Seven years old and back with my mum – I couldn’t have been happier. Three months is a long time in a child’s life and part of me fretted that Mum would have forgotten me somehow. I needn’t have worried. We soon slotted back into our old routines. I couldn’t do enough for her. Our meals wouldn’t win any awards, but I did my best. The flat was a bit grubby, with tattered lino on the kitchen floor, and we didn’t have much in the way of cleaning equipment, but I scrubbed and brushed as much as I could. Sometimes Mum would chat to me while I did it. Sometimes she’d say, ‘Leave that and come and sit down,’ but I needed to do it. On some level, I worried that if the home didn’t look nice, the police would take me away again.
I’m not going to let that happen.
For a while Mum and I were inseparable. Then she went out one night and I didn’t see her for two days.
Was I worried? Of course I was. But only about her. The only thoughts going through my head were Who is cooking for her? Where is she sleeping? Who is looking after her?
It never occurred to me to be worried about myself. I had my own bed, I had our few possessions around me, I could cook any groceries I could slip into my pocket in the shop and play records whenever I liked. The only thing that would have made it better was having Mum to talk to. I was content enough on my own, though.
Mum’s nights out weren’t the only familiar thing. We were home one afternoon when there was a knock on the door. Before I could get up, it swung open.
Apart from the times Granny came to visit, no good ever came of that door opening. I couldn’t hear a knock without fearing the police had come to take me away. On this occasion it wasn’t the boys in blue or social workers. It was Mark and another man.
I said hello and went back to sit with Mum. I hadn’t quite reached the seat when Mark said, ‘And where do you think you’re going?’ His voice was firm.
‘Leave her alone,’ Mum said. That’s when I realized he was talking to me.
‘She knows her job,’ he said, walking over. ‘Don’t you, Cathy?’
I did. How could I have forgotten? I started to head to the kitchen, ready to begin rolling. As I stepped out of the lounge, I glanced back at Mum. She wasn’t smiling.
She doesn’t want them here.
It was the first time I’d ever noticed.
Mark’s friend gave me the stuff to make the cigarettes. He wasn’t as nice as Mark, but he was all right. He didn’t raise his voice. In fact, he just stared silently. I don’t think he trusted me to do a good job. Feeling someone’s eyes burning into you is enough to make anyone all fingers and thumbs.
An hour or so later, there were about six men in the tiny flat. By then someone had brought the bong, so I was kept busy preparing that. Mark watched me this time. It was the first time he’d been in the kitchen of our new flat.
‘Christ, this place is a tip,’ he said, kicking the loose flaps of the well-worn lino. ‘We’re going to have to do something about this.’
‘Yeah,’ I replied, not really knowing what he was referring to, and carried on getting the bong ready.
Just then, another man came in. I’ll call him Brian.
‘We going to get started, or what?’
Mark looked at me, then back at Brian.
What else do they want me to make?
It turned out they didn’t want me to do anything.
‘I’ve got something for you,’ Mark said, and he fished a small packet out his pocket. It looked like a little paper bag.
‘What is it?’ I asked nervously.
‘It’s a sweet.’
I wasn’t convinced.
‘I’ll ask my mum.’
As I went to leave the kitchen, the one called Brian blocked my way. Without thinking, I dived to my knees and scampered through his legs.
‘Mum! Mum! Mark wants me to take something!’
Mum’s face was suddenly alert – and terrified.
‘Leave her alone!’ she shouted, pulling me over to hold. ‘Don’t even touch her.’
The four other men immediately looked to Mark for instruction. He, in turn, looked calmly at Mum.
‘We need to have a party, Jenny. I suggest Cathy takes one of these pills.’
I felt shivers run up my spine. The way Mum gripped me, I knew she felt it too.
Pills? What pills? What will they make me do?
Mum was standing now. ‘She’s not taking anything.’
I held Mum’s hand tight. Mark moved to within an inch of her face.
