Getting a Life (New City Series Book 1) Read online

  Her face was still covered in blood, and she sat there, everyone looking at her, but her head buzzed and ears rung, and she passed out.

  She woke up in the nurse’s office, with a wet paper towel on her face, alongside a girl with period pain.

  It was time for French, so she just went. It was so easy to slip by unnoticed, people didn’t want to notice her, they didn’t want to care.

  It got worse when she was thirteen, and she grew tits. David watched her wherever she went in the house, and she took to pushing her little bed against the door at night. Then there was his son. Rebecca didn’t mention him to Mrs Hulston. That way was a dark road to go down.

  It was the way of things for her, it was just how it was. Other kids hated her because she was poor, and instinctively knew she was less than other people, and that feeling never left her.

  Then when she was fifteen, and had managed to avoid her fears, things took a turn for the worst.

  David had become a drug dealer, heroin, coke, pot, uppers, downers, speed, and e. The people who came to the house were scarier than he was, Rebecca spent more time away from home than there, sometimes she slept in the park, or when she got her shop job, Mrs Patel invited her upstairs and fed her, more than once she slept on their little fold out bed.

  She was a small and wizened woman, with big kind eyes. Rebecca loved her bright clothes and pretty gold jewellery, and admired the couple for being kind and good. Mr Patel was quiet, but Mrs Patel ruled the house, she taught Rebecca to cook. She told Rebecca of her son, who was married, and how they came to England in 1978, a young family with nothing.

  Her husband had opened the shop in ’89, and they liked it, even if some people were ignorant. She hated English weather, and missed her family, but not her in-laws. She’d tell Rebecca about India as they sat at the kitchen table cooking. Rebecca learned how to make proper Indian food. Mrs Patel said she made very good chapattis.

  Rebecca hadn’t been home in five days when she slunk in. David and his ‘business partners’ were in the living room, she could smell the cook of heroin, and her head ached immediately. Her mother, dishevelled and decidedly stoned, staggered out and dragged her in. She was berated for smelling of curry, and David kicked the shit out of her.

  She lay on the floor with David standing over her, she heard laughing, someone tried to get her to smoke something, but she turned her head and crawled out the room. Blood dripped on the carpet, pain shot through her, sharp and dull at the same time. David gave a last kick on her bottom, making her cry out. They all thought it was hilarious.

  If she didn’t hate her mother and David before, she did then.

  Rebecca held a wad of wet tissue to the bleeding cut under her eye and spat blood out as she leant over the bathroom sink, she caught sight of her bruised and swollen face, and anger took over.

  It was outside of enough, she was done. She packed her backpack, leant out the window, threw it down, and climbed out. She edged herself down to the concrete plinth that jutted out over the front door, landed on it and jumped down. She didn’t care that it hurt.

  She walked into the police station and up to the man on the desk. She looked at his blue pullover, and the numbers on his epilates.

  He eyed her bruised and swollen face.

  “I’d like to report an assault, by my mother’s boyfriend. I’m sick of him beating me up, but I know you don’t care, and won’t help me, but if I tell you he’s a drug dealer to boot, will you do something then?”

  He raised a brow.

  Half an hour later, she was in a small room in a comfortable chair with a cup of tea.

  “Do you want to see a doctor?”

  “If you like.” The social worker was a large harassed women, but whose face focused on Rebecca when she told her and the sergeant with her about David.

  The worst parts, the things she feared most, were sat under the surface, she wanted to scream and shout, accuse and demand justice, but all she did was sniffle.

  “Last week he said I…well, my mum takes drugs. She gets them from him, but he has to be paid. He wants me, mum said it’s okay. She’s jealous, but the heroin is more important, it always has been. I won’t let him touch me, and I know what he’ll do. I can’t be there anymore. I won’t.”

  Rebecca was sent home when David was arrested. His seventeen-year-old son was still in the house. She wanted to spit on the social worker.

