Sarah's Story

by Sarah Preston

  Back at his flat, he spent longer looking at me than he normally did, looking at how my body had changed. He had tried to take all my clothes off but I made so much fuss and wriggled so wildly he gave up in the end. I would not lie under the covers with him or get into bed with him without my clothes on, which was what he had expected me to do willingly that day. This really annoyed him. He wanted to see me climb into bed with him in the same joyful way as young lovers would have done. It was his sick, sordid, soiled way of thinking. After all, he reminded me, it wasn’t as if he had never seen my breasts and vagina before.

  That night after getting home I managed to get into the bathroom first. I heard Mum shouting, annoyance sounding out in her voice that someone had used all the hot water, but I didn’t care any more about her, Dad or anyone else.

  I had had my bath. I had earned it. I scrubbed harder than ever, my skin becoming extremely tender and sore. I had to wash his persistent handprints off me. I had to remove his soiled stains. I used Mum’s scrubbing brush and the Vim. I looked in the mirror when I had finished, but underneath the red, swollen scratches I’d made with the brush, I could still see handprints, as if they were indelible.

  Fourteen

  AFTER THAT DAY, Bill didn’t call as often. I went out and enjoyed myself and did what other teenagers did. It felt quite strange at first. I went to the disco more often, shared time with my friends and I saw lots more of Daniel. During this time we went to more stock-car meetings. I particularly enjoyed going on the thirty-mile journey to Bolton because it meant being away from home for longer.

  I loved travelling to other towns. I loved every moment alone in Dan’s Mini, in our own special world, a world that had no space for Bill in it. Daniel and I became even closer and shared lots of time together. But I always felt as if I had deceived and tricked him in some way. Even when I was happy I felt I had let him down. I often used to go off into my own little dream world and spend time thinking about how he would have felt if he had known his girlfriend, whom he thought so much of, had been the regular plaything of a sixty-one-year-old paedophile.

  I think that Daniel – as loving and gentle as he was – would not have been able to cope with my past. I know he would never have intentionally hurt me, but I recognised deep inside my heart that he would not have been able to help, or protect himself from, the feelings of bitterness and hatred that would have overflowed from his heart into his mind, in time destroying what we had carefully built together.

  It’s a terrible thing to think about abuse, let alone come to terms with it.

  Daniel and I had been going out with each other for five months when things began to change. He had wanted me to go to an important stock-car meeting with him, but he forgot to tell me about it. He called on the off-chance that Dad would let me go out with him, but Dad had never let me go out in the week unless he knew about it in advance. When Daniel arrived I was delighted to see him, but Dad was in one of his usual bad moods. I knew it was a desperate situation. Dad came into the kitchen, saw Daniel and immediately walked out of the room again. He called me into the lounge. Dad disliked Daniel, as he had the first time he saw him. He hated the age gap. In fact, he hated me being with boys full stop.

  He asked me why Daniel was here, and once I told him about the meeting and wanting to go out the same night, he was even angrier. I had no idea what had got into him but he took his anger out on Daniel. He walked into the kitchen, asking him all kinds of questions. ‘Why do you want to go out with Sarah? Do you know how old she is?’ Dad had always suspected me of lying to Daniel about my age; he never really understood Daniel or me.

  ‘Yes, I do know how old she is, she’s fourteen,’ Daniel replied as he moved closer to me.

  Dad looked even more annoyed when he saw Daniel take my hand. It seemed to fuel his anger even more than before. ’Well, you may as well go home,’ he snarled at him. ‘She will not be coming out tonight.’

  Daniel looked hurt and upset. Dad had behaved badly and I could tell by the look in Daniel’s eyes that he was getting fed up of his ever-worsening attitude towards him. He walked out of the house and made his way to the car. I followed him. I needed to talk to him so badly, alone and away from Dad. I got into the car with Daniel and we sat talking outside the house for the next hour. All the time I was there, Dad kept calling me in from the window.

