Goodbye Teddy

by Stockholm, JD

  The girl who shouted at me chases me. She chases me all the way around. She shouts at me to give her the ball. I don't. She tells me I better stop or she is going to beat me up. I laugh about it. She can’t beat me up. I run backwards and laugh at her when she runs then I throw the ball at her and stop. I try to throw it at her head. But she catches it. She calls me a bad name. But I don't care.

  She doesn’t go back to her friends. She asks me why I took the ball. I shrug my shoulders and tell her because they are stupid girls. They can’t play football. She has a funny voice. I ask her where she is from. She says London. She is called Rachel. I tell her my name. I tell her she has to learn how to play football. She says she can.

  I don't believe her. I saw her play. It isn’t very good. We play together with the ball. I kick it to her. Then I get it off her again and make her chase it. She falls for all the tricks all the time. She smacks me hard in the arm about it. We play with the ball until it is home time.

  “What are you doing tomorrow after school?” she asks me. I tell her nothing. She asks if I want to meet her. I say yes. Then I go home.

  Aadi isn’t there at the house. He has gone home. His mum came to get him. They all talked for a long time. My mum doesn’t know what is wrong with me. I am so rude all the time. She taught me to be nice and I don't be. I tell her I don't care. I say, “So.”

  “So?” she shouts it at me. She says it lots of times. I fold my arms and sigh. I don't care. She points and tells me to get in the dining room right now. I make a big yawn at her. I always have to go in the dining room. I always have to sit on the stupid chair.

  She goes and gets my dad. I hear her shouting. She is sick and tired of how I am. My dad comes out with my mum. Now he has to shout at me because she told him too. I tell them why don’t they have Aadi as a son instead. My mum says yes. He is better than me. Maybe they should. I tell them good. Everyone is better than me. I know I am bad. I know they don't like me. I don’t like them too. I fold my arms over and I don’t talk to them anymore.

  My dad asks me what my problem is. But I don’t answer. He gets mad because I don’t talk. He shouts loud at me. He shouts his words all at my face. I don’t let the crying part come out. I don’t let him see it.

  He smacks me hard in the head because I am so bad. I nearly fall off the chair. But I get back up again. He scrunches my face in his hand. I make my eyes get closed then I don’t look at him. He tells me I have to get upstairs right now. He doesn’t want to talk to me. I am too bad.

  I go upstairs. But then he comes too. He follows me to my room. I tell him he said he didn’t want to see me. He gets mad at me. He shouts at me for answering him back.

  He tells me to sit down on my bed. He asks me why I am being so bad. I make my shoulders shrug about it. I don’t know. I don’t help it. My dad says he doesn’t like to shout at me. But I get bad too much. He stands up. He gets his pants open and then he puts it in my mouth. I close my eyes then I don’t have to see. I don’t like it. But I don’t cry about it. I tell myself inside my head that in an hour I will be asleep in bed. I think about that instead. I don’t think about my dad. I try not to be sick when he finishes inside my mouth. He makes me look at him. He watches me swallow it. I don’t like it. It makes my tummy turn upside down. It all wants to come back. But I make it go down.

  My dad fastens his pants back up. "Go to bed now," he says. Then he goes out of my room and closes the door. I hug myself very tight. I roll over on my bed. I cry very hard until I fall to sleep.

  .

  Thirty Three

  Rachel is my best friend. Better than Peter and Kirsty and Jason. She doesn’t ever get mad at me. Not really. I see her every day. After school when I have got my uniform changed. Then I run to her house and call for her. We don't talk to anyone else. Jason doesn’t like her. He gets mad at me. He gets mad at me a lot. I see her too much and I don't ever see him. He says I am mean. But he has lots of friends. He doesn’t need me too. Rachel says maybe he is jealous about it.

  Jason did like Rachel. He thought she was nice. He asked her to be his girlfriend. She said yes. But they aren’t now. She didn't want to be anymore. Then he told me I couldn’t be friends with him and Rachel. I shrugged about it. Friends don't make friends pick like that. He got mad about that too. He told me I wasn’t his friend anymore. He shouted lots of bad names at me and told me to get lost. Everyone shouts bad names at me though. No one likes me. Not really. They say they do, but I know it is just pretend. Everyone gets mad. Then they shout at me and say mean things. Rachel doesn’t.