  Rebecca refused to step foot in the house, her mother was half-undressed, pent up with rage waiting to give Rebecca what for, no, she wasn’t going back.

  She ran all the way to Mrs Patel when she sidestepped the social worker. Mark’s eyes bore into her while they were all arguing on the doorstep. She knew he was going to rape her, he had threatened it often enough. She’d said it to the social worker, the woman gave her a look as if she were lying.

  Rebecca never went home. Social services came to the shop, and Rebecca told them in no uncertain terms, to get stuffed. She was done, they wanted to send her back to a deranged drug addict, who beat her and was prepared to prostitute her out. Ten years of failure was spat out at that poor woman.

  “Every time I begged for help, beaten up, starved, humiliated, abused, tormented, I was ignored, no one listened or helped me. The only people who care about whether I live or die, are these people. I will not go back. What about when he gets out, and he rapes me, or kills me. What then?”

  The social worker looked at the desperate young woman, and felt helpless. Rebecca saw that look with disgust.

  In the end, she had to go with the social worker, who put her into a group home, full of children with serious problems, it was only for two months, while she did her exams, and at sixteen, the council gave her a flat.

  She worked for the Patels on the weekends and evenings, and worked in an office during the week part time.

  She went to college, got her A-levels, and moved on. She bought her house when she was twenty.

  “I saved, I did not want to be in social housing, not that there is anything wrong with it. I wanted out. I wanted my own. It was a life saver for me, but I didn’t…”

  “Want to become your mother.”

  “Yes. I worked so hard. Mr Patel died and Mrs Patel went to live with her son. They were so kind to me. Their shop has been knocked down now.”

  “Did you ever see your mum?”

  “A few times, not on purpose. I saw her from a distance, but I ran the other way. Once, she saw me and chased me in the street.”

  “What happened to make you leave?”

  “I have a cousin.” The memory made Rebecca uncomfortable, she only told part of the truth, no one needed to hear all of it. “Mum’s sister. You know, I don’t ever remember seeing her, there was so much that happened that no one told me about, I still don’t know what happened to my nan. Ashley was sweet. Only three years younger than me. I do remember her being at nan’s a few times, and I remember being at her house, I remember her dad, but not my aunt.

  “Anyway. I saw her. I was out shopping, and she came up to me. We started talking. Never about family, I couldn’t, we were just tentative, but after a while, it felt like she was fishing. It rattled me. I was careful not to say where I worked, or lived. She could see I was doing well. She on the other hand, looked like mum. Older than she should look, and cheap. She said that mum had changed. She was clean, away from David, who was out. There was a party. I said no.

  “She said I had to, I’d regret it if I never tried. I caved, I was weak. I had no one, and even though I hated her, the way Ashley talked about her, it was so positive, I thought how nice it would be not to be so alone, to have the mother I wished I had. I wanted to let the past go.

  “Only when I got there, I realised I’d been had. David was there, and Mark. Mark pulled me into a room and put his hands round my throat. Mum saw it all, she would have let him rape me. Who does that? Who is so damaged that they allow that to happen. I managed to get away, fight him off, but there were so many people there,
all on drugs, he was so off his face I think that’s the only reason I managed it. I punched Mark in the wotsits and made a run for it. Mum caught me by the neck, and tried to pull me inside, David pulled at me. I was, well, I was beaten up pretty bad right there in the street.”

  She shuddered at the memory of Mark, and that tattoo on his neck. The smell of his cheap deodorant, the lingering smell of drugs on his clothes. She remembered his fingers biting into her skin as he pulled her jeans down. Pushed his tongue in her mouth, the weight of him as his pinned her to the kitchen table.

  “Someone called the police. I had two broken ribs, two broken fingers, fractured arm, covered in bruises. I don’t remember much. I was in intensive care for nearly a week, there was some internal bleeding, so it took a while to recover. It seemed now that I’m older, and had a good job and a house, I was listened to. Taken seriously. I told the police of the abuse, of every person I asked for help, and had ignored me. I laid out how I was failed by the police and my local authority and social services, and I held nothing back.

