Into the Darklands (23 page)

Here’s another one for the girls: do a recognised self-defence course. If you can’t talk your way out of it, you want to make sure you hurt the bastard enough so you get a chance to run. And if you get a chance…
run.
Don’t even stop to think about it.

If the worst happens and the Bad Man is trying to take you away, do everything you can to get away from him. Talk, lie, cajole, scream, push, punch, gouge, stomp, slash. Take out his eyes with your fingers. Break his fingers. Kick his testicles all the way up to the back of his throat. Dislocate his kneecap with your heel. Whatever it takes.

The only reason he wants to take you away is to get you somewhere isolated, somewhere quiet. He wants to take you somewhere he won’t be disturbed. Whatever he does to you there, you can be sure it’s going to be bad.

You’re always better to take your chances then and there because if he gets you to his quiet place, you’ll have no chance. If he wants to kill you, better to take your chances where you are than going to some lonely place where he’ll have time to play out
his
script of the murder scene. Do whatever it takes, just don’t go with him passively.

If you are alone when the Bad Man comes, or he gets you to his quiet place, stay calm. Think. Most of all, think.

There will be time for fear later. You
have
to stay in control. He’s come for a reason and you need to work out what that is and how you can get out without getting hurt.

There is no one thing that will work in all situations since there are many different kinds of Bad Men. Above all though you need to stay calm, notice everything, and be flexible in your approach. You need to read him carefully, to try and work out what makes him tick. Always remember that he’ll be acting out a script he’s written in his head. He wants you to react in a particular way.

He might stop if you tell him you’re pregnant or that you have cancer.

He might stop if you act concerned and ask why he’s doing this bad thing.

He might pause if you talk to him about his family or yours.

He might stop if you yell and fight him.

He might be intimidated if you portray confidence.

He might want to talk about himself, about why a ‘nice’ man like him would want to do something like this.

Any one of these things might work, or they might have the opposite effect. Sometimes if you act calm he’ll want to hurt you more because he likes your fear. Sometimes if you act friendly he’ll just feel encouraged.

The most important thing is to notice what effect you are having and adjust your actions accordingly. If crying makes him angry, stop. If pleading makes him angry, stop. If being nice makes him worse, stop. If fighting makes him worse, stop. On the other hand, if whatever you’re doing has the effect of calming him or making him slow down, keep going.

Know too that sometimes there is nothing you can do, absolutely nothing. In that situation your only job is to survive. Do whatever it takes to accomplish that.

If the Bad Man wants the money, don’t be an idiot. Give him the money. I know there have been cases where people have complied with the robber’s demands and still been hurt, but statistically your best chance is to remain calm, and do what he says.

In general my best advice would be that, whatever situation you are in, remain calm, and think. Most of all think.

The Bad Man
always
has a reason for coming. He might lie to you about what that reason is, but he will always have one. If you can find a way to give him what he wants and not get hurt, do that.
If you can find a way to distract him or convince him to change his plan, do that.

To summarise: Notice everything. Be flexible in your approach. If what you’re doing isn’t working and it feels like things are getting worse, then stop. If it’s working, keep going.

Remember too, after all this scaremongering, that the world is for the most part a safe place. Your chances of being the victim of a violent crime are still very small. People are generally good. If you lose your wallet, there’s a reasonable chance someone will try and find you to give it back. The sun shines most days.

There is always more good news to report than bad, it’s just we never see it because it doesn’t make such good television. We don’t always hear about all the nice things that happened today in the world, but they still happen nonetheless. Today people helped their neighbours and parents read stories to their kids. Today perfect strangers had kind words for one another and some of them even scratched their dog’s ear.

All these things happened, and more.

LET ME TELL YOU a story about a boy who never was. None of this particular story is real. This is not a case study. The boy who never was really never was, but there are plenty of kids like him out there.

