No Easy Road

by Patsy Whyte

  The car drove through the now familiar busy streets of Aberdeen. I felt a sense of calm after deciding to look upon it all as yet another adventure, another new phase in my life. If only I knew then what lay ahead of me, I would surely have ran away as far as I could at the first opportunity.

  Chapter Fifteen

  The car pulled up outside the large grey granite house. It was an imposing building, solid, surrounded by monkey puzzle trees which hid it from the outside world. There were no flowers or bushes anywhere to brighten up its dullness. I stood next to my social worker in front of the heavy wood panelled front door. Nervously, she straightened out her skirt and brushed a few imaginary creases away with her fingers before ringing the door bell.

  A moment or two later, a lady dressed in white overalls stood in front of us. She was huge, the spare tyre around her middle placing an almost impossible strain on buttons threatening to fly off in all directions at any moment. A dusting of white flour covered her dark hair which was tied up into a tight pony tail, giving her the appearance of someone who was much older. My social worker explained who we were.

  "Yes, the house mother's expecting you. If you'd like to come this way", said the lady.

  There was no trace of emotion anywhere in her voice. She quickly led us along a wide hallway to a green coloured door and stopped outside it. After two quick raps with her knuckles, she turned the large solid brass door handle and ushered us through.

  The house mother sat behind a desk in the middle of the room, head buried in some kind of report. Her eyes barely looked up as we entered. She reminded me of the stern prison wardens I'd seen in films. Large black heavy framed glasses sat perched half way down her nose. Her hair was tightly drawn off her face into a bun at the back of her head.

  As I looked around the room, which doubled as both office and sitting room, I felt the chill from her cold demeanour and I started to cry. I knew no warmth was to be found in my new home. She glanced up from the report she was so engrossed in and her eyes met mine.

  "You can stop that right now. Those tears won't wash here!", she snapped.

  Her words cut straight through me and made me grip the handle of my suitcase even tighter. My social worker said nothing in my defence and quickly excused herself. All of a sudden, she was late for another appointment. Before I knew it, she was gone and I was on my own, listening to the sound of her footsteps walking down the corridor and fading in the distance.

  The house mother said nothing. She motioned me to follow her out of the room. We stopped in the dining area. There I noticed the same type of blue plastic plates used in the home. They were all laid out on the large table in the centre, ready for the evening meal. She broke the silence, laying down the law with a list of rules.

  "This is where you will come to eat", she said. "If you are late, you won't get a meal. You are allowed to go out two evenings a week until 9 o'clock. Any later and the police will be called. You hand all of your wages over to me on a Friday, straight after work. You do not open your wage packet. You bring it straight into my living room and then hand it over. Do you understand?"

  "Yes", I replied meekly, feeling more miserable with each passing second.

  "And", staring directly at me, as if to measure each word carefully for effect, she slowly added, "you do exactly as you are told to do. When I ask you to do something, you jump to it. Do I make myself clear?"

  There was no need for me to reply. It wasn't expected. The fear written all over my face was enough. She knew I got the message loud and clear. After pointing me in the direction of my room, the house mother turned her back on me and walked away. At that moment, I don't think I ever felt so alone in the world. The only thing keeping me going was the promise my social worker made. I was only here for two weeks, just while she found another place for me, and I couldn't wait.

  I climbed the main staircase to my room which I found easily enough and planted my suitcase down on the floor. The room was bright and airy and held three single beds and three chests of drawers. Green flowery wallpaper covered the walls and matched in with the bedspreads. Knick-knacks and other personal items lay neatly on top of two of the chests of drawers. I assumed rightly the one with nothing on top was mine. So I picked up my suitcase and placed it on the bed next to it and unpacked.

  During the evening meal, I finally met up with my room mates and the rest of the girls at the hostel. The hostel was empty and quiet up until then. I stayed hidden in my room out of sight of the house mother, not wanting to cross paths with her if I could help it. But now I couldn't avoid her. She was sitting at the dining table.

  The house mother said nothing. She never so much as looked at me as I took my place at the table. Neither did any of the other eight or nine girls. They must have noticed me yet they didn't talk to me or even acknowledge I was there.

  The dining room was fairly large with a carpeted floor. It was dominated by the highly polished table we were sitting at. Food brought through from the kitchen was ready and waiting in the warming drawers of a large trolley pushed up against the far wall. When the house mother nodded, one of the girls got up and served the food.

  I found sitting amongst complete strangers a real strain. Throughout the meal, I never uttered a single word, apart from a quiet but polite thank you when food was served onto my plate. So I watched and listened to them all. Quickly, I realised the conversation was more about scoring brownie points.