  “In the end, it was the drugs he got the time for. Guilty on all charges. The judge looked at his past, at everything. Mother claimed she was brainwashed by her pimp. Managed to avoid being charged.”

  “Do you believe her?”

  “No, she beat me up because she hated me, not because anyone made her.”

  “I’m sorry it happened to you.”

  “Thank you. I couldn’t stay, I’d never feel safe there. So I thought I’d have a start fresh. Hope for better things.”

  “Well, you can stay if you want to, and please call me Alice.”

  “Thank you, I’d love to.”

  “Well, I’ll give you the tour and see the room first, let’s see what you think.”

  The living room was large and comfortable, with a William Morris patterned suite and curtains, warm oak furniture, books, knitting, photos, plants, all the warm clutter of a loved room. There was a large old-fashioned stereo and a moderate TV. An upright piano was nestled at the far end, by the patio windows. The kitchen was large with the big rectangular table in it, the dining room next to it was small but formal, and seldom used. There were boxes and paperwork cluttering it up.

  Upstairs were three main bedrooms served by a family bathroom, and the fourth bedroom over the garage, had its own bathroom.

  It would be hers. It was a pale peach, with light wooden furniture, and a large bed. It had little French windows, which opened onto a balcony overlooking the back garden.

  “I’ll take it.” It really was very lovely. Dated, but in an almost fashionable again kind of way.

  “Good.” They went downstairs. “Are you sure you don’t mind doing things for me, I mean, it’s a big house.”

  “All you need is a spring clean.”

  “When can you move in then dear?”

  “I’m paid up until Friday.”

  Rebecca got half way through the word Friday, when the front door opened. Alice muttered.

  “Oh dear.”

  A man, tall, with dark hair and grey eyes came in, he wore a suit but no tie, and had the sourest grimmest look on him. Rebecca flushed at the expression on his face. She felt like she had done something wrong. He didn’t acknowledge her, but she couldn’t help but acknowledge him.

  He was younger than expected, Alice must have been nearly eighty, and he looked about thirty. He was a stern proud looking man, but so handsome. She swallowed.

  “Mother, is this one of them?”

  “Well hello son, nice to see you too.”

  There was a beat of silence.

  “Well? Is she? Have you even had a reference?”

  “Art, enough.”

  “No mother, you’ll be taken advantage of, this is preposterous. What on earth made you do such a reckless thing?”

  He was quite loud by that point and Rebecca slunk down into her chair frozen in fear.

  “Arthur Lindon Hulston, stop it.”

  Alice looked at Rebecca who was quite pale. He cleared his throat, as he stood in the kitchen, taking up all the space, hands on hips.

  “Do you have a reference dear?” Alice seemed gentle when she spoke, Rebecca noticed they had the same eyes.

  She nodded, trying so hard not to cry. She fumbled in her bag, and pulled out a card. She slid it over to Alice but Arthur stepped forward and picked it up.

  “D.I. Edwards? A detective?”

  Rebecca finally looked up at him. “Who better than a respected member of the police to vouch for me. You cannot object to that?”

  Her voice was flat and slight, but it didn’t tremble, she was proud of herself.

  “I’ll go. If your son won’t allow you a lodger, I’ll understand. Thank you for the tea, and the chat.” She snatched the card back from Arthur and left. She quietly shut the door behind her.

  She was torn, she loved the house, and Alice seemed lovely, but the son would leave her in fear, and she swore never to live that way again. She began the trudge back when she realised there wouldn’t be a bus for an hour.

  A car pulled up beside her after she’d been walking for ten minutes. A sleek luxury car, the window wound down and Arthur looked at her.

  “I’m sorry.” She didn’t stop, but hurried her pace. He got out and caught up to her. “Wait. Please. I’m really sorry. She told me she put an ad in the paper, and I lost my temper. I didn’t mean to take it out on you. Mother seems to like you, and she’s set her mind on it. I won’t lie, I don’t like it. But if it will make her happy, then so be it. I have been told you fetch you and your things and take you back, should you wish it.”

