Not too long after my bath, the phone rang. It was Duncan, telling Ruth he’d just heard from Mum. When she realised I was missing she’d quizzed Adam and he had mentioned that I’d been speaking a lot to Duncan of late. She’d screamed down the phone at him, ‘Where is she? Where is she?’
Duncan told Mum I was safe but I didn’t want to come home. He didn’t tell her where I was. I remember looking at Ruth and thinking she was so brave to have me in her home. Everyone was so scared of my mum, she was so intimidating, but Ruth had taken me in, here where her precious little girl also lived, and I thought that showed great courage. No one had ever done that for me before.
Ruth and Mark lived in a two-bed flat. Megan had had her own room, but Ruth had cleared it out in preparation for my arrival, so I could have my own space. She made it look lovely. I remember getting into bed that night, it being clean and warm, and the bedding smelled of fresh detergent and a mother’s love.
Ruth came in and put a nightlight on for me, so I didn’t have to sleep in the dark. She brought me a warm drink, a hot chocolate, but I found it hard to eat or drink anything. She bade me a good night’s sleep, but I couldn’t sleep that night, or the night after that, or even the one after that. The black sack Duncan had missed had been the one with the ‘Katie’ towel inside, my snug that I slept with every evening, and I felt bereft without it.
Yet what was really keeping me awake, more powerful even than missing my comfort blanket, was my overriding, all-encompassing, nauseating fear.
What would Mother do next?
CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT
Dear daughter,
I know I’ve not been perfect, but I’d love the chance to see you. Can you meet me at Morrisons so we can talk about this?
I love you,
Mother
Dear daughter,
Your granddad’s very poorly. Won’t you come home? He and your nan are so stressed out about you going. They’ve lost two granddaughters and they’ve now lost you. You’re going to kill them, you’re going to drive them to an early grave, you need to come back home. They can’t cope without you.
Dear daughter,
I realise now you’ve had a nervous breakdown. I shouldn’t have done what I did to you …
Dear daughter,
I’m sorry for everything I’ve done. I love you, Victoria. I love you.
My mother’s daily letters were messing with my head. Never, not once, in eighteen years of living with her, had she ever told me she loved me before. Was this the truth? Or was it the other her who was real? I felt so confused.
I wouldn’t agree to meet her in Morrisons, though, or anywhere else. I knew if I saw her … I knew the power she had. There was a place in my brain that she knew how to switch on and off at will, so I just couldn’t see her – because if I saw her I’d go back, and I couldn’t go back. I could never go back.
She didn’t play the part of the caring mother consistently. Her daily letters – these hugely long, passive-aggressive missives stuffed full of emotional blackmail, written on both sides of pages and pages of A4 paper, and handed to me via Duncan – mixed nice and nasty: so the disorienting ‘I love yous’ were interspersed with more typical rants against my character, saying what a naughty child I was, how I’d always been a bad girl. Those letters were easier to read: more familiar; more like home.
She took to directing carefully crafted speeches at Duncan as she handed over her missives for me. ‘She’s only a child, Duncan,’ she would say, utilising all her powers of persuasion. ‘We want her at home – she’s autistic, she needs to be here. I need to be looking after her; she can’t look after herself.’
Duncan would tell her I was eighteen, and doing fine, and that they were looking after me. The Witnesses asked her to give me back my comfort blanket, saying I needed it because I couldn’t sleep.
‘I don’t care, she’s not having it,’ said my loving mother. ‘If she wants it that much, she can come and get it.’
She wanted me to come round because she wanted to get to me. For she knew that for me, quiet little me, to have left, this was something serious. Perhaps she’d been lulled into a false sense of security over the years, and thought her world would never come crashing down; she wanted me back so she could damn well make sure of it. But I was never going back there. I never wanted to wheel my chair up to that stinking doorstep ever again. And – though little did I know it – I was about to choose a path to make that wish of mine come true.