  Daniel had been my lifeline, my hope and inspiration in the weeks that had passed. He had fended off the stalker in my life just by being there, yet he was unaware of Bill’s existence and what he had done to me. Now he was slipping away from me, and who could blame him? The age difference had never been a problem, but now it was different – Daniel was being punished by Dad’s assault of words, words that he didn’t deserve. His only crime had been loving me and wanting me. I knew how upset he was at being treated like a schoolboy, but I was on my own – Mum wouldn’t help for fear of reprisal and another argument flaring up between them both. She knew how bad Dad could be and, not unnaturally, she wanted to keep on his best side.

  I once asked Dad why he had treated Daniel so badly but he just pushed me aside as he left the room, refusing to answer my question.

  Our friend Karina knew Daniel was fed up and had taken to talking to him whenever she got the chance. She was a year older than me and was still going out with Paul. We saw them occasionally, but we didn’t go out as a group like we used to do. Karina had become quite fond of Daniel, and she didn’t hide the fact. She flirted with him and, one day, when I saw them together, I realised I was losing him. I watched Daniel with Karina the following week and felt so alone. I wanted to move away, go somewhere else where it would be just the two of us. I knew from the way he had begun to look at her that he was going to leave me and go to her. The pain I felt that night was insufferable. I felt as if my whole body had once more become crushed and trapped by sadness.

  Dan and I parted as friends, but I felt more alone than ever. I had lost my renewed hope and faith all in one. The bright light that had shone on Daniel and me, bringing hope with it, had become a flickering, faltering candle, running out of both wax and wick; a candle placed by an open window waiting cautiously for the next gust of wind to extinguish it.

  What was I to do?

  Who could I turn to for salvation now?

  Who would help me?

  I felt so alone.

  So troubled.

  So afraid.

  And so very, very desperate.

  It had been three weeks since Daniel and I had split up. I seemed to have lost my energy and that newfound enthusiasm for life. My passion for living had walked out on me. I felt lonely. I certainly couldn’t talk to Karina. She had taken my place. The only true friend I ever had had been stolen by another so-called friend. I never really fathomed out why she had to do this to me. It was yet another blow to my confidence. The once bright light that Daniel had illuminated in my heart had been extinguished. My life started to grind to a halt. Even Lucy wasn’t available to chat any more. Her time was taken up pursuing a boy called Adam. She was head over heels about him. Totally besotted. But he was two years older than her and didn’t even notice her – not the way she wanted him to. We used to get off the bus after the disco and once he was around the street corner we would follow him just so Lucy could spend longer looking at him, often through his kitchen window once he had returned home. She had it bad.

  Adam was a nice boy, so who could blame her. I knew what she saw in him and why she wanted to go out with him so badly. Adam wasn’t very tall, but he was blond and handsome with the most amazing blue eyes. Eyes that were both welcoming and appealing. I used to say that eyes like his were ‘go to bed’ eyes. I didn’t really understand what I was saying way back then, but now I know what the words mean I realise how true they were. He truly had beautiful, inviting eyes, eyes that were surrounded with love, a love that was ready to be shared.

  And my time had been taken up with other things, too. I had been seeing Paul since he had asked me ou
t a couple of weeks previously. He was a good laugh, but sometimes he was a little too serious. We had spent quite a bit of time together and we seemed to be becoming close. We saw each other at the disco, where Dan still went with Karina.

  One day, Bill appeared as if by magic. No one said he was coming. No one said anything when he appeared at the door. It was as if he had slipped into place as part of the family. He walked into the room, grinning. I had always hated the way he had assumed such familiarity within my home. He walked in as if he had always been here. Every room downstairs within his reach had become tainted and discoloured by his very presence. He brought foul air into the kitchen, a sour, bitter smell that old perverted men have with them, an odour that they can’t get rid of but to people like me, people who have been abused and taken advantage of, it is an odour you can’t mistake.

