Living With Evil (19 page)

I sat up tall and looked him straight in the eye.

‘No way!’ I screamed. ‘I just can’t take any more.’ I had reached absolute breaking point and this man wanting to hurt me was the final straw.

I thought I might be able to fight him off. I was quite small and skinny, and he was much stronger and bigger than me, but I lashed out with all my might.

His eyes flashed angrily. My bold talk seemed to enrage him and make him more aggressive. ‘Oh yeah? Try and fuckin’ stop me,’ he snarled.

He made a grab for me, and I struggled, kicking and lashing out with my fists for all I was worth. I felt tiny and helpless, but I wasn’t giving up. I really couldn’t take any more.

Suddenly I was aware he was hovering high above me. He was standing on the pillows, holding on to the big wooden headboard behind me.

I screwed my eyes shut in a blind panic, realizing what he was about to do.
Stamp!
went his heavy foot, down on to my face.

I felt something snap, and the pain was excruciating.
Stamp!
he went again, cursing and shouting at me as he lifted his foot ready for the next blow.

I felt blood coming from my nose as he stamped on my face again and again. As I lay there writhing in pain, he had his way with me.

I went to Mammy afterwards, once I eventually found the strength to lift myself off the bed and stagger downstairs. ‘That thug stamped on my face!’

She was sitting by the fire drinking her favourite sherry, and she didn’t look up. ‘Stop being such a complainin’ little bitch.’

I begged her to take me to the doctor’s, but she refused and sent me back to bed. I’d heard her say before that Daddy’s wage was too high for us to get free medical care. I guessed that was why she never took me to the doctor.

The thug visited me in bed many more times. I never had any warning, and he had a habit of appearing from nowhere.

I often went to school with black eyes and bruises. I’d get fresh bruises on top of old ones, so my skin was always pitted with varying shades of black, blue and yellow marks. When I looked particularly bad, I just tried to make myself invisible at the back of the class and keep out of everyone’s way. Nobody at school seemed to notice, or perhaps they just thought I got into lots of fights.

Mammy said nothing. She seemed quite happy to sit downstairs drinking and smoking and turning a blind eye to what happened to me upstairs night after night. I felt so weak and exhausted, like my body was being broken over and over again. I wanted to fight, but I felt like a tiny speck compared to my abusers. There had to be another way of escaping them.

As summer turned to winter, I started pretending I wanted to use the toilet to get out of the bedroom and away from the possibility of more pain and terror.

I figured that the thug couldn’t get me if I was in the outside toilet in the back garden. It was dark and damp and stank so badly it made my eyes well up and sting, but it was better than lying terrified in bed.

Sometimes I huddled out there for ages, imagining spiders crawling over me, but it was far better than lying in bed and waiting for the thug to crawl on top of me, knowing Mammy was downstairs pretending nothing was happening. Or maybe she hated me so much she was even enjoying the fact I was suffering so badly?

One night, I was standing in the toilet in my vest and knickers. It was a bitterly cold night, and I was wondering how long I could stand it before I would be forced to go back inside.

All of a sudden, my nerves started to twang, and I felt myself physically shaking with cold and fear.

I could hear a strange noise outside, above my head. Someone was prowling around. I listened so intently that I could hear my own blood pumping through my veins. It was him looking for me, I just knew it. He didn’t come in that time, but he made it clear he had worked out what I was up to. I knew it was only a matter of time before my plan stopped working.

That time arrived just a few nights later, when he hid in the toilet, behind the door, waiting for me. When I crept in, hoping for a few minutes’ peace, he slammed the door shut, put his hand over my mouth and hurt me very quickly, and very violently. Afterwards he shared a laugh and a joke with my mammy.

There was no escape. I felt utterly trapped. I wasn’t strong enough to fight him off, and it felt like the only weapon I had was my mind.

I tried to switch it off whenever he appeared. I didn’t want to feel anything or think anything. If I emptied my brain and let it fuzz over, I would feel less hurt and pain. It worked a bit, but not as much as I would have liked.

It was impossible to feel normal. Daddy was still hurting me too. Sometimes, when the thug had finished with me for the night, he would go and Mammy would send me to sleep in the front bedroom again, and Daddy would roll in from the pub and attack me too. I rarely got through a night without one or both of them forcing themselves on me.

Other girls at school chatted about what they had done at the weekend or watched on TV. They had family gatherings, walks to church and shopping trips with their mammies. I didn’t do any of those things, and I felt left out.

I just couldn’t talk to my friends, in case I really was a very bad person. What would they think of me?

They wouldn’t want to hear about the time in the building when the men put me in a different room, then all queued up outside the door and took it in turns to come in and hurt me. In fact, no one would want to know any of what happened to me. Having all those men there simply to do terrible things to me was too traumatic to contemplate. Who would want to hear about all that? It was sickening.

Sometimes the men sat on chairs in a row and passed me round while they all laughed loudly. I didn’t want to even think about it myself, let alone tell my friends.

At least when I was in school I knew nobody was going to hurt me in the way Daddy and the other men did.

I loved fooling around with my friends. Even though the posh kids kept out of my way or looked down on me for my scruffy appearance, I didn’t care. I had my own mates, and when I was making them roar with laughter with my impression of Mother Dorothy, nose pointed in the air and pretend cane swishing in my hand, I felt great. ‘You are all SINNERS!’ I’d hiss theatrically. We’d all fall about in hysterics, and it felt so good to switch off from my worries and be myself for a little while.

