The Abuse E-Book

Ulla Bolinder

• Herausgeber: Books on Demand
• Kategorie: Gesellschafts- und Liebesromane
• Sprache: Englisch

Seitenzahl: 155

Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2021

Beschreibung

One late autumn evening, a young woman is on her way home after being to the cinema. She comes walking on the street when an unknown man approaches from behind and drags her into a yard and violates her. After the assault he flees. Susanne would rather forget but manages by her own efforts to regain control of her life while feelings of guilt and denial slowly let go. THE ABUSE, which is based on a real event, is a strong novel about a young womans struggle for independence and integrity.

Leseprobe

Rape has its inner, private meaning for every victim.

Table of Contents

Part One

Part Two

Part Three

Part Four

Part Five

Part Six

PART ONE

1992

Coming out on the street, out into the light on the street

Close to losing balance, take support against the house wall

Do not see, do not know

Close my eyes

Feel a hand on my arm, a hand that seizes me by the arm

What has happened to you, then

happened to you

It goes around in my head, my legs almost give way under me

must not faint, must not fall

The hand grips harder

do not fall

Standing against the wall, standing pressed against the wall

Do you need help

Open my eyes, see his face

eyes, nose, mouth

Has anyone been unpleasant to you

unpleasant

My throat stings, my tongue feels stiff

must go home, must get my bag and go home, must go back and fetch my bag

Sway, catch hold of

Take it easy, I’m holding you, it will be all right

The lamp on the wall, the clothes on the ground, scattered on the ground, thrown on the gravel, the torn gravel, the tracks in the gravel

Walking in the pale light on the street, walking beside him on the pavement, on the cold pavement

Feeling his arm around my back, his thigh against my hip, his leg against my thigh

he helps me

My knees below the edge of the long cardigan, my knees and feet mechanically moving forward along the sidewalk, my feet in dirty ankle socks against the paving stones, hard and cold stone under my feet, the wind cooling between my legs

It cuts and burns for every step, burns for every step, cuts and burns

must come along, must go with him into

Sitting on a chair with my hands on my knee, sitting tense and still with my legs close together

It smells of smoke and perfume, the air stands still, rustling of clothes, scraping of shoes, murmuring of voices, clattering of porcelain

inside the restaurant people are sitting and eating as if nothing has happened

Soon the police will be here

the police

What has happened here, then

Looking at his hand, looking at his hand next to his

uniform trousers, gaze at his – stare straight at his

See the trouser leg, the holster, the shoulder belt

Hear his voice, the voices, the voice

Has someone been nasty to you

nasty

My throat feels thick, my head is empty

must sit silent and still, silent and empty in the dark,

must not give in, must not let it out, must not let it

Yes, now you will soon come with us here

the police, must go with the police

Getting into the police car, into the dark in the back seat of the police car

cannot manage, must lie down, must rest

No, now you can’t

Now you must

must sit up

The car slides quietly away across the asphalt, shadows and lights in front of my eyes, crackling voices in the radio, the call signal tones in the radio

must come along

Sitting on the chair with my cardigan pulled down as far as possible

My back and throat are aching, it aches and burns between my legs

not seriously injured

The lamp lights up the tabletop, the chair feels warm underneath my body, warm and sticky under my body have no briefs under my cardigan, is he thinking of that, can he resist thinking of that

Tense my body, make my body numb

may not relax, may not feel, must tell what happened,

must remember how it happened, must take it easy, must

have a cigarette and calm down, smoke and calm down

Holding the cigarette between my fingers, there are red stains on my fingers, reddish brown stains on my fingers, dried blood on my fingers

where does it come from, must go and wash it away

No, now you can’t

First you must

Standing naked on the floor under the lamp

my face is dirty, my face smells bad

Have you got something inserted into

It stings and burns between my legs, stings and burns

will soon pass

Wash hands and face

do not become clean

The door is unlocked, anyone can come in

nobody comes in

My body is tense, my legs are trembling

must go out now, must continue, must manage, must help

Face after face

He may not be included

is not included

Sitting at the table with the door closed, alone with him with the door closed

man, policeman, detective inspector, police officer

Could you please give an account of the course of events as accurately as possible

cannot give an account

Questions and answers, questions and answers

unable to be with it, haven’t put up with it yet, cannot follow

His hands on the steering wheel, streetlights gliding in over his thighs, down over his thighs, down between his parted legs

alone in the car with

It is cold, my feet are cold, a ribbed rubber mat under my feet

no briefs under my cardigan

Controlling that the buttoning of my cardigan does not gape open

Darkness and light, no traffic, streetlights on the empty asphalt

When I came home Bernt was awake. The movie had ended before half past ten, but I didn’t come home until after three. I hadn’t called him either, because I thought he was sleeping and that it was unnecessary to waken him. But he was up.

