‘Is Lisa there?’ I asked Nancy. I’d already tried her mobile but it was switched off again.

There was a beat. A muffled voice, as though someone was talking with their hand over the receiver. ‘Sorry, Kat. You’ve just missed her,’ Nancy said a little too brightly, and I knew she was lying.

That night, at the park, after Lisa had dragged me away from Aaron, I’d clung to her as we walked home, my legs shaking with shock. At my front door I’d started to say again: ‘If you hadn’t come…’ but Lisa had held her hand up and taken a step back.

‘You shouldn’t have told Mr Lemmington, Kat.’

I was stunned. How was this my fault? ‘I had to. Someone could have got hurt. Died even. What if you’d had a bad reaction? He needs stopping. Besides, did you see the look in his eyes? God knows what he’s capable of. He’ll try and get his own back. I know he will.’ I was babbling. Fear pushing my words out in one gibbering rush.

‘Stop thinking about yourself. What if he tells the police he was selling to me? Did you think of that?’ She was shouting.

‘He won’t. Why would he? Don’t worry,’ I’d told her but she had walked away without answering.

I hadn’t left the house in two days for fear of reprisals and now Lisa wouldn’t return my calls. Still, I didn’t think my dread of Aaron was the only thing making me feel sick.

I swung my legs out of bed and pulled on yesterday’s sundress before sliding my drawer open. From underneath the tangle of bras and pants I pulled out the Boots paper bag. My period was late, and I couldn’t keep pretending it was coincidental I never fancied breakfast any more and felt sick every day around dinner time. I had to find out for sure. I unfolded the paper that came in the box and read the words slowly and carefully, but despite my straight A grades at school, I had to read the instructions three times to try and make sense of them and I desperately wished Lisa was with me.

I hesitated before carrying the kit into the bathroom. Apart from the first time in the woods we had always used a condom, and no one gets pregnant their first time, do they? But the little voice in my head mocked and you’re supposed to be the clever one and I knew if I wanted to find out, now was the time with the house to myself for the day. If I wanted to find out.

Perched on the toilet I scanned the instructions again just to make sure. My bladder was bursting, but I couldn’t wee. I had to run the taps for ages before I could. I put the cap back on the test and rested it on the side of the basin before checking the time and washing my hands. The box said results could show in anything between sixty seconds and five minutes. To make sure the test had worked I was determined to wait for the full five minutes before I checked, but there were only so many times I could pace the small room, nerves slithering around my stomach, before I snatched up the stick, staring in disbelief at the + in the results window. Although I knew it meant positive, I studied the picture on the front of the box again, just to make sure. My knees turned to jelly and I sat heavily on the side of the bath. I couldn’t be pregnant. I just couldn’t. I was too young, but I was old enough to know better. We were old enough to know better, I reminded myself. I wasn’t in this alone, but still we should have used a condom. My gaze darted between the box and the stick and the words ‘99% accurate’ leapt out at me. My shoulders sagged a little. Of course. There had to be a 1 per cent chance of failure.

I took out our toothbrushes from the glass on the windowsill and rubbed dried toothpaste from the rim before filling it with lukewarm water from the tap and gulping it down. It took four glasses and twenty minutes before I could produce a small amount of wee for the second test but I put the cap on the stick, hoping it was enough. This time I couldn’t take my eyes off the small square box that would predict my future and as a cross began to appear, faintly at first but darkening with every passing second, bile bit the back of my throat. I shook the stick like a mercury thermometer and checked the window again, as though this may have altered the result, but it still showed positive. Positive. What an innocuous word but what implications it carried. My mind fast-forwarded to a time I’d be living in a grotty bedsit, fag hanging from the corner of my mouth – ridiculous as I’d never smoked – stirring a pan of beans at a one-ring hob, while a toddler in a stained T-shirt stamped his feet, screaming for attention. And yet there was another picture, nudging the first out of the way. Me crossing a kitchen, roast chicken browning in the oven, to kiss Jake hello as he came home from work and, as young as I was, I liked that picture. I’d always been drawn to babies. Always wanted to be a mum and it flitted across my mind that I might have done this subconsciously, found an escape from this house, my dad, but when I thought of my dad I felt sick. What was I going to tell him? What was I going to tell Jake?

