No Easy Road

by Patsy Whyte

  Many times since then, as I passed the sitting room door, I wanted to knock but was too afraid of the consequences of doing so. I stood there, with hand raised, but always courage failed me at the last second. So I turned away, keeping my problems and difficulties to myself.

  But this felt different. What was it she wanted of me? What did I do wrong today? I couldn't think of anything. As I approached the sitting room door, the house mother was standing half in and half out. She looked sternly at me.

  In a sharp raised voice, she said, "There's someone called Louise on the telephone for you. She wants to know if you can come out or if she can come and see you. You tell her you can't and not to call this number again."

  The house mother pointed me towards the hallway telephone sitting on a table at the main entrance to the home. The receiver was off the hook and I picked it up. I said nothing to Louise other than what the house mother told me to say and hung up. That was the end of my first ever telephone call.

  All the while, the house mother listened intently to make sure I said exactly what she told me to say. Then she questioned me. I felt like a criminal.

  "Did you tell her to call you? Did you give her the home's number?", she asked accusingly.

  I stammered out, "No, I told her nothing. I don't know how she got the number."

  The house mother looked long and hard, almost searching into my very soul, not convinced by my nervous reply. Then, with the well practised dismissive gesture she always used, she waved me away without a further word.

  Quickly, I walked back through to the television room, glad to be out of the house mother's view. All through the rest of the evening, my thoughts kept returning to the telephone call and how and why Louise had tried to contact me. I longed to have a friend, to do all the things other teenagers did, like going to discos or youth clubs or just visiting each other's house to listen to records and talk about boyfriends and clothes. But I knew all of that was impossible.

  Next day, at school, Louise kept her distance and I felt too uncomfortable to say anything. How I wished I could have explained I didn't deliberately shun her. But I had no choice. I had to do what I was told. I was never allowed to do normal things, like other girls my age.

  I think Louise felt as empty as I was inside. She was struggling to cope with the death of her father, a fisherman, who was lost at sea. So most days, she sat quietly in class, withdrawn, never laughing or joining in. Perhaps the telephone call was a cry for help, the beginning of her reaching out. Maybe, when she saw the sadness in me, she recognised it in herself and making friends with me was a first step. It must have taken a lot for her to pick up the telephone. Then I cut her dead. She never called the home again. We never became friends.

  * * *

  Louise reminded me so much of Jennifer. Years before, when I was looking through the steel bars of the playground fence, I noticed a young girl aged about 10 being led by the hand up the gravel driveway to the front door. The lady holding her hand was dishevelled in appearance and her once stylish hair now showed the last remnants of a perm.

  The lady noticed me and smiled self-consciously as if to hide the large buck teeth protruding out from her mouth and continued walking past me up the driveway. She hesitated for a moment or two just a few steps away from the door, as if unsure what to do next, and then rang the doorbell.

  After some words were exchanged, the two of them entered the home. I continued playing for a short while until it was time to come in. The girl I saw earlier was now sitting in the dining room. I was told her name was Jennifer and that she had come to live with us.

  Jennifer's hair was soft and short and dark. One eye squinted as she looked at you. She was very shy and withdrawn and hardly said a word. All she did was stare at the floor. We were told the following morning she wasn't coming to school with us. Instead, she was going to a school for children they called backward.

  Jennifer was a good few years older than me. Like me, she never had any family visits over the years. She never played much with the rest of us, always preferring her own company. I learned much later the lady with the buck teeth, who I never saw again, was her mother.

  Some five years down the road, it was time for Jennifer to get a job. So she found herself employed at a nearby woollen mill which made jumpers and knitted hats and gloves. But after only a few days, Jennifer was in floods of tears in the kitchen, talking to the house mother, when she was supposed to be at work. I was hanging around the home killing time, prior to a visit to the dentist.

  "You've been fired after only a few days at the job!", I heard the house mother shout out.

  The anger in her voice only made Jennifer cry and sob all the more as she tried her best to explain. But the house mother was having none of it.

  The house mother demanded, "So what are you going to do now? If you can't do a simple job like that then you're no good to anyone."

  I tiptoed out the kitchen, frightened of the house mother turning her anger on me and thankfully made my way to the dentist. The next time I saw Jennifer, she was carrying her belongings and clothes from the big girls' room, where we both slept, to an adjoining room used for members of staff. I realised Jennifer now had a new job, looking after us.

  It was not unknown for children in the home to end up being employed as members of staff. As I found out later, Jennifer was the replacement for another staff member who was once brought up in the home and who had now been thrown out.

