“No, no I like boarding school,” I panicked. What if they wanted to throw me out… banish me from my sanctuary? “I really, really like it here…” I said.
It was against the rules to do someone else’s punishment for them so I couldn’t explain that I’d rather stay in at weekends and be paid with chocolates to do someone else’s ‘manual’ than go home to Dad and Joanne. As usual, when confronted by any conflict I started to cry. I thought the principal was so kind when she passed me a tissue.
“But Jane you cry so much that I’m worried about you. You were passing at the beginning of the year. Not great marks, but you were getting fifties. Now your marks have plummeted. You haven’t achieved much above thirty percent in the last month. The staff complain that you day dream and don’t finish anything. If they moan, you cry. Is there something the matter that you perhaps need to tell me about?”
I wanted so much to tell her, but again came the dark thoughts. ‘What’s the use? No one believes you. Even the doctor didn’t say anything. And what about the nun? If you tell now, Mrs Martingale will say it’s not true and phone your Dad and he’ll kill you when you get home.’
“Jane? Jane, talk to me.”
I opened my mouth but something stopped me. ‘It’s our special secret. I do it because I love you. But if you tell anyone at all I will kill you, Jane.’
No sound came out. I started to shiver and cry but I couldn’t speak.
Mrs Martingale was watching me closely. “Jane, what’s wrong?”
All sorts of thoughts ran through my head.
‘An honest speaker comes out with the truth.’
‘He’ll kill you.’
‘Speak. I’ll be beside you.’
‘Speak and it will be worse than it has ever been before.’
Fear spoke louder. I recall wringing my wrists and saying something like, “I’m having a hard time at home …. My stepmother hates me and … my real mother never phones me or visits me and my dad … well … he can be real mean to me.…”
Then she asked me something that surprised me. “Jane, I understand that there was a time when your real mother hurt you and the school was worried about her. When you were at Black Fern Primary... Can you remember that?”
“No….”
“Jane? I have your file here in front of me.” She was sounding stern now.
“I mean yes,” I sniffed.
“What was your mother doing to you?” Her voice was both firm and reassuring.
“She used to pinch me and make bruises. And when she washed my hair she scratched me with her nails so I got sores on my head.”
“It says here that your mother left your dad. Do you know why?”
I was embarrassed but I wanted so much to be honest, especially to Mrs Martingale.
“My Dad used to hit my mother.”
“Did he make her bleed and bruise her, Jane?”
“Yes.” I whispered it, feeling treacherous to my father.
“Did he ever hit you?”
“Yes. But all dads hit their children … I think.”
“Yes, some do, but did he hit you hard, Jane?” she asked. “Did he ever make you bleed or leave bruises?”
I looked at my hands and began to shake my head. Mrs Martingale took my hands and looked at the scars that were healing. I looked away.
“Jane, it says in this file from your last school, that one day you wouldn’t swim at school and the teacher saw a huge bruise on your leg when you bent down to pick up something. That was in … Mrs Liebig’s class. She wrote it in your school file. Do you remember?”
Heat surged in my cheeks.
“Look at me, Jane. Did your dad maybe do that to you?”
“Sometimes I couldn’t swim because I had my period.”
“Your teacher thought you couldn’t swim because you didn’t want her to see the bruises your Dad gave you … and he had written you an excuse letter.”
“Well…maybe he didn’t mean to… he was always angry and Joanne said he was stressed at work … and we should just keep it in the family. It was family business.”
“So he did give you bruises?”
“Umm, maybe. But I could have got that one when I fell off the motorbike.” I knew I was unconvincing.
“Are you sure, Jane? Sometimes children tell a lot of stories to cover up for bad things their parents do. But parents are not allowed to do bad things and hurt their children, Jane. It’s called abuse.”
“Yes I did fall off the motorbike … at the river crossing…”
Mrs Martingale wrote in her file and I sat uncomfortably, waiting. Then all of a sudden she stopped and closed her file.
