by JD Nixon
I eyed her malevolently as I passed, which made her top lip curl up. “I’m keeping close watch on you, Chunky. I like your spirit, but I don’t like rebelliousness or disobedience. I’m going to break you like a twig.”
And that was how the Assistant and I became such special friends.
Chapter 3
One week slowly passed into two. Our daily routine didn’t vary. Up at five-thirty, pre-breakfast exercise, followed by a meagre breakfast. Exercise until a meagre lunch, then more exercise before a meagre dinner. Bed at seven o’clock. No matter how tired we were, every three days we had to wash our tracksuits (and any other clothes, like socks, undies and pyjamas) in the small laundry room leading off the bathroom.
By the end of the first week, I was ready to turn cannibal on one of my bunkmates from hunger. When I wasn’t fantasising about killing Clive and/or the Assistant while I slogged mindlessly through the torturous exercises, I tried to decide which of my bunkmates looked tastier, and whether it would be better to eat them with ranch dressing or a soy sauce and sweet chilli sauce combination.
Nearing the end of the second week, I’d lost so much weight and had so little energy that some nights I didn’t even bother to pull the blanket up over myself. We didn’t chat anymore at night, but fell into our beds and straight to sleep. By now, most of us were too tired to cry into our pillows, though I heard Jessie’s plaintive quiet sobs on occasion.
Apart from Ariadne, who must surely be regretting her decision every second, all of us in Bunker One had been sent here involuntarily – some by their partners, one by her domineering older sister, one by her controlling grandmother. None had been sent by their work supervisor, which just made me angrier with Clive. He could have just saved me all this pain by ordering me a bigger uniform.
Jill confessed ashamedly that her son had sent her. “Actually it was my daughter-in-law, if I’m honest,” she’d told us. “We’ve never got on together and I’ve been forced to live with them for the last twelve months. I don’t know which has been worst – this place or my year living with her. They’re both hellholes.”
We’d grown close as a group over the past fortnight. We’d been kept completely segregated from Bunker Two. It was only later that I learned there was a second ‘field’ behind the bunkers. Also located there was another amenity block.
So this cold morning, when Assistant One tried to goad me in front of everyone, was the first time we’d joined together. I didn’t know if I was heartened or depressed that Group B looked as ragged, weary and hungry as we did.
It had been exceedingly unwise of G-F-H to speak and even more so for me to respond. I should have ignored her. But now we’d attracted Assistant One’s attention. I didn’t know if Assistant Two was as sadistic as our little daffodil of joy, but it didn’t seem earthly possible.
“Going to be like that, are you, Chunky? You two ladies, who like to chat when the rest of us are here to exercise, can stay here. The rest of you can give me twenty laps.”
Great, I thought. Now the other bunker was going to hate me.
While the others trotted off obediently, no matter how unwillingly, under the supervision of Assistant Two, we stood as still as we could.
“I’m getting a bit tired of you, Chunky. That spirit of yours should have been crushed like a bug in my hand by now.” She demonstrated by viciously closing her fingers into a fist. She paced back and forth. “I’m going to have to move up to the next level with you.” She eyed off G-F-H. “And you too. From what Assistant Two tells me, you’re the Chunky of Bunker Two.” She turned her back on us and strode off, stopping only to look over her shoulder. “You’re both on half-rations from now on.”
No! I howled to myself, wanting to punch something. I was so hungry. The previous night, I’d found myself gnawing on my pillow just to see what it tasted like – an utterly humiliating moment in my life that I wouldn’t soon forget.
When she was out of earshot, satisfied in our craven servility, I tried the ventriloquist trick again in an even lower voice, no longer caring about anything. “I’ve had enough of this shithole. I’m busting out.”
“I’ll join you. Hands down, this has been the worst fortnight in my life,” whispered G-F-H.
