One Way Ticket

CHAPTER 1

T he alarm sprang into action, but I had been awake for hours.

My heart started to pound as I wondered what the day would bring, the house was quiet and that was always a good sign. I strained my ears for any sounds coming from downstairs, particularly from the lounge area, but nothing!

Last night had been another terrifying night and I had only relaxed a little when the manic laughter had stopped and the last beer can had fallen on the laminate flooring with a familiar crash. Well this was my life! But no time to ponder, it was time to make the morning dash to the bathroom and get my daughter and myself out of the house before he woke up and the familiar torrent of abuse started once again. Sliding the bolt I opened the door of the bedroom that had been my home for the last few months, trying not to let the handle spring back quickly and give me away. Stepping in rather awkward and random steps I made my way to my daughter’s room; we had both become expert at remembering any squeaky floor boards or creaking stairs that would give our presence away. We had become the silent people.

Showered and dressed we made sure we had not forgotten anything; we needed to go straight out of the door without stopping, we did not want to get into any hassle. I looked at my daughter’s pale face; the strain of all this was taking its toll and I hated him for this. Don’t worry darling it won’t be forever, I said. She managed a slight smile; neither of us in reality could see a swift end to this horrible situation.

Once in the car we felt safe, the music started and Roy Orbison transported us to another place as we sang along to Blue Bayou together and tried to hit the high notes. It was just another normal day outside; children were running and laughing together on their way to school, their mums chatting and exchanging local gossip, even the old man was there walking his dog at the usual time. If only our lives were so normal. I wondered what they would think of our life, it would certainly make good gossip for tomorrow’s chat. Oh well, I had to stay optimistic and upbeat for the sake of my daughter, it would not help to have two crazy parents. As we listened to Roy at full volume I craved the tranquillity of the beautiful Blue Bayou. How about a holiday, it will be Easter soon, maybe we could go somewhere hot? Her face lit up, Yeah, that would be good. The smile faded as soon as it came, but would we be allowed? I knew exactly what she meant; we had been controlled for so many years now. Well he is not going to know, I will book it and we will just disappear one night. We looked at each other and laughed, as she got out of the car I hoped it would be a nice thought to start her day with.

With thoughts of our planned escape I made my way through the rush hour traffic to work. It was such a relief to get out of the house and my heart started to slow as I thought of the eight hours in safety at work. My spirits had lifted and my mind was now filled with my plan to get my daughter out of this situation for a while and have a little fun. But where? As I waited at the final red traffic light before the turning to the hospital my thought turned to the day ahead. Today was Tuesday, the day for severe dementia; not for me but for the 25 of the 125 patients that attended the hospital day centre weekly. Not the most relaxing job in the world and certainly stressful at times, but I loved it.

I was the all singing, all dancing Activities Coordinator. My role there was varied, officially I was to plan two one-hour sessions of group activities to help the consultants chart the progress or otherwise, of their patients. In reality, my role was to be the ever-smiling happy face that greeted them each morning and tended to their every need during their stay, from delivering the perfect omelette to being a comedy show host providing them with stimulation to help with memory and general well being. In the reality of my Tuesday group, Betty saw me as the vicar’s wife, the vicar being my assistant, a lovely guy from Russia who they all adored and who had the patience of a saint. Betty would love to burst into her favourite hymn and got most upset if the others didn’t follow her.

I was mum to Stan, a gentleman who had the sweetest nature but saw me as his mother, he was well into his eighties and confused the others no end in continually following me everywhere saying Mum, mum, when are we going home? Not even the bathroom was out of bounds as far as Stan was concerned and he would continue his request whilst knocking on the door.

To Florence I was her long lost daughter who she re-found every week and would amaze the other ladies and myself with the stories of what I had supposedly done as a child.

Estelle was a little scary, she had been in the theatre for most of her life as an actress and from what we could gather had a rather wayward husband during these years. She was convinced that I was one of the women who had an affair with her husband 40 years ago and would shock the other ladies with this information on the hour, every hour.

Then of course there was Renee, a rather tall lady with a likeness to Mrs Doubtfire, who carried a Maggie Thatcher handbag which she constantly lost throughout the day. She had been a Head Mistress in a very large girls’ school and searched repeatedly for her office and handbag; she saw me as a truculent teenager who was less than helpful in her search of both.

My favourite lady of all was Olive; she was perhaps the most troubled soul of all, she would scream for her husband throughout the day to come to her. He cared for her at home alone; it must have been exhausting for him. Along with the screaming, Olive would launch attacks if you were not on your guard, gouging chunks from your skin in her efforts to get close to you.

So this was where I spent my working day and I was actually looking forward to it, part of me wondered if after all the stress over the last few months I would end up soon as a patient myself. My day passed far too quickly. After numerous renditions of Daisy, Daisy and Knees Up Mother Brown plus our hour long games of Bingo, it was time to say goodbye until next week for our little group.

