Even with his coat buttoned up to the collar, the unrelenting kiss of the November chill clung to him. It entangled him, like the web of a spider isolates its prey.
The heel of his shoes clicked on the ground, echoing around the empty school. In front of him, the trees that overlooked the frozen ditch, were bare. They stood like frozen statues, their bare branches like outstretched and distorted arms; they appeared to reach out to him with accusing fingers. He lowered his gaze as he crossed the bridge and turned left towards the car park.
During the day the car park would have been brimming with vehicles, but all that remained was his car, and a bicycle that leaned against the iron railings. He climbed in, and as his breath was captured by the cold air, clouding up like a swirling mist in front of him, he reflected on the events that led him to his unenviable position.
*
It had all started with the girl. An interesting girl. No- an odd girl. Un-assuming yet forward. He supposed she was not an un-attractive girl. She had rich black hair that fell about her shoulders, made all the more apparent by the paleness of her skin. So pale, that a vein was clearly visible as it traced along her cheek to her mouth. He recalled how on occasion it had un-nerved him because when she smiled the vein curved with the crease where her lips met; it made the apparent innocence of her smile sadistic. Her lips were a stark contrast to her skin. Scarlet red. A deep red like the kind that comes from a finger tip when pricked by a thorn. But most of all it was her eyes. Haunted. Haunting. So dark that her pupils were indistinguishable from the green that encased them. He felt like they were watching him wherever he went. Tracking him. Stalking him. It was her eyes most of all that he couldn’t escape. He remembered likening her to Snow White after she fled the hunter in the woods- the irony of the simile stifled him with pain. Her the hunted. If only. If only...
Like any self respecting teacher of English, he saw no harm in assisting the girl when she asked him to read the stories she had written. And at first that’s all it was. He assisted her in the stories she wrote. Stories that, if he was honest, were nothing more than child’s play. They were stories typical of the gothic genre: vampires that prey on defenceless women and seducing them in romantic settings before the kill, or creatures unimaginable to the natural world who find their home in the world of the supernatural. The child tried to write fantastic literature except there was no depth. No craft. No flair. Her stories were nothing more than stories about things that go bump in the night. The gothic- the fantastic, is more than just linear narratives with surface meanings.
Time passed and he noticed that the girl’s writing was developing somewhat; she started to understand the art of showing rather than telling. Her stories became more vivid, more beautiful. Although they spent a lot of time together in the school library, where he gave her feedback and advice, he didn’t anticipate the change and uncomfortable direction her stories would take. The gothic child's play gave way to darkness. The darkness she explored was not only highly inappropriate- it terrified him. She started handing him stories with recurring characters, a female that fit her description, who would begin intimate affiliations with a character that fit his description: brown haired, blue eyed, slight build, a previously broken nose that had not been reset. It was when she gave him a story in which she and the fictionalised version of him had sex on the backdrop of a setting resembling Thornfield Hall that he broke off the arrangement, feigning pathetically, his workload.
She was furious. So much so that her pale skin took on a darker shade, becoming almost grey. Her hair, un-brushed that day, fell distorted and uneven about her shoulders, and her eyes- those haunting eyes, penetrated him. She could have been the mad woman in the attic personified. Furious at the betrayal of her 'lover' she demanded that he read her stories or she would ruin him. He tried to remain calm while he endured her onslaught. But in the end, exasperated and overwhelmed by fear, he took control and ordered her out of the classroom. Thank God it had been the classroom and not the library! She did leave. But just before she left, she turned and said to him, “Do as you will sir" (this she emphasised), “But remember this. You are mine!" Then she was gone, leaving him standing there, a stupefied statue. What ever could she mean? And what could the consequences of this discourse be? He couldn't leave the classroom immediately. Fear had frozen the blood in his veins. He was isolated. Trapped. Who could he talk to? No one. Was he in some way at fault? Of course he was! Naive. No... stupid.
When he could carry himself from the room, he sat in a toilet cubicle, and wept.
The day following was a Saturday. He had slept in later than usual- sleep did not find him till late. The event in the classroom had left left his soul feeling as conflicted as Bunyan's. The battleground between heaven and hell. Except he could not see heaven in the fog. Hell was winning.
