The Doll's House (9 page)

K
eith had been dreaming of summer, of warmth. He had been running. In the woods, the breeze light against his skin, sunlight dappling and stranding through the tree trunks. He looked at the woman in front of him. He could remember her. She was so young, so pretty. So happy to see him. She smiled at him. He returned it. And never wanted that moment to end. That perfect moment.

Keith opened his eyes. And found he had pissed himself.

He was still in his chair from the previous night, still propped in front of the TV in the living room. He looked round. Listened. Heard nothing. He was alone in the house. Kelly hadn't returned.

Keith knew she wasn't just being quiet. She was incapable of that. When she was in the house she would always have the TV on, or the radio playing some inane pop music, or her iPod going. Or she'd be on the phone to one of her equally gormless mates. Never silent for one second. She wouldn't be sitting reading or doing a crossword. She was too thick for those things.

He saw the girl from his dream again. Perfectly formed once more, in his mind's eye. Smiling. Happy to see him. Making him feel good about her, about himself. Giving him hope. He sighed, his chest hurting, but not as much as his heart.

That was Kelly. The girl he had met in a nightclub, just a chance encounter, had turned his world upside down. Made him happier than he had ever thought possible. But that was years ago. Before everything that happened happened. Not the Kelly who lived here now. She was a different person. A lesser person. A wholly despicable person.

And a bitch that hadn't come home.

The dream had reminded him of what things used to be like when they were good. When she used to look at him like she did that time in the woods, with the sun on his skin, the breeze on his face. The girl in the summer dress in front of him, running, teasing, making him follow. Giggling, her dress falling from one shoulder. Giving him the promise of what pleasures awaited when he caught up with her.

He remembered it so well. Revisited the memory often. He
had
caught up with her. Tickled her to the ground. Laughing and squirming they had gone down in a happy heap. Then, once on the ground, the branches crackling beneath them, the leaves and moss warmer and more inviting than he would have imagined, they had looked into each other's eyes. Their mouths had met. Then their hands. Then their bodies. Then…

A key in the door.

He opened his eyes, turned. It was her entering. He knew by the clack of her spike heels on the polished wooden floor of the hall.

Keith looked down at his lap once more, saw again the stain on the front of his tracksuit bottoms, felt the cold material against his skin, smelt the acrid tang of urine. He was ashamed of himself. Whatever she was, whatever she had become, he didn't want her to see him like this.

Kelly came into the living room. Stopped dead.

‘Oh,' she said. ‘You're…'

‘Still here,' he said. ‘I fell asleep in front of the TV.'

He tried to move the chair away from her line of vision, but it was too late. Her eyes had darted to his lap. She had seen what had happened. The curled lip, the expression of distaste on her face told him that more eloquently than words could have done. He felt his face reddening from the shame. Wanted to scream, to cry out, to…

He wanted his legs back. His body.
His life
.

‘So where've you been, then?' He asked the question to stop the depression overwhelming him, knowing that there would be a new kind of depression hitting him soon, depending on her answer.

‘I just… It was late. And I couldn't get… so I stopped at Debbie's.' She looked away from him, clearing her throat as if to dislodge the lie. Unable to even believe it herself.

‘Come… over here,' he said. He knew that was asking for trouble, knew it was only going to make the pain worse.

She came nearer, looked down at him. ‘You've…'

‘Pissed myself, yeah. That's… what happens, isn't it? That's what happens when you go… go running off and, and… leave me.' His breath coming in short, ragged gasps, each one seeming to tear a strip off his insides.

‘I'll…' She looked downcast. ‘I'm sorry. I'll…' She made to move away.

‘Stay… here.' His voice, although weak, still carried some of its old authority.

She did as she was told.

He noticed that she was still wearing her coat, despite the heat in the house. In fact, she had it pulled up around her throat.

He knew what she was hiding. ‘Take your coat off,' he said.

Her hand went quickly to her throat, alarm in her eyes, but the coat stayed where it was.

‘Take your coat off,' he said again.

Still she didn't move.

‘It's… hot in here. You should… should take it off.'

