Purgatory Is a Place Too Read online

  Cody came reluctantly over, avoiding my eyes, and listened with acute attention to every handy hint I delivered to her. Then I got into the cab and joined the queue out onto the track.

  “Come and watch how an expert drives,” I heard Jo saying to her as she guided her up onto the stands. I suppressed a smile. Jo would give her some really good driving tips while they watching the Final, while continuing to rub her disgrace well in.

  I won the Final, so was forced to have a full lap handicap for the Grand National, and won that too, hoofing Devlin out of the way on the last bend. I’m not saying I wouldn’t have anyway, but it behove me to put on a good show to impress our new pupil. I needed to remind her why she was lucky to be having us as her mentors.

  We dropped Cody off at her house as it was on our route home, and then back at the Satterthwaites’ place we unloaded the two cars and trailers.

  Paul and Pete were in the barn, looking over one of Pete’s cars for tomorrow.

  “How’d it go?” Pete asked.

  Jo tossed down an armful of stuff she’d retrieved from the car. “I’ve just witnessed the most almighty tussle of wills, which Eve won magnificently. That kid’s a complete wildcat! I’ll be leaving Eve to manage her.”

  Pete grinned and Paul raised an eyebrow.

  “Rod of iron, that’s Eve. Not what I expected somehow,” Jo reported. “Got a sort of dangerous look in her eye when Cody cheeked her, which Cody clocked straight off and subsided somewhat.” Jo looked at her Dad. “Whereas you kept Eve on admirably loose reins I seem to remember…”

  Paul looked thoughtful. “She seemed a lot more mature than Cody does at the moment. Obviously had her head screwed on, instantly self-corrected with the minimum of guidance and was utterly single minded. She just needed a bit of support to be pointed in the right direction and then we just let her loose from the bow to hurtle at the target.”

  I looked between all their three similar faces. They were doing themselves down. They’d done so much more than that for me. They still were.

  “Oh yeah, and Eve got the hat-trick,” Jo added, turning back to her men folk.

  “Just getting my hand back in before Paul reappears to take all the titles back off me,” I joked. Well sort of joked. It might well turn out to be true.

  Suitably cowed by her disgrace and by having heard the incident discussed disapprovingly by Steve and Jonny on Stoxradio, Cody behaved impeccably the next time. As punishment, we’d insisted on another day with the black cross up. This time her instructions were to drive as fast as possible, paying attention to learning control on the corners, and to get out of the way of any red roofs who were passing. She did everything asked of her and I offered her some modest praise. I saw her eyes light up and her tension unwind a little. I got the sense that she was a character who was going to need both strict and instant criticism and plenty of responsive praise to keep her on the straight and narrow. There wasn’t much that remained internal with Cody. Yappity, yap. Off the scale highs, black sulks, miserable lows. Jessica this, Arran that, Paige the other. Her constant stream of consciousness was filled with an array of buddies from school, celebrities, plots of stuff from TV. I couldn’t always disentangle which was which. I meanly sent her home in Jo’s car. I was exhausted. It was doing my head in. Could Jessica come next time? Please, please. Well I suppose. But we weren’t a weekend kids’ club for all and sundry. Please, just Jessica. There was a REASON. Ok then, just the once. Though I’d probably regret it.

  Paul and I took my new build to a track open day and took turns timing laps in it.

  “What do you think?” I asked with a frown.

  “I think you’ve done a good job. It’s got great balance and cornering. I’m pleased with our choice of differential. The engine will need running in a bit more though.”

  “What schedule are you thinking of?” I asked neutrally. I trusted him to test the car and suggest necessary adjustments. I just dreaded the stage when he started to really push it. At some point it would have to get trashed and it would be like watching my baby in a car crash…

  “It makes sense to follow Pete’s schedule,” he said thoughtfully.

  Poor Pete, I thought. That meant all the World Qualifiers for a start. But as Pete’s support mechanic, Paul couldn’t exactly disappear off on his own. No doubt Paul would use the newness of the car as an excuse to take it easy for the first few appearances, so as not to immediately start competing with his son. Paul must have a pretty good idea about how Pete must be feeling. He must also guess that I had intended to have a go at taking the Gold off Pete this year. Was he returning to the fray to get in my way in the World Final so that I couldn’t get ahead of Pete? I had to not think about that. I had to join in the pretence that it was all about perfecting my car.

