by Jo Jakeman
I hadn’t meant to hurt him. Not like that. When he came round he would be furious with me, and I would have more than a torn earlobe and barbed comments to worry about. I had to buy time. I had to keep us safe until he’d calmed down, until I knew he could be trusted, until I knew he couldn’t go back on his promises.
I rushed back up the stairs and out to the shed. I didn’t know how long he would be unconscious for. I found a climbing rope, an old set of Phillip’s handcuffs with the key taped to the cuff and a bike lock. I ran back to the cellar.
His outstretched leg reached up the bottom three steps. I clicked one cuff around his ankle. It wasn’t long enough for me to attach his leg to the radiator without me lifting or dragging all unresponsive thirteen stone of him. I uncoiled the bike lock. It was heavy in my hand, and long enough to chain all three of our bikes together on the few times we’d been out as a family. I threaded it through the cuff that wasn’t on Phillip’s ankle and strained to make it click shut behind the radiator. I rattled the radiator to check it wasn’t going to come off the wall. Solid. I was beginning to be thankful that Phillip had spent so much on remodelling the cinema room.
I tied Phillip’s wrists together using the blue climbing rope and covered him with a blanket from the sofa. When he woke up he would see that I wasn’t being cruel, just practical. I nudged him with my foot and he groaned lightly. I walked round him and pushed him with a bit more force.
‘Phillip?’
His breathing was steady but he still wasn’t conscious. I patted him down as if I was in an American cop film. I found his mobile, wallet and the keys to my house and held them to my chest.
‘Can you hear me? I didn’t plan this. You were meant to stick to your end of the bargain and then leave. But now look what’s happened. You wouldn’t have fallen if you hadn’t attacked me, and I wouldn’t have shut you in here in the first place if you hadn’t attacked Naomi. I hope you can hear me, Phillip.’ I crouched over his body and touched his face where the slightest hint of stubble grazed his chin. ‘Because you are about to find out that your actions have consequences.’
NINE
11 days before the funeral
Panic, like an arrow in my chest, woke me before Alistair stirred. I couldn’t remember falling asleep. I was on the sofa and the early-morning light was pushing its way between the wooden shutters, casting piano keys across the floor. I could see the cellar door from where I lay. Still closed. Still locked.
Still silent.
The clock ticked loudly, providing the beat for the day. Hands jerked past 5 a.m. Scant sounds of life from outside: a door slamming; an engine starting; a dog barking. Someone dragging bins out to the side of the road. Ordinary people just starting their ordinary day. But no sound came from the cellar.
My neck ached and my cheek was wet with drool. I was wearing yesterday’s clothes and could smell my own breath. I sat up and reached for the wine glass on the table, which still held an inch of ruby liquid. There was a small black fly floating on the surface. I prodded at it until it stuck to my finger. I flicked the black body away and downed the wine in one gulp. Waste not, want not.
I called work early, so that I would have the benefit of lying only to an answer machine. I borrowed Naomi’s migraine for the day and it fitted me perfectly. I pulled on a clean pair of jeans that were hanging onto their knees by a thread, and a baggy black jumper that I’d always hated. I fussed Alistair into his uniform and out of the house without even passing the cellar door.
‘But, Mummy, I haven’t had any breakfast.’
‘Just do as I say for once,’ I snapped.
His eyes watered, the hurt pooling into thick tears, and I pulled him into me and kissed his messed-up hair.
‘Sorry, sweetie, Mummy’s tired. We’re having a special treat, okay?’
With over an hour to fill, we took the long route through the park. Rowers were already out on the river, slicing through the water and making us feel cumbersome in comparison. We nodded to the runners and the dog walkers while the cathedral bells rolled over the morning to softly cuff our ears.
We stopped at Bakin’ & Eggs, for beans, sausage and toast. It was too early in the year to brave an outdoor table, but we did it anyway. I buttoned up my yellow jacket and sipped my extra-large coffee with the extra shot of caffeine, and the extra sugar hit of caramel syrup. Alistair drank milky, sweet tea and swung his legs in time to a song in his head.
