Sidling up to other children in the playground with an uncertain smile on my face, I stretched my arm out with the bag, offering them around. I was immediately surrounded. Hands dipped into my bag, children jostled each other as they eagerly snatched my offerings. I stood in the centre of the group, hearing them laughing and feeling for the first time that I was part of them. A wave of happiness hit me as I felt finally accepted. Then my bag was empty, the last sweet was gone. The laughter, I realized, was at me as the children melted away with whoops of glee as quickly as they had appeared.
I knew then that although they liked the sweets, they were never going to like me. After that day they liked me less for they could sense how desperately I wanted their approval and despised me for it.
I remembered then the visits to Mrs Trivett’s house and the question I would always put to her: ‘What are little girls made of?’ I remembered her reply, and thought now that I must be made of a different substance.
Chapter Six
Iwould always be exhausted by the time I had walked home, but I still had homework to do. I would sit at the table in our kitchen, which also doubled as our sitting room, trying desperately to stay awake. The only heat came from the cooking range at the far end of the room, the only light from the oil-fuelled Tilly lamps, which gave out a dim, orangey glow.
Once my homework was finished, I would try to sit closer to the warmth of the range and read, or I would watch my mother put a griddle pan onto the stove. Onto it she poured a batter mixture, which magically turned into drop scones or soda bread. We had to be as self-sufficient as possible in those days. Bought cakes and bread were considered to be as great a luxury as red meat or fresh fruit. If it was not home grown we simply didn’t buy it.
We had our chickens, which not only provided us with a regular source of eggs but also paid in part for the groceries we bought from the twice-weekly van. Potatoes and carrots were supplied from our vegetable patch, and when I went to the neighbouring farm to collect milk I also collected the buttermilk that my mother used for baking.
Now that I was seven and a half I could read fluently and, during the time we spent at the thatched house, my love for books grew. A mobile library would come at the weekends and I could choose whichever books I wanted. Apart from my animals, books were my escape. I could disappear into other worlds of fantasy, adventure and fun. I could play detective with Enid Blyton’s ‘Famous Five’, explore the underwater world of the Water Babies and feel frightened by Grimm’s Fairy Tales. Little Women showed me how women could be independent. I dreamt of being like Jo when I grew up. Under the light of the Tilly lamps I could have secret adventures with imaginary friends and vanish with them into a life where I was beautifully dressed and where everyone liked me. As my love of reading grew, so did my father’s resentment of it.
He never read more than the sports section in the newspaper and considered my mother’s and my interest in books a waste of time. Whereas he didn’t dare criticize her, he had no qualms in venting his displeasure on me.
‘What are you doing that for?’ he’d grumble. ‘Can you not find something better to do? Does your mother not need you to help? See if there is some washing up to do.’
Another time he’d say, ‘What about your homework?’
When I replied, ‘I’ve finished it,’ he’d give a disdainful grunt. Unnerved, I would feel his resentment wash over me and pray for bedtime so that I could make my escape.
Full of resentment for anybody who might be happy or educated, my father’s rages and tempers were unpredictable. There were the times when he came home quite early, bringing my mother and me sweets and chocolates. Those were the evenings when the jovial father would appear with hugs for my mother and friendly greetings for me. In my mind I had two fathers, the nasty one and the nice one. The nasty one I was very scared of, while the nice one, whom I remembered meeting us at the docks, was the laughing, good-humoured man whom my mother loved. I was only ever allowed rare glimpses of the nice father now, but always hoped for more.
In the spring my father rented a wooden barn, which he said he could keep all his tools in, so that he could repair the car. Housing the chickens, he said, had taken up all the available sheds near the house. This would save us money, he said, since he was a qualified mechanic. Wouldn’t it be stupid to be paying other men good money for a job he could do better himself?