Having got up late he didn’t see the brown envelope that lay waiting for him on his doorstep till way in to the afternoon. He realised the depth of his problems when he saw that the envelope had no address or stamp on it. The package was hand delivered- in so neat a condition, that it could have been placed on the mat by hand. What if she had been here? She was. What else could she do to me? Anything. Why can't she just leave me alone? She wont. He prised his hands together almost in prayer. He shook while staring at the package he held in his hand, as if seized by a fever. He was dismayed, and his heart sank as his fears were realised. In his hands he held a manuscript, the first page blank, other than four letters typed in a small font...Mine.
He sobbed as he read the abomination. She had written a story that ignored all socially acceptable and moral boundaries. A story in which he, the teacher, became the predator. The fictionalised version of himself followed her and stalked her. She knocked him back, but still he insisted. Until finally, driven by a passion, he trapped her and raped her. But most worrying of all, his character had enjoyed it. Yes enjoyed it! He had screamed with satisfaction, with exultation, with pleasure. Then, as he finished he smothered her. Strangled her. screaming while he did it “You are mine!”
He remembered how he had stood by the kitchen counter unmoved. A glass half full with scotch in his hand and an un-smoked cigarette sitting in a dirty ashtray. It was in that moment that his sobs became violent hysterics and the rest of the weekend became a drunken blur.
The following Monday he had been called in to the Head Teacher’s office. He was told that an accusation had been made against him. An emptiness took hold of him as a suspension with immediate effect was sanctioned. He was given advice to clear his desk until he (the head), the governors, and the police could resolve the situation. He knew that he was finished. He could see it in the Head Teacher’s accusing eyes and the way his tongue slivered across his lips. A reverend. A reverend who thought he was as guilty and sadistically perverted as the girl with the fantastical imagination said he was. She was after all, fantastic. He had taught her to be great. And she was.
He left the school immediately, and returned when he knew most of the staff would be gone. He didn’t need their empty eyes glaring at him, wounded at the deceit they felt he had sold them. The insult they felt at being seduced into friendship with a paedophile stamped on their gullible faces. Idiots! The girl obviously wouldn’t make a story like that up. She was ‘lovely.’ The little cunt!
He cleared his desk and checked his classroom one last time. He could still hear the rattle of chairs as pupils had to rush from his classroom to make it to their next lesson. A common occurrence. When he taught, children were enthused and listened. Not any mooooore!
Upon returning to the staffroom he found a post-it stuck to his satchel. On it, written in thin black pen, was one word: MINE. He spun, searching to see if she was still there, lurking in the shadows indulging in his panic. But no, she was gone and so was his credibility. Furious at her, furious at himself for being so ridiculously stupid, he screwed the post-it up and exited the staffroom for the last time. His intentions as a teacher, and sharing his enthusiasm for his subject, felt like a lie, a hollow void where his heart used to be.
He pulled up outside his house. The air, now colder, formed a mist that resembled crashing waves as they rolled over the partnering terraced buildings; the grey was exemplified by the dim hue of the street lamps. It had grown late fast. He was alone on the street. The only sounds came from the occasional chinks of the two bottles of scotch he had bought when he stopped at some forgettable off-licence.
Once inside, he dropped everything at the bottom of the stairs except the two bottles. He went into the kitchen, grabbed a glass from the washboard and went up to his room. He left all the lights off.
He lay on his bed, loosened his shirt and allowed the emotional weight he had suffered over the previous days to seep in to the mattress... Then he started to drink.
During the next hour he switched from drinking from the glass, to drinking straight from the bottle. In that time he experienced a range of emotions. He started off angry, cursing the child for her ignorance and abusing the pupil teacher relationship to manipulate the opinions of his colleagues and other pupils in the school- many of whom had held him in high esteem. His anger then turned to a self pity so profound, he sobbed with convulsed grief, loathing the girl who had cost him everything. Questions slickered in his mind like the tongue of a snake, as though they were taunting him; How will you tell your family? Your friends? How will you live? No one is going to employ someone who could very soon find themselves on a list reserved for the lowest of the low in society. You dirty paedophile! You Cunt! Then, as the scotch took its inevitable hold over him, and he started to pass over in to the world of the unconscious where, he hoped, he would be spared any more pain for the night, he found his humour. He laughed. He laughed at his naivety. To let a girl, who had undoubtedly taken a liking to him, get so close to him. To share with him her stories that had lulled him into a false sense of security, before she instigated her real game plan. But her show of affection for the teacher wasn’t a rosy red apple. No! It was in the form of two characters, that resembled them both. It was in her stories where she could explicitly express her desire for her teacher. After all, she was right. He was hers. She had made sure of that! He dropped the bottle spilling its remnants on to the floor. His eyes glazed over, exhausted. His head was a ricochet of laughing. Pages of apples. Pages of apples. Then nothing...
