by Holly Archer
I could have stood there in his arms forever but my phone was ringing again and Kev was getting impatient.
Pulling away, I said, ‘I’m sorry. I really have to go.’
Omar gave my hand a little last squeeze. ‘OK. But I’ll call you tomorrow. I promise.’
It was only when he was out of earshot that I dared answer Kev. He sounded impatient and frustrated, as always.
‘About time,’ he snapped. ‘I’ve been calling you for the last ten minutes. I’m at the end of your road.’
I can’t even remember who Kev took me to that evening. I guess it can’t have been that bad, in the grand scheme of things, because I’d have probably remembered had it been really horrendous. It sounds bad, but when you’re seeing so many horrible men so often, one encounter merges into another and only the really awful ones stick out. I later learned that some girls who were sold like I was were plied with alcohol and drugs as a way of making them comply – of numbing them to the horrors of what they were being forced to do. But I was never given anything, not in the early days, anyway. Nothing to cloud my brain, or to help me forget. It was up to me to close my mind off. I had to block it all out myself and I guess I got quite good at it.
After we’d finished, Kev would often take me to Lisa’s or back to the family home, next to the house where I’d first met the really old Chinese man who touched my boobs. No matter what time it was, Lisa would always be dressed to the nines, full of smiles and cups of tea, calling me babe and sweetie and darling and asking how I was, was school busy, had I had a nice weekend?
Every time I saw her smile at me with her perfectly made-up lips, I liked her a little less. At first, I’d been so naive I’d given her the benefit of the doubt. She’d seemed so normal. Surely she’d have felt sick to her stomach if she’d realised Kev was selling young girls to pay for her make-up and clothes and fancy furniture? But the longer things went on, and the more Kev took me to her house on the way to or from some sordid job he’d lined up for me, the more I couldn’t accept that she didn’t know exactly what was going on. Why didn’t she think it was really weird that her forty-something boyfriend kept turning up on her doorstep with a fourteen-year-old girl he appeared to have no connection with?
Lisa knew. She knew all right, but she chose not to say a single word because the money I made for Kev paid for her shoes and her leather couch and her lipstick and the toys for the love-child she’d had with the man who was touting me around town like I was a piece of meat. I still sipped my tea and thanked her politely, because what else could I do? But when she tried to chat to me, my answers became shorter and more clipped and, when we left, I didn’t smile as I said goodbye like I used to.
‘See you soon, honey,’ she’d say, all sugary. She was still pretending to be oblivious to how much I was beginning to resent her but, as I shuffled out of the door, I sometimes looked back and caught her eye. I wanted her to see the torment hidden within me, but she’d always quickly look away. There were times when I wanted to run back up her driveway, past the bush Kev had stolen from the grass verge at the side of the M54, and barge into her house and ask her did she know? Did she know what I’d had to do so she could get those designer wedges or that new phone? But of course, I never did, because what would Kev do then?
Still, sipping tea in Lisa’s was preferable to being taken back to the family home. The girls would always stand at the top of the stairs and stare at me wordlessly, like I’d arrived there from another planet. I don’t think I ever saw either of them on the ground floor any time I went there, which was really odd. From what I could gather, their mum’s health was getting worse and worse and she needed more care. Not that you would have guessed it from the way Kev acted. He never once popped up to see if she was OK, or expressed any kind of concern for her.
Farooq and Imran were still allowed to do just as they pleased. Imran was out all the time with Ali and the other boys, so thankfully I rarely bumped into him. Farooq always seemed to be home, though, and most of the time he’d be watching his porn videos in the lounge. Needless to say, Kev never batted an eyelid. One evening, I was sitting awkwardly on the sofa, trying not to watch him as he masturbated, when he came over to me, boxers round his ankles.
Without warning, he started swinging his penis in my face and rubbing it on my cheeks. I was caught so off guard that I jumped out of the chair, but Farooq didn’t give over.
‘You like me, Holly?’ he sneered. ‘You like my dick?’
