God Save Me

She’d been active in previous weeks. It had become a kind of ritual; when the sun began its fiery descent, she knew it was time to get ready. 

Active. She’d been active. The word made her stomach sway.

Before she closed her bedroom curtains, she ventured one last look through the tattered blinds. The street outside ill-lit and consumed by shadows cast from the yellow street lamps. Her little brother’s go-kart was upturned by the fence.

Her house was perched in the middle of a row of houses which, as if huddled together for warmth, all watched out over the rolling fields that stretched onwards in a sea of green. Featureless save for the silhouette of a barn in the distance standing weakly against the pale sun.

 Some cattle in the fields, mostly cows. They lumbered idly along the prairie dead-eyed and vacant with the autumn frost blooming from their dampened snouts. And the road outside the house, the road which ran straight and narrow through the hedges of the farmland, was quiet and empty. There was Old Jack Doherty’s Vauxhall parked sideways by the pavement but that was no surprise for the man was too old to leave the house, let alone drive. The rest of the neighbors still at work. Her father, still at work. 

(If work is what he insists on callin’ it)

Five houses in total. Little squat two-story council homes. Pebble-dashed walls and single-glazing windows and the shingles on the roofs loosened and some were completely torn off by the storm at the end of the summer. 

The tail end of a hurricane they reckoned it was. Some hurricane from somewhere out foreign and they got the tail end of it, they said. 

She closed the blinds and then the curtains and made note of the time. Made note too of the space outside her house where her father’s pick-up so often sat. Recognised the peace it brought, having that space empty for a while. Knowing the man wasn’t here.

(God knows where he is but he ain’t here so)

Maybe peace was the wrong word. For she could still feel a quiet sense of dread somewhere in her stomach. Nothing to throw her into a panic. Just a little flame burning somewhere inside of her. Kind of like when you turn the stove down and the flame cowers away into small, blue tongues and stays like that, and doesn’t make any noise. But you still know it’s there. You can feel the heat.

The clock ticked on the wall and she pulled out her drawers and emptied everything onto the floor. There was blemish creams and make-up and rolling papers, and with a dull thud on the frayed carpet came the hairdryer. With the mirror crooked on the yellowing plaster of the wall, she dolled herself up. Pulled all kinds of faces as she put her makeup on and covered her spots. Must have looked like one of them lunatics. Her eyes wide and lips pulled down then up and then she flared her nostrils so she could get the concealer right into the crease above her upper lip.  

She sat cross-legged in front of the mirror for some time. Slowly she watched the person in the mirror become someone else and saw the scorn in that other being's face as she looked back at her. A dirty old business, this gig she had found herself doing. But it was a steady stream of cash and at this point she was so focused on getting out of that house that she’d do damn well anything to save up and leave. Before she left she checked the time again and checked the front street again. Still no sign of her father. Good. 

It’s not like she wouldn’t hear him arriving anyway. He always made sure they knew when he was back. 

She left behind her compact bedroom. She left it in a mess, actually. Clothes were strewn over the single bed in bundles and knots and all her things were on the floor. By the wall above the bed was a faded poster of Sharon Tate emerging from the coral-blue water of the ocean. Don’t Make Waves starring Sharon Tate. The corner of the poster was dog-eared and curled inwards. Loved that film, she did. Had it on tape and all. Although, that wasn’t much use since her father had bludgeoned the television a few months ago.

Next to this, was a black and white (much smaller) poster of Elvis Presley. Live at Florida Theatre, it said. She turned the lights off and closed her door. 

The hallway was cold and narrow. She passed her mother’s room on the way down the stairs. Her mother had taken to sleeping through the day recently. Whatever was wrong with her, she didn’t seem her usual self.

(you fucking know what is wrong with her) 

Down the stairs she went. Clumsily, too, for the heels she wore bit into her feet. She turned the banister at the bottom and passed the living room door. Slowly, she pushed it open. Her younger brother sat on the living room floor in the darkness. He made noises as he played with the toy cars. He had draped a blanket over his shoulders but still, even inside the house, she could see the boy’s breath. 

Why are you playin in the darkness? She asked him. 

He shrugged.

Ain’t that silly? 

No.

She searched along the wall and turned on the light. The boy squinted, looking up at her. Daddy said we caint use that light, he said.

What?

Daddy said we caint use that there light. 

That’s ridiculous.

The boy shrugged. He says it costs too much money.

Well I’m not going to have you sitting here in the freezin cold and the dark. Plus, daddy ain’t home, is he?

He will be. 

She retreated from the room. Pulled tight her fur jacket. Her heart thundered in her chest. The boy was dropping weight now. She could see it in his cheeks. They were all sunk in and heavy-looking. And his eyes. 

I’ll bring back food, she called to him as she left the house. 

No answer.

What do you want back? She tried again.

I don’t know, he said.