Phoenix Resurrected

by Oliver T Spedding

  Garth glanced at me angrily, stood up and left the room. I heard him get another beer from the fridge. He came back to the lounge and sat down on the couch next to me. He opened the can and took a sip.

  “You’re quite right when you say that it’s my life and my money.” he said. “And I don’t need any help with either of them. Everything’s great. Okay?”

  Feelings of fear, anger, frustration and helplessness had been a part of my life for as long as I could remember and now these feeling were reinforced by Garth’s indifference towards me. On top of this, my father seemed determined to find an excuse that he could use to assault me and I couldn’t help feeling that this stemmed from the fact that in less than two years I would be twenty one years old and free to leave his house without needing his consent. And I was determined to do just that. Not for a single second would I remain there for longer than I had to.

  By now my body was almost fully developed, something that thrilled me and made me feel proud of myself. I was excited every time I saw the lust in the eyes of boys as well as mature men whenever I caught them staring at me. I was also quite a bit taller than my father and this seemed to add to his anger. The fact that he had to look up to me whenever he shouted at me somehow made him feel inferior and to counter this he began to berate me for my misdemeanours while we were eating our meals at the kitchen table as, when we were seated, I didn’t appear to be that much taller than him. But I still had a terrifying fear of him. His anger was frightening in its intensity and the violence that he threatened to unleash on me was still a real possibility. I therefore took great care not to antagonize him, even though there were times when, no matter what I did, he would become infuriated with me. Then, about six weeks after my seventeenth birthday the inevitable happened.

  My mother and I were sitting at the kitchen table eating our supper when we heard my father arrive at the front door. As usual he had been drinking at his club and, by the way he struggled to open the door, it was obvious to us that he was drunk. Finally he got the door to open and stumbled into the house, almost falling as he turned to close the door. Having managed to slam the door closed with a great deal of swearing and cursing, he turned towards the kitchen and, with his first step, tripped over the carpet in the passage. He flung his arms out and fell flat on his face.

  I was sitting at the far side of the table facing the front door and as my father crashed to the floor, I let out a nervous laugh, not so much because of my father’s drunken antics, but in fear of what he might do in his inebriated state.

  Not only did my father hear me laugh, he looked up so quickly from where he lay on the floor that I was unable to change my expression before he saw me. His face went red with fury. He staggered to his feet and lunged into the kitchen, his eyes wild with rage.

  “So, you think that my falling over the rug was funny?” he screamed at me. “You fucking little bitch! I’ll show you what happens to sluts like you who laugh at me!”

  I was paralyzed with fear and before I could move my father leant over the table and punched me as hard as he could. Even in his drunken state, his aim was good and his fist hit me directly on my left eye. The force of the blow knocked me and the chair I was sitting on over backwards. The back of my head hit the hard kitchen floor and I lost consciousness.

  When I regained consciousness I was still lying on the kitchen floor and my mother was sitting next to me and gently wiping my forehead with a cool damp cloth. I winced as pain lanced through my head. I also couldn’t see out of my left eye.

  “Don’t try and get up.” my mother said. “Just lie still until you’ve regained your senses.”

  “Where is he?” I asked.

  “He’s in the bedroom lying on the bed fast asleep and snoring like a drunken tramp.” my mother said.

  “My head hurts and I can’t see out of my left eye.” I said.

  “Yes. You banged your head on the floor when you and the chair fell over.” my mother said. “And your eyes badly swollen from the punch your father gave you.”

  “Mom.” I said, my voice shaking with shock. “I know that I can’t legally leave here until I’m twenty one but I don’t care. I’m leaving tonight.”

  My mother nodded.

  “I understand, Cindy.” she said. “And I won’t try and stop you. But where will you go? Can you afford to live on your own?”

  “No, I can’t.” I said. “But I will not stay here a minute longer. Garth Gilmore, the boy I was at school with and have been going out with since we left school, has offered to let me live in his house. You know; the house that he inherited from his aunt in Tjikati Street. I’m going to take up his offer.”

