by Matt Shaw
Stop being stupid.
It won’t happen.
Tired.
Letting my imagination get carried away with itself. Everything will be fine.
“You’ll be okay,” I tell myself out-loud, breaking the silence of the room.
The uncomfortable silence.
At least soon I’ll be able to share comfortable silences with Darren again. Just the two of us. Perhaps we could just get out of the house - surely dad was worth some kind of insurance money. Surely mum and I are entitled to some sort of pay out.
A lump sum won’t erase memories but will serve some purpose to build new ones.
Would they pay out, though, if he was murdered?
After what I’ve been through, it’s hard not to look at the negative implications of everything. Don’t think about it. Just think about being in Darren’s loving arms again. Will he still want to be with me? The last time we spoke - I was a bitch. Have I pushed him away?
And if I haven’t - I still want an abortion. Get rid of this thing. This reminder to what my dad has put me through. This reminder to what I’ve done to my dad.
Get rid.
We’re young - Darren and I - lots of opportunities to start a family in the future.
Lots of opportunities and, hopefully, nicer circumstances.
As soon as I’m out, I’ll call him.
Hopefully he’ll meet me at the hospital. They might let him stay the night with me. Help me feel more secure. Help me feel safer.
Hopefully.
They’ll be here soon.
They’ll let me out of these restraints, ensure I’m okay and probably take me to the hospital to keep an eye on me for the night - make sure I really am okay.
How long has it been now?
It feels as though hours have passed. I expect it’s only minutes in truth.
Panic.
Did mum call for help?
Is she okay? I can’t hear her upstairs. I would have thought she would have yelled to me that everything was okay and help was on their way.
I’ve heard nothing.
No scream of pain from stabbing herself. No thump from if she had fallen to the floor unconscious. No movement.
Movement.
Surely, from down here, I would have heard her dragging her body over to the telephone on the kitchen wall. Surely, she would have stabbed herself first to make sure she actually went through with it. Would have been hard to explain to the police after they burst in only to find she was still trying to summon the courage to go through with it; sticking the knife in her stomach.
“MUM?” I called out.
Maybe the floorboards are so thick I wouldn’t hear anything?
No.
I know I would.
I heard him walking around, before now, and he wasn’t exactly being heavy-footed.
I listened out - no reply.
“MUM?”
Listen.
Nothing.
“MUM - ARE YOU OKAY?!”
Was he really dead?
What if he was just unconscious - she went to check his body and get the knife and he suddenly sprung up and killed her? And, no.... now she is sat upstairs bleeding out.
No help is coming.
She’s dead.
He’s dying.
And I’m trapped.
Panic.
“MUM!!” The loudest I have ever screamed before.
No answer.
I feel my eyes begin to well up.
No, don’t be stupid. It’s not that bad. Everything is fine. Help is coming. Keep telling yourself so.
Help is coming.
Help is coming.
Help is coming.
She’s not answering because she can’t hear you - or because she can’t shout as loud with a knife-wound, even a small wound to the stomach would stop her from being able to strain to call back... and definitely stop her from coming down the stairs.
It’s fine.
As fine as it can be, at least.
Help is coming.
Help is coming.
Help is coming.
But...
No.
No ‘but’.
Help is coming.
It’s just the darkness of the room. The darkness playing tricks on your mind. Everything is going to be fine. In nothing more than a couple of hours, you’ll be tucked up in a hospital bed surrounded by loved ones and people who want to ensure you are okay.
I go to call out for mum again but stop myself. If she is up there, hurt, the cries for help will just upset her because she won’t be able to get to me.
Everything will be fine.
I hope.
My mind skips, again, to what will happen to mum. She didn’t kill dad. I did. It was me. I shouldn’t have let her take the blame for it. Will she go to jail? I need her. This isn’t her fault. It’s his fault.
Everything is his fault. What happened to me. What happened to him. All his fault. I hope they treat mum as a hero, instead of a murderer. I couldn’t bear it if they took her away from me.
Even though, deep down, I know she was part of this - on some level - I can’t lose both of my parents.
