by Lily O'Brien
Every morning when I arrived at the school, the nuns would make me pray. They would make me pray for forgiveness, for all the sins that I had committed against them, and they would tell me to stand up and pray, but I wouldn’t; I would stay sitting in protest against all the praying they made me do over the years. I was sick of praying for myself and I was sick of praying for them, I had been praying for the last eight years and now I was sick of it. So I decided that the day had come and I was going to tell everyone what I thought of them, and I did. I told the nuns that I was not going to pray for them anymore and I told them that I hated them and their school, and their stupid way of life.
The nuns were shocked and furious with me and, from that day on, they would find any excuse, no matter how small, to send me to Mr Williams; and it was just so they could get their own back on me. And once I was alone in Mr Williams’ office, he would shout at me, saying that I was an ungrateful, worthless little girl that didn’t deserve anything, and he would make me write lines as a punishment, knowing full well that I was unable to read or write properly. And if the nuns told him that I had been a very bad girl, he would take me into his office and lock me in a broom cupboard for the rest of the day that was in the corner of the room.
I would have to stand in the small dark space and I would have to knock on the cupboard door if I wanted to go to the toilet; and if he didn’t answer or open the cupboard door, I would have to stand and wait in the cupboard until home time. Then, just before he left his office to go home, he would unlock the door and let me out and I would have to run to the toilet before I wet myself. Almost every day the nuns would tell him that I was a bad girl and I just couldn’t take it anymore.
So, one day at lunchtime and before they sent me to Mr Williams again, I decided that I had had enough, so I got my bike out of the bike shed. I was going to ride out of the school and home; but as I got my bike out of the shed, Mr Williams ran towards me, shouting at me as he got closer, ‘Where do you think you’re going, Lily?’ And he shouted at me to put the bike back in the shed and to get back inside the school. I didn’t reply to him and I kept walking with my bike, as if I hadn’t heard him, and he shouted again, ‘If you walk out of that gate, you’re going to be expelled.’ I smiled to myself. I was so happy to hear him say that, that I almost turned around and said thanks. But instead, I just kept walking out of the schoolyard, pushing my bike with me.
He was furious and he shouted at me again, ‘Stop’, but I didn’t; I got on my bike and I began to peddle. He was in such a temper that he ran over to the car park and then he got into his car. I looked back at him and I began to peddle as fast as I could, as I knew he was going to come after me. I managed to get a head start on him and I rode along the road and through some red traffic lights, knowing that he couldn’t follow me until the lights turned green.
Then I rode between two cars and they skidded to a halt, just missing each other and me as I cycled between them and out the other side, without them squashing me. The two drivers shouted at me and beeped their horns, but I just kept peddling. I knew Mr Williams was close behind me, but I never looked back, I just knew I had to get away from him as fast as possible. I rode up and over the pavement and I cut across the corner of the road, trying to get some distance between us and I could hear his car skidding as he turned the corner and began to gain ground on me.
So I rode through another set of red lights, peddling even faster and he had to stop for the traffic lights again. I carried on peddling and I could see the convent up ahead. I knew that if I just kept going, I could reach the gates before he could catch up with me and I did. I rode through the open gates and I headed for the front door, dropping my bike and running the last few yards towards the front door, screaming as loud as I could for the nuns to open the door. I never looked back, but I heard his car pull up and then him running up behind me. But as he got closer to me, the front door of the convent opened and I ran inside.
He was furious and he wanted to kill me, but one of the nuns stood in front of him and she politely told him to step away from the door. He went crazy and pushed his way past her and then he ran inside, chasing me through the hall and into the kitchen, then he ran around the kitchen table after me. I stopped at one side of the table and then I made horrible faces at him, sticking my tongue out at him and laughing up into his face from across the table, while the nun shouted at him, ‘Mr Williams, you can’t do that to a child. Get out now’, she said.
Then I shouted to the nun, telling her that he was locking me in a broom cupboard at school and he was keeping me there all day every day. He looked over at me and he shouted at the nun that I was a horrible, nasty little girl and that I was now expelled from the school. She said, ‘Yes well, good, that’s fine and now get out of the house.’ He was furious and he continued shouting and swearing at the nun, telling her that I was the devil’s child and that he wanted to kill me. However, the nun shouted back at him and eventually he had to leave the convent, and I never went back to school again and the nuns gave up on me ever going back again.
Now that the nuns couldn’t send me to school, I was constantly under their feet all day, and I was always hanging around the institution and Willows; and now that I was bigger and older, the nuns couldn’t get away with hitting me as much as they used to. Plus I was now able to stand up to them and I was able to fight them back if they laid a hand on me; and if they shouted at me, I would stand in front of them and shout right back at them and they hated me for it.
