“No, no, no, no, no,” sobbed the man. “That's not what was going to happen here,” he cried, weeping wildly. “They destroyed my tent. They stole my food. I only wanted to...”
“Ye only wanted tae what, ye cunt, huh? Ye only wanted tae what?”
“To scare her. To teach her a lesson. To take her back to her parents and tell them what she'd done to my possessions.”
“Tae scare her, aye. Tae teach her a lesson. Your four times her size, ye big fuckin’ cunt.”
The man continued to sob hard.
“Bet ye wished you’d just left them be now and let them run off intae the woods, aye?” Dad said with another callous chuckle. He took a deep breath. He stood back up and turned to me and my sister.
“Go on then, girls. Auf ye’s get now. Ye ken the way home. Av left two fresh rabbits oot on the kitchen worktop for ye’s. Pick some veggies fae the garden and start making a soup for dinner the night, all right?”
I didn't look at Dad. I just stared at the scared, sobbing man, sitting down in front of him, looking like a frightened animal caught up in the biggest trap of his life.
Somewhere deep inside I knew dad was going to kill this man, then bury his body out here in the woods somewhere where he’d never, ever be found again, before getting rid of all evidence and trace that he was ever there in the first place.
I wanted to tell dad to leave the man alone. To just let him go or get him to a hospital like he so desperately wanted. He was harmless. And I was pretty convinced that he'd never say a single word about anything that happened here to anyone, even to the authorities. I mean, it was his word against two, innocent, little teenage girls and a policeman after all, no?
But that cold hard stare from my father. I'd seen it before and it always chilled me to the bone. He wasn't someone you could just question for the hell of without there being some kind of consequences and repercussions.
And then there’s the fact that he'd been so nice to us—so proud of us for surviving out there in the wild for three nights on the trot. Pride was a feeling that was usually alien from my father, but when you did receive even just a kindle of it, and he praised you and he made you feel so good about yourself in just a few short moments, I always felt ten feet taller afterwards. So, you could imagine how my sister must’ve been feeling.
“On ye's go then. Chop fuckin’ chop,” said dad, ushering us away. “Al deal with this mess.”
I finally met my father’s stare, but his steely gaze was almost impossible to hold. So, I quickly nodded and turned away. I glanced at my sister and motioned her, with a swift nod, in the direction that we should be moving in.
Before she even took one step, she asked my father outright if she could stay behind and help him out or at least watch and learn something from what he was about to do. I could almost hear my dad's heart swelling with more pride than it could surely hold. He’d almost, but not quite, let out the faintest of smiles too.
“No chance, ye wee bampot. Now get a fuckin’ move on and get that bloody pot of soup ready for me coming home. Comprende?”
My sister nodded and let out a disappointed sigh like she’d been denied to stay out a little bit longer after dark.
She took a hold of my hand and we both began walking off through the trees, towards the south side of the forest. Neither of us looked back and neither one of us talked about what happened there that day. Well, not openly and out loud to the other, that was for damn sure.
Chapter 6
We didn’t go to school anymore. Dad kept us both holed up at the farmhouse all day and night, while making us read all kinds of books, fiction and nonfiction, either from his own collection or stuff that he’d pick up for us at the local library and book stores.
Every time he gave us a book he told us to read it by the end of the week and then write him an essay in our own words regarding what the book was about, what we’d learned from reading it, and how we could implement what we’d learned from the pages into our own lives.
On some occasions he’d also ask us how we could make the book better, like if we’d wrote it ourselves. What would we change? How could we tell a better story?
What were the books you might ask? Nothing I ever wanted to read for my own pleasure, that was for damn sure. It was usually just whatever nonsense he happened to be in the mood for himself.
Like books about poisonous and edible plants. Survival books. Mountain Climbing and survivalist biographies. Or fiction books that he’d enjoyed reading himself while growing up.
Last week it was Cormac McCarthy’s Child of God. The week before it was Crime and Punishment. This week it was Pan by Knut Hamsun. Surprise, surprise, there was usually some kind of survival theme in the subtext and a man was always the main protagonist and author.
I remembered a rare friend of mine from school loaned me a copy of his old, fantasy adventure book. It was called The Princess of Mars and I absolutely adored it. This was the kind of book children my age should be reading.
Apparently, there were another seven or eight follow up books in the series but I never got around to reading any of them. Here’s why: a few months back, dad had both me and my sister yanked out of school. A school that was based in the town nearest to us, fifteen miles away.
It was when one of our teachers, Mr. Morris, had become suspicious of our after-school lives and activities. He’d began noticing more and more marks and bruises regularly appearing on the exposed parts of our bodies over the ongoing weeks and months. I think he believed that our seemingly good and decent Chief of police, Christian father, was up to no good and beating us most nights, black and blue, back at our farmhouse.
Pretty big and wild accusations to be swinging around such a small, quiet town and against such a highly respected town official. To tell you the truth, yes, our father did strike us from time to time, perhaps a couple of times a year, but he always did it in such a clever way as to never leave a mark, especially on any part of our bodies that might be exposed to the public.