He stared at her, looking deeply into her eyes, making sure she looked into his. This wasn't like his dream. They weren't the same people any more. When he looked into her eyes now, he didn't see love, or joy. Just calculation and resentment. Fear that things might not go the way she wanted them to. And lurking somewhere at the back, hatred. Of what he had become and what she had allowed herself to become. Of what she had to do to get what she wanted.

It almost made him smile.

‘Take… it… off.'

Reluctantly, but seeing she had no choice, Kelly removed her coat, placed it over her arm. Keith stared at her. Saw what he wanted to see. Felt acid gather in his body.

‘What's that?' he said, pointing to her neck.

Her hand jerked upwards, covering her skin.

‘Take your hand away.'

‘I'm just…'

‘I said, take… your hand… away.'

She did so. He saw the discoloured skin. The dark bruise of a love bite. She opened her mouth to speak.

‘Don't,' he said. ‘Just… don't.'

She stood there mutely, her eyes trying to communicate telepathically how sorry she was.

‘Get out of my sight.'

She knelt in front of him, ignoring the smell, the stain. ‘I'm sorry, Keith, really I am. I didn't mean to, I just… He…'

‘Just… fuck off.'

The tears came then. Not for him, he knew that. But because it looked like her money was disappearing over the horizon, never to be seen again.

She had no idea how true that was, he thought.

‘Please don't cut me off,' she said. ‘Please don't… when you've, when… I don't know what I'll…' Her hands fumbled at the waistband of his joggers. ‘Here, I'll…' Her hand was inside them then, the look of distaste on her face replaced by one of desperation. She lowered her head, eyes closed.

He put his hands on the wheels, turned the chair away from her. The movement sent her sprawling on the floor. He saw straight away she wasn't wearing any underwear.

He wheeled himself away, kept his back to her. Eventually he heard her get to her feet, walk quickly out of the room. He heard her go upstairs, sobbing.

Anger welled within him. It built, then came crashing down.

This is it
, he thought.
This is the time. No more fucking about
.

He wheeled himself over to his phone, picked it up, dialled a number he knew from memory. Quickly, before he could change his mind. The call was answered.

‘It's me,' he said, his voice rasping and harsh, like it was costing him a lot to speak. ‘Keith Burkiss.'

‘Yes, Keith,' said the voice. ‘What can I do for you?'

Keith took one last look around the living room. Then down at his own lap, his useless, broken body.

‘Do it,' he said. ‘Let's do it now.'

T
he Green Man was huge, looming; it looked like it could fall at any minute. Or come to life and walk away. Marina always stared at it, she couldn't help it. A huge statue made of stone and augmented with vegetation, the extravagantly horned forty-foot figure towered over everyone and everything in the area. His features wild, his body overly muscled, the statue rippled with a pagan energy that was simultaneously stimulating and terrifying, a reminder that no matter how humanity tried to fool itself, comfort itself in the belief that it was the dominant species, there were much stronger forces on the planet that needed to be treated with respect and fear.

Or that was how it made Marina feel. But now, taking her place at a table in a coffee house opposite the statue, she knew there were other things – and people – to be feared. Much nearer to home. And much more real.

The Custard Factory was part of the ongoing gentrification of the Digbeth area of Birmingham. Originally the area's Bird's custard factory from which it took its name, it was now home to a thriving community of artists and designers, media and charity organisations, with vintage clothes and furniture shops, record shops, bars, cafés and restaurants. Marina found it achingly hip but not uncomfortable.

‘Hello.'

She turned. Hugo Gwilym appeared from a shadowed alcove beside the till, walked towards her, pocketing his phone as if just ending a call. He smiled, sat down. She looked at him. Sunlight from outside the café hit his face full on. He squinted against it. Caught in the bright glare and without the previous night's make-up ministrations of a TV studio, his features looked older, more worn, dissolute. His skin carried his life's history of various alcoholic and narcotic abuses like a road map. He gestured back to where he had come from.

‘Can we…?'

‘What?'

‘Go and sit over there. The light's too bright here.' He made to rise.

‘Here's fine for me,' said Marina, refusing to budge.