I hurried into the bathroom, and there I quickly put on a pair of already used briefs that I dug out of the laundry basket. I had to make an effort not to lock the door behind me. The ankle socks I threw into the refuse pail. Then I peed, washed my hands and face, and went out to Bernt.

He had been sitting and smoking at the kitchen table, because the light was on and the ashtray was full of butts. He had also been drinking a little, but not so much that he was drunk.

“What the hell have you been up to?” he said, sounding like he thought I had been out with another guy. I didn’t want to talk with him when he sounded that suspicious and on his guard. But I had to tell him what had happened.

He went back to the table and sat down and lighted a cigarette, and I saw that he was upset. His face was like a stiff mask, and his voice was hard and cold, as it often is when he is either angry or feels uncertain and afraid.

– Come out with it now! Where have you been?

– I have been with the police.

– With the police?

– Yes, something happened after the movie.

– What kind of thing?

– It was just a guy who became a bit intrusive.

– What fucking guy?

– One who turned up when I was on my way to the bus.

– And what did he do?

He had probably become worried when I hadn’t come home the time I was expected to. But I felt almost… elated and said that a guy had come and started arguing with me – and he could easily understand in what way, when he saw that I didn’t have all my clothes on.

He asked what had happened to the clothes.

“They were left there,” I said. “The police took care of them later.”

“But they didn’t get hold of the guy?”

And I didn’t know that, but if that had been the case, I assumed the police would have told me, so I said he had escaped. Then he said that he would go out and try to find him. I thought he was ridiculous, because how could he find him after so long? By then he had had plenty of time to disappear.

And what would he have done if he had got hold of him? Beaten him up? But he would never had succeeded in that, because that guy was much bigger and stronger than him. And he didn’t care about what had happened to me, so it was just ridiculous of him to talk like that.

And he didn’t go. I hadn’t believed he would either. He stayed at the kitchen table and smoked and didn’t say anything more.

When I had undressed in the bathroom and saw all the marks on my body, I almost got a shock. I had never seen such big and dark bruises before. I hurried to lock the door so that Bernt couldn’t come in and see me. I barely dared to look myself. It looked like I had been in an accident.

In the shower I gently soaped myself, and it stung everywhere, but I couldn’t let the water run for too long, because it was in the middle of the night. I thought I could shower one more time after I had slept.

Bernt had gone to bed, but he was still awake when I came into the bedroom. I had put on a nightgown with long sleeves, and I went quickly to bed and turned off the lamp so that he wouldn’t see the marks. I didn’t want him to get the wrong impression and maybe believe that it had been worse than it was. After all, it doesn’t take much to get a bruise.

It didn’t feel well to lie so close to him and not know what he was thinking or what he could do. I was afraid he would touch me, against both his and my will. But he didn’t do anything, and at last I heard that he was asleep.

I don’t want to be seen like this. The marks on my body are not visible, but the one on my face I can’t hide, nor the bruises on my arms. Yes, if I have long-sleeved sweaters on, and I mostly have now in the autumn, so it will probably work. I don’t want people to start wondering and asking what has happened to me. If it hadn’t been necessary, I wouldn’t have told Bernt about it either.

It’s in the newspaper today. I have clipped it out and intend to save it. I don’t know if Bernt has read it. I hope he missed it, because I think it’s none of his business.

ATTEMPTED RAPE.A woman in her twenties, resident in Uppsala, was molested late on Friday evening by an attempted rape in central Uppsala. She was walking on Vaksalagatan when suddenly a man turned up behind her and forced her into the back yard of Vaksalagatan 25. The perpetrator was wearing a dark windcheater and is described as being 20 to 25 years old as well as powerfully built. He was at midnight still at large.

My whole body hurts. It feels like pain after training. And the bruises are sore. But otherwise there isn’t anything.

At the police station there was a policeman who asked me if I had experienced similar things before, because I was taking it so easy. But everyone wanted me to tell what had happened as quickly as possible, and then I couldn’t care about my feelings at the same time.

Earlier, when I was sitting in the police car, I thought I could relax a little. It was as if I were stunned, and it felt like I couldn’t stay up. At first, I thought that the police officer beside me perhaps would hold me or give me a blanket to wrap myself up in, but he didn’t. He did nothing at all. Not until I leaned my upper body to the side and tried to lay down on the seat and pulled my legs up, he did react.

“No, now you can’t lie down, now you must try to give us a description of him,” he said.

After that, I didn’t try again.

The police officers might have thought that I had agreed to it in the beginning but regretted it later, because I seemed so composed. That wasn’t the case, but it was my own fault that it happened. I hadn’t needed to be there.

