How to Play Dead

by Jacqueline Ward

  Half an hour later he came down with an arm full of clothes on coat hangers. He laid them on the table and went back upstairs. More clothes. Then a suitcase. I could feel him behind me.

  ‘I’m going on a conference. I’ve told Jeff Simister you’ll not be in this week.’

  I relaxed a little. A conference! This is both good and bad. Good because I will be alone and not afraid. Bad because I can’t go to work. Or outside. There is no point asking. It will just mean trouble.

  He packed the bag and left it by the door. I had expected him to go there and then. But he was in his study all night. I could hear his TV and his chair creaking as he shifted around. He didn’t go to bed. He left this morning without the suitcase.

  When he had been gone about an hour, I opened it and looked inside. I counted the shirts. There were enough clothes for about three days. He’d packed a bag of toiletries and I opened it and sniffed the musky shower gel. I went to the sink and squirted it down, leaving a tiny bit in the bottom. It is little things like this that make me feel more in control. Then I saw the condoms. A pack of ten, squashed down in the bottom of the bag.

  I took the pack and, with shaking hands, opened it. I counted them and there were eight. I carefully placed them back in the bag and zipped up the case. Then I went upstairs and checked the bathroom cabinet. The condoms he used with me were still there. A pack of ten. With two left, like before.

  So he was definitely sleeping with someone. This was no business trip. He was going away with her. I burst into tears. I should be pleased. I should be celebrating that he is going off with someone else because then I will be free. But I still have a sliver of self-respect. I still get upset when he is lying to me. I still get upset when he stays out all night.

  I have tried my hardest to control it, God knows I have had enough time on my own to analyse it. I know, deep down, even through periods when I try to defend him in my own mind, that I don’t deserve this. And I am suddenly pleased. All the manipulation, control and violence has not worked. He hasn’t broken my spirit.

  Chapter Eighteen

  Day 12

  I have no choice. Even though the footage of the car outside the accommodation block has completely shaken me, I have to carry on as normal. It set me on yet another trajectory of wondering if I should report it, but after almost an hour of weighing it up when I should have been working, I wrote it in my diary. He’s playing a game of cat-and-mouse with me. It’s almost as if he wants me to call the police so he can laugh at me.

  Even so, yesterday I made sure that Malc knew to keep the gates shut and locked at all times and not to let anyone in without asking me or Janice. But I carried on, making the kids tea. I did not want to leave them but I am damned if I am keeping them off school. Damned if I am sitting trapped in our flat all day. They are edge-to-edge safe. I laughed and chatted with Donelle when she came home later with a takeaway. She asked me if anything else had happened with the stalker and inside I was screaming, Yes, Donelle, yes; he won’t leave me alone. But I shook my head and hugged her. What would I say? I saw him outside my work? He was in the pub the other night? He tried to abduct me?

  It sounds mad, even when I practise telling Donelle and Janice everything in my head, as if I’m making something of nothing. I know this is exactly what happened back then, when I sat in the newly refreshed lounge with my mum and dad and they quizzed me about Alice. Why had we fallen out? Was he my boyfriend? Had I had ‘relations’ with him? They actually said ‘relations’. I knew that she had gone with him. That she was obsessed with him. I knew everything about her because we were like sisters. But they wouldn’t listen. I even tried to tell them what had happened to me, but all they wanted to know about was her.

  I know deep down that this is why I am working at SafeMe. I became what I am that day: someone who stands in the background, behind all the drama, managing it for other people. And, when it happens to me, I push it deep down with my memories of beautiful Alice and our friendship. Now, as I sit on the wall outside Sheila’s, Danny texts me.

  Hey, babe. Fri-yay! Day 12. We’re doing it. Not long left now x I love you x always x

  I type a reply. I don’t trust my words to not convey how scared I am inside, so I just type:

  ‘XXX’.

  I’m staring at my phone, willing him to send something back, a heart or a smile, when Sheila appears beside me. She’s already defiant and feisty; she knows that I know about the TVs.

  ‘All right, Ria. Coming in or just lookin’ like it?’