At that point, Kev appeared in the doorway, clutching a cup of tea and shaking his head with a little chuckle, as if he’d caught Farooq sneaking an extra chocolate bar into his lunch-box. He didn’t try to stop him, but Farooq soon got bored and turned back to his film. As the moans of another big-breasted blonde woman rang around the room, he started wanking again.
I think that’s maybe why I got so attached to Omar. I hadn’t wanted a boyfriend, far from it, but he was an oasis of normality in my very abnormal world. I’d only ever get to see him for twenty minutes a day, half an hour maximum, because I was always on such a tight schedule, so this free time became so precious to me. I’d see Mr Khan after school, then I’d go home and do my homework and maybe grab some dinner. Most nights Kev would pick me up and take me to some filthy house but, if he didn’t, Beaver would collect Carly and me and we’d help out with his pizza deliveries. I suppose I didn’t really have to see Beaver, because he was just a mate and didn’t make any demands, but I wanted to. I felt like he needed us, Carly and me. We helped him with his English and he told us his problems. It didn’t seem like he had many other people to talk to and he really wasn’t happy at home. I don’t think he really wanted to have a baby, but he never said as much.
‘You always have to go so quickly,’ Omar said one night, as he’d pulled me in for another kiss. ‘Can’t you stay just five minutes longer?’
‘I can’t,’ I sighed. ‘I really wish I could but I have to be home. My mum goes out every Tuesday and I have to look after my sisters.’
‘Where does she go?’ Omar asked.
Without thinking, I came up with a lie: ‘She does a college course. Between half-five and half-seven.’
Omar kissed me again, threading his hand through mine. ‘It’s ten past. You better go.’
‘I’ll ring you tomorrow,’ I said.
‘OK,’ he replied. ‘Oh, but Holly?’
‘Yes?’
‘I was just . . . you know . . . kind of wondering, if you’d maybe . . .’
‘Maybe what?’
‘If you’d maybe be my girlfriend?’
My eyes lit up. ‘Yes,’ I replied, without hesitating. ‘But I really have to go.’
I practically skipped all the way down the road, even though I was heading to Kev’s car. It felt totally different from when Imran had asked me to be his girlfriend. This time it felt real. Omar hadn’t even asked me for a blow job. He hadn’t even mentioned it. He only seemed to want to kiss me.
I was on such a high that I didn’t even mind that I was heading off to have sex with an old man. It was only the Chinese man with the posh house. I knew it would be painless and it wouldn’t take long and I was right. As I walked back to the car, head still in the clouds, thinking of Omar, I handed the pile of notes to Kev.
As usual, he counted every single one, and then counted them again, to make sure I’d come back with the right amount. When he was satisfied all the cash was there, he started the car and we drove off back in the direction of home. I thought I was done for the night, but I was wrong.
‘I’ve got someone else for you,’ Kev said. ‘But not now. Later.’
‘Later?’ I said. ‘How much later? I’ve got school in the morning.’
Kev rolled his eyes. ‘Bloody hell, Holly, you can stay out late one night. It won’t kill you. Half past ten. I’ll pick you up at the end of your road at quarter past.’
It was the first time Kev had ever asked me to stay out that late, but I could tell from his tone of v
oice that it wasn’t an option. Still, I started to panic a little about how I’d explain it to Mum. Plus I’d arranged to meet Carly and Beaver later and I felt a bit bad. Beaver’s baby was due in just a few weeks and he was getting more and more anxious about becoming a dad. I felt I had to be there for him.
In the end, I told Beaver I’d meet him the following night and asked Carly if she wanted to come along. I assumed she wouldn’t, as she’d have to sneak out too, but she seemed keen. I couldn’t think of a decent excuse for Mum, so in the end I decided I was going to pretend I was having an early night, then creep back out, making as little noise as possible. Mum always bathed the girls and put them to bed early, and then she and Phil were usually so exhausted they didn’t stay up too late. They’d usually gone upstairs by ten o’clock.