  It all happened just a few days earlier. The house mother was tipped off and burst into her room in the middle of the night, catching her in bed with her boyfriend. So she was dismissed on the spot. The shouting and swearing woke me up. I heard the house mother tell her to pack her bags and get out.

  The nigh time visits were going on for quite some time. The boyfriend climbed up the drainpipe on the outside wall and entered the room through an open window. Then he sneaked back down the drainpipe in the early hours before anyone in the home stirred. But the dismissal left the house mother short staffed and Jennifer conveniently filled the gap.

  Jennifer, not being very bright, struggled with every task she was given. The house mother lacked patience at the best of times and hated any sloppiness or excuses. So she was always on Jennifer's back, shouting constantly and taking her bad temper out on her.

  The house mother thought nothing of barging into Jennifer's room at three o'clock in the morning, cursing and swearing and dragging her by the hair out of bed, hitting her about the head and bundling her down the stairs half naked because she forgot to blacken the kitchen stove. I saw it all, peeking out from underneath the blankets. My bed looked directly into Jennifer's room. She was terrified as she raised her arms above her head in an effort to protect herself.

  I felt powerless to help. I could do nothing but watch as the house mother's anger grew day by day and Jennifer turned more and more into a skivvy. It was nothing for Jennifer to begin working at 6 o'clock in a freezing morning and still be slaving away late into the night, long after we were all in bed.

  I am ashamed to say the house mother's attitude also rubbed off on the rest of us as we blamed Jennifer for everything we did wrong. Of course, we were simply saving our own skins, not realising how wrong it was getting her into so much trouble. It just became part of everyday life.

  But Jennifer was never vindictive or angry with any of us. She had sympathy for the children she grew up with and never told tales on anyone. I liked her a lot. She was a gentle soul who deserved so much better. But there was no home to call her own or anyone to care. So she had no option but to stick it out, for years and years. She was the Cinderella and the house mother was the wicked stepmother.

  Chapter Twelve

  As I put my new swimming costume on in the changing rooms, a tingle of excitement ran through me. I was more than a little nervous, too, although determined not to show it. All would be decided soon, I reassured myself, as I made my way from the changing rooms with the rest of my team mates a few mome
nts later and walked slowly up to the top of the swimming pool and the starting blocks. There was hardly an empty seat anywhere. I looked around me at all the faces staring down, expectant, anticipating the start of the relay race.

  "Ready, set, go!", said the starter, firing his starting gun.

  A sharp crack split the air and the race was on. The girl leading our team was quickest diving into the brightly lit pool. Within seconds, she was pulling ahead of the rest of the field. The race was the highlight of the inter-school championships. I was picked for the team because I was considered a good swimmer. We practised hard for weeks, even going to the pool during some Saturdays, so determined were we all to win. Now the hard work was paying off. Everything was going to plan.

  It was during one of these Saturdays I happened to accidentally catch the eye of a young lad at the other end of the noisy crowded pool. There was something about him as he stood there with two other boys, both around the same age. I kept looking at him. He kept staring back at me. Suddenly, I knew he was my brother.

  I couldn't explain how I knew. But the feeling inside was so powerful, so overwhelming. I looked carefully at the other two boys with him. Yes, I was certain. They were also my brothers. There was no doubt in my mind. But they didn't notice me. The spell was broken in the next instant when they were all ushered out of the pool by an elderly man. I felt sad as I watched them disappear out of sight.

  I discovered years later they were indeed my brothers, Michael, Andy and Alec. But no one ever told me. I never knew they existed. It felt strange, meeting them for the very first time at the children's home they were brought up in. I was 19, with a child of my own, and I recognised them instantly. They were the three young lads I saw at the other end of the pool many years before.

  We were way out in front as the second girl in our team-of-three dived into the water, increasing the lead yet further with every stroke. Then it was my turn. After diving in confidently, I swam powerfully in my hand knitted costume which was given to me the night before by the house mother. I was determined to increase the gap between me and the swimmer in second place who was by now some five or six yards behind. The crowd included children from the home and many pupils from my school with their parents. They all screamed and cheered me on, sensing victory would soon be ours.

  I was punching through the water as fast as I could. Suddenly, I felt the weight of the water pulling my swimming costume down the front of my chest. At first, I tried to ignore it. I touched the end of the pool and pushed off to swim the final length. But with every yard I swam, the more baggier the swimming costume became. By the time I reached the middle of the pool, it slipped all the way down to my waist and was gathered around my stomach in a shapeless mass.