  He sat around for the next forty minutes grinning at me, each five minutes that ticked by seemed like five hours. Then he looked at his watch, stood up and said he should be off as he had sandwiches to prepare. I moved uncomfortably in my seat and felt my blood run cold when I heard the words that left Mum’s mouth:‘If you hang on a minute, Sarah will come and help you.’

  He glanced at her, looked at me and smiled his pathetic smile. He looked as if he had won a jackpot prize at the bingo. I remember clearly how vigorously I objected, but she would have none of it. I had to go and that was that. I looked across to where Dad was sitting: he smiled at Bill and avoided my gaze.

  No, surely not …

  I had to be wrong …

  Were they in it together now?

  Were they going to compare notes when Bill brought me home?

  Dad would never do that. Would he?

  Bill once again took me to his flat to do as he wished. He did all his usual things. I lay there rigid, weeping, begging him now more than ever to stop.

  He said he enjoyed being with me. He thought I was beautiful and he always wanted to be able to visit me.

  I wanted him to stop so desperately. I jumped away from him before he ejaculated all over my tummy. I gained fresh courage that afternoon; where it came from I don’t think I will ever know. I just knew that this had to end. If it didn’t, then next time I would end my life successfully, without any goodbyes to get in my way or rescue me.

  I remember somewhere along the journey home becoming very calm. I think it was shock, mainly – the shock of realising I had gained some strength. As we drew up outside the house, I told Bill that that was the last time I would ever go with him.

  He looked at me fiercely, but this time I felt cool. I told him that I wanted to be with my friends and not spend time with him. I told him that I now knew what he was doing was not right. It had taken me almost four years to stand up for my rights as a child; unfortunately, it was too late for me to rescue my childhood back. After all, what point would there be in telling anyone now about a stolen life that could never be recovered and made whole again?

  When I finished speaking, he looked at me and grinned. I knew he had not realised I was strong enough to stop him.

  Fifteen

  AS THE DAYS that followed slipped quietly by, Bill appeared to be keeping his distance from both Mum and me. On the odd occasion Mum went off to bingo, she always asked me to go, but I never did. I didn’t want to think about what would happen if I saw Bill, or what he would do if he got a second chance. I knew he would try his best to lie and trap me once more in his odd, perverse world. A world he thought I belonged to.

  I still felt fear when his name cropped up in any conversation. I wanted to cry out, shout for help, but I never did. As always I remained silent and soundless. I still had his words from the past firmly fixed in my head: ‘No one will believe you.’

  As I whispered each one of the words quietly to myself they tasted bitter and sour, leaving me feeling nauseous once more.

  Even though Bill wasn’t around as much as he had been, I still felt his presence. It was as if he had become entwined with me over the past years, becoming one with my shadow. A limpet on a rock.

  I thought long and hard about everything that had happened to me as I lay in bed at night, watching the garden shadows forming mysterious unfamiliar shapes on the bedroom walls. I thought about the situation I was in and the help I should have had.

  Why had it taken me so long to build up the strength I needed to free myself from him? I felt as if I had lived my life trapped in his shadow; but unlike the unfamiliar shadows I saw forming on the wall at night, Bill’s shadow had a haunting, memorable shape that I would never easily forget. My first memories of his abuse had been locked inside my head for such a long time, packed rapidly away in their box, a box that now was so full it was struggling to stay upright. I had to remove those memories before they weighed me down. If I emptied my box into the river, the memories would sink, drowning them completely, like the men who had come and abused me had each in turn drowned me with their weight.

  For over four years, I had wanted to remain a child growing at the right pace, but I couldn’t. They would never let me. They each had a plan for me, which they carried out with menacing success until they had their way.

  I came to the conclusion that I could never recapture the past; only the future was standing untouched in front of me now. It was up to me to change the course in which I was heading. I had to change it beyond recognition, moving it in a better direction far away from all the troubles and torments that had gone before.

