Under My Skin

by James Dawson

  Dr McCulloch sombrely explained that, even with plastic surgery it was likely she would be scarred for life. Sally could learn to live with that. ‘Doctor, can I ask one thing?’

  ‘Of course.’

  ‘What happened to my tattoo?’ Sally whispered. Her mother and father were out getting a sandwich and would return at any moment.

  Dr McCulloch smiled sadly, tucking a stray black lock behind her ear. ‘Sally, dear, your skin was very badly burned. They were third-degree burns. I didn’t even realise you’d had a tattoo.’ She gave her unburned right shoulder a gentle punch. ‘Years from now, you’ll still be able to get tattoos, I promise. It’s not the end of the world!’

  Sally only just held back a tear of relief. ‘Oh, no. I won’t be getting another. Believe me.’

  OK, so Sally was alive, but it wasn’t going to be a walk in the park. That was fine. She’d known for a long time that she wasn’t getting out of this unscathed. The only worry now was how long she was going to be stuck in the hospital. Boredom had fully set in, alongside the pain, and she’d only been conscious for five days.

  Her father stayed at her bedside, not even mentioning his job or the bank. Not once did he or her mother ask what she’d been doing in the derelict building. Instead, he read to her – the Satanville companion novels – and he even attempted different voices for the characters.

  On the sixth day, her parents and Dr McCulloch agreed she was well enough to receive visitors and Stan and Jennie barrelled in. She’d been warned that Stan had been burned while pulling her out of the ‘squat’, but aside from some bandages around his hands, he didn’t look too bad.

  ‘Hey, how are you feeling?’ Jennie held it together for about three seconds before bursting into full-on ugly crying.

  ‘Oh, don’t cry! I’m not too bad.’ That was a lie. She was so, so sore. Sore everywhere. With smoke inhalation, her voice sounded like she’d had a fifty-a-day smoking habit for ten years.

  ‘You liar! You almost died!’ she sniffed. ‘I’ve never been so worried in my life.’

  ‘I’m sorry. I thought it was the only way.’

  Stan looked over his shoulder to check no one was listening. She was in a private room on the intensive care ward so he pushed the door closed. ‘And? Did it work?’

  ‘It worked,’ Sally said as triumphantly as she could. ‘She’s gone.’

  ‘Thank God,’ said Stan, letting out a dramatic breath. Jennie also visibly relaxed. ‘It wasn’t for nothing.’

  ‘And the House of Skin is gone. I hope. I saw Rosita and Boris burn . . . they couldn’t have survived. None of them could,’ she added, thinking of their many victims. Hopefully now they were free to go wherever it is dead things went. She looked at Stan’s wounds. ‘How are you?’

  ‘Oh, that? It’s nothing. Less than nothing. What’s a little second-degree agonising burn between friends?’ He smiled, wearing casual heroism well.

  Sally considered him. He wasn’t the same Stan any more. The whole encounter had aged all of them. This new version was . . . intriguing. She wasn’t the same Sally and he wasn’t necessarily the mayor of the Friend Zone any more. ‘Well, thank you. I can’t believe you went back into a burning building to get me . . . I told you to go!’

  ‘You’re not the boss of me,’ he grinned. ‘I wasn’t going home without you.’

  ‘Do you guys wanna be alone?’ Jennie asked, backing towards the door.

  ‘No.’ Sally gave Stan a meaningful glance. ‘I want both of you. Stan and I will talk later.’

  He wrapped his bandaged hand in her gloved one. ‘Sure. We have all the time in the world. I’m not going anywhere.’

  Sally gestured at her bandaged body. ‘Neither am I, clearly.’ For the first time in a long time, everything felt right. She was with Jennie and Stan and her heart was light with love. As long as they were all together, everything would be OK. Instead of fretting about what might happen with Stan, she was excited. There was so much to explore, but that was something to cling to as time passed in this place. ‘Hey, I have a question. Stan . . . what tattoo were you going to get?’

  Stan blushed. ‘I couldn’t really think of anything so . . . ’

  ‘Oh God!’ Jennie gasped. ‘Don’t say you were going to get Sally’s name on a heart or something?’

  ‘No! Sorry, Feather! OK, don’t laugh, but I was going to get Dante’s tattoo – The Order of the First numeral with the wreath of ivy.’

  Sally felt toasty inside and it felt nice. ‘Speaking of, did you record Satanville? Don’t you dare watch it without me . . .’

  ‘Jennie Gong . . . do you want to tell her or shall I?’

  Jennie grimaced. ‘Sorry, I already watched it. I couldn’t wait!’

  ‘Oh my God, you are so dead to me!’ Sally gasped. ‘Ex-friend!’ They talked and laughed and teased and laughed until Sally could keep her eyes open no longer.