I can’t.
Stop worrying about it.
Everything is going to be okay.
It’s a good story. He took me. He went to get her on side. She freaked out. A fight broke out. He came off worse. They’ll believe it.
Soon.
Everything will be over.
Help is coming.
3.
I wake with a start and jump, again, when I see mum stood above me - holding a tray out in front of her. Don’t remember falling asleep, must have drifted off.
At first, in my confused state, the tray doesn’t even sink in.
“What time is it? I asked.
“Morning time,” she said. Her voice was cold and hostile. Bags under her eyes. Blood on her top.
“Are the police coming?”
She leant forward, with the tray, and rested it over me.
Food?
“What’s this?” I asked.
“Breakfast. Eat up.”
“I don’t understand.”
“Breakfast - the most important meal of the day.”
“You said....”
“I know what I said. Now eat up before it gets cold.”
“I feel sick.”
Not sure if that’s at the thought of what is happening or because of the pregnancy.
“Eat!”
“You were going to call for help... you said...”
“They’d have never believed that story. You’ve ruined it. Ruined it for all of us.”
“No, I haven’t....”
“You killed my husband!”
“My dad! You said....”
“Forensics.... they’d prove I didn’t kill him. They’d show you as the killer. You’d go to prison... do you really want to go to prison?”
“No but....”
“You’d go to prison, no doubt I’d go down as well as they’d find evidence I had been here too.... he’s dead and we’d both rot in prison. Although, I’d be out sooner as I’m not a murderer like you....”
Tears.
I don’t understand.
It’s too much for me to cope with.
I turned my head to the left and vomit down the side of the mattress. The smell and taste of the sick make me heave again and I can’t help but throw up once more.
“Well, that won’t be pleasant to lie in all day.”
“Please...”
“You ruined it. Everything would have been fine had you not killed him.... he had let you out of here. He trusted you. He loved you...”
“No, he didn’t. He wouldn’t have put me here if he loved me.”
“He put you here because he loves you. He didn’t want you to lose your child like we lost ours.”
What? What child... I didn’t say anything. Just looked at mum. She looked annoyed at herself - like she had said t
oo much.
“What do you mean?” I asked.
“Nothing.”
“You -”
She cut me off again, “He put you here so you didn’t make a decision you’d live to regret. He was doing you a favour. And you’ve ruined it. I can’t let you out now. I can’t trust you.... I can’t trust you won’t turn on me like you turned on him....”
“I won’t...”
“And no doubt you said that to him too. No, you’ll stay in this room... it’s over for both of us. There’s no turning back. I’m not going to prison. You’re not going to move on from this. You’ve ruined it for us. You’ve ruined your own life with your selfishness.”
Can’t stop crying now. Please stop. Be strong. Keep telling yourself...
Help is coming.
Help is coming.
No help is coming.
No one is coming.
No one.
I’m alone.
“Please let me out.... Please....”
“No.”
She back away from the bed as she caught a whiff of the sick.
“You said everything will be okay...”
“And it will be. For the baby. It’s the only one who will come out of this at the other end unaffected. It’s the one who will get over this and go to live a normal, happy life. It’ll probably never even know of this. Probably never know you killed it’s father.”
“What? He was my father...”
“And you killed him...”
“He’s not the baby’s father!”
“That’s not what the baby will think. I’m it’s mother and Bryan was it’s dad.”
“Well, what am I?”
“You’re ruined.”
“Please, don’t say that.”
“There, there.... everything will be okay.”
“Stop it.”
“Everything will be fine.”
“Stop it.”
“Mummy make it better for you...”
“STOP IT!”
She turned away and walked towards the stairs, “I suggest you try and eat some of your breakfast. It’s going to be a long stay.”
And with that she walked up the stairs, closing the cellar door behind her.
With the exception of my sniffling, I’m in silence again.
What have I done.
I’ve killed one monster just to awaken another.
I should have killed myself.
There’s still time.
4.
The house is quiet.