My mother agreed with him, which put him in a good humour and suddenly his manner towards me changed. He stopped always being cross, criticizing everything I did. From alternating between wanting me out of the way, ignoring me or shouting at me, he suddenly became friendly all the time. Remembering his hasty fumbles that time when my mother was out of the room, I viewed his overtures with suspicion, but I forced my doubts to one side because, above everything else, I had a desperate need to be loved by my parents. I should have trusted my instincts.
‘She’s done so much homework this week,’ he said to my mother one evening. ‘She’s had all those long walks to school and back, I’ll take her out for a drive in the car.’
My mother smiled brightly. ‘Yes, Antoinette, run along with Daddy. He’s going to take you out for a drive.’
I jumped into the car enthusiastically, my pleasure only marred when Judy was barred from coming with us. As I sat gazing out of the window I wondered where the drive would take us. I was soon to find out. At the end of our lane he turned off into the field where the small wooden barn he had rented stood. This was where all my weekend drives would lead.
He drove into the dim, shadowy building. The only natural light came from a small window with sacking nailed across it. I felt a sick sensation in the pit of my stomach, felt an unknown fear and knew that I did not want to get out of the car.
‘Daddy,’ I pleaded, ‘please take me home, I don’t like it here.’
He just looked at me, with a smile that did not reach his eyes.
‘Stay here, Antoinette,’ he commanded. ‘Your Daddy has a present for you. You’re going to like it, you’ll see.’
The fear I had of him intensified into terror, creating a leaden weight of dread that kept me firmly in my seat. He got out of the car to lock the shed, then opened the passenger door. When he pulled me round to face him I saw that his trousers were unzipped. His face was red; his eyes were glazed. As I looked into them he no longer seemed to see me. A tremor started deep inside me, shaking my body and forcing its way out of my throat as a whimper.
‘You be a good girl now,’ he said, taking my child-sized hand, small, plump and dimpled, in his. Holding it firmly, he forced my fingers round his penis then moved them up and down. All the time I was doing it I could hear small animal whimpers escaping from my throat and mingling with his grunts. I shut my eyes tightly, hoping that if I couldn’t see then it would stop, but it didn’t.
Suddenly my hand was released and my body thrown back across the seat. I felt one hand holding me firmly by pressing on my stomach while another pulled my dress up and yanked my knickers down. I felt shame as my small body was exposed to his eyes and I was pushed further down on the cold leather seat. He pulled me sideways, leaving my legs dangling helplessly over the edge. Legs that I tried in vain to close. I felt him force them further apart, knew he was gazing at the part of me that I thought private, felt a cushion slide under my bottom and then the pain as he pushed himself into me, not hard enough in those early days to tear or damage, but hard enough to hurt.
I lay as limp and as mute as a rag doll, trying to focus on anything apart from what was happening, while the smell of the shed with its combination of damp, oil and petrol, mingled with my father’s male smell of tobacco and stale body odour, seemed to seep into the very pores of my skin.
After what seemed like an eternity, he gave a groan and pulled out of me. I felt a warm, wet, sticky substance dripping onto my stomach. He threw a piece of sacking at me.
‘Clean yourself up with that.’
Wordlessly, I did as he instructed.
I already knew that was true.
The one secret I held back from my father was the secret I held back from myself. My mother did know. The one fear he had was that she would find out. So that was the day we started the game; the game was called ‘our secret’, a game that he and I were to play for seven more years.
Chapter Seven
My eighth birthday arrived, bringing with it an early autumn quickly followed by the chill of winter. A diet of dark-brown peat was constantly supplied to the stove, producing a red glow, but however much we fed it the warm pool of heat never seemed to spread more than a few feet. I would huddle as close to it as possible as my permanently damp coat, shoes and woollen tights steamed on the wooden clothes horse. Since I only had one of each they had to be ready for the following day.