  She’s already walking back to the flats and I watch her, stomping up the pathway. She’s wearing gold open-toe sandals, black leggings and a gold shiny top. Her eyes are lined with black kohl, making the whites of her eyes look even more yellow. I follow her.

  The usual aroma of her flat, tobacco mixed with Estée Lauder Youth Dew, has a faint tinge of brandy. I glance towards her bedroom and see a sequined dress flung over the back of a chair. Sheila is smoking still, the corners of her mouth sticky with spit, her breathing heavy. She throws a newspaper at me. It’s the early edition of the Chronicle.

  ‘Thought I’d show you this before you see it anyway.’

  The paper is folded at an article headed ‘Manchester win for bantam-weight belt’. Underneath are several photos of celebs going into the arena. One of them features Frank and Sheila with the caption ‘Ex-mayor Frank James and his wife show up for pre-match gala’. Shelia is watching me carefully. Sheila in the picture looks glamorous and is smiling widely. Her arm is linked inside Frank’s and he has his hand over hers. I look at her.

  ‘Was it good, then?’

  She snorts. ‘Yeah. Course it was. People hitting each other in the face is always a bloody treat.’

  I’m annoyed and she knows it. Not just about this, but also about the TVs and her not telling me.

  ‘So why go?’

  She blows smoke at me as she speaks.

  ‘No law against it, is there? I mean, not in prison, are we?’

  I see a wall go up. Not that it’s ever really come down with Sheila. But she is right. There is no law against any of the women going out. Socially. In fact, they go out most Friday nights, taking turns to babysit the children. When we explain that they are free to come and go as they please, people are shocked. It’s as if they think SafeMe is a kind of institution, where these women who have been abused should be grateful and stay inside, looking after their children and doing crafts.

  But this is pure bollocks and the opposite of what it really is. The women here have done nothing wrong and are not having their freedom curtailed. They have already been in a kind of prison, physical, psychologically or both.

  ‘Nope. You’re not in prison, Sheila.’

  She flicks her ash.

  ‘Frank’s lads came and said he wanted me to go. The other day. He said that it wouldn’t do any harm. Sent me some of my clothes over.’ She points to the bedroom where I see a black suitcase leaning against the wall, one that I haven’t seen here before. ‘All the nice stuff. Said he wanted to take me out.’ She stares at me, her eyes dark now. ‘Court me.’

  I nod. Of course he does. Start again. Like it was. When we first met. Dating. Courting.

  ‘And how do you feel about that?’

  She sighs. ‘He sent a car for me. Just like that first night when he changed it from paying me to taking me out. Just like that. Black limo, Frank’s style. Little present on the back seat.’ She flashes her non-smoking hand and I see a diamond ring on her little finger. A new one. ‘Real, that is.’

  I nod. She’s holding out her hand and it shakes slightly.

  ‘Look, Sheila. It’s up to you what you do. I just want you to be safe.’

  ‘When we got there, he was waiting in the car in front round the corner. I saw him get out and then get in with me. The windows in them cars, they’re blacked out, you know.’ She drops her diamond-studded hand into her lap and stubs out her cigarette. I see a tear drop.

  ‘Oh, Shelia, love.
What did he do to you?’ I scan her for injuries, but apart from the cast on her arm, which is partially covered by a gold lamé scarf, I can see none. But that doesn’t mean that there aren’t any. ‘Has he hurt you?’ I go to hug her but she leans backwards, more agitated now.

  ‘I saw her. She was in the car. In the back.’ She picks up the newspaper and points to a young blonde woman walking two people behind her and Frank, head slightly turned. She looks confident, taller than Sheila and perfectly coiffed. I can see, even from the black-and-white newspaper picture that she is wearing Christian Louboutin high heels, and her short skirt is expensive designer-wear. Her right hand is raised to brush her bleached-blonde hair out of her face and she is wearing a simple tennis bracelet that has caught the camera flash. She appears to be about twenty-five. I touch Shelia’s arm, but she is up, rooting in boxes and pulling out folders of photographs. Eventually she finds what she is looking for and sits down. She pulls out a photograph which is sepia with age, corners folded.

