Read by Rose Biggin (2nd story in podcast, at 21m 40s)
Mam warned me it would end badly.
“He’s a violent man, Ciara,” she told me. “Look what happened to his wife. I don’t care how many years he’s been inside repenting, it’s only a matter of time before he raises his hand to you.”
I wouldn’t believe a word of it. “Michael’s changed,” I insisted. “He’s found God. He’d never harm a hair on my head.”
Now Mam’s lying dead at home with kitchen scissors roosting in her neck, and I don’t doubt that nosy social worker will have seen her body through the letterbox when no one answered the door this afternoon.
*
We head west, stocking up on provisions in a roadside grocery store. Water, crisps, some sliced bread and processed cheese. A tasteless, on-the-run menu for fugitive lovers.
“You shouldn’t have lost it like that,” I say, as we dump the carriers into the boot, made bold by the distance we’ve covered.
I regret the words the second they leave my mouth.
Michael slams the boot and his jaw clenches. I stiffen. He’s a passionate man, and maybe I’ve been too bold. Mam was right about him raising his hand. Sometimes the anger buried deep inside spills out.
“I swear you’ll be the death of me, Ciara.” He turns, pinches my chin between his finger and thumb, and his eyes drink up my tilted face. “If I didn’t love you so much …” There’s no mistaking the fury coursing from his body to mine, and my skin prickles.
“The baby’s awake,” I murmur. With a touch as soft as feathers, I take his hand from my face and place it over the ripple in my belly. His eyes brim as if he’s glimpsed heaven, and he wraps me up in a tender bear hug, anointing my crown with kisses.
My God, I adore this man.
*
I press bread and cheese together into stodgy sandwiches, for my pregnant body is starving, and cram the food into my mouth. Only when I notice the crescents of dried blood under my nails do I stop and gaze out of the window instead.
The motorway studs gleam like a never-ending rosary, and my vision blurs from counting them. It’s been our dream to start afresh where nobody casts stone glances. But when I close my eyes, I find no peace. Instead, the scarlet horror of the day seeps through my lids, playing on repeat.
When Mam’s body had slumped to the floor, I screamed all my breath away. All I’d wanted was for her sharp tongue to rest − never this. Michael pulled me to my feet, pressing my face to his chest until the trembling passed.
“It had to be done,” he’d said. “She shouldn’t have stood in our way.”
I’d agreed. After all, Michael had only wanted me by his side, where I belonged.
Mam should never have meddled.
*
When the fuel light blinks on, we pull into a service station and spend the last of our cash on petrol, but there’s barely enough for half a tank. I wait in the car while Michael lopes inside to pay, hood up and shoulders hunched against the CCTV camera. There’s a queue at the counter, and while I’m waiting, I reach into my coat pocket for my phone.
I know I shouldn’t, but I turn it on.
Multiple missed calls from Sandra, the social worker.
I tap on her name.
She picks up after the first ring, her voice oozing with concern. I picture her furrowed brow and her liquid brown eyes. But I’ve seen how her mouth puckers when she listens, a sure sign her caring demeanour is fake. Just like Michael says, all she wants to do is trip me up. I’ll bet those lips are as creased as scrunched paper right now.
“Ciara! Are you okay?” she gushes.
“I’m fine.”
“Are you with Michael? Is it safe to talk?”
“I can talk for a minute.”
“We know what Michael’s done to your Mam. Ciara, I’m so sorry.”
No words come to mind, so I wait.
“Where are you, pet?” she presses. “Just tell us where you are and we’ll come and fetch you. It’s not too late to make the right choice.”
“I’m sorry, I have to go.”
“Ciara, think of the baby −”
I drop the call, slipping the silenced phone into my pocket just as Michael strides back across the forecourt. We buckle up and set off.
“Where are we heading?” I ask as the traffic thins out and the mountains loom like approaching thunderclouds.
“To the peninsula. There’s an abandoned cottage out on Connor’s Point that a cellmate mentioned. We can hunker down there for a week or two.”
I pick at my fingernails, counting the days left until my due date. We’ve talked about a free birth, far from the prying eyes of midwives and those who’d interfere. We’ve decided that a natural birth is best, with only God to intervene as He sees fit. But now, the thought of delivering in a windswept shack ties my stomach in knots.
“The police will be after us,” I say.
“We’ve had a good head start,” he retorts, but I’ve spooked him. He turns on the radio and tunes in for the news.
Gravely worried, a newsreader announces after naming me, her contralto voice as calm as if she were reporting high winds out at sea. Considered extremely dangerous, she says about Michael. Members of the public are urged not to approach. Michael slams the steering wheel with his fist and the car lurches.
“Goddam it! They think I’m a monster. I’m not that man any more.”
I cradle my belly, shrinking into my seat. “When the world hates you, remember they hated Jesus first,” I remind him.
He glares through the windscreen. Moments pass before he nods and offers a gruff “Amen.”
*
The petrol runs out in the early hours and Michael steers the juddering car up an overgrown logging track. In the heart of the whispering forest, I lean across the seats and shiver in Michael’s arms, drifting in and out of sleep until dawn.
