“I do, I saw it,” Danny replied.
“Tell me.”
“In your mind I saw your longing for the city, the lights, the people… and your hesitation. You took yourself there, to that elevator. You transported yourself. I saw no steps, no lights, only the transition from the bathroom to the elevator.”
This was a stunning revelation, too bizarre to be believable. How could I have done this on my own? I’d always needed Danny’s help in the past.
“How did I manage to do it and why a darkened elevator, of all places?” I whispered. “What on earth would possess me to transport myself somewhere that would trigger such horrible memories?”
Danny leaned forward and lifted me to sit on his lap, his arms wrapped around me, keeping me safe and warm. I felt safe and warm.
“You were worried about hurting people you knew, so your mind chose a place where you couldn’t hurt anyone, where you could be contained.”
He kissed the top of my head and stroked my hair. “As to the how, I think somehow our union is responsible. There’s so little information available to me, I can only guess.”
“Why doesn’t it work the same way for me?” I asked.
“Probably because you’re not an angel.”
“Oh,” I said, crestfallen. “I thought it might have been because deep down I was an angel. Different, yes, but there was an angel inside me nonetheless.”
Danny tightened his grip on me and rested his cheek on the top of my head. I kind of got the impression that he wished I was an angel as well.
15. The Dream
“I need to face my demons, Danny, back in the city. I can’t go on if repressed memories are going to keep popping to the surface like this.” I shuddered at the thought of the box.
He didn’t say anything. I crawled out of his lap and went to the bedroom, found my old jeans and pulled out the money I’d taken from Chris. Marching back into the living area, I waved it in front of Danny’s face.
“I only want twenty-four hours. That’s all I’m asking. I have the money for a room.” I sat on the arm of the chair and dropped the money in his lap. “You can come with me if it makes you feel better. It won’t take that long and I thought maybe… well, maybe we could do some stuff together.”
He was still silent. I slid to the floor and looked up at his face. “Please, I need to do this. You keep telling me to have faith, now I need you to have a little faith in me.”
Danny pinched the bridge of his nose between his fingers and sighed.
“Remember when we went to that burger joint and that pimply kid served me at the counter? I didn’t once think about feeding off him. And those hikers, I saved them, and not just for breakfast.”
“You’re right, of course,” Danny said. “Your behaviour has been exemplary, and you’ve done nothing so far to give me any cause for concern. But facing your personal demons? I’ve seen what they look like. That will be quite a challenge.”
I shifted to my knees and placed my hands on his legs. “Think of it as a final test. If I pass this, I can do anything. Nothing will be beyond me.”
Danny nodded his head. “Very well, a final test then. The preparations are made… for tomorrow.”
“The preparations are made? No way,” I scoffed. “There’s the room to book, an overnight bag to pack and I need to figure out what we’re going to do.”
“The room is booked,” Danny said firmly. “The other stuff I’ll leave to you. But for now, I think you should get some sleep. You had quite an ordeal today.”
I didn’t want to go to sleep. I was afraid of what my dreams would hold for me. Instead, when the bedroom door was closed, I packed an assortment of things in an overnight bag — nearly everything really — and thought about what I’d show Danny of my city. The nicer city, not the seedy one — he’d see that soon enough.
Who am I kidding? I thought. He’ll have seen all of the city thousands of times already! Maybe through my eyes he’d see it differently.
I pulled on some sweats and a t-shirt, and crawled into bed. He wouldn’t come to me tonight, not unless I asked him to, and while I wanted him badly, I needed to think, about my past.
How long I lay there until I fell asleep I don’t know, but when I did fall asleep I was drawn into a nightmare from which I couldn’t escape…
I was four years old, and there was a ruckus downstairs. I’d been asleep, but the noise woke me. It was still dark outside. The light that peeked under the curtains in my bedroom was from the street lamp across the road.
It was my birthday today. Was it still today? I know that when it’s night the days change, but there was a special time when that happened, and I didn’t know what that special time was.