About a week after I left, I found myself sitting on the sofa at Ruth’s, with her and Duncan there to give me moral support. I was eighteen, and a legal adult … but without the strength they gave me, I might not have been able to do what I did next. They had to be really strong for me because I was so brainwashed.
I picked up the phone and I dialled the local police station.
‘Hello,’ I said, and then I paused. How do you say it? ‘My mother’s been abusing me,’ I said in the end. What else could I say?
A police officer, uniformed up with a stab vest on, came round almost at once. He was about to go tearing round to save Adam and Chris but I reassured him; I said she’d never once hit Adam, and that Christopher was safe at my nan’s. Somehow, I knew we had to be careful about alerting my mum to me going to the police. It had to be handled so carefully. I had seen her walk all over the authorities before, including the cops. This time, we had to get it right.
The Witnesses moved me out to Hereford. It was as if I was under house arrest, living at Ruth’s, because I couldn’t go out in case Mum saw me. It was while I was staying with some other Witnesses there that I gave my first full police interview. Two female officers came to question me. Their names, funnily enough, were Victoria and Charlotte.
Victoria Martell was the lead officer on the case. A tall, broad woman with very dark hair, she was reserved and distant, but I could sense an inner strength to her. And I thought, We’re going to need every ounce of that strength, Detective Constable Martell, if we’re going to bring my mother down.
The officers spoke to me for a couple of hours at that first interview. At the end, they asked me if there was anybody else who might speak up about what had happened.
I hesitated. ‘Well, there’s my sister,’ I said. ‘You could try her. Her name’s Alloma, she lives in Bristol.’
In the end, Alloma corroborated everything I’d said. I’d hoped she would, once the police approached her directly. It was easier for her that way, not having to make the call herself. It was incredible to know she backed me up because I could tell the officers had had the same initial reaction as Mark – disbelief. With Alloma now part of the case, too, I thought: I told you what I said was right.
The police started taking away Mum’s letters to me. She was so confident she was actually making generalised admissions in them, strategically apologising for what she’d done. The police filed them all away, and they began to build a case against her. Although I still didn’t trust them, not really, I had no other choice but to do as they said. I was under strict instructions to talk to no one, in case rumour of the case got back to Mum.
I didn’t like being in Hereford, away from all my friends. It was so lonely. The only good thing was that every day I was away from Mum, I felt stronger. The more I didn’t see her, and her cold, dark eyes, the more strength I gained. Every minute I wasn’t in her company, and was with regular people, the safer I felt and the more confident I became – so much so that, in the end, I found the courage to discuss with Ruth if I might possibly move back to hers in Tewkesbury, where I thought I’d be happier. She agreed it was a good idea.
Once I moved back, Ruth tried to help me adjust to my new life. She kept telling me that I didn’t need to watch Megan, or follow her around: ‘I’m her mummy,’ she said, ‘that’s my job.’ I was so used to watching Adam – and being beaten if I did it wrong – that it was second nature for me to find myself a ‘job’. She went through my clothes with me, and made me throw most of the
m out. ‘That’s mildewed, Torrie,’ she’d say, or ‘That’s far too big for you,’ or ‘That’s badly stretched.’ Lots of my clothes were stretched in odd places, because of where Mum had grabbed me to pull me out of my wheelchair or drag me round the floor. Ruth gave me a pair of her old jeans to wear instead and that was quite a moment. I’d never worn jeans before. As I looked in the mirror at the trousers on my legs, I felt an unfamiliar pride in my appearance. I was barely eating, and the weight was dropping off me. I thought I looked … well, good.
Jackie helped me put my name down for a council flat. I’d have quite happily stayed at Ruth’s forever because I was so overwhelmed by all the new experiences, but I knew that wasn’t fair.
At the council offices, they asked me if I could walk at all, so they could determine the kind of accommodation I needed.