  ‘See. Look at me there.’ It is almost a replica of the newspaper photograph, Frank and his entourage entering an event. He clearly has a set piece, where he leads, his woman beside him, his right-hand man just behind, then his ranks filtering behind him. Sheila points at herself.

  ‘Look. What you have to understand is that he will have told everyone exactly how he wants this to look. Everyone in these pictures will have received strict instructions, and sometimes the clothes to make the right impression. It’s very important to Frank that everything looks right.’ I picture him last week in the perps meeting, his golf swing and the cufflinks. Sheila’s jaw is set. ‘Yeah. He bought me that dress and shoes. I had to wear them, exactly those. And that bracelet.’ I study the picture. A tennis bracelet.

  ‘But I don’t understand. Why would he …?’

  She is crying now. Her face crumbles and her eyeliner makes rivulets down her over-tanned skin.

  ‘I knew. He thought he could keep it from me, but I always bloody knew. I even asked him, plenty of times, but he just said, “Don’t be bloody stupid, woman.”’

  She throws the newspaper at me and its pages flutter through the air, landing all over the sofa.

  ‘That’s the bloody problem. What he didn’t say. Me and Frank have never had a proper relationship. It’s always been what he wants. If I couldn’t give it to him, he’d go and get it elsewhere. And that’s what’s happened here. He’s gone and fucking got it somewhere else. And of all the things he could have got me to go to, he wanted me at this one. I knew when the car drew up and I saw her in his car.’ She wipes underneath her eyes, a practised motion that removes most of the mascara and eyeliner, and wipes it on her leggings. ‘He kissed her on the cheek and got out.’

  She takes another photo. Frank kissing the cheek she offered to him.

  ‘I’m so sorry, Sheila. It must be awful for you. Is this the first time he’s done this?’

  She suddenly stops sobbing.

  ‘Done what?’

  I’m confused. She’s just shown me Frank’s mistress, his twenty-odd-year-old mistress who he brought on this supposed date with his estranged wife.

  ‘Well, this woman …’

  She starts to laugh, a snotty bellow, right from her lungs, mixed with her black tears.

  ‘No. No, no, no. Well, granted, that would be fucking bad enough. But this is worse, love. Much worse. That’s no high-class hooker, or even his girlfriend, love. Nah. There’s been loads of ’em, but I’ve had to turn a blind eye. No.’

  She laughs long and hard.

  ‘No, this time he’s took it further. He’s proper rubbed my stupid little nose in it. Not that I had a bloody choice, and he knows it. But he picked his moment. Gives me a diamond. Sends a car. Has me believing that all this can be fucking bearable because how much worse could it get. Eh? How much worse?’

  She’s pulling photographs out of the folder, her face scarlet, and she’s ripping them up. The fragments cover the floor around her, fingers working quickly. She grabs another handful of photographs and begins to tear, but the bundle is too thick and it will not shred in her hands. She throws them to the floor.

  ‘See? I can’t even do this. I can’t even rip up a few photos.’ She lights a cigarette with shaking hands and the smoke drifts into her back-combed hair. ‘I can’t keep a baby inside me.’

  I start to pick up the tiny shreds of photos and pile them into a carrier bag.

  ‘Come on, Sheila, love. The fact that we’re sat here talking, in this flat, shows that you can do something. You got away. This is just a blip. You knew there would be bad days.’

  She nods and wipes mascara tears across her face.

  ‘Not this bad. Not this fucking bad. But I’m not surprised. Not really.’

  I put my hand over hers.

  ‘So now you know what to expect. You know if he asks you again. You don’t have to go, you know.’

  She smiles a little. ‘Yeah. But he has his ways and means. I did it for this lot. And you, lovely.’

  ‘Oh. For who, Shelia?’

  ‘Well, he said he’d promised to do a refurb, like, you know, to help.’ She says ‘help’ in the most sarcastic way possible and I know then that she knows it is all just a game to Frank. ‘So he said if I went to the boxing with him he’d get a wide-screen TV for every flat. It’s all some of ’em have got here, TV, Netflix and that, so …’

  Unbelievable. He’s blackmailed her.

