‘Ophiuchus’ was first published in Tears in the Fence 39 (2004), and now appears in Reasoning: Twenty Stories.
…He was revising for his exams when he raped my daughter. Christine was at her Bible study, and I was in the hills, and we had asked Rob over to baby-sit Louise. Louise tells us he let her watch a video while he lay on the sheepskin rug with his books. She tells us he kicked his legs in the air and spoiled her view of the television, and when she asked him to stop he giggled and ignored her. At half past eight he turned off the video, and sent her upstairs to undress. He raped her on the sofa, holding his hand over her mouth to keep her quiet. Outside, a jackdaw helped himself to the seed that we had put out for the finches…
Dr Sarah Gallup is a clinical psychologist at the California Department of State Hospitals. She also runs a podcast exploring the history of mental health care and the stories of people who lived or worked Behind the Walls of the World’s Psychiatric Hospitals. In six recent episodes she reads from Dangerous Asylums...
Read postAll newsThe day was dull, rather misty, and wet under foot, but neither too warm nor too cold for walking. I began to think (without being especially aware that I was thinking) about the place of blood in Christian iconography, about the chapel in which I was raised, which seemed mildly obsessed with it...
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