  “Is that wise?” my mother asked. “He can’t be much older than you.”

  “Yes, he’s the same age as me.” I said. “In fact, I’m a few months older than him. And apart from the house, he also inherited some money. So it’s not as if I’ll be a burden to him.”

  “But what will people say?” my mother asked. “Two nineteen-year-olds living together.”

  “Mom.” I said. “This is two thousand and seven; not nineteen fifty seven. Lot’s of young people live together.”

  “Your father will try to stop you.” my mother warned.

  “If he does, I’ll lay an assault charge against him.” I said. “I’ll fight him with everything I can; but I’ll never come back here!”

  My mother looked down at me and I could clearly see the helplessness and despair in her eyes. Slowly she struggled to her feet and leant down to help me stand.

  “Try and stand up.” she said.

  Slowly and painfully I stood up, holding onto the kitchen table to steady myself. My whole body shook from shock and pain.

  “What do you want to do?” my mother asked. “You must get your eye seen too.”

  “I’m going to ‘phone Garth and ask him to come here and help me move.” I said. “But I think that you should lock the bedroom door. When Garth sees my eye he’ll be very angry.”

  My mother’s eyes opened wide with fright.

  “Don’t worry, mom.” I said. “I’ll see that Garth doesn’t do anything silly. But lock the bedroom door in any case.”

  “I think that you should get Garth to take you to the hospital first.” my mother said. “Your eye looks terrible.”

  I nodded and walked uncertainly to my bedroom. My cell phone lay on my bedside table. I called Garth.

  “Garth, it’s Cindy.” I said when he answered. “I need your help. There’s been some trouble at my parent’s house. Can you come here please?”

  “Okay.” Garth said. “I’ll be there in a couple of minutes.”

  By the time Garth arrived at the house my mother had locked the door to the bedroom where my father lay on his back on the bed snoring loudly. I had also had enough time to bathe my eye in warm water and cover it with some cotton wool.

  “Christ! Who did that to you?” Garth said when I opened the front door and he saw my damaged eye. “I’ll kill him!”

  “Please, Garth.” I said. “Don’t make a fuss. It was my father and he was drunk. He’s passed out in the bedroom. Will you please take me to the hospital casualty department so that I can have my eye seen to? I don’t think it’s been damaged; it’s just badly swollen.”

  Garth took a deep breath and nodded.

  “Okay.” he said. “Let’s go.”

  As we walked to the nearby hospital I told Garth what had happened.

  “Christ, Cindy.” Garth said. “You’ve got to get out of that house. You know that my offer still stands. Come and stay with me.”

  “Okay, Garth.” I said. “But only until I’m able to afford my own apartment.”

  “That’s fine with me.” Garth said. “I’ll help you move your things after we’ve been to the hospital.”

  “Before we go there,” I said, “Have you got a camera?”

  “Yes.” Garth said. “My aunt had a small digital camera. It’s in the bedroom cupboard. What do you want a came
ra for?”

  "I want to take photographs of my eye so that I can use them to threaten my father if he tries to force me to come home” I said. “I’ll threaten to lay a charge of assault against him and use the photographs as evidence.”

  “Good idea.” Garth said. “Let’s go and take the photos now. Then we can go to the hospital.”

  We hurried to Garth’s house where he took a number of photographs of my swollen eye. He then loaded them into his computer and printed them. He put the prints into a large envelope.

  “Okay.” Garth said. “Let’s go to the hospital.”

  The doctor at the casualty ward inspected my eye carefully.

  “The eye itself isn’t damaged.” he said. “You must have been able to close it before the blow struck. I’ll cover it with a bandage and give you some anti-inflammatory ointment to help reduce the swelling. You’re also suffering from very mild concussion as a result of the blow to the back of your head.”

  “Can you give me a sick note?” I asked.

