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360 lines
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HTML
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<h2>4</h2>
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<p><em>It was on her</em>.</p>
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<p>It had her in an embrace so foul that the very contact was
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enough to drain the life from her. It was eating her, sucking her
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dry, filling her with its poison and she could feel herself rot
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from within, bones and flesh melting and dissolving as her blood
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mingled with whatever foul stuff was running through its veins. It
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held her tight and she held it tight, both of them locked together
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in a deadly, dreadful enfolding.</p>
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<p><em>A dream, only a dream...</em>she tried to tell herself, even
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in sleep...<em>wake up wake up wake up</em></p>
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<p>It tightened against her, clammy and amphibious, cold as ice and
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hideous to the touch. It was feeding on her, gobbling her up,
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sucking and slurping and she could sense her own self diminish and
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shrink as it gathered energy and waxed strong.</p>
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<p>It was a dream. A part of her mind, the internal sentry that
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kept watch in the dark, listening for danger, told her it was a
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dream, a nightmare, but she could not free herself from it. She
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could not waken.</p>
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<p>It had changed, in the way that dreams do when they alter from
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the acceptable and familiar into the surreal, when they crest on
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the brow of night and go swooping down the black backslope into the
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chaos of tormented vision.</p>
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<p>She had been coming home. An early finish, stepping light
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despite the drizzle and the early darkness of midwinter. A few days
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before Christmas with most of her presents bought, and all of her
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cards written up and posted for a change. She was heading past the
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shopping centre, listening to the little choirboys singing her
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favourite carols. There was a sparkle of tinsel and a twinkle of
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lights on the Christmas tree and she was looking forward to the
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holiday, her mother’s good cooking and dad snoring in his
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chair by the fire, still wearing his paper hat and giving off the
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faint aroma of his annual cigar. She walked briskly, planning to
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pick up a couple of small gifts in the shops, just
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stocking-fillers, before going round to Celia’s to feed the
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cat.</p>
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<p>They’d asked her to go with them, and she’d been
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tempted. Two weeks in the sun of a Greek island, away from the cold
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and clammy winter would have been wonderful. She’d been
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tempted and had almost agreed, but at the last moment she’d
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thought of her father’s angina and the way her mother would
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look if she told her she wouldn’t be home for Christmas. And
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there was Tony too. They hadn’t been going out so very long
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but already they were close and she wanted to spend part of this
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time of the year with him.</p>
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<p>There would be other Christmastimes, other winters when the lure
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of the sun might drag her away, but she’d plenty of time. The
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weathermen said there was a possibility of snow as a high pressure
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area brought cold down from Greenland and there was a chance the
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pond would freeze over and they could go skating.</p>
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<p>All of this, the recollection of thoughts and fragments of
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emotions whirred past in her dream as she saw herself come into the
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mall. The doors whisked open silently and a warm blast of air from
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the overhead draughtbusters came billowing down in a welcome
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breath. The choirboys sang out louder now she was inside, clear
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recorded voices piercing through the hubbub of the crowd and the
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clack and clatter of heels on the tiles. She stopped at the leather
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shop and picked up a pair of chunky earrings, moved on to the Tie
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Rack for a pair of neat leather gloves for her grandmother. She was
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just putting them in her handbag as she was leaving the shop when
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she became aware of the commotion on the central walkway.</p>
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<p>Somebody had been screaming. She wasn’t sure whether she
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had heard it or whether one of the shop alarms had gone off further
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along the mall. She turned towards where the crowd was gathering. A
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woman was hurrying from another shop, her overall flapping. The
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woman was running, but of a sudden, she was moving in slow motion.
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Everything started to lose speed. The world took on a viscid syrupy
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texture.</p>
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<p>The sound of the choir boys faltered, as if drained of power.