My mother’s voice would float up the still uncarpeted stairs to wake me in the darkness of every early morning, and a chill would nip the tip of my nose as it ventured outside the cocoon of blankets. Automatically my arm would stretch out to the wooden chair, which doubled up as table and wardrobe, as I fumbled for clothes, which I would draw in under the blankets. First my school knickers, followed by woollen tights, brought from the kitchen the night before, were wriggled into. Then, with chattering teeth, my unbuttoned pyjama top would be hastily pulled over my head to be replaced by a woollen vest. Only then would I swing my legs out of bed, leaving my warm nest behind and venturing into the cold of the unheated house. Hastily I would boil the kettle on the range, which would eventually, with some prodding from the poker and some small pieces of peat, come slowly to life.
I would wash quickly at the kitchen sink while my breakfast egg was cooked, then scramble into the rest of my clothes. Breakfast would be consumed hurriedly, then, pulling on my still damp coat, I would pick up my satchel and leave for school.
At the weekends, dressed in an old sweater, mittens and wellington boots, I would help my mother collect eggs, both from the deep litter outhouses and from the scattered hiding places of the free-range chickens. Hoping for brown eggs, she gave them cocoa every morning at eleven o’clock. Whether it increased the ratio of brown eggs to white we were never sure, but the chickens would come running when she called. Greedily, their beaks would dip into the warm sweet liquid time and again. Lifting their heads from the bowls they would shake them, their little beady eyes gleaming as the liquid trickled down their throats.
Frogs would be rescued from the well’s bucket and twigs collected for kindling. But my favourite time was when my mother baked. Scones and soda bread were removed from the griddle and, once cooled, placed into tin containers, because food had to be protected from the army of mice that took shelter with us during the winter months.
Sugary-smelling cakes and biscuits were placed onto racks and, if my mother was in a good mood, I would be rewarded with the bowl to lick out, my fingers sliding around its cream and white sides, scrupulously gathering up the last drop of the buttery mixture. I would suck them clean, under the gaze of Judy’s and Sally’s bright and hopeful eyes.
Those were the days when flashes of the old warmth that kept my love fuelled sprung up between my mother and me. For if her mind was firmly locked on the memory of the handsome auburn-haired Irishman in that dance hall, the man who waited for her at the docks, a man generous with his hugs and unfulfilled promises, mine was for ever locked on the smiling loving mother from my early childhood.
From the money that I’d stolen, I bought myself a torch and batteries. These I hid in my room and at night I would smuggle up a book. Tucked up in bed with the blankets pulled high I would strain my eyes every night as I shone the weak light of the torch onto the print. The rustling and scurrying sounds of the insects and small animals that lived in the thatch receded once I lost myself in the pages. Then for a short time I was able to forget the days when my father took me for the ‘drives’.
Each time he picked up his car keys and announced that it was time for my treat I silently implored my mother to say no, to tell him she needed me for an errand, to collect the eggs, fish the frogs out of the well water, even bringing in the water for washing from the rain butts, but she never did.
‘Run along with Daddy, darling, while I make tea,’ would be her weekly refrain as he drove me to the wooden shed and I learnt to separate my feelings from reality.
On our return sandwiches would have been prepared and a homemade cake, cut into thick slices, would be arranged on a lace doily, which covered a silver-plated platter.
‘Wash your hands, Antoinette,’ she would instruct me before we sat down to our Sunday afternoon tea.
She never asked me about the drives, never asked where we had been or what we had seen.
Visits to Coleraine, once taken for granted, now became longed-for treats. I missed my large family there, the warmth I always felt in my grandparents’ house and the companionship of my cousins.
On the rare occasions my father decided that a visit was due, the tin bath would be filled in a curtained-off part of the kitchen the night before. Here I would sit in the shallow soapy water, scrubbing myself clean and washing my hair. My mother would towel dry me, wrap an old dressing gown of hers around my skinny frame and seat me in front of the range. Taking up her silver-backed hairbrush she would run its bristles through my dark brown hair until it shone. The next morning my best outfit would come out, and my father would polish my shoes while my mother supervised my dressing. My hair would be swept back and held in place with a black velvet band. Looking in the mirror I saw a different reflection to the one my peers saw at the village school. Gone was the unkempt child in crumpled clothes; in her place stood a child who looked cared for, a child who was neatly dressed, a child with loving parents.
