AllFreeNovel
Share Us
MOLLY – THEN
‘Pregnant?’ Molly said. She hugged her dressing gown around her and took a step away from Hannah, almost as if she was contagious. ‘No way.’ She felt desperately sad for Hannah, seeing the anguish in her eyes. They’d become so close since she’d arrived at the Cloisters as a penniless and frightened homeless girl, despite Molly initially finding her intimidating. Getting pregnant was every sex worker’s worst nightmare – especially here – and she had no idea how to help.
Hannah held out a plastic stick with two lines on it. ‘Fucking am.’ She hurled herself down on the old sofa next to Vanessa, who offered her a cigarette. Hannah took one. It was just the three of them in the room.
‘There’s places you can go,’ Vanessa said, not looking up from her magazine.
‘Yeah. Right,’ Hannah said, though, as she was staring across the room, Molly saw something else in her eyes – something that sang out that she didn’twantto go to a place. Presumably a place that would make her not pregnant.
Later, Hannah and Molly were alone. Molly was sweaty and needed a shower before her next john, but she took a moment to sit with Hannah, who’d fibbed to Darren that it was her time of the month and she had terrible cramps and couldn’t work. Darren, as ever, wasn’t best pleased, saying, ‘You’re always on…’ But Luba had calmed him down in that magic way of hers that men like Darren seemed to respond to, and Hannah was given the night off. Luba had winked at her over Darren’s shoulder as she wrapped herself around him.
‘Just tonight,’ Darren growled as he walked off. ‘Or else you’ll be the one explaining to Vaughn why you’re not earning your keep.’
Hannah had nodded, the heaviness in her heart making even a simple gesture seem hard.
‘How did it happen?’ Molly asked as they sat together. Everyone else was working. They always used condoms.
‘He was young, like us,’ Hannah replied matter-of-factly, though there was another look in her eyes now. Something wistful. ‘A first-timer.’ She twirled her hair with one hand and ate a Snickers bar with the other.
Molly pulled a face. She didn’t understand. They were always so careful.
Hannah jabbed her stomach just above the waistband of her shorts. ‘He cried when I undressed him and he was shaking, so I let him go without. I wanted him to remember his first time as special. Fucker wasn’t supposed to finish but he, like, you know…’ She made an exploding gesture with her hands and a bit of chocolate fell on her leg. ‘All of five seconds.’
Now Molly understood. ‘You like him, don’t you?’ She read Hannah’s face. Whipped up with the sadness swirling in the milkiness of her gaze was something fresh and new. Something she wasn’t used to seeing in any of the other girls’ vacant stares. Something tender and real. ‘Does he like you back?’
Hannah shrugged. ‘Haven’t told him about this.’ She jabbed her flat stomach again.
‘Will you? What will you do?’ Molly’s mind swam with what lay ahead for her friend. ‘I’ll help you with whatever you choose.’
Suddenly, Hannah reached out and grabbed Molly’s hand, squeezing it so hard she had to bite her tongue to hold back a squeal. ‘I’m scared,’ she whispered. ‘I want to keep it. I really do, but Darren, Vaughn, they’ll kill me.’
Molly nodded. That was certainly a possibility – if not in the literal sense, then they’d make life impossible for her.
‘What’s the guy’s name?’ Molly asked. ‘Will he help?’
Hannah shrugged. ‘He’s just a geek who still lives with his mum. He cried when he told me he was a virgin. Then he told me he loved me. But yeah, I like him. He was…sweet and…differentto the others.’ She gave Molly’s hands a quick squeeze again. ‘Come with me,’ she said, beckoning Molly into the bedroom. ‘I want to show you something.’
Once in there, she dropped to her knees and pulled back the rug, revealing the old wonky floorboards that creaked with every step. Hannah looked up, a finger over her lips. ‘Don’t tell a soul about this,’ she whispered, glancing at the door. Then she grappled with one of the floorboards – one that looked as though it had been previously cut, perhaps for pipes or wiring – and lifted the section of wood completely out. Then she dug around in the space beneath and pulled out a knife. It had a wooden handle and a six-inch blade – dusty but clearly razor-sharp. ‘I had it on me when I arrived. They never found it, or they’d have taken it off me with my passport and other stuff. It was…it was my dad’s. From his workshop. It’s…special to me. Got me out of a few scrapes, I can tell you.’ Hannah had tears in her eyes.
Molly’s mouth dropped open as she crouched down beside Hannah, casting a furtive glance to the doorway. ‘What are you going to do with it?’ For a horrible moment, Molly wondered if Hannah was going to ask her to perform an operation on her, make her mess go away. But instead, Hannah lifted her hand and cut a paper-thin slice across the fleshy part of her palm. A line of blood oozed out.
‘Here, give me your hand.’
Cautiously, wide-eyed and trusting, Molly held out her palm and allowed her to make a similar painless incision on her. A matching line of blood appeared on her skin. Then Hannah clasped their palms together, pressing their thin cuts against each other. They stayed like this for a couple of minutes, only the sound of their breathing audible as they looked each other in the eye, their faces close.
‘Now we’re sisters forever, right?’ Hannah said, finally withdrawing. ‘Our blood flowing through each other’s veins. It means we look out for each other,always. If anything ever happens to one of us, the other takes care of it.’
Molly nodded, feeling the weight of this responsibility. ‘Of course, Han. Sisters forever.’ She leant forward and gave her a tight hug. ‘So…so you’re definitely keeping it, the baby?’ They all knew that liking johns was a big no-no, inthatsense anyway. You could like them just enough so that they felt special, so they came back for more. But no love or feelings allowed.
‘Don’t you see?’ Hannah said. ‘It’s a reason to get out of here, Mol. A chance to go and actuallylive. Me and my baby.’ For the first time ever, Molly saw true excitement in Hannah’s eyes. She guessed it was what hope looked like.
Molly thought about this, about getting out. She wasn’t sure if having a baby really was a reason to live, or if perhaps it was the start of something else – a slow death brought about by being so utterly responsible for a helpless human that the rest of you withered away, becoming even more helpless and reliant than they were. Her own mother was a fuck-up, after all. She couldn’t imagine having a child, what you would do with it after it was born, or how you’d get money to feed or clothe it. There were so many impossible-to-answer unknowns ahead for Hannah that she had no real advice to give her. So all she said was, ‘You can have all my money, what I’ve saved up so far. It’s not much, but it might help.’
Hannah squeezed her even tighter.
The next week, Vanessa rubbed Hannah’s back as she lay on the saggy sofa recounting how awful the abortion had been, how she felt sick and regretful but that it was the right thing to do. Earlier, up on the flat roof while they were smoking, Hannah and Molly had cooked up a plan: Hannah would hide her pregnancy from everyone, and meantime, they’d save up as much as they could between them, steal from the johns if they left their wallets lying about, nick stuff to sell when they went on shopping trips, and both of them would offer their services on their days off by standing on the road that was known as the ‘red mile’, wearing heels, stockings, short skirts and make-up. They knew they’d get chased off by the girls and their pimps who worked that stretch, but even if it earnt them a few quid extra, it would be worth the hassle. They reckoned they had a few months before Hannah would show enough to cause raised eyebrows and, until then, she’d stuff her face with food to get as fat as she could to explain away her bulging belly.
‘I saw it in a film once,’ Molly explained. ‘A girl did it to hide that she was pregnant from her parents. She gave birth on the bathroom floor before the baby was ready to come out.’
