Sarah threw the book in the corner and took a last look around. The mirror was set in a gold frame, and she remembered the day that he had bought it for her. It was early afternoon and he had come upstairs puffing with the weight of it. He’d removed the wrapping, placed it against the wall, and all she could think to say was, ‘Oh, it’s a mirror.’

‘You don’t like it,’ he said, ‘I’ll take it back.’

‘If you even think it, I’ll never speak to you again,’ she replied.

Her dress had been the colour of wet slates. Such an unflattering colour against her pale skin; yet she had seen his reflection behind her smile, ‘You’re so beautiful, skin like ivory.’ he said.

She had remembered a particular phrase her mother had once said. “Cool face, cold heart.” But it was not true, she had loved him deeply and as if to prove it, she had risen and moved into his arms. Afterwards they had dressed and made their way downstairs. They had ham and eggs for lunch again. Because it was his favourite and he was in a hurry, Bill was calling for him at four.

The doorbell had rung and he had kissed her goodbye. Four hours later the police had arrived, there had been in a collision on the M1 and he was in a critical condition. She’d sat by his bedside all week, praying for a miracle that never came. On Friday it was all over. The doctors declared him brain dead and the machines were switched off.

After the funeral she had became a recluse, preferring to live with her memories, sooner than face life.

Now ten years on, Sarah sat in the bedroom that overlooked the garden. Beyond the garden, there was a school and she could hear the sound of laughter as the children played. She smiled, there were still some things in this life that could make her smile, but not enough to make her reverse her decision. For years now she had thought of doing this and now she had finally plucked up the courage. Bravery, she knew, was often underrated. It had taken a long time to get to this point.

A Secret Kept

Flora Blunt was eighty-two year of age and for fifty-eight of those years she had hidden a terrible secret. A secret so vile that had it ever come out she would have been ostracised and banished from polite society and in all likelihood excommunicated by the church. She had been married to her husband George – bless him for the gentle man that he was – for forty years and she had never so much as breathed a word of it to him. She would never have dared and even if she had, she wouldn’t have been able to stand the look of disgust in his eyes.

George was a gentle man, a kind and loving man, who loved her with all his heart. But if even he, who loved her so well, had ever learned of the dark and filthy secret in her past, he would have ended their marriage at once. So she had never told him and they had had a happy marriage. Well, as happy as a marriage can be when one of the partners is eaten up inside with guilt. Her mother and father had never known, if they had, she felt that they would have thrown her out in the street and wouldn’t have hesitated to report her to the authorities. Maybe she should have taken the chance and told them, but she couldn’t bring herself to do it and then they passed away and it was too late.

Now after fifty-eight years of keeping such a secret locked inside flora was tired, oh so tired and she felt it was the time to unburden herself of all that guilt. But whom could she take into her confidence? There were three women in the Carrick Home for the elderly that she considered friends. Mary Thoms, Rose Peterson and Alice Jones. They were all a little older than her, Mary was ninety-two, Rose was eighty-nine and Alice the youngest was eighty-seven.

The Beating

Wham! the fist slammed into Rose’s ribs and she reeled backwards unable to breath, never mind cry out. Her back hit the wall with a thud and she began to side towards the floor hoping that he wouldn’t hit her again. But it was a vain hope, as she had know deep down it would be. He grabbed the front of her dressing gown, hauled her upright and punched her in the stomach, doubling her over. This time she did hit the floor and curled into a protective ball against the blows still to come. She squeezed her eyes shut and prayed that he would tire soon and go to bed.

She didn’t need to open her eyes to see him standing swaying over her, his face bloated red with the drink and his pig eyes screwed into vicious pinpoints of drunken rage. She had seen it all so many times before on a Friday night, every Friday night in fact. He only beat her up on Fridays when he was drunk out of his mind. The rest of the week when he was only morosely drunk, he ignored her and she was pathetically grateful for that.

Why did she put up with it? She asked herself that question every time and the answer she got every time? It was her fault that he was, as he was. Tom was a deeply disappointed man who had turned to drink and it was she that had made him that way. She wished it wasn’t so, but it was and she had made her bed and now she must lie in it, as her mother was fond of saying.

They had been happy back in 1968 when they first got married, he caring and attentive and she head over heels in love. At the time they both had fairly good jobs. She worked as a telephonist in the Co-op offices and he was a bricklayer working for a local builder. With two wages coming in they had decided to forgo trying for a family until they were comfortable and could manage to live without her wage coming in. Being a relatively well off young couple they could afford to furnish the house, run a small car, go out with their friends at weekends and still manage to save a little each week.

