Elaine had been the cause of both of her marriages failing. She was a failure, just like Tracey had always said. But Tracey was a failure, too. She’d failed tremendously, and horrendously as a mother. She had failed Elaine. Once Morris had given up and abandoned her, Elaine had decided to abandon her search for love. After all, she’d found it three times already, she was just unable to hold onto it. And Tracey was the reason for that. It was time she dealt with the cause of all her problems. It was time to head back to Ainsley. The village she had thought, she’d never see again. But needs must. If she wanted to truly move on, and heal, Elaine would have to confront Tracey. She was done with running away, hiding and trying to forget; those methods hadn’t worked for her.


She’d tried therapy at Sean’s suggestion - eventually, after he’d nagged her for months - but that hadn’t helped either. Morris had suggested couples counselling but she’d refused. None of her partners knew exactly what she’d suffered, and she hadn’t wanted them to.

The look of pity in their eyes when she had her emotional breakdowns, was already bad enough. Elaine didn’t want or need pity, she just wanted the pain to end. She’d once believed, that becoming an adult and gaining her freedom,m and escaping the claws of Tracey, was all that she’d needed to be happy. How wrong she’d been. She was an adult only by age, but her brain was stuck in her torturous childhood, holding her back, refusing to let her go. Her counsellor had told her that she needed to face her problems in order to overcome them. Tracey was her problem. Always had been, always would be.


Elaine had avoided all contact with the woman; she didn’t even use social media, making herself less accessible. She had kept an eye on Tracey via Facebook, though, using a ghost account. As always, Tracey seemed to be doing okay in life. Still living in Ainsley, still considered a pillar of the community. Elaine thought it was ludicrous, that Tracey had avoided detection, and had not yet been revealed as the monster she really was. What was wrong with the residents of Ainsley? It was understandable that people got away with all sorts of evil in big cities, because life was more disconnected there; neighbours barely spoke to each other. But in a small village like Ainsley, everyone knew each other. Well at least they thought they did, but they didn’t know Tracey at all.


Elaine had psyched herself up with plenty of Dutch courage - in the form of brandy - in preparation of coming face-to-face with her arch-enemy. The woman who birthed her, ruined her life and had shown not a morsel of regret or remorse. Elaine wanted Tracey to acknowledge and apologise for the hell she had forced her to live. Elaine was going to put the past to bed, but not until her monstrous mother had accepted what she’d done. Then, Elaine would leave Ainsley, and pretend like the village and everyone living in it, did not exist. But things hadn’t gone the way she’d hoped, and here she was, trying to recall how she’d ended up in this room. But the reason for being here was starting to fade back into her memory.


Elaine remembered catching Tracey, unawares, inside the cottage they’d once lived in together. Just the sight of it had made Elaine feel nauseous, and light-headed. She’d let herself inside via the unlocked backdoor. The door that had served as an entrance and exit, for the men who’d paid to do sickening things to her as a child. Tracey, now in her late forties had been asleep in the living room and hadn’t even stirred, when Elaine had entered the room and stood over her, as she snored in an armchair. She had opened her eyes and screamed as soon as Elaine had held a knife against her throat. A drunken Elaine had threatened to slit that throat, unless Tracey apologised for what she and countless others who’d paid for the privilege, had done to her. Tracey had laughed after recovering from the shock of the situation; she’d mocked Elaine, telling her that she didn’t “have the balls to do it.”


Realising that Tracey would not play nice, even with a sharp blade against her throat, Elaine had applied pressure. She’d drawn the blade lightly on the surface of the older woman’s skin. It wasn’t a deep cut but there was blood and the look on Tracey’s face had changed; she had now realised that Elaine wasn’t here to play games. Elaine would kill Tracey, unless she got that apology. But Tracey hadn’t said it with sincerity and Elaine wasn’t satisfied, so she’d forced her to go down into the basement, where she injected her with Benzodiazepine, she’d ordered off the dark web.

