The Liar’s Chair

by Rebecca Whitney

  Will grabs my hand and looks up. ‘Where are you going?’

  ‘Home.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘Because David will be angry.’

  ‘You don’t have to put up with his shit. Why don’t you leave him? You could if you really wanted to. I can help.’

  ‘What? Help me get away from David?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘You don’t understand. You have no idea what kind of man he is.’

  Will stands and paces a small line back and forth. ‘Well, maybe I do, maybe I know more about him than you think. What d’you imagine that bloke was talking about just now? Someone’s on my case, been putting out feelers as to where you go to on your nights off.’ He stops to look at me then paces again. ‘I’m one step ahead though.’

  ‘Why didn’t you tell me?’ I hug my waist, the temperature sucking from the room. ‘How close is David to finding us?’

  ‘Not very. There are enough people covering me for now, but I’ve only got so many favours to call in.’

  ‘When did you find out?’

  ‘About a week ago. I know people who know people. But like I said, I’m on it. Why do you think we met at a different pub last night?’ Will looks me straight in the eyes. ‘We could go, we could leave, together. Soon it will be too late.’

  ‘I don’t know.’ More breath than words come out of my mouth. ‘David will find me, I know him, he won’t give up.’ I move away from Will and look towards the door, then back to Will again. The customers in the launderette are watching and I drop my voice. ‘I’m scared.’

  ‘Then let me help you.’

  ‘How?’

  Will pulls me down on to his chair and kneels in front of me. ‘I’ve told you, down at the docks. It’s easier than you think to slip away, it happens all the time. Tell me that you want to and I’ll fix it.’

  In the corner the mother jiggles the buggy and the baby is quiet. The dryer pauses in its cycle and the man searches through coins in his palm to feed the machine. For one moment there is a brief and complete stillness. I think of David at home waiting; the habit of us, even though it’s painful, is like cement, and I can’t believe I’d ever be free of him. Then there is the possibility of a life with Will, the two of us grubbing away in the arse-end of God knows where. And lastly there’s the man whose life I took. He has no choices any more. Perhaps I shouldn’t either. Bad people get what they deserve.

  Tears rise in my throat but I won’t let them through. My voice is a whisper. ‘I’m sorry. I should never have come here, it was stupid of me.’ I push the hair back off my face with shaking fingers. ‘I can’t see you any more, it’s too risky for both of us. I have to go.’

  I stand and walk towards the exit as the dryer starts again.

  Will stands, grabs my arm and holds me as I pull away. His voice is low. ‘This is it, Rachel. I’m tired of this same argument – you’re always so cold – but I’m offering you a way out. Us together has become dangerous. If you feel the same way about me as I do about you, now is the time to leave. I’ve put myself on the line, but I won’t do it again. This is your last chance. You need to decide.’

  Without a second’s pause, I pull my arm from his grip and walk towards the door.

  Will calls after me: ‘Yeah, bugger off then. Remember, next time you come knocking, I won’t be here.’

  The underwear man looks up at me with a blank expression, as if this kind of heckling is a regular pastime in these parts. The door is stiff and I tug it a few times but it only opens a couple of inches.

  I hear Will behind me, opening the machine and clunking the door shut. ‘Fucking hell,’ he shouts. I turn to see him kick the machine. The metal shudders.

  ‘You need to push,’ underwear man says.

  With my shoulder, I release the door into the biting air, and my back prickles with the three pairs of eyes I sense are watching. Behind me, the door swishes back and forth, and the noise from the machines pulses through the gap. I get into my car. Before I start the engine a text comes through from David.

  ‘Baby, where are you? I need you. Something’s happened to the dogs.’

  13

  DOG FOOD

  As I open our front door, David rushes to me and throws his arms round my shoulders. His head is hot and his clothes are damp with sweat. For once his body odour is unchecked.

  ‘Rachel,’ he says, ‘I’ve been going out of my mind. The dogs, there’s been an accident.’

  ‘What’s happened?’ From somewhere inside the house come manic barks but I can’t see the animals.

