A Hopscotch Summer

by Annie Murray

  Lost in her own thoughts, she didn’t notice Miss Lineham approaching until another cuff across the head slammed her back to the present.

  ‘What did I tell you? Go and stand by my desk!’

  Miss Lineham followed her up to the front, frowning in anger. Em felt her legs turn to jelly as the teacher picked up the thin cane which lay across her desk.

  ‘Hold out your hand.’

  Em obeyed, reluctantly, trying to be brave, but she was already trembling with fear and hurt pride and it took her all her will power to keep the hand there as Miss Lineham whisked the cane through the air and delivered six stinging lashes with it to Em’s palm.

  ‘Now you can stand there until I tell you to move, d’you hear?’

  ‘Yes, Miss,’ Em said, so close to tears she had to swallow hard to keep them back. She clenched her smarting hand and nursed it under her other arm. Her head was throbbing from Miss Lineham’s slaps and she felt the eyes of the whole class fixed on her. Many, she knew, would be on her side, but others would be enjoying seeing her brought down a peg. She didn’t look at anyone, but stared down at her slate through her swimming eyes.

  Out in the playground at break time, Katie was at her side immediately.

  ‘Bad luck!’ Em wasn’t sure if she imagined the smug edge to Katie’s voice. ‘She was after you this morning, wasn’t she?’

  Em shrugged, still trying not to cry. Everything was changing too fast and she didn’t understand what was going on. This wasn’t meant to happen, not to her – Emma Brown getting the cane! Nothing felt right at home, with Mom still so quiet and strange. It all felt wrong, and even the new baby seemed like an intruder now, because, lovely as she was, she was the one who’d made Mom poorly. Em just wanted her to be back how she usually was when they got home from school, standing on the step canting to Dot, or cooking tea, singing ‘Cherry Ripe’ or ‘Down Yonder Green Valley’, songs she’d learned at school, while she bustled about the kitchen, shooing Sid and Joyce out from under her feet. Now she was always upstairs having a lie-down and the house felt silent and deserted, as if Violet had stolen their mom.

  ‘Oh-oh.’ Katie nudged her. ‘Here comes old smelly.’

  Molly hove into view, in a grey frock which was too big for her, her thick hair scraped back untidily into a bunch. They saw one of the others shout a nasty remark at her, and Molly scowled and retorted in kind.

  Em waited for Molly to say something irritating in her sucking-up way but, to her surprise, she said matter-of-factly, ‘That Miss Lineham’s a cow. You don’t want to take no notice of her. Bet yer hand’s smarting, ain’t it?’

  Em nodded miserably.

  ‘Here, what you wunna do is go and put it on the railings – they’re nice and cold,’ Molly said.

  ‘Who asked you, then?’ Katie said with a sneer, but Em could see that Molly meant well. She tried it, reluctantly, but she found Molly was right. Even though they were a bit rusty, the iron struts felt cool and soothing against her stinging flesh.

  ‘Bet that feels better, eh?’ Molly spoke in a motherly way, very pleased with herself for having been able to show Em something. She was used to dealing with canings. ‘D’you wunna play statues?’

  Em looked at Katie, who rolled her eyes and said, ‘No!’

  But Em was grateful to Molly. ‘Go on, then,’ she said.

  On the way home Em thought: Let our Mom be all right, let her be up and making tea for us.

  She was with Katie, and Molly, who was now determinedly glued to their side.

  ‘I’ve got three ’alfpence,’ Molly boasted. ‘Let’s go to Prices’ and I’ll get yer some rocks. Yer can have an ’alfpenny each.’

  It was too good an offer to resist, even for Katie, and soon they were in the Price sisters’ palace of sugar and Em chose her usual favourite of liquorice laces. The sweet taste was a comfort.

  ‘Ta, Molly,’ she said, and Katie grudgingly said thanks too, sucking on her sweets.

  ‘You playing out after tea?’ Molly wanted to know.

  ‘Dunno,’ Em said. ‘Our dad said he’d make us a kite.’

  The envy was naked on Molly’s face. ‘Oh,’ she said. ‘Can I come and watch?’

  ‘Dunno,’ Em said evasively. ‘I’d have to ask our mom.’

