The warning wasn’t the stinging of her skin,
it was the water beginning to run cold. She’d scrubbed and
scrubbed, rinsed and then scrubbed again. All of her was red, raw
looking. She hadn’t noticed. So much of her was pain that it wasn’t
important. But the water running cold, that was important. That
said something about time, about how long she’d been in there. The
whole of the cubicle was fogged, cloudy. Opening the door, a blast
of seemingly frigid air enveloped her. As did the stench of urine.
She stepped carefully out of the cubicle, reaching for the towels
warming on the heated bar. She placed them all on the floor,
watching them soak up the fluid, watching the stain soak through
them. When they were all down she walked round them, skirting them,
and opened the cupboard. She brought out fresh towels and wrapped
her body in one, then her hair. They were massive, covering most of
her. She added a third across her shoulders, like a cape. All that
showed was her shins, her ankles and her hands. And her face. She
looked around. There wasn’t a mirror. She sat down on the toilet
seat, shaking. She wasn’t sure if she could ever stand again. She
looked at the door. It was white, with black running through it, as
if it too was marble. There was no lock. No bolt. Nothing. The
panic started up in her. She pushed it down, ruthlessly pushed it
far away, away to the place the questions were. When she could
afford it, then she’d bring it back. Not now. With a deep breath,
she forced herself to stand, forced herself to open the door. The
voice inside her was utterly silent, for which she was
grateful.
He had to admit he was startled as the
bathroom door opened: surprised. He had expected to have to go and
fetch her. He had taken the stopping of the shower as his cue and
was waiting long enough for her nerve to break before going in and
getting her. He was undecided if he was pleased, or annoyed, at the
change of plan. The going to get her plan had involved wondering if
she would fight, or try to run? Run was fun, fighting was fine.
Would give him a chance to lay down some rules. He had been running
through both scenarios, deciding which pleasure he actively wanted
her to present him with. She had done neither, forced him to
recalculate: he was pleased. Good thing he had laid the table out
all ready. It would not have done to be caught on the hop. He
watched her edge nervously into the room. Great fun. Yes, this was
better than having to go fetch her. He lifted the first pot.
“Tea?”
She jumped when he spoke, then froze, her
exit from the bathroom interrupted. He stood by a table, a table
laden with plates and cups and tea things. His raised hand held a
silver tea pot. She stared.
“I find tea a most refreshing drink.” He
picked up a plain white cup and saucer, deftly filling the cup.
“Also...” placing the pot back onto the cloth, he picked up a
silver jug. “I find it an excellent activity in those awkward
social moments.” He smiled at her. “Milk?”
She stared. He ignored her.
“It is quite interesting you know, that
today...” he poured the milk and placed both cup and jug down. “...
very few people take sugar in their tea. Once, it was almost
unheard of not to put sugar in your tea. Now, no one I know puts
sugar in their tea.”
He had moved round the table, ‘til he was on
the far side of it, and sat down. As he poured his own tea, he
glanced up at her, smiling, then busied himself. He finished
speaking as he dropped two white sugar lumps into his own cup. The
noise of his stirring mesmerised her, transfixed her. Nothing she
could think of, nothing she could imagine, explained what was
happening. He finished stirring and placed the teaspoon delicately
onto the edge of the saucer. As he lifted the cup to his lips, he
inhaled deeply. He smiled, then sipped.
“Delicious. One of my favourite mixes. Most
refreshing.” He indicated her own cup, sitting on the table. “Will
you not join me?”
The menace was thick, the message clear. It
broke through to her. She moved forward slowly, awkwardly, not
wanting to get closer to him. She wanted to look around the room,
get her bearings back, but the need to keep looking at him overrode
everything. The chair she was to sit on was pulled back and angled,
making it easy for her to seat herself.
“Excellent. Do try the brew, see if it is to
your liking. Biscuit?”
Again, as he offered her a plate of pale
Madeleine’s, his tone was unmistakable. She reached forward,
hesitated, then picked one up. She cradled it in her lap as he
prattled.
“It is an interesting blend, mostly Assam
with some Darjeeling...” his voice droned on, somewhere above
her.