I scanned the park for anyone looking at me, like I was a crazy woman who had a man tied up in her cellar, but they were all intent on stirring their teas and eating their breakfast cobs, or power-walking and petting their dogs.
Alistair talked about the everythings of life – the when-I-grow-ups and the big-picture he was yet to paint. It was up to me to make sure that the future was as open to him as any dream had a right to be. Pave the way. Remove obstacles. Suddenly school seemed trivial, play much more important.
This new version of me – the one who locked her ex in the cellar – considered letting Alistair stay off school and have a day of building dens and telling stories, but the old me gave us one of her looks and I returned our plates to the café and skipped him off to school. I hugged and held him until he wriggled to be free of me and left me with nothing else to do except return home.
The sun, which had dominated the sky not an hour ago, was smothered by a smooth cloud-blanket. I had to tighten my eyes against the grey glare to look towards home. My house was the same shade of non-colour as the sky, but the front door was a dangerous red. There were no swirling storm clouds gathering overhead, nor a murder of crows screeching out, ‘He’s here, he’s here!’ It still looked like an ordinary house on an ordinary street, owned by a sub-ordinary woman, and a passer-by would be forgiven for not noticing the dungeon-like qualities of the lower floor.
I pretended to fumble in my bag for my keys, listening for a sound from within. Through the glass panel I peered into the hallway. As far as I could tell, the cellar door was still closed. I glanced behind me and saw Mary, my neighbour, with her hand on the net curtain. I waved my keys at her and unlocked the door, closing it softly behind me.
The morning sun hadn’t penetrated the cool hallway, so I kept my hated-by-Phillip jacket on as I shuffled to the cellar door.
I leaned my forehead and palm against it, trying to picture him. There was still no sound. He was breathing when I left him. I knew he was.
It was self-defence, I swear.
I opened the cellar door, slowly took a deep breath and stepped inside. I thought I heard a rustling, like someone scratching their head.
‘Phillip?’
He grunted.
Thank God.
My shoulders relaxed and my breathing slowed.
‘Would you like a drink?’
His voice, when it came, was calm and quiet, but his words leaned against each other lazily.
‘Ifsnot too much trouble, I’d like a cupperty.’
I found the polite self-control more alarming than if he had shouted and sworn.
‘Sure. One minute.’
I made him coffee instead.
I took it down on a tray with aspirin, a bottle of water laced with sleeping tablets, and two slices of toast topped with his least-favourite spread.
He was lying on the sofa with his head on the cushions and his cuffed leg on the arm closest to me. The handcuffs were still on his ankle, with the other end threaded through the bike lock, which, in turn, was attached to the radiator, but his wrists were untied and the rope was coiled at the floor by his side.
‘Oh,’ I said.
‘You never could tie knots.’
His voice was still calm, as if this was a normal situation.
I put the tray on the small white table, just out of his reach. It was colder in the cellar than upstairs. The small radiator hadn’t been used in months. I could do something about that, if I wanted to; but I didn’t. Phillip had spent thousands turning our small, dank cellar into the c
inema room of his dreams. A projector was trained against one smooth white wall, and there was a sofa and one armchair. All the walls were white, the furniture was tan leather with blue cushions. Minimalist and male. At one time he’d had shelves lined with action figures, though he told me these were limited-edition collector’s items, not toys. They’d gone with him to The Barn, along with some of his films and the rest of his paraphernalia that I could never get excited about.
‘Is that Marmite?’ he asked, sitting up and shuffling to the edge of his seat.
‘Yep.’
‘I hate Marmite.’
‘Do you? I must’ve forgotten.’
He was sleepy, eyes still half-closed, hair sticking up on one side, the shadow of a bruise on the left side of his face. It was fresh, a few hours old, and must have happened when he fell down the stairs. His stubble came high up on his cheeks, dark and thick, out of place on his usually smooth face.
‘How’re you feeling?’ I asked.