There was a beat, and then I said, ‘Technically, I should be able to walk. Everybody says I can’t but …’ I swallowed hard at the treacherous words cresting over my lips, betraying the secret Mum and I had shared for so long, ‘… but I’ve just not been allowed to.’
‘Well, shall we try to get you up, then?’ said the lady brightly. ‘We’ve got to try to get that going.’
Jackie and the lady stood on either side of me. I slipped the metal foot pieces of my chair to one side and put my feet onto the floor, the unfamiliar ground giving an odd resistance to my muscles. The women helped me stand, and I almost collapsed from the weight of the guilt that thundered onto my shoulders, as soon as I was up on my own two feet. I heard my mother’s voice in my head: ‘You stay in that chair, it’s the least you can do! You caused that car crash, you killed your granddad’s granddaughters, he’s going to die an unhappy man now and the least you can do is get some money for him.’
Every single time they got me up, I felt like I was betraying her. Tears streamed down my face at my unforgivable disloyalty. Jackie kept telling me, ‘You’re allowed to, Torrie. You’re allowed to now.’ They had to really, really convince me that I wasn’t being bad.
It took a good few physiotherapy sessions after that before I could leave the chair behind me. I had to build my muscles back up slowly, but also overcome the mental barriers, and my guilt. I thought I was so evil, just as Mum had said. Beginning to walk again threw up new physical problems, too. My hips were no longer aligned properly because of the crash. I had cartilage missing from one leg, and that caused grinding pain every time I walked. My right side would sometimes give way completely and I’d fall to the floor. But I was out of the chair; I was walking.
One afternoon, Mark came home from the Kingdom Hall with a gift for me. The Witnesses in our community were, on the whole, being very generous, leaving presents for me at the Kingdom Hall, or money for Ruth and Mark to help care for me. It was a very confusing time for most of them – one moment I’d been in a wheelchair, now I could walk; one moment I’d been living with my mother, now I wasn’t, which was highly unusual for a young unmarried Witness woman, and yet it was a situation supported by the elders. Some Witnesses were nosy as anything, but only four were openly on Mother’s side; most were generous and kind. So it wasn’t a strange thing for Mark to hand me a gift upon his return. This one was in a big silver box, all taped up.
I unwound the reams and reams of tape and reached my hand inside. It was a big soft teddy, one of those grey bears, wearing a purple woolly jumper. I had always wanted a grey bear like this. When I’d been in the hospital, I’d wanted one of these more than anything. My heart skipped a beat.
I turned the bear over in my hand. It had a slogan on its jumper. The slogan said: ‘To a very special daughter’.
I’d never heard Mum say that before. It was too much for me. Tears coursed down my cheeks. I felt so guilty for betraying her.
Perhaps I should see her, just once, I thought. She is my mother. Doesn’t she deserve better than this?
I called Ruth over to talk it through with her. The pain and the confusion were tearing me apart.
Ruth listened quietly, but I noticed her hands were shaking in her lap. And then she said to me, ‘Victoria, if you go back now, I will slap you, and I’m serious.’
And cruel as that may sound, if she hadn’t said it, I might have gone back. I might have gone back. It stopped me because I didn’t want to be hit, not again. I knew what that was like. But also, to see Ruth that angry, it made me realise: This is wrong, what Mum has been doing. This is very wrong.
No wonder the police were ready to arrest her.
CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE
I was lying in a hospital bed, my stomach aching. The surgeons had finally got me in to operate on Colin. He couldn’t be reversed, not for the moment at least, but they’d refashioned him into a more manageable position, rather than the emergency one I’d had for the past four years. I had staples all down my stomach, and a morphine drip in my arm. Though the morphine made me nauseous and drowsy, I was glad it was there: it took the pain away.
My mobile phone vibrated on the hospital table in front of me, and I reached forward to answer it, my stomach protesting at the movement. It was Victoria Martell.
‘Victoria,’ she said, ‘we’ve arrested your mother.’
I’ll never forget those words. They were so frightening. I just thought, She’s going to know now. She’s going to know what I’ve done to her.