She was staring fixedly at the white linen
table cloth. The voice at the back of her mind was assessing it
dispassionately. Had to be linen, such a large, yet fine, weave. It
gleamed. The light bouncing off it with a shimmer. Her hand reached
forward involuntarily, touching it. Damask, said the voice,
definitely the finest Damask linen.
“It is Damask,” he said. “Do you like
it?”
She startled out of her reverie so suddenly
she couldn’t breathe, blood pounding in her temples. She looked
over to him. The terror in her eyes was almost a force, a tangible
sensation that flooded him. He took her gift eagerly, pressing for
more.
“Do have some tea, it will make you feel
better.”
He pushed the cup and saucer towards her.
His hand reaching closer froze her for a moment, sent her blood
pressure racing, her heart skipping beats. She was transfixed,
unable to take her eyes from the smoothness of his hand. Pale
smoothness, not unlike the cup. The contents swelled slightly,
resettling. The dreaming quality returned, the cup shimmering,
shifting in front of her. Her eyes hurt with the effort of looking
at it, looking so hard she wondered that it didn’t shatter. There
was a slight noise, he cleared his throat: impatience. She lifted
her hands, which were very heavy, unwieldy, one aiming for the cup,
the other the saucer. Both landed roughly where they should, she
grasped, pulling them back to her. The cup trembled slightly as it
travelled, liquid swelling up, dribbling over her hand. The heat
was warming, she cupped both hands around and raised it to her
lips. She felt the heat rise and touch her skin, tickle her nose.
The tea was very milky, not at all what a good Northern Lass should
be drinking. She swallowed some down, closing her eyes as she
tilted her head back, not wishing to see him. There was pain as it
flooded down her throat. She found it hard to swallow, had to force
the muscles to work. Yet it was also good, refreshing. Her thirst
roared within her, demanding more. She clattered the empty cup back
onto the saucer.
“There, I thought that might be just what
the doctor ordered.”
She didn’t look up as he drew the cup back,
poured another cup, pushed it back to her. It was just as milky as
the first. She reached for it shakily, her hand overshooting the
mark. The cup, and its contents, spilled wildly across the table,
soaking the perfect Damask. Her hand stayed where it was, over the
now empty saucer, her eyes watching the spreading stain.
“Tut tut, what a pity. Here, allow me.”
He’d stood somehow, and was now beside her.
White napkins, which she hadn’t noticed, were being piled onto the
tea stain in an attempt to soak up the mess. The tea blossomed
through.
“What a nuisance, here, let me have this
towel.”
The towel from around her head was whisked
off before she’d reacted to his request, its thick pile more use
than the napkins. He was so close to her, she could feel the air
between them move as he leaned this way, then that. He pushed the
pot, sugar bowl and Madeleine’s back, mopping at the massive stain
one small cup had made. When it was contained, he picked the
Madeleine’s up, wiping dry the bottom of the plate.
“What a mess. Dreadful of me, to over fill
that cup.”
He carried on mopping, pushing dry towel
onto wet cloth, drawing out the stain, carefully blotting round its
edges. Satisfied, he turned to her.
“Here, run and get me a towel soaked in cold
water, to stop it drying.”
He handed her back her towel, smiling. He
motioned to the bathroom door, encouraging. She watched his back as
he again turned to the table, moving things around. She stood,
shakily, clutching the soiled towel to her middle, afraid the ones
wrapped around her body might fall. She backed away, eyes never
leaving his back, until she bumped into the edge of the bed. With a
tiny yelp, she turning, fleeing into the bathroom, almost tripping
on the towels she had left dealing with her other stain. She
dropped the one she held, pulled a fresh one from the cupboard,
stuffing its bulk into a sink and turning on the cold tap. The
water spouted up and over her but she barely noticed. Her mission
was to get that towel as wet as possible, as fast as possible. She
jammed the towel in one end of the sink, watching as it pushed out
the other. This just wasn’t working. The whole dammed thing was
never going to fit in the sink! Panic started once more, and she
picked the towel up and threw it into the bath, turning off the
sink tap as she went. This time, as cold water flooded the towel,
it started to soak quickly. The water pressure was immense, the
bath rapidly filling. She switched it off, swirled the towel round,
picking up one edge and wringing it out over the bath, working her
way up the length as she pulled it clear of the water. It could
only have been two, maybe three minutes before she was back in the
bedroom, hurrying forward with her burden. He’d cleared the cloth
out from the table and folded it neatly. He took the towel from her
and wrapped it around the tablecloth, as if he were wrapping a
gift.
