Page 58 of The World Outside My Window

And yet I just couldn’t do it.

I struggled to describe the terror I felt, the all-consuming dread that, if I left the safety of my flat, something or someone would be waiting for me, ready to pounce. It took over my mind, my body, paralysing me every time I even considered setting foot outside.

I wasn’t sleeping either; how could I let myself be so vulnerable? The worst times were when Jim was away. Those long, sleepless nights were when the terror crowded in and left me shaking and sweating, tangled in my sheets every morning and feeling more tired than I had when I’d gone to bed.

Jim begged me to speak to my doctor, to ask for something to blunt the sharp blades of my fear. But I refused that too, having some confused idea that I needed to remain alert at all times. And yet at the same time I was drinking more and more to forget. I’d tried limiting it at first because Jim disapproved of me drinking so much and I didn’t want to keep asking him to buy it for me. But then I convinced Mr O’Neill from the shop three streets away to deliver a box of six bottles to me and leave it on my doorstep, so I stopped keeping track of how many I was getting through.

So that was where I was, two months after the attack. Stuck indoors, alone half the time, and making my husband’s life a misery the other half. I swung violently between abject terror and utter boredom, but at least I felt safe cocooned inside my little flat, so that was where I stayed. Jim had recently brought home a VCR to try and keep me occupied and I spent days in my pyjamas watching the same films over and over again:Steel Magnolias,Indiana Jones,Romancing the Stone,Heathers.

But Jim was coming home today, so I’d made an effort to wash my hair, get dressed and plan a meal for this evening – although even then I’d have to send Jim out to the supermarket to buy the ingredients before I could cook it for him. God, how utterly helpless I was. It was a wonder he was still with me, the stress I put him through.

I turned away from the back garden and sat down on my bed. I was so exhausted all I felt like doing was lying down, closing my eyes and going to sleep. But I knew it wouldn’t be as easy as that, and I also wanted to at least try and do some cleaning before Jim got home. It took all the energy I had to haul myself to my feet and wade through to the kitchen to dig out the cleaning products. I was just reaching for a new cloth when a clatter outside the back door made me jump so much I clonked my head on the edge of the cupboard and almost knocked myself out.

What the fuck was that?

Despite the throbbing in my head, I peered down the stairs towards the back door. The stippled glass was clear, no shadowy figure lurking. But that didn’t mean the coast was clear. I pulled myself to my feet and stumbled closer, creeping down the stairs step by step, trying not to make any noise. My heart pounded and my legs shook with terror, but I was determined to carry on. Finally, I reached the bottom step, and stretched my hand out to push down the handle. But halfway there it stopped, hovering in mid-air as though on a paused video.

I couldn’t do it.

I couldn’t open the back door.

I stood for a moment, frozen, unable to move either forward or backwards. Then the world rushed into my brain again, and I turned and sprinted back up the stairs, through the kitchen, along the hallway and all the way to the living room at the front of the house. The curtains were always closed in here, so I threw myself onto the sofa, buried my face in a cushion and curled myself into a ball.

The next thing I knew, there was a hand on my arm, and I was being shaken gently. I snapped my eyes open and looked up.

‘Jim!’ I lunged into his arms and clung to him, and he lowered himself onto the sofa and held me. Eventually, he pulled away.

‘What’s happened, darling?’ he said.

I closed my eyes. ‘There was a noise outside and I thought… I thought…’ I gulped in air.

‘Hey, hey, hey, what is it?’ He rubbed my upper arms and I felt the tension slowly drop away. I hung my head. ‘I thought there was someone there. I thought they were trying to get in.’

‘Oh, Lola,’ he said, pulling me to him. I sat for moment, safely cocooned in his arms. It wasn’t until a few minutes later I realised it was already dark outside.

‘What time is it?’ I said, squinting to make out the glowing green figures on the VCR. My vision swam, my eyes red raw from crying.

‘It’s seven o’clock,’ he said.

‘Oh God, I was going to make you dinner,’ I said, horrified.

‘It doesn’t matter, darling, I’ll make something.’

‘No!’ I leapt up, brushed myself down, aware suddenly of how awful I must look. So much for making an effort, for wanting Jim to see the old Laura, the Laura he fell in love with rather than the scared, cowering creature I seemed to have become. ‘I wanted to make you something special, I made a list, only…’ I trailed off, aware that he was unlikely to want to traipse round looking for an open shop at this time of the evening. I let my arms drop to my sides, suddenly exhausted with feeling like this all the time.

‘It doesn’t matter,’ he said. ‘Really. I’m just glad to be home. I don’t need anything fancy to eat.’

I dropped my head, then looked back up at him. I studied this kind, handsome face I’d loved from the moment I first set eyes on it, and tried to smile. He still loved me despite everything. I didn’t need to prove anything to him. Everything was going to be fine.

‘I love you, Jim,’ I whispered.

‘I love you too.’ He kissed my nose gently, then stepped away. ‘Now, why don’t you go and see if there’s something in the freezer we can rustle up for dinner, and I’ll make sure there’s nothing untoward going on outside?’

I nodded, and we made our way to the kitchen, where I found the cleaning products I’d pulled out earlier still scattered across the floor. I hadn’t even got round to doing that, and it struck me then what a mess the place looked, with piles of dishes in the sink and empty drinking glasses along the side, dust on every surface and washing piling up. The whole place needed a damn good clean, and with me not being at work and Jim working all the hours he could, I knew he always hoped I’d at least have the place looking half decent when he got home. I also knew that, given the state of me when he walked in just now, he wouldn’t say anything about it.

But for me, that was worse. I felt a like schoolgirl with a black mark against her name, and I could feel the disappointment in him because I felt it myself.

While Jim went down the back stairs to investigate what the bang had been, I set about cleaning the kitchen. I kept my back turned to the open door even though it was all the way down a flight of stairs, and ignored the cool breeze that trickled through the open doorway into the kitchen. I didn’t relax until I heard the back door slam, and Jim’s footsteps heading back up towards the kitchen again. I turned to face him.

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