‘You know what will happen if she doesn’t take them, don’t you?’
I couldn’t believe what I was hearing. That was a threat. An actual threat. Mum was shaking, I could feel it. What did he mean, ‘You know what will happen?’ What will happen? What will he do to her?
Then a thought struck. Or is he talking about me?
I didn’t have time to decide. Mum was looking at me.
‘I’m sorry,’ she said, desperately trying to fight back the tears. ‘Come with me.’
Mark stood back and let us pass into the bedroom.
‘You’d better do as he says.’ Mum sighed. ‘They’re just sleeping tablets. They won’t hurt.’
‘But I don’t want to sleep.’
‘Just do it!’ Mum shouted.
Shocked, I slumped backwards onto the bed. Why is she shouting at me? What have I done wrong?
Then I realized. She was scared. Scared of what would happen if I didn’t take the pill. Scared because she knew exactly what would happen because she’d seen it before.
I had no choice. I was crying now, like Mum, but I held out my hand, took the pill and popped it into my mouth. Mum handed me a glass of water from my bedside cabinet and I swallowed it. Then she helped me lie on the bed and stroked my forehead and told me, ‘I’m sorry. I love you.’
And that was the last thing I remember.
The next time I saw a clock it was already after noon. I’d slept for about fourteen hours straight – although, from the cloudiness in my head, it felt more like ten minutes. Looking back, a pill designed to knock out an adult was obviously going to have a severe effect on me, but I couldn’t understand why I felt so groggy after such a huge amount of sleep. Gradually the fog cleared, however, and I got on with my business of cleaning the flat and making sure Mum was okay.
The next time I saw Mark and Brian they were carrying a huge, thick tube. Large as it was, I still assumed it must have something to do with smoking.
I suppose they’ll want me to do something with that.
They did – but not in the way I imagined.
Mark went straight into the kitchen and called me through. In the past I’d been happy to make his joints for him. It was one of my chores, something for Mum to enjoy as well. Since the last time, though, since I’d seen him speak to Mum in that threatening way, things had changed. I was seeing him with fresh eyes now, like he was a completely different person – one I didn’t like one bit. This new man was uglier, he looked older, his teeth were yellower and he stank, mainly of smoke, but aftershave as well. His clothes were stained in places and his breathing was heavy. All things I hadn’t noticed before, things I hadn’t picked up on when I thought he was a friend. Now I knew the truth. He definitely was no friend of ours.
‘You’ll be needing this,’ Mark said, and he handed me a chunky knife with a short, savage-looking blade.
‘What’s this?’ I asked.
‘It’s a Stanley knife.’
‘What do you do with it?’
He laughed. ‘Lots of things. But in this instance, you lay lino with it.’
The penny dropped. The long thing they’d brought in was floor covering. But what was I meant to do with it? ‘Just pull up this old crap,’ Mark said, kicking the current linoleum sheet, ‘and put this down.’ He showed me how to hold the knife. ‘Think you can manage that?’ He was smiling, but there was a tone to his voice I didn’t like.
I shrugged. He took that as a yes and left.
I
stared at this roll of vinyl, then at the knife, then at the kitchen floor. It was about five foot square. It never occurred to me to say no. The only question in my head was Where do you start?
All the while I was working – on my knees, cutting and pushing and trying to inch the stuff into place – I could smell the sweetness of the joints and hear the sound of the bubbling water in the bong, as well as the rowdiness of half a dozen or more men. Some of them were familiar faces, others were new to me. Everyone was laughing. Everyone, that is, except Mum.
I kept straining to hear, trying to make out her voice, but the noise was too great. What if they’d hurt her? What if they’d given her one of those pills?
Every fibre of my body wanted to rush out and check, but I didn’t dare. Mark was being nice today, but I’d seen his true colours. If I went out to check on Mum, who knew what he would do to her? It was clear now: he was that sort of man.