“There, that should keep it from drying out
until I can get it cleaned. I shall just go pop it into a plastic
bag.”
He smiled once more, and quickly left the
room via the door that she’d been not looking at. Silence crashed
around her. Her legs felt weak and before she’d really noticed what
she was doing, she’d sank down onto the edge of the bed. He’d left
the door open, light spilled in, forming a long rectangle on the
floor. She stared at it. A thought was just beginning to form, who
knows what it might have been, when she saw his shadow precede him.
She lifted her head. He was drying his hands on a small towel, no a
tea towel. He used it to wipe clean the surface of the table. There
had been a tray, somewhere on the floor on his side of the room,
for he leaned down, lifting it up onto the table top. It took
seconds to clear the clutter, all neatly piled up. He sighed, then
leaned down to the floor, picking up the Madeleine she’d
cradled.
“Clumsy.” He shook his head. “Never mind,
mess can always be cleaned up, always.”
His voice on the second ‘always’ was faded,
distant. It sent a chill down her spine, the hairs on her neck
prickling. She contained the shudder that went through her as he
once more swept out of the room, this time with tray in hand. Her
eyes returned to the light that blazed across the floor. The floor
gleamed under its impact. She moved her feet, feeling the cool
surface. The light continued to bounce up at her, bounce up from
the smooth, seamless floor. The floor was covered in linoleum.
Thick, dark coloured linoleum. Her hands rested back onto the bed
cover as she puzzled this. As they sank onto the sheeting, she felt
the slight crinkling underneath. The voice inside her head rang out
with authority, with warning. She realised it had been trying to
say something for some time. Her hands massaged the soft covering,
investigating. The crinkling was way down, two or three layers. She
pulled back the edge of the sheets. There, under three sheets, was
a bed protector, sealing the mattress. Gleaming, exactly as the
floor gleamed. The voice became louder, more insistent.
Instinctively, she covered the bed back up as she tried to grapple
with what it was saying, what her mind had noticed. The panic it
brought set off her body, dizziness once more threatening to
overwhelm her. Her hands began to shake, breathing more difficult.
Sweat once more sprang out of every pore in her body. He came back
to the room as the scream was fighting up through her chest,
desperate to get out. She wouldn’t let it and the effort was
choking her. She would hold onto this, her mind was insisting: she
had to get a grip. She didn’t look at him, her eyes again studying
the floor, the deadly, smooth, eminently cleanable floor. She was
wrong, she just had to be wrong. He must have spoken, but she
didn’t hear the words, aware only that there were other sounds in
the room apart from her heartbeat. The scream was still trying to
get up, get outside her, make itself large over her thoughts; she
couldn’t risk looking up. She dropped her head lower, her chin
dropping onto her chest: she would not scream. Her left wrist was
yanked upwards, her head following naturally. He was standing over
her, the light from the door once more making his face indistinct.
His mouth was moving. She stared at his lips. Her arm was pulled
sideways. The pain made her focus.
“I expect to be answered, do you hear
me?”
His face was twisted up, his voice too. She
nodded, unsure of what he’d said.
“Good, I am glad we have that settled. I did
not speak for my own amusement.”
His voice had evened out, unkinked. He let
go of her wrist. The pain immediately bloomed through her bones,
shot up her arm. She grabbed the wrist with her other hand,
rubbing. The pain lit out again, making her groan. He’d turned away
from her, closing the door softly. The light was shut out,
returning them to the dimmer glow of the lamps. He was there again,
beside her.
“Whilst we are on the subject...” the pause
had the desired effect. She raised her face to his. “There is still
a little outstanding business between us.” His voice was soft,
tender; cajoling. “I distinctly remember telling you not to leave
the bed.”