Escape From Evil - Cathy Wilson [34]
I thought I was going to be sick on the spot. I was on my way to the bedroom anyway, resigned to the usual routine. Mum needn’t have got herself into trouble, but she was in a spirited mood. She paid for it with a crack across her face.
Stunned, her legs gave way and she collapsed. Before I could move towards her, a man put his arm in my way.
‘Bed or she’ll get another one.’
I didn’t need to be told twice.
After that, I never hesitated again when they sent me away. I didn’t want them to touch a single hair on Mum’s head and I knew that was the only way to stop them. I wish Mum had realized it too. If she did, then she never showed it. Time after time, she stood up for me and got a hard swipe across the cheek for her trouble. It seemed to be every time now. Something had escalated. The relationship between her and the men, whatever it was, had somehow got worse.
I never lost the sense that I needed to look after Mum. Whether it was cleaning or cooking or worrying that she’d remembered her coat on a cold night, I always looked out for her. Knowing that if she didn’t let them drug me she would be hurt drove me mad. I found myself almost sprinting into the bedroom.
If I’m quick, Mum won’t have time to argue – and she won’t get hit.
Sometimes it worked. Other times I’d hear the smacks through the thin walls. Seeing her be hit was horrific. Hearing the attack – because that’s what it was – and wondering what had happened to her was somehow even worse. I didn’t dare cry out in case it made things worse for Mum. But anyone listening at my door would have heard me crying as quietly as I dared, cowering under my blankets, imagining horror after horror.
Mum, though, didn’t give in. One day I was in the kitchen rolling joints when I was told it was pill time, so I had to make sure everything was neat before I could leave. That gave Mum plenty of time to object. Too much time. Even though we were in different rooms, I could hear every word of the argument. I realized I was tensing, just waiting for the moment someone’s hand struck her face. This time, however, Mark went further.
‘If you don’t shut up,’ I heard him say, slowly and calmly, ‘I’m gonna do to Cathy what I’m about to do to you.’
That was it. Silence. I didn’t hear another peep out of Mum, not even when I emerged from the kitchen and traipsed over to the bedroom. Just before I closed the door I dared a glimpse in Mum’s direction and shuddered. Her face had a new level of terror etched all over it.
Why?
Mulling it over in the bedroom, I realized Mark hadn’t hit her because that never seemed to work. So he’d threatened to hurt me instead. I didn’t know how. Something about doing to me what he was going to do to Mum. It sounded ominous but unclear. Whatever it was, Mum knew exactly what it meant. And that was enough to keep her quiet. I cried as I realized she was sacrificing herself for me.
Over the course of I don’t know how long, things worsened. The men were still only coming round about twice a week, but their manner changed. They used to be friendly. Mark, in particular, would go out of his way to keep me onside. I thought he might have been trying to impress Mum, like a boyfriend, by making me like him. I couldn’t think of another reason. And she’d seemed to like them all in the early days. At least, she’d appeared to. Was there ever much more than indifference in her eyes when they’d arrived those first few times? Every time I thought about it, the memory was just too far out of reach.
Now, though, with the pills and parties and the threats against me, the atmosphere in the flat whenever the men were there was hideous. I literally felt sick whenever the door opened and there they were. I prayed each time that it wouldn’t be them, but more often than not it was. We had no friends, so who