Don't You Love Your Daddy? (21 page)

Once I was calm again he would give me a cloth he kept in the glove compartment, if we were in the car, or hand me a tissue if we were in my bedroom. ‘Here, clean yourself with that.’ And each time I obediently did, before pulling my knickers back on.

‘Sally,’ he said repeatedly, ‘this is something special between us. You mustn’t talk about it, do you understand?’

‘Yes,’ I replied, when I was eight, nine and ten. After that, when I no longer believed him any more, it was too late: by my own actions I had been labelled a liar and had created a world in which he was safe from anything I could have said.

But until then I listened to the subtle threats of being taken away and heard his promises that, as long as I was good, he would never let it happen.

Then there was the other threat that frightened me even more – one he didn’t need to voice again: if I didn’t obey him I would spend eternity in hell and never see my mother again.

‘I won’t tell,’ I said.

‘Let’s get you home’ – or, if he had visited my room, ‘Go to sleep now,’ said in a calm voice as though nothing untoward had happened.

Often, the next day, there would be a present for me of packets of sweets or chocolate. ‘For my special girl,’ he would say, and each time I would see the resentment on Sue’s face.

‘You spoil her,’ she said accusingly. But he took no notice.

After the death of my mother, when our old house had become a cold, unhappy place there had been little supervision, but the new one was run strictly, according to Sue’s rules. She saw it as her domain. After all, as she pointed out to my father during their rows, it was her family who had bought it, and him and his children who benefited from it.

Any sign of Dolly’s presence had to be cleared from the garden the moment I arrived back from school. Outside the back door there was a trowel and plastic bags. Before I was allowed to enter the house I had to search the lawn. I bent double with my head down, scared that if I missed anything there would be another argument about getting rid of my little dog.

Shoes were taken off before entering the house, all toys had to be kept in our rooms, homework had to be done upstairs and there was no question of Dolly being allowed further than the kitchen. Within weeks of our moving in, Sue’s half-hearted courtship of Billy’s and my affection ceased. The attraction of a ready-made family had vanished and he and I were pushed aside. I had heard the saying that children should be seen and not heard, but Sue didn’t want either.

If I sat in the lounge with a book I was told to take it upstairs. If I asked to watch anything on television she said it was bad for me, and if I went into the kitchen when she was preparing food she told me I was in the way.

Then I would creep into the garden to play with Dolly or take her for short walks, with Billy trotting along beside me. ‘Don’t go far,’ was always Sue’s warning when we left. Apart from issuing instructions or reprimands, she had little to say to us.

She had stopped working at her father’s firm soon after the move. ‘Got enough to do looking after the house and your children,’ I heard her say.

Billy and I started at the local school and now it was my turn to take a younger family member with me each morning. To begin with I liked my new school. Gold stars were given out for my work and, eager to earn more, I would sit in my room with my school books propped in front of me, diligently preparing for the next day’s lessons.

Spelling was something I worked at. I would try and memorize each letter until they looked like so many black squiggles and my eyes burnt, but it was worth it the next day when the teacher praised me; and I was becoming addicted to praise.

The children at the local school, unlike my previous one, were friendly. They knew nothing about my mother, her drinking or her breakdowns, and within a few weeks of starting, I found myself being asked to parties or to visit.

But when I asked Sue’s permission to go, instead of being pleased that I was being accepted by the local children, she was more concerned about who they were. An inquisition about the family and which part of the town they lived in would follow any mention of a child at school.

‘I don’t think so, Sally,’ was Sue’s answer, when I told her the name of each new friend I had made.

The excuses she gave varied. Sometimes it was because they worked for her family and therefore my father; at others she didn’t approve of their address or the work their father did. When the invitation was for the weekend, there would be a sigh. ‘No, not this time, Sally. There’s no one to take you and bring you back. Your father works hard all week so we’re not going to ask him, are we?’

Once I asked if I could have a friend over to visit me, but my request was met with a horrified look. ‘No, Sally. I have quite enough to do feeding and cleaning up after you and Billy, without having more children in the house. Your father needs his rest after work – he doesn’t want noisy children running around.’

The sound of Dolly welcoming me on my return from school would bring Sue rushing to the door. Her face would scrunch up in exasperation when she saw the little dog yapping excitedly as, tail wagging, she jumped up to greet me. ‘Sally, keep that dog quiet! We don’t want to upset the neighbours, do we?’

Billy, once chubby and lively, now looked despondent. Used to being fussed over by my grandmother and my aunt, he pined for his old home and the people who had brought him up since my mother had died. ‘Want Nana,’ he would say repeatedly, and his language became more babyish again. He started sucking his thumb, which infuriated Sue. ‘It’s unhygienic and looks terrible. Take it out of your mouth now,’ she would shout at him.

Toys that were noisy, such as the drum he had been given by my aunt, were confiscated and games of hide and seek or any of the others we had played together were now forbidden. She had refused to allow him to bring my old Space Hopper, which he loved, to the new house.

‘Don’t want that scuffing up the lawn,’ she had said, when he didn’t want to part with it. The lovely new things that Sue had promised the house would be full of had not included toys. He was at an age when little boys find it difficult to be quiet, and now that he had no cousins to play with, he became bored and depressed. At five his baby plumpness faded and his wide, trusting smile disappeared. Sue might have turned him into a well-behaved child, but she had not created a happy one.

She believed that I was my father’s favourite and knew that I was old enough to tell him if she ever raised her hand to me. However, she also seemed to know that being ignored was punishment enough for me. Billy was not so lucky, and should he forget one of her increasing number of rules or fail to respond immediately to her commands, not only did harsh words fall on him but also a stinging slap.

