Time and again the police were called by worried neighbours, but Mummy would simply go to the door, all indignant despite her battered face, and tell them to go away. ‘I told ’em to sling their bleedin’ hook. Interfering bastards.’
One day, after she had sent the police away yet again, she went into the kitchen to make a cup of tea. I watched her spoon the sugar into the cup and her hand was shaking so much that she was spilling as much on the counter as was going into the tea. I stood next to her and laid my head against her hip as the kettle boiled.
‘What do you want?’ she snapped.
‘Are you alright, Mummy?’ I asked, tears trickling down my cheeks and soaking into her dressing gown. ‘Your eye looks sore.’
‘Just go to your room or something,’ she replied, pushing me away. ‘You’re always under my bloody feet.’
I knew by her reaction that she didn’t want me to mention what Dad had done to her. It was almost as if she was embarrassed and couldn’t meet my eye. So from then on whenever I saw her cut or bruised, or wearing her Polaroid sunglasses inside the house, I didn’t say anything. In fact none of us did. I always felt very scared when I saw her bruises though. I was scared that he would hurt her really badly one time, and even more scared that he would hurt me. If he so much as raised his voice, I would find urine trickling down my leg. The more violent and unpredictable he became, the more I would wet myself, then I would panic that he would notice I’d had an accident and punish me with a slap or a kick. I crept round the flat like a little mouse, doing my best not to draw attention to myself.
I wished I could go back and live with Nanny again. But somehow I knew without asking that Dad would never let me.
I started school when I was five. The nursery I’d attended when I lived with Nanny was based in the same Victorian building, so I was quite familiar with it already. I was looking forward to playing in the big girl’s playground, where I could use the skipping ropes and hula hoops. Nanny knitted me a new hat and scarf, which I wore despite the late September heat, and Jenny and Freda bought me a pretty dress and long white socks from Woolworths. I felt really smart in my new outfit. Mummy couldn’t walk me to school herself as she was having a lie-in with Dad, so Diane took me on the first day. It was a ten-minute walk away.
‘I won’t be able to walk you every day,’ said Diane as she held my hand, ‘so make sure you remember the way, just in case Mummy doesn’t get up in time.’
‘I should have brought a bit of bread to crumble, like Hansel and Gretel,’ I said, and Diane laughed.
As we approached the gate, I was so nervous my insides were doing somersaults. But once I was inside I quickly settled in. The classrooms had proper desks with lids that lifted up and smashed back down on our fingers if we weren’t careful. I sat next to a girl called Claire Sullivan, and when we had to line up in twos we giggled as we held hands. I liked it at school, at least at first.
Mummy spent most of her waking hours at Dad’s beck and call, catering to his every need, whether that meant running over the road to put his bets on, or spending hours in the bedroom with him whenever he announced ‘Feel that, Donna. I’ve got the right horn.’
Mummy had plenty of time for him because since he had moved in, Dad had insisted on a few changes. Firstly, he stopped Mummy working for Uncle Bob in the pub because Dad believed it was ‘whore’s work’ and besides, Uncle Bob was a ‘no-good cunt’. Mummy could forget ever working there again–and another thing, she had better get used to the fact that she wouldn’t be able to ‘flash her tits all over the shop’ any more.
‘You’re fucking everything that moves in that boozer,’ he spat. ‘What d’ya take me for, some kinda mug?’
‘Why would you say that, Frank? I never look at anyone but you.’
‘Cos you’re a slag, that’s why,’ he replied with a sneer.
While he was at it, Dad also banned her from contact with any member of her extended family, especially ‘the old bitch and two ugly sisters over the road’. Mummy accepted all this and even seemed pleased that he was so jealous and possessive of her, as if it was confirmation of his love.
‘You just want me all to yourself, don’t you?’ she laughed.
The only time I remember her crying about any of his rule changes was when he trashed her make-up collection. He held her face in one hand, distorting her mouth so she looked like a fish, and then began to make her up like a clown with exaggerated red lips and large black crosses on her eyelids which smudged in her tears.
‘Look at the state of you,’ he said, roaring with laughter and twisting her face so she could look in the mirror. She began laughing then–laughing, coughing and crying all at the same time.
I was watching through a crack in the door, confused that Mummy could be happy and sad all at once.
With a clatter, Dad tipped Mummy’s make-up into the tin wastebasket in the corner. Her best rosy brown lipstick fell onto the carpet and he stamped on it with a crunch.
‘Could do with a new bit of carpet in here anyway,’ mumbled Mummy, cigarette clamped between her circus-painted lips.
Once she had stopped working at the pub, the lack of money gave Dad yet another reason to lose his temper. Ever since he had taken up with Mummy she had provided for his every need and now that money was sparse Dad found things difficult.
‘No booze, no fags, and I can’t even have a fucking bet.’
In desperation, Mummy would send Diane or Cheryl over the road to Nanny’s to ask if she could spare a few quid to tide us over. Since taking up with Dad she hadn’t spoken to her family directly but she wasn’t too proud to ask for cash. Nanny couldn’t bear to think of us children going without the basics so she would always put a little money in an envelope and send it back to Mummy with her love. Little did she know that instead of buying food, Mummy would give the money straight to Dad who would quickly smoke, drink and gamble it away.
Sometimes I’d cry myself to sleep because I missed Nanny so much. I couldn’t understand why I was sometimes allowed to visit her and other times I couldn’t. I wanted to ask, but once I’d made the mistake of saying ‘Nanny’ in front of Dad and he’d smacked my bare legs so hard that I wore his red handprint for the rest of the day. It made me frightened to even think about her when Dad was around in case he could read my mind. If I saw Nanny and Freda sitting out on their balcony when I got home from school, they would wave and shout across the busy road, and even though I wanted to jump for joy and blow kisses, just as I used to in the old days when Nanny picked me up from nursery, I was worried that Dad might see me from our flat window, so I turned away and ran up the steps into our block as fast as I could.
Once Mummy whispered to me in the bathroom, warning me not to sneak over the road to see Nanny in case I got run over. She bent down until her frowning face was level with mine and her grip tightened painfully on my upper arms. I knew she wasn’t really worried about me crossing roads because I walked to school on my own every day now and I was allowed to play in all sorts of dangerous places, such as the canal where a boy had drowned once and derelict houses with floors missing. I knew it was just that she didn’t want me going over to Nanny’s because Dad didn’t want me to, and if he found out, he would be angry.
The thought of Dad’s anger flipped my stomach. He quite often smacked my bare bottom if I didn’t do what he asked