Birmingham Rose by Annie Murray

realize it in a minute and stop touching her. She thought her heart was going to burst it was beating so loud, and her hands had gone clammy.
    ‘Stand up,’ Mr Lazenby ordered. His voice sounded polite still, but had a hard, unfamiliar edge to it. He pulled her up by moving his hands under her arms and he steered her away from the chair. Rose obeyed, bewildered. She was very afraid, but she couldn’t think what else to do. The building around them had gone quiet.
    After that, quite silently except for his breathing, which sounded loud and fast, he pulled her against him. She was still facing the desk, the impassive blotter, the penholder and the set, smiling faces of his children. He moved up and down against her buttocks, fitting himself close to her.
    He began grabbing at her clothes, the green cardigan and soft white blouse. He lost patience with the buttons and she heard the blouse tear apart at the front. The image of Miss Smart’s face as she had ripped Rose’s bloomers that day filled her mind for a second. At least then she had understood what was happening.
    ‘Stop it, Mr Lazenby – please,’ she begged, her voice turning high like a little girl’s. ‘I don’t like this. Please stop and let me go home.’
    She turned her head and felt a plunging sensation of revulsion at the sight of him behind her. He didn’t look like Mr Lazenby any more. His eyes were half closed and seemed to be rolled up into the lids so he looked all peculiar, as if he were in a trance. And his tongue was sticking stiffly out of his mouth towards her ear.
    ‘What are you doing?’ she shouted. ‘Help me somebody – please. Please!’
    She tried to get his hands off her, but as if prompted by her cries, Mr Lazenby shoved her to the floor, cold against her breasts and stomach as she writhed and kicked. She felt his knee in her back pinning her to the floor, and twisting round she saw he had unbuttoned his trousers and was rubbing himself with his hand, fast up and down. He pulled off her underwear and stockings, pausing to caress himself with one hand as he did so. She knew she didn’t have the strength to get away from him. She put her arms flat on the floor and laid her head down so she didn’t have to see his face with its self-absorbed expression or his horrifying, swollen member.
    He pushed her skirt up and made her move her legs apart. She had never taken her clothes off in front of a man before, not even a doctor. She pressed her eyes shut at the shame of it. Tears squeezed from her lids on to the floor. She thought at least she hadn’t got her monthly to add to the humiliation. She knew that what Mr Lazenby was doing must be what she had heard her father do so often to her mother, but it didn’t prepare her any better for what happened next.
    He gradually forced one of his fingers up inside her so that she squirmed and cried out in shock and pain.
    ‘Oh . . .’ Mr Lazenby gave a low groan. ‘Young, tight.’
    They were the only words he spoke until he’d finished. Quickly he climbed on her and forced hard up into her from behind and she screamed and then whimpered at his repeated movements. Each time he pushed into her she felt a terrible stab of pain somewhere deep in her guts. Her hipbones and ribs were grinding hard against the floor with the weight of him on top of her and she was finding it hard to breathe. She lifted her head, sobbing and trying to take in gasps of air so her mouth dried out. It took some time before he managed to finish, and he came at last with a loud, relieved cry.
    When he had stumbled off her he buttoned himself up again and watched as she slowly pulled herself off the floor and found her clothes. The wet ran down her legs as she stood up and her tears wouldn’t stop coming. She didn’t look at Mr Lazenby when she was clothed again. She began to walk mechanically to the door.
    Mr Lazenby gave a little cough. ‘Er – Rose, just a minute,’ he said.
    She forced herself to look round and