Standing in the shower, water drumming her back, Lenina shuddered beneath Nick’s hands as he stroked her shoulders with slippery hands.
Lenina wriggled away. ‘You’re slimy.’
‘It’s gel.’
‘Wash it off.’
‘You don’t like it?’
Staring at the tiles on the opposite wall, Lenina brooded on how much the slick glide of gel on his fingers resembled the sensation of fresh blood against her skin.
She remembered the stranger as he’d gripped her shoulders, and the way his mouth dragged down the side of her face to reach her throat. The warm lap of his tongue. For a moment she returned to the park, pinned beneath a cruel, foreign weight.
Even with the blood swirled away down the plug hole the smell lingered, clogging her nostrils like wads of cotton wool. Her face stung and, despite her best efforts, water slowly soaked the bandage against the side of her throat.
She jerked free and stood directly under the shower head, letting the water pound her skull and paste her braids against her face and back.
Hot water sluiced over her neck and she caged a groan behind her teeth. ‘Damn it.’
‘Don’t get any more water on it, babe. If you really don’t want to go to the hospital we have to make sure it doesn’t get infected.’
‘It hurts.’
‘I’ve got painkillers downstairs.’
‘No good down there, are they?’ Lenina snapped. A sigh followed. ‘Sorry. This isn’t your fault.’
Nick touched her shoulder. ‘Please let me take you to hospital.’
‘No.’
‘Can I hug you at least?’ He stepped forward to wrap his arms around her, but the slick of shower gel on his hands took Lenina back to the park.
She shoved him away. He slipped on the bottom of the bath. Fell. Swore, a rough burst of Afrikaans.
‘Sorry! But I can still feel his mouth and his breath in my ear . . . that horrible smell . . . when you touch me with that stuff on your hands I feel it all again.’
The water plastered his blond hair flat to his head. ‘Nina . . .’
‘I’m so sorry.’ She clutched her face.
Nick’s lips compressed into a tight, thin line. ‘Tell me what to do. I don’t know how to help you, but if you tell me . . . I could make some tea?’
That brought a faint smile to her lips. ‘That’s probably the most English thing you’ve ever said to me.’
‘I have my moments, né? Do you want one?’
The mere thought of drinking made Lenina’s stomach cramp but the helpless look on Nick’s face was far worse. ‘I guess.’
His shoulders relaxed. ‘Kwaai. I’ll do that now. Shout if you need me.’
She nodded, hugging herself beneath the shower jets until he climbed out and vanished from sight. Only when the bathroom door closed did she release the breath she held.
Minutes later she exited the shower, skin tingling from the harsh scrubbing. Wrapping her hair in one towel and her body in another, she stepped over the pile of bloody clothes and returned to the bedroom.
The first thing she saw was the bed, dotted with leaves and flakes of dried blood.
A scream bubbled in her throat, but she held it back and channelled the nervous energy into her breathing.
Slowly in. Slowly out.
Again and again she repeated the exercise and then stripped the bed.
She did so faster than ever before, handling only the edges of the sheets where blood couldn’t touch her fingers. Wadding the whole thing into a ball, she dragged it to the bathroom and left it with her clothes.
With the sheets gone and a clean body, Lenina immediately felt better.
Even the room smelled better.
She closed her eyes to enjoy the silence.
Darkness consumed her mind’s eye, filled with jagged shadows thrown by the branches of bare skeletal trees. Terrible laughter rang in her ears. In the dark she saw steel-grey eyes, ginger hair and yellow teeth. Fruity shower gel gave way to the scent of old cigarettes and mouldy meat. Almost strong enough to taste.
She opened her eyes with a gasp. Her heart’s thudding seemed louder in her ears than ever before. She could feel it in the side of her neck. Her fingertips. The back of her throat. She swallowed and took a deep breath through her mouth, to cleanse the scent of old smoke.
‘Smoke and blood,’ she murmured. ‘Alexandria burns.’
Lenina slapped her hands over her mouth.
The memory came crashing back like slap to the face: sand, swords, bodies strewn across the ground like so much waste. Blood everywhere. She saw it all through the eyes of a man with strong square fingers, a deep, rumbling voice and a lingering ache in his chest. She felt the grit of sand through his sandals as he walked back towards a city slowly burning to the ground.
‘Nick . . . ?’ Her voice barely carried.
Charred flesh; its reek filled her nostrils.
Lenina lurched forward, stumbling against the dresser. Pots of moisturiser and make-up hit the floor. She clutched her stomach as the vision returned, playing bright and clear, using the back of her eyelids like a projection screen.
Smoke hung low over a city composed of golds and browns. No cars. No street lamps. No greens but for the occasional flower display, trampled by dozens of marching feet.
‘Nick, help me!’
A girl, no more than six, crouched behind the body of a woman, clearly dead from a savage slash to the throat. She cried and held out her hands as Lenina came closer. Cried out for Captain Saar.
Lenina came to herself with her head cupped in her hands, her body bent double against the floor.
Through the carpet, she heard the doorbell ring and knew the police had finally arrived.