Alex Lake - Seven Days

The man giggled. ‘Come on now, Fruitcake, of course I do!’

Fruitcake? Had he called her Fruitcake ? That was impossible. Only her dad called her that.

‘Who told you about Fruitcake?’ she whispered. ‘How do you know that?’

‘I know everything about you,’ he said. ‘I’ve been watching you for years. And now you’re mine.’ He smiled. ‘Safe and sound and all mine, forever and ever.’

Maggie felt bile rise in her throat. She leaned forward and retched, vomit splattering the carpet by the side of the bed. The man tutted. His expression had hardened, the anger back.

‘I’m sorry you did that,’ he said. ‘What a mess you made.’ He shook his head. ‘I’ll bring you something to clean it up with tomorrow, but tonight, to remind you not to do it again, you can live with it.’

Maggie didn’t care. The room already smelled of vomit. She’d rip up a corner of carpet or pull the mattress over it and cover it somehow.

‘Fine,’ she said, looking up at him through narrowed eyes. Part of her knew antagonizing him was a bad idea, but she didn’t care. She was angry. ‘Leave it. If it means you go away then that’s fine by me.’

His expression hardened further. ‘I am trying,’ he said, slowly. ‘To help you. To take care of you. Have you any idea what could happen to you out there? Here you’re safe. Protected . Sheltered. Out there’ – he shook his head – ‘you could be ruined.’ He reached into the pocket of his robe and took out the packet of Marlboro Lights she had bought a few days back. ‘These, for example. It’s unbecoming for a young lady to smoke this filth. I can’t allow that. I have to help you. Don’t you see?’

Maggie ignored the question. ‘Leave me alone,’ she said. Her voice rose to a scream. ‘Just fucking fuck off!’

He flinched. ‘Don’t swear,’ he muttered. ‘I don’t like it. Good girls don’t swear. And you’re a good girl, which is why you’re here.’

‘Fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck!’ Maggie screamed. ‘Fucking fuck off, you fucking bastard!’

He rubbed his cheek and temple. His left foot tapped on the floor. ‘I can’t,’ he began, ‘I can’t believe you’re doing this. This is awful , it’s’ – he puffed his cheeks out, his eyes twitching in agitation. ‘It’s simply not acceptable .’ The last words came out as a shout, and he glared at her, his body now still again. ‘Stop it. Stop it now . You’re ruining everything.’

‘I don’t care.’

‘You will,’ he said. ‘I didn’t want to do this today. Not the first time we met. But I think I have to. I think I have to teach you a lesson. This really isn’t what I wanted, I’d like you to know that. But you leave me with no choice. This is your fault.’

His right hand went to the blue belt of his bathrobe. He undid the belt and the bathrobe opened. Underneath he was wearing a white T-shirt and pale blue Y-fronts. They were tented at the front. He gripped the cloth. ‘This is your doing, Fruitcake,’ he mumbled.

‘No,’ she said. ‘Please, no.’

‘You brought this on yourself,’ he said. His face was now fixed, a hungry, wild look in his eyes; he seemed almost like a different person. ‘Lie down. On your front.’

Maggie shook her head. ‘No. I’ll do what you want. I won’t swear. I’ll be good, I promise.’

‘This is what I want,’ he said, and took a step towards her. She shrank back, her shoulders pressing into the wall. He reached out, and grabbed her arm. He twisted it, forcing her on to her front. He lay on her, heavy, his breath hot against the back of her neck.

She tried to pull away from him but it was impossible. He was too strong. He forced her legs apart with his knee.

When he was finished, he grunted and stood up. She lay face down, her eyes closed.

‘I love you,’ he said. ‘I love you, Fruitcake.’

She was woken up by Max climbing on to her. They slept together, but most nights he rolled off the mattress on to the floor. Wherever he slept, though, he almost invariably woke before her and climbed on top of her. The lamp was on low. She didn’t like to sleep with it on, but hated the darkness when it was off, so she had begged the man to buy her a dimmer switch – she had told him exactly what to buy – and installed it herself. He had watched, his eyes narrow with confusion that she knew how. It was one of the many things he didn’t know about her. She was not what he thought she was, not a helpless child in need of rescue, and she was glad to have the light to remind her of who she had been, of the girl who had been taught electrics and plumbing and car maintenance by her father.

Now she was awake she turned it up full. Max climbed off her and she watched as he emptied the box of Duplo on to the floor. He arranged them into some kind of square. Maggie propped herself up on her elbow.

‘What you making, bub?’ she said.

He glanced up at her.

‘Light beam,’ he said. ‘So we can go somewhere.’

If only it was so easy , she thought.

‘Great,’ she replied. ‘I can’t wait. Where should we go first?’

‘I think to the moon,’ he said. ‘To see the man. And his mum.’

‘OK,’ Maggie said. ‘The moon it is. You work on the light beam and I’ll get some fuel.’

By the bath there were two boxes. One contained Max’s clothes, and the other contained hers – over the years, the man had brought her some jeans and T-shirts, as well as underwear. She had no bras – the elastic on the one she had been wearing when he took her had worn out, and he had never replaced it. She supposed it would have been odd for a man of his age to buy bras. Children’s clothes or nappies were one thing – he might have grandkids – but not bras. He probably could have done it without being noticed, but she had learned that the man was super careful.

She took out a pair of dark blue jeans. They were high-waisted and shapeless and the kind of thing her mum would have considered out of date but the ones she had been wearing needed to be washed. She would leave them by the door and the man would return them in a day or two.

As she pulled them on the button came off. She picked it up; it was cheap, the front metal but the back made of plastic. She reached to the back of the shelf for her sewing kit. It wasn’t much; just a spool of cotton thread and one needle, but it was enough for the infrequent repairs she needed to do. She had convinced the man to get it for her a few years back; at first he had refused, but he seemed to like the idea that she could use it to reduce the number of clothes he had to buy, and so, one day, the spool and the needle had been left on the tray.

That was all she had. Other than the bucket, bowl, and mattress, all he had brought her were some clothes, the Duplo Lego, and the sewing kit. No knives and forks, no shoelaces, no blunt objects. It was wise of him. The last thing he needed was for her to have a weapon of any kind. There were times – many of them – when she would have used it.

There wasn’t much you could do with a needle and thread and some Lego, though. She’d thought about it often enough.

She’d thought about everything. Tried some things; in the first few weeks she was here she had attacked him when he opened the door, clawing at his face with her nails, feeling the skin break and blood flow.

But he was a man and bigger than her and stronger and he threw her across the room then advanced on her, his face puce with anger, his cheeks lined with scratches. He screamed at her and for a moment she thought he was going to kill her – he could, no one knew she was here – but then he breathed deeply and turned around and walked out.