Until Christmas, everything was fine.
Well, not entirely fine. Going out with someone who was away working for days at a time wasn’t fine at all, really, but when he was around, everything was good. When he was going to be working on a job for several days, he warned me first. And when he reappeared, I was always so ridiculously relieved to see him back in one piece that any reproach I had just melted away.
When he was around, he practically lived with me in my house. When I was at work, he would tidy up, fix things that needed mending, cook dinner for when I got home.
When he was away, I missed him more than I thought possible. Every night I wondered if he was safe, and whether I would ever get to find out if anything bad happened to him. Although he usually turned up exhausted, starving and in need of a shower, he didn’t appear again at my front door with any injuries. Whatever happened that first time, I wanted to believe that he was more careful now, because of me.
Not for the first time in my life, I was alone on Christmas Eve. Lee was working somewhere—it was his turn, he said. He’d tried to get out of it so that he could spend time with me. He said he was going to try to leave early, but by ten o’clock on Christmas Eve there was no sign of him.
Fuck it, I thought.
Getting ready to go out didn’t take that long. My favorite dress, heels, a quick bit of makeup, hair up, bits of it falling down just moments later, and I was ready.
By ten-thirty I was in the Cheshire, and Sam and Claire were there too. I was several shots behind them and had some serious catching up to do. Claire had already found a likely candidate for a festive night in; he looked rather young, though, and a wee bit too pissed to be able to put up much of a performance.
“Don’t fancy hers much,” I yelled into Sam’s ear, above the noise of Wizzard singing “I Wish It Could Be Christmas Every Day” for the millionth time since October.
“Yeah, but you should see his friend,” Sam shouted back, pointing with the top of her beer bottle over to the corner, where someone dark and much more appealing was watching them both with an expression that was hard to determine.
“Friendly, is he?”
“Not so far.”
The friend came over and introduced himself, and actually he turned out to be rather nice. His name was Simon, and he was in the army, he said into my ear. Off to Afghanistan in two weeks’ time. I listened, and watched Sam’s eyes, which showed total adulation, and slight mortification that this dark-eyed sex god seemed to be paying rather too much attention to me.
“Simon,” I shouted into his ear, “this is Sam. I’m just leaving. Happy Christmas!” I gave him a quick kiss on the cheek, for luck maybe, gave Sam a wink, and went off to find where I’d left my coat.
The Cheshire was out, then. And I wasn’t nearly pissed enough yet, I thought, as I clattered up Bridge Street to see if the Hole in the Wall was too packed. Grateful that I’d actually worn my coat over my dress, because it was starting to rain. Not cold enough to snow, but it felt freezing none the less, and for a moment I wondered if I’d have been better off staying at home after all.
“No, man, I’m not fucking doing it. No way. You can fuck off!”
The sound of an argument from an alleyway, and something made me look over. There were three men having a bit of a set-to, one of them drunker than the rest. Half in shadow. Probably a drug deal, I thought absently, head down, keep walking, you don’t want to know.
There was a line outside the Hole in the Wall, but not a big one. I huddled in the doorway of the supermarket, next door, along with a couple of other people I knew vaguely.
Just in time to see two of the three men who’d been arguing in the doorway walking up Bridge Street past us.
One of them was Lee.
He didn’t look over, just kept walking, laughing at something the other man was saying, hands in the pockets of his jeans.
Just then, a pile of drunken guys spilled out onto the sidewalk and moved off in search of a festive kebab. The noise from the bar crashed out with them, some Christmas music, just for a change, along with a gust of warmth and a smell of beer and sweat.
“You coming in, or what?” said the doorman, holding the door open for me.
Fuck it, I thought. And I gave the doorman a Christmas kiss on the cheek and sidled into the warmth and the chaos.
When I got home from work tonight, there was a note waiting for me.
Seeing it made me smile. It was waiting for me outside the flat, on the landing, just outside my front door. I guess Stuart thought I might have some objection to it being pushed under the door into the flat itself, and had left it outside, knowing that nobody was going to be coming past my door apart from him.
I picked it up before I started checking the door, put it into my coat pocket, and finally got to read it an hour and a half later, when I sat down in my living room at last.