He knew he was dreaming. Worse yet, he knew where he was and that he was powerless to prevent what was about to happen. It was like there was an unseen force assuming control over his body, directing his movements, forcing his emotions. He was in the story she wrote. The first story she wrote that went far too far. All was so clear, even the affects of the alcohol could not prevent the inevitability of the drama he had been selected to play out. His senses were heightened; his vision unaffected by that typical dreamlike quality. He could taste champagne-dipped strawberries in his mouth that sparkled deliciously. He could smell the vanilla scented candles that had been placed meticulously, benevolently, lovingly around the room. But worst of all, it was what he saw. Her. On the bed, looking at him suggestively on plain white sheets that complimented her porcelain skin. So much so, that she could have been lost amongst the quilt, had it not been for the look in her haunting eyes. And those lips! Those thick red lips! So think! So red! They could have been an imprint of blood- a smear on the sheets. Her hair fell about carelessly on her bare shoulders. Oh God! She was naked under the sheets! And yet... he could feel himself surging for her, feel himself edging closer to the bed, sitting on it. The power controlling him was enjoying the intimacy as much as the character in her stories did. He begged himself to wake up. He shouted at himself. Screamed! Screams that fell on silent ears. Both of them were stuck in the moment. Actors playing out the drama unperturbed by the pleading in his head. He sat, captivated, seduced by those eyes, staring straight in to him, knowing him, wanting him, loving him.
She bought her hands from underneath the quilt and caught it with her elbows so it clung to her skin. she used her hands to pull him to her. By now he was screaming so hard, he could feel the rip in his throat. The gurgle of blood. Yet his fictionalised self allowed himself to be drawn closer so they were cheek to cheek. He smelt her hair, indulging in the scent of roses, then traced the vein that travelled the line of her cheek till their lips were almost touching. They stared at each other, adoring one another. Then as he looked down to imprint the first kiss, his real self who up to that point had been an unwilling guest, heightened his horror to a frenzy, desiring himself to wake, gurgling blood from his ripped throat. He realised that his fictional self had become distracted. There was blood coming from his mouth, dripping like the beginning patter of rain on to the bed sheets.
Then everything changed. He was still looking directly in to the eyes of the girl, but all was different. Gone was the taste of strawberries, champagne and even the blood. Gone was the smell of the scented candles; gone was the look of passion as she looked at the character she had created in her story. Instead, he felt like she was looking at him. Directly at him. The real him. She moved so that she was almost leaning over him, her hair hanging sporadically about her shoulders, her lips a dull red, her eyes blazing at him. He tried to avert his gaze, but couldn’t. Then she said the words that had haunted him, and would continue to do so, as long as he lived...“Do as you please sir. But you are mine!”
He sat up in bed. Too fast. The world was spinning. He coughed up blood into his hand. Before he had a chance to comprehend this he ran to the toilet where he was violently sick; a mixture of blood and whiskey that burned his tender throat. He returned to his bedroom, sweating and still nauseous. He climbed in to bed and wiped the remnants of blood from his mouth on to the duvet. He prayed that sleep would not find him. But it did.
This time things were different. Very different. Wrongly different. He knew this was the finale, the crowning achievement of the girl with the warped mind. This was her final story. Her rape. Her murder. Shit. He knew what her imagined personification of him was supposed to be capable of here. He was terrified and horrified. He wanted out. But yet again, as before, he felt as though there was a force assuming control over his body. It was like her pen had written their climax in a narrative arc that could only end tragically for them both He preferred death to what he was about to do, while his character form would relish in it.
He opened a worn and aged black door; a helpless passenger. In front of him was a stairway that descended to the basement. He flicked a switch that produced a dim light, partially illuminating the stairs and the floor space beneath. The stairs moaned and creaked as he made his way down to the chamber. The creaking got so loud that more than once he thought the stairs would give way beneath him and send him sprawling to the floor.