A happy life that in the January of 1971 began to change slowly from an idyll into the nightmare that it was to become. When Tom was made redundant on the 2^nd of January Rose wasn’t worried, she had a good job and they would manage. After all Tom was a good worker and there would always be a job for a good, time served, bricklayer. Unfortunately that turned out not to be true as the build trade was going through one of its periodic slumps. Tom tried everywhere for work and was becoming more and more depressed with his lack of success. Then one evening as he was reading the paper he looked up and said excitedly, ‘Listen to this. It says here that the Australian government will give an assisted passage to anyone with a trade or occupation on the approved list that wishes to emigrate. It will only cost ten pounds each and they need building workers and office staff too.’

Rose was stunned, she had lived in the town all her life, she had been born only two streets away from where they lived now. She had never thought of moving anywhere else, let alone another country at the other side of the world.

‘Well, what do you think?’ Tom asked

For the first time since he had lost his job he looked happy and excited.

‘Whoa! Wait a minute, let me get my head around the idea,’ she said, All the time knowing that if made him happy, she would probably go along with the idea in the end.

They discussed the idea over the next few weeks and finally she agreed to go. It didn’t happen. Two weeks later she found out that she was pregnant and she changed her mind about traipsing half way around the globe. She tried to soften the blow by saying that she would think about going after the baby was born. The offer did noting to pacify him and the terrible rows began. Then six months into the pregnancy just when things had settled down, she lost the baby. She was totally devastated, and Tom, who was already drinking by then, lost the plot completely. He started coming home drunk and while he didn’t argue or hit her, he told her over and over again that she had spoilt everything by not going to Australia.

The trouble was that she believed it and still did. Two month later he came home drunk on a Friday night and the beatings began. They had been going on for five years now and still she believed it was her fault.

He kicked her in the back and this time the pain that shot up her spine was excruciating and she blacked out. She didn’t know how long she was out. But it had been long enough for him to strip her off, drag her upstairs to the bed and begin to rape her. She kept her eyes closed and lay still until he had finished. It didn’t take long before he fell on top of her in a drunken stupor. She lay without moving for a further ten minutes. Then slid out from under him, went into the bathroom, took down the curtains and removed the two and a half foot long, two inch thick curtain rod from its bracket.

Returning to the bedroom she raised the rod above her head brought it crashing down over and over again and was half way down his back before his eyes opened. But by then it was too late he couldn’t move. She had begun at his shoulders and had worked down to his buttocks and with every blow she screamed, ‘It’s not my fault you bastard.’

Beat That One

It was her day off and Maria had gone through the house from top to bottom, dusting cleaning and polishing. She’d put new sheets and covers on the bed, taken down the winter curtains and put up the new flowery summer ones. The house sparkled, the carpets were cleaned and vases were full of heavily scented spring flowers. ‘That should do it,’ she murmured to herself.

She and Rob had quarrelled the night before over something stupid and like all arguments it had escalated into an almighty slanging match. Each had accused the other of ridiculous things.

‘You spend more time with you mates from work than you do with me,’ she complained.

‘Aye well I might come home sooner if I thought my tea would be on the table on time.’

‘You bastard, I work too and I don’t see you giving me a hand.’

‘You only work part time.’

‘Yes I do. I also do the cleaning, the washing, the ironing and the cooking too.’

‘So did Helen and the house was like a new pin.’

That did it; she wasn’t having his ex thrown into her face. ‘No my house couldn’t be as clean as your sainted Helen’s.’

‘You said it. Not me.’ he replied with a sneer.

That really hurt and from then on the insults from both sides became ever more hurtful until finally she had thrown a lamp at him and flounced off to lock herself in the bedroom. He had slept on the sofa and had already left for work when she had come down this morning. Well, she wouldn’t be beaten by him or his holier than thou ex wife. The arrogance of him, she’d show him. By the time he came home from work she would have the house gleaming and his favourite dinner would be on the table. 

The cleaning done, she prepared the casserole, checked the time on the kitchen clock and satisfied that it would be ready on time, slipped the dish into the oven. A quick cup of coffee and she went up to have a bath; she was looking forward to a nice long soak before getting ready. The bath was full, she had poured in her favourite bath oil and she was about to step into the water when she froze. She couldn’t for the life of her remember whether she’d switched on the oven. It was no good. She would have to go down and check.

Dressed as nature intended she hurried downstairs. Reaching the kitchen door she bent almost double, scurried across to the oven, turned it on and set the dial. That was when someone knocked on the backdoor. She glanced at the clock; it would be Bill from the farm shop, delivering her box of organic vegetables and if she didn’t answer the door he would walk in and leave the box on the kitchen table. Scurrying back the way she had come she only just managed to slip into the hall cupboard as the back door began to open. Pulling the cupboard door shut, she held her breath and waited. The footsteps crossed from the backdoor, came straight through the kitchen into the hall, stopped and the cupboard door swung open. Rob, about to hang up his coat stood there gawping at her.

