have been. I remembered reading a story about a woman whose ten-year-old daughter goes missing and is eventually found dead, having been raped and murdered. There’s this moment when the police come to the mother’s house to tell her they’ve found the body, and even as she’s hearing the words and understanding what’s happened she’s staring at the living-room floor where there’s a TV guide with Monica and Chandler from Friends on the cover and along with I’m very sorry to have to tell you, we’ve found the body of a girl matching the description is the thing about Matthew Perry being in a sex-addiction clinic and the two things are both in her head at the same time and it’s a disgusting equalisation and it must mean she’s evil or insane.
That was me. I was like that. Always had been. When I was nine I had a pet mouse and neglected it and it died. My dad had just said, very quietly, I’m so sad about this, Lulu. And my heart had filled up with panicky self-hatred to hear him say that and to see that he really was sad, but also there was a sensual thrill that I’d done this to him – me! My face had felt warm and soft, just as it had when I’d turned and seen Aunt Theresa standing there in the basement and my pants were round my ankles and she’d said, Talulla Demetriou, you are a dirty, filthy little girl .
I’d expected emptiness in my womb, like the space left by a scooped out avocado stone, but it felt undelivered. The pains (I would have said contractions if the baby wasn’t already out) meant something was wrong. Something other than the blank where instant love should have been, something other than my dead heart, my failed motherhood, my third recurring daydream.
It was filtering through to the animals that they couldn’t grasp the spikes. I watched their long teeth slip and slash. Distress began to gather in them, my distress. I turned my head. Cloquet was still unconscious, for all I knew dead.
The only way to free my hand was to slide it up the shaft of the spike and off the other end, like a chunk of meat off a shish kebab. Three feet, give or take. It made me think how time must have crawled for Christ on the cross, a horse’s tail swishing, a centurion easing his leather cap, a boy drawing with a stick in the dust. That was the world: innocent vivid continuity, regardless.
My wolves lay down around me. There were a dozen of them in the room now, and others arriving. I wanted more than anything just to be able to turn on my side and curl up in a ball. I clamped my jaws together and began to force my hand up the spike, slowly at first, then when the scale of the pain registered, quickly, to get it over with. Three seconds with a white-hot circle in my palm – then it was free. The first moments of welling blood were worse than the impalement, but with a sudden disgust at the figure I cut – helpless, legs spread, choking – I willed myself through it, gripped the skewer in my throat and yanked it out. My left arm was still pinned, but I had the joy of being able to turn onto my left side and draw my knees up a little, as far as my still-big belly would allow. Blood pooled from my neck like a cartoon speech bubble. Cloquet coughed and groaned, then fell silent again.
I passed out.
When I woke the door was closed and there were at least twenty wolves lying in a circle around me. Their warmth quilted me but was spoiled here and there by the air from the broken window. I pulled out the last skewer and fresh blood oozed from the wound. Then another contraction came – and with it the realisation that the reason I felt as if I was still in labour was that I was still in labour.
10
My son, whom I’d lost the right to name, was born into violence and death. His twin sister, whom I named Zoë, was born surrounded by the warmth of wolves.
I fell asleep after delivering her. In spite of the conviction the vampires would return I dropped down into darkness and darkness closed over
That was me. I was like that. Always had been. When I was nine I had a pet mouse and neglected it and it died. My dad had just said, very quietly, I’m so sad about this, Lulu. And my heart had filled up with panicky self-hatred to hear him say that and to see that he really was sad, but also there was a sensual thrill that I’d done this to him – me! My face had felt warm and soft, just as it had when I’d turned and seen Aunt Theresa standing there in the basement and my pants were round my ankles and she’d said, Talulla Demetriou, you are a dirty, filthy little girl .
I’d expected emptiness in my womb, like the space left by a scooped out avocado stone, but it felt undelivered. The pains (I would have said contractions if the baby wasn’t already out) meant something was wrong. Something other than the blank where instant love should have been, something other than my dead heart, my failed motherhood, my third recurring daydream.
It was filtering through to the animals that they couldn’t grasp the spikes. I watched their long teeth slip and slash. Distress began to gather in them, my distress. I turned my head. Cloquet was still unconscious, for all I knew dead.
The only way to free my hand was to slide it up the shaft of the spike and off the other end, like a chunk of meat off a shish kebab. Three feet, give or take. It made me think how time must have crawled for Christ on the cross, a horse’s tail swishing, a centurion easing his leather cap, a boy drawing with a stick in the dust. That was the world: innocent vivid continuity, regardless.
My wolves lay down around me. There were a dozen of them in the room now, and others arriving. I wanted more than anything just to be able to turn on my side and curl up in a ball. I clamped my jaws together and began to force my hand up the spike, slowly at first, then when the scale of the pain registered, quickly, to get it over with. Three seconds with a white-hot circle in my palm – then it was free. The first moments of welling blood were worse than the impalement, but with a sudden disgust at the figure I cut – helpless, legs spread, choking – I willed myself through it, gripped the skewer in my throat and yanked it out. My left arm was still pinned, but I had the joy of being able to turn onto my left side and draw my knees up a little, as far as my still-big belly would allow. Blood pooled from my neck like a cartoon speech bubble. Cloquet coughed and groaned, then fell silent again.
I passed out.
When I woke the door was closed and there were at least twenty wolves lying in a circle around me. Their warmth quilted me but was spoiled here and there by the air from the broken window. I pulled out the last skewer and fresh blood oozed from the wound. Then another contraction came – and with it the realisation that the reason I felt as if I was still in labour was that I was still in labour.
10
My son, whom I’d lost the right to name, was born into violence and death. His twin sister, whom I named Zoë, was born surrounded by the warmth of wolves.
I fell asleep after delivering her. In spite of the conviction the vampires would return I dropped down into darkness and darkness closed over
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