  ‘But he didn’t promise anything. I never agreed. He turned up with some Xboxes for the kids and Janice took them, but no plans were made. I wouldn’t let him, anyway.’

  She laughs and mimics me. ‘Wouldn’t let him. Funny. You don’t let Frank, love. Oh no. He’ll just do it and bugger the consequences. If he wants to send everyone a gift of a TV, then he will. But he said if I didn’t go with him, you know, take up his little “first date” offer, then he wouldn’t. And he’d make things difficult for you. I told you, love. He’ll stop at nothing.’

  I straighten now. It’s hard to see how he could make things more difficult than they are right now, but Janice and I always say, Just when you think you’ve seen everything, so I pay attention. Maybe he was going the extra mile already.

  ‘But you did. And the TVs arrived. I didn’t agree. And you should have asked, Sheila. I don’t want stolen goods here.’

  She laughs. ‘Oh, lovely. They’re not stolen! Frankie would have bought them fair and square for something like this. Loves to pay cash, he does. A good way to get rid of it, this sort of thing.’

  She picks a few sepia strands from down her armchair. ‘No. He knew what he was doing all right. He can’t get to me here. No arm twisting or pinching or scaring here. So he thought he’d do it another way.’

  She’s looking at the newspaper now, staring at the woman in the picture. I look upside down, Frank his usual collected self, no sign of cufflink jangling here, where he is king of all he surveys. She turns the paper round again and shows me the picture.’

  ‘You see, he’s kept her hidden. Not been to owt like this before. But I’ve been told. A few meals out, been seen at the Trafford Centre. But in the same car. That’s my place, that is. But not any more.’

  She’s tearing up again. I try to reason with her.

  ‘The thing is, Sheila love, you and Frank are split up. I know you were there last night and, yes, that is a dirty trick. But you might meet someone else as well.’

  She laughs again, guttural and deep. She leans forwards, a sneer on her lips.

  ‘Bloody hell, love. You are dense, aren’t you? That’s not his bloody girlfriend. It’s his daughter.’ She shoves the paper at me. ‘And her, in the background. That’s her mother.’ I squint at a small woman, younger than Sheila, dressed in a long black gown, two people behind her daughter. ‘All Frank’s women. All together. Bloody hell.’

  I hug Sheila now as she cries hard. I know how hurt she was over Bobby and how she, and, I thought, Frank believed that it was at the bottom of t
heir marriage problems. But this. Frank has punished her for all that he feels she has done. For leaving. For not returning. For telling me about Bobby. He has dealt a blow that will last for ever, striking over and over again at Sheila’s soul.

  I look around at the flat, in even more disarray than when I arrived. Sheila is at rock bottom, and I know that this is the time when many women just give up and return to their old lives. I rub her shoulders as she sobs into my chest, desperately trying to think of a remedy to this solution. But Frank has it sewn up. It’s all out in the open now, his daughter and his mistress out with his wife. It’s laid out in the newspaper for all to see. The ultimate betrayal. Sheila stops sobbing a little.

  ‘All for a couple of tellys.’

  She is deliberately missing the point. The TVs were a small enticement, a signal that Frank had control. Even here. She would have gone anyway, desperate to recapture whatever fucked-up origins their relationship had. But now she is desolate and there is no comforting her. I look around the flat.

  ‘Yeah. But where’s yours, Sheila? Where’s your TV?’

  She snorts. ‘What do I need one for now?’

  Tanya

  Diary Entry: Friday

  I am writing this now in case something happens to me. I have this feeling a lot, mainly on Friday as I leave my desk and wonder if I will ever see it again.

  I did the unthinkable. He didn’t come home on Thursday night. He came back for the suitcase today, at teatime. I hadn’t made tea but it didn’t matter because it didn’t look like he was staying. He came in with another, larger suitcase and opened it on the table. Then he went upstairs and brought down more clothes. A suit, some casual clothes. Three pairs of shoes. Socks.

  Then he went into his study and brought out some papers. He placed them and a laptop in the suitcase. I sat at the kitchen table and watched him.