  I knew what I had to do, but the question of how left me weeping for hours.

  In my heart, the words of my plan unfolded, words that were to be my arrows, arrows that would hopefully keep Bill at bay.

  Unusually, Bill stayed away for the rest of that week and part way into the next. I had found myself strangely wanting him to call – a feeling I struggled with and couldn’t understand, until I realised that it was linked to my plan to rid myself of him once and for all. I knew that if he didn’t come I could not put my plan into action. I continued to have sleepless nights, tossing, turning and dreaming the dreams that had freed the memories, unlocking them from the box in the still of the night. I despised my dreams; in each one I relived my humiliation with feelings of hate and disgust one hundred times over. Each dream was like a painting that had excellent detail and fine clarity. Each day Bill didn’t appear during the daytime, my vivid, violent dreams visited me at night, taking his place.

  Then, without warning, he came. Smug, sanctimonious, self-righteous and expectant. He was expecting me to be his plaything, a thing to amuse himself with. He was in for a shock.

  Bill walked into the kitchen through the unlocked back door, whistling as he moved forward. He stood leaning against the sink, looking around, and every once in a while glancing my way, winking when he thought no one would notice. Each time he did I averted my eyes, my skin feeling as if a thousand millipedes had crawled under it. I felt cheap and soiled before he even had a chance to touch me. He stood there like he owned me.

  He asked if it would be OK if I went to help with the sandwiches. Dad looked at him, glanced at me and hesitated for a while. I thought for a moment that he was going to stop what he knew was happening to me, but he didn’t. He looked at me again for a brief second then turned to Bill and agreed. I looked across at him as I went out to the car, following Bill slowly. Why hadn’t he stopped this? He knew what was happening, yet he stood and did nothing. Was he really my dad, or was he my agent? I wanted to kick and scream from the tallest building, pointing the accusing finger at my abuser first and my father second. But I knew it would serve no purpose. I would be judged and they would be forgiven. After all, grown-ups don’t lie, do they?

  I sat quietly in the car, not taking part in his conversation. He continued to speak his words, but it was just meaningless rubbish. I had planned this so carefully, I had to act it out meticulously. It had to be right to work. I continued to listen, but continued to say nothing in return.

  As the car drew up outside the flat, he got
out. I got out too, but took longer than I usually did. Once in the building I ambled along behind him. He sighed a few times as we went up the stairs – I knew that I was annoying him but my heart leaped with wondrous delight each time I heard him sigh. Once in the flat, he took off his coat and kicked off his shoes. I sat by the fire. He looked at me before going into the kitchen for his usual bowl of water. I said nothing but continued to watch him in silence. He came back into the room and left the bowl beside the bed, then he moved towards me.

  I stood up fast.

  It made him jump. He stepped back momentarily, wondering what was going on. My heart leaped again.

  He stood in front of me, looking shocked by my sudden movement. I started to speak, but nerves got the better of me. No words left my mouth. Don’t desert me now, I pleaded silently …

  He took hold of my hand; I pulled away sharply. He looked at me in the way he had before when he hadn’t got what he wanted. It was a look of pure and extreme dislike. He took hold of my hand again. I pulled away from him again.

  ‘What’s going on, Sarah?’ he asked sharply.

  ‘I don’t want you to do this any … any more.’My words fell over each other as I tried to stay in control. ‘I don’t want you to do this any more. I have a life I’m not living, a life that should have laughter and friends and excitement in it. I am fourteen years old, not forty. I want to be me again, not a toy for you.’

  He stood looking at me. ‘I thought you enjoyed coming with me. Don’t you want to have other things? I could give you money. You’d like that – you’ll be able to go and buy new clothes and other things you want. I’ll give you five pounds today …’

  His reply stunned me and made me catch my breath. He looked at me as his words hit me like a bolt of lightning. Who did he think he was? Was that all he thought I was worth?