C, hope you are well. Been thinking about you. Fancy going for a drink or something on Saturday? S x
God, yes, I do, was my first thought. This in itself made me laugh. Me, go out for a drink? With a man who knew I had mental health issues, who’d seen me having a panic attack? I must be getting better.
I’d been practicing deep breathing, as suggested by some of the material Stuart had printed out for me. I had tried this before, last year, when it was getting worse and worse, but back then the panic attacks and the terrible thoughts were sneaking up on me, and I was already panicking before I could start trying to calm myself. Then I would start panicking because I wasn’t breathing properly, wasn’t doing it right, and it would just make it worse somehow.
Now that I was more aware of the things that triggered it, it might just work. So every evening after work I built a new rule into my daily regime. After checking the flat, I would sit on the floor of my living room, close my eyes and breathe. Slowly, in and out. I made myself start by doing it for three minutes. I set the kitchen timer. At first it was a struggle to keep my eyes closed for that long; every sound disturbed me. The first few times I did it, I found the old perfectionism, the desire to control my life, meant that I would admonish myself for getting it wrong if I opened my eyes before the timer went off, if I turned my head to the window at the sound of a noise in the street below.
This is how it all starts. I do something that seems like a good idea. Locking the flat is a good idea, after all, right? Then for some reason I’ve not done it properly one day, and that’s no good at all, because if you’re going to do something that’s for your own benefit, you’ve got to do it properly or there’s no point. Then I start fretting about it and picturing all the bad things that might happen if I get it all wrong, if I screw it up the way I’ve screwed up so many other things in my waste of a life.
So, the first time I tried my deep breathing exercises, it was all a bit crap and I ended up doing it twice, failing both times, and then going to check the flat again three times to make up for my failure.
That was all a bit shitty, and I found myself wondering whether seeing a doctor and being in touch with the medical profession again had been the best way forward. I was doing all right, wasn’t I? I was still alive, wasn’t I?
I tried again, later, before bedtime, and the second time wasn’t so bad. In fact, while I was doing the deep breathing I found myself remembering Stuart, his hand holding mine, talking me through my breathing just as he had sitting on my cold floor, his voice soothing, calm, his eyes anxious. Before I knew it the timer was going off, and I’d managed three minutes without opening my eyes.
That night I slept better than I had in a long time.
I placed Stuart’s note on the floor in front of me, crossed my legs, spent a moment listening out for sounds in the flat and outside, and then shut my eyes and started. In. Out. In. Out. Picturing Stuart with me was the only way it was going to work, I decided. What the hell, if it worked it had to be a good thing, right? So I took him away from the cold, drafty floor and went upstairs instead, into his living room, the wide, deep sofas, relaxed back into their softness. It was sunny and warm, the sun streaming through the windows onto his face, and he had one hand on my upper arm, and was saying the things he’d said to me before, and a few other things too.
“I’m here. It’s all right, you’re safe. Now breathe—in. And out. And again, in . . . and out. That’s it, you’re doing fine. In. And out.”
Five minutes later I opened one eye and looked across to the kitchen clock.
I’d forgotten to set the damn timer.
By the time I made it home, it was nearly two in the morning. I had company most of the way back: three drunken lads and two of their girlfriends happened to be staggering in my direction, and I walked with them, chatting to one of the girls, Chrissie, who turned out to be a cousin of Sam’s.
The last little walk along Queen’s Road wasn’t too bad, really. The wind had dropped a little and although it was frosty, I’d had enough vodka to keep the worst of the chill off. And my wool coat was warm and toasty. I might make a nice cup of tea when I get in, I was thinking, and then a nice long nap in the morning . . .
A figure was sitting on my doorstep, and stood up when I approached.
Lee.
“Where have you been?” he asked.
I fished my keys out from the bottom of my handbag. “Out, in town,” I said. “Didn’t feel like staying in. Have you been here long?”
“Ten minutes.” He gave me a kiss on the cheek. “Are we going in? Fucking freezing my nuts off out here.”
“Why didn’t you use your key?”
“You told me not to, remember?”
“What?”
“You said I wasn’t to come in and mess up your stuff.”
“I didn’t mean it like that. Of course you can come in.”
