Кара Хантер - In the Dark

I was sick, afterwards. There was blood running down my legs.

But he left the water and some food

And he put the light on

[ several sheets missing ]

. . . how long I’ve been here but I can’t keep count because he took my watch and he took my phone. My period came today so it must be at least three weeks. I told him I needed things for it and he just brought me bog roll. He wouldn’t even give me my knickers back, the mean bastard. He says they’re dirty. And in any case he likes looking at me without them. Calls it my ‘vagina’.

He sat there and watched while I stuck the paper between my legs. He had a strange look on his face. As if he liked the blood. As if it made it even better in his twisted screwed up mind. He said it was a pity we couldn’t have sex while I was bleeding but he could do it to me from behind if I want. It’s like he thinks we have sort of a relationship. I didn’t think anything could make this nightmare worse, but that does.

[ several sheets damaged ]

. . . nicer to me now. He says we can be a family and he’s always wanted a child and he hopes it will be a boy. He let me have my pants back and he’d even tried to wash them. He lets me have the light on too. And more food. But when I said I needed to see a doctor he laughed in a really nasty way and said I was in the right place. Then when I asked again he said women in the 19th century had babies in the fields and went straight back to work. That I was young and strong and he’d look after me. Me and the baby.

But he must have been angry with me because he turned the light off again after that. I lay here in the dark. Feeling his kid in me. Eating me from the inside.

[ one or more sheets missing ]

It’s lying there now looking at me. When it cries its face crumples up and goes red. He told me I had to feed it but I turned my back on him. He wanted to have it – he can feed it. He got milk and managed to get the kid to drink some.

He took the dirty bedding away and gave me new sheets. He kept saying he’d made sure everything was clean and hygienic and I said I didn’t care. I didn’t care if I died. Not any more. And he said I had to live for the baby’s sake and I just turned my face to the wall and cried.

He said we were lucky I’m so young and the labour was so easy. And I said ‘Lucky? Lucky to be kept prisoner down here? Lucky to be raped day after day?’ And he said it’s not like that and I know it, and I need to behave myself. That he’s been lenient because I was pregnant but things are going to have to change now.

He says I’ve got to look after the baby and he’ll leave me alone if I do so it’s in my interests. I tell him to take it upstairs and look after it himself but he won’t. He says it’s mine. Mine and his. He says it’s called Billy.

I’m not going to give it a name

Not down here

Not in the dark

He’s looking at me now. The baby. He has blue eyes. Dark hair just like mine. I’m trying to think of him as mine. As just mine and nothing to do with that horrible old pervert.

He doesn’t cry much. He just lies there on the blanket looking at me. It’s over three months now. The old man is still being ‘nice’ to me. I get better food. Tampons. He even came back with some clothes. He must have got them in a charity shop but they could have been worse. He got some clothes for the kid too. A T-shirt and some onesies.

Perhaps having the baby will be a good thing in the end. Because he can’t keep a baby down here forever, can he. What if it got sick? He won’t let it die. He doesn’t care about me but he won’t let anything happen to the baby.

Not his son

Not his Billy

[ one or more sheets missing ]

THERE’S NO FOOD LEFT AND THE WATER IS RUNNING OUT I DON’T KNOW HOW MUCH LONGER I CAN MAKE IT LAST

I CAN HEAR PEOPLE NEXT DOOR BUT HOWEVER LOUD I SCREAM NO ONE COMES

NO ONE COMES

***

Baxter calls me from the custody suite at 5.30 p.m. My head is full of words. The girl’s words and the pictures my brain has made from them. I knew what he must have done to her but it’s different – hearing it, watching it play out in my brain. I’ve an anger now that I know I’m going to have to be very careful of. And the most immense pity.

On the other end of the line, Baxter is waiting. ‘Boss?’

‘Sorry, miles away. What is it?’

‘It’s Harper. He’s lucid. And he says he wants to make a statement.’

Time to count to ten.

‘Right. Have you called his lawyer?’

‘She’s going to be at least an hour, I’m afraid, and I’m not sure we can afford to wait. Not in the state he’s in – by the time she gets here we could have lost him again. His doctor’s here though, so if you’re OK with it she’s willing to be the appropriate adult.’

‘Fine by me. Bring him up to Interview One. Is Quinn around?’

‘Haven’t seen him.’

‘You then. I’ll be there in ten minutes.’

*

Harper looks me straight in the eye when I go into the room, which is definitely a first. His back is straight and he seems aware of his surroundings. The doctor is a capable-looking woman with tired grey hair and unexpectedly pretty eyes. I take my seat next to Baxter and look across at Harper.

‘I believe you want to make a statement, Dr Harper?’

I sense Baxter glance at me; he can tell something’s changed just from my voice.

Harper hesitates, then nods.

‘And you are aware that this is a formal interview, and you are still under caution?’

Another nod.

‘In that case, for the recording, I am Detective Inspector Adam Fawley. Also present besides Dr Harper are Dr Lynda Pearson and DC Andrew Baxter. So, Dr Harper, what is it you want to tell us?’

He looks at me, then at Baxter. But he says nothing.

‘Dr Harper?’

He looks around at us all, slower this time. ‘It’s her, isn’t it?’ he says.

‘I’m sorry?’

‘You want me to talk about her .’

Baxter opens his mouth to speak but I put out a hand to stop him. I want to hear this the way Harper tells it. I’ve heard the girl’s version; now I want to hear his.

He reaches for the cup of water in front of him, then looks up at me. His eyes are wet and streaked with tiny red veins. ‘Have you ever wished you could put the clock back – even just for a single hour?’

My heart hammers and for a moment I don’t think I can breathe. Whatever I was expecting, it wasn’t this. The anger, it’s still there, but what I’m feeling most now is loss. Not Hannah’s, not Vicky’s, not even the child’s. My own. Because I wouldn’t even need an hour; I’d give everything I have for five minutes. The five minutes I spent sorting out the dustbins the night Jake died. The five minutes that meant I was too late reaching him, cutting him down, getting life back into his lungs. That’s all it was.

Five minutes.

Five bloody minutes.

‘She haunts me, you know,’ he says suddenly. ‘That red dress that made her look like a whore. Her cold little hands closing round my cock. I knew it couldn’t be her – that she wasn’t actually there. But it didn’t stop. Night after night. She wouldn’t leave me in peace.’

I lean forward. ‘Who are you talking about, Dr Harper?’

‘It was a moment of madness. That’s what they say, isn’t it? A “moment of madness”. But you can’t go back. Afterwards, I mean. You have to live with what you’ve done.’

He puts his head in his hands and rubs his eyes. ‘These last few months, I know I’ve not been myself. The bloody booze. Blackouts. Seeing things. Waking up somewhere and not knowing how I got there.’

He sits back in his chair and his arms drop to his sides. ‘That shit Ross wants to put me in a home. Says I’m fucking doo-lally. Perhaps he’s right.’