The Broken Ones

by Sarah A. Denzil

  “Oh, you poor love.” Eileen delves into her handbag and produces a packet of tissues. “After your coffee, Peter mentioned that you had a sick mother to care for. I wasn’t sure if it was true, or…”

  “It’s true,” I reply. “She has early onset dementia. It has taken quite a toll, and with these phone calls and everything else…”

  Eileen leans forward and squeezes my arm. “Say no more. Don’t you worry about my son. I’ll take care of it.”

  On the way home, I can’t help wondering what my life would have been like if I’d had a mother like Eileen. Someone to pass me tissues when I was upset, to call me “love” and make me cups of tea.

  I head back home to quickly pick up some extra marking before school starts. Eileen had agreed to meet me at 7:30, before we were both due at work. But as I pull up the car, Susanne is storming out of the house yanking a cigarette from her packet.

  “She’s tapped, that one,” she calls out.

  With the front door wide open, Mum stumbles out onto the drive in her bare feet.

  “Don’t you ever come back, you whore. I know you stole him from me.”

  I’m not sure what to address first, so I turn to Susanne. “What’s happened? You know she gets confused. She has Alzheimer’s.”

  “Yeah, that I can deal with,” Susanne replies as she attempts to light her cigarette. “But punching me in the face? Throwing her cup of tea at me? Look at this bruise! How the old bird has the strength, I don’t know. This is a hostile working environment. Your mother needs two people around at all times. I need to go home.”

  I sigh, completely deflated at this next turn of events. I can’t argue with Susanne, not when the shadow of a bruise shines along her left cheekbone.

  “All right, you go. I’m sorry that she hit you. She’s not been in her right mind.”

  “That’s the thing,” Susanne says. “She wasn’t even confused at the time. She was plain old mad at me for getting her tea wrong. That woman was a cruel, stone-hearted bitch long before the Alzheimer’s.”

  I open my mouth to defend her. That’s what I do. I defend Mum’s behaviour. I’ve done it my entire life. But not anymore. I’ve changed. The part of me that has been chained to her my entire life is now free.

  There is no way to defend her, so I shut my mouth and let Susanne go.

  “Come on, Mum. It’s just you and me now.”

  *

  After getting her settled, I pick up the phone and call the school, requesting that they put me through to the head teacher.

  Moira’s voice is as clipped and no-nonsense as always when she replies. But I detect a slight tone of pity as she uses a higher register and speaks more slowly than usual. “Sophie. Is everything all right?”

  “That offer for sick leave—is it still on?”

  “Of course,” she replies.

  “I’d like to take it. And I’d like it to start today.”

  I tell her about the nurse, about Mum’s assault, and how I have to stay with her all day now. She’s calm, patient, and kind with me, traits that I’ve never expected from her. When I disconnect the call, I know I should be relieved, but I’m not. Aside from the sadness, I feel cheated, as though a gift has been snatched from my fingers. All my life I’ve felt uncomfortable in my own skin, as though I’m not truly who I say I am. That’s the real reason why people avoid me, and why most of my friendships and relationships have fizzled out. I think Jamie saw that in me but was attracted to it. Attracted to my insecurity.

  But being at the school gave me an identity. I was Miss Howland. I was well-liked and respected by my students. I’m a good teacher, confident in what I do but not unpleasant about it. Now that’s gone—at least for now—leaving me feeling like a lost teenager with no direction in life.

  “I’ve wet myself.”

  I turn around to find Mum standing in the kitchen holding her crotch. The air is filled with the tang of urine. Mum’s bare feet are in the centre of a puddle of pee, her skin covered in the urine.

  “That’s all right. It’s only a little accident. Let’s get you cleaned up.”

  I help her up the stairs. She’s frailer than ever before, and tears wet her nose. I pity her. But most of all, I wonder if this woman, this bent over, piss-stained person, could also be the same person who’s been stalking me and driving me crazy. She drank bleach a few weeks ago. She forgets my name and forgets the name of her nurses. She wet herself and needs help getting into the bath. How can this be the same person sneaking around the house cutting up my clothes and hacking into my email account?

