by Jay Nadal
“I’ve seen enough of this to last me a lifetime. Leave the boy alone. If I see you do this again, I’ll frogmarch the three of you to the principal’s office. Do I make myself clear?” he said in a firm and deliberate voice.
His threat was met with a continuing wall of silence. The only response was a defiant smile from Rollings as he turned towards Matthew and said in a hushed tone, “We’ll see you later.”
Saunders and the boys heard a series of footsteps behind them. Abby and Scott had overheard the altercation whilst they wandered through the school and grounds.
“Everything all right here?” Scott asked, sensing the tense, icy stand-off.
He could see the terror in Matthew Edrington’s eyes as they flicked nervously between Scott, Saunders and the boys. His hands were clenched tight in a ball under his chin, his arms protectively shielding his chest.
“Nothing I can’t handle,” Saunders said in frustration.
“You okay, Matthew?” Scott asked.
“I said nothing I can’t handle,” Saunders insisted.
Matthew opened his mouth to speak, but immediately decided against it when Rollings turned his head shooting him with a threatening glare. The boy’s eyes were wide, his lips pursed tight and his jaw muscles flexed as his stare pierced Matthew’s fragility. Matthew shot Scott a quick look and gave a tremulous nod.
“Get on your way now, the lot of you…go!” Saunders shouted, before he too turned and hurried away.
Rollings shoulder barged Matthew as the three boys waked off. “We’ll see you later…” he snarled.
Scott watched as they sauntered off nudging one another and laughing. “Matthew, wait…”
Matthew paused in mid-step, slowly turning on his heel to face Scott, with one eye firmly fixed on his aggressors. He hung on tight with one hand to the rucksack over his shoulder, his other hand buried deep in his trouser pocket.
Scott walked over to him and placed one hand on his shoulder in support. “Are they always picking on you?” A wall of silence met his question. Matthew stared at the ground as if it might open up and swallow him whole. Scott decided to change tact. “Do those boys pick on other kids?” Matthew shrugged his shoulders, not answering. Scott could feel the bony shoulders of the boy through his blazer. Scott gave him a reassuring pat on the back. “Listen, if there’s anything you want to talk about, here’s my card. Give me a call,” Scott offered pulling out his card from the inside of the suit jacket.
Matthew scurried off in the opposite direction, keen to put some distance between him and the others.
“The poor boy looks terrified,” Abby tutted. “Kids can be so cruel.”
Scott paused for a moment. Bullying was something he knew happened in every school. Whether it was a state comprehensive, or an elite boarding school, boys or girls, it happened. Schools would try their hardest to stamp it out, but in his experience, as soon as a victim sought help from the teaching staff it inevitably led to further victimisation from the aggressor.
For that very reason so many victims chose to remain silent. They would endure years of torment looking forward to the day they could finally leave school. Their lasting impression of school wasn’t one of carefree fun and learning. It was one of fear and sadness.
“What makes you think that Matthew’s been singled out?” asked Abby.
“When we first turned up here, do you remember how he was talking about how he had let his house down and they were going to be angry with him?”
Scott stared down the corridor, his eyes drifting in space. There were just too many things that weren’t adding up for him.
17
Laurence Goddard attempted to put his key in the lock for the third time as he leant against the frame for support. Each time he’d tried, the key had slipped or refused to slide into the keyhole. He’d cursed, “Useless piece of shit.” To him, the task seemed as impossible as threading a needle with the naked eye. He finally drove the key home with a satisfying grunt, and pushed the door wide open and stumbled in. Another day of dealing with illiterate adults and snotty-nosed kids had left him with little patience. He had decided to seek solace at a pub around the corner. The last thing he wanted to do was come home.
Earlier this evening, he’d felt safe with his favourite friend, Jack. Several rounds later, the tension had eased from his shoulders, so much so that his eyes felt heavy as the world around him spun. He’d not eaten anything since breakfast. Glancing at his watch, he’d gone more than twelve hours without food. Goddard’s mouth was tinderbox dry and his throat still parched. He looked down at his bruised hands. His knuckles were red and purple.