As he looked out in front of himself, he could feel his lips form a satisfied smile at what he could see. Although in side, his biggest fears were realised...Chained to the piping by her ankle was the girl. Her white night gown was wet with tears and blood. This, mixed with the filth on the floor he realised, bought him satisfaction. Not just the fictionalised persona she had created no, he too was satisfied. The pain she had undergone, even if it was fictional, brought pleasure to him. He had nothing left; a man condemned. And here she was, a lamb to his slaughter, lying on the floor quite at his mercy. To him, both fictional and real, the tides had turned. She was now his. And he relished in it.
Something seemed to happen at that moment, as if in acknowledging the same feelings as his fictionalised other, they had blurred in to one. The force of her pen that seemed to control him before, assuming the movement of his body and emotions, ceased. And for the first time in what seemed an age, he felt like he was in control. He smiled, and this time it really was his own smile.
The girl looked up at him with those same eyes; except this time, all the power they used to exude over him were gone. They were desperate, pleading and pathetic. He bathed in it. Absorbed it. He laughed. "You created this! You got what you wanted!" He laughed more malevolently this time and the girls fear became more apparent as she tried to yank free her blue and bloody ankle. No joy. “You wanted me and now you have me. Remember? I am yours!” he said, trying to control himself. Her eyes sank further back in to her head; the thick black lines under her eyes became more prominent, giving her face a skull like quality. Her skin, characteristically so white, was grey and riddled with bruises and cuts. Her lips, where they were so red before, had become colourless, as grey and transparent as the ghost he intended to turn her in to. “So what happens now?” he shouted. Non-responsive. “You should know! You created this God forsaken place!” Nothing from the girl, nor would there ever be again. In the next instant, he undid his belt buckle and the eyes of the girl became wide, shocked and she tried to scream, but couldn’t. What she didn’t realise was that he wasn’t interested in her body; he just wanted to inflict pain upon it.
He pulled the buckle till the belt hang loosely at his side. That was when the girl realised his true intentions and reached out apologetically, sobbing. He raised his arm above his head and almost hesitated, before remembering the girl’s destructive intent towards him. The first blow came down hard across the girls back. She arched in pain and her arms reached out as if seeking atonement. A thought crossed his mind. She had wounded him. This was only a dream. In reality, he was still the wounded animal. It was then that he let his arm swing freely till she lay still, looking up at him, breathing very faintly, very softly.
He let the belt, dripping with blood, fall to the floor. He too then dropped to his knees exhausted. They remained that way for a few minutes; her barely conscious and barely breathing, too numb to cry, and he breathing keenly, sweating profusely. But he wasn’t finished; the anger rose in him again, surging through him like a tsunami. He grabbed each ankle and pulled her to him. Her eyes barely registered his presence. He brought his face to hers, cheek to cheek and traced it with his nose till they were face to face- clear and unobstructed eye contact. He glared at her, her soft breath barely leaving an impression on his face. He said, “I am yours Violet. But in the process of making me yours, you became mine!” Then he seized her by the neck, pressed both his thumbs against her windpipe, and forced them down. In the time that followed, they didn’t break eye contact.
He woke with both a feeling of melancholy. She was right. He did belong to her. He was hers. His #life was over. There was no opportune fork in the road. No where to turn to. He was as good as dead. #lifeless. A puppet in the stories she orchestrated. His path was destined. He had no future. He had no choice. He lay in his bed, the blood he spat out the night before had congealed on the sheets. Tears filled his eyes.
He carried himself to the kitchen, sat at the table and lit one last cigarette, inhaling deeply with every drag. Then, stubbing it out, he turned and put the oven on, a gas oven which would serve his purpose perfectly. He held a match in his hand and inhaled, allowing the gas to infiltrate his nose, his lungs, his system. He lost himself in the retelling of his own story. A story of her crafting.
He jerked back to reality with the sound of his house phone going to answer machine. He was not aware how long he had been in his trance like state, but the smell of gas was overwhelming, like a transparent smog, both blinding and suffocating. The answer phone beeped and he heard a voice he did not recognise. “Mr. Godwin? This is Detective Inspector Walton. I’m calling in regards to the murder of a girl I believe you were affiliated with. A Violet Hart. It appears she was murdered in her sleep. Strangled. We have two constables waiting outside in a patrol car. Due to the circumstances of your dismissal, we would like you to accompany the officers to the station for questioning. Thank you.” The answer machine clicked, the line went dead.
Godwin smiled to himself and wiped some dry blood, still clinging to his lip, away. Violet Hart was right. But so was he. He did belong to her. But in the process of making him hers. She became his.
He struck the match.