  Cody installed Jessica in the passenger seat of my car, and got into Jo’s herself. We were off to Belle Vue for Cody’s first F2 shale experience. Cody had whispered in my ear that Jessica wanted to talk to me about something, but Jessica remained remarkably silent for the first twenty minutes.

  “Were you wanting to say something to me?” I asked eventually glancing sideways at her.

  She was a petite girl with long dark hair, light brown eyes and a closed expression. She’d sat with her arms folded looking out the side window with compressed lips. Not what I’d expected at all.

  “That was Cody’s bright idea,” she said snappishly.

  I changed gear and glanced in my mirror to turn out into the motorway traffic from the slip road. “Fine, that’s up to you then,” I said coolly. “Just remember that you’ve got just one hour left of the journey, and once we’re at the stadium we’re all going to be far too busy to listen, and on the way back we’ll all be far too knackered, so it’s now or never.”

  She sat and sulked.

  On arrival at the track and after settling into our few square metres of the muddy pits area, Cody whispered, “Well?” to me.

  I shrugged. “She didn’t say a word the whole journey, even though I invited her to.”

  Cody looked disappointed.

  “It’ll be up to you to keep an eye on her,” I warned her. “Jo and I are going to be busy.”

  All went smoothly until we came down from the stands watching Cody’s improved performance in the Consolation. I was busy with my car when I heard Jo exclaim, “What the hell..?”

  I glanced round to see Jessica sitting cross legged on one of the trailers, blood pouring from her forearms. Still in one hand was a Stanley knife she’d obviously found in one of our tool kits.

  “Oh that’s all I need!” I said crossly. “I’ve got a Final in ten minutes! Jo take her down to the St. John’s Ambulance lot.”

  Jo was looking appalled. Cody had gone really white, there were tears in her eyes and she was shaking.

  “She’s not going to die of that, Cody,” I snapped unsympathetically. “It’s just attention seeking behaviour. Go with her to the ambulance station if you want to…”

  I didn’t let it affect my driving. Between the Final and the Grand National I checked up on what was going on. Jessica was still at the ambulance. They’d steri-stripped the slashes and wrapped bandages tightly round them. They looked disapprovingly at me. “She won’t say why she’s done it.”

  “She won’t know why she’s done it,” I said abruptly. I glanced at Jo. “We’ll go straight home after the National.”

  In the car, Jessica was silent again. But this time not sulky.

  “So what did you want to talk to me about?” I asked again. It was dark now. Her face was lit up on and off by passing street lights.

  She hesitated. “Cody said you’d been raped. Said you’d be the one to talk to. Said you’d even had pictures of it sent to a newspaper.”

  I changed gear with such a crash that the car juddered in protest. Those damn pictures. Did everyone in the world know about them? How many men down the stadiums had had them pinned up in their garages for a bit? I bet a few of them had done th
at. Bet they had…

  “So have you been raped then?” I asked in a neutral tone.

  A tear rolled slowly down her cheek. Uh oh, I thought, tensing. I really don’t want to hear this. I really am not the right person. I really can’t cope.

  But the story that poured out was beyond anything that I expected. I clutched the wheel tighter and tighter. Shit, this was appalling.

  She sat sobbing then suddenly undid her seatbelt and tried to get the door open. We were driving at seventy in the middle lane of the motorway. Grimly, I pulled back in behind a lorry and cut over to the hard shoulder and screeched us to a halt as fast as I dared whilst towing a heavy trailer up behind. As soon as we stopped she threw open the door and got out and started running up the hard shoulder. I put the hazard warning lights on, got out and walked up the steep grassy hawthorned bank on the safe side of the barrier and sat in the damp grass, my arms around my knees pulled to my chest, watching her small figure flickering in the lights of the oncoming cars. I felt sick. But I wasn’t going to get killed running down the motorway after her. If she really wanted to die, she could do it any time she wanted. But she wasn’t taking me with her.