This was the start of the second game, a game all three of us took part in, the game of happy families. It was a game directed by my mother, a game of acting out her dream, the dream of a happy marriage, a handsome husband, a thatched house and one pretty daughter.
On our ‘family’ visits my mother would sit with an expression that I had already come to recognize. It was an expression that showed she was there on sufferance. A polite, slightly patronizing smile would hover on her lips, a smile which showed toleration of those visits but never enjoyment, a smile I knew would disappear immediately the visit ended and our car turned out of my grandparents’ road.
Then a steady trickle of condescension would float in the air until, drop by drop, it fell into my ears. Each relative received my mother’s verbal appraisal, accompanied by a laugh with no humour. I would watch the back of my father’s neck growing redder as mile by mile she reminded him of his origins and, in comparison, her own worth.
If my mother’s memory of my father remained locked on the handsome ‘Paddy’ who had danced her off her feet, in his eyes she remained for ever the classy English woman who was too good for him.
As my mother regurgitated her views of the day, my pleasure would evaporate until, by the time my bedroom was reached, it was a distant memory. The game of happy families had ended and I knew it would not be played again until the next visit.
Just before our last Christmas at the thatched house we visited my grandparents again. To my delight, in the tiny back room where my grandfather had at one time mended shoes, was a strange-looking bird. It was bigger than a chicken, with grey plumage and a red gullet. A chain attached to one of its legs, secured it to a ring in the wall. It looked at me with what I saw as hope. Hope for company. Hope for freedom. On asking my grandparents what it was called they simply said ‘a turkey’.
I promptly christened him Mr Turkey. At first, mindful of his beak, which was considerably bigger than a chicken’s, I simply sat and chattered to him. Later, seeing how docile he was, I grew braver and reached out my hand to stroke him. The bird, d
isorientated by his surroundings, allowed me to pet him without protest and I believed I had made another feathered friend. No one told me what the fate of my new friend was going to be.
My grandparents had invited us for Christmas Day, and I dutifully wore the uniform and played the role of the child of a happy family. A small Christmas tree, overburdened with red and gold decorations, stood in the window of the small cramped sitting room. Chattering relatives occupied every available space, while plentiful drinks were poured, passed round and consumed. My father, flushed with alcohol, was the centre of attention. He was the joking, jovial, favourite son and adored brother in his family, and I was loved because I was his.
My grandparents had moved their small table from its place by the window, where the tree now stood, to the centre of the room. The table’s extensions were so seldom used that they seemed to be of a lighter wood, once it was extended to accommodate eight people. Cutlery had been polished, Christmas crackers arranged beside each setting and borrowed chairs had been placed around it. I was seated opposite my father.
Delicious smells wafted from the tiny kitchen along with the noise of great activity. Meat, boiled vegetables, crispy roast potatoes all swimming in gravy were put onto plates and carried to the table by my grandmother and aunt. My mother had not offered to help, nor was she asked to.
As I looked at my piled-high plate of food, my mouth watered; breakfast had been a hurried weak cup of tea and a digestive biscuit. Impatiently, I waited for the first adult to commence so that I could follow, and then my father pointed to the meat and told me what had happened to my friend.
Nausea replaced hunger, silence hung in the air for a few seconds as I looked around the table in disbelief. My father’s eyes both mocked and challenged me. I saw the amusement in the adult faces as they exchanged glances and I forced myself to show no feeling. Instinctively I knew that if I refused to eat, not only would he be pleased, but somehow in that mysterious adult world where children’s feelings are not real, any tears shed for Mr Turkey would be gently mocked.
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