Aurelia

By Alex Porter

Aurelia was like any normal 18 year old. She was blessed with a loving mum, a doting step-father and a perfect boyfriend. The summer before university should have been a joyous time.

Yet this idyllic life was irrevocably marred by the past. A past she could not hide from, however hard she had tried. Aurelia's battle had, in truth, been underway since she was a little girl.

Now, it was coming to an end...one way or another.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Lulu.com
• Release date: Apr 24, 2015
• ISBN: 9781326149482

Alex Porter

Alex Porter is engineering development manager at Entela, where he supervises testing and validation programs at five different locations. His managerial responsibilities include testing and validation software development, design of testing methods and procedures, and analysis of test results. He holds three patents for testing methods and has written articles for such magazines as Compliance Engineering and has given technical seminars in testing and validation methods for the Society of Automotive Engineers.

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Aurelia

Aurelia

Copyright © 2015 Alex Porter

ISBN 978-1-326-14948-2

All rights reserved

No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in or introduced into a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means (electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise), without the prior written permission of the copyright owner, except by a reviewer who may quote brief passages in a review.

This book is sold subject to the condition that it shall not, by way of trade or otherwise, be lent, resold, hired out or otherwise circulated without the author’s prior written consent in any form of binding or cover other than that in which it is published and without a similar condition including this condition being imposed on the subsequent purchaser.

First Printing, 2015

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Acknowledgements

For their constant support throughout, my sincere thanks go to all of my family. Without them, this book would simply not exist.

One

‘Are you going to finish your tea?’

Mark looked down at his half empty mug and cupped his hands around the ceramic. It was cold to the touch. He shook his head in response to Rachel’s question. She picked up the half-drunk beverage and poured it into the sink, watching the liquid disappear down the plug hole and into the darkness that lay beyond it.

‘What’s wrong with you today?’ she enquired, her eyes still trained on the stainless steel sink that now displayed the faintest streaks of cold tea.

Mark played with his finger nails. He sighed and looked up at Rachel, who had now turned around to face him, perching on the edge of the kitchen counter. Rachel had aged well, with only a few wrinkles beginning to show. Her outfits were always classy yet casual; perhaps some figure hugging jeans and top teamed with a smart blazer. Her wavy, hazelnut hair framed her lightly tanned face.

‘Nothing, I’m fine. Honestly,’ he lied in a tone that was worryingly natural, even to Mark.

Rachel was obviously disappointed. It had been more than four years since they had first met and Mark still avoided speaking about his feelings in any great depth, despite her greatest encouragements. But as usual she decided to let it go. She could never understand what Mark had gone through and how it had truly affected him, so she never pushed him into saying more than he wanted to. She would be lying if she said it did not hurt when he would not open up about his feelings and his past, but she had made her decision not to press him on this issue several years previously and it was one that she had stuck with, whether rightly or wrongly.

‘Right, well I’m going to pop out for a bit. Will you be alright on your own?’ she enquired.

‘Course,’ he replied with a rehearsed nonchalance.

Rachel pushed herself off the edge of the counter and disappeared out of the kitchen door, briefly placing her hand on Mark’s shoulder as she passed. Mark heard the jingle of her car keys as she picked them up off the side and then the slam of the door as it shut behind her. Remaining in his seat at the kitchen table, Mark wondered to himself why he could not open up to Rachel even after all the years he had known her and everything she had done for him. She was aware of bits of his past but not all of it. Sometimes it felt as though he could tell her and that she would understand. Yet, each time he got close, he backed out and instead kept it bottled up. One part of him thought it had gone too long now and that he would never be able to tell her. The other told him that he must tell her, for the sake of their future. The thought of losing her, the one who saved him, was just too much to bear. He knew what his life without her would be like and he could not face going back to it. The drink, the drugs and the depression were all too fresh memories.

He could still remember the day they first met. It was one of the few days from that part of his life that he could remember with any sense of clarity, the rest of it being spent in a semi-conscious haze. Mark had spent the whole day in a bar in town, drinking anything and everything to numb the pain and suppress the memories. He was off the drugs by then, but alcohol had been the only thing he could find to take their place.

When the bar eventually closed in the early hours of the morning, he reluctantly left and ventured out into the freezing cold December air. The moon shone brightly in the clear night sky, over the deserted town, not obscured by a single cloud. He cannot have been more than a hundred metres staggering distance from the bedsit he was living in when he was attacked. Two men, dressed all in black with hoods up and baseball caps on began to beat him with blunt objects until he was on his knees and then curled up on the floor, blood dripping from his mouth and the wind knocked out of him from repeated strikes to his stomach and torso. He had not even heard them approaching. In his drunken state, Mark was completely helpless and the thugs made off with the little remaining cash from his wallet and his mobile phone. In truth, this was all he had apart from the bad memories and he wished they had taken them too. At least then he may have had found some peace.