Yesterday I was three and today I am four. I’m almost big enough to go to school. I want to go to school because there will be lots of other children for me to play with. I’m tired of playing by myself.
I wanted a bunny for my birthday, but Mummy said she was allergic.
I said to her, “Mummy, there’s no need to be frightened of bunnies. Bunnies are nice.”
She laughed at me and said, “No, silly, allergic means bunnies make my eyes water and my nose run. Then I sneeze and sneeze until I think my nose is going to fall off.”
I didn’t want Mummy’s nose to fall off. She would look very funny, but people would laugh at her and make fun of her if she didn’t have a nose. Mummy would cry if they called her names.
I asked Mummy if the Easter bunny would make her sneeze. I was worried he might not be able to come over to our house anymore and leave some Easter eggs for me. I like Easter eggs. Chocolate was yummy! Mummy said he was a magic bunny. I wished I knew where we could get a magic bunny, because then it would be all right and Mummy wouldn’t sneeze and lose her nose.
But Mummy and Daddy gave me the next best thing to a real bunny for my birthday. They gave me bunny feet and when I put them on I could pretend I was a bunny! Then they sang Happy Birthday and there was a big cake! It was bigger than my head! I blew out all the candles with one huff! Daddy said I had good lungs.
I slipped out of bed into my fluffy bunny slippers. I loved my fluffy bunny slippers. They showed me where to walk. I followed the direction they pointed in.
The bunnies waited at the door while I turned the knob as quietly as I could. I would get into trouble if Mummy found me out of bed. This was the time for grown-ups to be alone and I should only come out if I needed to go wee. Mummy says you must always wash your hands after going to the toilet, so I was allowed to do that as well, then straight back to bed. Sometimes I didn’t go straight back to bed. I would be quiet as a mouse and play with my toys. Sometimes I was having so much fun that I’d forget to be quiet. That’s when I would get into trouble.
The bunnies didn’t want to go wee. They made me walk to the railing at the top of the stairs and I crouched down so I was teeny-tiny like a beetle, and hoped the grown-ups wouldn’t see me. I peeked over the side. Sometimes they would be singing and dancing, or sitting and talking. I liked to watch the cuddle dance best of all. Mummy and Daddy cuddled, and moved slowly around the floor in time to music that made me feel sleepy.
“What have you done, what have you done!” Mummy yelled.
Mummy only yelled when someone was naughty. Had Daddy been naughty? Silly Daddy! I giggled. He was almost as naughty as me. Oops! Mustn’t make noise or the grown-ups will hear.
Daddy was talking in whispers and I couldn’t hear what he said. Mummy was crying. I didn’t like it when Mummy cried. It made me sad. I liked it when Mummy smiled. She had a pretty smile. My smile was yucky because I’d lost a tooth. I fell over last week and my lip got fat like a slug, and there was blood on my clean top, and a tooth on the ground. I cried because it hurt and I thought Mummy would be mad at me because my clothes were dirty. Mummy gave me a kiss and cuddle, and said a new tooth would grow back in its place. When I woke up from my nap I found money under my pillow. Mummy said the tooth fairy took away baby
teeth, but always left money for it. I wanted all my teeth to fall out. Every day I wiggled my teeth with my tongue to check for loose ones, and to see if I could feel the new tooth.
“Oh god, Helena! I have to save my baby,” Mummy cried. “You may have condemned us, but I will not allow them to take her!”
When Mummy yelled my name I thought she’d seen me. I crawled back to my room, trying not to make any noise, and closed the door. I was mad at the bunnies because they were going to get me into trouble, and Mummy would yell at me instead of Daddy. I kicked the bunnies off my feet — bad bunnies! — and jumped back into bed. I pulled the blankies over my head.
When I heard the door open I lay very still, so Mummy would think I was asleep.
“Helena, darling?” Mummy whispered. I squeezed my eyes shut and didn’t make a sound.
“Jack, you’ll need to carry her. She’s fast asleep.”
Jack was Daddy’s grown-up name and only grown-ups were allowed to call him that, like Mrs Pollock from next door. She was little and old, and had a face like a prune. I was almost as tall as her.