  ‘Portia ran into the road. I think she’s OK. It’s Petra I’m worried about, she went after her and took the full impact of the van.’

  ‘Oh my God, why didn’t you take them to the vet’s?’

  ‘It’s only just happened. Stupid gate’s not working and they got out of the garden. I’ll sue the arse off whoever’s to blame.’ He grabs my hand and pulls me into the house. ‘They’ve been going crazy. I need your help to get them into the car.’ He leads me towards the kitchen. ‘I’m so relieved you’re home.’

  ‘David, I’m really sorry.’ Relief bubbles up. ‘I was scared to come back, I thought you’d be angry.’

  David stops and turns to me briefly. ‘You don’t need to be scared of me, baby.’

  The heating is up full blast. In the kitchen I pull off my jacket and throw it over a chair, and leave my bag on the table.

  ‘David, I want to explain, about last night.’

  ‘Don’t worry about that now,’ he says, pulling me towards the boot room. ‘There’ll be time later to sort everything out.’

  In the boot room, the two dogs are tied up. I expect to see blood but there’s none.

  Behind me, David backs away and locks the door. I swivel to see him on the other side, watching me through the glass panel at the top. His face is passive but he holds up the index and middle finger of one hand and points them towards his eyes, then he points the two fingers at me. He repeats this action several times before walking away.

  I run at the door, shaking the handle, but it won’t budge. As I stretch my neck, I see David leave the kitchen.

  ‘Let me out, David!’ I shout. ‘Don’t do this, please. I’m sorry.’ I bash my shoulder on the door as behind me the dogs bark louder, gasping at their leads as they try to leap away from the wall. I rattle the handle and kick but the door remains solid. ‘David. I can explain.’ The noise of his car starting up is just audible above the barking, and I press my ear to the door and listen as the engine recedes at a gentle pace. Then it’s gone.

  Through the glass I see my jacket on the chair, but my handbag has been taken and with it my phone. The call history’s been erased and the few photos I’ve taken have already been forwarded to my new private email before being trashed, so if anything David will be suspicious about my lack of activity if he checks my calls. Links to electronic phone bills are deleted as soon as I receive them. What can he do without evidence?

  I turn back to face the room and sink to the floor until I’m eye level with the dogs. Their barking whips the air. I cover my ears, but it does little to help. With my eyes shut I try to concentrate on a plan, and then remember that Seamus’s watch is also in my bag. David will have found it by now, he’ll be touching it, maybe turning it over in his hand before throwing it from the car. I am bereft, as if I’ve betrayed Seamus; I’ve handed him over to the enemy.

  The dogs snarl and I recognize their noise as hunger. I stand and edge round the room to the cupboards where the food is kept. Inside are three large tins and a bag of biscuits. Each dog-food tin has a label on it – ‘day 1’, ‘day 2’, ‘day 3’ – and the top of the biscuit bag has been rolled down to leave about enough for three days inside. No food has been left for me. I dish out the smallest portion for each of the dogs – the smell thick and sour, reminding me of an overcooked school dinner – and put the bowls in front of them, leaving the animals leashed. They chomp their food down in lumps
.

  Off to the right of the room is a small toilet and I try the door but it’s locked from the inside. I’d need a screwdriver to turn the latch from this side, but everything has been emptied from the drawers and cupboards. I use my nails, jamming them in the groove of the latch and twisting my fingers until they hurt. My thumbnail bends back and rips across the skin. Now the idea of the toilet is in my head, I need to go even more, and I cross my legs. There’s a large tray on the floor by the back door filled with litter. We got it from the vet when the dogs were puppies as they had to be kept in the house after they were spayed. It hasn’t been used for years. It’s clean and freshly laid. I listen again for David’s car. Only silence. He knows I’ll have to use the tray, but he doesn’t want to see his wife sink that low – that would put him off for good – and I have a small debt of gratitude for him sparing me this humiliation. Outside, it’s quiet. I take off my tights and pants, put them to one side, squat over the tray and piss. The dogs watch me. I stare back. ‘Fuck off,’ I say.

