Escape From Evil (14 page)

Not having a parent around to look after me was so second nature that I never questioned it. I didn’t even query why Mum was spending so much time away from our lovely flat. She’d always come and gone as she pleased. That was how I expected her to behave. While she was away I’d cook, sometimes even attempt to bake a treat for her. Then I’d sit in the lounge or in the bedroom, staying awake as long as possible after a hard day at school, playing with Mushka or just singing along to records. I’d found the David Soul album that included ‘Don’t Give Up On Us’ in Mum’s collection and that was on repeat for as long as I was alone in the flat. Again, how many kids had that freedom?

When Mum came home, it was action stations. Not from her – whether it was morning or night, she usually returned looking completely vacant. She always reminded me of Brian staggering and stumbling up the hill to the rockery. The only difference was that she was lovely, so very lovely, and he really wasn’t.

There would follow a day of recuperation. Sometimes sleep would be enough, sometimes she’d eat. If I presented her with a cake she always made an effort to eat it. Often, though, she was too ill. I hated seeing Mum too sick to make it to the toilet in time. At least I could clear up after her, make her as comfortable as possible. As long as I could be useful, I was content.

Looking back, it was all upside-down, wasn’t it? For a moment, when I’d fallen off that wall, I’d been a normal eight-year-old girl in search of parental aid. When I hadn’t found it, I’d reverted back to my default position – of looking after my own dependant instead. Mum was the child, I was the adult. It was all wrong.

Mum didn’t seem in the best of shapes. She was often so lethargic that days would disappear before she even emerged from her bed. And yet she still looked so tired. I began to notice dark rings under her eyes. When I asked her, she said she was fine. Everything was fine. That was good enough for me.

When she wasn’t ill or absent, we had really good times together. Our Telscombe Cliffs flat had such a lovely, light atmosphere, just being there made us smile. Compared to the Preston Park place, it was heaven itself. I couldn’t think of those small rooms without my blood going cold. It had become synonymous in my memory with the evil goings-on of those vile men.

But that chapter was behind us now. Thanks to Grandpa, we had a chance at a new life and I, for one, had taken it with both hands. Mum, in her own way, was relishing the freedom as well. We spoke about how nice it was not to be worried about the next knock on the door. Social workers couldn’t complain because I was attending school. The police had no reason to bother us, Mum assured me, because she had nothing illegal in the house. And the men who’d come close to ruining our lives had no idea where we were. Everything was rosy.

And then, one afternoon, I came home from school, pushed open our front door and heard a familiar voice.

‘Hello, Cathy. Did you miss me?’

About a week earlier, Granny had taken me aside. She was behaving weirdly, I thought, a bit cryptic.

‘Cathy, I think you might need to phone me this week,’ she’d said, and pressed a couple of five pence pieces into my hand. ‘This money is only to be used for the phone, do you understand? Don’t go spending it on sweets. Save it. I think you’ll need it.’

I had no idea what she was talking about, and she wouldn’t tell me.

‘I hope you don’t need to call me,’ she went on. ‘But if something happens that you don’t like, anything at all, then you tell me straightaway.’

I learnt later that Mum had confided to Granny her fear that the men had tracked her down. She didn’t explain how it had happened, although Granny felt that if Mum insisted on still going out to her regular haunts at night, then she wouldn’t have been that hard to trace. Granny had said she would help. She was sorry she hadn’t known what was going on before. And that is why she’d given me the money for the phone box. She knew the men were coming back.

They were there en masse. About fourteen blokes, more than I’d ever seen at one time, were squeezed into our little flat. I could barely see for the fog of joints they’d obviously rolled themselves, but I recognized most of the faces. They’d all been to our various homes at one point or another. They’d all contributed to our unhappiness, even if they had usually done it in pairs or small groups. This crowded approach was very unusual. And very, very scary.

Before I was even out of my uniform, I was rolling Rizla papers as usual. There was no point fighting it. As I entered the kitchen, where the stuff was already laid out next to the huge bong, I froze.

Brian!

Was he here? I tried not to appear worried, but on the pretence of saying hello to Mum, I stuck my head in the lounge. I needed to know, for my own peace of mind, whether I could expect my bedroom door to be opened later by Brian out for revenge. But I couldn’t see him anywhere. In fact, I would never see him again.

Making roll-ups for so many people took a while. By the time I’d finished and I could hear the bong bubbling away in the lounge, I just stood in the kitchen, chin on my chest, waiting for the moment when I’d be sent to my room. When I’d be drugged. When the men would ‘party’ with Mum. I was sick with the anticipation. And then I remembered the coins.

This is what Granny was talking about! She knew the men were coming back.

So why hadn’t she told me? I suppose she didn’t want to ruin the time I had before it happened. There was always a chance they might never have come, after all.

I put my hand in my jacket pocket and felt the coins she’d given me. This is what they were there for. Now, though, I had to use them.

The noise from the lounge was louder than anything I’d ever heard.
Would they notice if I popped out?

I had to try.

There was a big red phone box on our street, so I dashed in there and rang Granny. As soon as she heard the pips, she knew why I was phoning.

‘Are those men back?’

‘Yes. There are loads of them.’

‘I’m coming over.’

I ran back to the flat and headed straight for the kitchen. If anyone had noticed my disappearance, they didn’t mention it. Then I waited, heart in mouth, for the cavalry to arrive.

Looking back, I don’t know what Mum had told Granny about these men. I can only imagine it was a watered-down version of the truth. She’d probably confessed that they had something to do with drugs. But I bet she’d kept quiet about the levels of physical abuse they were happy to mete out, not only to her, but to me as well, if she couldn’t stop them. How else do you explain why a little old lady would walk into that snake pit alone and think she could possibly do anything to stop them?