I wondered why Daddy would have to carry me, and where we were going. Daddy picked me up, blankies and all, snug as a bug in a rug. I giggled in my head. I liked it when Mummy tucked me in at night and said, now you’re as snug as a bug in a rug. The first time Mummy said it, the very next morning, when I lay on the rug in front of the TV, I searched for the bug. He must have been really snug in the rug, like I was in the blankies because I couldn’t find him.
Daddy carried me down, down, down. One, two, three, four, five… what came after five? What was the funny numbers song Mummy sang about catching a fish alive? Oh, if only I could remember, then I’d know what number came after five!
There were lots of steps, but I couldn’t see because my head was still under the blankies. Some of the steps made a different noise — creak, creak, creak. We must be going to that scary room under the ground, where Mummy did the washing. I didn’t like that room. There were monsters living down there. I heard them when they were hungry. Their bellies rumbled louder than mine.
“Pull all the stuff out of the box and pop it on the bench,” Daddy said.
I heard a lid open and Mummy moving some stuff. It didn’t make much noise. Maybe it was the big blanky box, the one Mummy said she’d let me play in when I was a baby.
Daddy laid me down in the box and I heard the lid shut. There was a thump on the box and then it was quiet. I was frightened. I wished I had my fluffy bunny slippers, even if they were naughty and got me into trouble. Go to sleep, Helena. That’s what Mummy would say. It will be all right in the morning. So I went to sleep.
When I woke up it was still dark. I stretched and hit something hard. Ouch! I was still in the box. Was Mummy still mad at me for sneaking out of bed? It was naughty, and Mummy always says that when naughty people get caught doing naughty things they have to be punished.
I pushed on the lid, but it was heavy and I couldn’t lift it up. Maybe Mummy was sitting on the lid, waiting for me to say I was sorry.
I hit the lid with my hand. “Please, Mummy, I’m sorry. Let me out now.”
I pushed on the lid, but Mummy didn’t move.
“Please. I need to go wee… I’m sorry!”
I cried. Mummy always came when I cried, so I cried louder, but Mummy didn’t come.
“Mummy!” I yelled.
“Mummy, I want to get out! I don’t like the box. Please, Mummy, I’ll be good, I promise. I’ll be good! I’m sorry I was naughty. I won’t do bad things ever again, I promise!”
I sucked my thumb.
Baby, baby, baby!
Am not.
Baby sucks her thu-umb, baby sucks her thu-umb!
I pulled my thumb out of my mouth and poked out my tongue. I don’t care, I’m scared! I stuck my thumb back in my mouth.
I could hear the creak, creak, creak of the stairs, but they sounded very far away.
“I swear I didn’t call the cops.”
That was Daddy, and if he was swearing he was being naughty, and Mummy would make him put money in the swear jar.
“You’ve made our lives here just that little bit more difficult. We don’t appreciate that.”
I didn’t know who that was, but he was very angry at Daddy, even angrier than Mummy had been.
Mummy screamed. I knew it was Mummy because she screamed when she saw spiders and it hurt my ears. It must have been a big spider, maybe the size of a dog. Could spiders grow that big? Mummy once told me about a bird-eating spider, so maybe there were dog-eating spiders as well.
Mummy’s scream was very loud, even in the box. I was frightened — Mummy was scared and Daddy was being told off by a stranger. Didn’t they know about stranger danger? Every day when I went to playgroup the teacher would say, don’t talk to strangers, don’t take lollies from strangers and don’t get into a car with a stranger.
Mummy was crying and it got louder — she must be close to the box — and then it slowly went away. I heard the creak, creak, creak of the stairs. Everything was quiet again. Where was Mummy? Where was Daddy?
I banged on the lid again. “Please, let me out!”
I cried because I couldn’t hold on any longer and I wet myself. Mummy would be very angry with me. It smelled yucky and I couldn’t breathe properly. I coughed and coughed and put the blankies over my face to hide the smell. I was hungry and thirsty and didn’t like being wet. It made me feel dirty.