Assistant One consulted with Assistant Two before returning to us, so we had no chance to discuss that enticing idea any further. I wasn’t sure if G-F-H was serious or not, but I was. I was escaping from here and taking as many women with me as possible. If I could manage to get my brain thinking about anything but food, I’d try to formulate a plan tonight.
“Good news, ladies. I just didn’t feel as if half-rations was enough to stop me being so angry, so Assistant Two and I agreed that you’ll also each be responsible for cleaning your respective bathrooms after dinner. Good times ahead for both of you tonight.”
After a hard day of physical torture and minimum amounts of food, I waited until the others finished in the bathroom so I could start cleaning it. I sat on the floor while I waited, too tired to keep standing.
“Tilly,” said Ariadne. “I’m worried about you. You’re looking very thin.”
“I lose weight fast. And stack it on fast,” I murmured, now lying on the cement floor in a curled up position, eyes shut. I could have gone to sleep at that moment. The others sympathetically stepped over and around me.
Ariadne crouched down next to me and looked around furtively before pulling a scrap of stale bread crust from her pocket. “I saved you what I could from my food.”
“Thank you so much,” I whispered, tears of happiness springing to my eyes. I gobbled the crust down and closed my eyes again. I slept for a while until Jessie shook me awake.
“We’ve finished here. I hope it doesn’t take you too long to clean. I wish I could help. You’ve helped me so much.”
I nodded to show I’d heard her and reluctantly dragged myself to my feet. I spent the next hour scrubbing, wiping, mopping and topping up the soap, toilet paper and air freshener, before having a short shower and brushing my teeth, both of which I did with my eyes closed. The whole time I thought about how and when we could escape. I had no doubt that if we were caught, the consequences would be severe, though I couldn’t be bothered checking the rules to see exactly what they were.
I zombie-walked to the bedroom, hearing nothing but the rhythmic sound of the other women sleeping inside the Bunker. It wasn’t long before I joined them. It seemed an even shorter time before the horn blasted us awake the next morning.
“I can’t stand this place one second longer. I’m going to escape. Who’s with me?”
Ariadne, Jill and Jessie all agreed immediately. The others were shocked by even the suggestion of breaking the rules, too afraid to face the consequences to consider such a reckless action. That saddened me. I hadn’t realised how cowed they’d become, but a part of me understood their caution. Most of us were now halfway through the torture, so why risk making the remaining time even worse?
“How will we manage it?” asked Ariadne.
“I’m sorry. I didn’t mean it. It was just the tiredness speaking.” I shot the three willing women a meaningful glance. I didn’t want any of the others running to the Assistant to tip her off.
The other women laughed in relief to hear that, and we busied ourselves getting ready for the pre-breakfast exercise session.
While I was in one of the stalls in the bathroom, I used a small pen I’d found in the jeans I’d worn on my first day and had hidden. You never knew when something would come in handy, and at that stage I’d imagined writing an SOS message to Daniel somehow. I used a couple of sheets of toilet paper to write the same message four times: We have to plan this secretly. Flush this away after reading. I passed three of the messages to my fellow willing escapees in the bathroom and managed to find an opportunity to pass the fourth to G-F-H when the Assistants weren’t looking for a second on the Field later.
That became our method of communication, and there wasn’t a person in Group A who
could accuse us of plotting to leave.
G-F-H, or Gloria as I found she was really called, wrote to me that she had three women in Bunker Two willing to risk it all to escape. Once again, I cursed the fact that the Assistants had taken our car keys from us. Otherwise I would have piled all the escapees in my little car and just driven out the gates tonight, not confident I wouldn’t run down anyone who got in my way, especially if it was one of the Assistants. But at least they’d left us our house keys, probably as reassurance they weren’t off ransacking our property and drinking our milk while we were stuck here.
Our toilet paper plan began to evolve. We decided I’d speak on behalf of Bunker One, and Gloria for hers. That made it safer for us, as it reduced the number of notes being passed back and forth, and also saved confusion from too many people chiming in on the matter.
