Wake Up, Mummy (4 page)

‘Who is that?’ I whispered to my brother. ‘Is that our mummy?’

‘I think so.’ Chris’s voice was barely audible. ‘It…It sort of looks like her…’

I tightened my grasp on his hand and bit my lip to stop myself crying out. I couldn’t understand what the woman was saying, and I still wasn’t sure whether she was my mother or someone really scary who looked a bit like her. She crossed in front of the open door repeatedly, but never once did she look away from whatever she could see in her arms and notice us. We watched her for a while and then crept silently back up the stairs, climbed into my bed together and held hands tightly until we fell asleep.

MY MOTHER’S PARENTS
often came to visit us in those days and when my mother was certain my father couldn’t hear her, she’d plead with them to take us away and let us live with them. My grandfather’s response was always the same. Although his dislike of my father had grown stronger over the years my parents had been married, he would tell my mother she had to stick it out and make the
best of it ‘for the sake of the children’. What was more important than anything else, he would tell her, was that my brother and I had two parents. He was wrong, as it turned out, but I think he meant well.

Of course, part of the problem was that my mother had always had a tendency to exaggerate and overdramatise everything. She’d been doing it since she was a small child, and her parents had grown used to never knowing what part of anything she said was fact and what part was fiction. So my grandfather simply didn’t realise how miserably hopeless our lives had become.

IT WASN’T LONG
before something must have happened to make my grandfather change his mind, because one day he arrived at the house with my uncle and told my father, ‘That’s enough. I’m taking them home with me. They won’t be coming back.’ He didn’t shout or even seem angry. He just spoke in his calm, authoritative way without raising his voice. But I think my father could tell he’d made up his mind and that he was in no mood for arguments.

I could feel my heart thumping, as though it was growing larger with every beat until it started banging against my ribs. Were we really going to escape from the constant threat of my father’s violent temper and go to live with my grandparents, who I adored? I didn’t dare believe it was true.

It wasn’t long, though, before my excitement turned to fear, as it became clear that my father wasn’t going to let us
go without a fight. I didn’t understand why he bothered: I was sure he’d be glad to see my mother and me leave, although I knew he’d be sorry about losing my brother – for a while, at least. So perhaps it was just because he liked to be in charge. He always insisted on being the person issuing the orders, whatever the situation, and I suppose it was the fact that my grandfather had taken control out of his hands that made him so aggressive.

My father was a bully and, like all bullies, only abused those who couldn’t fight back. So he didn’t try to vent his anger and frustration on my grandfather or my uncle. Instead, he started screaming at my mother, who, for once secure in the knowledge that there was someone there to protect her, screamed back at him.

‘It’s okay.’ My grandfather could see that I was frightened, and he laid a large, comforting hand on my shoulder. ‘Just go and put on your shoes and coat. Take Chris with you.’

A few minutes later, I walked out of the front door of my home and stood waiting to be told what to do next. My father was standing by the gate, still shouting and swearing, and when he saw me, he walked back up the path, bent down until his face was level with mine and shouted, ‘That fucking doll was bought with
my
money, and that makes it
my
fucking doll. You don’t own a single thing. So you won’t be taking a single thing with you.’

Thin threads of his saliva spattered across my face as he spoke, and I could feel his hot, stale breath on my cheek. I tightened my grip on my doll, Sally, and tried to tuck her under the open front of my coat. But he snatched her easily from my hands, pulling her away from me with one sharp tug and tossing her on the ground between us.

‘Good God, man!’ My uncle sounded shocked and angry. ‘Surely you can let the child keep her doll!’

My father smiled a slow, smug smile that didn’t reach his eyes, and then ground the heel of his boot into Sally’s face.

I was still sobbing hysterically when my mother came flying out of the house shouting, ‘You fucking bastard!’ For a split-second I thought she was finally going to speak up on my behalf. But when I looked at her face I could see that her anger was more an expression of how much she was enjoying the drama of it all than of any feelings of sympathy for me. She was probably already imagining telling the story at the pub. She loved describing the terrible life she had to put up with, not least because the more shocking the story – suitably embellished – the sorrier people felt for her and the more drinks they bought her.

The woman who lived in the house next door had come out into her garden when all the noise started, and she was standing, openly watching, with one hand resting
on the fence and the fingers of the other holding a cigarette to her lips.

My father turned towards her. ‘We’ve got some toys for your kids,’ he said, reaching into the open bag my mother had dumped beside the front door and pulling out a teddy bear and a red-painted steam engine, my brother’s pride and joy. ‘Anna and Chris don’t want them any more.’

As he walked towards her, I began dragging toys out of the bag and trying to stuff them into my pockets and under my coat, although I was sure the woman wouldn’t take them, because it was obvious that what my father said wasn’t true. But when I looked up again, the neighbour was smirking as she reached eagerly across the fence to snatch the things my father was holding out to her.

My uncle clenched his fists and took a step towards my father, as if he was going to hit him. I felt a sudden thrill of satisfaction at the thought that someone was finally going to stand up to my father in our defence, but my grandfather laid a hand on my uncle’s arm and said gruffly, ‘Leave it. Let’s just get them out of here.’ So, instead, my uncle took the small suitcase my mother was holding and threw it into the boot of my grandfather’s car, along with a couple of carrier bags of hastily collected clothes. Then my brother and I clambered on to the back seat and we drove away, my mother still cursing my father as she leaned dangerously out of the open window beside
her, and my father shouting and gesticulating furiously from the pavement outside our house.

Leaving our home and our father was a horrible, traumatic experience for many reasons, and it left me and my brother – at the ages of just four and two and a half – without a single familiar or loved possession. What I didn’t know on that day, though, was that it was to be the beginning of the two happiest years of my life.

