Domesticity

I have never wanted a knife block. I always knew it would be a mistake. My mother thought it would be a great present. I should have told her there was a reason I didn’t already have one. But I couldn’t. I would have had to explain. And we don’t have that kind of relationship. We talk about the weather, she talks about her boyfriends, I pretend everything is fine. Talking about why I shouldn’t have a knife block, would open up too many wounds, involve too many explanations. I didn’t want to expose myself to that kind of vulnerability. I had never sought her advice, and I wasn’t ready to receive any now. But I knew in my heart, it was better not to open myself up to the possibilities that the knives brought with them.
There are days when I stand on the edge of the pavement and am so very tempted to step in front of a bus. Let this be over. But I don’t. Or I’ll find myself in the china section of a department store and I desperately want to run my hands along the shelf and smash everything to pieces on the floor. I don’t do that either. I fight it. The urge to destroy someone or something lurks there, simmering. I simmer.
“So what happened?”
I resist the urge to say, well you’re the detective why don’t you tell me?
I look across at the Sergeant and bite my lip for comfort. The red light is on the tape machine. Everything is ready, waiting for me to explain. God how did I get here? How do I explain?
“It’s okay you can take your time. We just need to understand what happened. “
He’s already told me that everything I say could be used in court. Best not to mention the buses and the crockery then. It’s not going to help. He doesn’t need to know that. No-one knows that.
“How about we start from the moment your husband Dave came home?”
I nod.
“You’ll have to speak up, the machine can’t register a nod.” He smiles encouragingly. He’s being kind. I wonder why.
I wasn’t supposed to be home. I’d really hoped I’d be staying with a friend for the weekend as it was a bank holiday. It was her birthday, I thought it would be nice. But she’d forgotten, or maybe I hadn’t explained why I needed to come. Why I needed to be away. Dave had gone out to the game. It was a school trip. A reward for good behaviour. Or so he said. I don’t know, maybe it was. Not his you understand. The pupils. He’s a head of year at the local school.
It was sunny. Unusually nice for a bank holiday. Outside I could hear the sounds of early summer, a lawn mower buzzing in a neighbours garden, cricket in the park, jets skis on the beach. You can only hear that when the wind is in the west.
I was in my kitchen. Our kitchen. Dishing up the kids dinner. Dave stormed in across the back garden, flinging the French doors wide open.
“Why are you here?” he asked. “I was supposed to be cooking the kids dinner.”
“But it’s all done now.” I had a laden plate in my hand.
He grabbed the plate and smashed it t the floor. The dinner lay mingled in with the broken china.
Our children Holly and Lizzie took their dinners and disappeared into the house. Fourteen years of this had taught them it was better to get out, before they too were dragged in.
“You aren’t supposed to be here. I am.” As he spoke spittle flecked his mouth and landed on my cheek. He was drunk.
“I know. But you went out. So I cooked. The kids just wanted some dinner.” I bent down to pick up the pieces of plate.
“Why aren’t you with your boyfriend? Has he dumped you? I’m not surprised no one would want you, you are a barren shrivelled up bitch.
I walked out of the kitchen and into the hall. I needed to think, I went into the lounge and closed the door behind me. I stood leaning against the door breathing hard for a moment and then sat down on the sofa, head in my hands, wondering what to do.
Dave followed me.
“Get off the sofa you fat cow. You’ll break it you’re so obese. Off you get.”
With these words he tipped up the sofa with both hands and threw me onto the floor. He was so angry he seemed to have super human strength. His eyes were bloodshot, his skin red and blotchy, he stank of beer and sweat. I tried to crawl away, he kicked me in the stomach. I curled up into a ball. He kicked my legs, my thighs, my calves. Then he kicked me in the head. “
“Don’t worry it won’t show, I’ll make sure of that.”
“Even in this moment of madness there was some perverse logic coursing through his brain. If I had a black eye where he’d kicked me in the face, he was in trouble. But this ringing in my head, that was okay.”
Again I tried to crawl away. He’d lost it this time, he wasn’t going to stop. As he bent over to kick me again I reached up and grabbed his hair. A clump of brittle white hair came away in my hand. He yelped and jumped back in surprise. I never fight back. He knows that. He came towards me again. Oh no. I’ve done it now. This is it. He bent over me. “I’ll be back. I’ll come in the night and slit your throat.” And he left.
I stayed curled on the floor for ages. My head hurt bad. The ringing in my ears wouldn’t stop. The front door slammed.
I put the sofa back the right way up and sat down on it. I heard the kids creep down the stairs, they opened the door slowly.
“Can we go to the park?”
“Sure.”
I felt dizzy and couldn’t get up. But I didn’t want to stay in the house too long. I had no idea where he had gone and how long I was safe for. I sat up. I needed somewhere to go. I grabbed my keys and went to my car. I had no idea what time it was. It had to be somewhere he wouldn’t come and find me. Somewhere safe. I went to my friend Hilary’s and knocked on the door. Luckily she was home and so was her husband Brian. She took me in and gave me a drink and after a while I told her what happened. She wanted me to call the police, I didn’t want to. She insisted I write everything down, while it was still fresh. “You might change your mind.” I wrote it all down. She made up their spare bed. Brian offered to beat Dave up. I smiled, running my hands through my hair.
“That’s very sweet, but no.”
I went upstairs, it was hard to sleep. My head was still throbbing and thoughts whirled around, never settling into a pattern I could make sense of.

Early the next morning I went home, Hilary offered to come too, but I said I was fine. I was worried about the children. At home the children were still in bed. They’d been on their own all night.
When we got back from the park the back door was wide open but there was no one home. Where were you? I went to stay at Hilary’s. The children accepted the explanation and didn’t ask anymore. I went downstairs to make us all a cup of tea. My head still hurt, my jaw ached, the bruises on my legs were throbbing. If I bumped into anything it hurt like hell.
The front door opened, he went upstairs. The children came down.
“He’s throwing all your clothes out of the window. “ I sighed. Will this never end? The judge was granting our divorce next week. I thought getting a divorce would be enough. It would stop. Maybe he would come to his senses. If only he had moved out, or we had managed to sell the house. Living together when getting divorced is madness. His madness, I think a part of him refused to believe it was happening. That I wouldn’t have the courage to leave. And in a way I hadn’t. I was still there. I had nowhere else to go, not with two children. I’d left once before, on my own. But I came back. I couldn’t bear to be aware from the children. He said he’d change and maybe he did for a while. But I didn’t love him anymore. I couldn’t.

I heard him come down the stairs again. He walked down the hall and came into the kitchen, he came towards me. He had an empty drawer in his hand.
“Your stuff is all outside. Now get out.” He threw the empty drawer at me.
“Stop it Dad, stop it.” Holly shouted.
Without turning round I reached out for the carving knife. It was the centre one in the block. I plunged the knife into his stomach.
Dave looked at the knife. Blood spread across his shirt. Holly screamed. I stood and stared as he fell to the floor , and saw their were flecks of blood sprinkled across the perwinkle blue flowers on my summer dress.
Lizzie dialled 999, like I had taught her. An ambulance came. You came - the police that is.
I just wanted it all to stop. And now it has. He can’t ever hit us again.
So Sergeant that’s what happened. What happens next?