That evening, they seemed to take longer than usual and my heart was pounding in my chest as the minutes ticked round and I could still hear the noise from the telly in the living room below. Quarter to ten came and went, so did ten to. I wondered what would happen if I didn’t turn up. Would Kev come marching round to our house and tell Mum I was a prostitute to spite me for messing up his arrangement? I hugged my knees as I let the thought swirl around in my brain, but in the end I had to stop thinking about it because it was unbearable.
At ten o’clock, they still hadn’t come upstairs and my palms had started to get sweaty. I could hear the distinctive chimes of the BBC News at Ten coming from downstairs and I felt dizzy with frustration. Why are they watching the bloody ten o’clock news? I thought. They never stay up to watch the news!
Just then, my phone lit up with a text message. I grabbed it and opened it straight away, thinking it might have been Kev, fifteen minutes early, without any warning. But it was from Omar.
Night gorgeous. Can’t wait to see you tomorrow xxx
I thought about Omar, who was probably tucked up in bed by now, just like I should have been. But here I was, lying under the covers, fully clothed, waiting for an opportunity to sneak out into the darkness. He had no idea my night was just beginning.
Finally, at five past ten, the sound from the telly stopped and I heard two sets of footsteps on the stairs. Beads of sweat were forming on the back of my neck, as I knew I was on borrowed time. I heard Mum go into the bathroom and start brushing her teeth and washing her face and doing God knows what else. By the time she’d finished, it was twelve minutes past and Phil still hadn’t been in yet. He’d just gone in and closed the door when my phone lit up again. This time, it was Kev.
At end of road. Hurry up.
I wasn’t sure what to do and I was feeling really panicky. Should I try to sneak out now, really quietly, and risk bumping into Phil on the stairs? Or should I wait a few minutes, until he was done in the bathroom, and they’d put out the bedroom light? I had to make a split-second decision and I decided on the second option. If Phil saw me creeping down the stairs fully clothed, he’d go absolutely nuts and the whole house would be awake and I’d have to sit and listen to a lecture for twenty minutes. If that happened, there would be no way on earth I could meet Kev. My knuckles were white, as I clutched my phone in my hand and tapped out a reply to Kev.
Be there soon. Just trying to sneak out.
The response came within seconds.
Hurry up!!! Need to be there by 10.30.
It was already seventeen minutes past ten when Phil closed the door and turned out the light on the landing, but I knew I couldn’t leave straight away. I had to wait at least a couple of minutes, but those minutes seemed to take forever as the clock ticked by. Kev rang me twice but I ignored it. If I started talking on my phone, someone might hear and then I wouldn’t be able to get out.
It was twenty-one minutes past before I decided to bite the bullet and just go for it. Phil was evidently wiped out because I could already hear him snoring loudly from the bedroom. I hoped Mum had fallen asleep just as quickly, or at least that she was dozing off.
I carried my shoes in my hands as I eased down the stairs on my tiptoes, in the dark. I prayed Lauren or Amy hadn’t left a toy on the stairs because if I tripped and made any kind of noise, it was game over and I’d be in the shit. I’d been late for Kev before, and missed a few of his calls, but I’d never yet failed to turn up completely and I really didn’t want to find out what would happen the first time I was a no-show.
My heart leapt with every tiny creak the stairs made. I remember asking myself why they never normally seemed to make any noise, why they only refused to be silent when you really needed them to be. With every step I took, I was convinced I’d turn round to see Mum or Phil standing at the top of the stairs, absolutely fuming.
I finally reached the bottom and breathed a shallow sigh of relief, but I still had to get out the door. Slowly and carefully I pulled the door handle down and eased myself across the threshold and onto the first of the stone steps outside. I closed the door as softly and as stealthily as I could, and then stood with my back against it for a few seconds, heart hammering wildly.
I was out.
It was only then that I put my trainers on. I began to run, as the cold February rain blew into my face. I didn’t even waste time doing up the laces; I just bolted as fast as I could to Kev’s car, with its engine running, at the end of the road. God knows what the neighbours must have thought, but none of them seemed to say anything to Mum, or to suggest that they’d seen me.
