Both of You

That’s something. I wonder, is there a chance this could be over by Thursday? How long does Mark or Daan, whichever, think he can keep me like this? Obviously not indefinitely. Neither man is a killer. I am their wife. The sentence makes my scalp crawl. The wrongness of my situation has lurked in my subconscious for years, a dark stain on the peripheral of my vision, a small catching in my nostrils that meant I chose to breathe through my mouth. I’m not used to articulating it even to myself.

I am Mark’s wife.

I am Daan’s wife.

I belong to them both.

They both belong to me.

If Mark is my abductor, Daan will already know I am missing as he was expecting to see me on Monday. If Daan is responsible, then because of the way I’ve constructed my life, Mark won’t know I’m missing until Thursday afternoon. But this is madness. They will have to let me go eventually. Exposed, humiliated, brought to my knees, lesson learnt but he – whichever he it is – has to let me go. Doesn’t he?

‘Mark?’ I call out. I scramble on all fours, as close to the door as the chain will allow and listen. I know someone is on the other side of the door. I can’t see or hear them, but I can tell there is someone there by the way the light falls. ‘Mark, is it you? I think it is. I understand. I’m sorry.’ I start to cry. I don’t want to. I don’t want to appear weak, defeated or pathetic, but I am. I’m all three. ‘Think of the boys. I know, I know, you always do. I should have. That is what you are thinking right now, isn’t it? That I should have thought of them. I am so sorry. Don’t let this get out of hand, Mark. Please. If you let me go by Thursday, they will never need to know this has happened, we can carry on as normal.’

The words tumble out, without me really thinking about them. How can we carry on as normal? What is my normal? Two husbands. Mark is never going to agree to that. That isn’t even what I mean. Is it? Am I asking him to take me back? Am I saying I’ll give up Daan? I don’t know. I don’t know. I just need to get out of here.

The typewriter throws out a short, angry-sounding burst. I should wait to see what it says but I don’t, I talk over the clatter, desperate to get my point across. Desperate to convince. ‘Is that what’s happening here? Will I be given a choice? A chance? I’ll have been taught my lesson without the boys being affected. Mark, I know that matters to you. They above everything, matter to you.’

The note slides under the door.

Wrong.

Reading the word. I clamber, scamper like an animal, back towards the radiator away from the door. As though the word has burnt me. Shit. The room seems to tilt, I’m on a rolling ship in a storm. Wrong husband? Wrong that I’ll get a choice, a chance? Wrong that the boys matter above everything? Maybe not above anger, jealousy, fury. My heart is beating so fast now that I can feel it in my throat, in my gut.

‘Daan?’ I realise that calling both men’s names is likely to further infuriate whoever it is who is out there but I’m beyond being rational. I slam my hand into the floor. ‘Let me explain, let me out. Daan? Daan?’ Nothing. I scream, ‘I hope to God it is you out there, Daan, because if I’ve driven Mark to this point of madness, the boys will lose both parents!’

The typewriter clatters. I scramble for the note.

Don’t pretend to care about the boys.

You only care about yourself.

I do care about the boys. I love them. It might not look that way right now, considering everything, but I do. I always have. That fact has never changed. It’s unalterable.

Suddenly, I feel a familiar but rare gurgling low in my gut. I can’t reach the bucket quickly enough; the waste starts to pour out of me before I can pull down my trousers and pants. Steaming shitty liquid runs down my legs. I look around me helplessly. I snatch up the sheets of paper and try as best as I can to use those to clean myself, but the waste keeps flowing from my body. I’ve barely eaten anything these past few days but anything I have eaten is now on my clothes, my legs, the floors, the bucket. It’s even on my hands – steaming, stinking, humiliating. The food must have been covered in a laxative.

I peel off my jeans and pants throw them in a corner, I’ll put them on when they dry out. I can’t afford to use my drinking water on cleaning anything other than my hands and legs. I sit in the corner furthest from the door, back against the wall. Half-naked. Sullied. Degraded. My stomach screams with hunger, but I can’t risk eating anything else, my arsehole is raw.

I start to cry. To sob. My pity is mixed with fury.

‘Thank you for lunch, fuckface.’

20

Mark

Friday 20th March

Mark doesn’t know where to start with telling the boys their mother is a bigamist. Whether it is even something he ought to do. Isn’t it bad enough that she’s missing? That she’s gone? Isn’t that enough for a child to process? Oli might know the word but Seb would probably sigh and ask, ‘Do I have to look it up?’ Leigh makes the boys do that – look up in a dictionary words they don’t recognise or understand. She only allows them to google if there isn’t a dictionary close to hand. She says the process of researching etymology helps with remembering the meaning better than just being told. Yesterday, the government announced they are closing schools and cancelling exams. Mark thinks his head is about