‘It makes you really ill, doesn’t it? The worry?’ She had understood I didn’t experience concern in the way other people might. My fears are crushing. They have broken me before now. If it weren’t for George…
We talk for hours, often at my house, because her flat is poky and cold. She and George get on well, although he generally disappears after dinner to ‘leave you girls to your gossip’. But she hasn’t come round these past few weeks.
I miss her.
I settle myself at my desk, squirting the surface with antibacterial cleaner and wiping it slowly, before cleaning my phone, although nobody uses the handset but me. When I’ve finished I cross the room to toss the cloth into the bin. Through the door I can see out into the reception area. George is still here, huddled by the door with Tash. They are both exchanging whispers, wearing the same harried expressions as though they are facing a mirror, not each other.
Hesitantly I step forward. Oddly it feels like I am intruding even though I know they are talking in hushed tones about me.
‘We can’t tell her. Not yet,’ George says. ‘She’s too fragile.’
‘It’s so hard keeping secrets – I feel like a total bitch,’ Tash says.
‘You’re anything but.’ Briefly George lays his palm on her cheek.
‘If we’re not careful, she’ll guess,’ Tash says.
I hurry back to my desk, feeling sick. Again, PC Godley’s words boom: what the medical professionals recommended for you. Are they planning an intervention in case I relapse? The thought of who they might make me see. Of where they might take me is terrifying.
When my best friend comes and takes her seat opposite me I turn my face to the wall to avoid her questions. So I don’t ask any of my own.
Chapter Nineteen
Carly
Then
It was morning. The girls had been imprisoned for an entire night. Through the window Carly watched as dawn brushed its pink-and-orange fingers over the sky. The world was so beautiful, she had never realized. She wondered whether she would ever get to enjoy it again. Tears leaked from behind her eyes. She didn’t wipe them away, not wanting to disturb the twins, who were still sleeping. Her heart hurt as she gazed at their pale faces. Their small hands, dark purple bruises staining their skin. Carly’s own hands throbbed from banging them against the door. Her head pounded, gums ached where she’d dislodged a tooth. Her knees were sore, the cut on her cheek raw. Every single muscle in her body was as hard as one of Bruno’s bones. The twins had taken up most of the room on the mattress and all night Carly had balanced on the edge, fearful of toppling onto the hard, dirty floor. The blanket wasn’t quite large enough to stretch over them all. Carly had tucked it around the shoulders of the twins and lay shivering, not only with cold but with terror.
What were they going to do?
Think.
The sun rose higher, pushing through the bars and creating stripes on the drab floor as it burst thought the pastel colours, painting the sky a cornflower blue. The clown on the back of the door grinned.
‘I fucking hate clowns,’ Carly muttered.
‘You said the “F” word,’ Leah whispered.
‘I fucking hate him too,’ Marie said.
‘I didn’t know you were both awake.’ Carly was mortified. She already thought she’d be blamed for getting them into this mess. If the twins started swearing at eight years old she’d be in even more trouble. She rose to her feet. Stalked around the room again and again. Ten paces long, turn. Six paces wide, turn.
Think.
Panic clutched at Carly as she inhaled the stifling air. They couldn’t stay in here another day. Another night.
Ten paces, turn. Six paces, turn.
Let-us-out. Let-us-out. Let-us-out.
The words were inside Carly’s head, inside her mouth, inside the room.
‘Let us out. Let us out. Let us out,’ she yelled as she pelted towards the door. All three sisters began thumping to be free again. Screaming. Fists pounding against the clown’s face. His nose. His mouth. His eyes.
It didn’t take long before they tired. Weak from lack of food. From the surges of adrenaline that rushed through their veins before ebbing away.
‘My tummy hurts.’ Leah slunk back to the mattress.
‘Mine too,’ Marie joined her twin.
‘It’s because we’re hungry.’ Carly dully made her way over to the box. Snaps and Coke for breakfast. They were running low on food. Surely the men would come back today. The thought was terrifying and reassuring in equal measure. She was sure they’d find out why they had been snatched but did she really want to know? There was a cruelty to Moustache she could sense. He was like Stephen at school who bullied the younger kids, stealing their lunch and their branded sports kit. Punching them in the stomach for fun. Stephen’s friends hung around him because they were intimidated. Was that why Doc was with Moustache? She thought he had a gentle side. The softness of the blanket, the teddy bear with his fluffy coat and rounded tummy, which made him ‘totally cuddleable’, according to Leah.
If Doc came on his own they might have a chance. She could, perhaps, talk him into letting them go. Carly had watched her mum persuade Dad to do things he didn’t want to do with the right words, a smile. You twist me round your little finger, he would say. Could she do that to Doc?
If he comes without Moustache.
If.
If.
If.
In the meantime, Carly scanned the room again; they were stuck. Trapped. Again, panic swooped low, clutching Carly around the throat. There wasn’t enough air in the room. She had to get them out. Her feet tingled as she clumped around the room. Examining every single millimetre of the wall for the umpteenth time. Running her hands over the cold, slimy surface, feeling for something under the graffiti. A hidden exit. A loose brick.
Something.
There was nothing. Carly stared up at the ceiling until her neck ached. Why wasn’t there a hatch, an air vent?
Anything.
‘I need to wee, Carly,’ Leah said in a small voice.
Carly jerked her head towards the corner, averting her eyes, unfairly cross with Leah. The stench in the room was already unbearable.
She couldn’t breathe.
Ten paces, turn. Six paces, turn. A lion in a cage.
Waiting.
Waiting.
Waiting.
Time ticked past painfully slowly. Intermittently, Carly had doled out sweets. They had hardly any food left, and only one can of Coke that they were sharing.
‘Small sips only,’ Carly had warned. Although hunger pangs cramped her stomach, she knew they could survive days without food. Not without any liquid, though. It was only the second time that day she had needed to wee and her urine stank – she was becoming dehydrated.
Carly pulled up her pants and turned around to see the tell-tale bulge of a blackcurrant liquorice sweet in Marie’s cheek. ‘For God’s sake. I told you not to have any more.’
‘I’m starving,’ Marie said.
‘We’re all starving. Did you steal a sweet too, Leah?’ Carly spat out the word steal like it was the worst thing you could do and she thought perhaps stealing was. Not sweets though, but children.
Leah shook her head. Carly believed her, she was always the one who followed rules. Horrified when she had caught Carly forging Mum’s signature on notes so she could get out of doing PE.