Charlotte (8 page)

Yes, that was it.

The slag. He placed his drink on the worktop.

Mike shook his arms, flexing them, waving away the rage.

You going to take that from a girl? A nine-year-old girl? Pussy.

"Nope. I'm not."

You are.

"No."

Prove it.

He breathed out and calmed himself, breathing slowly. After a moment, he slipped his phone from his pocket again and located the camcorder record function.

Bitch is going to pay for this.

Locating his shirt pocket, he slid the phone in, the camera peeking above the rim of the material, filming whatever was in front of him.
Perfect,
he thought.

Mike walked back towards the front of the house. "Amy?"

The response sounded with despair and utter annoyance. "What?"

"Your house is so boring."

"Well, watch something on TV or play a game…or better yet, fuck off home. You aren't needed here."

"I can't play those games. I've completed most of them. Seriously, your dad has crap taste in games, and if you think I'm giving up fifty quid for doing nothing, you're mistaken."

Amy glanced up, almost hissing a sigh through her teeth. "Well, that’s not my problem. I didn’t ask you to come here."

"Your parents did. If you want me to tell them you were good or well behaved, you'll play a game with me. Now."

Amy folded the corner of her page over and closed the book. She placed it on the floor with the others and crossed her legs on the sofa. She breathed out, hinting that it was a major inconvenience on her reading time. "Okay, fine. What did you have in mind?"

"How about a game called initiation?"

"Never heard of it." Amy folded her arms.

"Well, we play it at school. Boys do the initiation to get into their cliques. Like an audition, if you will?"

"Really? Boys are
so
lame." Amy smirked, drawing anger from Mike. His face contorted at her very words. She smiled at his response, content.

"You're the only one who's lame. If you don’t play, I know you’re a chicken shit coward."

"Fine, I'll play. What are the rules?"

Sandy bound into the room, seeking attention from Amy. "Not now, Sandy, get."

"There are no set rules as such; we have a variety of games. I was thinking of…water boarding. No, that's too much for a kid like you…"

Amy said nothing. She crouched down and stroked the puppy.

"We could do shots. No, you're well under age."

"Alcoholic shots? You're under age too."

"Yes, but us men develop quicker. We can handle it."

"That's a lie. If you paid attention in class, women actually develop quicker. Get your facts right, dickhead."

"Well, in that case, it leaves one option." Mike licked his lips. His urge to see Amy's reaction to his next proposal was exhilarating.

Amy straightened up. "Let me guess, you want to fuck me?"

The words stunned Michael. He groaned; his breath shot from his lungs. He backed off a step, then two.
How did she know?

Amy smiled, angled her head, and chuckled. "You really think I didn’t know what an initiation involves? I'm not stupid, you know?"

"How…how, there's no way you could have…"

Sandy was still fussing at Amy's feet. "Well, you’re a teenage boy. In a house with a girl on her own? Teenage boys think with their dicks and not much else. Doesn’t take a genius to figure it out. And I've seen that look in your eye before. Remember that day we went swimming? Shame on you. Only, did you think far ahead? What would happen if you did happen to get your hands on me? For
fuck
sake, Sandy,
fuck off!
"

Amy stepped back and picked up Sandy, cuddling the puppy in her arms. She stroked its fur and looked up at Mike, smiling. The dog started panting, happy in its embrace.

"My dad could get me off. Money is power. Who can stop me?"

"I bet he can
get
you off, fag. Your teachers teach you that?"

"Fuck off."

"Your father wouldn’t even look at you for touching me, an innocent little girl. Money has turned you into a monster. I used to enjoy hanging around with you. Now? It makes my skin crawl." Sandy was fidgeting in Amy's arms, uncomfortable. "Your dad would be ashamed of what you become, a money grabbing, power-hungry parasite."

"It's not going to matter when I get hold of you."

"You speak to all the girls like this?"

"Sometimes. It usually works. Money talks, Amy."

"What do you do when you get hold of them?"

"Come here and you'll find out."

"I doubt that will happen."

"Oh yeah? What you going to do to stop me?" Mike took a step forward.

Amy's lips curled and opened. She licked her lips. "You want to know?"

