Perched on the toilet I scanned the instructions again just to make sure. My bladder was bursting, but I couldn’t wee. I had to run the taps for ages before I could. I put the cap back on the test and rested it on the side of the basin before checking the time and washing my hands. The box said results could show in anything between sixty seconds and five minutes. To make sure the test had worked I was determined to wait for the full five minutes before I checked, but there were only so many times I could pace the small room, nerves slithering around my stomach, before I snatched up the stick, staring in disbelief at the + in the results window. Although I knew it meant positive, I studied the picture on the front of the box again, just to make sure. My knees turned to jelly and I sat heavily on the side of the bath. I couldn’t be pregnant. I just couldn’t. I was too young, but I was old enough to know better. We were old enough to know better, I reminded myself. I wasn’t in this alone, but still we should have used a condom. My gaze darted between the box and the stick and the words ‘99% accurate’ leapt out at me. My shoulders sagged a little. Of course. There had to be a 1 per cent chance of failure.
I took out our toothbrushes from the glass on the windowsill and rubbed dried toothpaste from the rim before filling it with lukewarm water from the tap and gulping it down. It took four glasses and twenty minutes before I could produce a small amount of wee for the second test but I put the cap on the stick, hoping it was enough. This time I couldn’t take my eyes off the small square box that would predict my future and as a cross began to appear, faintly at first but darkening with every passing second, bile bit the back of my throat. I shook the stick like a mercury thermometer and checked the window again, as though this may have altered the result, but it still showed positive. Positive. What an innocuous word but what implications it carried. My mind fast-forwarded to a time I’d be living in a grotty bedsit, fag hanging from the corner of my mouth – ridiculous as I’d never smoked – stirring a pan of beans at a one-ring hob, while a toddler in a stained T-shirt stamped his feet, screaming for attention. And yet there was another picture, nudging the first out of the way. Me crossing a kitchen, roast chicken browning in the oven, to kiss Jake hello as he came home from work and, as young as I was, I liked that picture. I’d always been drawn to babies. Always wanted to be a mum and it flitted across my mind that I might have done this subconsciously, found an escape from this house, my dad, but when I thought of my dad I felt sick. What was I going to tell him? What was I going to tell Jake?
The front door slammed, startling me. No one should be home. Heavy footsteps pounded up the stairs. The door rattled.
‘Kat?’
‘Dad. Thought you’d gone to work?’
‘I forgot something. Need the loo now I’m here.’
Hurriedly I looked around. If I came out carrying the box and tests he would see them, and there was nowhere under my dress to hide them. In the corner was a stack of towels and I stuffed everything underneath the top one. I would move them as soon as he was done.
‘Come on.’ His impatience radiated through the wood.
I clicked open the lock and slipped through the door, not able to look him in the eye. In my bedroom I straightened my duvet and plumped up my pillows, waiting anxiously, listening for the flush of the chain, but it didn’t come. A shadow fell behind me and as I spun around I was met by my dad’s furious face. He raised his hand and slapped my cheek, hard. Falling back onto the bed I began to cry, but he yanked me to my feet and shook me like I was nothing. His eyes were wild, and I was scared. Really scared. As strict as he was, he had never laid a hand on me before.
‘Slut.’
The word stuck like a spear. I opened my mouth but there was nothing I could say to make this better. ‘Couldn’t you keep your legs shut? We’ve time to get this sorted.’
I could see him mentally working out timescales, and I say: ‘Sorted?’ although I know perfectly well what he meant.
‘You can’t possibly keep it,’ he said and, in that moment, I felt a burst of love for the baby. My baby. Jake’s baby.
‘I can.’
‘You will bloody well have an abortion.’
‘You can’t tell me what to do. You’re always telling me what to do!’ Nineteen years of built up resentment came spewing out.
‘While you’re under my roof—’
‘Then I won’t stay under your roof.’ I pushed past dad, knocking him with my shoulder, pulled open my drawer, flung clothes onto my bed.
‘Don’t be stupid,’ he said. ‘Where are you going to go?’
‘Anywhere but here.’
‘You’ll stay in your room until I get back from my meeting.’
‘I won’t.’ I was defiant.
‘You bloody well will and we’ll talk when your mum gets home.’
‘I’ll be gone by then.’ I almost goaded him but I was too angry to tread carefully. I knew I had gone too far when his fingers dug into my shoulder and his hand lay heavy on the small of my back, forcing me forward.
‘I’ll make sure you’re still here.’
I tried to dig my heels in, stretching out my arms for something to grab hold of, but my fingertips closed around air. Before I could properly catch my breath he was forcing me down the stairs. At the sight of the hall cupboard, with its lock on the door, I knew what he was going to do.
‘Please.’ My voice was high and shrill. My skin slick with sweat. ‘Don’t do this. You don’t have to do this.’
There was a grunt behind me, the sound of heavy breathing, and I did everything I could to make it harder for him. I stiffened my body and struggled, and there was a second when he released his grip, when I was free, and just as my mind was processing there were no longer hands on me he opened the cupboard door. I tried to run but instantaneously there was pressure on the top of my arms and I was shaken, hard. My brain rattled around my skull. I bit my tongue and swallowed down my fear and the metallic taste of blood.
My vision grew hazy, the ground beneath my feet felt soft, as my body grew limp. I had the sensation of falling before I was yanked back and thrust forward, landing heavily on my hands and knees. My head banged against something hard and solid and slivers of pain shot through my arms and into my neck.
Dazed, I almost didn’t hear the slam behind me. The click of a lock.
‘No! Wait! Dad!’ I leapt to my feet. Nausea rose as the world seemed to rock and I blindly reached out, trying to find the door. The blackness was all-consuming. Crushing. My hands shook as I slapped my palms over the walls, spinning around until at last I found it. I gripped the door handle but my hand was clammy and it took me three attempts to twist it, and when I did it confirmed what I already knew.
I was trapped.
45
Then
Something terrible had happened. Nick knew as he stared in horror at the trashed kitchen. He didn’t know whether to call the police or search the rest of the house. He had never felt the blood whooshing through his body before but now he felt everything. His pulse throbbing in his ears, the heat in his veins, the prickling in his scalp. He picked up the knife and held it in front of him as he left the room. The lounge was empty. On its side, a crumpled can of lager on the coffee table, sticky liquid on the glass. Something else for his mum to clear up. Mum. The word filled his head, bouncing around his mind. He needed to find her, and yet he was almost scared to.
Something terrible had taken place here tonight.
There was a faint knocking noise and, at first, Nick thought it must be his mum, but it was only the fridge, and the house fell into an eerie silence once more. In the hallway, Nick switched on the light and his stomach contracted hard and fast as he noticed the blood trailing down the passage, up the stairs. He squeezed the knife handle. His palms were slippery now; his grip wasn’t as tight as he would have liked.
Unbidden his feet began to climb the stairs. One, two, the third that creaked. His whole body tensed. As he reached the top he half expected a fist to slam into him, pushing him back down, but there was nothing there except the sense of foreboding sticking to him like a second skin. On the landing, Nick caught a whiff of the minty shower gel he had used before he went out. Which way? The bathroom to the left. His parent’s room to the right.
His whole body was pulsing like it did in the car with Richard’s dance music, and at the thought of his friend Nick wondered whether he should ask him to come in. Safety in numbers. Coward whispered the voice in his head. And Nick forced his feet forward.
Mum.
He crept into his parent’s bedroom. Fearing the worst but hoping for the best.
He turned on the light and gasped.
46
Then