I’D KNOWN FROM
a very early age that my father actively disliked me, and although I didn’t realise it at the time, there was nothing I would ever be able to do – no instance of good behaviour or amazing achievement – that would make him change his mind. My mother’s attitude towards me, however, was more one of indifference: I was a nuisance and an inconvenience to her and, most of the time, she was happy simply to ignore me, as long as I didn’t get in her way. And she never let me forget that the reason my father treated her so badly was because I was a girl, rather than the son he’d wanted. I knew I was a disappointment to them both, and at the age of four I was already convinced that I was as worthless as they so often told me I was.

Therefore, particularly in contrast to the first four years of my life, living with my grandparents was an unimaginable revelation as I slowly discovered what it felt like to
be loved and what a difference that feeling can make to a child’s life. In their large, comfortable house in a quiet road in an affluent area of town, Chris and I became completely different children. We idolised our grandparents and loved our aunts and uncles, and they in turn made us feel special and important.

From being a timid, uncared-for and anxious child, I became a well-dressed, well-spoken little girl who made friends quickly when I started at the local school. For the first time in my life, I felt I fitted in somewhere. I’d never before experienced consistency and stability, and I loved being part of a respectable family and living
within
a community, rather than at the edge, always watching and feeling excluded. And I loved not having to be afraid and wary all the time. It was as though my grandparents had built an invisible protective bubble around me, enclosing within it all the things I wanted to be part of and making it impossible for anything or anyone to hurt me.

The very best part of every day was the early morning, when my grandmother came into the bedroom I shared with my mother – when she bothered to come home at night – and whispered to me, ‘Wake up, sleepy head. God has blessed us with another beautiful day.’ Or, sometimes, ‘God has sent rain to make the farmers smile.’

As she tiptoed out of the room again, I’d jump out of bed, quickly get washed and dressed and then almost
tumble down the stairs in my eagerness to reach the kitchen, where I’d sit at the table and wait for her. As everyone else rushed to get ready for work, my grandmother and I would eat toast and marmalade and talk to each other. It was a wonderful way to start the day and I’d always leave for school full of confidence in the knowledge that my grandmother loved me, and therefore I was someone special.

Having been used to being considered an irritating nuisance (by my mother) and a completely worthless waste of space (by my father), I’d always assumed there was something wrong with me, something I didn’t understand that made me unlovable. So I could hardly believe that someone as wonderful as my grandmother actually wanted to sit and eat her breakfast with me every morning.

During the two years we lived with our grandparents, Chris and I built very special bonds with them. They became the parents we’d never had and, perhaps most importantly of all, they made us see that there was another way of living. Until then, like all children, I’d simply accepted the hand I’d been dealt. I’d been completely unaware that other people’s lives might be different from my own. If I
had
ever thought about it, I’m sure I’d have assumed that all mummies got drunk and that all daddies shouted and swore and punched them
until they cried and blood ran down their faces. But living with my grandparents and having close contact with my aunts and uncles made me realise that some people are kind to each other, that they live together happily, without screaming and fighting, and that maybe it was possible to choose what sort of life you wanted to have.

My grandfather still worked in construction and he often had to go abroad on contracts, sometimes for weeks at a time. My grandmother would go with him, as she’d always done, and so would my brother and I during the school holidays. During term time, however, we stayed at home in my grandparents’ house, ‘looked after’ by our mother, although it was actually our aunts and uncles who fed, clothed and cared for us. My mother’s sisters and brothers had countless arguments with her as they tried to make her understand her responsibilities towards us. But however furious and frustrated they became with her, they were always good to my brother and me and always careful to make sure we knew they weren’t angry with us.

It seemed that my mother always had her finger on a self-destruct button. When she left my father, she’d had a choice between her children and her love of alcohol, and she’d chosen the latter. Surprisingly, though, considering the amount she drank, she somehow managed to hold
down a job in an office. She was young and attractive, and there was no shortage of men willing to pay for her evenings out. So she rarely came home after work other than to wash and change her clothes before flying out of the front door again.

I don’t remember ever missing my father or wishing he was there and, fortunately, during that time neither he nor my mother really figured in my life. They’d both become strangers to me and I was happy for my new life to revolve around my grandparents, aunts and uncles.

My mother had impressed upon my brother and me as soon as we moved in with my grandparents that we were never to call her Mum or try to hold her hand in public. She told us she didn’t want her new friends to know she had children. I didn’t really understand what she meant, and it felt as though she was ashamed of us. I accepted it, though, as I accepted everything, and for a while I was satisfied just to run to the front door to greet her as soon as I heard the sound of her footsteps coming up the garden path. Eventually, however, after repeated rebuffs and the hurt and disappointment that brought hot tears to my eyes each time she flicked her wrist irritably to loosen my grip on her hand, my eagerness to see her dwindled to a self-protective indifference. And then I barely lifted my head to look as she flung open the front door and ran up the stairs, shedding dirty clothes in her wake.

Sometimes, I’d be playing in the garden with a friend when my mother came home from work and walked straight past us without any sign of acknowledgement. Then my stomach would start to churn as I waited for the argument that always started as soon as she set foot inside the house.

‘You just don’t want me to enjoy myself,’ my mother would scream. ‘You can’t bear the thought that I’ve got friends. If you don’t want to look after the kids, send them back to their useless bastard of a father and let’s see how he likes not being able to go out in the evenings.’

My grandmother would sound angry and there’d be a sharp tone of exasperation in her voice that I only ever heard when she was arguing with my mother, as she answered, ‘For pity’s sake, Judith! You haven’t been home for the last three nights. And now you’ve only come to get a change of clothes. Surely it isn’t too much to hope that you’d want to spend just a few minutes with your own children?’

Then someone would remember we were playing in the garden and a window would bang shut, muffling the sound of their voices.