Page 43 of The Stranger in Room Six

Belinda

Time in prison goes much slower than you think. In films, they show men carving dates into their cell walls one minute, then getting out the next. But it’s not like that in reality.

Instead, you have to make a pact with yourself. You have to stop counting the days. You must stop marking the months in your mind, and think in years instead. So far, I’ve done three. They feel like a lifetime.

Even when those years are up, you need to convince a parole board that you’ve reformed enough to be released. If they aren’t convinced, you serve another year. And maybe another. And another.

When you do get out, the world will not be as you know it, although that’s another story. The point is that if you allow yourself to tick off every day inside, you will go stark raving crazy. If you’re not crazy already.

I know this because Mouse has told me. She speaks a lot of sense, my cellmate. But I wouldn’t want to get on the wrong side of her.

In the meantime, I’m working very hard at pretending to be scary myself. The odd thing is that the longer it goes on for, the more I begin to feel that I really am frightening and not just play-acting.

Meanwhile, we’re coming up to Christmas.

It’s one of the few landmark dates that Mouse says I’m allowed to acknowledge, as I mentally count down the years to release.

It would be hard not to. Staff are on leave; festive decorations are allowed, but no tinsel, which could be used for strangulation.

There are more visitors in the already overcrowded hall.

Everyone is upset and emotional because they want to be with their families, even if they hated each other before coming in here; in some cases even murdered them.

Add menstrual and pre-menopausal and post-menopausal symptoms to the cauldron and you get the picture.

‘You’re different, Mum,’ says Elspeth when she pays her monthly visit.

‘Really?’ I ask, knowing she’s right. I’m doing my best to be brittle and uncaring, at least on the outside.

‘You seem to have accepted you’re here.’

‘I have to, darling,’ I say.

Seeing Elspeth is such a relief. We talk about her university studies and which career Gillian might choose and whether life is all right with Uncle Derek.

I somehow manage to ask these things despite the jealousy raging inside my heart. A jealousy mixed with fury because Gerald’s affair and my own stupid actions mean that someone else is bringing up my children.

‘I don’t like to think of you being alone here for Christmas, Mum,’ she says to me.

‘I’ll be fine,’ I say firmly, determined that she mustn’t carry my pain of a solitary December 25th in my cell: a far better option than sitting with my companions in front of the communal lounge TV.

After Elspeth has left, I am filled with such despondency that I allow myself the luxury of opening Imran’s latest letter.

Dear Belinda,

I know you have my address because I put it on the last letter, but I still haven’t received a reply.

You can’t get rid of me that easily. I’m going to keep writing because I can’t bear to think that I found you again and then instantly lost you.

We’ve been through that once before. Do you remember the Magdalen Ball?

You looked beautiful, Belinda. That was the night when I said I wanted to spend the rest of my life with you.

All right, I know I wasn’t completely honest with you then, but I meant what I said.

I just didn’t explain my personal circumstances.

You were right to get upset when I told you the truth.

I was sorry then and I’m even more sorry now.

Give me another chance, Belinda, please.

I will wait for you, no matter how long it takes.

Love, Imran.

I’d thrown all of Imran’s previous letters away, but this one I put under my pillow for one night only and then, in the morning, I tear it up into narrow strips.

As I do so, I feel Mouse’s eyes on me, leaning over from the top bunk.

‘Good girl,’ she says. ‘Remember what I’ve told you.

Put up a barrier and then the bastards can’t hurt you. ’

‘Imran isn’t a bastard,’ I retort.

Her eyes glint. ‘So that’s his name, is it?’

I curse myself for having let that slip out.

‘Is that why you murdered your husband? So you could go off with lover boy?’

‘No,’ I snap back. ‘It was because Gerald was having an affair and I didn’t allow myself to go off with the only man I’ve ever loved.’

Mouse, hanging upside down from her bunk like a bat, shakes her head.

‘I’m not sure I get you but either way, Belinda, you’re doing well.

You’re stronger than you think. The women respect you, but you need to work more on the staff.

I’ll tell you this for free. The only way to get through this hell is to make the bastards think you’re on their side.

Do a good deed that makes them respect you. ’

‘But what?’

Mouse’s head is going up. She’s retreated to her top bunk, out of sight. But her voice floats down.

‘You’ll think of something. And if you don’t, you’d better start making plans for your own funeral. ’Cos sooner or later, someone will try and top you. Jac might be gone, but some of her friends are still here – and they have long memories.’