"Yeah. You're Amy Brunswick, a nerd, a geek. You have imaginary tea parties with your fucking dolls. You don’t even factor on the coolness scale; you're nobody, invisible. No one even bats an eyelid at you. Your parents don’t even care about you, your daddy spends all his time away and your mummy is one Vicodin away from a severe mental breakdown. Ask my mum, she'll agree with me. Those are her words, not mine. You're pathetic."

"That all you got?" Sandy was yelping now, wanting to get away. Amy held on firmly, stroking the puppy with hard, uncaring hands. The puppy bucked and twisted, trying to bite her.

Mike laughed. "My God…you're so lame. You can't even comeback properly."

"I don’t need a comeback. I've already won."

"Oh yeah, how's that then?" Mike bunched his fists. "I'm going to enjoy this."

Amy smiled. "This is how. Just so you know—this was
your
fault."

A darkness filled Amy's eyes. The smile dropped from her face.

Mike looked at the girl and shivered. 

Suddenly, her hands grabbed Sandy by the scruff of the neck and the small of the back and twisted violently. A sickening crack shattered the silence in the air. Sandy yelped in pain as her neck and spine was broken. The head twisted right around until she was staring over her own back, the eyes emptied of life.

"What the fuck…" Mike groaned and backed away, speechless.

Amy continued twisting until the head pulled away from the body in a spurt of blood and crack of fragile bone. A puff of wet fur splatted onto her chest. Urine started dripping from the dead puppy. "I win," she uttered. Her eyes were full of vehemence and menace.

Mike howled in fright and stumbled back, knocking one of the dining room chairs over. The wood hit the floor with a hollow clonk. Amy tossed Sandy into the air and punted her against the wall. A huge smear of blood screeched across the paintwork as the small, dead corpse bounced in the hallway with a wet thud.

"I loved that puppy. So what do you think I'm going to do to you if I get my hands on you?" Amy's eyes glazed over.

Mike yelped and backed off, standing behind the dining room chairs. "You wouldn’t, it's murder." Sweat broke out on his forehead.

"We still haven't discussed your plan to fuck me. Did you not think it through? I'm nine and you’re a teenager. It's illegal and, considering I'm not consenting, classed as rape. Those charges are quite severe if what my good friend has told me is true. You'd be putting yourself in the frame straight away, being here and all. You really are a shit for brains idiot, aren’t you? Even your sap father's money wouldn’t get you out of that one."

"Yes it would. Money can buy anything."

"It doesn’t buy respect, apparently."

"Fuck you."

"So little Mike turned into a pervert. Why am I not surprised? Do you pay the women off? Or do you just bury the bodies?"

Mike said nothing.

"C'mon, Mike, share it with me. It's Amy, your childhood friend." Amy took a step forward.

"Fuck you."

"Well, we know
that
isn't going to happen, don’t we? You see, I brought a friend with me and…well, let's just say three's a crowd."

Fear cupped Mike's balls, his scrotum shrivelled and his flesh spiked with gooseflesh. His eyes lowered to the desecrated puppy corpse on the floor. Blood was pooling out around it. The dead eyes stared up at him.

This is your fault.

"You're lying. No one is here; your mum said you were alone."

"Yes, she would. Unfortunately for you, she missed that vital detail out, I'm
not
alone."

"You can't pin anything on me, you have no witnesses." Mike's eyes were wide, bulging. They darted an inch every second, scanning the surroundings, petrified. "I didn’t do anything."

"Not true. You see, I don’t need a witness to pin this on you. I won't even tell my parents it happened. And true, you didn’t actually
do
anything; you only implied that you'd sexually attack me."

Mike started to relax.
Maybe he could talk his way out of it. His dad would pay him off, surely.
"That's right." He remembered the phone in his pocket, recording. "I didn’t do anything. I'm innocent. People say rape all the time. Like a joke." Mike swiped his forehead, wiping the sweat away.

That’s it. You're in the clear. Dad will work his magic.

"If you think the recording will get you out of this, you're mistaken."

"It's evidence.
Evidence
. I can use it. It'll get me off…"

"It could do. But, I don’t care about the evidence. What makes you think you'll walk out of this house?"