‘Like I drank a bottle of cheap wine and fell down the stairs.’
He lurched at me, without warning, but I stepped backwards and his fingers only brushed my hip. I was on my guard.
‘Now then …’ I said.
I gave a quiet nasal laugh that betrayed my nerves, but Phillip didn’t smile.
‘You do remember, don’t you, that there’s the camping toilet behind the wall? The bike lock should be long enough to—’
‘Jesus, Imogen, I can’t believe you’ve chained me up.’
‘I know. No one’s more surprised than I am,’ I said. ‘I didn’t know what else to do.’
I sat down in the armchair and crossed my legs, forcing myself to loosen up.
‘You could have not chained me up,’ he said, and then added, ‘like a normal person.’
‘Normal,’ I said. ‘Not a word I’d apply to either of us. Sometimes you have to think outside the box.’
‘There’s a difference between outside the box and outside the boundaries of sanity.’
He grimaced as he reached for the aspirin and swallowed two down without water. I looked at the water bottle, wondering whether he knew what I’d done to it; whether he could tell.
‘You should drink the water,’ I said. ‘Keep hydrated.’
‘I’m touched that you should care,’ he said with a sneer.
The overhead light was unflattering, casting his face into shadows as dark as his eyes.
‘Why the hell have you cuffed me?’
‘I didn’t fancy being attacked again. I’ll let you go, as soon as you agree to my terms.’
‘Assault,’ he said. ‘Unlawful imprisonment.’
‘What are you doing?’
‘Attempted murder, kidnap.’
‘Phillip …’
‘Just thinking about what they’ll charge you with.’
‘You’re not making me want to let you go,’ I said.
His bonds were only physical. I knew he could still reach me with his words, if he wanted to. He used them as others would use a knife. A thousand small surface cuts to weaken you, an unbearably painful lattice hidden beneath an outfit of normality, chafing when you moved.
‘You’ve made your point,’ he said. ‘Unchain me and I’ll give you an extra month in the house.’
‘It’s not about the house, Phillip.’
He rolled his eyes at me.
‘And you can keep custody of Alistair, of course,’ he said.
‘I’ll need that in writing.’
‘You can take my word,’ he said.
‘I won’t fall for that again.’
Creased, puffy bags hung beneath husky-blue eyes. They were dusted grey and purple. The whites of his eyes reminded me of the beige paint on the walls of the hallway. Something was eating away at him, and I didn’t think it was just because he was in the cellar.
I clenched and unclenched my toes. Concentrated on the rug beneath my feet. Made myself calm.
Breathe in.
Breathe out.
‘Why do you want me out of the house?’ I asked.
He shook his head and looked away.
‘Fine,’ I said as I stood up. ‘I know you’re up to something, Phillip. I’m not letting you go until you agree to my terms. And if I’m going to let you see more of Alistair, I’m going to need assurances that you won’t hurt him.’
‘I’ve never laid a finger on that boy, and you know it.’
‘The things you say wound as much as the things you do. You’ve hurt him in ways he will never recover from. Remember that time you shouted at him until he wet himself?’
‘Bloody delusional, you are.’
Phillip had a way of making me doubt myself, but I knew the truth.
Alistair had been four years old. He had done something – a something that may as well have been a nothing. Crayoned on the wall maybe or, I don’t know, forgotten to wash his hands before dinner. It didn’t warrant the strength of the reaction from his father. Phillip was furious. Shouting so much that spittle formed at the sides of his mouth and his cheeks were rage-reddened. He stood Alistair on the table, so that they were eye-to-eye, and he bellowed. He yelled at him until Alistair cried and called out for me. I stood on the fringes, wanting to go to him, but Phillip stretched out his arm and kept me back. He roared and shouted vile things about disappointment and embarrassment, told Alistair how everyone laughed at him for his babyish ways and his pathetic attempts to join in with the grown-ups.
