Chapter 11: Revelations

I settled down on the couch, half turned so that I could watch Daise while she talked. She paused for a while, obviously gathering herself, before she launched into her story.

"Everything I have told you so far is true," she started, "except I have left out some of the most important parts."

"Like what?" I asked.

"Please, would you mind if I told you this in my own way? When I am finished, you can send me away if you want, but I need to tell you the whole story; I need to get it all out before I can think about answering questions."

"Sure. Sorry I interrupted. Carry on."

"OK. Well, when Alina and I finished school, we knew that there were no prospects for us. We had no money to go to University, to study anywhere actually; both of us started looking for jobs. I eventually found a job as a waitress in a small restaurant. Alina didn't find anything. The job didn't get me much money. I got a meal during the day, which meant that at least I had something to eat. I took some of the table-scraps home for Alina, you know. She looked after the flat; did all the things that needed to be done like washing the clothes and cleaning the place."

I nodded to show that I was paying attention. Daise had finished her tea, so while she was talking, I topped up her cup.

"That went on for almost six months, but it got very bad. They stopped me from taking home the table scraps and so I had to sneak part of my food out to take home for Alina. Both of us got very thin."

"What about Alina's mother?" I couldn't help asking.

Daise just looked at me reproachfully, and I shut my mouth and motioned for her to continue. She took a ship of her tea, and nodded gratefully at me.

"One night I got back from work late. Alina wasn't there. That was very unusual. I had to look after her mother that night, give her the medicine we had gotten for her from the State Hospital and change the sheets where she had messed on them. I had done it before, but mostly just helping Alina, not on my own. I waited and waited for Alina to come home, but she didn't. I finally fell asleep, and when I woke up, it was late morning and Alina has still not arrived.

"I went out then and walked to all the places that I knew Alina liked to go; the park; the library; a bridge over the river and she wasn't in any of those places. I didn't see her again for three days. I had to go to work again, and then look after Alina's mother when I was at home. I went to the police, but they laughed at me; they just wrote off my story as being about yet another pretty girl disappearing. They seemed to think that she was probably on a binge with a boy friend or something.

"The fourth night after Alina disappeared; I was sitting in our living room darning some of my work clothes, when I heard footsteps in the corridor, then a soft banging on the door. I rushed to the door to open it, and Alina practically fell into my arms. I helped her over to the couch and she sat and cried in my arms for a long time. When she was over that, I got a chance to take a look at her. She was a mess. Her clothes were torn and she was sticky all over. Her hair was matted and she was dirty, as if she had been rolling in the dirt. I got up to help her to the bathroom and I had to undress her to get her into the bath. When I took off her dress, I saw that she had no underwear on, nothing, not even panties. She had also been bleeding."

It was apparent that Daise was not just reciting this story; she was reliving the memory of it. Her eyes were blank as she stared off into the distance, and she was narrating the sequence of events in a monotone. She paused now, and I waited for a long time for her to go on. I had learnt my lesson; she needed to tell this story in her own words and at her own pace.

"She had dried blood all down her legs. It was mixed in with other stuff. She had bruises on her arms and legs, between her legs and on her breasts and stomach. As she turned around to get in the bath, I saw she had bruises all over her back and buttocks as well. Once she was settled in the bath, I asked Alina what had happened. All she would tell me then or later was that six men had continuously raped her. They took turns with her, and sometimes more than one penetrated her at the same time; front and back. Alina's voice was hoarse and when I asked her about that, she told me it was from screaming and then from choking from being raped there too while her nose was held so that she couldn't breath."

Daise paused. She breathed in and out heavily a few times. I could see she was both reliving the experience of hearing the story for the first time as well as imagining the violation as being her eventual fate. As she had told me about where Alina had been injured or bruised, she had touched herself in those places on her own body. I recognised that she had made the transferral of Alina's injuries to herself. When Daise had been quiet and lost in her thoughts for over ten minutes, I decided to prompt her gently.

"Did she tell you why it happened?"

Daise looked at me, but I could see it took a long time for her to come back from where-she had gone to in her head.

"Yes. That was the worst part. It was criminals and they wanted her to whore for them. They had chosen her and this was a deliberate strategy to 'break her in' to make her ready."

"And... ?"

"She only told me that the next morning. That night, after she had bathed, I took her to our bed and held her through the night. That was the last time she cried. After that, she just turned to stone. She would sometimes let me inside, but to everyone else she showed the mask that she developed after that night. They left her alone for two weeks, then one day there was a man on the doorstep. He had a cell-phone for her and told her that she would be called on it and told where to go whenever they needed her.

"After that she would get calls every few days and would go off to be with one of the clients. We found her photos on a website later. They had her listed as an 'independent' and were charging a lot of money for what she was doing. She was only given about 10% of it. It was enough for us to live, just, but I hated using the money. It was dirty. That is why I carried on working in the restaurant. Then we came up with a plan.