Still, he doesn’t fit in a book like this, in a work of truths. He’s trespassing, an unwelcome guest. Try as I might, though, I couldn’t keep him out.

He’d been standing back in the shadows for years, patiently waiting his turn. So if you don’t like made-up stories maybe you should skip this bit, get back to the
real
stuff.

Sleep doesn’t come to her. Instead she wraps the sheets tightly around her small body like a bandage. She has done this every night for the last four years, since she was nine, and it has never done any good.

The night steals from this child, it takes and takes until she feels little more than an empty shell. Soon she will be all gone. Soon she will be done. But not yet, there is still more to be endured.

Just after midnight he comes, the floorboards creaking in the quiet sneaky way that only floorboards can in the dead of night. She screws her eyes shut and curls into a ball, stretching the blankets so tight they almost tear.

He pauses at the door, as he always does, and she hears his breathing falter. He’s listening. But there’s no one to hear his creeping. Her mother is at work and her little sister is sound asleep in the next room. There will be no help this night, or any night for that matter. She is 13 years old and as alone as any girl has ever been.

She hears him sigh, and that’s how it always begins. With that long shaky sigh. Inside she’s screaming, but outside she is a cold little stone, frozen in the ground.

She feels the weight of him on the bed and her fingers lock into the blankets, praying that might be enough to save her. But of course it isn’t. He peels her.

She hardly notices when he finishes. Her body is numb by then, without feeling of any kind. It remembers though, the body always remembers. ‘I love you, honey,’ he whispers from the door on his way out, quietly, as if he doesn’t want to wake her.

The cold little stone makes herself the same promise she has made every night since she was nine years old: she will never be like that, she will never love anyone. Never ever. And when she wakes in the morning and goes down for breakfast you would never know, because she looks just like a normal girl.

No one would guess she’s really a cold little stone, with a secret she carries inside. A dirty little secret she won’t even know herself for another eight weeks.

Inside her the rag-tag boy has begun.

In the end they pretend she became pregnant to some boy at school, although this is never talked about, never said. They all just ‘assume’.

‘We’ll support you,’ her father says as they sit around the kitchen table.
‘Won’t we love?’ he asks, turning to her mother.

‘What choice do we have?’ her mother mutters, angry.

Much later, she will come to believe that her mother always knew she carried her father’s bastard child, and that’s why from that moment on they hardly spoke. But not then. Then all she feels is a terrible burning shame. There are no boys at school, and everyone at that kitchen table knows it.

When the baby is born it feels as if she is being raped by the whole world. Strangers poke and prod at her, and worse than the pain is the terrible bright light, and all the watching faces. So she screams and screams.

And through it all her father holds her hand. ‘Breathe,’ he says. ‘Keep breathing, honey.’ When it finally comes out of her she does not want to see it, all she wants is to crawl into a small dark space and cry.

‘Look,’ her father says, turning to her holding the tiny mewling child, ‘he has his grandad’s eyes.’

The baby never stops crying. She does her best, such as that is, but the baby never stops. Nothing she does seems to make any difference. It’s as if the baby hates her, as if he’s been sent to punish her. His tiny screaming is a constant reminder of where he came from. It hurts her just to look at him.

By now she’s moved out of her parents’ home. She’s on the benefit, living in a small flat. It quickly became intolerable at home, where she didn’t speak to her mother. By now the hatred between them has become almost a physical thing.

Her father still comes to visit her two or three times a week, bringing money and alcohol. They drink together for hours as the baby cries. Then he usually gropes her for a while before he eventually staggers home.

After he’s gone she lies in the dark, crying, feeling the worst kind of empty. There is nothing in her world, not a single thing. No love. No joy. No hope.

One night, as he reaches under the kitchen table where they’re both drinking to grope her, she pushes his hand away.

‘What?’ he asks. ‘What did I do?’

And she hates him even more than she hates herself. ‘Get out,’ she tells him. ‘Get out, you pervert.’