I watched a dark line thicken Alistair’s trouser leg. Phillip curled his lip and told him he was a disgusting little baby, a pathetic little boy, he was ashamed to call him his son. I shouldered Phillip aside, scooped Alistair up and ran with him to the toilet. I felt warm liquid on my side and I loathed my husband at that moment. I remember the rush of earnest, handcrafted hatred and the liberation of being able to feel anything at all. I had been so unhappy for so long that it had been preferable to feel nothing at all than to be wounded anew every day. This new brand of hatred demolished the wall, and I could see a light shining some way off. Little did I know that light was called Naomi.
No amount of shush-shushes and there-theres would calm my baby and I slept in his bed with him that night, for my benefit more than his.
It was the first time I had openly disobeyed Phillip.
‘Come to bed.’
‘No.’
‘I mean it, Imogen.’
‘Screw you!’
Two weeks later he moved in with Naomi. My only regret was that I hadn’t kicked him out sooner.
Once, Phillip had been my saviour. He’d promised freedom from my pedestrian life, but he rescued me from one tower just to lock me up in another. He had appeared before me smelling of cigarettes and pay packets and talking of the police force and ‘protecting people’. He talked about his vision for the future. He’d been married before, but it had been a mistake, a young and foolish accident. The wife was a cold fish, an old fish, and she liked dogs more than kids, and all he wanted was a big family some day and a wife he could take care of.
He told me about his wife, Ruby; how he hadn’t laid eyes on her in years but was trying to track her down and ask for a divorce. The girlfriends he’d had since the breakdown of his marriage had meant nothing, until he met me.
He understood what it was like to lose a parent. He’d experienced the same. His father died when he was only eleven. Snap. He had no siblings. Snap. He was alone. Snap. But not any more. We marvelled at fate for bringing together two such damaged people who deserved happiness and love.
My father, Andrew Stanley Neville Winston Joyce, exited my life when I was nine years old. He had been named after a series of Conservative Prime Ministers. The first, Andrew Bonar Law, was Prime Minister for just two hundred and nine days. Andrew Joyce was my father for just three thousand, four hundred and thirteen days.
After he died, I misplaced a part of me. One day I was happy and whole, a confident child who no more thought about death than walking on the moon. But t
he next, I grew silent and scared. Phillip became that missing piece. With him in my life, everything started to work again; to make sense.
I could trace my triskaidekaphobia back to Father’s death. He died on the thirteenth; there were thirteen white roses blooming over the love-seat; thirteen stones in the duck pond; thirteen ripe tomatoes on the plants in the green-house. Only thirteen people attended his funeral, and that included Mother, Aunty Margaret and me. I cried for him thirteen times a day – the exact number of times a day that Mother cursed him.
I counted the olives into a Greek salad: twelve or fourteen, but never in between. The volume on the car stereo was never at thirteen. I knew that logically there was no reason for this. But what if there was something in it? A slight chance? The smallest of chances? Would it hurt anyone if there were only twelve olives in the salad?
The 13th August was the last day that my father had witnessed both sunrise and sunset. It had been a gloriously hot one that melted pavements and tricked eyes into believing the world above the road was shimmering. The sun stung the backs of legs and the music from the ice-cream van had children streaming onto the street like ants onto a dropped lollipop. I knew it was a scorcher when Dad stripped to his vest in the garden and rolled up his trouser legs. He clucked over the tomato plants and said they’d need watering more than once this day, but the hosepipe ban was in force and he’d have to trek backwards and forward with his green watering can. We had one bottle of elderflower cordial left over from the previous year’s bounty and I sucked it delicately through a striped straw, like it was nectar.
The twins from across the road came over to play that day. They were two years younger than me, but seemed to know much more than I ever would. Our hands were sticky with melted popsicle and our summer skirts were tucked into our knickers as we lay on the picnic blanket, talked about music and read Nicola’s copy of Are You There, God? It’s Me, Margaret. Mother thought it was good for young girls to be reading books about religion. She’d not heard of the book’s author, or that the local library had banned her books. Mother’s ignorance was my bliss.