The plan was simple, as the best plans usually were. We decided that after dinner the next evening would be the ideal time to make our run for it. Once we were freed from our misery for another night to eat dinner, the Assistants stopped supervising us. The Assistant had watched us closely for the first week, but noting with satisfaction that we were all too buggered to do anything except eat, wash and crawl into bed, she left us alone. The lights automatically turned off at seven each night and I suppose she figured if any of us wanted to stay up later chatting, we’d be sorry the next morning when the alarm sounded at five-thirty.
Of course our bunker ladies would miss us immediately when we didn’t turn up in the bathroom, but we had a plan for that too. I’d tried to figure out every possible contingency, thinking that Heller would be proud of me – if I succeeded.
The next morning, we were all surprisingly chipper. I had to shake my head and frown at Ariadne and Jill, who giggled together while making their beds. We didn’t want to attract any attention today. I wanted everyone, including the Assistant, to believe it was just another ordinary day of torture on the hamster wheel for all of us.
The half-rations were severely affecting my energy levels. I couldn’t believe it was possible, but I’d lost even more weight since my food had been stripped in half. I had to keep yanking up my tracksuit pants during exercise to stop them falling down. When I looked at myself in the bathroom mirror, I didn’t like what I saw. I looked pale and gaunt, the epitome of utter misery. I’d almost passed the point where I was no longer hungry, which worried me. I was fast heading into a ketosis phase, but with not enough protein or fat to make up for the lack of glucose. It was a dangerous diet and if I had any energy I’d be furious.
As a result, I really had to somehow muster the determination to make it through one more day without drawing the Assistant’s ire. She worked us hard, and we all did what she demanded, no sound audible except our panting and grunting during some of the more difficult exercises.
I thought the day would never end, but eventually it did and we were released for the evening. I’d instructed the women to slip back to their Bunkers to secrete their house keys in their pockets.
We ate dinner silently, the Assistant popping in briefly to make sure I’d followed her instructions for half-rations, something she did without notice now and then, trying to catch me out.
“I might think about letting you have normal rations tomorrow, Chunky, as you’ve behaving yourself,” she smiled at me.
Fuck you, bitch, I thought, keeping my head low and nodding to let her know I’d heard her. Hopefully, I’d be eating all I wanted tomorrow, in my own flat, surrounded by people who loved me. And Clive.
Several of the women headed to the sink to clean up. We’d decided to have a roster at night, so that at least every couple of nights we all had the chance to go to bed earlier.
I joined them wearily. “I think it’s our turn tonight.”
One looked puzzled. “Really? I thought it was ours, but to be honest I can barely even remember my own name anymore, let alone a roster.”
“Go,” I insisted. “Fair’s fair.”
They didn’t argue, but gratefully scooted away, taking advantage of the unexpected early pass. Ariadne and Jill were on my kitchen duty team and began to clear the tables. Jessie lingered, pretending to take longer than normal with her dinner.
“Are you finished yet, darling?” Ariadne asked her for the benefit of the last woman, who’d decided to have some more cold water and was taking her time about it. We all wanted her to get lost immediately. After a few more minutes in which Jessie chewed and chewed food that must be paste in her mouth by now, the woman wandered out to the bathroom to join her bunker-mates.
“Thank God,” said Jill to me in a low voice, wiping up as I washed. “I thought she’d never go.”
“Let’s hurry through this,” I said in return.
Five minutes later, we switched the light off in the kitchen and closed the door. We’d planned to meet Gloria’s group at the perimeter fence closest to us where there were no automatic spotlights. They’d come via the rear of our Bunker; we’d approach from the front. The danger for us was that we’d set off all the lights on each building as we passed, but I didn’t think anyone was on patrol. After all, it wasn’t a prison, no matter how much it felt like one. And there were only five staff. They had to sleep some time, even if they didn’t seem human.
