Stolen Souls

73

FRESH SNOW SETTLED on the Audi’s windshield as Lennon parked outside the apartment building in Stranmillis. The girl, Galya, had said little as he drove. She stared out the window, her face blank, his coat wrapped tight around her.

“Here we are,” he said.

Galya did not reply.

Lennon got out and walked around the car to the trunk. He opened it and pulled out the foldable transit wheelchair the hospital had provided on loan. It took only a few seconds to open and lock its frame, then lower the footrests. Its small wheels left tracks in the snow as he brought it around to the passenger side.

He opened the door, and Galya looked up at him for a few seconds, as if she were unsure of where she was. She took his hand when he offered it, and winced as she stood. He guided her into the chair, supporting her as she sat down. She weighed hardly anything.

On the journey here, Lennon had thought about the women whose company he had paid for. How many times over the last few years? Scores, maybe, even if he had resisted the urge for the last six months. He had always felt shame during and afterward, but it had never stopped him. They were willing to take his money, he told himself, they had not been coerced. They got paid while he scratched the itch. Nobody got hurt. Nobody suffered.

As far as Lennon knew, none of the girls had been trafficked. Some of them were foreign, of course, with delicate features and Slavic accents. But in his mind, they were free women. He would never go with a girl who’d been forced into it.

But how could he be sure?

He forced himself to stop thinking about it as he wheeled Galya through the entrance and into the lift. The silence lingered as they ascended. He watched her reflection in the lift’s polished walls. Her eyes focused on something many miles away.

Lennon had dealt with enough assault victims to know they were not the same people they had once been. Their lives had been split in two, the Before Person, and the After Person. Anything that had ever mattered to the Before Person no longer existed for the After Person.

He wondered what the Before Galya had looked like. He wondered if the After Galya would ever fill that hollowness in her countenance.

The elevator pinged as they reached Susan’s floor, and the doors slid open. Susan waited for them in her doorway. She smiled at Galya, but not at Lennon.

“Thanks for this,” he said as he wheeled Galya through the door.

Susan did not answer. She led them through to the living room where wrapped presents where stacked beneath the Christmas tree, the silvery paper reflecting the blinking lights. A moment of panic gripped Lennon. “Did you … ?”

“Yes,” Susan said. “I sneaked up to your place when they went to bed. I wrapped them for you too.”

“Thank you,” he said.

“I didn’t do it for you,” Susan said. “I did it for Ellen.”

“All the same, thank—”

“Jack,” she said, looking him hard in the eye. “Stop talking.”

She crouched down by Galya. “Now, sweetheart, what can I get you? Something hot to drink? Tea? Coffee? How about some toast?”

“Yes,” Galya said, her voice small like a bird’s.

“Okay,” Susan said. She stroked Galya’s hand and stood.

Lennon pretended not to notice that Susan had offered him nothing. He wheeled Galya to the seats. After she allowed him to help her onto the sofa, he found himself unsure what to do next. Eventually, he gave in to his own fatigue and settled into an armchair. He let his head fall back on the cushions and closed his eyes.

What seemed like an instant later, the sound of a cup and plate being set on the coffee table jarred him awake. He lifted his head to see Galya reach for a steaming mug of tea. Susan set another in front of him.

“Not that you deserve it,” she said.

She did not return Lennon’s smile.

He took the mug from the table and sipped the hot, sweet tea, felt the warmth in his throat and chest as he swallowed. Susan disappeared for a few minutes, then reappeared carrying a bundle of clothes. She set them on the couch beside Galya.

“They’ll be a little big for you,” she said, “but they’re warm. Better than those hospital things, anyway.”

Galya returned her mug to the coffee table and placed a hand on the pile of clothing. Lennon smelled the comforting scent of warmed fabric softener and had a sudden memory of being a boy in his mother’s house, pulling on socks fresh from the hotpress on a cold morning. He smiled and curled his toes at the remembered sensation.

Then Galya crumbled before his eyes, and he felt his smile dissolve.

One moment she sat, her hand on the bundle of clothes, the next she seemed to fold in two, her shoulders hitching, and she wept. A low moan that sounded as if it started in her belly, worked its way up through her torso, and escaped her throat as a strangled whine. Heavy tears dripped from her cheeks into her lap. She opened her hands beneath them, as if trying to save them from being lost to the fabric of the dressing gown she wore.

Lennon stood, though he had no idea what to do next.

Instead, Susan did it for him. She pushed the coffee table out of the way, kneeled in front of the girl, and opened her arms. Galya fell into them, buried her head between Susan’s shoulder and neck.

“It’s all right, darling,” Susan said, her breath stirring the fine blonde hairs on Galya’s head. “You’re safe here. No one’s going to hurt you anymore.”

Lennon’s and Susan’s eyes met. Hers brimmed, a deep understanding in them, and he wondered how she knew about this kind of pain. He wanted to say something, thank you, anything, perhaps to touch her, but he could only stand with his arms at his sides, his tongue useless behind his teeth.

A movement on the other side of the room saved him from his own inadequacy. He turned his gaze there and saw Ellen and Lucy peek out from the hall that led to the bedrooms.

“Merry Christmas,” he said.

The girls slipped in, unease on their faces as they saw the strange guest.

“You came back,” Ellen said.

“Course I did,” Lennon said, knowing it had been anything but certain that he would keep his promise.

Ellen didn’t reply, but crossed the room and hugged his thigh.

“Has Santa been?” Lucy asked.

Lennon cleared his throat, smiled, and pointed. “Have a look and see,” he said.

He followed the girls to the Christmas tree, brushed Susan’s neck with his fingertips as he passed. She brought her hand up to meet his and allowed him a weary smile.

The girls had already begun sorting through the gifts as he lowered himself to the floor between them. Ellen wormed into his lap and set about unwrapping the packages she’d found. She and Lucy giggled and squealed and compared their presents, showing each other the bright boxes and cooing over the contents.

They each found Barbie dolls with various outfits— Lennon and Susan had colluded on this point—and they set about freeing the plastic figures from their packaging.

As Ellen adjusted the doll’s arms into a satisfactory pose, Lennon remembered the one she had when she first came back from Birmingham with her mother, more than a year ago. It had been naked, its hair straggly, but she loved it anyway. He wondered what had happened to it.

Ellen leaned back into his chest and whispered, “Who is she?”

“She’s someone Daddy needs to help,” Lennon said. “She’s had a bad time, so we’re going to look after her just for today.”

“I dreamed about her,” Ellen said.

“Did you?”

“There was a bad man,” Ellen said. “He wanted to hurt her.” At one time, Lennon would have been shocked at Ellen’s understanding of things that should not concern her. But he had learned over the last year or so that she had a way of knowing things that she should not.

“He’s going to jail,” Lennon said. “He can’t hurt anyone.” Satisfied at his answer, Ellen got to her feet and crossed the room to where Susan dabbed Galya’s cheeks with a tissue. Ellen took Galya’s hand.

“Come on,” she said.

Without a word, Galya stood and allowed Ellen to lead her back to the tree, taking tiny shuffling steps on her tattered feet. She sat down on the floor between the two girls as Lennon looked on.

Ellen pressed the doll into Galya’s hands. “Lookit,” she said. “You can change her clothes.”

She selected a dress and showed it to the visitor.

Galya smiled and said, “It is very pretty.”

Ellen chose a trousers suit. “What about this one?”

“Is pretty also,” Galya said.

“But which one’s nicer?” Ellen asked.

“The dress,” Galya said.

Ellen handed her the outfit, and Galya began undoing the clasps, her tongue between her teeth, a child’s concentration on her face.

Lennon left them to play.