  I bundle up the soiled clothes and put them straight into the washing machine while Mum soaks in the bath. Then I clean the pee from the floor and disinfect everything she touched. Then I help Mum back out of the bath, dry her off and help her into a nightgown. All the while, she calls me Mummy.

  This will be the only time I hear that word. Uttered by my own mother. Yet, even in this dark moment, they make my stomach ache for a little girl to say them to me.

  After I get Mum back into her bed, I slip downstairs, run the taps to fill the sink, and cry until my eyes are sore.

  I want that ache to go away. I want, more than anything—more than I want to know the dark secret in my past—to feel whole. Because I never have felt whole. I’ve always felt as though a part of me is missing.

  When the breakfast pots are cleared away, I take a glass of water up to Mum.

  She sits upright in bed when I see her. For once, there’s a bright smile on her face. I set the glass down on the bedside table and watch as she opens the top drawer and takes out a bottle of pills.

  “Look, Sophie—I’m taking them all at once, like you told me to,” she says.

  I watch as she opens the pill bottle and takes one out. She slips it into her mouth and swallows it down with the water. Then she takes another pill from the bottle and opens her mouth to take it.

  I snap out of my trance. “No! Mum, no. Don’t take that. I never told you to take all the pills at once. Don’t ever do that.”

  With shaking hands, I remove the bottle of pills from her fingers and leave the room.

  Chapter Sixteen

  My laughter echoes. Every time I laugh, I hear it sung back to me, like a bird imitating the human voice. That laughter makes me feel lighter. It’s a young laugh. A child’s laugh. I’m a child.

  There’s a hand in mine, pulling me forward.

  “Come on, Shadow.”

  I trot along, faster. I’m running. It’s the end of summer, and I’m thinking about ice cream—the kind with the flake and strawberry sauce—but I’m also sad. I feel forgotten.

  Then the sky goes dark, and I’m running faster. The hand that was in mine has gone, and there’s a dull pain in my chest. I cry out, but there’s no echo for my cry. I glance down at my body expecting, somehow, to be pulled in two. Ripped in half.

  I get the sudden, real feeling that I’m being chased, and I glance behind me to see the silhouette of a man following me. The moon outlines him, revealing his bulk. I urge my legs to carry me faster, tripping over the ridges in the pavement. Though it’s dark, I know where I’m going.

  My hands ball into fists as I run. I lift my right hand, and the moonlight shimmers across the strands of hair in my fist. The pain in my chest grows tighter and tighter, until tears run down my cheeks.

  “Mummy?” I say to no one.

  The man is gaining on me. I know he’s going to catch me up.

  I stare at the hair in my hand as I fall, and I know that I will never be the same again, because I’ve lost who I am.

  *

  I wake with a gasp, tangled in bed sheets. My hands fly up to my face to find my skin hot with a fever and damp with sweat. A smattering of fine hair falls over my face, and I realise that I’ve pulled out my hair in my sleep again. Touching the back of my head confirms it. There’s a light coating of blood on my fingertips.

  The clock says 6:15. I don’t need to get up for work today, though
I do need to make breakfast for Mum, and since I’ve enforced this early morning routine, she’ll be expecting that soon. But first, I wait until my heart is back to a normal rhythm, and until the shadowy figure from my dream has gone when I close my eyes.

  Every image in my dream evokes a vague sense of memory. That feeling of déjà vu spreads over my skin like cold custard. The significance of all the pieces is clear, but I can’t put them together to give me the answers to all my questions.

  Come on, Shadow.

  Was that someone talking to me? The way I remembered the existence of the shadow made me believe that it was someone, or something else. Nothing makes sense. Maybe this hair-pulling thing is a tic, or a habit from when I was little. The secret that my mum is keeping from me—could it be that I was disturbed as a child? That I’m mentally ill?

