S K Paisley

by Take a Breath (epub)

  “I said, stop singing that FUCKING SONG!”

  He erupted from the doorway, fist smashing into her face, knocking her to the floor. She lay stunned as white lights flashed in front of her eyes. More kicks slammed into her body, each one knocking the wind out of her afresh. He stopped and she stayed curled in a ball, not moving a muscle, listening to the heavy thud of his feet as he stalked off to the living room. Her face ached and she was trembling so hard she didn’t know if she could get up.

  She lay there for a while, dazed, unable to fully comprehend what had happened. Then she heard him get up and walk to the bathroom. She heard the door shut. She waited some more to make sure he wasn’t coming back before she finally struggled to her feet, grabbed her jacket and stumbled to the front door. She undid the lock and ran outside into the spitting rain. Her weekly ticket was crumpled in her pocket; she fished it out and waved her hand at the oncoming bus. No one looked in her direction as she limped to a seat. Beneath the privacy of her hood, she forced back tears and tried to think of somewhere to go. She had only a little change. She couldn’t afford a room. Gillian still wasn’t talking to her. She didn’t have anyone else she could go to. Utterly helpless, she put in her headphones and lost herself in the music while the bus did one circuit and then another.

  Hours passed. By the time the bus had begun its third circuit, it was night-time. A different sort of crowd began to fill the seats and clog the aisle: people on their way to nights out in the city centre. Lena stared listlessly out the window and turned her music up higher, wishing for the power of invisibility, desperately trying to avoid unwanted attention.

  The bus grew hot and stuffy. An overpowering smell of sour milk mixed with damp wool choked the air. The window, clouded with condensation, became a mirror in which she was able to monitor the goings-on. A blur of faces and colours. The party already started for most of them. Singing and dancing, passing bottles and phone numbers. Her eye kept catching that of one man standing in the aisle. She turned to face him, looked away and then back, but his eyes didn’t move. She told herself it wasn’t her he was looking at, but when the seat beside her became vacant, in her peripheral vision she saw him move in beside her. She shrank into the window, suddenly aware that his body was blocking her exit. Even before he opened his mouth, she knew he was going to speak to her. He was close enough that she could smell the whisky. He whispered, “I’m undercover police. Is everything OK?”

  She turned round in alarm. “Fine.”

  Outside, the lights of George Square twinkled.

  “Are you sure? Have you got some place to go?”

  She looked at the faces around her, but no one else was watching them.

  His knee drew closer and touched hers. She jumped to her feet. Her legs were stiff from sitting in one position for too long but she still managed to hurdle his legs and join the stream of people pushing out into the street. She got off the bus and straightaway was hit by the wind and the rain. She pulled her hood up over her head so that only her eyes were peeping through.

  At the other side of the square was the bus she needed to take her in the direction of home. It was a couple of minutes to midnight. If she didn’t get on it, she would be stranded, her ticket invalid. Cutting through the traffic, she sprinted across the square, barging past screaming girls in miniskirts, drenched by the rain, and men staggering, one in a bloodstained shirt. Voices were shouting and debris littered the ground. She kept her eyes focused on the bus, narrowly missing colliding with a bare-chested man who’d stumbled into her path. Even when the bus flashed its indicator and pulled out into the traffic, she kept on going. But then it roared down the street and out of sight and she finally she gave up, stopped where she stood, her arms flailing in exasperation, tears welling in her eyes.

  The sound of smashing glass in close proximity made her flinch. She swung round to face the mayhem but instead found herself face to face with the man from the bus. He stopped still.

  “I just want to help,” he mouthed.

  For a second she was too stunned to react. Then, after two steadying breaths, she turned on her heel and began to run. She crossed the road without stopping. Wet tyres squealed to avoid her. From the other side, she turned back to find him still there, in close pursuit. She broke into a sprint, dodging through the crowds. Passing Central Station, the lines of people standing in taxi queues, she was directionless but unwilling to stop. Before she knew it, she was in the darkest part of town, heading down towards the Clyde. The rain was battering down. There were few cars on the road, only a handful of people on the pavements. She was alone. She had no place to go. No one to turn to. There was nowhere left to run.

