Nikki Owen - Spider in the Corner of the Room

Pulling my head up as far as it will go, I study the EEG monitor. The graph paper shows frantic, peaked lines where it must have recorded the brain activity from what can only have been a vivid memory, a flashback. Which means that what I am experiencing now, here, must definitely be real. Slowly, almost too frightened to look, I inch my hand down to my abdomen and pull up my gown. There, beneath my fingers, is the scar. The scar Black Eyes gave me, just as I recalled. A memory, a real memory.

I lift my hand to my head.

And one by one, I rip the electrodes from my skull.

I stare at Harry. ‘Why did you not tell me you knew my papa? When we first met, why did you not tell me?’

Harry glances to Balthus. ‘Maria, my dear. I couldn’t. I…I am so, so sorry you have found out like this.’

‘Like this?’ I stand, manic. ‘Like this? I found out by chance, but, actually-’ I halt, scratch my head ‘-nothing happens by chance, does it?’ I commence pacing. ‘Numbers-they all have a meaning, a place, and numbers translate into code, and code into data, and data is just another word for information, for facts, for knowledge.’ I stop, chest heaving. ‘And you kept that knowledge from me, Harry.’

I turn, ignoring both men. How can I trust them, trust anyone? They have already lied to me, pretended they were something they are not, just like my university professor, like Father Reznik, like my hospital boss. Like Dr-fucking-Andersson. These are authority figures I assumed were genuine, there to help me. The enormity of it, the delayed shock, slaps me hard and I bend over, wretch, shoulders heaving, mouth raw. Even my boss at St James’s was not who he pretended to be, and if someone like him can be a liar, someone kind, with a family, with a loving wife, how can we ever really believe anyone is who they say they are?

‘Maria,’ I hear Balthus say. ‘Are you okay?’

I stand and wipe my face as dry as I can, not wanting to feel or appear weak any more, not wanting to seem like a victim. I want to get out, want to win my appeal. I want to survive.

‘Maria,’ Harry says, ‘I know it must seem very unlikely right now, but we are here for you, to help you.’

‘Then why weren’t you here right at the beginning?’ I say, voice firm. ‘When I was arrested? When I was facing my first trial?’

Harry sits forward a little, smiles, one with creases that makes his eyes almost disappear. I feel myself soften a little. ‘I wanted to defend you, Maria,’ he says, ‘but I was working on a high-profile case and-’

‘The chef with the knife?’

‘You know about that?’ Another smile. ‘Well, yes. And I couldn’t get out of the case, and then you acquired a legal team and all I could do was watch them butcher your defence. When you were convicted, Balthus used his wife’s connections, got you transferred to Goldmouth.’

‘The Home Secretary,’ I say, almost to myself.

Harry sits forward. ‘Maria, I wanted to help you. I called Balthus when we heard the news that you were charged. We used his contacts to get you to Goldmouth. You’re Al’s daughter for God’s sake. And he told us what he-’

My eyes dart between them both, heart shoots. ‘Papa told you? Told you what? What? What do you know? Did he tell you something to do with Scotland?’

They share a glance to each other.

‘Maria,’ Harry says, ‘Alarico didn’t mention anything about Scotland.’

I frown, shake my head. ‘Then what did he tell you?’

Harry exhales. Balthus rubs his head with his hand.

‘He told us that he was concerned for your well-being, Maria,’ Harry says after a moment. He clears his throat. ‘He told us he was concerned for you, how you would cope with day-to-day life as you got older. I suppose he was concerned for your…for your sanity.’

‘Get someone in here. Now!’

I hear the voice but I do not stop, a juggernaut of strength, of survival instinct, railroading through me. I have to escape. I have to. So I keep ripping. I tear the electrodes from my scalp, the slime of the jelly on the pads mixing with my sweat so it trickles down my brow, stinging my eyes, sticking to my lashes, but I do not care.

‘She’s tachycardic,’ someone shouts, but I don’t know who, don’t know from where.

The monitor is beeping; my heart rate is accelerating; still I rip.

Someone is in the room, flat voice, a subtle New York lilt. ‘There’s a change in her blood chemistry,’ they say. ‘We’re getting low potassium levels.’

‘Cause?’ Another voice, different, low, gravel. Scottish.

‘The sodium amytal drug. She must have had too much.’

And then I realise: Kurt. Is it Kurt’s voice? I paw at the IV drip, try to sit up. ‘Kurt!’ I shout.

‘You put it in the coffee as I instructed?’

I thrash. The coffee! He drugged me, in the therapy room. That’s why it tasted odd, why I felt tired sometimes, why events were hazy. And then I think: spiders. Is that why I saw double of them? Because he had drugged me? Is that why I thought I saw cobwebs?

‘We must have put in too much,’ the voice says now. We? Who is ‘we’? His girlfriend? The one with the leather and the studs? I lurch again to break free.

‘Kurt!’ I yell, but still he does not hear me. I thrash around, try to get up, but I am strapped down, secured by the ankles.

A face looms over my head. I gasp. Black Eyes. ‘Hmmm,’ he says, but not to me, to the other person, to Kurt. ‘The drug has certainly helped us tap into her mind, see what she remembers. Thank you for recording it all-I saw it all on the secure site. She located the camera, though. Was only a matter of time. She’s sharp, as we’ve trained her to be.’

The camera! The camera I found in the Banana Room. They were recording me. The people Kurt works for were recording me. ‘Get away from me,’ I scream, like a dog ravaged with rabies, wild, dangerous. ‘Get away!’

Yet, Black Eyes just stands stock-still, peers at me, scanning my body. ‘We’ll need to get her back there, though. Fresh recording, hidden device as before. I need to see a little more of how she is acting under pressure, how she responds when her thoughts are being challenged, compromised. And I need to see a little more of what she is recalling. It is fascinating.’ He lifts my right ear, inspects it. ‘What have the endocrinological investigations shown?’

‘No signs of Cushing’s syndrome or hyperaldosteronism.’

‘Kurt!’ I scream.

Black Eyes drops my ear and presses his palm onto my mouth, silencing me. His skin tastes of metal. I try to scream, but only woollen muffles come out.

‘I instructed you to go easy on the sodium amytal,’ he says to Kurt. ‘Your doses must have been too large. It’s supposed to lower her inhibitions and give her mental clarity to talk, not accelerate her heart rhythm.’

I thrash my head, try to shake him off; he presses down harder on my mouth.

‘Treat her with potassium and magnesium infusions. The dysrhythmia should stop. When you’ve done that and she’s calmed down, give her something to keep her lucid but controlled, then contact me. I have tests to run. MI5 are on to us now, so we need to keep her on our side.’ He looks at me, smiles, then removes his hand and slaps my cheek. ‘You scream like that again and we won’t be so nice next time. Do you understand?’

I do not respond.

He slaps me once more. A sharp sting flushes my cheek. ‘Do you understand?’

My body falls back to the bed and, reluctantly, I nod. He narrows his eyes. I pant for air, the room pixelating into spots before my eyes.

He watches me for three seconds then leaves.

‘Concerned for my sanity?’ I shriek. ‘No. No! Papa would never say that. You are just assuming that’s what he meant. He didn’t mean that at all!’