As he lay on the cold, hard concrete he looked up at the stars. He could remember questioning why if, as he had been told as a young boy, stars are angels waiting to descend to help those on Earth, there were still so many up in the night sky. As he felt a wave of pain pulsate through his ribs and torso, he thought of all the wrongs he had done and felt a sense of karma. He had caused suffering, so now he was to suffer in return. It was strangely poetic.

Luckily for him, Rachel was driving past not long after on her way back from the airport. Her flight, coming back from a business trip, had arrived very early in the morning. She saw Mark lying there and immediately stopped to help, even though they had never met. She was simply unable to turn a blind eye. So many others had already driven by and ignored him. A few people had even walked past and left him there. The winter night had left a grey tinge on the surroundings and they had all been happy to leave Mark to fade into the shadows.

‘Oh my God!’ she muttered as she jumped out of her car. ‘Are you alright? Can you hear me?’ she begged. She sunk down to the floor and knelt beside him, not bothered about the feeling of the freezing cold concrete on her exposed knees, a stark contrast to the warm air which had been blowing from the vents in her car.

Mark stirred slightly, groaning in agony as he turned to see who had come to his rescue. He caught a glimpse of Rachel’s eyes and felt something that he had not done for a long time. Hope.

Rachel helped Mark to sit up against the wall.

‘What happened?’ she asked.

‘Not sure,’ he said, rolling up his t-shirt to see the bruises that were already turning the soft skin of his stomach purple. Rachel caught sight of the damage and winced, sucking in air through her teeth. The stench of alcohol on his breath was unmistakable.

‘Right, well I should call an ambulance,’ she stated, fumbling in her jacket pocket for her mobile phone.

‘No ambulance,’ he pleaded in a slurred voice. ‘Just help me home.’

Rachel looked unsure. She could see he was in a bad way. His hands had yet to leave his stomach and his face was bloodied and bruised.

‘Alright,’ she conceded, slipping the phone back into her jacket. ‘Where do you live?’

‘Just down there,’ he answered, pointing down the road towards a street that ran perpendicular to this one.

‘Right, well get in the car and I’ll drop you off.’

‘Thank you,’ he replied.

‘Can you manage?’ she asked as she helped him to his feet.

Mark nodded as he struggled to stand up, using both the wall and Rachel’s warm forearm as aids. It was hard to tell if it was the beating or the alcohol that was making him unsteady on his feet. Neither would be helping. He eventually half sat and half collapsed into the passenger seat of Rachel’s comfortable car as she slid in the other door.

They drove the short distance to Mark’s bedsit in silence. He appreciated the warmth of the heater as it blew hot air into his face, contrasting the freezing winds that gusted outside. He let his head rest on the comfortable leather headrest, a welcome difference to the concrete he had been on just moments previously.

‘This one,’ said Mark on cue.

‘Are you going to be alright getting inside?’ asked Rachel.

‘I’ll be fine. Thanks,’ he responded, grimacing as he stepped out of the car, steadying himself on the roof.

He took one step away from the safety of the car and immediately collapsed to the ground. Quickly, Rachel hopped out of her car and dashed around to where he now lay.

‘You’re not okay, you need an ambulance!’ she pleaded.

‘Honestly, I’ll be alright. Just need to rest. Hospitals have too many bad…’

‘Hello!?’ called Rachel as Mark’s eyes closed and head lolled to one side. ‘Try and stay awake!’ she spoke loudly into his ear.

His eyes slowly opened.

‘We need to get you inside. Come on,’ she said, standing up and offering him her hand. She could sense curtains twitching as people strained to see what the commotion was. Yet not one person came out to lend a hand.

Mark reached out and put his hand into hers and pulled as hard as he could to pull himself up, though knew deep down that that could not have been too hard.

The next thing he remembers was waking up in his bed with a throbbing headache. He rolled over and saw a glass of water on the tarnished bedside table, which he promptly took and downed. He put the glass back on the side and went to lie on his back before feeling the searing pain that reminded him of the attack the previous night. He only had faint recollections of the attack but could, for some reason, remember being rescued by a beautiful woman afterwards. He thought that it must have been her who had left the water for him.

Just as he had managed to fling his legs over the edge of the bed, he heard a clattering and looked up, startled.

‘How are you feeling?’ Rachel asked, placing a cup of tea down next to him. ‘You didn’t have any tea bags so I had to pop out and get some. And milk. Yours was off.’

‘Sorry,’ he replied.