  Slowing down, she jumped into the shelter of an empty shop doorway and searched the road behind her, her heart beating wildly in her chest. She couldn’t see him. But that didn’t mean he wasn’t there. Every corner, every darkened alleyway was a potential lair.

  An involuntary sob escaped her, a tiny plea absorbed by the night. Her eyes fell on the Anderston high-rises in the distance. An idea began to form. Not a very good one, but it was the only one she had.

  If she closed her eyes and walked as fast as she could, she would reach his door in five minutes. Only the underpass stood between her and the block of flats where she had to believe she would find help. She looked at it and shuddered to think what horrors lurked beneath it. She’d never even braved it in daylight. But reaching his flat became the goal that overrode all other thoughts. She had to try.

  With determination, she started along past the street walkers and kerb crawlers. She braced herself as she entered the dank shadows, too scared to breathe for fear of disturbing the dangers that lay within. Not wanting to run, draw attention. There were bodies huddled, wrapped in cardboard, but she paid them no heed and kept walking. Her footsteps crunched over glass, echoing loudly in her ears.

  When she emerged on the other side, she couldn’t shift the sickening thought that if she were a cat, she’d have just used one of her nine lives.

  Within a few steps she was at the edge of his courtyard.

  At the door she pressed his buzzer. Again and again. When she got no answer she whimpered in despair. There was nothing left for her to do. She’d come this far for nothing. In desperation she threw her weight against the door and heard it click open.

  Unwilling, too ashamed to go into those details, she kept it brief.

  “There was a fight and I can’t go home tonight.”

  “With your mum?”

  She shook her head and with sharp breaths the words ripped out of her throat. “Jason. Her boyfriend.”

  Paul put his arm around her shoulders. When she stared up at him she saw a strange expression cross his face. She mumbled some more incoherent words but he quieted her. He’d heard all he wanted to hear.

  “Don’t worry. Listen, I know why you came here. You don’t even need to ask. OK?”

  She looked up at him, half dazed.

  “I’m gonna sort this for you.” He smiled.

  She wasn’t sure what he meant, but it was exactly what she needed to hear. She didn’t see how much it moved him to have her tear-filled eyes sparkle up at him, showing a trust he had never known. She didn’t hear the pact he made with himself. The pact to never let anything bad happen to her ever again.

  Chapter Nine

  Paul offered to drive her home the following day. In the car, Lena stared at the passing streets so intently, she was startled when she felt Paul’s hand reach down and touch hers. He briefly took his eyes off the road and smiled.

  “Don’t worry.”

  Lena relaxed her hands. She realised she’d been wringing them tightly together. Now her nervous energy transferred to her feet, which began bouncing up and down, ruffling the supermarket plastic bag filled with her damp clothes. Paul’s sweatshirt and joggies swamped her, their dryness still a comfort, the chill of last night�
��s wind still deep in her bones. She pulled the oversized sleeves down over her hands to make a pair of gloves.

  Asking for help had not been easy but somehow he made her feel it had been the right thing to do.

  But he was still very much a stranger to her and she felt shy in front of him. Suddenly life was very serious. He’d scolded her for walking through the red-light district, for not calling her mum to tell her she was safe. There was no joking or flirting this time. Once he seemed satisfied that, other than a few cuts and bruises, she was going to live, he told her to get some sleep; he would drive her home in the morning. She crawled into the familiar bed and lay awake, waiting to see if he would get in too. After a while she drifted off to sleep. In the morning, momentarily confused by the strange bed, unfamiliar bed sheets, she crept next door to find Paul asleep on the couch.

  “Not yet.”

  They’d pulled up outside Lena’s house. She’d started to get out when Paul placed his arm in front of her, motioning her back. Lena followed his line of vision to two figures standing at the bus stop opposite her house. There was barely an acknowledgement as the two advanced towards them and then walked up the path to the door of her ground-floor cottage flat.