  Sometimes Rachel gets grounded. She gets grounded lots of times. We play out too long and then she is late. Her mum gets mad about it. Then she shouts. Sometimes we get things broken. Or Rachel gets mad at her mum and says mean things. Then she gets grounded again. I haven’t ever been grounded. I get on my mum and dad’s nerves when I am in the house. They want me to go out and play.

  Rachel’s house is a guesthouse. They have people who stay there for their holidays. She has a bedroom at the side. It is very high. I sit in the alleyway. Then Rachel hangs out of her bedroom window and we play catch. She throws the ball to me. Then I throw it back up to her. Sometimes I miss. Sometimes when Rachel wants to make me mad, she throws it far away and then I have to run and get it. But I don't play when she does that. Sometimes it hurts inside to get the ball.

  Her mum gets mad about us playing ball. We are too noisy. The ball bangs on the wall. She tells me to come inside. If we are going to play then I can come in. Because Rachel isn’t allowed out. Rachel has a thing to play computer games on. We have to load up the tapes to play them. It makes a bad loud noise. But we don't care. It sounds like a screech. Sometimes it takes forever for the game to load up.

  It gets cold in Rachel’s bedroom. We lay inside the bed to play the game. We have to take our shoes off. Sometimes I get Rachel to do the touching part. She doesn’t say no about it when I put her hand in my pants or when I put my hand in hers.

  My mum doesn’t like Rachel. She doesn’t ever be allowed to come in our house. It makes my mum mad because I don't see Aadi anymore. Sometimes he comes around and talks to my mum and dad. Then I get in trouble because I am rude. I don't want to talk to him. It's all boring things. They want him for a son, not me.

  Aadi wants to be a doctor too. My mum says that he will do it because he has passion. “He’s very clever,” she says. “He gets very high marks at school. Perhaps if you were more like him, you would too.”

  I tell my mum about all my A’s. I have them in everything. She tells my dad then he gets mad about it. He says I have sex with my teachers. That is why I have good scores. But I don't. They don't ever believe me about it. My mum says I copy Aadi when I say I want to be a doctor. I wanted to be it first. But she says I am a liar. Rachel wants to go into the air force. My mum says she won’t do anything. “That girl will end up in some backstreet with ten kids by different fathers,” my dad says.

  Rachel thinks my mum is stupid. We laugh about it. I don't tell Rachel lots of things. I don't tell her my mum is scared about lots of things. She doesn’t mean to be mean. She just has things bad inside. Rachel tells me off when she sees the cigarettes. I pinched them from my mum. She doesn’t like it when I smoke. She gets real mad and shouts at me. She doesn’t call me bad names. But she gets mad and it makes her cry. I don't want to make her mad. So I don't tell her and I don't let her see the smoking. If she finds them in my pockets, that makes her mad too. Then she snaps them all up and puts them in the gutter.

  I don't ever tell her about the petrol. Maybe it will make her really, really mad if she knows. I don't think she likes lots of things like that. Her big brother died. It wasn’t a long time ago. He took drugs and horrible things. Then he went away. It makes her sad when she talks about him. So we don't. I don't like to make her sad.

  I sniff the petrol when I get home. My dad doesn’t shout at me. I am home for nine o’clock. Then I can go in the garage and he doesn’t care a
bout that. I sit on the cushions and read. My mum doesn’t care too. I make the cushions so I can see the kitchen. Then if my mum turns the lights off. I know it is time to go inside. She locks the house up at night time. I don't like it when they lock me out. Then I am far away and they are in the house all the way upstairs and they can’t hear me. I get scared of the windows. Maybe the bad man can look in. Maybe he sees I am there. I don't move at nighttimes when I am locked out. I sit in the corner. I don't go to sleep. I am good at not going to sleep. I do it a lot in my bedroom. I go to sleep when it gets light.

  The garage doesn’t have a good lock and the alley is just over the wall. Maybe the bad man can get over there and I don't see him. I don't ask Andrew. I don't talk to him anymore. But he is there. He watches. I know it is him. Maybe he sees the bad man and then he will make him go away.