Gwilym sat back down again. Marina felt a slight thrill at the little victory but something dark and ugly flapped across Gwilym's features. He clearly wasn't used to being answered back. ‘Suit yourself.' The tone of his voice said anything but.

‘So,' said Marina, struggling to keep her voice level, not betray the anxiety that was churning inside her, ‘you wanted to see me.' She kept her back stiff, hands folded in her lap. She didn't want him to see how much they were shaking.

‘Of course I did. Only natural, considering…' His features returned to their familiar setting. He smiled.

‘Considering what?' she said, throat dry.

He leaned forward, head down, voice low, conspiratorial. Back in control now. ‘Considering what we shared last night.'

Marina felt her heart thudding in her chest. Her head was light, vision spinning, spasming. ‘What… what did we share…?' She had thought about his words over and over on the way there. What he had implied, what he had said. There could be no doubt what he meant.

She had had sex with him.

The thought had made her physically sick and the feeling still hadn't gone away. In fact it had intensified. The thought of having sex with him was abhorrent enough, especially when she couldn't remember doing it. But something niggled at her. Something that wasn't right, that didn't fit. She had tried to pull it from her memory on the trip into town, but it was no good. Nothing came back to her. Just a sense of unease that something bad had happened. Something awful.

He didn't answer her straight away. He just smiled once more.

Marina hated that smile. It was the smug smile of a bully, of someone who had got away with so much, had gone unchallenged for so long they no longer had any self-doubt. They felt they could get away with anything.

‘We talked,' said Marina. ‘That was it.'

Another smile, showing his teeth this time. ‘Let's order.'

‘I'm not hungry.'

‘I am.' He gestured the waitress over, told her what he wanted. She looked at Marina, expectant.

‘I'm not hungry. Just water.'

Gwilym studied the menu. ‘She'll have the same as me.' He smiled.

The waitress looked between them.

‘I'm not hungry.'

‘She'll have the same as me.' He turned to her. ‘You can't not eat anything. Especially after the amount you drank last night.'

Marina's head felt like it was about to explode. ‘Whatever.'

The waitress hurried away. Gwilym turned to her, a look of smug triumph on his face. He had managed to get his own way again. He leaned back, comfortable. In control.

‘So. Last night.'

‘Did you fuck me?' Marina sat back, surprised by the words she had spoken and the vehemence with which she'd expressed them.

Gwilym seemed surprised also. His eyebrows rose. He laughed. ‘Well. I never suspected you possessed such directness.'

‘Just tell me.'

Another smile. She felt like a half-dead mouse being played with by a cat's paw. That, she suspected, was what he wanted her to feel. His tone, when he spoke, was mocking. ‘We had a… dalliance, yes. Quite enjoyable. Can't you remember?'

Marina felt the world around her tunnelling in then out again. A Hitchcock
Vertigo
trombone shot. Her stomach lurched and she thought she might throw up again. She breathed deeply, tried to get her body back in control.

‘No,' she said. ‘I can't remember. I've only got your word for it.'

‘Well I assure you, Marina, I am a man of my word. I wouldn't lie about something like that.'

She felt like she had been cast adrift from her life, like this was all happening to someone else. She looked round the café, saw Gwilym, her own reflection in the glass. This was real.

‘What… what happened?'

‘You were in a terrible state after the restaurant, so I escorted you to a taxi. You couldn't stand up, so I thought it best to take you home. But once we got into the taxi…' He laughed. ‘You were a tiger. Oh yes.'

Marina said nothing. Gwilym continued.

‘Couldn't keep your hands off me. Pulling at my shirt, my trousers. I mean, I don't know what the taxi driver thought. Seemed a very devout, religious man. A Muslim, judging by all the paraphernalia hanging in his cab. Bet he'd never seen anything like it.'

‘So… what happened?'

‘I took you back to mine.' She stared at him, eyes wide. ‘What else could I do? You made it quite clear what you wanted to happen.' He held his hands up, shrugged. ‘How could I resist?'

‘So we… slept together.'

‘Well, there wasn't much sleep going on. You got what you came for, then I called a cab. And off you went.' He sat back, gave another smile. ‘And here you are. Back for more.'