Good Me Bad Me(39)

‘What would you say now to your younger self that would have comforted you then?’

‘I don’t know.’

‘You have to try. What would you have liked to hear?’

That I was different from you.

‘That one day it would stop.’

‘You made it stop, you were very brave to go to the police.’

‘I waited too long, too many bad things had happened already.’

‘If you could’ve been heard earlier, what would you have said?’

‘Help me. Leave me alone.’

‘How could you have been helped if you wanted to be left alone?’

‘I don’t know, it’s just how I feel.’

‘Frightened, I think. What about if you’d said, “Help me, take me somewhere safe”?’

I count the books on the shelves. Numbers help. Then I begin to cry, hide my face with the cushion. Mike sits quietly, lets me cry, then says, ‘You do deserve that, Milly, you deserve to be safe and to have a new life.’

I remove the cushion. His face is so open, looks at me. He wants to make it better for me, I can tell, but he doesn’t get it.

‘You don’t get it, Mike. You think you know me but you don’t.’

‘I think I’m getting to know you, I think I know you better than most people. Wouldn’t you agree?’

If that was true, he’d know what to say. He’d know that the best way to help me is to say I can stay. That he’ll look after me. But I’m too scared to ask him. I know once the trial’s finished I’ll have to leave. Start over. And there’s nothing I can do about it.

‘Can we stop, Mike? It’s been over an hour. I’m tired, I want to go to bed.’

He senses shutdown, knows to take his foot off the gas for tonight.

‘Okay, let me grab your night-time meds.’

I stash the pills with the others, open up my laptop to see if there’s anything about you in the news. You’ve been placed into solitary confinement, no details other than an attempted attack by a fellow prisoner following the announcement your trial has been moved forward. Protecting you matters, I imagine, the public pressure to keep you alive.

Make you pay.





18


Dirt on my hands, a towel in the sink. Mike should have left me where he found me late last night after our session. The dark of the cellar.

Phoebe’s on the landing when I come out of my room, balanced on the edge of the banister, head in her phone, one foot on the carpet. Perfectly painted toenails, in pink. She looks up as I pass, says, what was all the noise about last night, you woke me up. I reply with the first thing that comes into my head.

‘I had a stomach ache, Mike brought me some tablets.’

‘Yeah, well, next time, keep it down.’

I continue past her, down one flight of stairs, turn and ask.

‘How are your lines for the play coming along?’

She gives me the finger, mouths fuck you. She knows Mike and Saskia are around, could easily hear.

‘Let me know if I can help,’ I reply, smiling.

She pushes off the banister, storms into her room, kicking the door shut behind her.

Saskia’s at the kitchen table nursing a large mug, fingers thin, clasped round it, pronounced veins running up her knuckles to her wrists. She greets me with good morning, a faraway look in her eyes, more of a pleasantry than a genuine attempt at conversation.

‘Eggs?’ Mike offers, a wooden spoon in one hand.

He wears an apron with James Bond on the front, ‘licence to grill’ written underneath. He sees me looking, laughs a little, tries to mask his concern. The inadequacy he must be feeling. Even after our session, I’m still fucked up.

‘Saskia bought it for my birthday last summer, didn’t you, Sas?’

‘What’s that?’

‘The apron.’

‘Yes, darling, I think so.’

I look at Mike as he turns back to the stove top. Tall. His body, strong and fit, his hair sandy, streaked with grey. The weight of us all on his broad shoulders, though I’ve never heard him complain once.

‘Here you go,’ he says. ‘Scrambled eggs.’

I thank him and sit down next to Saskia.

‘Aren’t you having any?’ I ask.

‘No, no, I like to eat later.’

Or not at all. Mike goes into the hallway, stands on the first step, shouts to Phoebe. He has to shout twice for her to come out of her room and reply.

‘I’ll be down in a minute.’

He joins us at the table, dig in, he says, go on. He asks me if I have any idea what I’d like to do for half-term.

‘I don’t mind, I’m happy to stay here. I know you’re both busy.’

‘I think June was right the other day, we should take some time out. There’s a nice spot in the country we’ve been to before, the trees will be beautiful this time of year.’

‘Well, this is cosy, isn’t it?’ Phoebe says as she walks in.

‘Morning, grab some eggs, join us.’

‘What was going on last night? You woke me up.’

‘I already told Phoebe about the stomach ache I had, how you brought me some pills.’

Mike hesitates, it’s not in his nature to lie but he’ll rationalize it in his head. Protective. A necessity.