"I will. You can't stop me."

"How about we play a game? My choice, this time."

"No, I'm done. I just want to go home. Your mum can stick her money."

"Let's play…initiation. I have an initiation of my own."

"You're crazy, a fucking mental case."

"Mike, meet Charlotte."

Mike frowned. Amy looked beyond him and chuckled. Mike froze, swallowed, spun around, and looked into the eyes of hell. A waving wisp, in the shape of a young girl, stood before him. The eyes latched onto him, and held his gaze. They were sunken and yellow, level with his, with only the faintest of dark retinas in the middle. Cat's eyes, only meaner and filled with absolute terror. Black tendrils snaked out from the centre, webbing the yellow orbs. They were supported by…nothing, nothing but distorted air. The figure waved back and forth, watching him. Before he succumbed to the power of the eyes, he put a hand out and it passed through the mist—whatever it was. He felt his hand slapped away and it fell to his side. 

Boo
, it whispered.

Mike shit his pants. A second later, his bladder released. The wet, excreting sounds filled the air in unison. Captivated by the eyes, Mike didn't feel the warmth of fear-induced urine splatter his thigh and trickle down his leg or the warm expansion of his boxers as his faeces curled into them, pushing against his butt cheeks, seeping through the leg hole and pattering the back of his legs and socks.

The stench was unimaginable.

Amy chuckled in the background.

Mike screamed as Charlotte moved towards him.

"Hi, honey."

"Where am I?"

"You're in the hospital. You had an accident."

Patricia wasn’t quite sure how to broach the incident.
What would Bruce remember? How would he react?
She hoped the cuffs were enough to keep him subdued. Bruce looked around the room at the cables and monitors and tubes. He tried to pull his injured hand over, but the handcuff restrained him. A huge metal clank filled the room, followed by a scraping. "What, what the hell?"

He looked down at his restraints. The bandage around his hand. A speck of blood was seeping through the cotton. "What happened?"

Patricia stared at the hospital floor, unsure of her next sentence. She didn’t want to incite rage in her husband. "You were attacked…by Amy."

"What?" Bruce's eyes softened and a wetness started to build at the rims of his tired eyes. "Why?"

"You…you hit her, Bruce. The second time, she defended herself and…well, now you're here. She ripped the skin off your goddamn hand."

"I wouldn’t hit Amy. Never." Bruce said it with conviction.

"You did. I
saw
you do it. You were in a rage, uncontrollable. If she hadn't stood up for herself…well, who knows. You might have
killed
her!"

"Pat, I don’t hit Amy. If I did, well, I don’t remember…"

"You've been drinking…haven’t you?"

Bruce laid back on his pillow and frowned, thinking. "I had one…an eggnog for lunch…and maybe some…Jim Beam the other day."

"
Don’t lie to me!
"

"What? Pat, I don’t drink. You have to believe…"

"You're in a hospital. The doctors did tests. Don’t fucking lie to me."

Bruce said nothing. He closed his eyes, compressing the tears, and one rolled down his cheek. For three long minutes, he didn’t say anything. He shook his head. Patricia leaned in with a tissue and wiped his face. Tears rolled down her cheeks. One fell off and exploded on Bruce's shirt. "How…how hard did I strike her?"

"Quite hard. You pulled her out of the car and slapped her." Patricia leaned on the metal bar, inches from her husband's face. "Then she did this to you." Patricia pointed at the bandaged hand.

Bruce followed her eyes. "Looks painful."

"It wasn't nice. Your skin was hanging off, blood everywhere."

"Damn."

Silence enveloped the couple. Patricia stared at her husband. He gazed off into nothing with wet eyes, pondering his next question. "The handcuffs. Are they to stop me opening the wound?"

Patricia leaned back and swallowed. "Erm…no."

"Then why am I cuffed. Wait…cuffs? Hospitals don’t use…Patricia, what's going on?"

Patricia stepped away from the bed, her hand still on his. "There's something else."

The door opened and D.S Moore entered the room. "Mr. Brunswick, my name is D.S Moore. How are you, sir?" He shut the door behind him. He was alone.

"I'm just peachy, who the hell are you?"