I used to like quietness as it gave me time to study for my classes. The slightest bit of noise would easily distract me from what I was trying to learn. Always happy to learn but never happy to waste an evening with a work-book.
I don’t like this type of quiet, though. I don’t like it at all.
I miss people talking.
I miss hearing the television from the other room.
I miss hearing the clitter clatter of pans and saucers from the kitchen where mum would be preparing our dinner.
I even miss the sounds from outside whether it be people playing in the streets, cars going past or birds singing in a summer’s evening.
I miss it all.
Funny what you miss when it’s gone.
Knowing how things have turned out - I even miss my dad.
At least, with him, I had the opportunity to walk around the house and do as I pleased. Now, I’m stuck. Tied to a bed. A mattress covered with vomit and piss in a musty room with air already stale.
I imagined Hell to be a fiery pit with tormented souls flying around - all groaning in their individual despair. I never thought Hell would look like a dark cellar with a mattress in it and yet - that’s exactly where I am.
Hell.
I’m surprised dad isn’t down here with me - strapped to another bed on the other side of the room - taunting me.
I’ve been crying for the past hour now.
All cried out.
On one hand I feel better for not crying - my eyes and nose sore from the experience. On the other hand - at least crying gave me something to do. Now I’m just here - on the bed - with nothing to do. Nothing in here to take my mind from what’s happening.
No point calling out to talk to mum. I doubt she’d come and, if she did... I doubt she’d say anything I’d want to hear. I believed her yesterday. The words she spoke. Her plan. Believed everything.
Stupid.
That must have been how dad felt as I stabbed him. How could he have been fooled into that... I guess that’s Karma - right back at me.
I pulled on the cuff-restraints seeing if there was any give on them.
None what-so-ever. Pulling against them will only hurt my wrists, no point.
I wonder, how did mum think I’d eat my breakfast with both wrists cuffed? Lean over and eat it off the plate like a dog eating from a bowl? Does she hate me that much now?
The more I think of her and this whole fucked up mess.... was she just pretending to be the caring one? Dad coming across as the one in charge to shake me up more, so I’d play along like a good girl and mum being the nice one - complete role reversal to how they treated me growing up.
I wish I could shut my brain off.
I’m fed up with thinking about everything now. It serves me no purpose other than to give me a headache. It’s not as though thinking about it suddenly frees me from my restraints or teleports me back to my old house or the arms of Darren.
Darren.
I guess he’s not coming now.
Now?
He was never coming. Did I really think anything else? Did I really believe they were going to bring him here? He would have gone to the police, for sure. I was stupid, again, to think he’d be invited to stay.
Hindsight is a wonderful thing.
As is sleep.
I feel tired.
Probably the stress I’m under.
Stress causing sleepiness and my stomach to ache and cramp.
I wonder if mum would bring me a hot water bottle.
* * * * *
“How are you feeling?”
I wake with a start. Mum’s stood at the foot of the bed.
“How are you feeling? she asked again.
The way her gaze is transfixed by my stomach, I presume she isn’t asking about my well-being because she’s concerned about me as such.
“Well?”
How am I supposed to answer? For weeks now I haven’t felt myself; stomach pains, headaches, dizziness and an emotional wreck. But, even if I wasn’t pregnant - I’d probably be experiencing all of this because of what’s happening.
Having said that, if I wasn’t pregnant.... I wouldn’t be here.
“We need to find out how far you’re gone,” she continued.
In truth, I don’t know how far I’ve gone. Even if I did - I wouldn’t want her to know anyway. I don’t want to be helpful. She isn’t exactly helping me. When I didn’t answer, she leant forward and pressed her hand against my stomach. Is that a faint smile on her face?
“Why are you doing this?” I asked, eventually.
My sudden question must have taken mum by surprise. She looked startled before she composed herself and moved away from my tummy.
“You know why,” she said as she stood up straight.
“I don’t,” I said. “You should be supporting my decision.”
“You don’t know what you’re doing,” she suddenly hissed. “Why would we stand back and support a decision which is so wrong?”
“Because I’m your daughter,” I wept.
