Persona - A Disturbing Psychological Thriller (32 page)

‘Getting out of here.’

‘What?’

‘You heard.’

‘What’s all this lack of fucking discipline? You do what I tell you, you cunt!’

Ignoring him, Ben ran off. Will jogged beside him, staring ferociously at him.

A mile on, Ben stopped and undressed.

‘You failed Commandment Five again, you useless cunt!’

‘I don’t need you,’ Ben said calmly. ‘You’re history.’ He rummaged around in Geoff’s bag and pulled out a white tracksuit and black trainers.

‘You ungrateful little cunt! If I didn’t have these cuffs on, I’d break your fucking neck!’

Ben slipped the clothes on. Though he was slightly bigger than the cunt, they still fit him.

‘You’re a fucking failure!’ Will continued. ‘Don’t expect my help again!’

Ben smiled. ‘You think I’m stupid enough to listen to you? I’m not ending up inside with you. You’re a fucking idiot. You have no originality or imagination. You can’t torture people - you’re too obvious and predictable to create real fear. You didn’t avenge me; Karen had an easy death in that basement. You exist to take orders, you stupid cunt, that’s all you can do. Prison’s all you can cope with.’

Will leapt towards him. Ben dodged and Will crashed into a tree. Ben lunged at him and threw punches.

‘I immobilised Geoff. If he survives, he’ll spend his life cursing the day he fucked with me. I escaped. That’s justice. That’s finesse. You are nothing. I disassociate myself from you. I am not Ben. I am reborn… I am…Zen.’

‘You are a disgrace to the beret! You need to be taught discipline! After reveille tomorrow you will slam in your tabs and report to a rifle company!’

‘You need to be taught Commandment Eleven,’ Zen hissed. ‘Zen’s blood is unique. Do not associate!’ He punched Will till he realised his fists were hitting bark.

Will had escaped.

36

Hesitantly, Dave entered the hospital. A nurse had described Geoff’s injuries to him over the phone. Minutes later, he found his friend sitting in a wheelchair, hands in lap, staring sadly at him.

‘I’m paralysed,’ Geoff said.

‘I know.’

Dave bowed his head, not knowing what to say. He pulled the curtain around them, and then sat down opposite Geoff.

‘How’s the police force?’ Geoff asked.

Dave looked up, holding back tears. His lively, ambitious friend reduced to this…

‘I’ve been on team for almost three months.’

‘Still enjoying it?’

Dave took a breath. ‘Who did this to you, Geoff?’

‘Scumbags. I don’t know them.’

‘I’ve spoken with the Colorado Springs police. You told them you were walking to a public phone to call a cab to take you to the airport, when a mugger dragged you into the woods, joined up with two others and they attacked you.’

‘That’s what happened.’

Dave nodded emptily. ‘All your belongings were found in the forest. Valuables had been left beside your bag – a personal CD player, a five-hundred-pound camera, a thousand-pound watch…That’s not muggers, Geoff.’

‘They took a fifteen-hundred pound ring,’ Geoff informed him.

‘Yeah, I heard that. I’ve never seen you wearing a ring.’

‘Doesn’t mean I don’t own one. They stole it.’

‘But why leave the rest?’

‘You’re the policeman, you tell me.’

‘Well, I’ll tell you it makes no sense. Why carry a bag two miles through woods and then leave everything in it?’

Geoff raised his arms in a gesture of confusion.

‘Why did they break your spine?’ It hurt Dave to ask this.

‘You know me. I retaliated, pissed them off.’

‘Enough to paralyse you?’

‘Evidently.’

Dave shook his head. ‘For Christ’s sake, Geoff, look at you! Why are you acting so blasé and disinterested? I’m your friend. You can talk to me in confidence. I’ve flown thousands of miles to be here!’

‘I gave a description. What more can I do? I won’t get the use of my legs back, so I don’t fucking care.’

‘Why were you travelling home early? You’d been here for three days!’

‘It was boring. Ben and Jenny were all over each other, and Tash just wanted to go shopping.’

‘You must have expected that.’

Geoff shrugged. ‘I didn’t think about it.’

Dave sighed, rubbed his eyes. ‘So are Ben, Jenny and Tash still here?’ He leaned forwards on his seat, awaiting Geoff’s response.

‘I don’t know. I presume so.’

‘Jenny’s home,’ Dave informed him. Geoff feigned surprise. ‘When I called, her father answered the phone and nearly blew my eardrums out. After warning me that if any of us called again he’d “fucking kill” us, he slammed the phone down. And Ben wouldn’t answer his phone or door back in England. I knew he was home - I could hear him inside. I don’t have Tash’s number.’

Geoff scratched his head.

‘There’s much more to this, Geoff.’ Dave looked gravely at him and then whispered, ‘Did Ben do this to you?’

Geoff smiled. ‘No. I was mugged.’

‘Why did Ben and Jenny break up?’

‘I don’t know. This is the first I’ve heard of it.’ He nodded at his legs. ‘And right now I’ve got other things on my mind.’

Dave decided he’d interrogated him enough. This was devastating for anyone, let alone a man who prided himself on physical perfection. ‘So, have they told you…the situation?’

‘Yep. I can recite it word for word. You don’t forget something like that.’ He looked Dave in the eye.

