After a moment’s hesitation, Polly unzipped my dress. Shrugging it off, I pulled on my jeans and turned to face her, leaving my four-inch collarbone scar and my terrifying stomach slash-scar on full display. ‘Did you listen to Dylan’s talk, about hope?’
Polly visibly cringed now, her eyes looking anywhere but at my mutilated body.
‘I know you feel trapped. You feel as though you have no hope. You think it is your fault. That if you act better, stop forgetting things, listen to his instructions properly, stop being so irritating… then he won’t hurt you any more. It is a lie, Polly. He is never going to stop. I know you think you love him, you need him. But you have to think of your baby now. I can help you.’ My voice broke. ‘Please let me help you.’
She bent down, hands fumbling with the buttons on her maternity dress. ‘How dare you speak to me like that? How dare you say these things about me? About Tony? He is a good husband. He loves me. You know nothing about it. Or me. I am not one of those women. I am not! Don’t ever speak to me about this again.’
She ripped off her outfit as she spoke, revealing a glimpse of the purple blotches I had spotted earlier before she pulled on her high-necked, long-sleeved sweater and frumpy, black trousers. ‘Stay out of my business, Faith! How dare you suggest I would put my baby in danger!’
I kept my voice soft, my tears in check. ‘Don’t you think your baby is in danger when he hits you?’
‘Shut up!’
‘I just want to help you, Polly. I know what it’s like. I’ve been in your situation?—’
‘I am nothing like you!’ she screamed, grabbing her bag and throwing the dress at me as she pushed past. ‘Nothing.’
11
My second scar, the stomach slash-scar, was given to me ten months after the first. Nearly a year of bowing, surrendering and disappearing inside myself as Snake ruled our household with a tattooed fist and crack-fuelled temper. Sam lurched from day to day, seeking oblivion from the pain of the past and the present in the only way he knew how. I worked, cowered in my bedroom, and tried, tried, tried to keep the peace, my sanity and my brother alive.
The money tin grew heavier.
I had to get out of there.
Beside myself with stress, exhaustion and self-loathing, I began walking. At first, to get away from the poisoned fumes swirling through every room of Grandma’s house, to avoid the near-corpses queuing up for another hit of death. To escape the stench of despair, including my own.
But after a while, as my muscles embraced the miles and my body grew sturdier, my breathing deep again, I found my eyes began to open. To the vibrancy of the rapeseed in the meadow, or the tomato-coloured chest of the robin on a branch. The perfect swirl of snail shells, clinging to verdant hedgerows. Thebeauty in the butter-coloured cornfields framed with thickets, the silvery-brown stream bubbling by.
My ears, dimmed by the slap of cruel words, retuned themselves to the melody of birdsong, the soothing paradiddle of rain on the treetops.
My expanding, unclogging lungs sucked in the scent of the honeysuckle, the sweet and sour of the autumn muck-spreading, the deep musk of moss upon the chestnut trunks.
Slowly, as the fresh promise of spring gave way to summer, I mapped the hills and hideaways with my worn-down trainers and I remembered that life was not all murky shadows, turmoil and unravelling ruin. There was life beyond fear and loss. I learned to appreciate the caress of sunshine on my skin, treasure the peace of a stunning vista, and relish the anonymity of a summer storm.
Walking saved my life. And after the second scar, walking gave me the strength to walk right out.
Snake decided I was hiding something. He refused to believe my walks were just walking. Every man who crossed my path became a suspect, and as I increasingly developed the strength to avoid his bed, he grew even more distrustful. Pumping himself full of paranoia-inducing chemicals only made things worse, and he convinced himself I had become pregnant. On a particularly bad trip one night, he tried to destroy the non-existent evidence of my affair with a bread knife.
Snake drove off in a fury, leaving me curled up on the bedroom floor. Sam patched the gash – mercifully shallow but still bleeding profusely – with surgical tape and Disney princess plasters. Once finished, he gathered my paltry belongings and threw them into an old school bag. It was time.
‘Come with me, Sam.’
‘What?’ He paused, kneeling on the bedroom floor to tie my shoes.
‘Come with me. Start again, just you and me. No Snake and no drugs.’
‘This is our house. Grandma’s house,’ he said.
‘No it isn’t. Not any more. You know that. And it’s destroyed anyway. The house doesn’t matter. We matter. Staying alive matters. Being free from him matters.’
He lifted his gaze to meet mine, raw fear swirling amidst the desolation in his eyes.
‘Come with me, Sam. Don’t make me do this alone.’ I placed my hand upon the top of his arm.
A tear ran down his emaciated face.
‘Please, Sam. We can do this. Please. If I leave you here, you’ll die and then I’ll have no one.’