  She did not want to get in the car with him, she really didn’t.

  “I’ll walk, and take a taxi in the morning.”

  “Why?”

  “Because you’re strange, and I am getting in no car with a man I don’t know.”

  “Don’t flatter yourself.”

  “Assault is not about attraction, it’s about anger. You’re very angry.”

  He looked down, he didn’t know what to say, she carried on walking. “Wait.” He unlocked his phone, called his mum, and handed it to her. She spoke to Alice, who assured her it would be okay.

  He opened the passenger door for her and got in himself. She cautiously slid in and passed him back his phone. She was silent, and stared forward as he drove them.

  Arthur tried to calm down, he’d had a shitty day, and was tired and annoyed. He couldn’t believe what his mother was doing, advertising for strangers to live with her. The woman next to him was beautiful, but there was something underneath, she was controlled, quiet, and something else he couldn’t figure out. He realised as she left that she was afraid of him, it was a horrible idea, but still, he didn’t know her game, she might be the most manipulative woman going.

  He waited in the car while she collected her things and came back out. She declined any help as she wheeled the two huge cases, and the holdall bounced on her.

  The silence was unbearable as they drove back.

  “Have you got a job?”

  “Not yet, I will, I can pay rent with what I have anyway. I’ve only just got here.”

  He pulled up to the house, and turned to her. “Let me be clear, whatever has happened in your life, do not bring my mother into it. If you’ve got some scheme in mind, I’ll find out, I’ll know, you hurt her, or even so much as upset her once, I will make sure you pay. All the valuables are in a safe, not in the house.”

  Much as she looked at Justin Patrick all those years ago, she stared dead-faced at him, and again refused his help with the bags.

  “Oh you came back!” Alice beamed at Rebecca, but she only nodded and struggled with her bags. “Arthur, help her, don’t just stand there.”

  “I’d rather he didn’t thanks.” Rebecca disappeared up the stairs. She could hear murmurings from downstairs as she looked about the dusty room, pushing down her fear. It crawled up her throat, and she squatted down. There was a noise behind her.


  “Sorry, I brought the rest of your things up.”

  She only nodded, she couldn’t speak. He left not saying anything else, yet he felt wrong, as though he had erred. He shook it off and said goodnight to his mother.

  Rebecca didn’t even make the bed up, she just went to sleep.

  In the morning, at six, she woke up. She could hear someone shuffling about, and came to. She remembered yesterday, and Arthur. She shuddered.

  She peeled herself out of the unmade bed, and threw off the coat she had slept under.

  She made tea for Alice, and a coffee for herself.

  “Well, I’m sorry about last night.”

  “No, it’s fine, I don’t like men so much, and especially ones that don’t like me.”

  “It can take him time to warm to people, he’ll warm to you soon enough, you’re too lovely not to.”

  “Thanks but I won’t hold my breath. Anyway, I need to go buy pillows and a duvet.”

  “Oh no need, there are some unused ones in the little bedroom, I buy these things and forget about them, there a sheets and things, in fact, take anything from the spare rooms, no one uses them.”

  “Thank you Alice. Today, I’ll get my room sorted, then, I’m going to do the kitchen.”

  “Oh, you needn’t do that today.”

  “I’d like to, besides, I want to do something.”

  “As you like dear, it’s your home too.”

  Rebecca spent the morning cleaning the bedroom and arranging it. It wasn’t a warm day, but the house was warm from the early September sun, she wore a tight vest, and little red shorts with blue piping, they looked right out of the eighties, she had pink rubber gloves on, her hair up in a messy bun, and a pair of flip-flops.

  She toted Alice’s yellow housekeeping bucket around with her, along with one of her few possessions, a little bright cyan DAB radio.

  She sang along to the nineties radio station all morning, only stopping for a late breakfast.