  Thirty Four

  My mum has to go to hospital today. She is having an operation. She has something wrong inside. Not in her head. It is in her stomach. It makes her not be able to eat a lot of things. Food makes her get sick. Maybe it is like my brother. Maybe she will nearly have a heart attack too. The doctor is giving her a new kind of medicine. Not the nice doctor. A different one. He works at the hospital, but he is nice too. He is doing something called keyhole surgery. I don't know what it is. Maybe they make a hole inside. Maybe they use her bellybutton. I don't like that. It makes me think about a long time ago and the church people. They stick things in my belly button. They pushed it in very hard and made it all bleed. They put lots of things inside at the same time. I don't like when I think about it. It makes me hug myself very tight. Sometimes it makes me cry. It gives me lots of bad dreams about it. I don't like to think about all those bad things. It makes me make the click in my throat. Then I can feel it. “Will you stop that?” my dad say. “If you don't stop it, you will end up being sent away to a mental hospital.”

  I try to make it stop but I can’t. It comes back. I make my throat click. Click. Click. Click. My dad looks at me with his mad face.

  I have to go to school. I tell him I am sorry. My mum and dad got up early because she has to be at hospital early. They will take her gallbladder out. She has stones in it. But I don't know what that is too. It has to be small if they are doing it with a key hole. Keyholes don't be very big. My mum is excited about it. She says it will make everything better. Then she can go outside and not be scared. Then no bad things happen. The angel people told her about it.

  My mum has angel people. They wear suits. They dress very smart. I have never seen them. But my mum does. She tells me about them. She saw one when she had to be in jail because she hurt my big brother. The angel man came and he brought her a cup of tea. He told her it would be okay. She didn't need to cry about it. He told her that she would marry the nice doctor too. That is why she knows one day she will. But his mean wife won’t go away. She doesn’t leave him alone and then my mum can’t be with him. It makes my mum cry. She loves him very much.

  I don't say goodbye to my mum and dad when I go to school. I don't want to get in the way. My dad gives me my money. He doesn’t ask me about the sex part. Or if I touch myself. My mum doesn’t get my hands to check. But I keep them away so she can't. I don't like when she does that at morning time. I go out of the house before they get mad at me. My brother isn’t going to school. He is going to the hospital because he is sad about it. I am not because I’m not bothered. That's what my mum says to me.

  My dad isn’t home when school is finished. I don't like to be in the house by myself. I get scared about the bad man. I run upstairs. Then I make my door locked. I change my clothes very fast and go out to Rachel’s. She isn’t home yet. But I sit and wait for her. We are going to play at the golf course. We have a den there. It is in the round trees. We aren’t allowed there, but no one sees us and no one tells us off about it. We go there all the time. We have a rope and we tied it to a tree. We run and jump and swing on it.

  We also have lots of golf balls. People hit them and lose them. Then we find them and collect them. We keep them in a bag. Rachel says we should sell them. But we don't. There is a pond near the gate. We throw the boring ones in there. We have to climb through trees and brambles to get to the pond. Sometimes the brambles scratch my skin and make it bleed. Sometimes it hurts too bad inside and I pretend the brambles hurt when I have to climb. But it hurts inside from my dad. I don't tell Rachel about that.

  Sometimes it hurts too bad inside that I don't ride my bike too. I don't tell Rachel. I tell her I am tired and then we push them instead. She says I am lazy. She laughs when I say I am too tired to ride my bike. She gets hers and rides away. Maybe she can make me do it and come after her. But I don't.

  It gets dark. All the stupid rich people have gone away. They don't play golf in the dark. Me and Rachel lie on the grass. She lies with her head on my tummy. We look at the stars and talk about lots of things.

  We don't stay there late today. I have to get home early because my mum isn’t there. I have to be home for seven. My dad wants to know where I am and he doesn’t like it when I am out getting into trouble. He says Rachel makes me do bad things. But she doesn't. I make her do bad things.

  My dad has made dinner. I walk in the back door and it smells very nice. It makes me hungry. My stomach growls. Maybe I don't get any. But my dad tells me to come and sit at the table. He has made the table nice. Me and my brother sit there. My dad has made roast chicken. It has lots of sauce and gravy. I like when my dad cooks He makes the best food ever.

