Innocence Revisited

by Cathy Kezelman

  My Daddy is talking to me and he’s asking me what happened today at school and he’s asking me what things I was doing. My Daddy calls me his princess and he hasn’t called me that for a long, long time. I’m really excited that I’m Daddy’s princess again. I can’t believe that! I’m jumping up and throwing my arms around my Daddy. Hugging my Daddy feels yummy and I don’t let go for ages because I love hugging my Daddy sooooo much. I know that if I hold my Daddy long enough then he won’t ever leave me. My Daddy and me sit on my bed next to each other and we talk. We talk about lots of things like we used to before my Daddy didn’t want to talk to me. And then the best thing happens - my Daddy starts telling me a story and the story’s about a princess like me but the princess in the story lives far, far away. I love when my Daddy reads me stories; I’ve missed them heaps. I don’t remember when my Daddy told me a story last time but I want him to tell me stories always. My Daddy tells me that he is having a special visit with me but he doesn’t have to tell me that because I know that already. And my Daddy tells me that I mustn’t tell anyone about his special visit, and that it’s a secret and he puts his pinky over my lips when he says it’s a secret. He says that it’s a secret that we mustn’t tell Mummy, because it’s a secret that she wouldn’t understand and don’t I know that she wouldn’t understand? And I do know that, of course I do and I tell Daddy that.

  I’ve missed my Daddy heaps. I’ve missed my Daddy talking to me and I’ve missed my Daddy tucking me into bed and saying good night to me and I’ve missed my Daddy reading me stories. I’ve missed my Daddy kissing me too but now my Daddy’s come back and I’m my Daddy’s princess all over again and I’m a very, very happy princess.

  I don’t know how long my Daddy stays with me on my bed but it isn’t a long enough time when he tells me that he has to go away. I really wish that my Daddy could stay forever. ‘Don’t go my Daddy, please don’t go.’ My Daddy bends down and he gives me a big sloppy kiss on my cheek and I go all shivery in my back. And my Daddy tucks me in like he used to tuck me in and he says, ‘Sleep tight, princess’. And because Daddy says ‘sleep tight’ I know that I will sleep tight and I do sleep really, really tight.

  The next morning I get out of bed straight away and I run into the kitchen so that I will be able to see my Daddy. I’m too excited and I can’t wait to see him but it’s no good because when I do see him he isn’t the same Daddy as the Daddy in my room. ‘Good morning, Daddy,’ but Daddy doesn’t say anything to his princess and I’m very sad about that and I go back to my room and shut the door because the Daddy from my bed has gone away. I wonder if the Daddy from my bed was a dream.

  I’m having another dream; I didn’t know that you could have the same dream more times than one. Maybe if you wish hard enough, dreams really do come true; that’s what the fairy tale books say and maybe dreams can come true more than one time. My dream comes true lots of times. It comes true three times that week and lots of times in the weeks after that week.

  I don’t ever know which night my Daddy is going to come for his special visit so every night I try and stay awake, because if I do and he comes, then I’ll be able to see straight away when he comes. I try really hard to stay awake; I really do but I get really tired and my eyelids get too heavy and they make me fall asleep. And I’m always sleeping at the time my Daddy comes but it’s okay because he wakes me up and then we can talk together on my bed.

  I don’t know how many times my Daddy has been coming to my bedroom before things get different to before but they do. The first thing that happens is that my Daddy stops telling me special long stories and he starts telling me short silly stories instead. I still like them, but not as much as the special long ones. My Daddy does still play with me, well he does sometimes and that feels really good, because I like when my Daddy plays with me. I like when my Daddy tickles me too because tickling’s my favourite. I like when my Daddy tickles me under my arms because that tickling makes me giggly and wriggly and wiggly. Sometimes I wiggle so much that my sheets come out from my bed and my bed gets all messy and my Daddy has to fix it up for me. And I like it when my Daddy pokes me in the ribs because when my Daddy pokes me in the ribs, I laugh a funny laugh and I like funny laughs. Sometimes my Daddy pokes me too hard and it hurts and I don’t like that and sometimes my Daddy pokes me in places where I don’t want to be poked either. And sometimes my Daddy tickles me and I don’t want to be tickled and he pokes me where I don’t want him to poke me and I don’t like him doing that. I don’t like some of my Daddy’s games at all, but I don’t tell my Daddy that I don’t like them because I love my Daddy lots and my Daddy is the best Daddy in the whole wide world.