  “Yes.” the doctor said. “You must give the eye a chance to recover without straining it. Stay at home for three days and then come back here and I’ll have another look at it. As far as the concussion’s concerned I want you to rest as much as possible. Don’t do anything strenuous and if the headache persists for more than a day come back here. I’ll give you some tablets that will ease the pain.”

  With my eye heavily bandaged, a large tube of ointment, a container of painkillers and the sick note, we left the hospital.

  “I don’t think that we should go to my parent’s house now.” I said. “My father may wake up and try to cause trouble. I’ll ‘phone my mother and tell her that we’ll fetch my things tomorrow morning after my father’s left for work.”

  “Good thinking.” Garth said. “Because if I see the bastard I’ll probably break his neck!”

  “No, Garth.” I said. “You mustn’t think of doing anything to my father. You’ll only make things worse. Just leave it. What happened can’t be changed. The important thing is that I get out of their house. And we’re doing that now.”

  Spending a whole night in bed with someone I loved was an amazing experience and I was surprised at the feeling of assurance that Garth’s presence next to me gave me. I woke up several times during the night and carefully put out my hand to assure myself that Garth was really there. For the first time in my life I felt really safe and, when I woke up in the morning I experienced a wonderful feeling of tranquillity. It was if a huge load had been removed from my shoulders. Garth’s steady breathing next to me as he slept made me feel utterly protected.

  My eye was still painful but my headache had gone. Garth woke up and we made love. Then we showered together, dressed and had breakfast in the kitchen. I washed the dishes and looked at my watch.

  “My father will have left for work by now.” I said. “Let’s go and get my things.”

  Before we left the house I called Misses Hawkins at Checkers and told her that I’d had an accident and wouldn’t be at work for the next three days at least. As we left the house Garth handed me the envelope of photographs that we’d taken of my swollen eye.

  “Take these with just in case your father shows up at his house while we’re there.” he said.

  We walked towards my parent’s house.

  “Garth.” I said. “Before we go any further we have to discuss the terms under which I’ll be living in your house. There’s no way that I’m going to live with you without paying you rent. I’ll pay you what I was paying my parents to live in their house. Okay?”

  “Yes, that’s okay.” Garth said. “It’s not necessary, but if you insist, then we’ll do it that way.”

  We arrived at my parent’s house and my mother let us in. We began packing my clothes and the items that I’d bought for my flat into a large cardboard box. I was surprised at how few possessions I actually had.

  “Won’t dad be angry at you for letting us into the house?” I asked my mother.

  “Probably.” my mother replied. “But knowing that you’re safely out of his clutches will be worth anything that he does to me.”

  Just as Garth was about to pick up the box with my possessions in it the front door opened and my father walked into the house. He glared at me.

  “I thought I’d find you here, you dirty little slut.” he said and then turned his attention to Garth. “Get out of my house. You’re trespassing and if you’re not out of here in ten seconds I’ll lay charges against you.”

  Garth stared at my father defiantly but before he could say anything I put my hand on his arm.

  “Wait outside, Garth.” I said. “I can handle this.”

  “Are you sure?” Garth asked. “I don’t trust him.”

  “I’ll be fine.” I said.

  Garth shrugged his shoulders, walked past my father without looking at him and left the house. My father closed the door.

  “What’s in that box?” he asked.

  “All my things.” I said. “I’m leaving.”

  “Oh no, you’re not!” my father shouted. “You’re still under the age of twenty one. You can’t leave this house without my consent and I won’t give it!”

  I leant down and picked up the envelope of photographs of my swollen eye. I took out the pictures and handed them to my father.

  “If you try and stop me from leaving I’ll lay a charge of assault against you and hand those to the public prosecutor.” I said quietly. “With evidence like that the charge will stick.”

  My father stared at the pictures and then looked up at me, his eyes filled with hatred.

  “This is blackmail.” he said.

  I shrugged my shoulders.

