Chapter 44: Victoria Schormann

Ashford, afternoon: Monday, September 29th

‘I haven’t seen you for two days.’ Victoria had been going mad with worry and frustration. She’d expected to have been moved into Seth’s room on the ground floor by now, to be seen by the commune as his girlfriend. ‘You said I was special to you. You needed me by your side.’

‘You are. I do.’ Seth stroked the back of her hand with his forefinger, then lifted it and kissed her palm.

He spoke so evenly she knew he was holding back.

‘Crap.’ She snatched her hand away and let her hair swing forward so he couldn’t see her face. She was cross to feel the hot tears at the back of her eyes. ‘What you said at the fest — and what you said that day on the canal…’ God, she wished she’d not suggested that walk; she wouldn’t be stuck in this shit-hole now. ‘And after that … that meditation …’ She didn’t dare say what she really felt about the sessions he held. She sat up, glared at him. ‘Bloody hell, Seth, you persuaded me to join this … this…’ She swung her arm around the dorm, where each partitioned-off section was identical, and then at her single mattress, her clothes hanging on the rail. ‘I gave you my whole savings. Five hundred pounds. You said it would be for things in my room. My room,’ she emphasised, barely able to keep the sarcasm out of her voice. ‘I didn’t mind that because I thought it would be our room.’

‘You don’t like your space?’

She heard the irritation.

What’s to like, she thought. But she’d need to be careful. She tried hard to soften her voice, to capitulate. Not something she was used to doing. She wanted to stay, but on her terms. She just had to make him see that she was different from the other girls, to make him admit that she was entitled to be treated better than she had been so far. The last thing she was to be kicked out. To be controlled by her family again. That business with Jackie coming to look for her had given her a fright.

‘I want to be with you, in your room. Like you promised.’

He stared at her. For a moment she thought she saw a hesitation in his eyes. That he was going to give in, to admit to being wrong. But when he spoke his voice was cold.

‘You need to chill, babe. When the time’s right, I’ll send for you. Unless—’ He lifted his shoulders, glanced out of the window. Victoria followed his gaze. A mist covered the West Country moors in the distance. ‘Rain’s coming in; it’ll be chucking it down before dark…’ A flock of birds swung past in a V-shape, heading for the hills. ‘Looks like they’re going back to their nests, to settle for the night.’ He turned to her. ‘Unless you want to leave? You can if you want, you know.’

Victoria felt a sense of alarm. ‘I don’t want to go back to my family—’

‘Your past life,’ Seth corrected. ‘You mean you don’t want to go back to your past life. So this is what you want? This life? With your family here?’

‘Yes. But with you. I mean really with you. Not here with all the other girls.’ Oh, what the hell; this time she let him see the easy tears of frustration. ‘All your letters — that time you came all the way to Cardiff on the train to be with me. You said I was the one you wanted. Only ever me,’ she said. ‘What happened?’

She waited for him to answer. That day in Cardiff had been one of the best days of her life.

When the train squealed to a halt and the doors flung open Victoria was relieved to see Seth was alone, threading his way through people on the platform. During the hour she’d been waiting she’d worried that he would turn up with a gang of his mates.

She touched the folded paper in her jean’s pocket; his last letter to her.

‘… you’ll live the life you deserve, babe. We’re all keen for you to join us in our new place. You’ll be free from all the petty crap you’re stuck with now. To paint whenever you want, do what you want, meditate with me – into your soul – be with us. Be free!!!! We’re waiting for you.’

They were waiting for her. If only she had the courage.

Despite the torrential rain on the glass canopies above the station Seth was dressed in a loose cotton shirt and trousers and sandals. He raised a hand, grinning at her, and she ran to him, glad she’d changed into her flared jeans, flowered waistcoat, smock top and platform boots in the station toilets.

They kissed, oblivious to the crowds that nudged and pushed at them.

‘My God, I can tell I’m in Wales,’ Seth said. ‘Nothing but hills and sheep and rain all the way here.’

‘Don’t exaggerate,’ Victoria said, coming up for air from the kiss that had weakened her knees. She leant against him and he hugged her close as they walked together down the steps.

‘What’s in the bag?’ Seth said.

‘Nothing.’ Victoria swung her straw shoulder-bag that held the boring jeans and jumper she’d left home in that morning over her shoulder. ‘C’mon, let’s get a coffee.’ Victoria took off her waistcoat so he could hold it over their heads to keep off the rain.

They splashed through the rain along St Mary’s Street and down side streets before they found a small café in an arcade. When, laughing, they crashed through the door Victoria marvelled how the drab little place seemed to come alive just having Seth in it.

He pulled one of the plastic chairs from a table and slumped onto it, pushing his wet hair back from his forehead. ‘God, Vicky, what a hole Cardiff is.’ He didn’t bother to lower his voice below the sounds of the orchestra playing some sort of classical music from the radio behind the counter. Victoria glanced at the plump middle-aged woman who stood, arms folded, waiting for them to order, her face impassive. ‘Bummer. Nothing like Manchester,’ he added, leaning the chair back on two legs and rocking.

‘You’re not seeing it as its best on a day like this.’ Victoria was disappointed that he didn’t like the city. She was always excited when she was allowed to go Cardiff on her own; she loved the shops. It might not be as “swinging” as Manchester, she conceded, but it was a lovely city with lots happening. She went to the counter. The woman served her without a word and without eye-contact. The coffee splattered over the rim of the large cups into the saucers when she banged them down in front of Victoria and held out her hand for the money.

‘So,’ Victoria said, putting the coffee on the table in front of Seth and dropping her bag on the spare chair next to her, ‘What shall we do?’ His shirt, where it was wet on his shoulders and arms revealed the hard muscles. God, he was fabulous.

