morning, she felt alive, although, for a moment, she wondered if it had all been a dream. Les staggered into the kitchen, still reeking of booze. She had her back to him and snatched the toast as it popped from the toaster. In her head, she was singing a tune, but not aloud; he would hate any noise in the morning, usually suffering from a hangover. She placed the buttered toast on a plate and slid it under her father’s nose. This time, she didn’t feel so petrified of him. That morning was probably the first time ever he’d said, ‘thank you’. She then placed the coffee by his plate.
She didn’t have to look at his chunky, puffy face to know he was tormented with guilt; she could hear it in his breathing, by the way he quietly sat down, and by the tone in his voice when he asked if the talking-to from Carl had helped her in any way. She rolled her eyes and smirked. ‘Some pep talk, eh? My fucking arse. You know what he did to me? Call yaself a father. You should be ashamed of yaself!’
She glared at her father’s expression of resignation, rolling her eyes once more when he asked if she had taken her tablets again. Finally, she stomped off, after he accused her of such mad and disgusting lies. They weren’t mad, and she wasn’t going to stand there and allow him to fill her head with bullshit.
A week later, the firm gathered again for their poker night, but Les ushered her to her bedroom. ‘Stay up there and don’t make a fucking sound,’ he demanded, before he opened the front door to let the men in. Lucy listened at the top of the stairs and then she heard Carl. She could visualise his smouldering eyes, his command for attention, and then the soft glance he would give her, but she was upstairs, hidden away. She wanted him and pondered how she could let him know she was there.
She added another layer of mascara and lined her lips with red lipstick, swigged another mouthful of neat vodka, and waited for her chance. The problem was, if she made a sound, her father would beat her or send her to the metal cabinet. Then, she heard her Prince Charming. ‘You fucked up again, Les,’ came the sarcastic laugh from below. There was a long pause, as she strained to hear.
‘No matter, Les, I suspect you are holding an ace up your sleeve or calling my bluff. How’s Lucy, and where is she this evening?’
Her heart skipped a beat. She wanted to yell down the stairs, ‘I’m here! Come and get me, take me away. I will do anything, but just get me out of this fucking house away from my monster of a father.’ But she said nothing and waited whilst imagining her father sitting there counting the ten-pound notes that Carl was carefully slapping in front of him, all to have a piece of her. She took another swig from her bottle of Smirnoff.
‘She’s upstairs,’ her father uttered, defeated.
Lucy remembered the grin on Carl’s face, as he stood there in the doorway to her bedroom. The butterflies were back, along with the fast beating of her heart, and she was ready for him. Looking back at that time, she shivered. Her father had sold her again.
Before Lucy’s mind returned to the present, a chilling thought entered her head. Where was her diary? She couldn’t leave that lying about for Justin or anyone else to find. It contained her innermost personal thoughts and feelings. Years ago, Dr Spinks had suggested that she made a diary to help her control her somewhat aggressive tendencies and fanciful recollections. It had been the only good advice she felt he’d ever given her. She knew her head was still in a mess. But she truly believed that until her present plans came to fruition, she would not become the person she had always wanted to be … she needed to be … for her own sanity.
Lucy’s thoughts returned to the present. Leaving the bathroom, she hurried to the bedroom, where she quickly got herself dressed in a soft woollen dress. She liked to feel wrapped in cotton wool, but the long black dress would have to suffice. She would allow Justin his space and work on him slowly but surely. She had come this far now; she wasn’t going to give up on such a good catch so easily – not without a damn good fight, anyway.
The exercise yard was a bleak place with the high barbed wire walls and the officers keeping a keen eye. Groups of women stood smoking and talking. Kara was alone and had no idea where she would fit in. A few necks craned her way, and she could feel the tension as the other women whispered and laughed. Her blood was rampaging through her veins like spears of ice, and she could feel her heart beating wildly.
Then, she saw Vic and didn’t know whether to go over or keep away. She was surrounded by a crowd of hard-looking women, with tattoos, meaty arms and scars, cold smirks, and toothless smiles. There was no one like herself. The black inmates huddled together, a few Chinese formed their own group, and then there was Big Vic. She was like a showpiece, with a following all looking up to her.
Kara was completely out of her depth. She looked who she was: a well-off person who would have been at home perhaps in one of the enclosures at Epsom Racecourse, but here, standing on Larkview Prison’s exercise yard, she was ill at ease. What was even worse was the rest of the inmates knew it. But try as she might to find someone like herself, she couldn’t.
But, then, who was she? All she’d ever been was Justin’s girlfriend. She didn’t have friends, too busy with her head stuck in a book. Now, she was still a nobody, but she was a nobody who was caught in a car’s headlights, ready to become roadkill. Vic looked her way, and for a second, Kara was gripped with fear. Had the cream worked? God help her, if it hadn’t. Vic flicked her head for Kara to join her. Reluctantly, she ambled over and smiled nervously, searching her face for any small indication that she was about to get her head kicked in.
‘This is Posh. She’s a doctor, a friend of mine.’
As if all her fears collapsed at once, Kara could breathe. She acknowledged the others, with a shy nod.
The short heavyset skinhead, with massive jowls, laughed. ‘Ya mate? Yeah, Vic, she don’t look like your kinda pal.’
A deliberate glare from Vic to the skinhead changed the atmosphere immediately and everyone stood around feeling tense. ‘Listen, if I say she’s me mate, then she’s me fucking mate. Now, if ya wanna argue the point, Teri, me and you are gonna fall out big-time.’
Teri, the skinhead, stepped back, realising she’d engaged her mouth instead of her brain. ‘Ahh, nah, nah, Vic, I was just saying she looks, well, ya know, soppy, like.’
With a deep, raspy laugh, Vic heavily patted Teri’s shoulder. ‘Posh, ’ere, is far from soppy. She will burn ya in ya fucking bed, if ya even look at her the wrong way, and if she don’t, Teri, I fucking will. Got it?’
Teri’s eyes widened, as she peered over at Kara. But Kara knew what Vic was doing. She was protecting her, by giving her a reputation that she didn’t really deserve. She’d never had a fight in her life.
‘Er, sorry, Posh, I mean, not that you look soppy, ya just look kinda cute, if ya know what I mean.’
Another wrong move. Vic’s hand gripped Teri’s shoulder, pushing her down. ‘And she ain’t into women either, so touch her, or even wink her way, and I will seriously fuck you up.’ She eyed the others in the group: it was a warning to everyone.
Vic walked away with her arm around Kara. ‘It worked, kiddo. That silly ol’ cunt of a doctor put his glasses on and had a closer look, and then he gave me the cream, just like you said.’ The older woman looked at the downtrodden expression on Kara’s face and sighed. ‘I know, love, it’s hard, trust me. I’ve spent most of me life inside. Ya don’t belong ’ere, and
