Chapter 33: THEN - The Safe Room

I let myself get swept up in the novelty of a new relationship—doing the big shop together, texting stupid memes during lectures, complaining about dissertations and early-morning shifts. Ed loved debating things; I loved listening to him twist logic into knots, and laughed whenever he gave in.

He came over one evening when my housemates were out, and we sat on the floor eating pesto pasta from cereal bowls. We were halfway through a conversation about movies when I got up to close the curtains as the sun went down. Ed went quiet for a moment before he turned curious eyes in my direction.

“Why do you always close the curtains as soon as it gets dark?” he asked.

I shrugged. “I guess it’s just a habit.”

“You usually check the windows are locked, too, and you always lock the door as soon as we go into the house.”

I blinked. “What do you mean? Aren’t they just normal things to do?”

“It’s more than that, Amber. Your shoes are always somewhere you can grab them fast. You sit facing the door every time we’re out. You scan every restaurant we enter. Every shop we walk into.” He held my gaze. “Has something happened? In your past?”

A hundred explanations rushed into my mind. I could lie. I could tell him I was paranoid by nature, that I was born with an anxiety chip built in. I could shrug it off with a joke. But I was tired of lying by omission.

So, I told him everything, going all the way back to the first car ride, working through the relentless stalking, and ending on Peter going to prison.

“I never told you this, but a few months into us dating, I had to give a witness testimony at York courthouse. Peter violated a restraining order against me when he followed me after a night out. The police found photos of me on his phone that he’d taken over several weeks in York, and he was sentenced to eighteen months in prison.”

He stared at me, his jaw slightly open. “Why didn’t you say something?”

“Honestly… I didn’t want to talk about it. I guess I just wanted to enjoy… this.” I gestured to us. “The whole thing with Peter at court brought back these horrible memories from the past. I’ve had to be a witness before, against my own dad when he tried to protect me.”

“What do you mean?”

“We found Peter outside my bedroom window one night. Dad stormed out into the street and punched him.” I sighed. “The police arrested my dad, charged him with assault, and made him pay a fine even though we lived on a council estate in Leeds.” I brushed away tears. “We had no money, so it was… That time in my life, it feels so… so dirty. And what you and I have is fresh, and pure. I didn’t want to mix the two.”

He set the bowl aside and pulled me gently into his arms. The hug wasn’t suffocating. He didn’t say he’d fix me or protect me or any of the hero-fantasy lines men in movies give. He just held me.

“I’m free to be me right now,” I told him. “He’s behind bars and everything is okay. But that won’t last forever.”

“Then we’ll take it day by day,” Ed said. “We’ll figure it out together.”

For weeks after, I slept better than I had in years.

There were still moments of fear. Small ones. A sharp knock at the door that made adrenaline spike through my nervous system. When a blocked number called my phone, it made my stomach twist. One day, a man in a dark coat walked too close behind me on the way home. I crossed the street and took a few sharp turns to lose him. Every time it happened, I felt like I’d failed. Like I wasn’t moving on fast enough, wasn’t healed enough to deserve a normal relationship.

I noticed Ed watching me with curiosity and every now and then I felt like an animal in a zoo. One morning, I caught him reading through the print-out of my witness statement that I kept in my desk drawer. He shut it the second I walked in.

“Sorry,” he said. “I wasn’t snooping. I wanted to borrow a pen and—” He shrugged. “I’m so sorry, Amber.”

“You read it?”

He hung his head. “I did. It was stupid. I swear I didn’t seek it out; I just found it.”

I didn’t know how to react. I was mad at first. After being violated by Peter all these years, my privacy chipped away, I couldn’t stand the thought of Ed doing it too. For a few days, I found myself keeping him at arm’s length until I decided to accept his explanation. It was just a mistake.

He surprised me with a picnic in the living room one night. He said it was for finishing my coursework draft, but I knew it was also because he felt guilty. And I accepted both reasons.

Partway through a juicy strawberry, it hit me. And I blurted out what I was thinking. “I love this, but it can’t last, can it?”

His expression crumpled. He opened his mouth to speak but I interrupted.

“Peter won’t be in prison forever. You have no idea who I am when I’m being actively stalked by him. I’m a different person, and I don’t know if you’re prepared for that.”

He held my hands gently. “Of course I am. I love you, Amber. I love you more than anything.”

I believed him.

Things moved fast after that. I spent Christmas with his family that year. Things were still strained at home and I rarely went back. Mum and I talked on the phone every few weeks, but seeing them was always a reminder of the trauma we’d gone through together. Honey avoided me most of the time. She didn’t call and often ignored my messages. It was a relief to be part of someone else’s family for a change. One without baggage.

Ed’s mother bought me a soft grey cashmere scarf and told me Ed talked about me constantly. We had a room and bathroom to ourselves in their enormous house and there was never one word spoken about my background. I had no idea what to do with that kind of kindness. It felt like receiving a gift I couldn’t possibly repay.

In January, we booked a trip to Edinburgh for Valentine’s Day. Train tickets, hotel, a walking tour of the catacombs. I told Rachel, laughing, that nothing said romance like spending Valentine’s surrounded by human bones. She said it was the most on-brand date I could have chosen.

I wanted to cram in as many great moments as I could. Peter’s release from prison loomed ahead of me, ending my life as I knew it. Soon I’d be back to the same levels of paranoia, the sensation of always walking on broken glass. I wanted to slow down time. Make memories. Live.

It happened two days before our trip. A letter addressed to me arrived at the house, postmarked from Leeds. My stomach turned cold. I tore it open in the hallway, already trembling.

Inside was one sentence written in block capitals:

DO YOU THINK YOU’RE SAFE WITHOUT ME?

I don’t remember going upstairs, but I found myself sitting on the edge of my bed with the letter clutched in my fist, my breath coming in thin, painful pulls. I couldn’t see straight. I couldn’t think.

Peter had been released early.

The eighteen months were over.

He was back.