The Family Remains(43)

But the hand came back to her mouth, this time harder, and the other hand was on her underwear, yanking at the waistband. Rachel tried to sink her teeth into the flesh of Michael’s hand but couldn’t open her mouth wide enough against the pressure. And then he was in her, and his hands were around her throat, his head up, his gaze somewhere on the ceiling, pushing her head further and further inside the cushions of the sofa with each thrust, and Rachel counted the thrusts to calm the roil of her emotions and it was fourteen. Fourteen thrusts. His hands around her neck. Her eyes pulsing and watering. Her legs cycling against the force of him. And then he was done. He was out of her. Off her. His hands gone from her throat. He stood over her, his hair ridiculous, his chest pumping, his eyes burning dark.

Rachel got to her feet and stood eye to eye with Michael. Her breath came fitfully through the tears burning her throat. ‘You raped me.’ Her voice didn’t sound like hers. It was broken and raw. ‘Michael. You raped me.’

Michael’s lip curled. ‘Your breath stinks.’

She felt him start to leak from between her legs and pushed past him to get to the bathroom.

‘You liked it,’ she heard him call out behind her. ‘I know you liked it. Don’t fucking pretend that you didn’t. I felt you come, Rachel. I felt you fucking come.’

She sat on the toilet and emptied herself of everything inside. Her bare flesh rippled with goosebumps. She wiped and she wiped and then she wiped again. She soaked a flannel in hot water and cleaned herself with that. She washed her hands, her throat, her mouth, her face. She looked at her reflection in the mirror and she thought of all the times, all the times when she had followed the rules: paid for the taxi instead of walking, tipped the drink into a plant pot rather than take a risk that it had been spiked. All the men she’d wanted to tell to fuck off but she’d smiled at politely for fear of making them aggressive. She thought of all the convoluted plans, the longer routes home, the bogus phone calls, the text messages to say she’d made it home safely, all the dates she’d told her friends about so that they’d know where she’d been if she didn’t come home. She thought of how she’d contorted herself and her habits and her behaviour for twenty years to be a person who would not be raped, and now she had been raped in the place where she was meant to be safe, by the person who was meant to protect her. She felt the artifice of the last twenty years of her life, the pointlessness and futility of it. She might as well have taken the shortcut, worn the tarty top, flirted with the shady guy. She might as well have lived her life free.

Black rage crept through her psyche. She stalked into the bedroom and took her pyjamas from under her pillow. Michael stood and watched her as she pulled on the trousers angrily. ‘There’s no coming back from this, Michael. You know that, right? We’re done here.’

Michael laughed drily. ‘Right.’

‘Right?’

‘Yeah. Whatever, Rachel. Paint yourself the victim.’

‘I’m sorry?’

‘You.’ He extended a finger towards her, a hard, pointing finger. ‘You creep in here, stinking of booze, fuck knows where you’ve been. You left me here, no word—’

‘I messaged you.’

‘Oh, yuh. Eventually. Yeah. When I’d already cooked for you. When I’d already planned my whole evening around you.’

‘Go to bed, Michael. Please.’

‘Out looking for it. No doubt. Well, there you go …’ He arced his arm across the sofa. ‘You got it. You got it hard and you got it good and don’t ever fucking pretend that that’s not what you want. Because it fucking is. I felt it, Rachel. And now we both know what you are and what you want. Don’t we?’

She left the bedroom, letting the door slam behind her. For a moment she had no idea what to do. She stood, looking around her, as if an answer might present itself to her from one of the dark corners of the room. Then she snapped out of it. She threw a coat on over her pyjamas, pulled on her trainers, grabbed her handbag and left the apartment, letting the door click shut softly in her wake.





36




June 2019


Samuel


It has rained and now it is sunny and the surface of the road dazzles back at us as we head down the Embankment. We have the blue light turning lazily, silently, not because there is an emergency, but so that other drivers will know that there is a reason why the car in front of them is driving at twelve miles an hour.

And then I see it, set back from the main road behind a small strip of railinged gardens, a row of imposing flat-fronted houses of varying sizes and colours. I have my phone in my hand, looking at the photo of the house from the music video.

‘Can you pull in there, Donal? Is there a turning? Yes, there. Thank you.’

We drive up the space between the large houses and the railinged garden and Donal parks up. On a sign attached to a low wall is the name of the street: Cheyne Walk.

‘Which one is it?’

I show him the photo on my phone and point at the house further up the street.

The house looks nothing like the house in the pop video. It is overgrown with creeping plants and the garden is full of rubble and the windows are grimy and covered in dirt.

Donal and I climb from the car, and I straighten my jacket, my cuffs. Donal is not wearing a proper jacket or cuffs, just a bomber jacket and trousers that are a little too tight for his figure, in my humble opinion.