“Well Jane, if you think of anything else you might want to talk about, I want you to come to me … or go to Matron Ruth. We are here to help you. In the meantime I hope to see a big improvement in your marks.” She smiled at me.
“Yes, Ma’am. I’ll try.”
“Are you still playing sport?”
“Yes, Ma’am.”
“What about the choir?”
“I am in the choir and I’ll be in the musical. I love to sing and watch the actors.”
“Good, Jane. You must keep busy and that way you won’t be so homesick.”
“I … I’m not homesick. I promise. I love school. I just haven’t been feeling well lately.”
“You are very pale. I think you should have a blood test sometime soon to see if you’re anaemic. Are your periods heavy?”
I blushed. Why did everyone want to know about my private business? I grew hot and flustered.
“Jane, I’m just trying to help. Sometimes if a girl loses a lot of blood it can make her a bit miserable and unwell. So I want to know if you are losing a lot of blood. Are your periods bad?”
“Only the last one was. But maybe it was because I missed for two months and it was catching up.”
“I’ll tell Matron to get on to it. Perhaps you need some iron.”
Matron took me to the doctor for a check-up. He drew blood for testing and later I was given a script for iron tablets. Matron said I should stop feeling so weepy quite soon but I thought it would take more than a few brown pills to do that.
Chapter 13
“Love does not delight in evil
but rejoices with the truth.
It always protects, always trusts,
always hopes, always perseveres.
Love never fails…”
1 Corinthians 13:6-8
On Sunday mornings, it was compulsory for pupils who stayed at school over the weekends to attend church. Matron Ruth and the girls all sat on the left, while Mr Emerson sat with the boys on the other side of the aisle.
Church was a source of enormous anguish for Tinkie but it was a great joy to me. I was never allowed to go to church at home but here I was at peace. It was a haven from the world I knew outside its walls. During the long services that my friends complained about, I loved to stare at the beautiful, stained glass windows reflecting stories from the Bible. I knew that I often argued with God and accused him of not caring for me but every Sunday, Reverend Simons seemed able to renew my hope that God did love me.
On the Sunday following my visit to Mrs Martingale’s office, the sermon was all about God’s love and protection. I liked the idea of God’s protection even though I found it difficult to relate to in my own life.
After church, we girls asked Matron if we could walk home past the dam as it was such a lovely day. Matron Ruth said it would be okay, as long as we kept our ‘Sunday best’ clean and got back in time for lunch. The dam was a pool of brown water trapped by a small earth mound, and could be seen quite clearly from the hostel.
We chattered and giggled as we walked to the dam. It was so good to be there. My hockey team had drawn our match yesterday morning and I’d helped in the tuck-shop in the afternoon. Last night had been movie night and Sunday was church. No wonder I loved staying at school on weekends.
We began by skipping stones across th
e calm water but as the sun grew hotter, the cool water became rather tempting. One senior girl took off her shoes and waded into the brown, muddy shallows. Her friend followed suit and soon we were all ankle deep, trying to keep our white Sunday dresses clean.
Suddenly someone kicked a foot-load of mud into the air and half a dozen girls were spattered with the brown ooze. Squeals and shrieks and a fair number of swear words rang out, followed by a voice yelling, “Mud fight!” and a bucket load more of the stuff was sent into orbit.
Angry shouts were followed by laughter and more splashing.
Next someone had a crazy idea and yelled, “Come on everybody, follow me!”
“Where are you going, Germaine?”called Saskia in horror as she watched the girl wading deeper into the water.
“To get the raft. Come help me!” She was heading towards a floating wooden structure in the middle of the little dam.
“You’ll soak your dress!” called out another coward.
“It’s already dirty. It needs a wash,” Germaine shouted back. “Just like all of yours! Including you, Saskia! Come on! ”
“Matron will kill us.”
“Oh well, too late, I’m dead. Anyway it will be worse if we don’t get the stains out of these dresses. Join in people!”