‘I have extensive damage along the motor nerve path from my brain to the muscles in my legs and abdomen - namely in my spinal region. Severely damaged nerve cells can’t regenerate, and it’s left me with paraplegia – paralysis of both lower limbs - complete paralysis – permanent loss of sensation and voluntary movement. Additionally, because the damage is high up in my spinal cord, my abdominal muscles are paralysed, which they think may result in permanent loss of bowel and bladder control and sexual function.’ He winked at Dave. ‘Which is nice. But at least I can use my arms. I can still flick my dick, make shapes with it.’

Dave wiped his eyes. ‘The spinal cord relays signals from your brain,’ he uttered sombrely.

Geoff blinked away a tear. ‘Not when the fucker’s severed it doesn’t.’

Dave summoned strength. ‘This isn’t the end, Geoff. You still have your mind and heart – they’re the most important things. You’re still alive. There are still options and possibilities. They’re just different now. You need to refocus.’

Geoff sniggered. ‘I always thought my cock was the most important thing.’

‘That’s not the way to think, Geoff.’

‘Easy for you to say with fully functioning meat between your legs.’

‘It’s hardly meat!’

Geoff laughed.

Dave inhaled. He wanted to cry, but knew he couldn’t in front of Geoff. ‘I’m going now. I’ll come again tomorrow.’

‘That’s okay.’

Dave shook his hand and then left.

Geoff watched him disappear round the corner…

So he had split them up, he acknowledged. He’d got what he’d wanted more than anything…more than his own health. What a fucking price to pay! Restricted to this wheelchair, to this piss and shit bag for the rest of his life…

When he’d accepted that he’d be here for a long time, he’d realised how alone he was. Dave would be his only visitor. Dave was the only person in the world who cared about him. His family had disowned him because he was ‘obnoxious’, and he was nothing more than an unpleasant memory to all the women he’d used and abused. Jenny had obviously told Tash everything, and she’d decided to go, too.

He’d met so many people during his life, and they should be here now supporting and encouraging him, but instead they were elsewhere with important, kind people who cared for them.

Why hadn’t he realised this before? Why did it have to hit him like a steam train when it was too late? He loathed himself for allowing this suffering. It was punishment for his misdemeanours.

Until now, he had never known dependency. In fact, he now knew more than that – he knew the desire for dependency. He needed someone and they weren’t there. Ben had gone on and on about need, but Geoff had rejected it as subtle bragging. Now he knew it wasn’t, knew that he’d been blind. Ben simply hadn’t needed to be crippled in order to understand need – he’d been comfortable with his emotions, unafraid to show and enjoy them. Geoff, on the other hand, had been a fool and had not only fucked himself up, but also Ben and Jenny. He’d been so jealous, selfish and vindictive that he’d devoted his time to crushing their happiness.

And for what? To end a petty rivalry? He’d had sex with Jenny and the memory couldn’t raise his dick. It was a vicious circle – tragically, he learnt of the support needed to endure a disaster of this magnitude only by suffering it first, when it was too late to make a difference. He covered his face with his hands.

He looked at his thighs and calves. They still bulged from the intensive training he’d done in England. Tears rolled down his cheeks. Soon the muscles would shrink before his eyes.

He didn’t care about justice. Receiving compensation for his injuries and having Ben locked up would mean nothing to him. What difference would it make? He was paralysed. He’d stay paralysed.

Geoff wheeled himself along the corridor, towards the lift. They had told him it was good exercise. He took the lift to the top floor and then manoeuvred his chair to the ladder. He freed himself from his chair, and then, using his arms, scaled the ladder with ease. Hanging by one arm, he opened the latch and then pushed open the door, setting off a deafening alarm. Geoff scrambled onto the roof, and then seal-crawled along the gravelled surface, his useless legs scraping over the stones beneath him.

He wondered what he’d created, trembling as he relived the ordeal. Ben had conjured up Will, believing his father was there with them. He had barked orders as Will and responded as himself. It was as if that murderer had possessed him, and it scared Geoff to think of what might happen.

He toppled off the building, heading towards all he had left to gain…

37

Two months later, Dave received a phone call from Ben, informing him of his new address and inviting him over. Dave was warned not to tell anyone where he lived.

That afternoon, as Dave climbed the crumbling, grey steps to Albany House, he likened it to a mini estate. Located in the slums of London, it was probably full of the same type of slag he dealt with on division.

He pressed the buzzer beside the communal door and waited for Ben to acknowledge him. Dave was anxious to unravel the mystery of Ben’s disappearance, his falling out with Jenny - Dave had been convinced they would marry - and to discover the truth about Geoff’s injuries.

Ben had sounded different on the phone – sinister and cold. When Dave pressed the buzzer again, the door clicked. Ben hadn’t spoken on the intercom. Dave pushed the door open and walked to the waiting lift. Stepping inside, he screwed his face up at the strong smell of urine and the obscene graffiti, and then pressed five.

On the fifth floor, he approached Ben’s door. Seeing it was ajar, he pushed it open and walked through, shutting it behind him. He walked along the narrow hallway and into the living room. Threadbare, yellow curtains were drawn, so everything was dim. The musty stench overpowered him. Ben was stretched out on the sofa.

‘Dave,’ he mumbled without looking at him. ‘Come in.’

Even in the poor light, Dave could tell Ben looked different. He was unshaven, unclean, and his eyes lifeless.

‘What’s happened to you, Ben?’

Ben leapt up from his seat, grabbed Dave by the throat, and then thrust him against the wall. Terrified, Dave looked at him.