  I repress a shudder at the thought. I block it from my mind. None of it explains the man chasing me in my dream, or the familiar streets and the little-girl giggle that I heard. My mind swims with all the disjointed images as they fragment and fade away. I want to dash into the living room and write them on the notepad I keep next to the phone, but I’m afraid that if I move, I’ll forget everything. So I stare down at the hair in my hand until I’ve committed as much as I can to memory. Then I swing my legs over the side of the bed and get up. On my way out of the room, I drop the strands of hair onto my dressing table.

  Mum is still sleeping when I pop my head around the door, which surprises me. I decide there’s no point in waking her up, seeing as there won’t be a nurse coming this morning. And I don’t have a job to go to, which means I can spend as much time in the shower as I like. I suppose there is an upside to taking leave.

  The luxurious heat of the shower brings my body to life, though the abrasion at the back of my head smarts when I shampoo my hair. If I carry on with these nightmares, I’ll end up bald. Perhaps I should mention this to my doctor, seeing as I have to go to get a sick note to sign me off for stress at work. That shouldn’t be too hard, thanks to my worrying colleagues. If everyone else believes I’m stressed, then I suppose I must be.

  I can’t help letting bitterness creep in. It’s followed by that familiar punch in the gut as I grieve over my lost job. Will I ever go back? Will they ever want me again?

  My mind drifts back to the nightmare. That same dull ache strikes my chest. I remember gazing down at my body and expecting to be ripped in two. Deep down in my bones, I know that is important—as vital as the awareness of my own brokenness. There must be a cause for all this internal anguish, and it must be connected to my childhood. My maturity is twisted up with the way Mum brought me up, and I can’t untangle myself.

  Mum is still sleeping half an hour later as I get dressed and dry my hair. Perhaps I still can get a moment to myself, even when I’m caring for her full-time this summer. Maybe we’ll manage to bond together, fixing whatever it is that’s been broken between us before the disease takes her away forever. Or maybe that’s wishful thinking.

  I tie my hair back to disguise the growing bald patch and head downstairs to make breakfast. While the kettle is boiling, I boot up my laptop and check on the camera in Mum’s room. It seems fine. Nothing has been altered this time. I rewind a little and watch her sleeping for a while. Then I close the laptop lid. Perhaps everything has blown over, and whatever Mum might have been trying to do has now ended. I make my cup of tea, think about my nightmares and my strange almost-memories, and wonder how much of all of this has been in my mind.

  I used to be a positive, optimistic person who always looked on the bright side. But over these last few months, I’ve lost that characteristic. I’ve lost a lot. If only I can make a new start, perhaps I can learn to find that missing part that I’ve been searching for all my life.

  It’s a beautiful morning outside, and the sound of birds singing filters into the house. I move across to the glass doors of the kitchen that open out onto the garden with the intention of taking my tea and toast to the patio table.

  I never make it to the patio table. I don’t even get to open the French doors leading out into the garden. My wrist goes limp, and the hot tea splashes up my shins. At my feet, the mug shatters into tiny pieces. Even with the pain of the hot liquid against my legs, I find myself transfixed and immobile. A small cry escapes my lips.

  There, on the glass doors, is a clear handprint. Someone has been in my garden. They have walked up to the glass doors, they’ve placed their hand on the glass, and they’ve stared into my home.

  *

  PC Hollis and PC Chowdhury arrive promptly at nine. By that time, I’ve distracted myself from the handprint by getting Mum out of bed, dressing her and making her breakfast. I explain to her that two men are coming round to the house to ask me a few questions but that she doesn’t need to be there. She can take her jigsaw puzzle into the living room. For once, she complies without question, and I’m glad.

  The two officers examine the handprint, take some photographs and check for shoeprints in the garden.

  “Has anything been taken from the garden or the shed?” PC Chowdhury asks.

  “I checked earlier,” I reply. “Nothing has gone.”

  “Did they break into the house?”

  “No. At least, I don’t think so. It’s just the handprint. Isn’t that trespassing, though?” I ask.