‘What did you say?’ he demands, indignant.

‘You heard me,’ she spits back at him. ‘You’re a pervert.’

‘You ungrateful little bitch,’ he yells at her, angry now. ‘After all I did for you? After all the money I’ve given you? This is how you treat me?’ He sweeps his glass off the table and it smashes against the cupboards. ‘You’d be nothing without me. You’d be living on the street, you little slag.’

‘Fuck you,’ she screams at him, the rage bubbling inside her like poison. ‘Fuck you.’ She runs from the kitchen into her bedroom, throwing herself onto the bed. The tears are like a storm and they take her away for a while, away to a dark painful place where the truth cannot be denied, only endured.

Much later she feels his weight settling on the bed.

‘I’m sorry,’ he whispers. ‘We shouldn’t fight. You know I love you…’

And, because it hurts her the most, because it’s the best way she knows to hurt herself, she lets him do the things he’s come to do. As he drapes himself on her, she knows in her heart she deserves this. She’s the worst kind of person, and that’s why he does these things to her. This couldn’t happen to a good girl. This could only happen to someone like her.

Through it all the baby screams, and screams, and screams. He’s hungry and his filthy nappies stick to his skin. Already he’s learning. The boy who never was has started to find his way in the world.

His first memory is screaming; screaming and darkness.

Three years old and huddled under a bed. She
—
he never called her anything else
—
has been drinking again, and when she drinks the ugliness pours out of her like sweat. He hides in the shadows and waits for the storm to pass.

She doesn’t know he’s there, and rants and raves, scouring the house trying to find him. At first he thinks she won’t catch him, but then he feels
the thump of her feet coming over the floor.

Bright light and the stink of alcohol floods over him as she pulls up the bedspread. Then she’s screaming again and he’s scrabbling to get away, digging his fingernails into the dirty carpet as he tries to escape, but even drunk she’s too quick for him. Her arm reach is bigger than the sky. She can find him anywhere.

Then he’s being dragged out into the room, and now he’s screaming. There are no words, just pure terror. Even at three he knows screaming will only make her worse, but he can’t stop himself, the fear is too great.

She drags him into the kitchen and he wails as she slams him into the chipped wooden cupboards.

‘I’ll fucking show you,’ she shrieks, ‘I’ll show you…’

And she does.

She pulls the jug chord from the bench
—
the black one with the tape wound round and round like a thin plastic snake
—
spilling cups and plates across the floor. All the while he’s screaming, terror coursing through his little body like a flash flood, sweeping away everything in its path.

And as the blows rain down and the hot white pain sears through him he knows for the hundredth time in his small life that he will surely die. He isn’t old enough to understand what death means, but he feels it just the same. His body understands. All living creatures understand this fear. And the pain is everything, all consuming. He screams until he can’t scream any more, until there is nothing left but a hoarse rattle.

Afterwards she puts him in the bath, to wash away the blood, and she cries. ‘I’m sorry,’ she whispers as the tears and snot drip into the water, mixing with the blood and piss, swirling about him in the lukewarm broth.

And he carries all of it with him: the sound of her tears and snot hitting the water amidst her drunken snivelling. Plop. Like a little hollow drum counting the time. Plop. Plop.

He’s an easy target.

They’re drawn to him like flies to a sugar bowl. He’s been living on the streets on and off since he was eight years old and they can see him a mile away. ‘Hi,’ they say. ‘Are you hungry?’ He’s always hungry.

Feed him and fuck him, that’s what they do. After a few months he knows the places to go, the public toilets and parks men go to looking for casual sex with hungry children. After a while it hardly bothers him. Soon he’s the one asking. ‘Wanna blow job for ten bucks?’

The old man nods and the boy who never was kneels down on the floor of the toilet cubicle, the concrete cold against his knees. Anything is better than being with her. At least this way he gets fed.