  The first day is long and I keep the dogs tied up for some of the time to have a break from their restless pacing. David has left the heating on, the thermostat probably up full as the room is baking, and I take off most of my clothes apart from my underwear and top, and make a bed out of the dogs’ blanket on the hard floor. My patch is on one side of the room, the dogs’ on the other. That night it’s hard to sleep as, without my drugs, the pain in my body finds new places to settle. I listen out for David’s car, even though I don’t really believe he’ll come home early; he’s set on his plan. David must have cancelled the cleaner and the dog walker, and the post is left at the gate. Only a fire would bring him home, and if there were matches I’d hold the flame up to the smoke detector which links directly to the emergency services, but the room has been cleared so thoroughly it’s as if we’ve moved out. I am sealed inside a box. I could starve and the dogs would eat me and no one would know, except that David has made me a deal of three days. Three days to prove to a woman that she is a dog.

  David hasn’t left the animals’ chews, so the dogs gnaw on their beds, grinding them with their teeth and leaving long scars on the plastic. When they get hold of my blanket they shred the quilted fabric, and feathers scatter across the floor. Once Portia and Petra sleep though, the silence is pure, and my heartbeat slows to a steady rhythm. That night there’s the occasional hoot of an owl. Two foxes fight like screaming babies. I’ve never taken the time before to notice that we have real wildlife in our garden, I’d assumed the grounds were as sanitized as the house.

  The next day when I wake, a small calm settles; with life reduced to basics and nothing expected of me, I become docile. Even the pain becomes bearable. From experience I’ve learnt it can be easier to allow the bad things to happen, like holding my breath under a passing wave. I slip into routine, creating a slow pace by measuring out the amount of time I have left, and the dogs’ feeding times help to punctuate the days. After their twice-daily frenetic leaps to get outside they seem resigned to the space, and sleep a lot. I follow their pattern. The litter tray is too small for them but they do their best, and at least David has left some plastic bags, though even these are rationed. There’s drinking water from the tap, but by the afternoon I’m so hungry that the dogs’ food begins to smell appetizing. I won’t eat the wet food though, and munch instead on a few biscuits, swilling my mouth out afterwards to get rid of the taste. It’s only meat and rice, I say to myself. I think of the starving dog at the caravan, its stomach aching for food, and how in my panic to get home I hadn’t stopped at the woods. Portia and Petra watch me and whimper as I pick morsels from the bag. I share some with them and they eat the biscuits, keeping their eyes trained on me, but their focus has softened. For the first time it seems as if we could be friends.

  Claire’s photo is still in my pocket, and when I take it out and look at her, she too seems trapped; my distant twin in a shutter of time. I try to imagine what she’s doing now. Sometimes I dream of Will touching me, and the sensation is so real I try to pinch myself in my sleep but my hands won’t move until I wake. When I come out of the dream, I remember Will’s anger, and how I’ve already cut my last tightrope to normality. Mostly, though, I dream of Seamus. He sits here in the boot room, one arm round each of our dogs, with his muddy laces skimming the ground. Water drips from his coat into a pool on the floor, as if he’s walked through a storm to get to me. Outside, the dog from the caravan leaps up at the window and scratches the glass with its paws. ‘It’s locked,’ I shout, but the animal keeps trying to get in. When I wake and open my eyes, the muddy prints remain on the window and Seamus is still in front of me, and it takes several blinks before his image disappears.

  On the evening of the third day, I pace the floor. The food has run out and the dogs are hyper having had no walks, so I tie them up and put their bed near the hooks on the wall. I use the washing-up liquid next to the sink to wash my face and hands but don’t bother with the rest of my body as there’s not even a towel in the room. The litter tray stinks; there’s so little that’s unsoiled. Hunger mixes with fear and becomes nausea. I bury my head under my blanket to stuff up the noise and wonder if, when David returns, this will be the end of my punishment, and what will have changed in my world when I emerge.