I didn’t want to stay at the house anymore and I began to venture out more and more each day, and I began to hang around with some of the children from the village and some of the bigger kids from the institution. But the nuns didn’t know everything about what I was up to and, in the evenings, I would sneak out of my window to be with the other kids. The nuns would have me and all the other children in bed by 9 pm and the whole house locked up for the night by 10 pm. But once everything went quiet and the nuns had gone to bed, I would open my bedroom window, climb out onto a ledge and then close it behind me so that it wouldn’t be noticed; then I would shimmy down the drainpipe, making sure I didn’t disturb any of the pipe fittings on the way down, so that I could use the same escape root night after night.
Then, once on the ground, I would run around to Simon’s window and wake him up by knocking on the glass. He would open the window and I would tell him to leave it open all night, so that when I returned later I could get back in, rather than me having to climb back up the drainpipe and then climb through my own window again. I did this for months, with Simon leaving his window open for me night after night.
But one night, when I returned and I tried to get back in, Simon’s window was locked and no matter how much I rattled and knocked on the glass, he wouldn’t open the window, he wouldn’t even walk over to it. I looked through the glass and I could just about see him and the two other boys that slept in his room through the net curtains, and they were all hiding under their blankets. I couldn’t understand why he never had the window open for me, because he always did, so in the end I had to climb up the drainpipe and over the roof, entering the house through an open skylight.
I climbed in and then I dropped down on to the floor; no one had heard me, so I crept downstairs to Simon’s room, I opened his bedroom door and the room smelt of fags. I walked in, switched on the light and walked over to Simon, and I tried to pull the bed covers away from his face, but he held on to them tight, and so did the other two boys in the room. I tried again, while I asked him why he didn’t open the window for me, but he never answered me. Then I got angry with him and I pulled at the blankets hard and pulled them away from his face and he began to cry. He then told me to go away and he shouted at me to leave him alone. ‘What’s a matter, Simon?’ I said, as he held back his tears just long enough to tell me that three of the older boys who used to live in the home had come back during the night and climbed in through the open window.
He said they sat in th
e room and they made him and the two other small boys smoke fags with them, and then the older boys began hitting them and they all took turns in raping him and the two other boys, one at a time, while the two other big boys held them down. He said they had big kitchen knives with them and they held the knives against their throats while they raped them, one after the other. I was shocked and I could see that Simon and the two other boys were very upset and frightened, so I walked out of the room and I walked towards the staff’s bedroom. I was getting ready to tell her about what had happened to all of them. But then I stopped. I knew that the staff would only say that we were all telling lies and making things up to get her in trouble, so I turned around and I went back to Simon and I comforted him until he fell to sleep. I stayed there all night, watching over him and the two other boys, making sure no one entered their room that night.
The next morning, Simon was very quiet and he pushed anyone who tried to talk to him away, and even I had trouble getting close to him; and getting a word out of him was almost impossible, he had become a withdrawn shell overnight. Simon was never the same person after that night; he became a very sad little boy and from then on he became very angry towards everyone and he would lose his temper quickly. He would slam and kick doors and shout at people, causing himself many problems with others around him and he would have terrible nightmares about what had happened to him. After that terrible night, I promised Simon that it would never happen to him again and I spent months sitting and sleeping on the floor outside his bedroom door, so that he could sleep in peace. And throughout the night, I would go into his bedroom and check the window, making sure it was still locked shut.
He was only ten and I knew that he was feeling very alone and ashamed about what had happened to him. Some nights, I would sit on the floor next to his bed and I would hold his little hand all night and occasionally I would get up to kiss him on his face or cuddle him like a mother would, until he fell to sleep. Some mornings, Simon would wake up and find me still holding his hand or asleep on the floor next to his bed, and he knew that I had been keeping him safe all night by watching over him and he liked it.
The staff knew that something was wrong with Simon, but they never knew what was bothering him; so whenever Simon lost his self-control and went mad with everyone around him, the only way the nuns knew how to cope with the problem was to hit him and punish him, and that is exactly what they did to him, day after day. Whenever he got angry with himself and caused problems, two of the nuns would gang up on him, with one nun holding him down while the other nun hit him in the head until he collapsed and fell silent to the floor. Then they would drag him into his bedroom and leave him there until he woke up again.
He never did tell the nuns what the boys had done to him, as he knew the nuns wouldn’t care and they would push him away, saying that he was a liar. But one day, his anger and temper towards everyone got so bad, that while the staff were cooking a mincemeat stew for dinner, he went into the kitchen and slung the saucepan of stew onto the floor. That was it, the staff couldn’t take any more of Simon’s tantrums, so the next day they sent him away; they didn’t give a shit about Simon or his problems and they sent him to Dublin for six months to a reform school for boys. And that was probably the worst thing they could have ever done to him; I was the only person he had, and he needed me even more than ever now, but he was all alone and faraway, with no one to turn to.
