A Toxic Affair Read online

Affair

  By Casey Harvey

  Copyright 2011 Casey Harvey

  A Toxic Affair

  Love comes, and love goes. But what if love stays longer than it ought? What if at the point when you should leave, you find yourself trapped, controlled, afraid of the partner you’re supposed to adore? This is a tale less of love gone wrong, and more of love gone on too long; of a boy, barely a man, who cannot leave; of a girl, barely a woman, who cannot help but control.

  This is the story of Sam and Sandy: one, the controller; the other, the victim…

  Day 100

  He stood at the end of a corridor he had walked down a hundred times before. Her corridor. There she was, leaning against the door to her flat, waiting for him: the girl who had come to make his life hell, to make him a prisoner in his own mind. As much as he yearned to be free of her, he had never been able to bring himself to do it.

  He could never have imagined in that moment that five days later, he would have his wish fulfilled.

  “Come on!” she nagged from her doorway. She was giving him that look again: like he was a disobedient animal who needed discipline. Yet her eyes were more intense than he had ever seen them before. They tugged at his heart-strings and he could not help but move his feet.

  His mind protested, of course. But since when had his mind been able to influence his body? Guilt drove his feet now, and he was powerless to shift it. Her daily invasion into his private life could not stop it. Her manipulative threats of violence could not stop it. Even her suicide attempt had not stopped it. Each time she chipped a little bit more of his soul away, his mind grew more agitated and his body more servile; each time he tried to protest, he became ever more her slave.

  So he walked, and she smiled. She had snared her prey a long time ago and now he was irretrievably, completely hers. She had had him wrapped around her little finger since the day they first met.

  He smiled back: a fake, outward smile, hiding the daily pain of his inner existence. He did not love her but he could not bring himself to say. And every time she told him and he lied back, a little more guilt was added to his already heavy load.

  Like now, for instance.

  “I love you,” she said, embracing him hard.

  “I love you too,” he lied.

  It was Wednesday: their pizza night. She led him into her room and pushed him onto his spot on the bed.

  “I’m so glad you came,” she remarked. “I’ve had a terrible day.”

  “What happened?” asked Sam.

  “That Lydia ruined it,” she shrilled. “Can you believe what a whore she is? She came in last night at three in the morning with another boy. Another one. That’s three different ones this week. Humph. I’m glad I’m not like that.”

  She was absent-mindedly rifling through the files on her desk as she spoke. Sam stood up to go to the bathroom, and in an instant she was in his face.

  “What are you doing? Where are you going?” she flustered. “You’re not leaving are you?”

  “What? No,” answered Sam. “I’m going to the toilet. I’ve been out with Sadiq all day. I haven’t had chance to go since morning. That is okay, isn’t it?”

  Sandy thought for a second. “Yes, of course, go. But I don’t like you hanging around with that guy.”

  Sam bristled. He had every intention of seeing Sadiq again, but something in the pit of his stomach was wary of disobeying her orders, as if to do so was wrong, immoral.

  “You know…” began Sam hesitantly, “You know just because he’s a Muslim doesn’t mean he’s like the others.”

  “I know,” called back Sandy. “But I still don’t like him. I don’t want you hanging around with him again. Understood?”

  He came out of the toilet to find her in his face once more. “Understood?”

  “Yes,” he said meekly. “I understand.”

  “Good,” she resolved. “Now go and get our pizza. We’re having meat feast tonight. The delivery van will be here in five minutes.”

  Sam approached the door and checked his wallet: he had just about enough money in there. Yet he had been planning on using it for something else, and he was always the one who had to pay.

  With his back turned, he plucked up the courage to speak:

  “I don’t suppose you could contribute a little this week? Please?”

  He turned slowly, hesitantly, to see the round face of Sandy staring at him as if he’d just called her a bitch. Her answer was short and simple, said in the elongated tones she saved for just such occasions: “No-oo!” Such a short word, yet it carried so much meaning: for the way she stretched the word out and lowered her pitch in the middle was like she was speaking to someone lower than herself, to someone who was too dim to see the wisdom of her decision. And of course it was wise, because it was hers.

  He cringed. “Okay. I’ll be back in five minutes.”

  As he entered the corridor once more, a weight lifted from his shoulders. He felt free from her clutches and was tempted to simply go away and never come back. Yet he had entertained such thoughts before, and he had always returned. His guilt had always driven him home, ever since the night it had all changed: that night by the canal.

  Guilt. Wasn’t this meant to be about love, about fun? What had happened to make it go so wrong?

  Day 1

  “Well, are you coming or not?” She worded it like a question but spoke it like a demand: he had no choice in the matter.

  The fire in her soul was obvious from day one. It attracted him to her, as did the fact that she wanted him. She wanted him. It was unimaginable. Just days before he had been the loser who had never scored a girl in his life; now there she was, a hot girl, standing in front of him. And she wanted him.

  More than wanted him: she demanded him. She had called up out of the blue that morning and practically dragged him out of his room to breakfast. They had met last week, had their first date last night and now he was going to make it official.

  The nerves were overwhelming. He had never done this before; not properly, anyway. Not in person. He gave himself a countdown in his head: 5, 4, 3, 2, 1…

  “Do you want to be my girlfriend?” he blurted out.

  She seemed taken aback, then smiled a thin, curled smile: “Yes. Yes, I do.”

  And that was that. She grabbed his hand and pulled him away into the corridor and into her room.

  Her room. His girlfriend’s room. He grinned maniacally and stood gormlessly by the door, unsure what to do. The room was magnificent: certainly compared to the brick walls and bad lighting of his student accommodation, Sandy’s residence was luxury.

  “Sit down,” she ordered, indicating a space on her bed, and he obeyed. She leapt beside him and pulled him down with her until the pair of them were lying together, staring into one another’s eyes.

  Her eyes. They were the most piercing blue he had ever seen and they amazed him. He had never truly stared with such depth into another human being’s eyes before, never noticed the intricate detail and patterns therein; now, he could make out the differing shades of blue and black and grey all mingling together into a constellation around her pupils; her ever-growing, dilating pupils.

  “Kiss me,” she ordered, and he obeyed. The taste of her lips on his was exquisite; it was like they complimented each other’s faces perfectly. They remained locked in their rippling, rolling embrace for what seemed like hours, what may well have been hours, until finally they could take no more and paused for breath.

  Sandy smiled down at Sam lustfully. “You’re staying with me tonight,” she ordered.

  And he obeyed.

  Day 12

  A knock came on the door to his room.

  “Come in,” he beckoned.

  The knocker needed
no invitation: she barged in, Sandy, and rushed over to his side.

  “Oh, my poor baby, my poor, poor baby!” she cooed at him.

  “Relax, it’s just a cold,” he brushed her off.

  “No, no, no, it’s more than that. You’re ill. You’re very, very ill, and you’re not to go out anywhere.”

  Sam smiled. “Okay,” he said. He could get used to such treatment. “Thank you.”

  “Now, I’ve brought you some chicken soup- you do like chicken soup, don’t you? Don’t you dear?”

  “Yes, I do, thanks!”

  “Good. Now eat it up while it’s nice and fresh. It’ll do you good while it’s hot. Just don’t let it get cold.”

  He was lying in bed and accepted her offer gladly. The soup was warm and soothing on his sore, swollen oesophagus; it flowed down into his belly spreading heat and health throughout his body.

  “You know, you really don’t have to do this.”

  “Oh but I do, I do!” she cooed. “I have to look after you. You’re mine.”

  She leaned a little closer to nuzzle him. “You’re mine,” she repeated, her voice softer.

  Sam scoffed. “What, like you own me?”

  “Yes,”