After forty-eight hours with no sleep, no food, and regular intravenous transfusions, Shelley’s medicine was making her ill. In an old, pink nightdress, she staggered to the dining table. She tried to pick up a pen but it kept slipping from her fingers. She wanted to write a list to stop the worries multiplying any further in her head. If she could get them on paper, they might stop increasing and she might be able to make sense of them and make a plan to calm the panic.
The recent periods of hibernation had ruined her daily ritual of examining the newspapers. Although she hadn’t seen anything on the news, not everything was reported on television – or the papers. But what if it had been, and she’d missed it?
She pictured her face in a wanted article, her mother and her aunt’s reactions. But if it had been printed, and if they had seen it, they would have phoned. Perhaps they hadn’t seen it yet. A friend or neighbour would take a clipping and show them. Any time now, she’d be found out. Her head felt compressed at the temples, creating pressure on her skull as if it might crack.
Still unable to lift the pen with her hands, she laid her chest on the table and pressed her face over the nib of the pen. With one hand pushing the other end, she forced it into her cheek to lever it up. Finally, the pen was in her hand but she couldn’t remember how to hold it. Her fingers weren’t working properly. With the pen gripped in one fist, she used her other hand to slide a white envelope from the opposite end of the table closer towards her.
She fell back on a chair. “Ow,” she screamed. Her bony backside broke her fall and as the leather chairs were thinly padded, it hurt.
Her double vision meant that she couldn’t tell if she was writing on the glass table or on the paper. The exercise was futile. She stood up. Her head felt heavy. She couldn’t see anything apart from shadows. Then, emerging from the shadows were the shadow people. Her legs went. Her body tilted forward then slapped down onto the wooden floor.
“Ow,” she cried again.
Diminutive policemen – the size of garden gnomes – were rolling out from under the dining table in droves. “You’re a bad girl, Shelley Hansard. We know all about you,” said one.
“Leave me alone.” Shelley hit out with her arm, but her hand was grabbed. A bantam policeman squeezed it. He stomped over her as he yanked her arm high behind her back. “Get off. You’re hurting me.” Shelley moaned in pain. “I didn’t do anything, I promise.”
“We know what your promises are worth, Miss Hansard,” a shrill voice said.
“The worthless promises of a whore,” said another.
She felt the tiny policemen climb onto her back, and with the weight of so many, she was pinned down on the floor. She looked around as far as her head could turn. She couldn’t see the shadow people. At least she was alone with the police.
“I didn’t kill him. He just died. It wasn’t my fault.” She sobbed. “Please, I’m telling the truth.”
“You were in Sodom,” one said, and they all jumped up and down on her back. “You think you’re high class. You’re a fucking whore.”
“Why are you being so cruel? I’ve never hurt anybody. I don’t deserve this.”
“High-class call girl, you’re still a whore girl. High-class call girl, you’re still a whore girl. High-class call girl, you’re still a whore girl.” Their high-pitched voices sung so loudly that Shelley feared her neighbours would hear.
“I haven’t done anything. I haven’t hurt anyone. I’m not like that.”
“High-class call girl, you’re still a whore girl. High-class call girl, you’re still a whore girl.”
“Stop it! Please stop,” Shelley begged, but they continued to sing. Preternaturally rage replaced her fear. “Shut up! Shut up!”
Unrelenting, they kept on.
“Shut the fuck up, you fuckers!” With all her strength, she pushed herself up from the floorboards and as she did, the miniature policemen rolled back under the table. She bent down on her knees to see if they’d disappeared, but they had not. They stood together in a line, holding their lilliputian shields and batons.
“Get out my fucking flat!” She banged her hands on the hard floor hoping to scare them. The tiny policemen bounced up and down.
“You have to come with us.” Two by two, they marched out from under the table and formed an orderly line. Their numbers had increased to maybe thirty or more.
“Where do you want to take me?” Shelley’s voice quavered.
“To the place where girls like you belong,” one said poking her in the cheek with his baton.
“Where’s that?”
“Hell,” they said in unison.
Shelley rushed into the kitchen and pulled out a bag of rice from the cupboard. She ran back to the table where the policemen stood and poured the rice over and around them. She watched as they tripped and stumbled, falling over each other on the oak floorboards.
