Prologue


January 2004

The walls shift. A face looms from the pattern of mould in the corner. My mind weaves between shadows. I don't know where I am. My body is soaked in some one else's sweat. I am crushed by his weight, torn apart by the pain that thrusts through me. I don't know how I got here.

Something turns in my stomach. I open my eyes. I'm not in that room. I got out. I left Sydney, left Australia. I touch the wall, feel the rough lumps of polyfilla that I know as well as I know my own scars. It's a year later and I'm back in England, in my childhood bedroom. Inside me the baby kicks. I put my hands on my stomach. Soon it will be over.

A dim light illuminates the animal print curtains. Outside is a broken world of terrorism, weapons of mass destruction and men. I can't keep this baby safe.

I can't keep this baby.

I don't know how I got here.


Rape Crisis


Chapter One




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Chapter One

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