The front door slammed, startling me. No one should be home. Heavy footsteps pounded up the stairs. The door rattled.

‘Kat?’

‘Dad. Thought you’d gone to work?’

‘I forgot something. Need the loo now I’m here.’

Hurriedly I looked around. If I came out carrying the box and tests he would see them, and there was nowhere under my dress to hide them. In the corner was a stack of towels and I stuffed everything underneath the top one. I would move them as soon as he was done.

‘Come on.’ His impatience radiated through the wood.

I clicked open the lock and slipped through the door, not able to look him in the eye. In my bedroom I straightened my duvet and plumped up my pillows, waiting anxiously, listening for the flush of the chain, but it didn’t come. A shadow fell behind me and as I spun around I was met by my dad’s furious face. He raised his hand and slapped my cheek, hard. Falling back onto the bed I began to cry, but he yanked me to my feet and shook me like I was nothing. His eyes were wild, and I was scared. Really scared. As strict as he was, he had never laid a hand on me before.

‘Slut.’

The word stuck like a spear. I opened my mouth but there was nothing I could say to make this better. ‘Couldn’t you keep your legs shut? We’ve time to get this sorted.’

I could see him mentally working out timescales, and I say: ‘Sorted?’ although I know perfectly well what he meant.

‘You can’t possibly keep it,’ he said and, in that moment, I felt a burst of love for the baby. My baby. Jake’s baby.

‘I can.’

‘You will bloody well have an abortion.’

‘You can’t tell me what to do. You’re always telling me what to do!’ Nineteen years of built up resentment came spewing out.

‘While you’re under my roof—’

‘Then I won’t stay under your roof.’ I pushed past dad, knocking him with my shoulder, pulled open my drawer, flung clothes onto my bed.

‘Don’t be stupid,’ he said. ‘Where are you going to go?’

‘Anywhere but here.’

‘You’ll stay in your room until I get back from my meeting.’

‘I won’t.’ I was defiant.

‘You bloody well will and we’ll talk when your mum gets home.’

‘I’ll be gone by then.’ I almost goaded him but I was too angry to tread carefully. I knew I had gone too far when his fingers dug into my shoulder and his hand lay heavy on the small of my back, forcing me forward.

‘I’ll make sure you’re still here.’

I tried to dig my heels in, stretching out my arms for something to grab hold of, but my fingertips closed around air. Before I could properly catch my breath he was forcing me down the stairs. At the sight of the hall cupboard, with its lock on the door, I knew what he was going to do.

‘Please.’ My voice was high and shrill. My skin slick with sweat. ‘Don’t do this. You don’t have to do this.’

There was a grunt behind me, the sound of heavy breathing, and I did everything I could to make it harder for him. I stiffened my body and struggled, and there was a second when he released his grip, when I was free, and just as my mind was processing there were no longer hands on me he opened the cupboard door. I tried to run but instantaneously there was pressure on the top of my arms and I was shaken, hard. My brain rattled around my skull. I bit my tongue and swallowed down my fear and the metallic taste of blood.

My vision grew hazy, the ground beneath my feet felt soft, as my body grew limp. I had the sensation of falling before I was yanked back and thrust forward, landing heavily on my hands and knees. My head banged against something hard and solid and slivers of pain shot through my arms and into my neck.

Dazed, I almost didn’t hear the slam behind me. The click of a lock.

‘No! Wait! Dad!’ I leapt to my feet. Nausea rose as the world seemed to rock and I blindly reached out, trying to find the door. The blackness was all-consuming. Crushing. My hands shook as I slapped my palms over the walls, spinning around until at last I found it. I gripped the door handle but my hand was clammy and it took me three attempts to twist it, and when I did it confirmed what I already knew.

I was trapped.