  It was true about the kite. Bob had been promising and now that it was Friday he said he’d make the kite and they’d have a proper day out tomorrow while the weather was still fine, right up to the Lickey Hills or somewhere, and fly it. That was a big outing and they were all excited. Em had only ever been to the Lickeys once before.

  But would Mom be well enough? Parting with Katie and Molly she went home, still tasting the last of the liquorice in her mouth. Nervously she pushed the door open. Yesterday when she got home, she’d found Joyce looking very down in the mouth, Mom upstairs, no dinner on. But tonight, relief flooded through her. Mom was downstairs and there was a delicious smell which made her mouth water!

  Sid was already home. She was supposed to look out for him but he always ran off with his mates and as the school was so near it didn’t matter. He and Joyce were waiting at the table. Cynthia, with Violet resting in one arm, was beside them.

  ‘Our mom’s got us fish and chips!’ Joyce yelled importantly as soon as Em appeared.

  And Mom was up and about, even though she looked pale, and she tried to smile as Em came in.

  ‘Come and have your tea now,’ Cynthia ordered Em. ‘Get your hands washed. I’ve got some kept warm for your dad when he comes in.’

  They all sat round the table and Em felt something give inside her, as if her emotions had all been twisted up like tangled wool and they’d suddenly been released. Things felt right, back to normal and life was good. The kids ate their bit of fish and chips out of the newspaper, the air tangy with vinegar, and when Bob came in from work his face lit up at the sight of all the family round the table. Em saw how relieved he was too.

  ‘Well!’ Bob said. ‘This looks like a celebration!’ He rolled up his sleeves and went to wash his hands and face in the scullery.

  ‘Can we make the kite, Dad?’ Sid boomed, jumping up and down on his chair.

  ‘Let your dad get his tea down him before you start on him,’ Cynthia said.

  ‘Steady on, son, or that chair’ll be matchwood,’ Bob said, emerging, wiping his face.

  He went to Cynthia, smiling at the sight of Violet plugged in at her breast and feeding contentedly.

  ‘You all right, love? Had summat to eat yourself?’

  ‘Yes, ta, I’ve had all I want – the rest’s for you,’ Cynthia said.

  Em frowned for a moment. She hadn’t seen Mom eat any of the fish and chips, had she? Maybe she’d had some before they got home.

  They spent an absorbing evening watching Bob carefully make a little kite out of thin strips of plywood, a frame onto which he glued thick paper. The smell of glue soon filled the room. It was a blue kite and he knotted on a thin string as a tail with little bits of coloured paper along it.

  ‘Can we fly it now?’ Joyce said, wriggling with anticipation.

  ‘No, it needs to dry,’ Bob said. ‘And d’you need a wee-wee, Joycie?’

  Joyce shook her head vigorously. She wasn’t going out back to the privy and missing the fun!

  ‘Now, don’t touch it or it’ll break.’ Bob twinkled at his eager children. ‘I’ll put it above the stove and if it’s a nice day we’ll all go out and fly it tomorrow.’

  The four of them were so caught up in the excitement of the kite that they didn’t see Cynthia, sitting over on the other side of the room, very still. The supreme effort she’d made to be there for her family when they came home, to get back to normal, had taken every ounce of her strength. Now, in the half dark, her face was a blank mask of despair.

  Six

  Molly lay in bed that night, the smelly blanket pulled up to her chin, for once thinking back happily on her day. The look of gratitude on Em’s face as Molly had soothed the burns from the cane again
st the cool railings had made it one of the best days she could remember. She had done something for Em, and Em had looked pleased and grateful!

  Looking up into the darkness she wove dreams about being Em’s friend, how Em and Katie would invite her into all their games without begrudging it or rolling their eyes when she came near. Maybe she could even share a desk with Em instead of sitting on her own. But Em was always with Katie O’Neill, the stuck-up little bitch, wrinkling her nose whenever Molly came near. Molly knew the nicknames the others called her – Moll the Pong, Yellow Drawers, Wee Wee Molly . . . She tried not to notice. Every day she tried to join in, hanging around her classmates and trying to make them like her, until their ganging up and name-calling got too much and she burst out in a temper and yelled at them all. But today Em had smiled at her – actually smiled!