(Our school had a swimming pool.) But the marks our teacher saw were always, hand on heart, from our survival adventures and extreme camping expeditions at the weekends, out in the wild with him or by ourselves.
When my dad finally met with the teachers to discuss the complaint, he proved his case undoubtedly by having them witness my sister and I building a shelter from scratch out in the school playing fields, while also digging for water, showing how to plant seeds and grow vegetables, while searching for edible plants to eat around the school grounds.
When the teachers started enthusiastically applauding us after we’d made a fire practically out of nothing but a couple of old dry sticks, the complaint against him was firmly dropped.
The other teachers then congratulated him on how proud he must be at bringing up two brilliant and abled little daughters all on his own, and how they wished the other parents and children at the school adopted just a few of his philosophies and teachings instead of just plumping their kids in front of iPads, iPhones and smart TVs after school hours.
Of course, he never mentioned a jot about his philosophies and musings regarding the imminent and looming end of the world and apocalypse that he believed, without a shadow of a doubt, was fast approaching and was about to wipe out every single one of these unprepared, gullible and idiotic people standing in front of him. Or why there happened to be a slightly higher case of unexplained and unsolved deaths, animal and human, in this particular region of the beautiful Scottish Highlands.
Unsatisfied though by his colleague’s swift dismissal of his concerns and light allegations, Mr. Morris also started subtly questioning us about the whereabouts of our mother too and why she wasn’t around anymore? When was the last time we’d seen her? And where she might be now? Which of course was another big no-no, once my sister had reported his enquiries back to my father.
A few weeks later, dad told the school that he was sending us away to live with our mother down in Glasgow as he didn’t h
ave the time or the resources to look after us anymore. And from that day on he began to home school us back at the farmhouse, away from the prying eyes of any interfering outsiders.
Two months later, we conveniently heard that some rather indecent images of children were found on our dear old teacher, Mr. Morris’s home computer. My dad of course took great pleasure in arresting him shortly after, right in front of the entire school assembly, before dragging him off to jail. Never to be seen nor heard from again.
Since then and on some very rare occasions, if someone who we happened to know from our school days, randomly bumped into us out in the country, child or adult, or up at the farmhouse, we were always told to say that we were just up visiting our father for a few days and going back to Glasgow soon to be with our mother again.
But that only happened one time when my sister and I were out trekking down the coast that stretches north and south for miles and miles in either direction at the back of our house.
We were searching for crabs, mussels, and oysters for dinner and bumped into another of our old teachers from school, who just happened to be out and about for a casual hike with her own family. We’d forgotten that it was a school holiday that week, so lucky for us our story of up on vacation visiting our father made out.
Which brings me back to The Princess of Mars.
Back when we were attending school on a regular basis and we had to socialize with the other kids, there was one particular boy I was very fond of: Jamie Brewster. He had the most beautiful blue eyes and mop-like blonde hair that fell down to just below his cheekbones.
Jamie was the one who’d loaned me the book. A book, I also had to keep well hidden from both my father and sister. I remembered fondly too that Jamie used to call me ‘his Princess of Mars’ which made my sister want to vomit and gag every time she heard it in the playground. But me, I adored him for it. And at the end of the day I think she was just jealous that someone had taken a shine to me instead of her.
Jamie and I used to hang around a lot at break time, playing snap cards, skipping around the school grounds, playing hopscotch, and running around pretending we were characters from the book. We did everything together during school breaks until, one day, my sister decided it would be most fun to set his beautiful blonde hair on fire.
Thankfully, she only managed to singe a fistful size clump of his beautiful blonde locks as she held him down by the throat with one hand behind the PE changing rooms one rainy afternoon before setting his hair on fire with the lighter in her other hand.
Running to Jamie’s aid I was quick enough to wrestle the lighter from my sister’s grasp, before pouring the contents of my lunchtime orange juice all over his burning head of hair to put out the flames before she had time to do any permanent damage.
I made him promise not to tell on my sister though. And to explain to the teachers, along with his parents, that he had found the lighter in the school changing rooms and accidentally set fire to his own hair. Reluctantly, he agreed. More due to the fear of what my sister might do to him while he slept at night more than anything else, should he ever confess what really happened that day.
He also swore never to speak to me again. And so, I never got to read any more in the Princess of Mars book series
A few months later, my sister and I were pulled out of school, which by that point Jamie’s new skinhead haircut was beginning to grow back, which I was extremely grateful for. But he never did call me his Princess of Mars again.
Chapter 7
I only ever brought up the topic of whatever happened to our mother once and why she’d left our family home. I think I must have been around nine or ten years old at the time.
No sooner I had asked that burning question when my father proceeded to lift me up by the roots of my hair, dangle me in front of his face, and shout all kinds of obscenities and foul mouth abuse in my general direction, mainly about how I should mind my own business and stop asking such stupid questions. Although, his words weren’t quite as politely put as that.