I remember Granny bursting in. She wasn’t a retiring sort of person and she tore straight into the lounge and shouted at everyone to get out. Nobody moved.

She started screaming, ‘Get out or I’ll call the police!’

Still no one budged an inch.

Gingerly, I peeped round the edge of the door. The men were just staring at Granny like she was some TV documentary they didn’t really understand. Then one of them – it had to be Mark – spoke. He didn’t raise his voice, but then he didn’t need to.

‘Let me tell you how it is, old lady,’ he said slowly, puffing on his cigarette between words. ‘We’re all just having a nice little party with Jenny here, so unless you want to join us I suggest you make yourself scarce.’

Granny shouted some more, but she’d lost the fight and she knew it. I couldn’t believe her plan was just to come round on her own. Why hadn’t she brought the police? (Later she admitted to being worried that Mum would have been in trouble as well.) She hadn’t even brought Grandpa (she hadn’t even told him, I learnt).

She has no idea what these men are capable of.

So, tail between her legs, she left. On the way out she gave me a hug and said I should come with her. I refused.

‘I’m not leaving Mum.’

The second she closed the door everyone seemed to move at once. Whatever calmness Mark had shown when he was intimidating Granny, he was livid now. He came flying into the kitchen and grabbed my neck.

‘You called her, you bitch, didn’t you?’

I denied it, but it was obvious I was lying.

‘Right, in the bedroom. Now!’

I thought I was just going to be given tablets and told to shut up. I was wrong. That wouldn’t do, not this time. I needed to be punished.

‘Don’t hurt me.’ I was surprised to hear my voice, small and weak. ‘I won’t do it again. I promise.’

Mark just stood there. In my imagination he was weighing up how to hurt me most. I felt my entire body tense.

What’s he going to do to me?

I heard screaming and suddenly Mum was shoved into the room as well. Then it dawned on me. Mark probably wouldn’t lay a finger on me. Why would he, when he could hurt me in a different way instead?

I could have kicked myself for going along with Granny’s plan. This was all her fault. She didn’t know about the threats, the hanging from the spire, the knife in my face. She didn’t know that the way these men operated was to not hurt the ones they were angry with but their loved ones instead.

I’m sorry, Mum.

I was forced to look on as two men ripped the clothes from her body. Then she was bent over the dressing table and one of the men forced himself inside her. I know now he was having sex with her – raping her, actually. Back then, I just knew that he was hurting her and she hated it. She was screaming and screaming and I was crying my heart out, begging them to stop, but the men were just laughing. This was fun for them. They took it in turns to do things to her.

And I was made to watch it all. That was my punishment for phoning Granny. My poor, poor Mum. She didn’t deserve this. No one did. They were animals. They treated her like meat and they took pleasure from it.

In one evening, two months of bliss had been totally destroyed. And all because of me.

EIGHT

I can’t remember if I was fed a sleeping pill or just fell asleep naturally, but the next thing I knew it was morning – and I’d missed registration at school.

That was the difference now: I had places to be. It took me ages to clean up after a visit from the men normally, even when it was only a handful of them. After so many of them, it seemed to go on forever. And then there was Mum to think of. Looking at her, with her silly grin and deep, dark, sunken eyes, just made me never want to leave her side.
School?
I thought.
I can’t go to school. I’ve got too much to take care of here.

But Mum made me go. Sluggish and seemingly out of it as she was, Mum knew I had to go. She didn’t want to talk about the previous night and I was trying desperately to pretend it was all a bad dream, so we had a silent understanding to move on. I hated leaving her, but she always promised she’d be okay. Nine times out of ten she was. Half the time I’d leave her at death’s door and by the time I’d returned she’d disappeared for the night. She obviously had a good recovery system.

I knew Mum was right about going to school. Things were different now. I had a life outside our home. The teachers and my classmates would notice if I weren’t there or I arrived late or dishevelled or showing any of the other side effects of my regular home life. It was a problem. But I knew I had to keep up appearances otherwise I’d be put straight into care again. And that wouldn’t help anyone.

Kids are pretty resilient. That’s what I’ve learnt in forty-odd years. I guess I must have been the same. I’d had an almost euphoric few weeks with just Mum in our wonderful flat – that she owned, not rented – but now we were back in our old routine and I just accepted it. It was as if my brain thought,
Okay, that was then, this is now – let’s deal with it.

Mum must have been the same. Again and again I’ve looked back and thought,
Why did you stay? Why didn’t you just admit defeat and move in with Granny and Grandpa for a while?
But she was too stubborn. Too proud, just like her dad. And, I would later realize, just like me.

Mark and friends were regular visitors again, usually in fours or fives, and I was chief joint roller. No one mentioned the phone call to Granny. No one laid a finger on me, actually. It was as if that nightmare experience had never happened. I made joints, set up the bong, took my pills and disappeared. Mum did whatever she did with them and was either there or not in the morning when I woke up. I’d tidy up and go to school. It really was business as usual for a month or two. Horrible, but bearable. Unpleasant, but normal.

And then, one day, I came home from school and Mum wasn’t there. Nothing out of the ordinary there. I hadn’t seen her the previous day either, but two days was normally her limit, so I got changed and decided to make her a chocolate cake. Granny had helped me buy the ingredients ages ago and I vaguely remembered how to mix it all together. That was going to be my little gift to Mum whenever she came back.

She’ll probably be feeling ill again. This will cheer her up.

An hour or so later I heard footsteps climbing the stairs.

No, it’s too soon! The cake’s not ready yet!
Even so, I was ecstatic Mum was back.
She’s probably not hungry anyway . . .