Inside the doorway, he pulled me around and pinned me against the wall, pulling my coat open, his mouth invading mine. His kiss was forceful, and dry, and tasted of him—not alcohol. Not drunk, then. Just hard.
“I couldn’t stop thinking about you today,” he whispered into my neck, his hands sliding over my dress, over the satin. “This dress makes me want you so much.”
I undid his trousers, tugging the belt free, pushing them over his backside. Right here in the hallway, I thought to myself. Good a place as any.
“Just tell me,” he said, groaning, into my hair, “tell me you haven’t fucked anyone else in that dress.”
“No,” I said, “only you. It’s yours. I’m yours.”
The weather’s been great today. I’m taking it as a sign. And, of course, it’s an even-numbered day, which means going out for a drink is a fabulous idea.
He was waiting for me when I knocked. I’d suggested calling for him when I was ready; that way he wouldn’t have to wait another half hour while I checked everything. I was all done with my checking, and it had gone well.
“How’s your shoulder?” I asked.
“Better,” he said. He was doing without the sling. “The painkillers do the trick at least.”
High Street was still heaving with shoppers taking advantage of the last few shopping days before Christmas, but Stuart steered me into a side street, then down a narrow alleyway. There was a pub at the end of the passage, comfortingly called the Rest Assured, with a chalkboard outside advertising “good food,” and he opened the door for me.
It was just opening, and we were the first customers. The bar was small, with two deep sofas beside an open fire that was just chewing its way through some balled-up newspaper, prior to tucking into the logs that had been neatly stacked on top. Christmas lights were strung around the bar, and a real fir tree in the corner was tastefully decorated with silver and white. Thankfully, in here at least, no carols.
He got me a glass of wine and I sank down into one sofa, near the fire. I put out my hands to warm them, but it wasn’t throwing out much heat yet.
“You look tired,” I said, when he sat down opposite me. “Did you get much sleep?”
“Not much, to be honest. But I’m used to all that. When I come in late from work I usually find it quite hard to sleep.”
I took a sip of the wine, feeling it going to my head almost instantly. What was it about him that made me feel safe enough to think about having a drink?
“I’ve been practicing the deep-breathing thing,” I said. “There was a whole chapter on it in that pile of stuff you gave me.”
Stuart leaned forward and put his Guinness on the table between us. “Really? That sounds promising. You just need to keep practicing until it becomes second nature, so you can do it when you need to, without thinking too hard.”
I nodded. “I’ve never been much good at relaxing, but it’s going okay so far.”
He raised his glass. “Here’s to a new start, then.”
There was a pause. I was starting to feel sleepy.
“Have you had any more trouble with that idiot sales manager?” he asked.
I shook my head. “Fortunately I haven’t seen him. No idea what I’m going to say to him when our paths do cross, but I’ll worry about that when it happens.” I thought about this for a moment. “I never really thanked you for—well, you know. For getting him off me. And for being honest with me about things. If it hadn’t happened, I’d probably still be in a crumpled heap somewhere. I feel like I’m making progress with it, at last.”
He smiled. “Don’t mention it. Anyway,
I
should be thanking
you
.”
“Me? Why?”
He sighed, and regarded me for a moment as if wondering whether to say what he was thinking. “I wasn’t in the best frame of mind when I moved in. I didn’t want to move from my last house, in fact, but I had to. But the house—I don’t know—it feels like home. And I think that’s got a lot to do with you.”
“With me? But why?”
He shrugged, and I realized he was looking a bit uncomfortable. “I have no idea. I just—look forward to seeing you.” He laughed, clearly a bit embarrassed, and I suddenly became aware that he liked me. I mean, he really liked me, and he was trying to tell me about it without freaking me out.
I wanted to say,
but you hardly know me
—but it wasn’t true. He knew a lot more about me than anyone I work with, and I don’t have any friends anymore.
In a small voice, which seemed to come from somewhere else, I heard myself saying, “You make me feel safe.”
The atmosphere changed a bit after that. I don’t know if I’d just had too much to drink—almost a whole glass, for heaven’s sake—or if it was the fact that the pub had suddenly gotten busy, the bar crowded with people. Stuart looked at me for a long time, and I held his gaze.
Someone came over to collect our glasses, and that broke the spell. “Another drink?” he asked, and although I started to get up to go and get the drinks, he waved me back down.