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The low hum of the escalator became a deeper, growling sound,
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hollow and mechanical and strangely animal.</p>
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<p>Over at the middle, the crowd were bending down to the flapping
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thing on the floor and she could hear their hushed, startled
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sounds, like distant, muted echoes.</p>
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<p>She was moving away. Someone was hurt and she didn’t want
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to see it. Someone was on the ground and of a sudden she was
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scared. She turned involuntarily, almost reflexively, and moved to
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the right, feet silent now on the hard tiles, as if she was gliding
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along, not quite making contact with the ground. She could have
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been a feather drifting in the wind, so powerless was the control
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she had over direction.</p>
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<p>A woman was coming round the side of the pillar. A small black
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shape was crumpled up against the wheels of a trolley.</p>
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<p>She glided on past the line up of buggies and prams, suddenly
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aware that something was wrong. Everything was wrong. The choirboys
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were tolling out a slow, tuneless dirge. Their clean little plastic
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faces seemed to run and melt. The escalator wheels were shifting
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and grinding. The tinsel sparked and spangled with a strange,
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electrical illumination. It writhed in the curved bows suspended
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above her.</p>
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<p>She stopped.</p>
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<p>The smell engulfed her and she stopped dead in her tracks. In an
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instant her stomach clenched in a reflex, gripped in a spasm so
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tight it sent a bolt of pain through her, worse than cramp. She
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grunted and the sound came out long and slow, thrumming in a way
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her voice never did.</p>
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<p><em>Take me!</em></p>
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<p>The command bloomed inside her.</p>
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<p>The smell billowed into her nostrils, rank and somehow musky,
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thick and cloying in the back of her throat. It scraped against the
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receptors of her membranes and for an instant she almost
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fainted.</p>
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<p>She was standing stock still, a hand clamped against her belly.
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The pain faded just a little, but it spread upwards, forked left
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and right, flowed into her breasts in twin warm and tingling
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streams. Without warning, the pain flared there too.</p>
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<p>Oh...<em>oh!</em></p>
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<p>Her voice seemed to have the cracked tones of an old bell.</p>
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<p><em>Take me take me. LOVE ME!</em></p>
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<p>A dreadful imperative shuddered into her mind, more painful than
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the twist in her breasts or the augur in her belly. It was a mental
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blast. A wave of heat ran through her veins, fast and jittery.
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Beads of sweat sprung out on her forehead and made it clammy. Her
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breath came short and shallow. All the twinkling colours reflected
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from the window faded out for a moment.</p>
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<p><em>Take me NOW!</em></p>
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<p>She felt herself turning. An old grey pram, one of the
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coach-built ones, maybe an old Silver Cross walker that had seen
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better days, stood alone at the end of the rank, just beside her.
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The courtesy chain that would have secured it to the bar on the
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wall dangled free. The folding hood was up, shading the inside, and
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the weather guard was firmly clipped in place. From where she
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stood, she could see nothing.</p>
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<p>But the smell billowed out, strong and volatile and making her
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emotions spin. She tried to walk on but her feet refused to obey
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her. She moved towards the old Silver Cross pram, shoes dragging on
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the tiles. Something inside it moved, just enough to make it
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shudder and rock on its old fashioned curved springs.</p>
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<p>A small sound, something like a grunt, something like a cry came
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out from the shadow. It riveted right into her.</p>
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<p>The noise of the commotion faded away and the choir boys bass
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atonal singing rumbled to silence. In that instant there was just
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she and the battered pram, enveloped in a musky, invisible cloud.
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Her heart was tripping erratically, thudding inside her and her
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skin seemed to crawl with a life of its own. Her feet moved her
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forward.</p>
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<p>She reached out and unclipped the snapper on the weather shield.
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She lowered it slowly. Down in the shadow, something moved.</p>
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<p>Without any volition, she unsnapped the second catch and leaned
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forward.</p>
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<p>For a fraction of a second, for the briefest instant eyes fixed
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on her, pinning her with a sharp and hot connection of will. She
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saw a face that at first had no real shape, just a rippling blur of
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flesh. A scream started to wind up down inside the hot clenching in
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her belly. She stumbled back, but the mental imperative stopped
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her. In that brief space of time she was held, shuddering with fear
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and alarm while another, stranger, and much more powerful emotion
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was building up inside her.</p>
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<p>It drew her back again and she looked under the hood. Her eyes
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blurred, focused again and impossible rippling sensation faded and
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stopped. She saw the baby.</p>
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<p>The big eyes looked up at her, glistening with baby tears. Its
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round face and little smooth red cheeks were streaked with them.