  The girls wanted to please the house mother all the time. They were very careful not to say or do anything which she might find fault with. It was obvious she enjoyed the power she held over them. The whole performance reminded me of a game of cat and mouse.

  Ruby, one of the girls, talked excitedly about the boy she just got engaged to whom she'd been going out with for some time. She tried her best to appear casual, waving and moving her hand a lot through the air so we would take note of the new engagement ring on her finger. Her friends seemed impressed. I wasn't. Neither was the house mother.

  Dinner was over quite quickly because most of the girls were in a hurry to get ready to go out for the evening. I hung about the sitting room and watched television. An older girl with long brown waist length hair, dressed in a brightly coloured top and long skirt, walked in and started raking about looking for something.

  She was small and weasely and her thin frame lay hidden underneath her loose flowing clothes. She reminded me of a hippy. When she didn't find what she was looking for, she started pulling cushions off the chairs and flinging them to the floor. Without saying a word, she moved over to the settee where a pile of magazines lay neatly stacked. The magazines also ended up tossed and scattered across the room.

  "There's a thief in here", she finally bellowed out, so I would hear.

  I ignored her and carried on watching television until she deliberately stood in front of me.

  "Did you take my cigarettes?", she demanded, in an American accent. "Are you a bloody thief?"

  "Who are you calling a thief! I never touched them", I screamed back.

  I felt irritated by her antics and attitude. The stress of the move and living in a strange place was difficult enough to come to terms with. So I wasn't in the mood for any of this crap.

  "Maybe you put them down somewhere else", I shouted. "Try looking before you start blaming me."

  "Huh. We'll see."

  We glared at each other for a moment. Then she threw her head in the air and stormed out of the sitting room, leaving me with the feeling we'd be anything but best friends. I decided to go to bed early because I was exhausted and felt down and wanted to be left on my own. There was no way I was looking for any further confrontation, either with her or with anyone else.

  My head no sooner hit the pillow than I was fast asleep. But not long after, I was wakened up by my room mates returning from their evening out. They seemed bubbly and happy and asked me all kinds of questions. One of the girls was aged about 17 and was called Jen. She was small with black hair feathered
in at the back and worked as an usherette at a cinema. She spent the evening at her boyfriend's house listening to Jimmy Hendrix records and loved Purple Haze.

  Joy, my other room mate, was a little taller than Jen with short blonde wavy hair. She wasn't as fashionably dressed and worked behind the counter in Boots The Chemist. I got the feeling she was the sort of person who would be there for life. Her poor boyfriend took second place next to her job.

  Before we all went to sleep, Jen warned me to watch out for the house mother. She was a bitch. The girl with the American accent was Kirsty, a single parent. She was right in with the house mother and liked to grass people up.

  Next day, I found out the fat lady in the white overalls was the cook. She seemed to have a lot of say in the running of the hostel and the welfare of the girls. The cook told me to stop moping about all day and get myself down to the employment exchange and find a job. So I did and got myself a job in a biscuit factory.

  It was a good job. All I had to do was carry trays of biscuits from the processing machines and stack them onto huge racks. I was allowed to eat as many biscuits as I wanted. It was great at first, until I sickened myself. On Friday, after work, I handed my wages over to the house mother as instructed.

  Jen told me she was supposed to hand me back 10 shillings. But this never happened. So it meant I had no make-up or clothes to go out with. Maybe I should have said something. But I didn't because I knew I would have to practically beg for it. I wasn't prepared to do that.

  Day after day, I kept looking out the window for the white car belonging to my social worker. But she never came and my heart sank deeper into despair. I finally plucked up the courage to ask the house mother when she was coming back.

  "What nonsense are you talking about? There's no one coming", she said, obviously enjoying my disappointment.

  At that moment, I realised I'd been betrayed, abandoned, dumped, left here to rot. I'd been well and truly conned and I felt the anger rising inside me as I turned to walk away. I thought to myself, I'm not going to be controlled any more. I'm out of here the first chance I get and no one's going to stop me.

  When I awoke next morning, feeling tired and drained after tossing and turning all night, I was late for work. I leapt out of bed quickly throwing my clothes on and dashed out the door to catch the bus. The bus was full so I climbed up the stairs and grabbed the first empty seat I saw. Then pulling at the hem of my mini skirt, to make sure I was decent, I slid across the seat to the window. Something didn't feel right. The seat felt unusually cold.

