‘I know they’ve been worried,’ I said, trying to sound like someone who’s already done something stupid, rather than someone who’s about to throw away her one chance of getting the help she needs. ‘The truth is, everything’s been blown out of proportion. You know what mothers are like. I was emotionally unfaithful to my boyfriend during the first five weeks of our relationship, and when he found out he took it very badly. It’s just taking a while for us to work things out. But we’re getting there.’
It sounds ridiculous to me now, but I imagine police officers working in a domestic abuse unit had heard it all before – or, at least, variations on the same theme.
‘But it’s nine months since he found out, isn’t it?’ Again, it wasn’t really a question. ‘Don’t you think your boyfriend might be overreacting by continuing to make it a bone of contention? I’d have thought that nine months would be more than enough time to work things out, if you’re going to be able to do so. Your sister says he cut all your hair off and threw away all your clothes.’
‘Clearing my wardrobe’ was something Joe had started when, in response to one of his early questions, I’d said that I was wearing jeans on the evening that Anthony and I first had sex. Joe had already thrown out all my underwear, and then specified the style and colour of bras and pants I was to wear in the future. So then he ripped up all my jeans, which I wasn’t allowed to replace, or, in fact, wear at all. Next, he made me throw out all the tops I had in certain colours, the dresses I’d worn on particular occasions, and eventually almost every item of clothing I possessed. When everything I’d chosen myself had been got rid of or destroyed, I wore only items of clothing I’d bought under Joe’s supervision and direction, none of which bore any resemblance to anything I might have worn at any time during the eighteen months when I was seeing Anthony.
I didn’t say any of that to the police officers, of course. Instead, I lied to them, the way I seemed to lie about everything to everyone except Joe by that time, and told them, ‘It wasn’t my boyfriend who cut off my hair. I did it. I wanted a change of style, that’s all. He didn’t throw out my clothes, either. I did. And he doesn’t tell me what to wear. I know he overreacted to what happened, but it was understandable because he felt betrayed and was struggling to come to terms with it all.’
‘What do you do during the day?’ It was the first time the male police officer had said anything, and his question took me slightly off guard. ‘Your mum says he hasn’t allowed you to work for several months. That must be very isolating for you. So what do you do every day? How would you say things were between you and your boyfriend? Do the two of you argue a lot? Your sister said she overheard one of your arguments on the phone and that he sounded “dangerous and unhinged”. She was very frightened for you. Is your boyfriend violent with you?’
The only question I answered was the last one. ‘No, he isn’t violent with me,’ I lied. ‘We do argue a bit, because he’s still working it all through. But of course he hasn’t forbidden me to work. I get depression, which has been made worse by what’s happened. That’s why I don’t work at the moment. I just don’t feel up to it right now.’
I had been so programmed by Joe that the explanations and excuses were almost automatic, whereas what I really wanted to say to the police officers was, ‘Help me! Please don’t leave me here. Take me away with you. Yes, he’s dangerous and unhinged; he’s violent and irrational too. We argue all the time. I barely sleep or eat. I’ve lost count of the times he’s strangled me and threatened to kill me, and I’m really, really frightened about what he might do to me. Cutting off my hair and throwing out my clothes are only a small part of it. He makes me run naked through the streets at night. He won’t let me have any contact with my family or friends. Can’t you see that I’ve been lying to you and that I need help, but that I can’t admit it because, despite everything, I think I still love Joe. If you won’t take me away with you, at least tell me that he’s right, that everything is the way he says it is, and that I haven’t endured all this suffering for nothing.’
I wondered later whether, if the police officers had persisted in their questioning, I might have told them any part of the truth – had my phone not rung at that moment.
‘I’m sorry,’ I told them. ‘It’s my boyfriend. I’ve got to take this.’ Then, into the phone, ‘Hi, Joe. I can’t talk right now. The police are here. Can we speak later? Yes, of course. Bye.’
Joe answered very calmly when I told him about the police. But I knew him well enough to be able to sense the seething rage that he was only just managing to control, and to know that I would pay for the police officers’ visit when he got home. And still I didn’t tell them the truth and ask them to help me.
When they left, they took with them the statement I had signed confirming that everything in my life with Joe was fine and devoid of domestic abuse. They did tell me they didn’t believe me, but said they couldn’t force me to accept their help if I didn’t want it. So they gave me a number to call if I changed my mind.
As soon as they’d gone, I picked up my phone and rang Joe. Although I had hoped he might be in a meeting, so that I’d have some time to collect my thoughts, he answered immediately and said, in a voice cold with anger and distrust, ‘I need you to meet me for lunch. Right now.’
We were in Sardinia, on the last holiday I was going to be able to afford before my savings ran out, and I could hardly believe how well things had been going – ‘well’ for us, at least. On the third day we were there, there was a period of maybe two hours when Joe didn’t ask me a single question about the past.
We had hired a small open boat with an outboard motor to explore the isolated coves and bays along the coast, mooring it offshore so that we could swim in the crystal-clear water. After we’d swum, we would lie on the pebbly beach, letting the warmth of the sun soak into our bones. On this particular day Joe was lying at one end of the boat with his back to me, reading, while I was sitting at the other end, sketching the bay and an old villa that could just be seen among the trees on the cliff above it.
As I sat there, listening to the sound of the birds gliding through the cloudless sky above our heads, I felt almost happy. I rarely daydreamed since the discovery; I was always too anxious, miserable and exhausted to think about anything beyond the confines of my life with Joe. But I found myself wondering what it would be like to live in a house like the one I was drawing, and to wake up every morning to the sound of the waves lapping gently on the shore.
It was late afternoon, but the sun was still very hot, and when I glanced up from my sketchpad I could see that the skin on Joe’s back was starting to burn. ‘I should tell him,’ I thought. ‘So that he can put on some more sun cream.’ But that would mean breaking the rare tranquillity of the moment and risk setting him off again, demanding answers to his crazy questions and shattering the silence with accusations and abuse.
So I didn’t say anything, and it wasn’t until we were finishing our dinner in a restaurant that evening that he started again. He wasn’t drunk, but he’d been drinking, and alcohol always seemed to make it worse. As soon as he spat the first question at me, I could feel the tears filling my eyes, because I knew I’d been stupid to have allowed myself to hope that night might be different from any other, and because I also knew that, if I gave up hoping, there would be nothing left.
‘Why didn’t you say something?’ Joe asked me angrily.
‘What do you mean?’ I replied, confused by the question and desperately searching my mind for something that might have triggered it, something I’d done wrong or had failed to anticipate.
‘Are you telling me you didn’t even notice the family who’ve just left?’ he demanded, nodding his head towards the now empty table next to ours and speaking so