Graft by Matt Hill Page B

Roy remembers thinking,  Just be brave, little man, and this’ll be fine. He supposed it was a scene from a life he might’ve had – a kind of reverse premonition.
    Backed against a wall, Roy edged across, hands splayed, as though on a ledge. He went deeper into the shadows, grateful that the TV flooded the room with sound.
    Then the woman opened the bathroom door.
    Roy flattened himself then, just off the angle. He stayed down and hoped and hoped –
    At last he looked – no danger – and used the long mirrors to watch them.
    The woman was patting her hair with a small towel. Not a clue. Her lad rolled over, his pyjama shirt open and chest fully white.
    â€œOh!” the woman said. “You big sausage. Why’ve you got that all over you?”
    The boy looked awkward. Sort of distant and sad. He put a hand in the pasty mess and started crying. “You told me Sudocrem fixes everything,” he said.
    â€œSilly apeth,” she said, and pulled him into her.
    â€œI want to go home,” the boy told her, muffled in her flesh. “Daddy’s never here even when he brings us with him.”
    Remarkably, this filled Roy’s throat.
    The woman held him then, and her towel came away as she sat on the bed.
    Roy was too tensed, lost his balance, felt a joint crack.
    The woman span.
    Roy cleared his throat, got up to leave, whispered, for some reason he’ll never understand: “Excuse me.”
    The boy nearly hit the ceiling. But he didn’t scream.
    The woman baulked, wet hair across her face. She did.
    Then the suite’s front door opened. Timing or what.
    The woman stared at Roy, hand on her mouth. Her eyes were glassy. Her scream echoed down the corridor –
    The mark ran in, saw his family, then Roy. He went, “You?”
    Almost like he knew him.
    So Roy being Roy took out his revolver and shot all three.
----
    T he woman’s mask comes into Sol’s hands with a sucking noise. Like papier-mâché off a balloon. The tubes come out with a gout of phlegm. She gags, but there’s nothing to bring up.
    Artificial light –
    And so much to take in at once: Sol looks into her drawn eyes, bigger than average, and dead-glazed, each staring loosely back; an uncanny luminosity to them. Her nose is crooked. Her head’s shaved bald. There’s dry blood caked on her chin, a dotted square tattoo on her throat. And her mouth is stapled closed.
    Sol simply shakes his head. Unreality. You can imagine horror, conceive horrific acts, but being confronted with it, and so intimately, dismantles the world around you – kicks you in the guts and leaves you swaying on the flimsiest of bases. A savage reminder that people are at their most inventive when they want to hurt each other.
    From her face, he guesses the woman must be in her early twenties. Nameless, voiceless – caught now between some hidden ordeal and the cold walls of Sol’s knock-off shop.
    â€œAre you OK?” he asks, a hand on his face.
    She peers into him, eyes sharpening. Working him out, maybe. Then she’s looking past him, focusing on the far wall. He clocks that she’s seen something – it’s there in her expression, a twinge, a shift. Her eyes snap back to him, and she seems to hold her breath. And then it all changes again.
    Just like that, just as fast, the woman’s fugue evaporates. She lunges at him, collapses on to him. Only the sounds of nasal breathing, scuffling, as she claws at his head and face. Caught off guard, he’s quickly overpowered. The blows come sharply, and while he parries what he can, she’s too powerful – so scarily quiet and committed. Her hairless head remains still, neck strong, and she doesn’t seem to blink at all.
    â€œStop,” he manages. “Stop!” Sol grabs a wrist, tries to drag it across him to decentre her weight. But the woman has him straddled, and each time he pulls, her third fist finds