  She looked closer, “Isn’t that… William?”

  His companion was just as hard-looking, intent on trouble.

  “What’s going on?” she asked, panic creeping in.

  “Watch.”

  She saw her front door open and the two of them drag Jason out into the garden, which was shared with the upstairs neighbour. They pulled him onto the grass. Got him on his knees and proceeded to stomp and punch him. Jason was big, but his attempts at self-defence were futile against the two of them.

  Lena watched in horror as her mum came into the garden, screaming. The upstairs neighbour was at the window shouting about calling the police. Lena roused herself. She flashed Paul a pleading look as she got out of the car. “Make it stop.”

  A horn blasted behind her and William and his accomplice stopped the beating.

  Jason was holding his face. Through the bubbles of spittle and blood which had formed in the corner of his mouth, he spat out, “You’ve broke my nose.”

  “Next time it’ll be your legs if you lay a hand on her again.”

  Lena ran into the garden as they kicked him one last time in the face before casually sauntering through the gate. When she looked back, she saw that Paul’s car had already gone.

  Her mum helped Jason into the house, muttering, “No police.” She flashed a look over her shoulder at Lena. “I’ll deal with you later.”

  Lena guiltily followed the stooping pair into the house, along a trail of deep red droplets on the pathway. She felt nauseous. Jason and her mum took a taxi to the hospital. Lena stayed in alone.

  That night, Jason packed his bags and left. Lena listened from her room to the muffled cries and arguments and pleadings. She couldn’t bear to look him in the face. His broken face. When she heard the door close she crept out of her room. Her mum was sitting in the living room at the dining table with her head in her hands.

  “Mum?” She was barely even whispering. “Mum.”

  “What are we going to do now? How are we going to make the rent now?”

  Lena knew he didn’t help with the rent, but it helped her mum to pretend that he did. She had no response for her. Nothing was the right thing to say. She’d watched his jaw shatter.

  At midnight Lena sneaked stealthily downstairs. Her mum was sleeping, curled up on the couch, an empty bottle of supermarket own-brand vodka lying beside her. Lena drew a blanket over her shoulders and gently shook her. When she didn’t wake up, Lena tiptoed to the mantelpiece and took five pounds from her purse. If her mum noticed, she would say Jason took it. Then she quietly left through the front door, closing it softly behind her.

  When she reached the main road it didn’t take long to hail a taxi.

  “The Anderston high-rises, please.”

  She could see the taxi driver eyeing her suspiciously in the mirror and remembered that her cheek was still shaded with a deep purple shadow, a swollen lump still protruding from her lower lip.

  She took the now familiar journey up to Paul’s flat and knocked on his door. From the light underneath she guessed he was home. She heard feet padding towards the door and could tell someone was looking at her through the peephole. Fingers fumbled at the lock and then came the rattle of the chain being taken off. Paul appeared, in a rumpled T-shirt and jeans, his hair dishevelled.

  “What do you want, Lena?” he asked in a tone that made her defensive.

  He glanced back over his shoulder. She looked too. She started to speak when a female voice from inside the flat interrupted.

  “Paul? Who is it, Paul?”

  “It’s no one. Just give me a minute,” he shouted back. Stepping out into the corridor, he closed the door till only a chink of light escaped.

  No one? thought Lena.

  “Is something wrong?”

  “No…” She’d lost her bearings. She wasn’t sure how to respond. “I just came… I wanted to tell you that Jason left.”

  “Good. I thought he might.”

  She desperately wanted to fill the silence, to prolong the conversation, even though in her heart she knew it was already over.

  “I didn’t get a chance to thank you. When I ran out of the car… I didn’t want you to think I was ungrateful.”

  “I didn’t think that.”

  A long silence lingered as Lena slowly melted inside.

  “Look, Lena—”

  She interrupted him, “Can I come in?”

  He exhaled loudly, rubbing one eye with his hand, watching her with the other. “I’m sorry. I don’t think that’s a good idea.”