Seth let the chair bang down on all four legs and leaned forward to grab her hand. ‘We’ll talk about when you’re going to come and live with me in the commune,’ he said. ‘I want you with me, babe.’

Victoria savoured the touch, felt the flip-flop of her stomach. When she spoke her voice was a high squeak. She coughed, took a deep breath and lowered the tone. ‘No. I mean, what shall we do today?’ Pleased with herself, she thought she sounded sexy.

It worked.

‘This.’ Seth leant forward, holding her face between his hands and kissing her. She felt the tip of his tongue probing between her lips and, conscious of the woman watching them, pulled back blushing.

He laughed quietly and slumped back in his chair. ‘Hang loose, babe. Who cares what we do.’

‘I know. It’s just —’

‘Just that you need to get away from all the tight-arsed stuff. Relax. Chill. When are you going to make up your mind?’

‘I will—’

‘When?’

‘Soon.’

They’d had a good day. The rain had cleared, they’d found a small park and sat watching some ducks on a pond. But mostly they kissed. And mostly Seth talked. Cajoling. Persuading. Until, at last, Victoria conceded. She would leave home in a fortnight, on the day Richard was going for his interview in Manchester.

She toyed for a moment with the idea of going with Richard and losing him as soon as she could to meet Seth somewhere there. But then thought better of it. Much as her brother got on her nerves, she couldn’t do that. Knowing him, he’d try to find her and probably miss the interview. One more thing that’d be her fault … even if she wasn’t there to get the blame. Anyway, she reasoned, her parents would know then where she’d gone. No, better to fall in with what Seth said, what he insisted on; let him pick her up from Llamroth.

She didn’t know why she worried about it anyway; her parents would be too busy seeing their precious son going off into the big wide world for them to notice what she was doing.

The excitement churned her stomach all the way home. She couldn’t believe she was going to do it. Every now and then, when the carriage was empty, she wrapped her arms around her stomach and laughed aloud. Seth wanted her. Like she’d never been wanted before, by anyone.

On the station at Pont-y-Haven she changed back into the clothes she’d left home in that morning.

‘So what’s happened?’ Victoria repeated. ‘What’s stopping us being together?’

‘Nothing.’ He licked his fingers and separating a Rizla paper from the packet, sprinkled the mix of tobacco and marijuana over it. ‘Except it seems to me it’s you having second thoughts.’

‘I’m not.’ Yet, if she’d known where ‘the new place’ that he’d mentioned in his letters was, would she have been so keen to join them? She’d thought about a lot that since she got here. The answer was yes; she’d always felt on the outside of everything, as though she was the one watching life, not joining in. She’d hoped Seth and the beliefs of the commune might fill the emptiness in her. But being here, in this building, part of the old camp, meant she was still connected in a way with her past … with her old life. ‘I’m not,’ she repeated, hoping the uncertainty in her wasn’t heard.

‘Okay.’ He shrugged, offhanded. Licking along one edge he rolled it into a tube and lit it. ‘Smoke?’ He held the cigarette between finger and thumb and passed it to her. ‘Here.’

She shook her head.

‘Here,’ he said again, his voice hard. ‘It’ll chill you out.’

Victoria took it from him and took a long inhalation. She still wasn’t used to the effect the drug had on her and right away she felt the whole of her body relax yet, at the same time her heart begin to race. She repressed a cough. ‘I’m sorry, Seth.’

‘Master—’ he spoke as he sucked at the cigarette.

She pretended she hadn’t heard him. ‘I’m sorry. It’s just that I thought I’d be making my own rules, living my life the way I wanted to and not how – my parents – thought it should be. And yet here I am, following somebody else’s rules.’

‘I told you when you got here,’ Seth said. ‘They’re not rules; they’re ways to be fair to everybody. And someone has to be the one to guide. I was chosen.’ His lips were a thin line.

Who by? Who chose you? Victoria just managed to stop the words from spilling from her lips. ‘Well, I’m sorry but I do think some of the ways are stupid—’ There it was again, that flash of anger. ‘I mean—’

‘Such as?’ He took a long drag.

‘Being shown how to clean this place by Chrystal. I know how to make a bed, to wash up, to sweep a floor, to mop.’ She’d seen her mother do these things a hundred times. True, she’d never actually done them herself but she knew how.

A long pause. Seth studied her. ‘She’s also teaching you about our beliefs and values—’

‘Which you said you’d do.’ Victoria couldn’t stop now. ‘Besides I don’t understand what you do believe in.’ Shut up, shut up, she thought but still the words tumbled out. ‘I didn’t like what you did, the other day.’

‘I needed to let the others know you were willing to be part of us. It was for your own good. I told you that.’ He grinned. ‘Besides it turned you on for the sex after, didn’t it?’

In a way it had but Victoria wouldn’t admit it. ‘Is that all it was, Seth? Sex?’ Not making love like before? She kept that thought to herself.

‘Master.’ He corrected her.

Oh, for God’s sake… She stifled her exasperation.

‘Our beliefs take in all religions … from Buddhism to Christianity.’

‘It wasn’t … isn’t right.’

Seth stood up. His face tight with rage. ‘You need to decide what you want to do, Summer.’ He spoke louder. ‘I think a day’s quiet meditation will help.’

‘I’m not in the mood,’ Victoria said.

Amber and Jasmine appeared in the doorway.

‘We’re going to the quiet room,’ Jasmine said. ‘Come with us. It will chill you out.’

‘No.’ Victoria turned back to Seth. ‘I told you, I’m not in the mood.’

He smiled. ‘It will help you.’

Smiling, each of the girls put their arms firmly around her waist. Other than physically pushing them off her, Victoria knew she had no choice but to go with them.