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It’s soft lips were trembling, as if it was about to burst
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into a spasm of sobs.</p>
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<p>Her heart swelled. The urgent thumping faded instantly. The pain
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down in her core shrank away, though the pulsing pressure in her
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breasts did not diminish, but swelled fiercer, but now it was no
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longer real pain. It was the pressure of need.</p>
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<p>She leaned towards the child.</p>
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<p>“Poor little thing,” she heard herself say, voice
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automatically talking on the sing-song cadence of an adult
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comforting a baby. Inside her, a part of her consciousness screamed
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at her to run away, to flee.</p>
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<p>It smiled up at her suddenly. It’s eyes were huge with
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appeal. The wide brow showed a twist of dark curls poking down from
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under a knitted hat. The baby smell infused her.</p>
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<p><em>Take me take me take me..</em></p>
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<p>The demand was urgent now, irresistible, inescapable. The fear
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was strangled back to whimper deep in her consciousness.</p>
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<p><em>Mother me!</em></p>
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<p>“Yes,” she said aloud, letting the word trail away
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in a long sigh. She bent right into the pram, pushing the hood back
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a little. The baby blinked its eyes tight against the light but she
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wrapped it in the old shawl and gently lifted it out. She opened
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the top buttons of her coat, overwhelmed by a sudden protective
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instinct, and clutched the baby in against herself. She turned
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around, looking up to the end of the concourse and down again to
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the near door where she had entered. For a moment of indecision she
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swithered, taking one step to the left, another to the right.</p>
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<p>Over in the centre, the woman kneeling beside the dark,
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prostrate body was slamming her weight down hard on the chest,
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using the heels of her hands on the breastbone, trying to restart a
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still and lifeless heart, trying to resurrect the dead.</p>
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<p>The need to get away came sweeping through her. She turned,
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keeping her head low, and pushed her way through the passing crowd
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of shoppers towards the nearest exit. As she passed, some of them,
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the women, turned suddenly, following her with their eyes. She
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could feel them on her but she tried to ignore them. She hurried
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forward. Down the centre, past the escalators she turned and her
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coat flapped open. Immediately the baby squirmed hard, and she felt
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a bolt of pain lance into the back of her head. Without thought she
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clasped her collar up to cover the small bundle. Moving fast now,
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as fast as she dared without breaking into a run, she got to the
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far doors which opened with a slow gush of sound like a harsh
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intake of breath.</p>
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<p>Out in the air it was winter dark and a <em>smirr</em> of rain
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was misting the air, though it was cold enough to be sure to turn
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to ice in the night. She swerved to the left again, keeping her
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head low and hurried up the pedestrian walkway, swerving to avoid
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passers by.</p>
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<p>The urgency was inside her. She had to keep moving, just get
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away. She had no direction yet, only the imperative to move, to
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flee. She walked up and over Hanover Street, down Wellington
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Street, past Victoria Square, all of them hung with fairy lights
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and each shop competing in the choral cacophony, but she heard none
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of it.</p>
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<p>Her entire being was focused on the internal voice which urged
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her on and on into the night, and the powerful, urgent need that
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surged within her in a powerful tide of emotion.</p>
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<p>In at her breast, the baby moved, shifted position, nuzzled
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further in against her warmth and the mother-love burgeoned like a
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flower. The scent of the baby was all through her now, a warm
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narcotic that nurtured her as she would nurture the baby.</p>
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<p>But first the had to find shelter. She hurried out of the
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shopping precinct, heading parallel to the river. She reached the
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junction that was the unofficial boundary of the city centre and
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turned right on Levenford Road beyond the Chinese restaurant.</p>
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<p>The alley yawned and she was scurrying up in the darkness. She
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was almost running now, heels slapping on the cobbles. A shape
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moved out of the shadows and she saw the grizzled old tramp. She
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looked at him and he stared back and the fear in her welled up in
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the depth where her own sense of self lived. It made her want to
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scream out loud and beg for help because over and above the
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powerful urge there was something wrong that she couldn’t
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fathom but deep inside of herself he was dreadfully afraid. She
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tried to stop and ask the man for help, not knowing why, only
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realising that something was happening to her, but the enormous
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gravity of the force inside her dragged her away and on and on and
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on. The dogs came and snarled but she hardly noticed them as she
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scurried along the path, pushed the gate open, found the door
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handle and let herself inside a house she had never seen
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before.</p>
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<p>The fear was rising faster now, a black tide of it, threatening
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to swamp the other emotion, the awful need. She went into the
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lounge, still the dark and leaned against the wall, feeling the
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strength drain from her as her knees gave way. She slid down
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against the wall leaving a damp stain on the wallpaper.</p>
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<p>Another damp stain was spreading across the surface of her
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blouse. In the dim light she watched it expand, grey against the
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white. A different scent came now, one that made her think of
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weasels and scaly things. It came strong now, tinged with that
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other, musky smell that seeped into her pores and into her blood
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and into her mind.</p>
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<p>Her breast was leaking milk,</p>