  Her reverie was shattered by the sound of the springs of the other bed creaking, and she tensed with dread. Not tonight . . . Oh please, not tonight . . . Molly felt the terrible pulse between her legs, a reflex. She clenched herself, pressing her hand over her private parts to stop it. She couldn’t get out and sit on the bucket now! He was coming, in his thick socks, round the bed, shuffle, shuffle.

  Mom had divided the room with a curtain, tied up between two nails. There were only two upstairs rooms in the house and she had to share with them.

  ‘There,’ Iris had said with one of her odd, cruel laughs. ‘There’s your room now – you’ve got a wall between yer!’

  Molly’s metal bedstead was tucked in close to the window. On the other side of the curtain, in the big bed, her brother Bert slept top to tail with her grandfather, William Rathbone: Iris’s father and Molly’s tormentor.

  She didn’t speak, but he knew she was awake. He always knew. Not that he cared if she was or not when he wanted to do his dirty things. Bert would be listening too; he would say dirty things to her tomorrow, nudging, poking her. All she could do was play dead until it was over.

  Screwing her eyes tightly shut, she pulled the blanket in closer, with its reek of stale urine. It was no use doing anything but lie still. He was a strong, heavy man. Whatever she did he’d get his way in the end.

  ‘Molly?’ His hoarse whisper shattered the quiet, and then his weight sagged onto the bed. The rank smell of him, already pervading the room, grew horribly strong in her nostrils, the combined stenches of stale sweat, unwashed clothes in which he slept, and the snuff which was his solace, his addiction. Or one of them.

  ‘Molly?’ The voice was stern now. He was a hefty man, sixty-six years old, who prided himself on his youthful looks, his hair only just turning grey. Its blackness was further darkened by grease. His face, though, was lined like an old boot, the mouth curving down cruelly below a bulbous nose and eyes like cold grey stones. Molly had scarcely ever seen William Rath-bone smile, and when he did it was usually at something harsh and sadistic.

  ‘C’mon, wench – let’s be ’aving yer.’ His hand gripped her shoulder and he was leaning over her so that she was enveloped in his stink. Molly screwed her eyes even more tightly shut. Even those times when he had done it in daylight she had tried to lock herself away in the dark, to take herself away in her own head. She had no choice but to wait until it was over, filling her heart with a dull numbness.

  But even with her eyes closed she knew exactly what he was doing. It was always the same. With no further preparation he burrowed his hand roughly under the blanket until he could grope up far enough to yank down her bloomers. There was a rip – Mom would tan her for that later. With his other hand he tugged at his buttons to release his thick, purple thing, agitating it up and down, grunting as he worked at it while he jabbed his fingers hard inside her inflamed passage, for all the long time it took him to climax. Dirty words spat out between his lips. At last his fingers stilled and he gave a sputtering gasp, then let out a long, relieved breath.

  Soon he was snoring on the other side of the curtain.

  Molly lay rigid, both hands pressed on the sore place between her legs once again to quell the burning sensation. Soon the pressure got too much and she started to sit up, dreading the loud spattering sound of her urine in the bucket. It was already too late: she couldn’t hold it. A hot gush came, burning her, making her whimper with the pain. The bed was saturated.

  There was nothing to do except curl up in its embracing warmth, comforting for a short while, hoping she might be asleep before the liquid cooled and she was too chilled to settle.

  Pulling the blanket close round her again to keep as warm as possible, she turned onto her side and conjured up a picture of Em in Miss Lineham’s class, the cane swishing down onto her hand, then Em by the railings, smiling back at her in wonder. Emma Brown, her friend.

  Seven

  All the Brown children’s hopes of kite-flying came to nothing the next morning. The fine weather broke: they woke to a rainy day.

  And Cynthia could not pretend any more.

  The baby had been crying on and off in the night. Cynthia had paced the floor, taken her downstairs to hold her, feeling utterly desperate and alone in the dead of night. When daylight came she at last managed a little sleep, and Bob woke first. Muzzy with sleep, he reached for the warmth of his wife beside him and snuggled up to her.

  ‘Umm – Sat’day,’ he murmured into her neck. ‘That’s nice. No rush. And that’un’s asleep for a change.’