  In the evening when I finally fall asleep with my mother’s cover over my head, I dream of nothing. A big blank space. As dawn breaks and the dogs start up their usual barking, it’s like no time at all has passed since last evening. I pull the blanket tight round my ears, but after several minutes of their noise I wake fully. The animals seem unusually agitated, and I stand and peer through the door to the kitchen. Everything is the same apart from my handbag which sits on the table. I try the door. It’s open. I run into the house, and from the kitchen window see David’s Jaguar retreating at speed down the driveway. I check in my bag and my keys are still there. Even though I’m in my underwear, I grab the keys and race to my vehicle, firing up the engine and taking the car down to the metal gates which have wound shut behind David. A large stone sits in the middle of the driveway which David must have used to hold open the mechanism and enable his speedy escape. The gates shudder and whirr as they begin to reopen for me, but the action is in slow motion, and by the time I get through there’s no sign of David.

  The dogs’ fevered barks reach down the driveway. I reverse back up to the house. In the boot room I unclip the animals’ leads and let them out into the garden. Wind brushes through their coats like water, and I envy their seamless return to normality; they’ll need no decompression – next time they see David they’ll lick his hands and jump up as enthusiastically as if he’d never abandoned them. I check in my bag and find the envelope with exactly the same amount of cash in it as three days ago, plus my wedding ring from the garage; the band of gold now part of this transaction, the same bringing to heel as the constraints of poverty. My phone is inside, plus the remaining painkillers and a fresh tub of diazepam. In the zip pocket there’s the watch. Its glass face is scratched as if it’s been rubbed with wire wool, and the inscription on the back is erased by deep lines, the kind you’d make with a school compass. Claire’s words to Seamus, a daughter’s message to her father, gone. Did Seamus thank Claire for her gift? I think of her rushing to the letter box each morning to wait for his reply.

  The action of the watch’s winder is stiff as if it’s been forced, and I hold the timepiece to my ear then bang it against my palm a few times. It’s broken. At the kitchen sink, I dry-retch.

  Before I shower I clean out the litter tray, emptying the contents into a bin liner and pushing the sack to the bottom of the wheelie bin, replacing the older bags on top. After I’m clean and dressed, I get in my car and head to the office; it’s the only place David could be, he never misses a day of work. En route I rumble with what to say, rehearsing the accusations that will come out in front of the staff who’ll bear witness. When I finally reach the forecourt my whole body is shaking with the
story as if I’ve already delivered the news.

  I walk inside. The room hushes. Heads turn one by one. Kelly rushes to me and hugs me.

  ‘Rachel,’ she says, ‘I can’t believe you’ve come in.’

  I take a moment to process before replying. ‘No, nor can I.’

  ‘I mean, don’t you think you should take some more time at home?’

  ‘No, I want to be here.’

  Kelly releases me and lowers her voice. Heads crane over workstations.

  ‘I know what you’re going through,’ she says. ‘You shouldn’t be ashamed. It’s more common than you think.’

  ‘Really?’

  ‘Yes. But we’ve got everything covered here, so you can take it easy and not worry.’

  ‘Where’s David?’

  ‘Um, well, he’s in his office running through things with the new exec.’ She starts to gabble. ‘David’s so sweet, he’s had him lined up for weeks now, ever since he knew you were a bit . . . well, you just took on too much, didn’t you? That kind of pressure would make anyone a bit wobbly.’

  ‘David’s said I’m wobbly?’ My voice is a shout.

  Kelly looks towards the watching staff, grasping at them for help, but their eyes turn down. She angles her own head to the floor, starting a sentence, stopping, then coming forth with, ‘You know, sometimes the person who has the breakdown is the last to know they’re in trouble.’

  ‘I haven’t had a breakdown. David locked me in the fucking utility room.’

  Some of the staff are standing up now. Panic tracks across Kelly’s face. David told the one person in the office he knew would be unable to keep the secret.

  ‘We’re all here for you, Rachel,’ she says, reaching for my hand, but I pull it away. ‘You don’t need to be paranoid, we’re on your side.’