Patricia felt her husband tense beneath her fingers. She retracted them slowly. Another tear slowly caressed her cheek and she groaned, wiping her face with her sleeve.

"I need to ask you some questions."

"You people don’t hang about, do you? Swooping in whenever you can. I was having a private moment with my wife, thank you."

"This won't take long. If you cooperate, it'll go a lot smoother."

"If my hands weren't restrained, I'd be flipping you off right now."

"There's no need for that tone, Mr Brunswick."

"No need? You handcuff me to a bloody bed and I have no damn idea why. Have the common decency to explain and I'll be the judge of if I can answer you or not.
Okay?
"

D.S Moore looked at Patricia. She shook her head and looked away from him, staring at the floor. Moore took a breath. "Do you know a Dr. Sam Barden?"

Bruce sneered the mere mention of the name. "Yeah, I remember that wanker."

Patricia leaned in close. "Calm down, honey. Please. For the love of God…"

"Mrs. Brunswick…step away from your husband. Please."

Patricia did as she was told. Bruce laughed. "Are you
serious
?"

"How do you know…Dr. Barden, sir?"

"He was our psychologist. For Amy, our daughter. We took her there earlier today…wait, how long have I been here?"

"Okay, we'll get to that. Can you tell me what happened? The extent of your visit?"

"We took Amy in for a discussion. Took about an hour. We left, decided he wasn't any use. We went from there. Decided not to pursue it."

"Were you…"

"Hold on, now I have a question. Why are you asking this? Did the doctor mug off some other dozy cunts as well?"

"Mind your language, Mr Brunswick. No, he didn’t. We found his dead body early last night."

"Last night?"

"It's Thursday morning, Mr. Brunswick." Moore slid his sleeve up his wrist and checked his watch. "Nearly four am."

Bruce went to say something and stopped. He thought back. "We left there at two, just after lunch. We had some food on the way and we went home after, I think."

"We believe you were alone with Dr. Barden for approximately three minutes following the meeting. His receptionist, Carol, remembered you raising your voice. We also found cash, with your fingerprints on, in the reception. Dr. Barden was dead on his couch."

"You think I did it?"

Moore said nothing. Bruce looked down at the handcuffs and realised his situation. "Of course you did. Lock up the innocent, let the guilty get away with it. Corrupt, the lot of you."

Moore ignored the comments. "Were you alone with Dr. Barden as mentioned?"

Bruce said nothing. After a moment, he nodded. "After the meeting, Amy went down to the car with Patricia. I had a few words. His therapy wasn't working on my girl. His methods were a little…unusual. Or too post-modern, but either way, my girl didn’t get any better. I saw her talking to…"

Then it hit him. He looked down at his hand, and then to his wife—who shook her head in warning—and back to Moore.

"I saw her talking to Charlotte. Which made me realise she wasn’t getting better, only worse." Bruce shivered, remembering the events that put him in the hospital. He remembered the sickening tearing of flesh, the look on Amy's face. His little girl.

He remembered slapping her and groaned.

"We know about Charlotte. What happened when you were alone?"

"Oh no, I'm not doing this without a solicitor. You want to pin this on me, fine, but I'm not going down for someone else's crime. I want my solicitor. Now."

"Very well, sir. Do you have someone in mind or shall I provide one?"

"Patricia, give him my card."

Patricia collected Bruce's wallet from the side and removed his solicitor's card, checked it was correct, and handed it to Moore. She said nothing.

"Excellent. I'll give them a call. Until then, don’t go anywhere." Moore smiled at his joke and left. Bruce sneered as he left the room.

Patricia placed her hand back on her husband's. Bruce stared off to the left. "What did you tell them?"

Patricia sighed. "The truth, Bruce. I didn’t want them taking you down. I told them everything I know. Apart from…"

"Charlotte?"

"Yes. Charlotte..." Patricia didn’t continue, for fear of having the discussion overheard. Bruce looked at her and they both nodded, silent in agreement.

Charlotte did this, not Amy.

Patricia groaned. She slid the chair towards the bed, its legs squeaking on the floor. Lowering her rump into it, she sighed. "Now, we wait."

Bruce nodded.

It would be a long night.