From that day onwards, I learned my lesson to never ever bring up the subject of my mother again, unless my father mentioned it first. Which of course he never did.
Then one day, while my sister and I were at home alone and my father was out at work, we discovered a secret basement chamber underneath the house. A series of secret, cellar-like rooms that we had no idea actually existed.
I was lying on the couch, trying to catch up on my weekly reading assignment, and my sister was meant to be outside hanging out the days washing and feeding the chickens in the back garden when, out of nowhere, a bloodied chicken head landed right on top of my lap, smearing blood and entrails all over my white t-shirt and worst of all the book I was reading—dad’s book.
I’d never felt more furious before in my life. I knew exactly who was going to get the blame for this, too, once dad discovered the state of one of his books. My sister was clearly his favourite, so already she would be in the clear from all wrong-doing.
I stood up. A rush of blood went straight to my head. My sister remained standing where she was, smirking and grinning as if to say what the hell are you gonna do about it? Which infuriated me further. I hated it when she entered one of these mischievous and playful moods.
It wasn’t my finest moment, but I went for her nonetheless. Even though I knew she was stronger than me and a better fighter than me, but I didn’t care. I grabbed her by the roots of her hair and shoulders and began wrestling her, every which way I could. All over the living room. On top of tables. Onto the couch. Over chairs. One chair even collapsed in pieces when I threw her into it.
I don’t know how, but we ended up fighting and brawling out in the hallway. My energy and strength were dwindling to almost zero. Scratch marks, blood, and bruises covered most of our bodies and faces. I’d definitely given as good as I’d been given on that occasion. Even my sister was impressed by my efforts, she later admitted.
Still, we wrestled against the hallway wall, pushing and pulling each other up towards the kitchen on the opposite side.
On the other wall, right beside the staircase, stood one of dad’s beautiful, old oak book cases, filled with all his favourite books and the ones that he’d make us read over and over again until our eyes cried blood. My sister then threw me head-first into that bookcase, sending most of those books flying this way and that.
My head throbbed hard as I fell back onto the floor, almost unconscious. My sister wasn’t done yet though, not by a long shot, and went to wrap her arms around my neck, putting me into some kind of strong sleeper hold.
That’s when it happened: the huge, heavy, old oak bookcase, along with the entire contents of its hundred or so books, came crashing down upon us. When we finally wriggled free from underneath the chaotic mess, we both just sat there, stunned to silence at what we’d found.
Lying behind the book case was a small, hidden doorway. It sat absolutely flush with the wall. So, when the old bookcase was propped securely up against it, nobody else would be any the wiser that a secret doorway was actually there in the first place.
We both glanced at each other and nodded, silently agreeing that we should go inside to investigate further. The slim door had no handle but it was unlocked, and with a slight push it led us into a tiny little cupboard room tucked nicely beneath the main staircase of the house.
The room was so dark inside, but my sister soon found an old light switch by fondling the walls with her fingers. She switched it on to reveal a very steep and narrow staircase leading all the way down to a huge iron door at the very bottom foundation of the house.
On the wall beside the first row of declining steps, a long and thick rusted key hung from a single hook. My sister nudged me to grab the key. I took it and cautiously moved down the stairs with my sister close behind.
Neither one of us uttered a single word; our previous fight and feud scattered to the wind like dust. We moved ever closer towards the iron door below. Apart from the
main lock, there were three other huge, thick bolts sitting upon the door. One at the top. One in the middle and one at the very bottom. I couldn’t help but wonder if this was to keep someone from getting in or to stop someone from getting out.
I placed the thick iron key inside the lock. I had to push it hard and wriggle it about half a dozen or so times before it finally slotted in. We pushed open the door together. It made the loudest and most unnatural creaking groan I’d ever heard, sending a shiver right through my spine, from top to bottom.
Inside, I’d never witnessed an eerie darkness like it. We felt our way blindly around the cold, hard edges of the cellar walls for any light switches just inside the doorway. We didn’t find any though.
Before we stepped fully inside this new dark place, I told my sister to wait for me at the iron door for just one minute while I ran back upstairs and fetched a torch or some kind of light source for us.
I knew she wouldn’t wait. Unlike me, she was absolutely fearless in these situations. Forever the avid adventurer. She didn’t need light to stop her from having a good explore of a pitch-black place. She’d be in her element there. She loved the dark just as much as I loved the light. Night and day. That should have been our names.
From the living room cupboard, I grabbed one of the long, thick candles and a lighter that my dad had stored there in case of a power cut. I hurried back down to the old iron door at the bottom of the steep, narrow staircase. As I expected, my sister wasn’t anywhere to be seen.
As I lit the candle on the edge of the doorway, I called her name. She didn’t reply. The candle light lit up a small portion of a long, winding, square corridor, which branched away to the right of the iron door. Here, there were various pitch-black doorways leading into other rooms scattered along the corridor’s length before it took another sharp turn to the right, way up ahead.
My Sister And I: A dark, violent, gripping and twisted tale of horrifying terror in the Scottish Highlands. Page 5