Saskia looked at me and smiled. “I’ll go if you come too Jane!” Delighted to be included, I grabbed my skirt and tried tucking it into my panties. Soon we were laughing hysterically as our white skirts billowed up on the water surface around our waists.
“Come on Megan!” I yelled and soon Megan and Tinkie were there too.
Girls were wallowing and splashing, armpit-deep around the wooden structure, when Saskia let out a scream. “Something touched me! Aagh! It touched me again. Help! It’s an eel!”
In a flash the floundering was over and we were all aboard the raft, soon to be named “The Cutty Sark”.
Fear of the eel lasted momentarily and the next cry was, “Man overboard!” as Germaine pushed Saskia. She landed with a splash and a few girls still on the bank cheered them on. In no time, Saskia was screaming, “Eel!” and scrambling back up to push someone else off into the ‘eel infested’ waters.
As the circus continued, a few more girls ventured through the cold muddy water to join in the madness. Fancying ourselves as the crew of The Cutty Sark, we tried to use some oars we found on the old wooden raft to move in towards the bank but the thing must have been anchored for it was going nowhere.
A game of raft gladiators followed and those on the bank continued to cheer and yell like rugby spectators as we pushed each other off with the oars. Finally, hunger defeated us. Leaving the oars on the raft, we braved the slime and eels, screaming all the way back to the bank.
In the shallows Megan turned to me and said, “You know, you’re such fun when you’re happy, Jane!”
We stretched out in the sun trying to dry our dresses when someone exclaimed, “Oh my gosh, we’d better go or we’ll miss lunch!” Then the scheming began. How would we explain the mess we were in to Matron Ruth and Mr Emerson?
Germaine, the noisy girl said, “Well Rosie and Sammy, as you are still dry and ‘cleanish’, you’d better go in the front door and distract Matron. Ask her for a headache pill or something and we’ll all sneak in the side door and quickly go upstairs to change.”
We spent ages arguing over our plan and finally set off back to hostel actually thinking we could pull it off!
Sunday 18 June 1989
I have just had the best weekend ever…
I described all the events of the weekend in detail, and then giggled as I recorded how we’d tried to trick Matron.
…Suddenly we noticed Mr Emerson was watching us from the hostel veranda. He had binoculars! It made us laugh even more because he’s rather stuffy and ever so proper! Well, all our planning to sneak in past Matron was a complete fail. She was waiting for us at the side door! Boy, I thought we were in trouble when she made us go with Mr Emerson – but it was to swim and clean up in the pool first, not to be punished! The pool was freezing but such a blast. Then we had a cookout which Mr Emerson organised!
I wish every day was like this with no worries and no-one to touch me and make me feel worthless.
Chapter 14
“Stolen water is sweet;
food eaten in secret is delicious!
But little do they know that the dead are there,
that her guests are in the depths of the grave”.
Prov. 9:17-18
Wednesday 12 July 1989
I am not happy. We are on school holidays. It is worse than I ever remember. Being away at school gave me a break from my Dad. Now I’m back home he won’t leave me alone. It’s back to the way it was in junior school. He does it anywhere he can and whenever Joanne is out or bathing babies or sleeping. He makes me watch his disgusting movies too. I spend so much time in that place where I watch him and close down my mind. I think I’m wasting my life away. But it’s harder to get the movies out of my head.
Last night he was on top of me in the lounge when Joanne walked in. He rolled me over and covered me up and said we were looking for my button. She just walked out again. I am sure she knows what he is doing but she says nothing. I hate her. I really thought God was going to be my protector and stop this but he hasn’t stopped my Dad yet. I don’t understand God. Sometimes I even hate God.
Those holidays passed slowly. I buried myself in watching TV and read loads of borrowed Mills and Boons novels which all the girls at school were reading. In my books I could be the heroine – beautiful and strong, lovely and respected. These women met handsome, proud men that they misunderstood and later they fell in love. They had dramas and pain but eventually they all married and lived happily ever after. I knew they were nothing more than fairy stories for big girls but I loved them anyway. If real life was more like my own, who would want to read about that?