For me lock down time was fast approaching and as I rushed through the traffic once more I dreamed about sunny beaches and blue skies. It had to be done, I had to book it! But where? There was always Spain, but I imagined happy families playing on the beach and love struck couples everywhere. It had to be somewhere else less ordinary, we had been away on holidays many times as a dysfunctional family but it had always ended in disaster, so much so that my older two children had always got anxious at the thought of going away at all. Two years before, we had been to my dream location Egypt, we had stayed on Crocodile Island beside the Nile and it was beautiful. I fell in love with the country in a way that made no sense to me. Pondering for a moment about going back, I decided that I did not feel brave enough to take my teenage daughter there on my own for our first holiday together.

This confidence problem was annoying, before meeting him, I was outgoing, adventurous and I had a mind of my own and hobbies, even friends! All of this had been knocked out of me little by little like a constantly dripping tap. The friends had long since stopped visiting the house due to his hostile presence, even my family had been made very unwelcome, emotional abuse and control is the hidden torture.

My daughter was waiting at the gate when I arrived at the school, she jumped in and we went for our usual evening meal at the local drive-through. This had become another part of our lives after not being allowed into my own kitchen of the house I had bought and furnished many years before meeting him. We talked about her day as we munched our happy meals, tossing the new batch of plastic toys onto the back seat, we had quite a collection now.

We finished our meal and it was off to ballet lessons, it was a Tuesday so my day off from teaching. My daughter had inherited my love of dance and had trained hard from the age of four, now a talented dancer in her own right it was a good distraction from our unhappy home life. The lesson this evening was to include rehearsals for an upcoming show and although she was tired I knew it was better than going home. I taught the younger children at the same ballet school on a Thursday and Saturday to make some extra cash, our lives were busy and there was precious little time to relax. Whilst my daughter fixed her hair on the way in the car we talked more about our escape plan.

The lesson over and after a quick chat to my friend it was back to the house of doom. No lights were on as we parked up outside, that was a good sign; maybe we would be able to get inside without any drama. Opening the door with great caution I looked around for signs of missing shoes to indicate if he had gone out or not. Only the dogs greeted us like long lost friends. It was a good chance to tackle the holiday situation so with no time to waste I dashed to the computer in the dining room. It had been some months since I had actually been in my own dining room and in horror I looked at the mess that he had made. Pictures of cars and trucks had been nailed to the walls and it resembled a teenage boy’s bedroom, the flooring was covered in old clothes and peanut shells.

With no time to ponder on this I switched on the computer and stated to scroll though the holiday deals on offer. With my daughter as a lookout I hastily looked through the options, What about Tunisia? I asked her, It’s nice there. I had been there many years ago and had terrible food poisoning but being optimistic, thought that things must have improved by now. They have a trip to the Sahara, we can take a nice camel ride at sunset and also go to the oasis where they pick the best dates I said. We won’t be allowed, mum Zoë said. Well he is not going to be there to stop us, was my reply, not the best answer in the world but the first thing that came into my mind. We both laughed in unison at our bad behaviour, Ok it’s done; we are going. Switching off the computer we dashed upstairs just in time before ‘It’ came back. We sat in bed giggling at what we had done; we planned how we could retrieve our passports from downstairs and our suitcases from the loft without detection.

Over the next few weeks in ostrich style we buried our heads to our current situation and only thought of our week in Tunisia. Sitting together night after night in the bedroom looking at the holiday brochures we had smuggled into the house to check out other views of our hotel and check out the local area. My daughter was now studying for her G.C.S.E. exams, struggling to complete her revision, course work and art portfolio. We fell into a routine of eating cold food that did not need heating, which we could prepare in the bedroom, as we had not been allowed to use the kitchen or its facilities for some time. There were of course our regular trips to the drive-through, always parking in the same place away from the local boy racers that used the car park for a meeting, revving up their cars at regular intervals and racing each other around the small space. Our treat was to shop for bargains on a Saturday afternoon at our local town’s shops for inexpensive outfits fit to wear in a Muslim country, we did not want to attract any attention and look like lonely tourists.

CHAPTER 2

G oing to bed the night before the flight was pointless, there was no way we could sleep. We had booked a cab for five in the morning and were worried if we could manage to get our cases down the stairs and out of the door before being discovered. The cab driver pulled up outside the house and he rang me on the mobile as I had arranged, my heart pounded with excitement and fear. This was the most dangerous part of our plan, to get out of the house without being noticed. I had written a brief note to be left in the hall, saying that we would be away for the week but not saying where for fear of being stopped at the airport. With our adrenalin pumping we managed to carry the cases down the stairs and out of the door in seconds, the cab driver got out to help us but our fear had given us super powers and the cases were in the boot before he could reach us. As we jumped into the back seat we breathed a sigh of relief.

The morning was chilly