Oh God what was she going to do now? Then suddenly she had the answer, she leaned forward kissed the tip of his nose and said, ‘The house is spotless, your dinner is cooking and if you come with me you can have your dessert first.’

She smiled as she led him upstairs and whispered to herself, ‘Let Saint Helen beat that one.’

Passport to Heaven

Sarah smiled to herself as she filled the plastic tubs with the thick paste; Mohamed will be pleased she thought, as she clicked the lids firmly into place and carried them over to the bed. The rest of the ingredients had been double-wrapped in plastic and carefully placed amongst the clothing in her case. Now all she had to do was wrap the tubs, place them inside and make sure they were well padded against the knocks of the baggage handlers. Finally satisfied that all was secure, she zipped the case shut and closed the padlock.

           Carrying the case into the hall she placed it near the door ready for when the taxi arrived and for the tenth time that morning checked that she had her ticket and passport. Glancing at her watch she realised she still had fifteen minutes to wait. Flipping open her laptop she checked her mail; two new messages, one from her mum wishing her Bon Voyage and the other from Mohamed asking if all was well and letting her know that his friend Abdul would pick her up from Al Tet airport. She typed a quick reply, ‘Everything OK, see you soon, Sarah.’

          She was looking forward to seeing Mohamed again. Who was she kidding; she was dying to see him again. It had been two years now since he had gone back home from Newcastle University and she hadn’t realised how much she had missed him, until he had contacted her by email two months ago. For two of the three years he had been in England they had been an item, she a peaches and cream English rose and he her dark skinned, dark haired, French Moroccan lover.

          They had been lovers but it had been a fiery romance. She was a feisty independent girl into politics and he, despite his looks and charm, had a touch of the superior Moroccan male about him. They would argue for days on end, spitting and fighting like cat and dog, mainly about politics and then spend a fantastic few days making up, before something would start them off again.

           At the end of term his father had ordered him to come back to Rabat. He had kissed her goodbye, promised to keep in touch and she hadn’t seen our heard from him until the email two months ago. Two weeks after the email he rang her from Santa Pola on the Costa Blanca. He had moved to Spain the year before, set up in business and he asked her to come out for a holiday. Maybe she shouldn’t have agreed, but the sound of his ‘come to bed’ French accent had awakened old feelings and besides, in exchange for the ingredients that she was delivering, he had promised her a passport to heaven.

          Sarah nodded off and only awoke as the plane thumped down and raced along the runway with the reverse thrust of the engines screaming. Thank God she had been asleep she hated landings. She didn’t like takeoffs either, but landing were the worst. Her overactive imagination painted pictures of flames and explosions as they ploughed into the unforgiving concrete.

          Three quarters of an hour after touch down as she pushed her way through the crowd at arrivals, she spotted Abdul, he was small and older than she expected, but she recognised him by the piece of cardboard he held with her name on.

          ‘I’m Sarah. Do you speak English?’ she asked, desperately trying to remember a few words of Moroccan from the past. None came, at least none that were suitable beyond the bedroom.

          He gave her a gap toothed grin, shrugged his shoulders and motioning her to follow led her to an old beat up Seat Ibiza. Fifteen minutes later when they pulled up outside the hotel Miramar, Abdul gave her a note from Mohamed and left her to carry her own case inside.

          Later in the room she read the note, ‘Sorry, I have some business I must attend to, but I’ll pick you up at eight. Love Mohamed.’

Young Executive

Sharon Conway was cheesed off. As a young up and coming executive in the well known firm of Ball and Socket she had been given the task of launching their new product, a left handed automatic assembler. It was a fantastic product that would be a boon to the flat pack industry. With one of these marvellous gadgets in every pack, those tables, cabinets and cupboards would practically build themselves in minutes and best of all there would be no missing or left over screws.

It was indeed a fantastic product, but like everything new it need to be fine tuned, then brought to the attention first of all to the manufacturers, then the public and Sharon had been given the task of bringing all this about. It was just the chance she had always dreamed of and she tackled the job with gusto. For a month she had liased with engineering, development and sales and finally the bugs had been ironed out. Next came six weeks of liaison with the airy-fairy team at Dream World, the companies chosen advertising agency.

Now finally with all the hard work behind her, she had to make her presentation to her senior manager Hillary Spence – or Horrid Hillary as he was known in the office. Sharon had spent last night in rehearing her PowerPoint presentation and it was three o’clock before she was satisfied enough with her performance to crawl into bed. This morning she had risen at six, taken special care with her make up, dressed in her best blue outfit and driven to work. Upstairs in the demonstration room she spent at least an hour ensuring that everything was in place for her presentation later in the day.

After a late lunch, Sharon was sitting by the projector in the demonstration room nervously twiddling with a pencil, when the door burst open and Horrid Hillary strode into the room, ‘Afternoon, Sharon,’ he boomed.

