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                                                 Chapter One

 

 

 

 

She stood naked on an ice stage with the wind blowing through her bones. Eve Lamont paused, raised an eyebrow and continued on another subject, the deed was done and executed perfectly.  

 

Days had passed but Sam was still raw and the wound festered.  She knew Eve was, at this very moment, reclined in her riverside penthouse flat with a glass of Rioja; her mood would be one of smug superior satisfaction.  Eve, viper bitch Lamont with her Valantino couture and her Mugler perfume, her designer tennis coach husband: Mrs perfect bitch slut Lamont.

 

Sam had created a reputation that was admired among the hierarchy of `Cloak Investments` and it now appears Eve had considered her a threat, surreptitiously created a ruse and exposed her inadequacies to the whole board.

 

She had gone over it so many times but there was nothing she could have done; looking back she was satisfied with her reaction, for all she could have done was remain silent, attempt the confident pose, whilst 

 

                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                     2

 

 

 

inside the pulse burned and cat-like she felt her claws emerge; she wanted to leap the table and claw that beautiful face, to leave the mask in shreds of skin and bone.

 

She leant back against the formica table that was secured to the magnolia painted wall.  It was a typical perfunctory bedroom as most hotels were around the South Bank, where tourists would come to stay and businessmen took their whores.  She had drawn the curtains and set the ambiance; the TV was set to a radio channel for mellow soothing music and a single bedside light had been illuminated and angled to reflect a soft glow on the headboard and down the lilac duvet.

She went through to the bathroom and turned on the light; the room was a combination of bright white and chrome.  She perfected her crimson mouth with a tissue, shaping her dry lips.  She paused at her reflection in the triangulated mirror, three faces, three angles looking back at her. 

She closed her eyes and considered her life.  Not a day went by when she did not recall the night, that night not so long ago when the child became a woman.

 

It was winter and the dead of night, ice had formed inside on the pitted sill.  The curtains which she had found discarded by the warehouse were too short allowing the moonlight to cast eerie shadows on the bare walls, but she was not afraid, for her ghosts were all too real.

Their raised voices could be heard for hours, with disruptions of intermittent screams and curses.  Soon she would hear the shuffling drunken steps climb the stairs and he would be there again.  She could cry no more, her small frail body was drained of tears.  She knew she was alone and that night she swore it would end and that she would never be hurt again.

 

 

She was panting now as she knew the time was getting nearer, the moonlight was catching her breath and creating moving drifting forms as she heard another loud scream and a glass smash and then those dreaded footsteps, which that night were not shuffling, they were heavy, determined.  The door slammed open and he stood in the doorway, she yelped pitifully at his grotesque silhouette.  His striped stained pyjama bottoms tied beneath his white bloated paunch, a string vest hanging like a discarded fisherman`s net, exposing his hunched hairy shoulders.  He leant on the door jam and took a drink from a whisky bottle.

 

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 `Bitch!` he mouthed under his breath as he entered the room slamming the door shut. He put the bottle down on the bedside table and switched on the lamp, a lone bulb without a shade casting ominous shadows around the small room. He looked down at her, his eyes glazed, contempt on his face.  She was confronted by his stench; a combination of alcohol, sweat and piss.  He picked up the whisky bottle, holding it high and drank; he growled as the liquid burned through his body and with one movement he ripped the cover off the bed exposing her; he grabbed her thin arm and pulled her towards him.

But this was the new Sam, the strong Sam, the Sam who was tired of the pain. The scissors which she had used to trim the curtains was gripped firmly in her hand, she swung the blade around and plunged it deep into his thigh.  He screamed and stumbled back, a stunned look on his face, as the realisation of what had happened was taking time to register.  He could only stare confused as a thin line of blood from an artery splattered the walls.  Sam laughed at the scene, the scissor handle protruding from his leg like the key of some hideous clockwork mannequin.  The door swung open and her mother appeared in the doorway, she screamed as a line of blood sprayed across her face. 

Sam hugged her knees on the bed, rocking, watching the scene unfold. Her mother grabbed his bleeding leg and they both drunkenly fell to the floor.

         Everything appeared in slow motion, there was no sound, only two open mouths, mouthing incomprehensible words, contorted faces, bulging eyes; two clumsy comical people clawing around in blood on the bare floor. 

It appeared like some bizarre silent slapstick film, played out especially for her.