‘Don’t be, everyone has rough times Mark,’ she said, involuntarily looking around at the dank, horrible place in which he lived. ‘I’m sure you will pull through.’

‘How do you know my name?’ he enquired, puzzled.

‘I looked in your wallet. I hope you don’t mind.’

‘Right,’ he replied.

‘You have a beautiful daughter by the way, what’s her name? She must be about six or seven in that photo, right?’

Mark felt an anger boil up inside, his privacy had been violated and it hit a nerve.

‘Don’t mention her! Okay? You’ve got no right!’ he shouted.

Rachel was obviously stunned and frightened. Mark looked into her eyes and whilst he still felt hope, he could sense nothing but fear emanating from her bright eyes. He felt an overwhelming sense of guilt, which is something he had not felt for a long time and for good reason. It had been just one of the many feelings he had hoped to suppress through narcotics and alcohol over most of the last decade.

‘I’m sorry,’ he began. He quickly thought of how he could justify himself. ‘It’s a…sensitive situation,’ he added.

‘Okay, right. I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have been snooping. I better head off and leave you to it,’ she said as she hastily gathered up her bag, keys and phone.

‘Yeah, sure. Thank you for saving my life and looking after me and everything.’

‘Anybody else would have done the same,’ she said smiling with one half of her mouth.

Mark was not so sure.

‘If you need anything, painkillers or a lift to the hospital, please give me a call,’ she said, handing over a business card with her phone number on it. He could see that she had done well for herself. She was a similar age to him and he could not help but wonder how their lives had ended up so differently.

‘Thank you…Rachel,’ he said, reading the name off the card. ‘But I don’t think I’ll be asking to go to the hospital. I’ve spent enough time in there recently. Believe it or not, this isn’t me at my worst!’ he half joked, making a passing reference to the many months he had spent in drug rehabilitation programmes. They had worked in kicking the drug habit, but had left a huge hole to fill.

Rachel nodded once and stepped out of the door, pulling it shut behind her as she did so.

Having taken enough of a trip down Memory Lane, Mark decided he did not want to be alone with his thoughts any more so chose to go out for a walk instead. Slowly, he slid the wooden chair back along the tile floor and stood up, straightening his red checked, short-sleeved shirt.

As he emerged from the house, the warm air brushed across his face and arms. Oakton had been Mark’s home since he moved in with his now ex-wife nearly twenty years ago. It had seen its fair amount of change over the years, as had Mark. But whilst Oakton had mostly grown and thrived, Mark had done rather the opposite.

As he shuffled along the pavement, Mark gazed out over his surroundings. Eventually, he found himself wandering along the edge of the park. The grassy expanse in front of him was dotted with young couples out enjoying the evening and each other’s company and he couldn’t help but feel he was looking back into his own past. Having just moved to the area in his early twenties, he would lie on the grass with his then girlfriend, soon to be wife, watching the sun setting and the stars coming out. Their whole life was ahead of them and the possibilities were endless. At that time, he had never considered anything other than a positive outcome. He just hoped that none of these couples turned out like they had.

He sat on a bench at the edge of the park and took out his wallet. Inside, next to that same picture of his daughter that Rachel had seen several years ago, was a picture of him and Rachel. The photo was taken when they were on holiday, on the beach with the sun shining. He always remembered that holiday so fondly. It had been the first they had taken as a couple. The first he had taken in nearly a decade. Tucked behind the photo was the business card that Rachel had given him when they had first met, now a bit ragged and torn. She did not know that Mark had kept it for the last four years but, to Mark, it was the symbol that marked the beginning of his second life. It was the turning point for him and, although he had a long way to go in many respects, he was glad that he had called her two days later and that she had remained by his side ever since.

A quick glance at his watch revealed it was later than he thought. He promptly stood up and tracked back along the route he had just come. Despite being summer, the air was dropping cooler now and he was beginning to regret not wearing a jacket. Mark rubbed his hands up and down his exposed arms to stave away the goose bumps.

A short while later, he arrived back at his front door. Rachel’s car now adorned the drive, indicating that she was home. He entered the house and walked into the living room where he found Rachel lounging on the sofa watching television. She must have been back for a little while as she had wet hair from a shower, had changed into her nightwear and made herself a hot chocolate. She did not ask where he had been because she knew. If he was ever out late in the evening, she knew he was clearing his mind.

‘Do you want one?’ she asked, nodding towards the mug of still steaming drink.

‘I might get one in a bit,’ he said, sitting down next to her as she sat up to make room for him.

‘You cheered up yet?’ she quizzed him.

‘I’m honestly fine,’ he assured her. ‘I’ve just got a lot on my mind, that’s all.’