It seemed to take forever, but eventually I got the lino down. Absolutely shattered, I stood back and admired my work. As much as I’d hated doing it and I’d hated Mark for making me, I felt really proud of myself. I didn’t know why he’d bothered enough to get it done, but there was a part of me that couldn’t wait to show him my handiwork.
I stepped cautiously into the lounge. One of the men noticed me.
‘Here she is.’
Mark span round. ‘I hope this means you’ve finished,’ he said coldly.
I realized I’d been stupid to hope to impress him.
‘Yes, finished.’
His face broke into a large smile. ‘I’ve got to see this.’ He marched into the kitchen and let out a little whistle. ‘Not bad, not bad at all.’
That feeling of pride rose again in my chest. It swelled even larger when Mark said, ‘I’ve got a reward for you.’
A reward? Wonder what it is?
His hand reached into a pocket and I couldn’t wait to see what he pulled out. When I did, my heart sank.
‘Swallow this and make yourself scarce, there’s a good girl.’
I took the pill and, with just a hopeful glance at Mum, made my way to bed. She went to get up, but a strong hand pushed her back down. I closed the bedroom door, forced down the tablet, then buried my head under the pillow. Whatever the men wanted me out of the way for, I didn’t want to hear.
I didn’t know what business our kitchen floor was of this unpleasant man and nor did I care. The end result was impressive, even if I say so myself. It gave the kitchen a clean feeling. It would be a lot easier for me to keep tidy.
The only thing I cared about was the party everyone had when I wasn’t there. I wasn’t envious. I knew adults did things that children weren’t invited to. But what was it?
My seven-year-old mind couldn’t really work it out. Looking back, I obviously did things and saw things that no child should ever do or see, but it was normal for me. Even the Stanley knife was within the bounds of what I was expected to do. It was no different to wiring a plug or cooking a roast. I wasn’t aware anything was out of the ordinary. Apart from the sleeping pill.
What were they doing? They could have been going out to a party, but why did I need to be forced to sleep? Mum was often disappearing for a night or two. She didn’t have a problem leaving me. Why didn’t she just tell Mark and his friends that I was old enough to look after myself?
So I decided the party had to be taking place at the flat. For them to want me out of the way made me think that I would have heard things they didn’t want me to. Otherwise they would just have told me to stay in my room. Looking back, I have to imagine drugs featured heavily, but at the time I wasn’t aware of what drugs were – the joints to me were just cigarettes. Marijuana was such a regular feature of home life that if it hadn’t been for the episode with the police and the panda, I would never have suspected there was anything illicit about it at all. It was as commonplace at the Wilson home as tea or eggs. More commonplace, actually.
The one thing I do know is that Mum always fought it. She was always resistant to the pills. Sometimes she stood right in Mark’s or Brian’s or whoever’s face – they all seemed to carry these tablets – and screamed that she wasn’t going to let them do it to me. That made me more proud than any workmanship in the kitchen. But she never won. Usually the men just raised their voices. Then, one day, they raised their hands.
I thought I was going to be sick on the spot. I was on my way to the bedroom anyway, resigned to the usual routine. Mum needn’t have got herself into trouble, but she was in a spirited mood. She paid for it with a crack across her face.
Stunned, her legs gave way and she collapsed. Before I could move towards her, a man put his arm in my way.
‘Bed or she’ll get another one.’
I didn’t need to be told twice.
After that, I never hesitated again when they sent me away. I didn’t want them to touch a single hair on Mum’s head and I knew that was the only way to stop them. I wish Mum had realized it too. If she did, then she never showed it. Time after time, she stood up for me and got a hard swipe across the cheek for her trouble. It seemed to be every time now. Something had escalated. The relationship between her and the men, whatever it was, had somehow got worse.
I never lost the sense that I needed to look after Mum. Whether it was cleaning or cooking or worrying that she’d remembered her coat on a cold night, I always looked out for her. Knowing that if she didn’t let them drug me she would be hurt drove me mad. I found myself almost sprinting into the bedroom.