DC Martell wasn’t finished yet. ‘The police went in this morning and we’ve got both of your brothers out, but neither of them are saying anything about the abuse. If they don’t say anything, they’re going to be allowed back home. Our last option is to bring them to you.’
No pressure then.
A couple of hours later, my private room at the hospital, where I’d been placed for my own safety, was full to bursting with social workers and police officers, all waiting to write down the details of my meeting with my brothers. I heard Adam coming first, that loud, imperious voice carrying across the ward. Christopher didn’t make a sound. Like me, he’d been conditioned to be quiet.
It was now early February 2005; I hadn’t seen Adam in just over a month. I wanted him to know that I loved him and missed him; that I was there for him, no matter what. He was laughing as he came in, this really high-pitched, over-confident laugh. It was a nervous laugh, I could tell. I learned later that the police had stormed George Dowty in a dawn raid that morning. It must have been very frightening for him, seeing Mum arrested, and Adam looked as if he was still in shock. He was still wearing his pyjamas, these blue, grubby flannelette pyjamas, with dirt round the cuffs, and his dark hair was all greasy. I could see the filth now my blinkers had been lifted. Adam might have been a favourite, but he was never cared for by my mother.
Chris, in stark contrast to Adam’s exuberance, was very quiet, anxious and unsure. I was desperate for him to admit what was going on. Not for me, because I knew now I was never going back. But for him – so he could see that life could be better, that we did, in fact, have options.
The first thing they said to me was, ‘We hear you’re walking.’
I nodded. ‘Yeah, I am walking. It was Mum who was stopping me from walking.’
Dozens of pencils scribbled down the exchange. I found the official witnesses very intimidating. We were here to talk about these secrets, these things that Chris and I had never even really talked about together, they were intensely private – but here were all these strangers, writing down our every word.
Adam went off in the end, to play in the children’s ward; he didn’t want to know. But that was all right. It wasn’t him we really needed to speak to. He’d never been hurt – not in that way, at least. It was Christopher I really needed to talk to.
He came over to my bed, and I looked him in the eye. I was his big sister, and I said quietly, ‘I’m not going back.’
I let him absorb that. I knew I had to get my message across so quickly, that I somehow had to break down years of everything Mother had ever told us. That was no mean feat; when even I, who had been free for
a month, was still hearing her words in my head, day and night. I spoke over the inner running commentary from my mum, who was busy telling me how worthless I was, and I said to my brother, ‘Please, look at me. I’ve been out weeks, and I’m walking, and I’ve just had the surgery she wouldn’t let me get. I’m happier than I’ve ever been, Chris.
‘I’m not going back.’
We stared at each other across the bed. I knew those eyes so well. I’d seen them widen with shock; screw up with pain; be kind and helpful, solemn and sad. Those eyes had looked at Nanny’s roast dinner with me, when we were both locked in that bedroom, naked and cold. Those eyes had watched me being beaten. I had watched those eyes be beaten back.
Christopher could tell that I was not messing about. Enough’s enough. It took him a while, but gradually he … melted. That’s what it looked like. He let out a breath and he said softly, ‘I was in “protect Mum” mode.’
I nodded; I understood. And then he started to tell the gathered guests about the sticks down our throats. As soon as he said that, they took him out to another room and cross-examined him on his own.
I was glad he’d told the truth, but I resented having to be the one who made him do it, having to be the grown-up when I still felt such a child myself. It took its toll, that meeting.
As did the get-well-soon card my mother sent me. Oh yes, she was let out on bail, and she came straight to the hospital. Luckily she couldn’t find my private room, though she wandered up and down the corridors searching, her distinctive black-and-grey hair tied up in a bandana. In the end, frustrated, she gave the card to another mother on the ward, and that mother gave it to a nurse, who gave it to me. I opened it up in innocence.
Tortured: Abused and neglected by Britain’s most sadistic mum. This is my story of survival. Page 18