Tracey remained louped up and sedated for five days, whilst Elaine sat in the kitchen, drinking all the alcohol that she could find around Tracey’s home.


She’d felt great in the first twenty-four hours of Tracey’s imprisonment but that had quickly changed. She’d wanted everything to end. Her life and Tracey’s. She’d injected herself with the same chemical that she’d used on Tracey. She’d slept for what felt like days before going into the basement to check on Tracey. Tracey was dead. Several days had passed since Elaine had provided her with any food or water. Elaine should’ve felt relieved but she wasn’t wired that way. She’d called the police and reported what she’d done and they had arrived along with paramedics and an ambulance. The next thing Elaine knew, she was waking up in a sterile, bland and clinical room. When she’d asked the nurse about Tracey, the nurse hadn’t known what she was talking about.

Elaine expected to be interviewed by police but as far as she remembered, that hadn’t yet happened. She was confused, her head and memories, fuzzy. She was even more confused when Sean had come to visit her.


She’d asked him if she was going to be arrested for murder, for killing Tracey. He’d looked at her with pity and love and told her that Tracey had died of a heart attack, two years ago. Elaine had asked him about Ainsley and he’d told her that she’d not been back there since she left five years ago. Sean had told her she was on a psychiatric ward, because she’d been hallucinating. She was in a private hospital in London and he just wanted her to recover; get the help that she needed and then come home to him. But Elaine had thought they’d divorced and she’d even remarried, what about Morris and that other man she’d been engaged to?

“Honey, we’ve only been married for eighteen months. I am never going to divorce you.


None of what she’d thought had happened, had actually happened. Elaine was twenty-four not thirty four, and she’d had a psychotic episode. She was even more stunned when her father Patrick visited her. “I thought you were dead,” she’d whispered.

“Not yet, my darling,” he’d said with a smile. Nothing had made any sense. She couldn’t focus on anything that people were saying. She was very confused. Things started to become clear after a few weeks as the antipsychotic medication began to take effect. She was also having talking therapy. The psychotherapist had access to Elaine’s medical notes from her childhood, as well as the reports done by social services back then; the abuse Elaine had suffered whilst in her mother’s care, had been reported. Many times by many different people but Elaine had kept running away from the care homes she’d been placed in. Running back to Ainsley and Tracey; Stockholm syndrome.


When she’d left Ainsley at eighteen and married Sean a few years after, the trauma of her past had been triggered, possibly when she’d found her father, but she’d spiralled out control at the news of Tracey’s death. Maybe because Tracey had died without ever accepting that she had inflicted so much pain upon Elaine. Sean was very loving, patient and supportive. He visited her everyday for the three months she remained in hospital. Her three half-siblings had visited her a few times, too. Elaine felt loved, appreciated and worthy. She had finally opened up, not just to her psychotherapist, but to her husband and relatives, too. Carrying the trauma of her past and trying to suppress it, hadn’t worked. She finally felt as though the weight of her trauma was getting lighter. She wanted to be a better and stronger wife, daughter and sister. And a mother, one day.


All the pain that she’d thought she’d experienced in adulthood, were just her fears. Elaine was relieved that she hadn’t sabotaged her first marriage, because she wanted it to be her only marriage. Now that she remembered how she got here, she was also ready to leave. She would continue to take medication for now, carry on with talking therapy as an outpatient, and live her life assured that she had support around her.

Stepping into Sean’s car, as he held the door open for her, she felt a wave of anxiety. For the past three months she’d not had to face the outside world and she was afraid of triggering an other psychotic episode.


As if reading her mind, Sean had bent down to kiss her and said, “Whatever happens, you will always have me. You can talk to me, anytime and about anything. I love you very, very much Elaine. And I’ll love you until I die.” Elaine had smiled widely and said, “I love you with all my heart and soul, Sean. I couldn’t have got through my breakdown and recovery, without you. Thank you so much.” They had driven home listening to all of Elaine’s favourite music and had made love ad soon as they’d closed their front door.

Life had been tough on Elaine but she was in a better place now and she would always remember how she got here.