  Hollis nods. “Trespassing is a civil matter rather than a criminal one. But with the other incidents that have occurred here recently, you can be assured that we will take this seriously. You’re being harassed, Ms. Howland.”

  I let out a sigh of relief. “I’m glad. I half-thought that you might just ignore it.”

  “No, no. There will be an investigation. You mentioned that you have a security camera at the back of the house?”

  “Yes. I’ve not watched the footage yet. It probably sounds silly, but I didn’t want to watch it alone,” I say.

  “That’s perfectly understandable.” Hollis smiles.

  I load up the security system on my laptop, pulling up the feed from last night. I rewind the footage until Hollis tells me to stop and click play. He has a good eye. He caught the movement before I spotted it.

  I let the video play. The three of us crowd around the laptop, each engrossed in the images on the screen. My heart patters against my ribs as I watch the events of last night unfold. As the footage plays, I’m aware of the blood draining from my face and the nausea that rises from my belly. Hollis gives me a quick, worried glance and a half-smile. It helps, but it doesn’t stop the dizziness. I grasp hold of the kitchen chair, desperately needing the extra strength.

  It’s a dark, moonless night, and at first the camera doesn’t pick any movement. But then, when a car passes along the street that runs parallel with our garden, its headlights illuminate a figure standing at the very end of the lawn. I have to clamp my hand against my mouth to stop myself from crying out when I see it.

  The figure is more of a person-shaped lump than anything else. I can tell that the person is short, that they’re wearing a long, dark-coloured overcoat, that their face is angled low, and that they’re wearing a hat. The overcoat is bulky, hiding their shape.

  It’s a fleeting, terrifying glimpse. Then the car continues down the road and the video goes dark once more. My eyes are still transfixed on the spot where the person was standing.

  When our outside light is triggered, I do let out a sound akin to a whimper. This time I fail to hold it in. It prompts PC Hollis to turn and ask if I’m all right. I nod and continue watching the recording.

  The figure is now close to our kitchen, and the outside light shines brightly on our trespasser. They stand with their feet planted wide, with gloved hands at their sides and their face angled down so that their features are hidden. If I once felt that I could explain all this away by blaming local kids, I now have confirmation that I cannot. There is calculated determination behind all this. I see it in the way they stand, the way they wait… It all suggests that they’re a
ware of the camera, and they know exactly what they’re doing.

  When the figure steps closer to the door, I think we all three experience the sensation of a spell being broken. We all start at the sudden movement. Even Chowdhury lets out a soft, nervous laugh. Without lifting his or her head, the trespasser slowly starts to remove the glove from their left hand. My heart skips a beat as I watch them lean forward, obscuring their hand from the camera. They lean forward and press their hand against the glass, covering the action with their body.

  When the deed is done, they scuttle away quickly, turning fast and keeping their head angled down the entire time. I let out a long, bittersweet sigh of relief.

  “Whoever it was knew about your security camera,” Hollis says with a frown. “Can we take a copy of the footage from last night?”

  “Of course. Do you think you’ll be able to see anything more?”

  “Well, we can’t enhance the images any further. It’s not like TV crime shows, I’m afraid,” he says with a grin. “But we might pick up on any little extras that might help. We should be able to determine the height of the suspect.”

  “They seemed about my height,” I reply.

  He nods. “I thought that too.”

  “Peter was short,” I mumble.

  “We spoke to Peter Woods after the incident with your clothes. I’m afraid there was little more we could do other than warn him about the phone calls,” Hollis says. “But we had no evidence that he was the vandal then. Perhaps we’ll find more evidence after this incident. The phone calls alone could be enough to get a restraining order, if that’s what you’d like to do.”

  Chowdhury takes notes and nods at his partner.

  “His mother called me the other day, and I met up with her for a coffee. I think she was concerned that Peter had, in her words, latched on to me. She said that he does this a lot with women. He fixates on anyone he goes on a date with and calls and texts them until they get fed up of him.”