Climbers – Part 1: Girl

They were climbers. He had already reached the pinnacle of wealth. She had yet to climb. But she showed a desire, a hunger to succeed, an inner steel and resilience, to get whatever she needed…

Alex needed a girl: somebody he could play with. At least, he felt he did. He didn’t know why he felt he needed this girl, this night, in her state. He just did. In much the same way, he craved food after rest, fluid after exercise, sex to cure his stress. A lonely, young man. A loner in an insular isolated world, a sad life void of fantasies, dreams, he needed a girl.

He found her in the usual place, cowering in her damp deserted subway shrouded in heaps of blankets on a bitterly cold winter’s night at minus three, breathing a deep sigh of relief when he realised she was alone. Most of her smooth face was concealed, snugly wrapped up in a drab beige woollen shawl. Still, he could make out her almond eyes, studying him, her dirt-crusted forehead, the tangled knots of greasy, copper, shimmering hair, clinging to her scalp. He stared at her. Her eyes closed, like roller blinds, hiding her shame, her humiliation, at having to beg of a well-off-looking, well-dressed youngish man, like him. A torn-off strip of someone else’s discarded cardboard packaging lay pleading at her feet:

I Am Homeless. Please Help Me.

Her plea was scrawled in black marker ink: dark and bleak, like her future. Assuming she even had a future. Alex shrugged, warm as toast inside his fur-lined winter coat. He drew out his leather wallet. Found some loose change, leaned forward, and deposited his charity in her empty tin. The single silver coin made a soft dull clang as it hit the base of the can.

The girl murmured a slurred, shivery thank you to him for being so kind to her. Her voice: thin, parched, weak with cold, wrought with fatigue, laced with traces of her uncertainty, girdled with fear, hung in the freezing air between them like a sworn curse, upsetting him.

Seeing that she was frightened he sought to reassure her, telling her not to mention it. He felt sorry for her, in truth, riddled with guilt at his wealth, her poverty. By what he wanted of her, expected of her, in return for his candid proposition. He treated her like this every night, at the same time, in all weathers, using differing denominations of coins. Whenever the girl was alone. He studied the top half of her face, fascinated, intrigued, assessing her meticulously, as if she were a business opportunity or risk. Alex Braid loved taking risks.

Who are you? he speculated, to himself, How did your young life end up in this dire mess?

For the want of her. Carefully, he considered the implications of taking her home. He’d need to find out her height, her weight, her bra size, her inside leg measurements, every last minute detail of her. His mind returned to her night ahead. How would she feed? How did she go to the toilet? She must stink to high heaven under her filthy rags. The girl must be starving, emaciated. He’d need to fatten her up. Did her body harbour lice – or worms? She’d need a hot bath when he got her home, a healthy rinse under the shower afterwards, maybe even sanitizing to cleanse her soiled body of her foetid stench, and lurking germs.

A freight train rumbled along the track overhead, shattering the still peace between them.

He looked around her squalid home. The walls of the subway were sprayed with vicious, lurid, graffiti: spray-on obscenities, harsh demands for equality, freedom and change. The sunken shielded lights in the ceiling, some of them smashed, cast a dull sodium glow over their art displays. The concrete path was covered in decaying mulch from where the chill winter wind blew in dead leaves from outside. At least, she was dry, safe from the freezing frost. Satisfied that he’d done all he could to help her survive another night, he turned to leave, dithering, unsure of whether or not he should take her with him, to his secret abode.

She felt, or heard, him go. Her exhausted body slumped against the curved wall in despair. She needed him – and yet? She fretted, wept, then cried, ‘Why are you doing this to me?’

Alex didn’t answer, never answered her. He left her lying on the ground to work out why.

He abandoned the poor girl to survive another night in her ice house, confident that she’d be there, for him, when he returned. So far, she had survived five nights of cold snaps of temperatures falling, low as minus seven. He saw no reason why she couldn’t survive the daunting snow, ice and frost of the hardest nights to come. This girl had an inner steel, an undeniable resilience that he’d come to admire in her, even love in her. Pray she made it.

He wondered whether his visits after dark were the sole reason she stayed alive – for him. The neediness in her eyes when she posed the question: ‘why are you doing this to me?’ demanded his response. It had taken all his self-restraint for him not to reveal his unusual offer of a sanctuary: a hot bath, clean clothes for her to wear, a filling meal, a warm bed. He’d turned away just in time, conscious of the culture shock his proposition represented. After all, the wealthy young donor and his beggar girl did live in entirely different worlds.

One end of the subway led to a tarmac footpath, a clear hazard for him to skate over when frozen, uphill, along the crest of the down, through sheep fields then into the ancient town, with its swollen muddy tidal river, ancient castle, quaint antique map shops, restaurants, tea rooms selling fancy cakes, its boutiques. There was a food bank at the far end of the supermarket car park. Alex suspected this was where she foraged for food during the day.

He wondered how thin she was getting underneath the blanket, how wasted she’d become, but he could only imagine, he’d only seen her eyes, forehead and hair. How old was she? Nineteen, twenty, twenty-one? What was her name? The girl appeared to be a local. Her voice carried a familiar West Sussex country burr. Why had she left the warmth and safety of her home, shelter, her hostel? To live here alone, exposing herself to the risk of serious illness, death or, worse still, attack by the predatory evil men known to prowl these parts in search of easy prey?

He felt contrite, ashamed of himself for deserting her. Why did he leave her? What if she couldn’t survive? He’d never forgive himself, if she came to any harm. So, he went back.

The girl’s eyes widened as he approached, sidling up to her, standing over her, pityingly.

‘Why are you doing this?’ she asked again, searching his blanched white face for a reason.

He crouched at her feet, so as to be closer to her, so as to be less threatening, and fearsome.

‘I have a warm place not far from here where you can stay. You’re free to stay as long as you like, leave whenever you want. There’s a hot bath, clean clothes for you to wear, a meal, a warm bed for you to sleep in afterward,’ he hesitated, his heart stuck in his throat, sensing a softening in her, seeing her shoulders slump under the blanket, seeing her frown.

‘Why would you take me in? You don’t even know me. Besides, I don’t have any cash.’

‘You won’t need any. I’ll help you out until you’re earning. Get you on your feet again.’

She found him condescending, ‘Who are you to tell me what I should and shouldn’t do?’

Alex shook his head, venting his frustration, ‘I’m only trying to help you.’

Her face hardened, filled with anger, ‘I don’t need your help, thanks. I’m happy as I am.’

‘Really?’

‘Yes, really.’

The tension in the girl’s voice said otherwise. She was in two minds as to what to do next.

He lost patience with her, ready to give up the ghost, ‘If you’re sure that’s what you want.’

‘It is what I want,’ she said forcefully, ‘I want you to leave me alone.’

‘Take good care of yourself then. Try to keep yourself warm,’ Alex got up off the ground.

He really cares about me, she considered. The tears welled in her eyes. She choked on her own words, ‘Don’t worry about me. I can look after myself.’

Even as the words left her mouth in puffs of frozen breath, she knew that wasn’t true: she needed him more than ever. Hiding her face under her blankets, she shut him out of her mind, unable to watch him leave her lying there.