Free Without Consent by Frances Fyfield

it funny that I can put wine in that thing, but not food?’ Anna said chattily. ‘It’s all his fault.’
    Helen kept her expression calm, privately thinking, The woman has flipped. This is not making sense.
    â€˜I hadn’t even got to my feet by the time the door slammed,’ Anna continued. ‘And I heard his footsteps going down the road before I moved. Then I looked down between my legs and I thought I was bleeding. A sort of red-coloured trickle was coming out onto the carpet. I stood up and it dripped on the floor. By this time, I was imagining some major haemorrhage. What had he done? Was it a knife? Hadn’t I noticed any pain, only cold, because the burns hurt so much and that was all I had room to feel? Bleed to death, go on, I told myself, but I knew it wasn’t blood.’
    Anna started to laugh. ‘It was a popsicle. One of those cheap ice lollies kids like so much, like a long icicle, wrapped in polythene; horrible things, but I kept them inthe freezer for neighbours’ kids. Should I laugh? He laughed. Get the girl all lathered up, then cool her down … it is funny, isn’t it?’
    â€˜No. It isn’t funny.’
    â€˜Promise me it isn’t funny … When I sat on the side of my bed, I was weeping strawberry juice. Tell me, lady lawyer, was that simply a joke, or was that rape?’
    Helen cleared her throat, reached for wine and cigarettes simultaneously.
    â€˜According to the letter of the law, no, that wasn’t rape.’
    Anna began laughing, a grim and mirthless chuckle.
    â€˜No,’ she said, ‘I don’t suppose it was. That’s me, isn’t it? Not even worth that.’

C HAPTER F OUR
    â€˜Where, on the trial of any offence under this Act, it is necessary to prove sexual intercourse (whether natural or unnatural), it shall not be necessary to prove the completion of the intercourse by the emission of seed, but the intercourse shall be deemed to be complete upon proof of penetration only. According to the old authorities, even the slightest penetration will be sufficient … It is submitted that this remains the law under the present statutory arrangement.’
    S helley remembered that when she had finally reached home on the fateful night of her meeting with Ryan, she had smelt. Hot-night sweat of rage and fear with overtones of heavy perfume. There was mucus on the jacket, tears in brown mascara rivers on her face, filth embedded in her torn clothes. When Derek had found her, he had not touched her. This had been, he explained, the actions of a careful man who had seen films about the need to preserve evidence in cases such as these.
    First, he had put down the rubbish bag he had been carrying and then sprinted for the phone. Highly sensible,a police officer had conceded, but Shelley did not think she would ever forget the fact that he had not hugged her.
    Their lives were full of patterns and plans. Derek was like her mum and dad: constantly in a state of vigilance against the awful threat of the unpredictable.
    D erek Harrison watched Shelley Pelmore get up and open the curtains he had just pulled closed. She did not open them completely, since she did not wish to contradict him, but enough so that she could see the opposite side of the road and the darkening sky from her window seat of oatmeal coloured fabric from Ikea, identical to that possessed by her mother; such good value. They now had a matching pair of such chairs, replacing the cushions she had possessed. Derek’s reason for the replacement was that sitting on cushions meant you had to go such a long way down to the floor and such a long way back up again, and even though she might reckon herself double-jointed, he was not. The same argument prevailed when it had come to acquiring a new bed to replace the double mattress. Derek was the master of do-it-yourself, but he liked to have her around when he did it, requiring an assistant and admirer for