  ‘Princess, I’ve been thinking and… I have a special idea. I know you’ll love it, you really will. How about we… er…unbutton our shirts? Come on, it’ll be fun, you’ll see. Come on, let’s try.’

  Before my Daddy stops telling me about his special idea, the buttons on his shirt undo themselves and mine do too and my Daddy and me sit on my bed next to each other and we don’t have our tops on and our skin is nakey and that is funny. The front of my chest is flat but my Daddy’s chest isn’t flat because his nipplies push up a little bit and I like looking at his nipplies because I think that they’re funny. And every time my Daddy comes after that time we take our shirts off and I poke my Daddy and he pokes me back and we giggle. I like giggling with my Daddy.

  ‘Princess, it’s silly for me to be outside of the bed when you’re inside. How about I slip in under the covers with you, then we can be together. How about that? What do you think?’ My Daddy climbs into my bed, he chomps his jaws and he pretends to eat me all up. I chomp my jaws back. My Daddy grabs hold of me by my tummy and he makes me play rollies with him underneath my sheets and I like playing like that because I am laughing. I am laughing, but then I get a laughing pain in my tummy and I tell my Daddy to stop playing rollies. I like when my Daddy and me are playing rollies together; I like that.

  ‘Princess, don’t you think that it’s silly to lie in bed with our clothes on? People don’t go to bed dressed now, do they?’

  ‘But, Daddyyyy they wear jarmies, you silly boy!’

  My Daddy doesn’t say anything about jarmies at all. He wriggles under my sheets and he lifts his legs up and he takes his pants and undies right off and throws them away onto my floor.

  ‘Come on princess, it’s your turn now… Isn’t this fun?’

  I wriggle and my Daddy tickles me and I wriggle some more and I take my jarmie pants right off under my sheets but I don’t throw my jarmie pants on the floor; I keep them under my pillow to keep them close to me.

  My Daddy does touch me and he touches my body in lots of places and my Daddy touches between my legs and I don’t like him doing that. I don’t say anything to my Daddy about it because I love my Daddy soooo much and I don’t want to make my Daddy sad. But I don’t like my Daddy touching me between my legs and I don’t like my Daddy asking me to touch his naughty bits. I don’t like my Daddy’s naughty bits one bit. ‘Yuck, no my Daddy! They’re too yucky!’ And my Daddy tells me a long, long story about fairies and witches and I love that story. I love when my Daddy tells me stories and I love fairies but I don’t like witches. Witches are yucky!

  I hate that thing that hangs off the end of my Daddy’s tummy because it’s really yucky. That thing is like a squelchy worm but sometimes when my Daddy is lying next to me the squelchy worm isn’t a squelchy one because it’s a hard one, but it’s always a yucky worm. I don’t like when it’s a hard worm because when it’s a hard worm it pokes into me and my Daddy is in my bed next to me and I can’t get away from the hard worm and I don’t want it to poke into me but it does.

  In the morning after the night when my Daddy comes to me in my bed I run out to see my Daddy but it’s always bad, because my Daddy is always sitting back in his chair and when he sits in his chair he doesn’t move. I hate when it’s morning because when it’s morning time my Daddy looks like a ghost and I don’t
like ghosts. And my Daddy’s eyes don’t look at me when it’s morning time, but they look right through me like I’m a window and I don’t like my Daddy’s eyes looking through me.

  When my Daddy does come to my bed he doesn’t ever play with me now and I don’t know why. My Daddy does things to me which I don’t like him doing and they’re yucky things like twinkling my nipplies. I don’t like my Daddy twinkling my nipplies but my Daddy likes doing it and I giggle because I want to make my Daddy happy. And when my Daddy twinkles my nipplies he touches me where I don’t like him to and I don’t like my Daddy doing that but my Daddy likes doing it; I can tell that he does. I don’t tell my Daddy that I don’t like him doing those things because I don’t want to make my Daddy sad.

  I like the hairs on my Daddy’s chest; I like the hairs on his chest so much. My Daddy doesn’t have many hairs on his chest not like some of the Daddies at the beach but he does have a few fun hairs and I like playing with the fun hairs that he does have. When I touch the hairs on my Daddy’s chest they curl up like little baby things and I make them my pets and I pull faces at them. And when I put my head on my Daddy’s chest, my hair pets tickle me on my cheek and they sometimes crawl inside my ear. I love my Daddy’s hairs; I love the ones on his chest.