Sharon jumped at the noisy greeting and after a pause said, ‘Good afternoon Mr Spence.’

‘Right,’ said Horrid Hillary, ‘I’ve only got fifteen minutes to spare, so let’s get down to business.’

Sharon was appalled, her carefully rehearse presentation lasted double the time she had just been allotted.

‘But sir my presentation takes half an hour at least.’

‘I can’t help that Sharon you’ll have to cut it down, just give me the salient points.’

Sharon tried her best, but with half the information missing it was turning into a shambles and she still hadn’t finished when Horrid Hillary looked at his watch, stood and headed for the door, ‘Times up Sharon, got to dash.’

‘But sir what about the launch?’

‘Sorry Sharon, it doesn’t sound like much of a product to me, just scrap the whole thing.’ And with that he was gone.

Sharon was devastated, ten weeks work down the pan and a brilliant product scrapped, just because Horrid Hillary was in a hurry. ‘Bastard!’ she screamed to the empty room, as she cleared away the equipment. I wish I could take this to someone higher up, she thought, but Horrid Hillary would soon put a stop to that. If only she could bump into the C. E. O. but there wasn’t much chance of that.

She finished putting away the equipment, closed the door, made her way to her desk and it was only when she got there that she realised that it was Friday afternoon and everyone had gone home. She tidied her desk, switched off her computer, turned to leave and spotted the C.E.O. standing in front of the shredder looking totally lost.

Sharon smiled; this was the answer to her prayers. She would offer to help, the C. E. O. would be grateful, they would chat and then she would tell him about the product. It was a piece of cake, he would sign off on the launch and Horrid Hilary could take a jump.

She walked over and said, ‘Can I help you, Sir?’

‘Yes, er…?’

‘Sharon Conway, Sir.’

‘My secretary normally does this,’ said C. E. O. ‘but she’s gone home and it’s very important that this is done straight away.’

‘No problem,’ said Sharon and taking the paper from C. E. O’s hand, she placed it in the slot and pressed the button.

‘Thank you, Miss Conway,’ he said. ‘I only need the one copy.’

Fifteen Minutes Of Pain

I was on the other side of the street when I saw Shirley heading up towards the station. Where on earth was she going? She was supposed to be meeting me in five minutes at ‘Wedding Belles’ the bridal shop, to look at bridesmaid dresses. She and I had been friends since we were kids. We had grown up together, we’d even double dated boys at school together and she was to be my chief bridesmaid when I married James.

I called across to her, but she continued to walk on and it was obvious she hadn’t heard me over the roar of the traffic. I crossed over and hurried to catch up with her, but before I could reach her she turned into the station entrance. Weird, she was supposed to be meeting me, yet here she was either going to catch a train or to meet someone getting off one. I turned in after her and called out once more, but she carried on walking towards where a train was disgorging passengers onto the platform.

Shirley stopped and waved a hand, I looked in the direction she was waving and wished I hadn’t followed her there. She was meeting a tall, very good-looking, fair-haired man and that man was James. My James. He pushed his way through the crowd and they embraced, not a little peck on cheek type embrace, but a full body clinging hug. I couldn’t believe what I was seeing. How could they do this to me?

Finally they disentangled themselves and headed up the platform towards me. I slid behind a pillar but I needn’t have bothered, she was clinging onto his arm and they were so engrossed in each other that they wouldn’t have noticed me anyway. Staying back a bit I followed, they stopped at the flower stall outside the station and he bought her a bunch of red roses. They were my favourites and he had bought them for her. I wanted to rush over and rip them from her arms but I was so upset I couldn’t move.

They set off again, this time heading for the centre of the town. I dodged from doorway to doorway keeping them in sight and when they turned down a small side street I could have cried, they were going to Luigi’s our special place. From a doorway at the other side of the street I watch in dismay as they entered and sat at the very same table where James had asked me to marry him. They held hands until the waiter arrived with two glasses of white wine, then they clinked glasses no doubt in a toast to their own deviousness and took a sip of the wine. A little more talking a little more holding of hands and then they rose to leave.

They left the bar and turned right, taking them away from me. At the end of the street they turned right again. There was nothing to the right but ‘The Dene’ a small ravine that been turned into a park. Beyond the ravine however there was a row of terraced houses and number six in that row was the house that we were going to move into when we were married. Surely the two timing bastard wouldn’t take her there. I couldn’t follow; there was nowhere to hide. For the full length of the dene, there was not one tree or lamppost, just the road, the path and the fence that surrounded the dean.

Now where were they going? They had gone through the park gate and disappeared down into the dean. This was my chance to follow, I hurried along the path and was halfway to gate when I looked down through the trees and spotted them walking back towards me along the path at the bottom of the ravine.