  “How was school?” my dad says to me. I tell him it is good. “What are you doing?” he asks. I don't like it when he asks about school. Maybe I am not hungry any more. The food feels all big and I don't want to eat it. Maybe I did something bad and he knows about it. I don't like when he tricks me. He makes it all nice then he hits me very hard when I don't know he is going to do it.

  I don't want to say bad things and make him shout at me. I don't want him to tell me I am stupid. He thinks I am stupid all the time. I tell him I am doing algebra. He smiles very big about it and he eats his dinner. He doesn’t hit me about it. “Do you like it?" he asks.

  I do. But it is very hard. I look at my hands. I don't want my dad to say mean things about it.

  He doesn’t. We finish dinner. Then my dad washes the plates and things. I dry them and my brother puts them away. We don't leave them for my mum. My dad says he can teach me algebra if I want. When my brother has gone to bed. Maybe I want to.

  I tell him yes please. My dad doesn’t ever teach me school things before.

  Thirty Five

  My brother sits and watches the television. I don't know what he is watching. Some stupid fighting thing. It’s boring. My mum doesn’t let him watch it when she is at home. But she isn’t. She is in the hospital so my dad says he can watch what he wants. He isn’t allowed to watch bad things. Maybe they make him bad like me. I make everything bad. He is all soft inside. My mum says he doesn’t understand the bad things. Not like me. I know how to do all the bad things because I don't care. She doesn’t let him watch the bad things because then he will get bad because he doesn’t know any better.

  My brother is stupid and a baby. My mum doesn’t know. She thinks he is nice, but he is bad really. He tells lots of lies and she doesn’t see it. I tell her about it and then he starts to cry. My mum says that it is me and how dare I say such bad things about her son. Then my dad gets mad and he hits me. I hate them all. They are always mean. I don't know why they are mean. When I am good, they are mean and when I am bad they are mean. Maybe they would like it if I went away.

  My dad doesn’t ever ask about my homework. Maybe he likes maths. I show my dad my sums. I don't know what they mean. The teacher told us all about it. But I didn't listen. I was writing a story in my book. It didn't want to wait. So I wrote it very fast. We have to do algebra. It is very hard. My dad says it is easy. He gets a pen and paper and he writes a sum down. I don't know what it means. He asks me to try. I stare at
it very hard. But I don't know how to do it. Maybe he will shout at me because I am stupid. I don't mean to be. I try very hard. I hug myself tight and say I am sorry. I don't want him to be mad at me. I don't know the sum.

  He doesn’t get mad about it. He moves up and sits closer. He starts it all again and writes the numbers. He asks me what I am supposed to do next. I tell him and he smiles because I get it right. He tells me well done. He doesn’t ever tell me well done before. Maybe I don't hate my dad. He shows me lots of times and I get them all right.

  “Maybe you can do some more?” he says. “While I am in the shower?” I nod my head about it. My dad gets some more paper and he writes some sums down and gives them to me. It makes me excited inside. I do them and then my dad knows I am not stupid. Maybe he can like me.

  My dad goes to get a shower and I sit on the floor with Sheba. She isn’t good at sums. She leans her head on my crossed leg. Maybe she reads the paper. The sums are very hard without my dad there. I try to think about what he said. I do them all. My dad doesn’t take a long time in the shower. He comes out and he has got changed. He smells like medicine. My mum makes him use special shampoo. It gets all the oil out of his hair. She doesn’t like it when he smells like cars. She says it is bad and disgusting.

  My dad looks at my sums. I didn't get them all right. He sits down again and he doesn’t get mad. He tells me to come and sit on the chair with him. He tells me which ones I got wrong and he shows me how to do them. But he says I tried very hard and he is happy. I smile about it.

  My dad says he is going to put my brother to bed now. It is his bedtime. He has school in the morning. My dad doesn’t stay upstairs though. My brother goes to sleep because he is tired. My dad comes back down and asks me if I want to watch some television. I don't know what to say. Maybe he gets mad if I say yes. But then if I say no he might be mad too. Maybe he gets sad if I say no. Because maybe he wants to do the sex thing with me and if I say no, then he doesn’t get to and he feels bad about it. I don't know what to say. I don't want him to shout at me because I don't answer.