Michael’s still snoring when my full bladder and aching back force me to stir. Murmuring words of reassurance, I wriggle from the rigid crook of his arm and heave myself outside. Showers have drenched the forest in the night and the air is as damp as if just exhaled. I stumble a short distance from the car to pee, steadying myself against the trunk of a tree as I squat. Rummaging in my pocket for a tissue, I find my phone and glance through the multiple text messages.
Please call.
We just want to know you’re okay.
Think of the baby.
“Ciara.” Michael looms over me, making me jump − I swear he never even snapped a twig creeping up on me. Ashamed, I place the phone in his extended hand and scramble to my feet, rearranging my clothes.
“I told you to leave it behind.” His eyes glitter as he scrolls through the messages. “Don’t you realise they can track us through this?”
When Michael’s temper sparks, it’s best not to say a word. He breaks open the phone, scattering components at our feet, and the sting as he slaps my face makes me gasp.
“Get moving.”
“Where? The car won’t make it any further.”
“We’re crossing the mountain on foot.” He grasps my arm as if I were a disobedient child and drags me back to the spent car, where he stuffs the last of our bottled water into his rucksack. My mouth is dry but this is no time to ask favours from a burdened man. It takes all my effort to scurry along in his wake.
I pray for God to soothe his troubled heart and grant us speed.
*
The pine forest opens onto an empty car park at the base of Pilgrim’s Trail, an ancient pathway to the summit and the valley beyond. Michael pauses by the small Shrine of Our Lady cut into the rock face and makes the sign of the cross. His shoulders sag, and I link my arm through his.
“I’m sorry,” he says. “It’s just that you and the baby mean the world to me, and now everything’s at stake.”
“Have faith, Michael. Remember we still have each other, and that’s all that matters.”
He kisses me, and my heart brims with love.
*
We’re both wearing trainers, and our soaked feet slip and splash through the rivulets of water trickling down the mountainside. Waking up yesterday morning, we had no notion we’d be clambering over glistening glacial rubble, and we’re grossly under-prepared. The wind picks up as we ascend, whipping up a shimmer on the paternoster pools we edge around.
“Look,” Michael says, pointing across the distance to where we’ve climbed from. Through the thickening mist, the car park from which we set off glimmers with headlamps as vehicles pull in. Blue lights flicker.
“I can’t go any faster.” I scramble on for a few more steps and pause, panting. The path is too narrow to accommodate the ungainly ballast of my body, and I’m cursing the wobble of my treacherous ankles. The sheer drop to our side makes me cringe.
Michael turns to glare at me, his hands raised to his head. His damp hair is plastered in spikes around his face. “Christ, sometimes I wish I’d never met you.”
The bitterness of Michael's words cuts so deep I lean against a boulder to catch my breath. I’ve never doubted his devotion before. “You don’t mean that.”
“I’ve tried to choose what’s best for you. God knows I’ve always put you first. But I can’t go back to prison again.” He pauses, dropping his gaze. “I’ve been praying for guidance, and I’ve decided to tell the truth.”
“You mustn’t! Michael, they’ll take the baby.”
“Oh, Ciara, they were always going to take the baby, don’t you see? But if they know the truth, perhaps they’ll let me play some part in his life. It’s over, Ciara. I’m done protecting you.”
He can’t let me down like this. Not now. Rage bubbles up and roars in my ears. The same rage that washed over me yesterday when Mam and Michael were screaming blue murder at each other and I had to make it stop. With the same strength that I drove the scissors into Mam’s neck, I lurch forward and throw my weight into Michael, pummelling his chest.
He staggers, unbalanced by his rucksack, eyebrows raised and mouth agape. His hands clutch at my shoulders and for a second, I fear we’ll both topple over.
But he does love me after all, for he propels me away with a shove that sends me staggering and him reeling backwards. His arms flail like wings but he is gone, a fallen angel swallowed by the cloud. Loose rocks patter after him, tapping their way into silence.
Blessed are those who mourn.
I fight an urge to follow, for never have I felt such despair.
Sandra’s words circle in my head, swooping like vultures to pick at my heart. Think of the baby, pet. Think of the baby. I stroke my belly, feeling through my skin for the knobble of his shoulder, the smooth curved back. She’s right. It’s what Mam and Michael would want. I’ll tell Sandra exactly what she wants to hear. I’ll explain how Michael was laden with guilt when he tripped and fell, for how can that hurt him now?
With chattering teeth, I lumber back down Pilgrim’s Trail towards the sweeping, searching beams of light.
(c) Cecilia Maddison, 2025
Cecilia Maddison is a writer from London, where her career as a health professional has run alongside her love for real & imagined stories. She is a Best of the Net 2024 nominee, & winner of the Edinburgh Flash Fiction Award 2025. Read more of her work at www.ceciliamaddison.com Instagram: cec_maddison X: @CecMaddison
Rose Biggin is a writer & performer based in London. She’s worked in live art, immersive theatre & plays. Most recently she devised & performed in alt. opera Star Quality (Cockpit Theatre 2024), featuring on BBC 6 Music & Resonance FM. She’s read both her own & others' work at Unsung Live, Nine Worlds New Voices & Naked Girls Reading. She’s author of two novels, punk fantasy Wild Time (Surface Press 2020: the Guardian's "Hottest Front-Room Seats") & gothic thriller The Belladonna Invitation (Ghost Orchid Press 2023). She is an associate lecturer in Creative Writing at Birkbeck.
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