As he rubbed them, the anger once again bubbled up inside. His stomach tightened causing his body to shiver. She did this to me. She forced me to hit her. She never listens, that filthy, fucking slut of a wife of mine.
His eyes had fought hard to focus on the other punters in the pub, a mixture of old, sad and lonely men like him offset by young city types and their floozies. “Women, bloody women,” he snarled through clenched teeth. He hated the way they had this Amazonian quality to twist any man around their little finger. The short skirts, high heels and big breasts were all that any hot-blooded man needed to fall under their hypnotic charm. How could men be so weak?
But he was just as weak. A saying rolled around inside his head, Women, can’t live with them. Can’t live without them. He was guilty of thinking it. Believing it. Living it. He’d been staring at the silky, cream flesh of those floozies all night, dulling his raging senses with booze. But it hadn’t worked. Their slender thighs and tight calves, oh, how he’d wanted to touch them. And their feet…how could a man forget their heel arches peeking out from the sides of their high-heeled shoes. God, they turned him on. His cock twitched in his boxer shorts. His heart pounded. His head spun…He needed sex. Now.
Back home, floozies became a distant memory as Goddard took one step at a time to haul himself slowly up the stairs as he gazed into the darkness of the landing. The stillness of the night was broken by the sound of his laboured breathing. The drink hadn’t dulled the cacophony of voices inside his head. They were banging off the walls of his skull like a pinball machine. A heavy throbbing in his neck seemed to keep him company more and more these days.
A thin crack of orange light that seeped underneath the bedroom door pierced the darkness of the landing. He paused for a moment as his mind took a few seconds to catch up with what he’d seen. She was never one to go to sleep with the bedside lamp on and this confused him as he swayed back and forth on his heels.
Goddard pushed open the bedroom door, expecting his wife to be fast asleep. Wife…That was a joke, only to find her sitting on the end of the bed fully dressed. He glared at her, bewildered. Samantha Goddard sat there fiddling with her wedding band and engagement ring that rested in the palm of one hand. He steadied himself in the doorway with one hand as his eyes trailed down to the floor where a small suitcase rested by her feet. She looked up at him nervously, neither of them breaking the silence.
“What…What theeee fuck do you think you’rrree doing?” he slurred.
She fiddled even faster with the rings in her clammy hands, as she took short, sharp breaths. She’d had this planned for a long time, knowing exactly what she was going to say. The events of the last few weeks had pushed her to the edge. Any hope of happiness had been cruelly dashed in the past few days. Samantha thought she could put up with the beatings if she was happy in other parts of her life, but soon realised she’d been kidding herself all along. The people she loved were never there when she needed them, leaving her full of resentment, anger and deep sadness. Was she that unattractive?
The speech had been rehearsed over and over in her mind, but her words fell at the first hurdle. “I’m…I’m…leaving you, Laurence. I can’t…stay here anymore. I need to leave now.”
Goddard glanced around the room, his head bobbing slowly like a nodding dog toy on the parcel shelf of a car. His jaw dropped as hi
s expressionless face started to contort. His eyes narrowed as thick crease lines ploughed his forehead. “You’re not going anywhere…” he seethed.
“You can’t stop me, Laurence. The only person you’re interested in is yourself. You never confide in me, and yet keep telling me that you can’t cope any more. You drink too much and then come home and beat the shit out of me…I’m not going to be your punchbag anymore.”
“Do you not think I know what you been up to?” he slurred, as he jabbed a finger in her direction. “The way you dress up, you’re inviting it. How many has it been…one…two…ten? You’re a disgrace, you filthy whore.”
“No, Laurence,” she said, finding her voice and fighting back. “You’re the bloody disgrace. Look at you. I don’t even know who you are these days. You’re drunk all the time. You’re fat, losing your hair and obsessive and secretive. You’re not the same person I married.”