Dirty girl, dirty girl, wets her pants, ha-ha-ha!
Mean boys always picking on me. I don’t like them. I want my Mummy!
I cried until I went to sleep again.
Something kicked the box.
“Mummy?” I called out, but my voice sounded small.
“Did you hear something?”
Another stranger. Shh, mustn’t let the stranger hear me.
“It came from over here, under this pile of blankets.”
Mummy had put the blankies back on the box. That’s why I couldn’t open the lid. But why would she do that?
The lid opened and the light was bright, even through the blankies. I stayed very still and quiet. Maybe they would go away.
“Jeez. This stinks worse than the body on the floor. Must be another one. Call for another body bag, will you?”
The blankies were pulled off my face and the light hurt my eyes. I screamed, and the man jumped back.
“Fuck, she’s still alive!” the man yelled. He was very surprised, and I was very scared. “Well, don’t just stand there, call an ambulance!”
He lifted me out of the box and I tried to kick him, but the smelly wet blankies were wrapped tightly around my body. I wriggled in his arms, trying to get free, and saw a big dark red puddle on the floor, under Daddy’s head.
“Why is Daddy red?” I whispered.
“He’s dead, hon, your dad is dead.”
“Helena,” Danny said, shaking me, “wake up. You’re having a nightmare.”
I struggled in his grip, hitting his chest with my fists and weeping uncontrollably. He pulled me closer to him and wrapped his arms around my shaking body.
“It’s okay, Helena,” he whispered. “Everything will be okay. It was just a bad dream. Here, take this.”
Danny handed me a handkerchief and I wiped my eyes and nose, still shaking in his arms.
“It was horrible, Danny. I relived what had happened, every single moment. I heard my Dad being murdered and my Mum being dragged away. I saw his body when the cops found me. All this time I thought they’d abandoned me, that I was just a problem child.”
“That probably explains why blood made you queasy up until recently.”
“I guess. I remember they said my Dad had been dead for at least twenty-four hours, so I had to have been in that box for somewhere between thirty to forty hours. No wonder I hate confined spaces, but that’s not the worst of it…” I whispered.
“What do you mean? Danny asked.
“It’s like a
key to the past has been unlocked. All these other memories came flooding back as well.”
I looked at the hanky and cried again. Danny just continued to hold me and it was a great comfort. He didn’t push me with any questions, didn’t try to rip the memories from me. He was happy to let me decide when I was ready to talk about it.
“It all started the night I was put in that box. I was in a hospital for a while, and then fostered out to a few different homes. No one could handle me.”
“You don’t have to talk about it if you don’t want to,” Danny said.
“No, I want to. I think it’ll be good therapy to get it out in the open and confront it. Lord knows, the little therapy I had as a kid didn’t work.” I took a deep breath and continued. “The last family I was placed with really was a last-chance family. They knew it and I knew it. If I stuffed up I’d be sent to an institution and locked in a room every night — another box, though probably a larger one. That house was where the abuse began. That’s when, at the age of eight, I had to start earning my keep.” I shuddered.
“Don’t say any more,” Danny whispered.
I ignored him and continued talking. “It wasn’t just him, it was their friends. They were very careful not to leave any bruises or marks that might raise an alarm, and they hung a sign on the back of my bedroom door that said Welcome to the last chance hotel. It was to remind me what awaited me if welfare services took me back.”
“Stop, please,” Danny implored.
I looked at his face. He wasn’t crying, yet I could see the pain in his eyes, and his brow was creased in anguish. I stroked his cheek. Why was I always so selfish around him?
“I’m sorry,” I whispered. “I shouldn’t have dumped all of that on you.”
“There’s nothing to be sorry about. It pains me that mortals, one of His favoured creations, can do this to each other. I don’t understand it at all.”
I gently kissed his cheek. “Neither do I.”
“Do you think you’re up to a trip to the city?” Danny asked. “We can go another time.”
“No, I’ll be fine. It’ll be a nice change for me. The last thing I want to do is sit around and dwell on things. Just let me get changed and we can be off.”
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