Nights he sleeps under bridges with gangs of up to 20 kids. They keep watch over each other. There’s safety in numbers when the sun goes down, and they huddle together against the cold glare of a world that doesn’t give a damn about them.

Most days he gets stoned on paint. A can of matt silver is the fastest, cheapest ticket out of here. All he needs is a plastic bag and within minutes he’s gone, safe in the numb chemical oblivion. Often he wakes up in some strange place not knowing how he got there or what has happened to him.

The cops pick him up occasionally, but he’s back on the streets before long. Over the years he floats in and out of foster homes, holding cells and a hundred dingy bedrooms belonging to men who hunger for boys like him.

He spends his days in the city, being invisible. He doesn’t want the world to see him, so he floats in the grey spaces between the crowds. Just another street kid.

One night a businessman in a Jaguar rapes him over a two-hour period, then kicks him out of the car without giving him any money. He lies on the cold wet ground for hours. Crying. Bleeding.

The next day he steals a screwdriver from a hardware store. For protection.

He buys himself a bottle of bourbon and a can of spray paint for his thirteenth birthday. Matt silver, his favourite. Money isn’t a problem. There are plenty of men who are prepared to pay for what he has to offer.

‘I’ll give you fifty if you let me do it without a condom,’ the man had panted in his ear. And the boy who never was just nods, and takes the money. He hardly feels it any more.

Later on he takes the money and buys his bourbon and his paint, then he takes it up to the cemetery at the top of Queen Street. Winding his way down through the dark bushes he heads for his favourite spot, a headstone sheltered from the cold wind deep in the graveyard:

In Loving Memory of Francis Jane Emerson
1898–1915
Sleeping in God’s Grace

Hardly anyone comes this far in.

‘Hey, Francis,’ he mutters, collapsing back against the cold stone. His fingers are numb, but he doesn’t care. Soon the rest of him will catch up. He takes several swigs from the bottle, feeling the hot liquid burning his throat and chest. It’s a good feeling.

He pops the top off the can of paint, opens the plastic bag from the bottle store and sprays the paint inside. Lifting it to his mouth he inhales deeply, coughing a little as the sweet toxic fumes seep into him. His lips feel sticky from the paint, but he hardly notices. All he wants is the numbness.

So he repeats the ritual until he can no longer hold the bag. He feels the cold stone against his back, sees the great blackness of the night sky, ears buzzing. Soon even that starts to fade.

And as he slumps backwards, as this lonely, unloved boy slides away from consciousness, uncountable memories fly past.

Fists…blood…fucking…cold hands…colder faces…emptiness. An emptiness which grows until there is nothing else.

Later, it begins to rain, but he doesn’t stir. The boy who never was has gone to the only place he feels safe. He has crawled into his can of matt silver spray paint, because that’s the only place where he doesn’t feel.

And as other children snuggle into warm beds and listen to bedtime stories, the boy who never was lies unconscious in his own special bed. Sleeping in God’s Grace.

His last day starts just like any other day.

He wakes amongst the tombstones early, wet with dew, cold. Sitting up he brushes the moisture from his jersey and shivers. His head aches and even though he stinks of paint fumes he hardly notices. Just across from him a girl lies sleeping under a bush. He knows her only as Mouse. He likes Mouse, even though she’s younger than him, because she always has lots of money. She’s a skinny little beanpole of a girl, and because of that she can always get money. Little girls are always in demand.

‘Mouse,’ he calls out. She doesn’t move.

‘Mouse.’ Nothing.

‘Mouse.’

‘Fuck off,’ she mutters, still half-asleep.

He smiles and clambers to his feet, his head spinning. Clambering through the bushes he heads for the toilets closest to the cemetery. He needs a drink of water, and he needs some money for breakfast.

He doesn’t even look to see if there’s anyone around. He knows there’s always someone. He goes to the last cubicle and sits down on the seat, closing the door. A few moments later he hears the sound of movement and then a gentle knock on the cubicle door.