“You’re not helping yourself, you stupid whore,” one said.
“We’ll get you, Shelley Hansard,” said another.
“No crime goes unpunished,” said a third.
The urge to run from her flat was intense. However, the fear of what might be outside was greater. She tried to move, but what she was telling her brain wasn’t being relayed to her legs. Her knees could move but her feet were glued to the floor.
She bent her knees and lowered herself down. Turning her head, she saw the policemen wobbling on the rice and shaking their batons at her. She looked away. She lay flat on the floorboards and used her arms to drag her body from the dining table by the entrance of the lounge to the coffee table in the centre.
Holding on to the wooden coffee table, she pulled herself up to kneel. The table appeared to be flooded. Her drugs, the works, the scarf, the spoon, the ashtray, her phone, everything floated on top of the river. She glanced over to see if the policemen had left. They hadn’t.
Apprehensively, she dipped in her hand. To her surprise, it didn’t feel wet. She blinked a few times and then squinted. All the items were still afloat. As they bobbed up and down and shifted around, she found it hard to keep her eyes on her ever mobile, mobile phone.
Swishing her hand in the dry water, she finally grabbed her phone. On bringing it towards her face, she couldn’t make out the buttons. With one hand, she covered one eye and her vision from her seeing eye became clearer. Her clumsy fingers eventually brought up the short contact list and she called for help.
***
“I need to go back and pay the cab,” Len said, standing at her front door.
“Of course.” Shelley clung to the door handle to stop her body from falling. “My bag’s by the sofa. Can you see it? I can’t see straight. My purse is in it. Take what you need.”
She heard Len’s light footsteps on the stairs. Although she hadn’t noticed him leave, he must have passed her; she was sure she hadn’t moved from her position by the front door. Her arm was getting tired holding the handle, so she pulled the door inwards and leant against it.
Suddenly, she was catapulted up in the air and floating through the hall. She flew into the lounge, past the dining table and chairs, and landed on the sofa. The ride had been exhilarating and she was disappointed it had come to an end.
“Let’s get you some fluid. Have you been drinking?” Len stooped over Shelley where he’d placed her on the sofa.
“No, I haven’t, I promise – just speedballing.”
“I mean water. Have you had any liquids?”
“I had some tea, or maybe that was yesterday. I don’t know.”
Len handed Shelley a glass of water, which she tried to pour into her mouth. Though she felt some go down her throat, she also felt her face and legs get wet. Len disappeared for a while then she saw him come back with another glass.
“Sip it slowly.” He raised the glass in his ‘F-A-T-E’ hand and held it to her lips, tipping it at an angle as she swallowed the water. “Sit up, Shelley. Sit up. You’re gonna choke.”
“I’m okay. I think I need a hit,” Shelley said in between coughs.
“You need a rest, love. That’s what you need.”
“I need a bit of gear to bring me down and I’ll be fine.”
“We’ll see. First, you’ve gotta eat.” He stood up. “What’ve you done to your Chevy?”
“What do you mean?”
“You’ve got biro all over one side of your face.”
While Len was in the kitchen, Shelley could smell burning and she expected it was her food, though what he might be cooking, she had no idea. She hadn’t shopped for herself in ages and Aunt Elsie had cleared the kitchen of everything that was out of date, which was everything she had.
She watched Len walk out of the kitchen, holding a dustpan and brush. He swept up the rice from under the dining table. As she looked over, she was relieved to see the policemen had gone. She hoped they’d actually left the flat and weren’t hiding somewhere. She would ask Len to check before he left.
He went back into the kitchen, and she heard the rice being poured into what she imagined was the bin. What would she use if they came back again?
Following the scraping noises that had come from the kitchen, Len sat down beside her and handed her a slice of toast. Shelley couldn’t grasp it. He raised it to her mouth and she took a bite.
“I’m so sorry. I usually manage okay on my own,” she said, with her mouth full.
“It’s all right, love. We all get fucked up sometimes. Like they say, shit happens, don’t it?” He fed Shelley another mouthful of toast. “What happened to you?”
She knew she wasn’t close to reality yet, and she told herself to watch what she said. There were a few matters of which she’d need to be mindful.