  For a moment she hesitated right on the line, and I closed my eyes briefly, fearing the worst as a car bore down on her, its horn blaring in an outraged way. Then she stepped back and walked slowly back towards my car. I saw her stop short when she realised it was empty.

  “Up here!” I shouted.

  She sort of fell over the barrier and stumbled up towards me, then promptly stopped and repeatedly threw up. I waited without saying anything. Finally she curled up silently on the soggy ground in a foetal position.

  “Ok Jessica, time to go home,” I said at last.

  Back in the car I activated the automatic child-locks. I’d always heartily disapproved of the existence of these, from the perspective that they could be used to hold someone captive against their will, you heard of girls getting raped by taxi-drivers who’d locked all the doors, but just now I could have kissed the manufacturer personally.

  Unfortunately, when we got back to town, Jessica, who’d remained curled up tightly in the passenger seat, refused to tell me where she lived. She insisted I just drop her off in the town centre. But after driving round and round with the wretched trailer in tow and the luridly painted aerofoiled race car causing no end of turning heads, I lost my patience, and I headed out to the only person who I could think of that could help her.

  Chetsi opened the door cautiously. It was quite late now. Luckily she wasn’t in her pyjamas or anything. I dragged Jessica forcibly in. Jessica stared at Chetsi then looked accusingly at me. “Why have you brought me to my psychiatrist?” She threw snarlingly.

  I stood between her and the exit. “I didn’t know you knew each other.”

  “Hello, Jessica,” Chetsi said calmly. Taib, her husband was on the settee. He looked over with a frown.

  “She’s been self-harming,” I told Chetsi. I wasn’t going to pull any punches.

  Jessica looked defiant. “So who the hell cares?”

  Chetsi smiled kindly at her. “Well Eve clearly does. And your parents do. And I’m very sorry to hear that you’ve started that up again. What made you feel so bad you needed to do that to yourself?”

  I realised that I’d just put Chetsi into a really awkward position. She wouldn’t want her patients knowing where she lived.

  “Eve, would you like to make us all a hot drink?” Chetsi said soothingly. God, she was great.

  I walked to the kitchen area and put the kettle on. I noticed that Chetsi also kept discreetly between Jessica and the exit. Jessica glanced around as though wondering what to do.

  “Are you still on your anti-depressants?” Chetsi queried.

  Jessica shook her head. “I flushed them down the toilet.”

  “Tea or coffee?” I called over. Taib ordered coffee, Chetsi, tea. Jessica refused to say, so I made her a tea. As I delivered Taib’s I leant over and whispered, “Could you absent yourself for a bit? I need her to tell Chetsi something…”

  He nodded, got up with his coffee and announced he was going to do some work on his computer. Then he retired with his lap top into their bedroom.

  Jessica visibly relaxed, and I sat down on the settee and patted the seat beside me. She gave in and sat down by me. I put a casual arm around her shoulder and Chetsi sat in an armchair at an angle to us.

  “Have you ever told–” I hesitated. Chetsi would want to keep it professional. “–Doctor..?” I glanced at Chetsi for her to fill in the gap.

  “Acharya,” she supplied.

  “–Doctor Acharya what’s been happening to you?”

  Jessica shook her head. She shot a brief wary glance at Chetsi from under her lashes.

  “Would it make any difference if I told you that Doctor Acharya and her husband are both Indian, and Hindu, and move in completely different circles to the Muslim men you have been telling me about?”

  Out of the corner of my eye I saw Chetsi stiffen. Jessica looked intently at me. I’d obviously got her attention now. “I really think you need to tell Doctor Acharya who really wants to help you, what has been happening to you. Because if you don’t, who will ever be able to help you get out of this?”

  Bit by bit, I dragged the story out of her. Chetsi and I exchanged glances. Chetsi was looking a bit shell shocked. Now perhaps she understood why Jessica hadn’t been able to trust her.

  “And you say there are lots more girls being trafficked like this? Some as young as thirteen?” Chetsi established, struggling to keep it professional. “In this town?”