I relished those golden moments, too, when I could read quietly and enjoy the peace, and on days when my head felt clear I really enjoyed learning. Mother Dorothy still gave out steam to me the whole time, and I never knew when my peace or fun might be snatched away and I’d be punished and shamed, but still, I much preferred being at school to being at home. Home meant horror. Home meant scary, violent thugs forcing themselves on me in the dark and hurting me. Home meant never knowing what Daddy might do. Home meant Mammy drinking and smoking and telling me I was a complaining bitch, I was crazy, I was a devil child; It was all my fault. I hated being at home.

Still, though, the one place I always felt better was by Granny’s side. I felt protected and safe, but I couldn’t tell Granny about all the strange and frightening things in my life, could I? I didn’t want to spoil my special time with her, it was too precious to ruin. I’d be beaten so badly by Mammy and Daddy that life wouldn’t be worth living. No, I couldn’t tell Granny.

I started visiting Granny more than ever. I went most lunchtimes and played truant from school whenever I could just so I could enjoy a bit of peace and friendly company. Sipping hot, sweet tea in her living room was a real tonic. It instantly pepped me up and made me feel a bit happier inside.

I felt the knots in my shoulders loosen when I walked to Granny’s. I could feel them easing with every step I took down the road and round the corner.

I would wonder if Granny might have some fruit for me, or maybe some broken biscuits. She always had a treat of some kind in store. Being with Granny felt so special. Hers was the only house I ever really visited, apart from Uncle Frank’s. She made me feel welcome and loved and safe.

I never got invited into any of my friends’ houses. They sometimes said they were sorry not to be able to invite me, but their mammies wouldn’t let them. I knew they were telling the truth, because I sometimes knocked on their door and their mammies told me flatly, ‘No, you can’t come in,’ or ‘No, she can’t play with you.’

I guessed it was because I always looked so dirty and messy, not a little girl anyone would want their child playing with. Anyhow, I could visit Granny whenever I wanted, and I loved my Granny.

‘Come in, Cynthia!’ would beam kindly when I knocked on the door at lunchtime.

‘Sit yourself down by the fire while I fetch you a cup of tea. I’ve got wafers today, lovely pink ones.’

I would smile back at Granny and settle myself on the floor. ‘Can you show me the Irish jig?’ I might ask. She was quite an old lady - she must have been about seventy-years-old - but she often got up and showed me the jig. ‘Please, Granny?’

‘Maybe later,’ she’d say, smiling. ‘Drink up your tea for now.’

A smile from Granny made me feel special. I loved visiting her. Mammy made me go there to do her cleaning and shopping, but I didn’t mind at all, I preferred being there than being at home.

Since the two new babies had arrived, things had got even tougher for me there.

Mammy expected me to look after all four of my younger siblings, and I found it really hard trying to help them all get dressed and give them their breakfast before school.

I was coming up to eleven now. Mary was seven, Martin was five, Michael was about eighteen months, and Theresa was a year old. Every morning I fed all four kids with Weetabix with sugar on, wiped their faces, kissed the babies goodbye and took Mary and Martin to school with me.

I always held their hands, like the mammies did, because I remembered how much I liked it when Esther used to hold my hand on the way to school.

Our mammy just stayed in bed.

I worried about the babies when I was out. I always left them in clean nappies, even if it meant tearing up old sheets and towels and wrapping them round their wriggling bottoms.

But they were always dirty and smelly when I got home at lunchtime to give them a slice of bread or some mashed-up potato and corned beef. Their little feet would be blue with cold too. I felt sorry for them.

Theresa was a very sweet, calm baby who never made much fuss and greeted me with great big smiles, but Michael hardly ever seemed happy.

Often when I came in, he would be rocking back and forth in a chair, or banging his head off a wall and crying. It made me really sad to see him like that, and I gave him extra cuddles.

After school, I went to the local shops for cigarettes and more bread or meat and vegetables. From time to time Mammy sent me to Dun Laoghaire with an old pram to fetch coal. It was three miles away, and my legs ached, but Mammy always warned me not to argue, and I didn’t want the babies to be cold so I always fetched the coal.

Sometimes we needed briquettes for the fire too. They had wire carriers around them that cut my hands, but I didn’t bother complaining. Most of the time I carried bags of turf and sacks of potatoes on my back. I got so tired in the evening my arms and legs felt as if lead weights, but I’d always help make the dinner. It felt as if I’d peeled a million spuds, but Mammy usually did the actual cooking.

If she was in a good mood, she made nice things, like burgers or chops with cabbage and turnips, but if she was in a bad mood or was very tired, we dipped bread into a dissolved Oxo cube or spread it with tomato ketchup.

By 7 p.m. I’d be dropping with tiredness, but I had to walk back to the shops to buy more cigarettes and alcohol for Mammy.

One day I asked her if I could buy all the shopping in one go, instead of making three separate trips. The local shops were only a ten-minute walk away, but I got fed up with all the walking and going in the same shops over and over again.

‘No way!’ was all Mammy said.

‘But I’m tired, Mammy. I could get everything we need at lunchtime! Why do I have to go at four o’clock and seven o’clock? I’m really tired.’

‘No way!’ she repeated angrily. ‘Are you arguing with me?’ Her fist was raised, and I knew that if I said yes she would punch me.

‘No, Mammy, I am not arguing,’ I said.

‘Good. Don’t be such lazy bitch. Just do it.’

When I climbed into bed, I’d be desperate for sleep, but my chores for the day were still not over. The thug was still attacking me in bed whenever he felt like it. Mammy seemed to have given him an open invitation into my bedroom whenever Daddy was still in the pub.

Daddy was still regularly hurting me in bed in the early hours of the morning, once he’d staggered home, usually the worse for drink, and once a month I was still being dragged to that horrible building with all those scary men.

When I had my ‘thing’ and I bled every month, I felt more tired still, but still none of the men left me alone. The blood made me feel messy and dirty, but none of the people who touched my body seemed to be bothered by it.