  Cynthia stirred and Bob leaned up on his elbow, looking down at her. Her hair curled prettily round her forehead. Often in the mornings it was quite frizzy and she cursed it and damped it down, but he could never see why. He thought it looked lovely. She was lying on her side and where the neck of her nightdress sagged forward he could see the soft, shadowy cleft between her full breasts. He longed to stroke them, fasten his lips on her milky nipples, and becoming aroused he began to stroke her back.

  ‘There’s my lovely . . .’

  Cynthia opened her eyes. She knew he was looking at her, that his honest face would be full of desire, but she didn’t move. Bob pressed on her shoulder, wanting her to roll onto her back as she would normally, reaching round to caress her breasts. She did move onto her back, but there was a deadness, her eyes fixed on the ceiling as if she was somewhere else, far away.

  ‘Love, are you there?’ He kissed her lips, then gently eased the nightdress down, exposing her swollen breasts. Gently he began to lick the nearest enlarged nipple. When he stopped for a moment, a jet of milk needled out at his cheek and he chuckled and fastened his mouth back on, tasting the milk’s thin sweetness. He moved to the other breast, its dark nipple seeping in sympathy and sucked, then smiled up at Cynthia, urgently aroused now, needing to be inside her.

  ‘Mustn’t take the little’un’s breakfast, must I? Let us in, Cynth – I’m burning for yer.’

  He was horrified to see that she was weeping, her face contorted in anguish.

  ‘What’s up with you?’ Hurt, his desire thwarted, he spoke more harshly than he meant to.

  ‘Don’t,’ she begged, like a frightened child. ‘Don’t get angry with me . . .’

  ‘It’s all right, love.’ He lay behind her, holding her, still longing to thrust up inside her but knowing he mustn’t, not now. He summoned his patience, trying to quell his desire, and said, ‘What’s the matter? You still feeling poorly?’

  This produced a storm of crying, her body shaking in his arms. When she could speak again, she flung out the words, ‘I can’t go on. I don’t know what’s up with me . . . but I can’t stand it, just can’t.’

  Bob was completely bewildered and flayed by her emotion. He knew things hadn’t been right, but he could make no sense of this outburst, nor judge what to do.

  ‘You’re just a bit tired after the babby. It’ll be all right, love. You’ll be right as rain in a few days. Tell you what.’ Inspiration came to him. ‘Look, you have a good rest today, eh? I’ll take the kids out like I was going to and you stay here, have a bit of peace. How’s that?’

  Cynthia turned
to him, suddenly intense. ‘Take the babby. Take her as well . . .’

  ‘The babby? But . . .’

  ‘You’ve got to take her!’ She was wild now, as if terrified, and sat up, pulling the front of her nightdress close to her in a strangely chaste gesture which made Bob feel even more shut out. ‘I’m frightened of her. Don’t leave me with her!’

  ‘What d’you mean?’ He was utterly lost. ‘She’s only a little babby! What harm can she do?’

  ‘I’m . . .’ Cynthia’s face crumpled again. ‘I’m afraid of, of . . . me. What I might do. I’m not myself!’

  ‘Oh, love!’ He was half laughing now. ‘What are you on about? You’ve looked after the other three with no mishaps! What’s all this?’

  She stared at him, knowing he didn’t understand, had no idea.

  ‘Look,’ Bob climbed wearily out of bed. She averted her eyes from his aroused state. ‘I’ll get myself dressed and take the kiddies out, right? Now, you can have a rest like I told yer. No working round the house. We’ll soon ’ave yer better, eh?’

  It was far too wet to take a trip to the Lickeys. When Sid heard that they wouldn’t be going he roared with disappointment and Joyce burst into tears as well. Em took the news quietly, especially as Mom had not appeared downstairs that morning. The younger ones didn’t really know what was going on, but she knew something was wrong.

  ‘Pack that in!’ Bob said sharply when the bawling didn’t let up. ‘We’ll go to the Lickeys with the kite another day. Any road, the thing’ll work best if it’s left to dry longer. Yer don’t want it coming apart in midair, do yer, in all the wet? What we’ll do – this afternoon we’ll go down to the park and let your mother have a rest.’

  ‘What’s the matter with our mom?’ Em whispered to him, solemnly.

  ‘Oh, the babby had us up and down a lot in the night. She needs to catch up a bit, that’s all.’