  It could only happen to me. Horrified, I stretched and pulled at the costume while still vainly trying to swim. At the same time, I was desperately attempting to preserve my dignity which was disappearing fast. But all eyes in the gallery were transfixed by the unfolding scene. They missed none of the detail as they got an unexpected eyeful of my well formed breasts.

  At that moment, the second placed swimmer swam past me, and then the third, and before I knew it, I was the only person left in the pool. I felt a thousand eyes following my every movement as I struggled to walk through the water while holding the costume up with both hands. It was a long lonely embarrassing walk back to the edge of the pool.

  As I slowly climbed up the steps to get out, the costume stretched so much it was now completely see through. My embarrassment was complete. I made a mad dash to the changing rooms where I found my team mates waiting. But they were far from disappointed with me, as I expected. Although I lost them the race, it didn't matter. They never laughed so much in their lives.

  When I returned to the home later that evening, I felt so annoyed we lost the race, and angry at being given such an inappropriate costume for such a public event. Unsurprisingly, I was the only one not to see the funny side of things. It took me weeks to get over the embarrassment and years to look back at it all and laugh. It really was so funny.

  * * *

  It was coming up to the summer holidays and my 15th birthday passed by unnoticed as usual. Sitting down at the dining room table finishing my tea with the rest of the children, I tried to pluck up the courage to tell the house mother I wanted to leave the home for good. I didn't want to live here a day longer than I had to.

  The house mother sat eating at her table in the middle of the room. She barely moved and almost blended with the furniture and fittings. Only her eyes blinked and darted to-and-fro, watching everything going on around her. For as long as I remembered, she always sat that way, looming over us all to make sure nothing passed her by.

  "When can I leave?", I finally blurted out.

  I did it. I've said the words. For the first time in a long time, I managed to get her attention. The expression on the house mother's face turned first to shock and then to anger.

  "You..."

  She looked stunned. Her voice trailed away and was followed by a sharp intake of breath.

  "You should be grateful for everything I've done for you!", she finally said in a low, hissing, venomous voice.

  But her hate filled words simply washed over me for I knew there was very little she could do to stop me leaving. I was at the age where she couldn't wield her authority over me any more, or threaten or intimidate me. Then she stopped herself short, as if realising the situation had changed and further words were now useless. The balance of power was shifting, forever, and she knew she no longer had control.

  In a calm voice, she said, "I'll make arrangements."

  That was it. I couldn't believe what I was hearing. For the first time I felt empowered, not scared, not frightened, triumphant. It was the greatest feeling ever. The weight that always seemed to be on top of me, smothering me, pressing me down for years, was now lifted as if by magic. My life was about to change. I felt as light as a feather. As I made my way out of the dining room, I couldn't wait for my day of freedom to arrive.

  Lying in my bed that night, I felt very happy but the feeling was tinged with sadness at the thought of leaving the rest of the children at the home behind. I tried to remember the faces of all those who'd come and gone over the years, wondering if everything had worked out for them in the big wide world. I thought about the old house mother who died and reflected on the fateful day I first laid eyes on the woman walking up the driveway who shortly afterwards became the present house mother.

  * * *

  It was now my final day at high school. The last two weeks were agony, every hour feeling like it was two and each day dragging by almost in slow motion. But now, here I was, at the very last assembly, and my name was being called out. I walked up on to the stage in front of the whole school to collect my Red Cross certificate in childcare. It took me two years of study and a two-hour written exam to gain the certificate. Proudly, I accepted it from the headmaster. It was my one and only achievement.

  The childcare classes were held once a week, mostly at the school but occasionally at a nearby medical centre. It was there I saw rows and rows of jars containing foetuses floating in preserving fluid. They were all at different stages of development. I was shocked the first time I saw them. Then, as we sat among them learning how to knit baby booties, I was saddened to think none had made it into the world.

  The school bell rang and marked the end of my school days. I made my way outside and into the playground. Some of the boys from my class were laughing and messing about. They played a farewell prank on the teachers, letting the air out of their car tyres. I enjoyed walking out the school gates for the very last time, glad to be leaving so many unhappy memories behind me. School days were supposed to be the best days of your life, but not for me. They were difficult years, often humiliating, a real waste of time in the end.

  The following Monday morning, the house mother told me to go down to the Labour Exchange and get a job. But I had no idea what the Labour E
xchange was or even how to get there. She told me to take a bus into town but gave me no instructions as to what bus to take, how to find it, or where the bus stop was. What was I supposed to say to the bus conductor? How much money did I have to hand over?