‘So I appreciate you trying, but it’s too late.’
Tony looked at Melissa. He knew she was telling the truth but it seemed such a horrible waste. She was still young and attractive – she clearly had a good brain and a big heart. Was it fair to consign her to a lifetime of brutality?
‘It’s never too late. Take this chance. I can help you -’
‘For God’s sake, Tony. Have you listened to a word I’ve said?’ she spat back. ‘I’m broken. There’s no way back for me – Anton saw to that.’
‘Anton’s gone.’
‘Not in here, he isn’t,’ she said, rapping the side of her head viciously. ‘Do you know what he did to me? What he did to us?’
Tony shook his head, wanting to know and not wanting to know.
‘Normally he’d just use his lighter or a cigarette. Burn us on the arms, the back of the neck, the soles of our feet. Somewhere that’d hurt like fuck but wouldn’t put the punters off. That was for small things. But if we’d done something really bad, he’d take us on a little trip.’
Tony said nothing, watching Melissa intently. It was as if she were no longer talking to him, instead inhabiting some dark memory elsewhere.
‘He’d drive you out to the old cinema on Upton Street. Belonged to a mate of his – it was a dirty great hole full of rats. All the way we’d be begging him to forgive us, let us go, but that’d only make him more angry. Once we got there, he’d…’
She hesitated before continuing.
‘… he had this bicycle chain, big chunky thing with a padlock on the end, and he’d hit you with it. Over and over again until you couldn’t get up and run even if you wanted to. He’d be shouting and hollering as he beat you, calling you every name under the sun, until he’d run out of steam. And when you were lying there… like a rag doll in the dirt and the blood and the filth wishing you were dead… he’d piss on you.’
Her voice was shaking now.
‘Then he’d bugger off and leave you there for the night. People said some girls froze to death there, but if you didn’t… then the next day you’d clean yourself up and go back to work. Praying that you’d never make him angry again.’
Tony looked at her. Her whole body was shaking.
‘That’s the kind of people we are, Tony. He did that to us and now that’s all we’re good for. That’s all I am now. That’s all I can be. Do you understand?’
Tony nodded, though he wanted to tell her she was wrong, that she could be saved.
‘The best that I can hope for is that it won’t kill me. That just for a little bit I can be safe.’