If I’m quick, Mum won’t have time to argue – and she won’t get hit.
Sometimes it worked. Other times I’d hear the smacks through the thin walls. Seeing her be hit was horrific. Hearing the attack – because that’s what it was – and wondering what had happened to her was somehow even worse. I didn’t dare cry out in case it made things worse for Mum. But anyone listening at my door would have heard me crying as quietly as I dared, cowering under my blankets, imagining horror after horror.
Mum, though, didn’t give in. One day I was in the kitchen rolling joints when I was told it was pill time, so I had to make sure everything was neat before I could leave. That gave Mum plenty of time to object. Too much time. Even though we were in different rooms, I could hear every word of the argument. I realized I was tensing, just waiting for the moment someone’s hand struck her face. This time, however, Mark went further.
‘If you don’t shut up,’ I heard him say, slowly and calmly, ‘I’m gonna do to Cathy what I’m about to do to you.’
That was it. Silence. I didn’t hear another peep out of Mum, not even when I emerged from the kitchen and traipsed over to the bedroom. Just before I closed the door I dared a glimpse in Mum’s direction and shuddered. Her face had a new level of terror etched all over it.
Why?
Mulling it over in the bedroom, I realized Mark hadn’t hit her because that never seemed to work. So he’d threatened to hurt me instead. I didn’t know how. Something about doing to me what he was going to do to Mum. It sounded ominous but unclear. Whatever it was, Mum knew exactly what it meant. And that was enough to keep her quiet. I cried as I realized she was sacrificing herself for me.
Over the course of I don’t know how long, things worsened. The men were still only coming round about twice a week, but their manner changed. They used to be friendly. Mark, in particular, would go out of his way to keep me onside. I thought he might have been trying to impress Mum, like a boyfriend, by making me like him. I couldn’t think of another reason. And she’d seemed to like them all in the early days. At least, she’d appeared to. Was there ever much more than indifference in her eyes when they’d arrived those first few times? Every time I thought about it, the memory was just too far out of reach.
Now, though, with the pills and parties and the threats against me, the atmosphere in the flat whenever the men were there was hideous. I literally felt sick whenever the door opened and there they were. I prayed each time that it wouldn’t be
them, but more often than not it was. We had no friends, so who else would come round? I wasn’t the only one devastated by their arrival. Mum began making less of an effort to pretend she was happy to see them. Some days it was as though she barely registered they were there until the threats started. Then she’d look at me, like she was trying to focus on my face, and say, ‘Leave her out of it.’
Mostly the men did leave me out of it. Mostly.
As I went to close the bedroom door one night, I felt the handle lift back up. Someone was trying to come in.
‘Mum!’
But it wasn’t. It was one of the men. Brian.
‘What do you want?’ I asked him. ‘I’ve got my tablet.’
I held it up to prove it. In fact, eager for him to go away, I swallowed it down, no water.
‘I’m not here for that. I just wanted to make sure you were comfortable.’
This isn’t good.
I closed my eyes and willed the sleeping tablet to do its work, but my senses were on red alert. I couldn’t switch off. I was so intent on listening that I didn’t even dare breathe. Then I felt the mattress sag with the weight of someone sitting down next to me on the edge of the bed.
My last thought as I passed out a few minutes later was Why is Brian touching me there?
It was my old foster parent’s behaviour all over again. Outside, I heard my mother scream.
Violence was slowly becoming a way of life – no longer was there just the threat of it. And the worst was still to come.
I didn’t know what I’d done to offend them, or what Mum had done, but there was a distinct change in attitude. Some of the men had virtually ignored me at first. Now they seemed to go out of their way to throw insults in my direction. One or two occasionally held me in ways I didn’t like.
‘Come on, Cathy, sit over here. Keep me company.’
Escape From Evil Page 8