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<p><em>What’s happening to me?</em></p>
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<p>The panic welled up again and the scent came thick and choking
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to mask it, smother it, clamp it down. In against her the baby
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moved and she felt it nuzzle down.</p>
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<p>She woke with a start, hauling for breath, shaking with the
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force of the dream. The room was dark and the curtains drawn and
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right then she did not know where she was. She was cold and stiff
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and the images of the dream hovered at the front of her mind,
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dreadful pictures spangling and expanding in the dark, changing
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with the flicker-flick speed of film sequences.</p>
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<p>A huge sigh escaped her. She was stiff and sore, as if
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she’d got cramp and as if she’d taken flu and that was
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surely why she’d had the appalling dream.</p>
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<p>She closed her eyes and her head thumped against the wall as the
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tide of the nightmare washed over and through her.</p>
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<p>“What a dream,” she thought, hearing the words
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coherent in the tumult of the aftermath. “I stole a
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baby.”</p>
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<p>It was an appalling notion, and that showed she must be coming
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down with something. She was lacquered with sweat, but cold and
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stiff. Her hair smelled damp.</p>
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<p>She had dreamed she’d looked in a pram and seen a
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beautiful baby and she had taken it and gone on a nightmare run
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through the rain and the dark and gone to a strange house in an
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unfamiliar part of the city. It had been awful, but now she was
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awake, shivering in the aftermath. Any moment her mother would come
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in with a cup of tea. Any minute now...</p>
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<p>“Must be getting broody,” she told herself, mind
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still vague and numb.</p>
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<p>A griping pain twisted down in the basin of her pelvis, sharp
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and cramp-like. The pain looped up like heartburn and spread across
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her ribs to pool in her breasts and she thought the flue was worse
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than she’d supposed and maybe it was something worse than
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that. She closed her eyes, twisting them shut against the
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sensation.</p>
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<p>And something moved on her skin.</p>
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<p>She woke completely then, every pore of her body tensed and
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galvanised, every downy hair on her neck and arms standing to
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attention.</p>
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<p>“Oh...<em>aah!</em>” Whatever she tried to say, it
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only came out in a little double gasp. She twisted away from the
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motion. It was small and slender. She could feel roughness scrape
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against her smoothness.</p>
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<p>“Oh please...” she bleated.</p>
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<p>The dream came back, swooping into her mind with powerful mental
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force, overlaying the conscious sensations.</p>
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<p>She pulled back, turning as she did so. She was slumped on the
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floor, not on the bed. Her arms were clamped around the thing
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inside her coat. She tried to unlock them but they were stiff from
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the force of her grip and they refused to move. In their embrace,
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the motion came stronger. She tried to look away, sudden appalling
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terror welling up inside her in a gusher of abhorrence. The thick
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smell came billowing up, rank and foetid and overlaid with that
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sickly sweetness. It suffused her again, this time not in a dream,
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this time all too real as the dream had been a recollection of
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something all too terrible.</p>
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<p>She felt her head turn of its own volition and she looked down
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into the shade in the folds of her coat. The small smooth head
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moved against her. It turned slowly. An eye opened, gazed into
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hers, held her for an instant, connecting with her, before it
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slowly closed again.</p>
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<p>“Oh mother oh Jesus oh.” The words tumbled and
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tripped over each other in a gush of incoherent fear. Tears sparked
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and filled her eyes,.</p>
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<p>The small shape turned again, eyes closed against whatever light
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was coming through the curtain but the pervasive scent came
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stronger. Ginny’s tears blinked away and the baby was in her
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arms. Away from the light, its eyes opened and its innocent gaze
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fixed upon her as if she encompassed its whole world.</p>
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<p>The rank odour faded to a sweet baby scent and she felt the
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sudden love and the fierce need swell inside her. The deep,
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primitive part of her consciousness protested and fought, yelling
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hysterically and incoherently, a blare of pure fear, but the need
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within her grappled it and she was paralysed, unable to move.</p>
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<p>There was blood on her blouse now, a faded patch where it had
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mingled with the milk.</p>
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<p>She knew she had no milk. She couldn’t have milk to feed a
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baby. Her breasts could not be bleeding.</p>
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<p>But there was a bloodstain on her blouse and her breasts were
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swollen and aching, pressing painfully against the cotton. The fear
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rose and the need clamped it down and her emotions wrestled and
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rolled while the baby fixed her with its wide, mesmeric eyes before
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it turned and nuzzled in where the buttons had come free. It
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burrowed down on her and she felt the scrape of skin as it sought
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her nipple. Her skin puckered, as if it was trying to crawl away
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from the contact. A shudder ran through her yet her body responded
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to the need and she twisted to assist. The mouth found her nipple
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and clamped upon it. It started to suckle, tugging hard, hard
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enough to cause the burning pain to return, but she was paralysed,
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locked within the fear and the mother-love, thoughts turning and
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tumbling and whirling within her, utterly terrified, completely
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smothered in maternal instinct, clutching the small thing that
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she’d stolen from the mall.</p>
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<p>After a while, she began to sob softly in the dark.</p>
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