Goddard hated being challenged. The kids challenged him. Their parents argued with him, and now his wife dared to challenge him. He was fed up of been taken for granted.
Without a moment’s hesitation, he clumsily launched himself in the direction of the bed, his forward momentum carrying him as he part walked and part stumbled. He rushed towards her and gripped her by the throat, pinning her to the bed. Samantha was taken by surprise at the power of his grip as he pressed down hard on her windpipe. She fought to rip his fingers away, but he sat his ample body on top of her, his weight crushing the air from her chest.
Her legs flailed as she thrashed around on the bed but she couldn’t breathe, couldn’t do anything. Drool escaped from her open mouth, as it ran down either cheek. Her face felt tight and hot as the blood gathered. Her eyes felt like they were bulging in their sockets. All the while, his hand kept squeezing, squeezing so hard that she felt her head might explode at any moment.
Goddard leant into her, his face just inches away. She could smell his warm, vile whiskey breath, which made her head spin with nausea. He tried to kiss her but with each attempt to lay his lips on hers she’d thrash her head from left to right. Her resistance was met with a heavy slap that whipped across her face. The crack of skin contacting skin echoed off the walls, vibrations of pain in his palm numbed by the drink. The redness in his hand matched only by the redness on her cheek. Her skin stung, her eyes wide in fear as he hit her again.
He hadn’t loosened his grip on her. Unbearable pain rocketed through her body as his thumb pushed down hard on her windpipe and black spots took over her vision, spreading like a contagious disease. Samantha’s mind raced with images of imminent death reaching out its icy cold hand to clutch her. Her vision flooded with blackness. Moments away from passing out, he loosened his grip on her neck. Samantha lay there gagging, desperate to draw huge lungfuls of air into her constricted throat. She gasped once, twice and heaved as some oxygen started to reach the rest of her body.
As she lay there, fighting for breath, her whole body ached, her vision just a daze as the room spun around her. Any hope that the attack was over became short-lived as his next atrocity loomed into her awareness. Goddard had unzipped his trousers and dropped them to his ankles. He scratched and clawed at her skirt pushing it up to her waist. She kicked out furiously in a desperate attempt to push him away. Her attempt to defend herself was soon crushed as he punched her hard in the stomach, forcing all the air out of her still struggling lungs. She gripped her stomach as the pain spread through her abdomen in waves like ripples on a pond.
“Stop fighting, you silly bitch,” he hissed. “You’re mine…do you hear me? You’re mine!” he shouted, as he violently pulled at her underwear, snapping the elastic and tearing fabric before discarding the fragments like empty sweet wrappers. He fell on top, thrusting himself into her with an aggressive grunt as he grabbed her hair on both temples and pulled violently with each thrust.
Samantha’s weakened body had lost the will to fight. She lay limp on the bed, eyes clamped shut. Her body ached in so many places. Her scalp prickled with pain as he tugged harder. She scrunched up her eyes, tears broke free from the closed edges. She escaped deep inside her mind, trying to block out the violation to her body. You’ll never do this again to me.
18
Matthew had spent the best part of an hour cowering under his duvet. He gripped the top of his bedding and pulled it tight under his chin. His eyes darted left and right in the darkness. His body craved sleep, but his mind raced in fear. He couldn’t win either way. If he fell asleep, he knew the nightmares would wake him as they had done so often. If he stayed awake, the waves of anxiety that racked his body would only intensify.
He finally succumbed to physical and mental fatigue as he drifted off into a deep sleep. His subconscious mind replayed the events of the day as his head jerked from left to right, beads of sweat bubbling on his forehead. His body jerked as tiny micro-muscular movements systematically repeated the assault from earlier today.
