The Carhullan Army

like a bird that had flown accidentally into the rafters through an open window, then lost its bearings and been unable to leave. Though I half expected her, Jackie did not come to see me again, and there were no more initiations or welcomes, no more meals brought to me on trays, just the muffled sounds of people below and outside getting on with things, signalling my exclusion. The second herbal analgesic had worn off, leaving me thirsty and quaking, and I was aware of how empty my stomach was again. I knew the decision to leave the room was now mine alone. Hunger rather than courage would drive me out. It was late afternoon when I finally found the desperation to move. By then the spasms in my abdomen had lessened and I felt able to face all those who must know about my presence but had yet to see me in the flesh.
    The woollen tunic seemed strange when I slipped it on, like a rough borrowed shirt, an item taken temporarily from a friend until wet or damaged clothing might be returned. In its weave was a mustiness, and the lingering scent of someone else – I did not know who – perhaps the last person to have worn it, whenever that was. But it was comforting to have been given it, and as I fastened its ties in a knot at my back I began to feel less solitary, less alien. I knew this was the first official step towards inclusion.
    I came nervously down the stone stairs, barefoot and careful on the cold steps. There was a door at the bottom of the hallway and a hum of activity in the room beyond it. I opened it to find upwards of thirty women sitting on benches at a long wooden table, taking a small meal of dark brown meat and kale.
    They turned when they saw me and stopped eating, and for a long minute I endured their full scrutiny, uncivil and raw. I scanned the rows for a face that I could recognise – Megan, Lorry or even Jackie – but there was no one I could quietly implore to rise and seat me, introduce me, or serve as my guide in this unfamiliar realm.
    Facing me were women of all ages, some with grey in their hair, some with long braids, and others with eccentrically cropped styles. They were mostly dressed as the women I’d met on the moors had been, practically, with thrift and a certain bespoke artistry. Some had overalls that seemed extreme and invented, tribal almost. Others had panels and shapes shaved into their heads. They wore straps of leather around their wrists and upper arms, and stone pendants: their smocks and shirts were cut down, resewn, and there was a small girl among them with her face painted blue, and blue stains on her jumper. No one else had on a yellow tunic. The bright item I was wearing suddenly seemed more like a convict’s uniform than it did my banner of belonging. I tried to smile and greet them but my mouth was paralysed. All I could do was remain still, silently waiting for someone to tell me what to do.
    I heard whispering along the bench. Then, one by one, they stood up, as if about to change shift. I thought perhaps they were leaving, because my presence had somehow triggered offence, because I was not wanted here. But instead they picked up their knives and began knocking the handles on the tabletop, quietly at first, then louder. They looked straight at me and banged down on the wood, and the plates in front of them jumped and clattered. Bits of food spilled off the earthenware onto the scrubbed oak. The knives flashed silver in their hands. The little girl leapt up and down on the bench.
    I blinked fast and involuntarily in the racket. The sound rang through me as if I were made of glass and might shatter if it continued, so brittle and thin was my spirit. I was rooted to the floor, afraid to move forward, unable to turn and leave, not knowing whether to ask for mercy or somehow stand my ground against them. The drumming went on and on, and I felt its tattoo echoing in the hollowness of my body.
    I knew then that I was nothing; that I was void to the core. To get here I had committed a kind of suicide. My old life was over. I was now an unmade person. In the few days that I had been at Carhullan nobody had called me anything other than Sister, though they had seen my identification card and knew my name, and I had shouted out my story over and over from behind the metal walls of the dog box, trying to engage their sympathies, trying to tell them who I was. The person I had once been, the person who had walked out of the safety zones and up the mountain, was gone.