Rachel picked up her mug of drink, blew across the top of it and took a sip. Licking her lips, she placed the drink back down on the table having decided it was still too hot to drink.

‘Well you know you can talk to me, don’t you?’ she reminded him. It was a conversation that they had so frequently that Mark could guess the words before they came out of her mouth. ‘About anything,’ she continued as expected.

‘I know Rach,’ he said. ‘But there isn’t anything to worry about.’

Rachel dropped her head down to lean on Mark’s shoulder and he responded by lifting his arm up and resting it around her. They watched television in silence for a while before Rachel sparked up conversation again.

‘What do you fancy doing tomorrow?’ she asked.

‘Don’t mind,’ he replied.

‘How about we go out for lunch? Just to that café on the edge of the park or something?’

‘I’m not sure,’ he said, clearly uncomfortable with the idea. Since they had met, Mark had never been very comfortable out in public. In case they met someone who knew more about his past than Rachel did. Someone who knew things he had yet to be able to bring himself to tell her. He would simply spend all of his time in the house, out walking alone at a time when he knew it would be quiet and, latterly, at the garage out of town where he now worked as a mechanic part-time. It had been good to get socialising with a new group of people. Somewhere he could begin to rebuild his life, and portray himself in the way that he wanted to without the burden of his past. It has been one of Rachel’s suggestions but not one that had gone down well initially. After some months of persuasion, Mark had eventually relented and applied for a job. With his mechanical skills, the interview had been merely a formality.

‘Come on Mark,’ she said as she sat up and faced him, crossing one leg under the other as she did so, ‘we never go out. It would do you some good to get out of familiar surroundings,’ she insisted, smiling at the prospect.

‘I said I don’t want to, okay?’ he persisted.

‘Why not?’ she queried.

‘Because I don’t!’ he snapped. ‘Will you please stop getting on at me? I said I don’t want to go to the café. End of.’

Rachel was shocked into silence. Even though it happened every now and again, she was still always stunned when Mark spoke to her like that. She would never admit it to anyone, but he genuinely scared her when he was in that mood. At that moment, she had no idea what he was thinking and there was a very real fear that, one day, it might go further than simply shouting. At times it felt almost inevitable that it would, yet she did not feel like she could leave him. Whether it was because she loved him or was scared of being alone, she could not tell.

By now Mark had stood up from the sofa and was backing away from her. Whilst his face still displayed some anger, his eyes gave away the hurt he was feeling. It was this look in his eyes that Rachel used to justify not leaving him. She knew he could not control it and that he hated himself enough for it. It would do him no good to think that she despised him too. It could be the tipping point to send him back to the abyss where she had found him. So she stayed silent and let him go upstairs on his own to calm down.

It had become almost a routine. At least that’s how Rachel would see it because whilst the anger and the shouting were frightening, there is something comforting about a routine. The predictability allowed her to believe that everything would be back to normal tomorrow. And invariably it was.

After a few moments had passed, Rachel relaxed back into the sofa. As she picked up the remote to change channel, she noticed how sweaty her hands had become as her basic physiological instincts had taken over. Once she had settled on a program, she wiped her hands on her top and picked up her mug of chocolate.

It was now cool enough to drink.

Mark reclined on the bed, breathing deeply to dissipate the anger that had overcome him. Over time, he had developed techniques to cool himself down after an outburst. However, he had yet to figure out how to stop it in the first place.

‘Is everything okay?’ came a calm voice from the door.

Mark turned his head to look over towards the door.

‘I heard shouting between you and Mum,’ she explained.

‘Sorry about that, I lost my temper and I shouldn’t have. Everything is fine though, I promise.’

She came into the room and perched on the edge of the bed. About the same age as his own daughter, Rachel’s daughter from her previous marriage had been a part of his Mark’s life ever since he moved in. She had never taken to calling him ‘Dad’ but, in a way, he was glad. It would have made him feel guilty and this was not a feeling he coped with particularly well.

‘Are you two going to break up?’ she questioned, playing with the ends of one of the dyed pink streaks which nestled amongst the rest of her honey blonde hair.

‘Of course not. It was just a silly argument and I got angry. But I shouldn’t have done and I was wrong. You know that, right?’

‘Yeah.’

‘Good.’

They sat in silence for a moment. He thought about Rachel’s proposal for lunch and now could not even think what he had against it. It was this that concerned him the most. There was no reason for his ire. It came on so suddenly, without cause, and he was unable to do anything about it.

‘Do you fancy going out for lunch tomorrow?’ he asked.

‘Yeah, that would be great. It’s been a while since we last did anything like that.’ She looked down at her watch. ‘I’d better be getting to bed. Night!’ she exclaimed as