  “Call it whatever you like.” I said. “But with those pictures as evidence you’ll very likely go to jail.”

  As my father stared at me I saw defeat begin to fill his eyes.

  “Take your things and get out of my house!” he shouted. “That my own daughter would stoop so low as to blackmail her own father is shocking! Get out of my house, you piece of trash!”

  I smiled at my father and I walked past him to the front door. I opened it. Garth looked at me, his eyebrows raised.

  “Garth.” I said. “Please come in and help me take away my things.”

  Garth stepped into the house, walked past my father and picked up the box with my possessions in it. He turned and walked to the front door, completely ignoring my father who stood glaring at him in silence. I followed Garth, closing the door behind me.

  ***

  I strongly believed that by living with Garth our relationship would flourish and that the indifference that he had shown towards me would disappear as we got to know each other more intimately. Unfortunately this didn’t happen and I could only imagine that this unresponsiveness stemmed from the abuse that he had suffered as a child and which he had mentioned the first time that we’d made love. I knew that at one time I had also shown strong signs of indifference to other people but I believed that I was more outgoing in nature than Garth was and I would be able, over time, to hide this trait. I decided to bring up the subject in the hope that it would help the two of us to become closer.

  One Sunday morning, as we lay in bed together, I took the plunge and, with considerable trepidation, brought up the subject of our pasts.

  “Garth.” I said. “Please don’t think that I’m prying, but when we made love the first time, you told me that you’d been abused by your father as a child. Well, I was also abused as a child and also by my father. That’s why I wasn’t a virgin when we made love. Ever since I first saw you I’ve had this strange affiliation towards you and I think that you’ve had the same feeling towards me. Do you think that our both being abused as children could have brought us together?”

  “I’ve never spoken to anyone about what my father did to me when I was a child.” Garth said after a long silence. “It’s too painful and I would prefer to leave the past behind me. But I do agree with you that our c
oming together wasn’t purely by chance and that it was probably because there’s something in us that attracts the other; something much deeper than simply a physical attraction.”

  We lay next to each other in silence. After what Garth had just said about his reluctance to bring up the past, I was scared to take the matter further, but the need to break through Garth’s indifference was too strong.

  “Garth.” I said, taking his hand in mine. “Please don’t get angry at what I’m about to say, but I do think that it’s important. I love you very much and I believe that you love me, but I can’t help seeing indifference in you towards me and I desperately want to remove it.”

  “Indifference?” Garth said. “I don’t feel indifferent towards you. That’s nonsense. I love you.”

  “One of the effects that my father’s abuse of me had was a feeling of indifference towards the world.” I said. “And I’ve had to fight it every day of my life since. I don’t want to be unresponsive towards people. I would love to be spontaneous with my feelings towards others by feeling their pain and their happiness, just as I feel my own. Do you also feel that way?”

  “I’ve never given it any thought.” Garth said. “But I don’t believe that I’m indifferent towards the world. Sure, I often get impatient with people especially when they over-react emotionally but I’m definitely not indifferent.”

  “I know that I’ve built a wall around myself ever since I was abused.” I said. “And I really struggle to breach it. Sometimes I do but most times I don’t. Are you aware of having built some kind of protective wall around yourself to keep out any further pain?”

  “Again, I’ve never thought about it.” Garth said. “But I don’t think that, if I have built a wall around myself, it’s any different from the walls that everyone builds around themselves. We all want to protect ourselves from something. Anyway, as I said, I don’t want to discuss my childhood and what effect it’s had on me. Let’s get up and go to McDonald’s for breakfast.”

  Garth climbed out of bed and went to the bathroom. I heard him turn on the shower. I stared up at the ceiling. Breaking down the protective walls that I’d built around myself was a huge task that I sometimes thought was beyond my capabilities, but I was determined never to give up trying, just as I was determined never to allow my past to destroy my future. And I desperately wanted the same for Garth. But how could I achieve this if I couldn’t even heal myself?