We huddled against the tall chain-wire fence, waiting for Gloria’s group. They arrived in a burst, all of them, except Gloria, looking terrified at their daring.
“Okay,” I said. “Let’s climb the fence.”
“Maybe we should stay inside up against the fence,” suggested one of Gloria’s team, Yvonne.
“Why don’t we just walk out the front gates?” asked another, Helen.
“I’m pretty sure that’s the one place on the perimeter that has lighting. We want to avoid any illumination.”
“But at least we know the ground here in the compound is even. We don’t know what it’s like on the outside,” argued Yvonne.
“That’s true, but I believe we’ll have less chance of being spotted outside the compound. And it’s more visible over there than it is here,” I responded patiently. We’d already been through this a million times. The plan was set in concrete. Or so I thought.
In the end we decided to climb the fence where we were. It was to the side of the buildings and in greater shadow than the rest of the fence. Scaling the fence probably would have been quite a physical challenge for some of the ladies a couple of weeks ago, but now proved no harder than the awful army-type manoeuvres we’d recently endured under the tender, supportive ‘help’ of the Assistants.
On the other side we regrouped.
“What about my car?” panicked Ariadne.
“Forget about your car,” I said, a little harsher than I meant. “I have some very tough guy friends and they can organise to come and get them for us.”
“Okay,” she said in a small voice. I felt bad for snapping at her, but I didn’t have time to soothe ruffled feathers.
“What are we doing now?” asked JoJo, a bubble-headed blonde from Gloria’s group.
I sighed quietly. “We’re going to head around the perimeter fence until we reach the road that leads here.”
We set off cautiously in the very dim light, not able to see the ground well. I suggested the ladies kept one hand trailing the fence to keep us on track.
“What are we going to do then?” asked Yvonne.
I shot Gloria a disbelieving look. She shrugged her shoulders apologetically, as though she’d tried to tell them the plan, but they hadn’t listened closely.
“We’re going to walk down the road until we find the nearest phone. Then I’m going to call some of those friends of mine and ask them to come and pick us up.”
“Sounds a bit vague,” complained Helen.
“You’re welcome to come up with your own plan, if you like,” I snapped, my patience running out.
“No need to be so grumpy.” What did she think I was going to be? I was exhausted and starving. It’s hard to be cheery in t
hose circumstances.
I stalked off in front, heartily sick of some of these women already. Gloria scurried to catch up with me.
“I’m sorry, Tilly,” she said in a low voice. “I did tell them, honestly.”
“It must have been fun bunking with them for a fortnight.”
“Why do you think I’m escaping?”
That made me smile reluctantly. “Then why’d you bring them with you?”
“They latched onto me from the beginning. They didn’t want to stay if I wasn’t going to be there.”
“So you won’t be inviting them to dinner one day?”
“Definitely not. I’d like to ditch them in the bush right now.”
We walked for a while, turning the corner on the fence from the side to the front. I stopped, waiting for everyone to catch up.
“The next ten minutes is the danger zone for us,” I addressed the group. “I don’t think anyone’s on patrol, but we don’t know for sure. So keep quiet and move fast.”
“I didn’t realise how bossy you were,” smiled Ariadne.
“I’ve been keeping fairly quiet for me while we’ve been here.”
She raised her eyebrows in amusement. “I’m looking forward to meeting up with you again when you’re your normal self.”
I didn’t respond, but pushed forward. Though it seemed as if some women didn’t understand the concept of ‘stealth’, crashing through the bush as though we were on a hiking jaunt, we made it to main road, skirting the lights of the gates.
I stopped and looked down that winding, dirt road. And I smelled the wonderful, heady aroma of freedom.
Chapter 4
The dirt road was much easier for us to navigate and we were fortunate that the moon was bright, otherwise we would have been walking in the dark. I wished for a torch or some kind of lighting, but we’d fled with nothing except our house keys.
“Does anyone remember passing a service station or cafe on the way in?” I asked hopefully.