his trousers, but I’d already noticed that this was a ploy with him, a way of wriggling out of discussions he didn’t want to have. “You need to lighten up, babe.”
“If you don’t get out of my house now, I will report an attempted rape.”
“That should turn the detective on.”
“Ivan—”
He smoothed down his hair with his handy comb and that seemed to help calm him. “I’m sorry, babe.”
“Ivan, what you just did then—”
“You started it.”
“Yes, well, you frightened me.”
“I wouldn’t hurt you. You know that.”
“JUST—GET—OUT!”
Ivan walked slowly towards the hall, really taking his time, but I allowed him that, I didn’t want to risk another attack. At the kitchen door, he turned back, and I saw real sorrow on his face.
“Sabbie, I don’t want to lose you.” He sounded so contrite I had to clamp my teeth together so that I couldn’t retract my words. I heard his footsteps pause at the door, as if deliberating whether or not to come back in, and my heart did one of those stupid lurches, reminding me in plain terms how terrified I had been.
As soon as the front door clicked shut, I ran to it and bolted it fast. Somehow, I managed to get back to the sofa. I was trembling as with cold. I curled up on the cushions, my head on my arms.
I tried wiping Ivan out of my mind, but then Kissie and Pinchie filled it. I knew that I had to tell the police what I’d seen in the cottage, but I wasn’t so sure about telling them what had just happened in my own house. I fancied the police would laugh at my stupidity, rather than fill out a crime form. Right that minute, I really couldn’t take the sarcasm and suspicion I knew the police—Rey, or surely Abbott—would throw at me.
I began to pull the protection around me that I draw on when I feel bombarded by threatening spirits—a silken, silvery cloak with a voluminous hood. Its imagined softness fell over my head and shoulders, and within its folds, I closed my eyes.
In the light of a dim lamp, someone was brushing their hair. They were brushing it from the back to the front, stroke upon stroke, getting rid of knots and tangles. Shoulder-length, mouse-brown locks fell over the person’s face, masking their features, so that I could not see who this was, or even if it were man or woman. Except, a man wouldn’t brush his hair with such care, would he? I stared at the hand that held the brush. It was strong and yellow in the lamplight. The brush I could see clearly; it was made of polished wood and fine, soft bristles. Each time it passed through the hair, it left a path of smoothness with a soft shine. When it passed through once, it caught at something and dragged it out, so that it clattered to the stone floor. It was a blue slide that glittered in the glow of lamplight.
The doorbell chimed for what might have been the second or third time. My heart thudded and I felt hot and sticky. My eyes were full of grit. I must have fallen into a deep sleep.
I moved down the passageway as if towards the cage of a wild beast, touching the wall for support as I crept closer. I imagined Ivan leaning on the porch, probably whistling a nonchalant tune, possibly even holding an overnight case.
The spy hole was in the door before I rented this house and until now, I’d only used it to play the infantile game of “turn your mate into a goldfish,” but now I put my eye to the glass lens in earnest.
Marianne was outside, as slim and grey as a heron in her trouser suit. She was here for her Sunday appointment. Flustered and heavy-eyed, I let her in, trying to remember what we’d done in her last session. Yes. We’d talked past-life regression, and I’d given her some shamanic starter exercises.
“Sabbie!” Marianne had never seen me in street clothes, and certainly never seen me look such a mess.
“I’m sorry,” I said. “I’m feeling a bit out of sorts.”
Marianne smiled. “I know what I must do,” she said. “I will make tea.”
She moved around the kitchen, her linen slacks swinging at the hem. I watched her, unable to speak, my head still caught up with Kissie, Pinchie, Ivan, and the sorry feeling the hair-brushing dream had given me.
Two steaming mugs were placed on the breakfast bar. I pulled myself onto a stool in s
low motion.
“You looked troubled, Sabbie,” said Marianne. “Can I help?”
I was touched. “It’s mainly a chap I met a few weeks ago. I’ve seen him on and off. Well, that’s the trouble. He’s still full on while I want to call it off. Actually, I’ve just chucked him. Turns out he’s overpossessive … jealous.” I stopped, unable to add and aggressive. I could feel tears behind my eyes. I tried not to blink because I didn’t want them to run down my face. I turned from Marianne and shook them away, but she reached out and squeezed my hand, her pretty pinked nails hiding my grubby broken ones.
“Are you all right. Really?”
“Yes.” The more I thought about it, the more I became certain Ivan had only intended to make a rough sort of love. I’d started the pushing and shoving—really, all Ivan had done was respond in kind. Men are stronger than they know—that was all it had been. Less than an hour had gone by, but already the memories were beginning to grow hazy around the edges. I shook myself. “I’m fine, Marianne. I’m not hurt. Ivan can go boil his head for all I care.” I took a deep breath. “How are things with you?”
“I have been working very hard since last week,” said Marianne in her precise way. “You are a great teacher.”
Even in my fuzzy state, I was able to slam down on that. “The greatness is inside you,” I said. “It’s what our spirit guides will show us if we allow ourselves to look.”
“I’ve enjoyed journeying for myself, rather than expecting you to do all the work. I have met some helpful allies.”
“Good,” I said, trying to keep my mind on what she was saying, forcing Ivan straight to the back.
Marianne drew a notebook out of her bag. Although I had, of course, given her one of my stockpile when she first arrived, that had soon been substituted for a far more feminine version. Her book was bound in pink faux suede with a pattern of glass jewels on the cover and smooth, ivory pages between. I could see that she had made an abundance of notes since she was last here.