  Later that night, Sally woke. She heard voices. ‘Mum?’ Some nights her mum fell asleep in the chair next to her bed. But tonight, the voice was a solemn whisper, someone murmuring. With a pained groan, Sally sat up and saw the guest chair was empty.

  It was dark outside the open blinds. Rivulets of rain careered down the windowpane. Her parents must have left ages ago. It felt late – really late. Instead, Sally looked out of the open door onto the corridor. That was dark too and she couldn’t see any of the nurses going about their rounds.

  It was nothing so very unusual, though. It was a busy hospital and someone on the ward outside her room always needed something – her sleep had been disturbed every night. With a great effort, Sally swung her legs off the bed and got to her feet. With all her dressings she felt like a mummy of ancient Egypt, but her feet were fine to walk on and so she shuffled over to the door and closed it.

  But the whispers continued. They were getting louder. Whispers became words in her head.

  ‘No . . .’ Sally said to herself, feeling that lift-going-down-too-quickly sensation. Sally limped to her poky shower room and switched the light on. The bulb was pretty feeble and only ever gave a thin, blueish, flickering light.

  She had to know.

  Her mother had covered the mirror in her bathroom, not wanting her to get upset by her burns. Sally had let her, not wanting to cause an argument, but now she needed to see. She pulled the cheap hospital towel out from around the edges and let it drop into the sink.

  Sally cried out in shock. A monster lurched at her. It took her a whole second to realise that the deformed creature was her reflection. Her hair was gone. They’d cut most of it off, but there were bald pink patches of burned flesh on her scalp. There was a nasty burn on her cheek too. Around the edges of her hospital gown and dressings she could see bright red scar tissue creeping up her neck. It was bad.

  But while Sally whimpered, her reflection just stared back at her, a stone-cold look of pure hatred on her face. And then her lips moved.

  ‘Now don’t tell me you thought it was going to be that easy,’ said Molly Sue’s voice.

  She didn’t sound happy.

  Chapter Thirty-Six

  ‘Not for a single second,’ Sally admitted, gripping the sink so hard that what was left of her fingers blazed. The burn is a lingering reminder of the fire.

  ‘Don’t you get it?’ Molly Sue went on, again using her mouth and tongue. ‘I am not a drawing of a woman. I am something bigger and older than your limited little brain can understand and I owned you long before Boris got his hands on.’

  Sally stared her reflection down. ‘I know what you are.’

  Molly Sue’s voice changed. It became older, sonorous. Not just old, ancient. ‘You know nothing. I am older than man and word. Wherever there is death and pain and hate and suffering, I am there to sip it up like red wine. I have taken countless names in a million languages, and as many forms and faces.’ And then she was Molly Sue again. ‘Doll, it’s gonna take more than a cookout to stop me. Did ya really think yo boy toy saved yo life? I kept you alive. By rig
hts, you should be deep fried chicken right now. Extra crispy.’

  It was hard to admit, but she couldn’t pretend. ‘I knew,’ Sally said. ‘I knew if I was alive then you would be too. I knew.’

  ‘I am eternal. I ain’t goin’ nowhere.’

  Sally looked herself dead in the eye. She was done with Molly Sue’s doom-filled warnings. No more playing. ‘I know. And I don’t care.’

  Molly Sue paused. ‘What?’

  I’m not scared any more. OK, that was a lie. Sally was scared and might always be, but admitting it felt freeing, like letting a balloon filled with toxic gas float away into the clouds. She’d let go of the shame if not the fear. ‘It looks like you and I are stuck with each other, so we need to get some things straight; establish some ground rules.’

  Molly Sue laughed bitterly. ‘I don’t think you’re gettin’ how this deal works, darlin’ . . .’

  ‘Oh, I get it,’ Sally said, pouring everything she had into remaining cool and calm. ‘And I want to thank you.’

  Another pause. ‘Ya wanna what?’

  A tear ran down Sally’s face – she was allowed one tear of mourning for her former self. But just one. ‘You have changed me so much and, here’s the thing: I needed to change. Before you I thought I was weak and scared and uncertain.’

  ‘You got that right.’

  ‘No. I only thought I was. You made me see I was wrong. You made me realise I could do things I never thought I’d do. I found my voice, I let people see me, I sang . . . so thank you. I needed you.’ Sally smiled at herself in the mirror. ‘Just one problem, Molly Sue. You created a monster. I’m stronger than you now.’

  Molly Sue laughed again. ‘Is that what you think?’

  Sally nodded. ‘It’s what I know. I can feel you inside me and, sure, you’re noisy, but you’re so small. You are just a voice in my head. You’re a parasite. You’re a backseat driver. I think I get it now. I made you. At the tattoo parlour, I wanted something bad, maybe I wanted to be bad.’ Her reflection flinched and Sally knew at once she was right. She had shaped these beings, whatever they were. ‘You were something bad and Bernadette was my something good. I created you both. But I’m neither virgin or vamp. I’m . . . just me. And you . . . you are nothing.’