  “Paul!” the voice called from inside, more urgently than before. “Paul!” The voice grew steadily louder as its owner approached the door. She was wearing a Chinese-style dressing gown, her hair swept high in a loose bun, sparkly earrings dangling to her shoulders. Her curvaceous hips swung with attitude. She looked Lena up and down with disapproval then turned to address Paul.

  “You’ve not started pimping while I’ve been away, have you?”

  “Shut up! She’s my little cousin.” He sounded angry.

  The girl eyed Lena suspiciously, a laughing glint in her eye. “She doesn’t look like your little cousin.” Her head nodded from side to side and she jutted out her chin when she spoke.

  “Just get the fuck inside. I said give me a minute.”

  “Don’t think I’m gonna wait all night.”

  She gave Lena one last disparaging look before turning provocatively like a lazy cat and disappearing down the hallway. “And don’t let all the cold air in.”

  The strong scent of her perfume lingered around the doorstep after she’d left.

  “C’mon.” Paul sighed as he pulled his jacket from the hook just inside the door and slipped on his shoes. He closed the girl in and walked towards the lift. Lena had no choice but to follow. They didn’t speak on the way down or when they stepped out into the cold night. The white clouds of their breath danced around in complicated swirls.

  He held out his arm and as a taxi pulled up he turned to her with a smile, ignoring her wounded, imploring stare.

  “You need to go home. This isn’t the place for you. Make it up with your maw. She cares enough to bring the polis to my door.”

  He held open the door and Lena stepped inside. Taking out his wallet, he paid the driver in advance. She had nothing to say any more. She didn’t care if she looked crushed. As the taxi pulled away, she swung around for one last look, one last chance to capture his image, to store every detail of him in her memory. But he had already walked away.

  When she got home, her mum was still sleeping soundly on the couch. The cover had fallen off. Before going to b
ed, Lena pulled it back over her shoulders and gave her a kiss on the cheek.

  Chapter Ten

  Paul was sweating; the atmosphere was stale and muggy. The sun was beginning to set, casting an orangey-red hue over the living room. Annie had his wallet in her hand. She made a show of rifling through it. Whatever pantomime she was putting on, Paul didn’t want to give her the satisfaction of being the participating audience. He watched mutely as she pulled out a card and twirled it through her fingers, like a magician preparing to make it disappear.

  “Funny what you can find out about a person by going through their wallet. It’s a bit like mind-reading. ‘Criminal Justice Social Worker’?” she read aloud, holding up a card.

  “Let me go,” Paul said as she delved in again, taking out bits and pieces, commenting, and putting them back.

  “Casino membership. RBS gold card. Bet that impresses the ladies.” She smiled and raised her eyebrow. “Expired. Driver’s licence…” She looked from the picture to Paul, to the picture again and shook her head. “Thirty-three. Life’s been tough on you.”

  Next she took out a small, passport-sized photo, bringing it up near her nose for closer inspection. “And who’s this?” She turned it to face him.

  Paul looked at the broad, trusting smile of the boy in the picture, almost a carbon copy of an image he’d once seen of himself at that age, except the boy had his mother’s eyes. He wanted to tear it from her hands.

  “Put it back.”

  Annie wasn’t listening. She’d taken a bent and damaged picture from his wallet and was studying the dog-eared Polaroid; the image was faded and cracked, a matrix of thin white veins spreading across it. Her fingers clasped the corners.

  Even though it had been years since he’d looked at it, Paul knew every line, every shade. He followed Annie’s eyes as they took in Lena’s nubile beauty, her cherubic face scrunched into a tantalising pout. Her arms pressed together to exaggerate her bosom. So heartbreakingly open; bewitching. In that perfect moment, her entire personality had been captured. Paul could see the photo was too discoloured to convey how bright the sun had been that day. Glasgow had shone like an emerald, the trees fat with an abundance of lush green leaves. He could see it now, so clearly, that buoyant spring day, almost two years to the day since he’d first met her.