I practically threw myself into the front seat. Carly was already sitting in the back. It was now twenty-six minutes past and we were really late.
‘We’ll never make it on time now,’ Kev hissed. ‘This is a fucking joke. If he cancels, this is all your fault.’
I genuinely thought he might kill us, as he tore through the streets at breakneck speed. He was driving the way Beaver had on the day he’d chased Mr Khan but, this time, I didn’t feel like anyone was trying to protect me, so I just felt really frightened. It was only as we swung round a corner and my phone lit up again that I realised I hadn’t replied to Omar. He’d texted again.
You OK? xxx
I managed to tap out a quick reply before we parked up behind another nameless takeaway on another nameless Telford street, telling Omar I was fine and that I’d see him the next day. As awful as it sounds, for a moment I kind of hoped Kev would send Carly in and I’d get to sit in the car for once. I didn’t want to spend half an hour looking at him as he silently seethed and raged with impatience over the time it was taking for him to get his precious money, but it was better than having to actually go in and do the deed.
But he said: ‘Carly, stay there. I’ll be back out in a minute.’
I managed to stifle a sigh, as I dutifully followed him up a set of stone steps and into another rank hellhole of a place that had the audacity to serve food and charge people for it. The chef was standing at the top of the stairs, still wearing his white, curry-stained work clothes. He was quite tall, with long black greasy hair that clung to his cheeks. I thought at first he was Pakistani, but I soon figured he was probably Bengali because he didn’t speak Kev’s language.
‘Go into the room,’ Kev barked, and I did as I was told. I eased myself onto another filthy, moth-eaten mattress as I took in my surroundings. The room was one of the tiniest I’d ever been in, and there was barely any room for the bed. But hanging above me was a washing line, with six or seven pairs of pants dangling from it. Every single pair had a hole in them but I bet the chef wasn’t one bit embarrassed. After all, no one needed to put on airs and graces for a little slag like me, did they?
I could hear Kev and the chef arguing outside in English, talking about money and how much he was willing to pay. He sounded really tight because every price Kev gave, he tried to haggle. I tried not to listen. I didn’t really want to know how little Kev was going to let me go for, after dragging me out of my bed in the middle of the night.
They must have eventually struck a deal because the chef soon came into the room and threw his stained overalls on t
he floor, before tearing at my clothes and unhooking my bra. He was holding a bottle of water, which he tossed down by the bed before climbing on top of me, and then the inevitable began.
At first I just looked straight ahead, at the pants hanging from the washing line. They were a bit disgusting but at least they gave me something to focus on. But twenty minutes must have gone past and the chef seemed no closer to finishing. Twenty minutes became half an hour, and when half an hour turned into forty-five minutes there was a thud on the door.
‘Fucking hurry up!’ Kev’s voice hollered from outside. ‘Fucking dick. I haven’t got all night.’
The chef – who hadn’t yet said a word to me – just laughed. For a moment, he stopped and I wondered if he’d just got bored, so I started to sit up, but he pinned me down again. He took a huge swig of his water and then just spat it on the floor, like he was a child playing in the bath and this was all a big game. Then he started again.
He’d been inside me for about an hour and a half when I started to feel really sore. I didn’t just hurt down there. The tops of my legs were aching from bearing his weight and I was really, really tired. All I could think of was how exhausted I was going to be at school the next day. I didn’t have a watch on, and I couldn’t reach for my phone, but it was definitely gone midnight and Kev had already knocked the door, swearing, three times. There were times when the chef’s breathing quickened a little, and I hoped he was close to finishing, but every time it happened he just took a big swig of water from his bottle and spat it on the floor, like it was some sort of weird ritual.
Around two hours had passed when Kev started knocking again. This time, he was really hammering the door and it sounded like he was going to burst in and beat the chef up.
‘You bastard!’ he was shouting. ‘You’ve taken Viagra, haven’t you, you fucking cunt!’