The sofa was comfortable; I could quite easily have gone to sleep.
“Anyone sitting here?” a voice asked, a young woman and an older lady behind her—mother and daughter out for a shopping expedition, judging by the bags.
“Yes, but you can sit there—there’s room here,” I said, patting the sofa next to me, wondering how long I could hold out before all this exposure to the general public was going to catch up with me.
I grabbed Stuart’s jacket off the other sofa and draped it over the back of the sofa next to me. I had to fight the urge to sniff it, and that made me giggle. Oh, God, I was drunk already. I could only have one more drink. One more.
Stuart came back after what seemed like an age, shot barely a glance at the two women who were now chattering away about someone called Frank and how he’d made a terrible mistake in leaving Juliette, and sat down next to me. It wasn’t a big sofa.
It was a test, really. If I could do this, if I could have him sitting this close to me, in public, if I could hold a conversation—of sorts—with this man I still hardly knew, and yet already instinctively liked and trusted, then maybe something could happen. At some point in the future.
“You okay?” he asked me.
Okay about what?
I wanted to say, but he meant the fact that I was sitting so close to him that his thigh was touching mine. Other than Robin launching himself at me, and Stuart looking after me through the panic attack, it was the first time I’d had any physical contact from a man since
him
.
“I’m fine,” I said, wondering just how flushed my cheeks were. “I was just wondering—how come I feel so . . . I don’t know. I’m just not scared with you. I’m scared with everyone. Anyone. And yet I’m not scared when you’re here. I don’t know anything about you.”
He downed half of his pint in one go, placed it decisively on the table in front of him.
“I’m glad you’re not scared with me. You don’t need to be.” He took my hand and held it. I looked down at my fingers inside his, wondering how my own were still cold when the rest of me was so warm, abstractly thinking that his hands were big and strong, his nails short. I looked for the panic, but it wasn’t there. My heart was beating quite fast, but not with fear.
“As for knowing things about me . . . well, I need to tell you things. I’ve wanted to tell you for a while, but I just haven’t had a chance. So here goes.”
I was about to say something about me not letting him ever get a word in edgeways whenever he saw me, but fortunately I managed to keep my mouth shut.
“Before I moved here, I was living in Hampstead with my girlfriend, Hannah. Well, she was my fiancée, I suppose, not my girlfriend. I thought we were happy, but apparently we weren’t.”
He stopped abruptly, looking at my hand curled around his. I gave it a little squeeze. “What happened?”
“She was seeing someone else. Someone she worked with. She got pregnant and had a termination. I only found out about that after it had happened. That was—difficult.”
“That’s awful,” I said, and I felt it, the hurt, emanating from him like a scent.
His thumb stroked the top of my hand gently, making me shiver.
“So I guess you’re not quite ready for another relationship just yet, then?” I said, baldly, trying to soften it a little with a smile. Nothing like coming out with it, I told myself. Lord knows what I’d be like if I had a few more drinks.
Fortunately, he smiled back. “Not really, no.” He finished off his pint, and then looked at our hands again and said, “But something tells me you’re not quite ready for one, either.”
I shook my head. I thought and thought about it, and eventually all I could manage to say was, “I don’t know if I ever will be.”
“Was it bad?” he asked.
I nodded. I’d only ever really talked about it when the police interviewed me, and even then I’d only really answered their direct questions, I didn’t volunteer any details about what happened. They tried to get me to talk about that in the hospital. I learned about which bits I could tell them, things I could say that would keep them happy, reassure them that I was recovering, in the hope that they’d let me out and leave me the hell alone. When they did let me out, they were supposed to sort me out with counseling, but it never happened. I wouldn’t have gone, in any case. All I wanted to do was run, run fast and never look back.
I didn’t think for one minute I was going to talk about it now, but it started to come out of my mouth as though someone else was saying it, and I was just sitting back and listening. “I was attacked.”
He didn’t speak for a moment. Then, “Did they find the person that did it?”
I nodded. “He’s in prison. He got three years for it.”
“Three years? That’s not long.”
I shrugged. “It’s just time, isn’t it? Three years, thirty years. They might never have found him at all. At least it gave me long enough to escape.”