Before and after my grandfather’s death, Sue steadfastly found excuses not to visit my father’s family. A dinner party, an invitation to her parents’, or a visit to one of her friends always took precedence over any proposed visit to her in-laws. At weekends she decided what she and my father would do, especially if there were powerful people she wanted to impress. Then Billy and I were shown off and banished to our rooms.

‘Oh, Sue,’ I heard a female friend say to her, ‘I do think you’re brave taking on another woman’s children like you have.’

‘Oh,’ she said airily, ‘it’s no trouble and they’re so sweet.’

Sue’s rules increased to our detriment. Family meals on Saturday evenings came to an abrupt stop. ‘I think it’s better if you and Billy eat together on Saturdays,’ she told me. ‘Then afterwards you can go to your rooms and play.’ She bought a small television and installed it in my room. ‘You can watch it up here,’ she said brightly. ‘Look how lucky you are – your own TV.’ It was followed by a cassette player and some of the latest cassettes.

‘When we have visitors, Dolly can go up to your room until they leave,’ she told me, as an extra bribe.

‘The children have already eaten,’ she told my father, when he looked puzzled to see the dining-table set with just two places. Billy and I had been given tinned macaroni cheese in the kitchen for our supper, and my mouth watered at the aroma of meat simmering in red wine that was wafting throughout the house.

‘David, we have to have our privacy,’ she said the next weekend, when she had ordered me to take Billy and go to my room while it was still light. ‘Sally’s room has everything she could possibly want and I’ve even let her take that dog of hers upstairs for company too. We need some “us” time, don’t we, darling?’ she said sweetly.

She was right: my room did have everything in it a girl could want. The only problem was that, apart from Billy and Dolly, there was nobody to enjoy it with me. Billy was too young to sit still for long and he irritated me when he fidgeted with my belongings. On the other hand he looked so miserable at the change in his circumstances that I felt too sorry for him to grumble. After the initial excitement of having a cassette player and my own television wore off, the walls of my room started to close in on me, until it felt more like a prison than a room a child could relax in.

‘Sally, show Auntie So-and-so …’ Sue would name one of her many friends, with the request to take her to my room. Up the stairs I would have to go with whoever it was and show them everything that Sue had put into it.

‘Well, aren’t you a lucky girl?’ was always the response, followed by praise for Sue.

‘Don’t spoil them too much,’ the ‘auntie’ would always warn Sue, when she returned to the lounge. Then, with Billy following me, I would go back upstairs.

Over the next few months my father and I drove down to visit my grandmother three times, and three times he stopped the car in the woods on the return journey.

‘Why will you not take Billy as well?’ Sue asked petulantly – a day with no one else in the house meant a day of bathing in scented warm water, painting her nails and covering her face with a mud pack. ‘I wanted to go to the hairdresser’s,’ she said crossly, on the third visit. ‘I didn’t marry you to be your children’s babysitter.’

More rows followed, but she had her way and Billy came too during the Easter holidays. After that, apart from when he was ill with mumps or measles, he came with us on each visit, much to the delight of Nana and my aunt, but most of all me. Unknowingly, he had become the chaperone who kept me safe.

It was then that Sue, angry about my father’s long days away from her, resumed her nights out with the girls – Her ‘me time’ or ‘catch-up time’. ‘I need them, David,’ she said. But I noticed that she didn’t seem very pleased when he failed to protest.

It was on a night when Sue was at one of her weekly girls’ nights out that my father let me know just how much power he had over me.

I was nearly ten. Unable to engineer any time with me when we were completely on our own, my father had left me alone for some time. Sue’s night out gave him the opportunity he had been waiting for. Safe in the knowledge that she wouldn’t return until late and that Billy was asleep, he risked coming into my room.

I was reading with the bedside light on when I heard my door open and looked up to see him standing there. ‘Hello, Sally,’ he said. ‘It’s been a long time since we were alone together, hasn’t it?’ Pulling the bedclothes right up to my chin, I looked fearfully at him over the top of my pink quilt.

His mouth was twisted into the conspiratorial smile I recognized while his eyes raked the outline of my body. ‘Stop hiding under the bedclothes – I know you want it. A dirty little girl like you always does.’

‘I don’t,’ I whispered, gripping the covers as though they afforded me some protection.

‘Sally, what have you been told about lying? You get punished for it, don’t you?’

I looked at him, not understanding what he meant but knowing that something bad was going to happen.

He moved fast, taking me by surprise. With strong fingers, he grasped my shoulders and pulled me out from under the blankets. Then, grabbing one of my pillows, he flung me on to my back and pressed it over my face.

I felt the weight of him pushing me down; my chest tightened and I could hear my blood drumming in my ears. My legs kicked out, but my arms were trapped by the quilt and blankets as I tried to reach out to his hands. But I was powerless to move and the feeble twists of my small body did nothing to dislodge the pillow, which was suffocating me.

It must have been just a few seconds, but in my panic it felt like hours before he released me. When he lifted the pillow, I still couldn’t breathe. My chest burnt, black dots danced in front of my eyes and my breath came in rasping gasps as I tried in vain to get air into my lungs. I looked at him imploringly. I needed my inhaler. Since I had my first asthma attack I was frightened of being anywhere where I couldn’t get to my medication. The attacks now happened regularly and it was only when I held it in my hand and was ready to place it on my mouth that my panic, which increased the ferocity of the attacks, ceased.

Although I was now allowed to carry it to school, in the house it was either Sue or my father who had control of it.

‘But what happens if I need it in the night?’ I had asked fearfully, when my father told me they were keeping it in their room. ‘What happens if I can’t call you or you don’t hear me?’

My father told me I was being over-dramatic: of course I could call out or knock on their door. Asthma didn’t paralyse me, did it? And using the inhaler too much was dangerous – hadn’t the doctor told me so?