I was so upset with the nuns for sending Simon away that I couldn’t get it out of my mind, so I ran away and I headed toward Dublin to find Simon, but the nuns found out and they sent the police after me. And it didn’t take the police long to catch up with me, and once they found me they took me back to the nuns; and once I was back in the house, I tried to explain about what had happened to Simon and why he was behaving the way he was, but they were not interested. They just didn’t give a shit about his problems, all they wanted was for me to stop running away as it was causing them problems, and they were sick of having to explain to the police why I was running away all the time.
After that, the nuns tried to keep me locked inside my room and out of the way, but I protested and I starved myself for a whole week. However, they said that if I didn’t start eating again, they would call the mental hospital and have me committed as a mad person for the rest of my life. I knew they were telling the truth and they would have me committed, as they had done it to other children before. So for a while, I did what they said and I did my best to behave myself, but I still told them that the only way I was going to eat properly again and not run away was if they got Simon back. But they said no, so I decided to play them at their own game and I behaved myself for a couple of weeks until they let me out again.
And straight away, I took the opportunity and I ran away. But the police found me again and they brought me back, and the nuns gave up on locking me away and I spent the next six months running away almost every week, until they eventually gave in and they brought Simon back to me. But it was too late. When he arrived home, I looked at him and he had changed; things had happened to him at the reform school that he would not even tell me about and it had changed him forever. His heart and spirit had been broken, he was an empty shell and his soul had gone forever, but I still loved him and I told him so every day. ‘Simon, I love you and I always will.’ But he just looked at me with empty eyes and I felt sad for him. He might just as well have been dead as his life was over, but I continued looking after him and I never gave up on him.
In the last few years of my stay at St Josephs, fewer and fewer young girls arrived at the house. Times were now changing and the church no longer had the iron fist hold on the local community as they used to have and even the police began to question the church’s actions. In the old days, the church had more power than the police did, and no one ever questioned the church or their actions and the nuns and staff got away with murder; they answered to no one but God, and only God.
But now people were asking questions, and many of them had less and less respect for the church and their actions were becoming questionable. They were losing their grip on the power they once had and now only stupid and corrupt people stayed close to the church for its protection. Girls still came and went at the home, with the occasional girl sent to the home by her out-of-date family, who still had some kind of loyalty towards the church, rather than towards the authorities.
And as I got older, some of the nuns left the institution and they were never replaced. So now, there was only a handful of nuns and a few staff left running the house; and for us girls still living there, it was great. We began to get our own back on the nuns and staff; we caused them as much trouble as we physically could. The tables had now turned and, whenever the nuns attacked me, I attacked them back and I liked it. And if they shouted at me, I would shout right back at them and they were now scared of me. I was getting the convent, the nuns and the complete church system back for what they had all done to me over the last nine years, and I was retaliating against them all. I had never forgotten about all the beatings they had given me, or all the times they had locked me up in rooms and cupboards, and all the times they let people in and out of the institution sexually and mentally abuse me. So now, I was doing every bad thing that I possibly could, just to upset them. And I began to have a lot of fun causing trouble for them.
I remember one night, three of us girls from St Joseph’s decided to run away with some of the local boys and girls from the village for the night. There were about ten of us in total and we all met outside our school, we spent a couple of minutes talking and then we all walked off down the road and past an old pub that we all knew well. We had a shopping trolley with us that we used to carry all our stuff in and on the way past the pub; we tried to steal a keg of beer from the back yard. But we made too much noise and the owner of the pub heard us and he ran outside and chased us up the road, but we couldn’t push the shopping trolley fast enough, so we had to leave the trolley and beer keg behind and run.
We all behaved ourselves that night, but in the morning we were woken by the girl’s father who owned the caravan. He had walked down to the caravan, looking for his daughter, and found us all sleeping in the caravan together. He went mad at us all, telling us to get up and get out of the caravan, but we just laughed at him, so he went off and he called the police; but before they arrived, he came back and took his daughter away with him so that she would not get in trouble.
The police soon arrived and they surrounded the caravan, and they all stood outside and looked in through the windows at us. We tried to hide by getting into the cupboards and under the folding beds, but they came in and arrested us all. I found the whole situation funny and I began to laugh at the police as they dragged me out of the caravan. And I shouted at them to let me go and to go away, because we had done nothing wrong. They said that we were all in trouble for staying out all night with the boys, then they put us into police cars and they drove us all to the police station.
