Free Hold My Hand by Serena Mackesy Page B

doesn’t take much to make it trip.
    Entering her bedroom is like stepping into a fridge: a month standing empty in early winter has left the whole house shivering with neglect. Pulling the curtains, she feels a blast of cold air from the window, creeping round the ancient casement. She remembers her father, one winter of her childhood before they could afford vinyl replacements, going round the house with Clingfilm and Sellotape, sealing out the cold air. I’ll get some tomorrow, she thinks, when we go to the supermarket. The list gets longer and longer.
    Kicking her shoes off, she gets under the duvet, thick brocade curtains piled on top like an old-fashioned coverlet, fully dressed. Waits for the bedclothes to warm up, then struggles out of her jeans under the covers.
    Normally, she can’t go to sleep unless she has at least brushed her teeth, but the prospect of facing the icy water in those taps is worse than the prospect of waking with a mouthful of fur. She stretches out on the mattress – it’s not far off new, she notices, and comfortable. Her mattress in Streatham was so far gone – dimpled and stained from years of use – that she didn't even try to offer it to the second-hand man. Just left it to be the building society’s problem.
    We’re going to be okay, she repeats to herself again. If you get a good night’s sleep it will all look better. She switches off the light.
    Darkness. Real, deep, velvet darkness of a sort she’s never known. The bedroom curtains are thin, but nothing – no sign, even, that there is a village over the hill – penetrates the room. There’s someone, she thinks. In the house, there’s someone, I can feel it. They’re hiding somewhere and I can only hear them when the lights are off.
    Kieran used to do that: hide in the dark. He’d do it when they lived together, ambushing her from under the hall stairs, getting up in the night and following her, silently, when she went to pee or get a glass of water, jumping out and grabbing her from behind, hand over her mouth to stifle her scream. He thought it was funny, in the beginning. Hindsight's a powerful tool isn't it? Allows her to kick herself for not noticing that his "jokes" were the early signs of a bully’s mentality. He thought that a lot of what he used to do was funny. That was the excuse: you don't have a sense of humour. I can’t help it if you can't take a joke. Christ, you wind me up. How can I live with someone who doesn't have a sense of humour? That’s the thing with the abuser. If they did it from the off, there would barely be a woman in the land who would let them stay. But it’s the slow creep, the escalations so insidious that you don’t see them, that get you, and trap you.  Cause he’d hold me, after, when I was shaking from the shock of it: he’d comfort me and soothe me and at the same time he’d laugh at me for being a baby.
    And he’d never apologise.
    What if it’s him? What if he’s here?
    A sough of wind and a clatter and she's sitting up in bed, light on, heart pumping.
    Don’t be stupid. Don’t be stupid . He can’t get you here. He doesn’t know where you are.
    What was that ?
    The wind. It’s the wind. Stop it.
    So much house. That long, long corridor, snaking from room to room. The shadowed attics. Anything could be happening and I’d never know. Anyone could be in here already and I'd never know.
    You’ve locked the doors, Bridget. The doors to the outside and the doors that lead from the flat to the house. They’re strong, stout doors and you’d hear if anyone tried to get through them. Stop it. Stop it.
    Will I ever get used to this?
    The clatter again, out in the yard. She jumps, bones rigid in her skin. Strains to hear. If I turn the light out, I might be able to see what’s out there.
    And if I turn the light out I'll be in the dark.
    Just stay here. Stay here where it's warm, and tomorrow it’ll be different. You’ll see. In the daylight. It’ll be fine.

Chapter