Closer Than You Think by Darren O'Sullivan

Author:Darren O'Sullivan
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9780008277871
Publisher: HarperCollins Publishers
Published: 2019-01-28T16:00:00+00:00

Chapter 26

6th September 2018

St Ives, Cambridgeshire

I didn’t want to be able to catch my reflection in the mirror, so I had to wait for the bathroom to fill with steam before I felt like I could step into the shower. Sitting on the edge of my bed I prepared myself to be in a bathroom, with the door shut, after a week of fearing it. I was grateful to Mum, who turned on the water, left the bathroom and without talking to me started to busy herself in the box room across the hall. She hummed as she pottered, giving me the space I needed but telling me she was not far away. Once I was satisfied the shower had steamed up, I slipped from my bedroom into the bathroom and shut the door. I undressed, thankful the mirror had completely fogged over. I turned the water up as hot as I could bear and scrubbed myself until all my skin was as pink as the scar tissue on my foot. As I washed myself, I could literally see the dead skin and dirt running from my body and down the plughole. Outside I listened as Mum sang to herself, loud enough to ensure I could hear her.

Getting out of the shower I wrapped the towel around my body and with another I dried my hair quickly. Then, wiping the mirror glass, I looked at myself. Although still shaken, I looked all right. In fact, if I didn’t know what I knew, if I didn’t know who I was, I would have said I looked like anyone else. I was almost normal.

I never thought I would think that.

Looking at my feet, both still pink from the hot water, I focused on the right, looking at the patch of floor where two toes should have been, and then from my toes up my calf where the skin had melted when he’d set fire to me, just before I escaped. And I realised that was normal too. Not normal by anyone else’s standards, but it was my normal. I held out my arm and looked at the scar that had resulted from my fall out of the window. I wanted to drop my towel and look at my stomach, but was worried it would be too much, so stopped myself. Sometimes, the small victories are the most important.

I tried to understand why I suddenly felt OK with myself, and realised it was my self-preservation kicking in. I knew I still had the strength of the person who’d climbed out of that window, blood pouring from her body, trying to escape the clutches of a brutal killer. I was determined to survive, only this time, surviving wasn’t running, hiding in grass cuttings. Surviving was stepping outside. Having a photo taken. Being a real person once more. Going outside felt like a more frightening prospect than trying to escape through that bathroom window. But, I needed to. Because if I didn’t, I may as well be dead.

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