The door to the dormitory opened quietly and the three figures silently made their way to his bed in slow motion. They glanced around at the other boys, deep in sleep and blissfully unaware of the fate that awaited one of their room-mates. The odd groan and snort punctured the silence of the night. They gathered around his bed, their eyes fixed on him. Rollings gave the other two the nod to proceed. Hunter leant forward and forcibly pushed a length of duct tape over Matthew’s mouth whilst Ford held the boy down by his shoulders.
Hunter’s eyes drilled into Matthew, menace pouring from them as his eyelids twitched. One corner of his mouth was fixed with a sadistic smile. He wanted to hurt Matthew; he wanted to hurt him real bad. Many students had privately thought that Stephen Hunter was unhinged and a complete nutter. He had a reputation around school, a reputation that was fully justified. Several months earlier students had witnessed Hunter capture a bird and break its neck as it thrashed around in his hands. He’d laughed as the bones in its fragile neck cracked. He seemed to relish seeing those around him wince in disgust and horror as he threw the lifeless bird in nearby bushes.
The year before, another pupil had burnt his arm in a chemistry class after bleach had been splashed on it. Despite an internal school investigation, the perpetrator of the crime had never been officially identified. It was widely accepted by his peers that Hunter had been the instigator, but a wall of silence fuelled by fear meant that no one would come forward.
Rollings stepped forward as the two boys dragged Matthew out of bed. The poor boy’s eyes widened with terror as his arms were forcibly held behind his back, a tight vice-like grip caused his hands to throb. When a black hood was placed over Matthew’s head, the overwhelming feeling of fear intensified and engulfed his tiny mind and body. Matthew let out a faint squeal as he tried to cry, his silence instantly assured as Hunter punched him hard in the kidneys with gritted teeth and fiery aggression in his eyes.
They forcibly pushed him towards the door. Rollings peered into the dark, cold corridor to check the coast was clear before he nodded at them to follow. Hunter and Ford held Matthew tight as he stumbled blindly. His bare feet shuffled along the hard, cold parquet floor.
They led him from Stanmer House, through the winding historic corridors that over the years had been graced by future politicians, CEOs, army generals and doctors. At night, they took on a different meaning to Matthew. They were his hell. He’d rather face a night on his own in the middle of the forest with nocturnal creatures, than endure the fear, humiliation and degradation that he faced every day. School was supposed to be the happiest, most carefree days of your life. Matthew saw them as something entirely different.
They walked through a much older part of the school, long consigned for redevelopment many years ago and not fit for purpose. Through a lack of maintenance and upkeep, it fell victim to ongoing disputes between the school and the planning department at Brighton and Hove Council over proposed plans for expansion. It was out of bounds to all students.
Plaster crumbled from the walls as damp crept up from
the floor like an evil, cancerous disease destroying everything in its path. The parquet floor had been long removed and replaced by dusty, uneven concrete that felt as rough as sandpaper on Matthew’s bare feet. A lack of ventilation caught him off guard, a claustrophobic stench like overturned earth or a damp cellar. Matthew heard a door creak open, the swollen timber dragging on the uneven floor. He was thrust into the room before coming to a stop.
After the hood was yanked from his head, Matthew blinked furiously as he tried to adjust to the semi-darkness. It was a soulless place. The dirt and dust from years of neglect gathered on the boarded windowsills. Cobwebs draped from the ceiling and dust particles drifted in the still air. Small candles placed around the room flickered, their ghostly shadows dancing on the walls. Matthew felt the faint trace of heat from the fireplace warm his face, the orange and yellow glow illuminated the features of those gathered.
“I told you we’d see you later. The weakest amongst us need to be weeded out,” Rollings said as he circled Matthew. “You faggot. Now for your punishment…you’ll take this like a man.”
Without another word, Ford and Hunter secured ropes to Matthew’s ankles and wrists before pulling them tight through iron wall fixtures. Strung up like a starfish, his shoulder blades and hips ached from the stress position. Confusion clouded Matthew’s senses. He pulled and thrashed in the vain attempt to free himself, but the harder he toiled, the more the rope cut into his skin. The stinging sensation burnt as red welts formed.