What Lies Between Us(10)
As I move myself up into a sitting position, the chain attached to my ankle rattles against the floorboards. The cuff strikes my other shin and I curse. That’ll add to the colourful tapestry of other bruises I’ve given myself with this damn restraint. You might think I’d be used to it by now and for much of the time I am. But sometimes I forget.
Rubbing my shin, I slowly swing both legs over the side of the bed and my toes feel the cool wood of the floorboards. I shuffle towards the window and begin my first watch of the day. I’d rather be up here in the crow’s nest and with a bird’s-eye view than living down in the basement like a worm underground.
The day I woke up in here, Nina informed me that the glass was shatterproof and soundproof, not that I’d be able to reach it anyway through the dense shutter slats. Neither the chair leg nor lamp I smashed against them even scuffed their surface.
I rise to get ready for the day. I clean my face with a damp sheet from a half-full packet of wet wipes, then use three more to clean my body. The orange scent from last night’s bath lingers on my skin and while I don’t welcome it – I hate citrus smells – I suppose it’s better than not smelling of anything. I change out of my nightie and choose a pink and red floral dress from the wardrobe. I don’t wear knickers any more because I can’t get them over the chain or ankle cuff. Likewise tights or trousers. Everything I slip on must be something I can pull over my head or wrap around my waist.
The wardrobe is still full of my clothes, but they’re of more use to the moths than to me. I’m sure Nina has left them as a reminder of what I once had; along with heels, scarfs, gloves and coats, they’re no longer fit for purpose. There are just seven ensembles I rely on, one for each day of the week. Every Friday, I leave a neat pile of my dirty washing outside my door and the following day, it’s been cleaned and pressed and returned to me. It’s like room service at a hotel I can’t check out of.
On the wall and an inch or so below the ceiling is a photograph of my husband Alistair that has been glued to the wallpaper. He’s smiling at the camera. When I first ended up in here, it was as if his eyes were following me around the room. I couldn’t escape him. I hated it and I hated him. But the length of my chain makes it too far out of my reach to tear it down. I threw a glass of orange juice at it once, but all that did was give the photo a sepia effect, like it had been taken a hundred years ago. In fairness, that’s how long ago our marriage feels.
I cover my bucket with a towel to contain the odour of last night’s expulsions. Nina only empties it once every two days but I’ve got used to the smell. Soon after this all began, I lost my temper and tried to throw the contents over her. But because I hadn’t got used to the restriction of the chain, I tripped over it, lost my balance and covered the floor with my own waste instead. Nina laughed until the tears fell from her eyes and refused to bring me anything to clean it up with until the next day.
She also used to leave me a can of air freshener until I tried to spray it into her eyes and blind her. She dodged the stream just in time and I never saw another can again. Instead, she leaves me car air fresheners to hang around the room, making it smell like a showroom. And they’re citrusy, of course.
Nina alternates between two chains of differing length to keep me prisoner. I don’t know what they’re made of, but they’re a solid, toughened metal that I’ve tried and failed to break or prize apart countless times. They’re comprised of links attached to a cuff that is secured to my ankle with a padlock that only she has the key to. They’re almost medieval in appearance.
My daytime chain is affixed to a metal spike in the centre of the room that’s secured to what I assume to be a joist under the floorboards. It stretches exactly the same distance in both directions, to the window and to the door on the opposite wall. I suppose that’s why she doesn’t lock my bedroom door. She knows I’m not going anywhere.
The second chain is only used when I join her for dinner, every second evening. It reaches down the staircase, along a first-floor landing and into the dining room. It also allows me into the bathroom on my floor for my twice-weekly baths. However, it won’t go as far as the next staircase or the ground floor.
I open my door to find a book and two transparent Tupperware boxes on the carpet. ‘Hotel room service has been while I slept,’ I say to myself. Inside the smaller of the boxes is breakfast. Two slices of cold, buttered, toasted white bread, a tin of fruit cocktail and an apricot yoghurt. The larger box contains a green banana, a ham and cheese sandwich, a satsuma and a packet of cheddar-flavoured crackers. There is no cutlery. I take it inside and sit on the bed, nibbling at the toast first, before I pick the fruit out of the tin with my fingers and drink the yoghurt. Later, I’ll make the lunch last throughout the afternoon until dinner arrives.
The longer I spend at this window, the more I realise I’m becoming like Jeff, the wheelchair-bound character James Stewart plays in the film Rear Window. Like him, I have little choice but to spend my days spying on my neighbours. Jeff thinks he has witnessed the murder of one of his neighbours. But the only thing dying in this street is me. And nobody knows that but my daughter.
Where did it all go wrong for us? I think. I’m aware of the answer; I just don’t want to be reminded of it.
I turn to pick up today’s book. It’s Room, by Emma Donoghue. I read the dust-jacket synopsis and find it’s about a mother and son who live in a single locked room together. Very droll of you, Nina. Every now and again she amuses herself with book choices like this. In the past she has left me biographies on Anne Frank, Terry Waite, J. Paul Getty III and Nelson Mandela – she favours anyone who has been held against their will or locked in a confined space. I can tell which books talk about ways to escape because they’re the ones with pages ripped out.