  ‘Nice try, darlin’, but —’

  Sally silenced her. She simply made her stop. In her mind, Sally pictured grasping that blackness, which now seemed little more than ink. Perhaps Molly Sue was something vast and ancient, or maybe, just maybe, she was something that wanted her to believe she was. Before, the presence had seemed so enormous, but only because she’d been so near. Up close, even the most insignificant things look huge. Now, taking a step back, Sally felt how tiny Molly Sue was, hardly bigger than her little fingernail. She was dark and frightening and loud, but she was so small. So easy to shut away. ‘You don’t own me . . . and you can’t control me.’

  There was a dark corner in her mind that Sally thought would suit Molly Sue quite nicely. Gritting her teeth, she pushed the darkness far, far behind the things and people she loved. Mum, Dad, Stan and Jennie. Taryn, Zeke and Dante. She pushed her behind everything she was excited about and everything she had to look forward to, all the things she might be. There were so many tomorrows ahead.

  She’d be there if Sally needed her. Maybe she’d come in handy one day . . . Molly Sue did, after all, have her uses. Sally didn’t doubt there’d be moments of weakness, days where she wasn’t so strong, and those were the days when she’d really have to be vigilant or Molly Sue could so easily slip back into control. But she’d be ready. She knew the signs now.

  ‘You can’t do this to me!’ Molly Sue screamed like a bratty child. Sally felt her trying to cling on, trying to remain in control. But Sally was stronger. She kept pushing and pushing, filling her head with frogs at the pond; dying Jennie’s hair over the bathtub; gummy bears in Stan’s room. She thought about the kiss. One day soon, she would sing on stage.

  As Molly Sue’s voice faded to nothing, Sally looked deep into her own steely eyes to issue a final warning. ‘Listen up, Molly Sue. I’m only going to say this once.’ Her lips curled into a slight smile. ‘Shut the fuck up.’

  The End

  Acknowledgments

  Working with Hot Key Books is always so effortless, although I’m sure that like a beautiful swan, as I glide along, the team are kicking their little legs really fast. So a massive thank you to everyone who worked on Under My Skin, especially the editorial team of Emma Matthewson, Naomi Colthurst and Melissa Hyder. Huge thanks to Jet Purdie for the gorgeous cover and humouring my cover suggestions; Sarah Odedina; Sara O’Connor; Kate Manning; Sanne Vliegenthart; Cait Davies and Jennifer Green. Like any author, you spend a lot of time with your publicist on trains and it’s always a pleasure to take a trip with Rosi Crawley and Livs Mead.

  Thank you, as ever, to my agent Jo Williamson and everyone at Antony Harwood Ltd. Continued love and thanks to all the booksellers, librarians, teachers and bloggers who’ve supported me for the past four years.

  Keen-eyed readers will have by now spotted Kerry Turner and Sam Powick are my regular beta readers and their opinion is still so important. Extra special thanks to Ana Grilo. Thanks to Erik Tomlin for trying to clear Little Shop lyrics. Finally thanks to Eleanor Ford (the real one) whose generous contribution to Authors For Philippines earned her name a spot in this novel.

  To the readers, thank you so much for sticking with me. Your letters, emails and tweets help plug the hole in my heart that love leaks from.

  PS – Prince says hi, too.

  James Dawson

  For eight years, James Dawson was a teacher specialising in Personal, Social, Health and Citizenship Education (PSHCE). As well as being a sexpert, his teen horror fiction and non-fiction writing led to him being nominated for and winning the Queen of Teen award in the summer of 2014, making James the first ‘Boy Queen’. His debut, best-selling YA novel Hollow Pike was followed by YA thriller Cruel Summer. James’s first non-fiction title, Being a Boy, the ultimate guide to puberty, sex and relationships for young men, was published in Autumn 2013.

  James is also a Stonewall Schools Role Model, and his guide to being LGBT* – entitled This Book is Gay – was released in summer 2014, alongside his first fiction title for Hot Key Books, Say Her Name. When he’s not writing books to scare teenagers in a variety of ways, James can usually be found listening to pop music and watching Doctor Who and horror movies. He lives and writes in London. Follow James at either www.askjamesdawson.com or at www.jamesdawsonbooks.com or on Twitter: @_jamesdawson

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  First published in Great Britain in 2015 by Hot Key Books

  Northburgh House, 10 Northburgh Street, London EC1V 0AT

  Text copyright © James Dawson 2015

  The moral rights of the author and illustrator have been asserted.

  All rights reserved.

  No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored or transmitted in any form by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying or otherwise, without the prior written permission of the publisher.

  All characters in this publication are fictitious and any resemblance to real persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.

  A CIP catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.

  ISBN: 978-1-4714-0297-5

  This eBook was produced using Atomik ePublisher

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  Hot Key Books is part of the Bonnier Publishing Group

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