I dreamed of having a lovely white wedding. I’d seen Princess Diana’s on TV when I was seven years old and I’d been mesmerised.
Larissa Law had come back to school after the last holidays with pictures of her cousin’s wedding where she’d been the bridesmaid. How we ‘oohed’ and ‘aahed’ over her photos! The bride was a bit plump and her big lacy dress reminded me of a fluffy meringue, but I thought it was wonderful anyway!
Larissa wore a gold satin dress and carried the most exquisite cream and gold bouquet. I envied Larissa and her cousin terribly although I knew Reverend Simons had said envy was a sin. I couldn’t help it. I so wanted to be a gorgeous bridesmaid at a fairy-tale wedding, preparing to be the next beautiful bride.
As it was, at that stage in my life, I felt anything but beautiful. My teeth were covered in ‘railway track’ braces which hurt so much at the start, but Dad said they would make my face prettier.
I didn’t think it would matter much if I was pretty or not once my prince found out that my father had taken my virginity when I was twelve. All the girls in the books I read were pure and seemed proud of their virginity – that word I was mortified to learn in the hostel earlier in the year.
What I was struggling with was whether virginity could still count if you’d only had the “special secret love” of a dad and not chosen to go with your boyfriend.
Despite my doubts that there was really such a thing as ‘true love’, I continued to spend the holidays hiding away in my novels when my father was not making demands on me.
One Friday in those holidays, Joanne took her kids to visit her parents for the weekend and Anthony went camping with his friend’s family. I wanted to go to Roxy’s place but Dad said, “No, Roxy can come to our house.”
Well I didn’t trust him, and thought he might start touching Roxy like he touched me.
Once before, another friend, Emma, had come to visit and we’d wanted to swim. Dad told me to make sure Emma changed by the door so he could watch her. I defiantly hung a towel over the double bunk to protect my friend from his eyes. Later, during
that visit, he called me to his room for a “chat” and used me quickly while Emma entertained herself with the game we’d been playing, so I never invited her to visit again.
At lunch time Dad came home. “Where’s Roxy?”
“She wasn’t allowed to come,” I answered triumphantly.
“Who said she can’t come?” he asked suspiciously.
“I did,” I thought, but replied, “Her Mom said they have visitors coming.”
“Oh.” He sounded convinced.
Later that day Dad told me about a game he wanted to play with his friends Rex and Jenny. I became hysterical and eventually he became grumpy, then said it didn’t matter and went out. He came home much later that Friday evening, smelling of beer and cigarette smoke.
Saturday 15 July 1989
I am so tired of my father and his sex games. I know that’s what they’re called. They play them in the movies he’s been making me watch.
He nearly made me crazy today as he wanted us to take off our clothes and take photos with his friends. I started screaming and crying and eventually he listened to me and he cancelled his plan.
He is disgusting. Twice this weekend I’ve argued and prayed and won. The only thing I know how to do is pray. But it was good to win.
Thank heaven school starts again soon.
Chapter 15
“My heart grew hot within me,
As I meditated, the fire burned…
Show me, O LORD, my life’s end
And the number of my days;
Let me know how fleeting is my life.”
Psalm 39:3-4
July 24, 1989
Eventually, school re-opened. I was overwhelmed with relief at being back but settled with difficulty into hostel life. The holidays had shattered my embryonic happiness.
The other girls had so much to talk about. They discussed their shopping trips with their mothers; their family holidays to various holiday cottages and visits to grandparents. I never saw my grandparents. Dad made sure of that. He hated his own mother, though I was never quite sure why. He said she abandoned him and no-one would ever understand what a hard time his father had given him – or something like that, but we were never allowed to discuss it. He never let me see my mother’s parents either, as Mom was ‘the enemy’.
Unspoken - Kiss of the Wolf Spider, Part I Page 8