  'Oh my God!', I thought to myself. 'I'm not wearing any knickers.'

  In my rush to get ready, I forgot to put them on. I carefully made my way downstairs and got off at the next stop and walked back to the hostel feeling rather foolish. Thankfully, no one spotted me as I darted into my room and then out again to catch the bus once more to work. When I finally arrived, I was called through to the manager's office to explain why I was late. Terrified, I stood in front of him and explained my predicament. Instead of firing me, as I expected, he burst out laughing. My face was red with embarrassment but at least my job was safe.

  When I collected my wages on Friday, I decided to open the packet and take 10 shillings out before handing it over to the house mother. She was not going to take all of my wages this time and leave me with nothing. I worked hard all week for the money. After carefully sealing the packet up again, I went into her office and handed it over. My fingers were crossed hoping she wouldn't notice the money was missing, but my luck was out. Within minutes, she marched through to the sitting room with a face like thunder and ordered me to follow her.

  "Explain yourself!", she demanded angrily, thumping her fist on to the desk where my opened wage packet lay. "Where is the rest of the money?"

  "I took the money out", I said, defiantly.

  "Hand it over now", she shouted.

  "I don't have it".

  She knew I was lying and her face grew even more red with anger.

  "What do you mean you don't have it?"

  "I've spent it!"

  She paused for a moment with a stunned, shocked expression on her face. No one ever stood up to her like this before.

  "What did I tell you the rules were about wages?"

  "To hand them unopened to you", I said.

  She paused. My hatred of her grew with each passing second. I refused to be intimidated as she tried to stare me down. She was going to be the first to blink, not me. And she did. Maybe, for the first time, she realised there was nothing she could do.

  "Get out of my sight. Don't think this is the last of it. I'll deal with you later."

  I knew I was in for a hard time now but I didn't care any more. The house mother could do what she wanted or give me any punishment but I was going to make life extremely difficult for her, too. True to her word, it started the next day when the cook handed me the biggest pot she could find and told me to start peeling potatoes and fill it.

  'Bloody hell', I thought to myself. 'I'll be here to midnight!'

  All the while, the cook hovered about making sure I didn't slacken for a single moment. Hours later, or so it seemed, the job was finally done. I went through to the television room. Kirsty was there with a couple of the other girls she was friendly with. As soon as I sat down, they began to snigger and whisper amongst themselves. They were talking about me, making sure I heard the odd remark.

  It wasn't the first time they acted in this way when I was around them. So their annoying behaviour was not entirely unexpected. I could see the girls who hung about with Kirsty were just using her, because she kept them supplied with cigarettes and money she collected from the DHSS to support her and her son. It was all so pathetic.

  On the Sunday, I was ordered back into the kitchen where the cook pointed to a large shelf filled with heavy steel pots and pans. She told me to scrub every single one of them until they all gleamed brightly. She disappeared out of the kitchen and I filled the white stone sink up with hot soapy water. A minute later, the cook returned pulling a wooden step ladder behind her.

  "Use that to climb up to the pots and start scrubbing", she ordered.

  This was the house mother's revenge. As I set about the task, my mood changed from dark to black and brooding. The more pots I cleaned, the harder I slammed each one down on the draining board. Kirsty wandered through, watching me.

  Then she began to snigger as I pulled another heavy pot off the shelf. The cook was also enjoying herself, constantly on my back, ordering me to clean the same pot over and over because it was not shiny enough, even although I could practically see my face in it.

  While reaching for one more pot, Kirsty deliberately pushed the step ladder. I nearly fell off. She burst out laughing watching me grab on to the shelf to steady myself, like it was all some kind of game. The pot slipped out of my fingers and tumbled to the floor with a crash.

  In an instant, something snapped inside me. I flew down the ladder like lightning and grabbed the cook with both hands, flinging her hard against the wall. Eyes wide open with fear, mouth gaping, 18 stones of flab slithered down and crumbled into a heap on the floor. I grabbed a large carving knife and bolted after Kirsty who was now howling and screaming at the top of her voice, running up the road for dear life.

  Possessed, a mad woman, hell-bent on catching her at any cost, I was oblivious to everything going on around me in this normally peaceful street. I must have run at least a quarter of a mile. But I couldn't find her. By then, the rage inside me was beginning to subside.

  Feeling shaky and shocked, and still holding the knife in my hand, I suddenly felt disgusted with myself. For I had no idea such anger existed inside me and that I was capable of hurting someone. So I threw the knife away into a clump of nearby bushes and slowly walked back to the hostel.