  I frowned. I’d thought ‘trafficked’ only applied to foreign girls smuggled in from abroad.

  “Are there any others you’ve met at the self-harming support group that this is also happening to?” Chetsi asked sharply.

  Jessica sat motionless for a moment, then gave a tiny nod.

  Chetsi sat back in her chair, and looked rather blindly ahead of her for a moment.

  Jessica suddenly started to panic. “You mustn’t tell anyone! They’ll kill my parents if they find out I’ve told! They said so! They even say they’ll get my friends and do something awful to them too! They’ve seen me with Cody more than once!” She started to cry. “I don’t want Cody to get hurt!”

  “We won’t let that happen,” I said comfortingly, and put my arms around her. But inside my chest my heart was beating hard. When we were sixteen the police and other adults around us had been completely useless at protecting us from a whole bunch of psychopathic night club bouncers and their cronies. I’d ended up in hospital twice as a consequence. And it sounded like this had been going on for bloody ages with no-one doing a darn thing about it!

  Chetsi suddenly reached for her car keys. “Best I take you home Jessica. We’re going to have to think carefully how to tackle this. Have you told your parents any of this? Because in the long run, they will be the best ones to protect you.”

  “No one can help me,” she said wildly. “Least of all them!” And then she began to sob with a note of hysteria in her voice.

  Shit, how could you ever tell your parents all that? I thought. I never even managed to tell my own Dad about what had been done to me by that bastard from work. He’d had to find out about it on the ITV documentary when all those vile photos hit the headlines. I felt terrible about that now. It must have felt like his whole world was turning upside down.

  Chetsi glanced at me and I knew she was signalling to me to help encourage Jessica to come down and get into the car.

  A few minutes later I was waving them off and getting back into my own car. It was after eleven when I finally drew up outside the barn. All the lights were off. I went in and flicked them on. Jo came over from the house. “Shit what happened to you? I’ve been ringing and ringing but it just went to answerphone.” She helped me unload Cody’s car. “Come in for a drink before we head back. Mum wants to ask you about Jessica. What an idiot she is, huh?”


  We took our brews into the living room where Sue and Paul were sitting cosily ensconced. “How’s this girl Jessica?” Sue asked concerned.

  Where to start? I told them what happened on the way home and then what I’d persuaded her to tell Chetsi. There was a shocked silence. By the time I’d finished telling them I was wiping hurriedly at my own eyes. I felt shaky as though I’d been a bit traumatised by it all myself.

  “I can hardly believe all that!” Jo exclaimed. “Surely she must be exaggerating to get some attention?”

  I ignored that. “Jo, please can you make sure you never let on where we live, never identify it online, never tag me in any photos especially any taken here or at the flat, and don’t publish any schedules about where I might be at any given time?”

  She stared at me. “For God’s sake Eve! Why would anyone want to target you? That’s just being paranoid!”

  Paul and Sue glanced at each other. “Do as she says Jo,” Paul intervened. “It’s best to be on the safe side. Remember how careful she had to be when the documentary was on…”

  Jo pulled a face, but ventured no further comment.

  On my lunch break the next day I rang Chetsi. I walked a bit of the way up the street from the garage so none of the men would hear. “I’m truly sorry Chetsi, I put you in a difficult situation. I had no idea that you were her doctor.”

  “Can’t be helped,” Chetsi said. “But we need to avoid it happening again.”

  “I’ll ring you for advice first next time,” I promised. “She was refusing to tell me where she lived, had just run out in front of the traffic on the motorway, and I was in a flat panic!”

  “The great thing is that we’ve at last got to the bottom of what’s going on with her…”

  “It’s just so shocking!” I commented. I sat down on a low wall and stared blankly at the garden opposite me.

  “I’m knocked sideways Eve, I don’t mind telling you. It sounds like it could be another Rochdale or Rotherham. We’ve had safe guarding awareness talks at work and I’m just gutted that apparently it’s been going on right under my very nose and I never spotted it! Do you really think she wasn’t telling me because she thought I was Muslim and would be linked with them?”