The Slap

This is a very controversial story that some may find disturbing!

Margaret, or Mags as she preferred to be called, was at sitting alone at a notorious gay bar in Dublin called The George, devouring a sex on the beach cocktail through a multi-coloured straw. The bar, full of campness, was packed to the rafters because it was Tuesday night, bingo night.

Mags, a beautiful, heterosexual woman in her late twenties, was only at the establishment because her best friend, Danielle, had just come out and needed a ‘wing woman’. Mags was on her own because, not ten minutes after their arrival, Danielle was nabbed by one of the most beautiful women Mags had ever set her eyes on. She was so perfect that Mags started questioning her own sexuality, but that could have been the drink talking.

Danielle and Mags had gotten ready in Danielle’s house where Mags was subjected to uncertainty regarding what Danielle should wear. By outfit three, Mags started on the vodka. She hadn’t been looking forward to the outing, not because she was homophobic, but because she was certain there would be no eligible bachelors there for her……then she met Steve.

Steve was a tall, muscular man with a square jaw and a tight haircut. ‘Typical’ Mags thought to herself, presuming that Steve was gay as it was her first time in a gay bar and she had absolutely no gaydar.

When Steve introduced himself in a thick Dublin accent, he asked Mags if he could buy her a drink. ‘Free drink!’ she thought to herself and quickly sucked the last few drops of her orange and red cocktail and answered with a smile. Mags was assuming she was only getting a drink because Steve felt sorry for her, after all she was the only one sitting on her own.

Steve brought a cocktail for Mags and a cider for himself to the secluded table as bingo started. He motioned for them to go her outside, she gladly followed.

Steve put their drinks onto a tall table just outside the club. He took out a contraption from his jeans pocket that aided him roll his own cigarette. It was a shiny silver box to which, when opened, he took out some paper, licking one side, and placed it in the gadget. He then added some tobacco and closed the silver box, a cigarette emerging from a long hole in the lid. Mags was impressed. He offered her the fruits of his labour. When Mags politely declined, he put the rollie into his mouth and cupped his hands around it, shielding the end from the air. He lit with a cheap blue lighter that he had to shake twice before it sparked for him. He took a long, deep, drag from it, ‘ahh, that’s better!’ he mumbled, smoke escaping from his nostrils.

‘I’m not gay!’ Mags exclaimed straight off the bat. Steve looked at her quizzically. ‘Not that there’s anything wrong with it,’ she gesticulated frantically. With his cigarette hanging from his lip, leaving his hands free, he reached out for hers to reassure her that she was ok. She stopped moving as he took another drag and with his right hand still on hers, he flicked the end of his rollie onto the street. ‘I’m not gay either,’ he confessed, ‘I’m just here to support a friend.’ Mags’s face lit up, ‘so am I!’ she said in a very squeaky voice.

Mags, knowing she was going to a gay bar hadn’t anticipated this unforeseen union. She wasn’t wearing her usual club attire; she just wore comfortable clothes and sensible shoes with only her normal amount of makeup. Steve, in jeans and a polo shirt, was also comfortable.

Throughout the night Steve bought Mags as many cocktails as she could drink and then held her hair back as she projectile vomited into the gutter. Mags, who hadn’t seen Danielle all night woke up to a text saying she was going to Suzie’s place. Mags presumed Suzie was the girl with the rocking body. At first, she was pleased for Danielle but then she suddenly noticed that she was naked.

Mags sat up with a start, pulling the blanket over her, and turned to see Steve asleep beside her. ‘Shit!’ she muttered before wanting to vomit. As she got up, taking the blanket with her, and managed to find the kitchen sink before her cocktails were regurgitated.

‘You ok­?’ a voice from behind her asked making her jump out of her skin. She wiped her mouth with the back of her hand and, assuring the blanket was covering her front, she slowly turned around. Standing there, naked, was the guy from the bar. However, he looked a lot rougher in the daylight. Mags obviously had her beer goggles on in the club.

‘Sorry,’ she apologised, to which he struck her with an open hand. ‘Stupid bitch,’ he screamed, ‘could you not have used the toilet?’ Mags put a hand on her stinging face, her ears ringing. She had never been slapped like that before. She was shocked at the situation she had found herself in.

Steve quickly tore the blanket Mags was clinging onto out of her remaining hand. He inspected it. ‘You got puke on it!’ he screamed and hit her again, this time with his fist. Mags’s head snapped back with a crack, as he had broken her nose with the blow. She could feel the blood gushing out of it, yet before she could place her hands to it, she got another blow, this time to her side. She heard another loud crack and presumed it was her ribs, mainly because of the overwhelming pain that came with the dig.

Mags was screaming doubled over in pain when she realised that no one knew where she was or who she was with. This Steve person, if that was really his name, could kill her and no one would know. She was in so much pain that she fell to her knees.

Steve pulled Mags up by the hair and led her into the bedroom where he forced her onto the bed. When she put up a fight, he hit her once more displacing her nose further. Mags could only see a white light; she couldn’t hear the screaming anymore as it was replaced with a ringing sound. She felt pressure as he climbed on top of her, brutally raping her.

He repeated the process over and over again until, finally, Mags lost consciousness. He had enough. He got dressed and wrapped her up in a blanket and carried her to the car where he put her in the pitch black, cramped boot. He drove her to the countryside, 30 minutes from his home, and dumped her in an area of long wet grass.

Mags woke days later in a hospital bed, her family surrounding her. She could hear her mother say, ‘she’s opening her eyes!’ to everyone. Mags felt as if she was on top of the clouds because she was on morphine for the pain. She blinked a few times trying see her family in focus, but it was all so blurry. ‘You sleep my angel,’ her mother said. Mags had no problem with that.

Mags spent eight days in the hospital with: a broken nose, an orbital fracture, a broken cheek bone, a broken arm, a bruised kidney and a broken jaw.

When she finally got home, Danielle came to the house. She looked dreadful, like she hadn’t slept in days and her face was gaunt. She knelt down beside Mags who was perked up on the black leather couch. ‘I’m so sorry!’ Danielle cried. Mags, unable to answer because her jaw was wired just put her unbroken hand on Danielle’s face, tears in her eyes, and smiled to the best of her ability.

Mags’s mom handed her a white board on which Mags was writing what she needed to say. She took the black marker from her mothers outstretched hand and wrote: ‘its my own fault!’ Danielle buried her face in her hands and sobbed, Mags joined her.

As she healed, Mags was able to tell the gardai all about Steve. They didn’t have much to go on, but they did a computer simulation regarding his appearance and were actively looking for him. However, they were unsuccessful.

This is a fictional story.

Picture from pixabay.