I don’t know why I go out like that sometimes, without Bernt. I don’t know what the point is, other than I want to be a little by myself for a while. Now it feels like what happened is the punishment for me going out, and that I only have myself to blame. Because I walked there and wished the evening wouldn’t end. That’s why I didn’t feel as negative as I should have done, when that guy started walking beside me. I looked at him to see if he were handsome or not and tried to feel if I liked his looks. If I had been completely uninterested, I wouldn’t have done so.

But he was rather ugly and didn’t feel nice, so I lost interest immediately. And he might have noticed that. Perhaps that’s why he got angry and grabbed me when I turned away. Anyway, I don’t think he had decided in advance that he would stand there waiting for a suitable victim to turn up. If I had just answered what time it was and hadn’t sized him up like I did, he perhaps wouldn’t have done more. Or if I hadn’t answered at all. But that could also have made him angry. And it seems so impolite to not answer when a person comes and asks for information.

“Here comes someone who’s walked into a door,” Egon said when I came to work and he saw the bruise on my cheek. I know what people mean by saying so, but I didn’t correct him. I didn’t even bother to lie to him. He is just a boring old man who I don’t need to pay any attention to.

“Sure,” I said and walked away.

Viola must also have seen the bruise, but she didn’t say anything.

I was able to work even though I was tense. I did just as I usually do. Sometimes I got stuck and sat staring straight ahead without thinking. When it felt like I was about to burst I took a cigarette or went to the toilet and washed myself. Once I went into Göran’s room and closed the door. I just stood there and didn’t know what to do. I thought that if he came and found me, I could have let it out and got help. But he wasn’t there.

In the evening, the police called and asked me to come to the police station the next day and fetch my clothes. It was Bernt who answered, and when he said I was wanted on the phone, he looked angry and weird again, as if it is very embarrassing and unpleasant for him that I have been involved with the police, and that I should be ashamed and apologize to him for that.

At the police station, I got to meet the same policeman as last time. We sat in his office, and he talked about the weather and said that the evening darkness comes earlier and earlier in the afternoons now, and that it can feel a bit depressing that the daylight has disappeared when it’s time to go home from work.

I said almost nothing, because I couldn’t bear to be polite, and I couldn’t relax, though that’s probably what he was trying to get me to do by talking about other things like that. I thought it was because of me he couldn’t go home before it had become dark, and I felt guilty.

The police had done a crime scene investigation and found a beer can and a shoeprint inside the yard, he said. I was surprised when he told me, because I didn’t think that crimes, where no one has been seriously injured, were investigated so carefully. Fingerprints and footprints, I thought were only looked for in serious crimes.

After a while he took out a bag with my clothes and put it on the desk. It was my coat, long trousers and shoes. My briefs lay in a transparent plastic bag which he held up.

“Well, these, I suppose, are just to be thrown away?” he said and dropped the bag into the wastepaper basket.

Then he began to interrogate me. He had to ask questions the whole time to help me get through it.

– And what happened after that?

– He started walking beside me.

– What did you think then? How did you perceive his intentions?

– I thought he was going the same direction as me. But then I thought that…

– Yes?

– That he was looking for company.

– And how did you react to that?

– Negatively.

– You weren’t interested?

– No.

As I answered, he repeated it and recorded it on a tape.

Sometimes it became a bit painful. When I was going to say that I suggested I could masturbate the guy, I didn’t know if I should say masturbate or jack off, but I chose jack off, and when he recorded it he said: “With the hope that the man would leave her alone if he got an ejaculation, she offered to masturbate him.”

Then he turned off the tape recorder and said:

“And then you jacked him off?”

Isn’t it called masturbate? I thought. I was close to saying it out loud. At the same time, I should have smiled a little archly at him, I felt. I don’t know what got into me. Because what kind of an impression would that have made, if I had begun to joke about sex in that situation? From that he could have believed that I did the same when it happened.

It was fortunate that I managed to control myself. But I was close to laughing because he seemed to believe that I wouldn’t understand if he said masturbate. I mostly say masturbate, but to that guy I said jack off, and that’s why I also used that word when I was interrogated.

– Use whatever words you want. If it’s easier for you to use slang expressions, just do that, and if you think it’s easier to use more strict words, do that. The main thing is that I get to know exactly what he did to you. Do you understand?

That I felt like joking was perhaps because I wanted to relieve the atmosphere a little, so that the policeman who questioned me would understand that he didn’t have to take it so seriously.

When I came home, Bernt asked me how it had turned out.

“What did the cop say, then? Had they caught the bastard?”

“No, and I don’t think they will either,” I said.

“No, and that’s just as well, perhaps?”

It seems like he thinks I am glad that the police haven’t found him. As if I actually hope that he gets away. But why should I hope that?

Bernt has been so weird since it happened, and I don’t know what to do to get him back to normal again. He tends to be kind, but now he isn’t any longer. He seems suspicious and angry, like he believes I agreed to it, or that I didn’t defend myself as much as I should have done, or that it was I who attracted him to me.