  Sometimes my Daddy tells me to get out of bed and he does too and then he lifts me up onto his knee. My Daddy’s knee is my favourite place in the whole world because it’s a really special place. It’s a special place when me and my Daddy have our clothes on, but now when my Daddy puts me on his knee he is nakey and his worm sticks into my bottom and it’s not special at all. My Daddy says that I’m a wriggler and I am. I’m a really big wriggler when I’m nakey and my Daddy is nakey and I want to wriggle really far away from my Daddy’s worm.

  ‘I love you, princess and I love being with you.’ I love my Daddy telling me that he loves me; he never tells me that enough times. My Daddy asks me if I love him and that’s a funny question, ‘Of course my Daddy, of course I love you. I love you more than anything’ and I jump up and I throw my arms around my Daddy and I give my Daddy the huggiest squeeze I can without our nakey bottoms touching because I don’t want his worm to poke me and stop us hugging.

  ‘Well, that’s my princess all right! I love you so much, you know that, don’t you, my princess? And that’s why I… I love coming to visit, but remember now…’

  ‘Yes Daddy, I know. I must never tell Mummy.’

  ‘Oh, you’re a smart one! That’s right, princess. You must never tell Mummy. She wouldn’t understand, now would she?’ My Daddy is right. My mother wouldn’t understand.

  Sometimes my Daddy lies on top of me when I lie down but he’s a big Daddy and he squashes me. My Daddy squashes me because I’m little and I’m skinny. That’s what he says. And when my Daddy lies on top of me I feel like I’m a little baby sparrow bird and the sparrow bird is getting squashed by a great big yucky eagle.

  One night when my Daddy is in my bed my Daddy whispers in my ear and he says that he has a surprise for me. I love surprises, especially Daddy surprises.

  ‘What is it, my Daddy? What is it? What’s the surprise?’

  ‘Well princess, it’s something really special! It’s something that two people do when they love each other like we do. And we really do love each other, now don’t we, princess?’

  But my Daddy’s surprise isn’t a good surprise at all because he sticks his worm into me and it’s a hard worm and not a squelchy worm and the hard worm hurts a very big hurt when my Daddy sticks it in. It’s the biggest hurt ever and bigger than that. And I’m a baby sparrow bird and my Daddy is a yucky eagle bird and the sparrow bird cries out and the eagle has a big shock and the eagle stops and it pulls its hard eagle worm out of the sparrow bird. The sparrow bird is hurt lots and lots and some of the juice that’s on the inside of the sparrow bird comes out of it and the juice runs down between the legs of the sparrow bird.

  My Daddy sees the juice of the sparrow bird running out of the bird and down its legs and he cries and the sparrow bird cries too and the sparrow bird looks at the sparrow juice and the sparrow bird feels scared. And the sparrow is bleeding blood juice and the Daddy is crying.

  ‘Don’t cry my Daddy. Please don’t cry!’

  And the sparrow bird doesn’t like when the sparrow bird’s Daddy is crying.

  ‘I… I just had a little baby shock, my Daddy. A little baby shock. And it’s only a little bleeding coming out, my Daddy… only a little. Please my Daddy, don’t cry. Please don’t cry. My Daddy, please.’

  My Daddy looks at me and my Daddy’s cheeks have tears on them. I want to wipe the tears off my Daddy’s cheeks because I don’t ever want my Daddy’s cheeks to have tears on them.

  ‘I’m so sorry princess. I… I… er… I wouldn’t ever do anything to hurt you. You know that, don’t you?’ My Daddy and I have a big squeezy hug and that makes me feel a little bit better. And as my Daddy snuggles into his sparrow bird, the sparrow bird snuggles close to her Daddy.

  ‘I’m so sorry princess. I won’t do it again if you don’t want me to.’ But Daddy wants to do it. I can tell that he does.

  ‘No, my Daddy. It doesn’t hurt much, really it doesn’t. Please Daddy, please. It’s special; you said so my Daddy, please. Please my Daddy, please don’t cry.’

  As my Daddy climbs back up on top of me, I close my eyes. If I can’t see my Daddy I won’t be able to feel anything bad, but I do feel something bad and it feels really bad and I want to cry out loud but I don’t because I don’t want to upset my Daddy. I lie on my back and I don’t move like when I play ‘stiff dolly’ with my Daddy only it’s lying and not standing, and my Daddy hurts his princess, but his princess isn’t there anymore because his princess’s head has gone all fuzzy and his princess has gone away to the place where sparrow birds go when mean yucky eagles eat them up.

  I’m sitting on the extra chair that stays in the corner of my bedroom and I’m watching my Daddy take the bad sheets with the sparrow juice blood off my bed. I’m watching my Daddy go out of my bedroom so that he can get some good sheets and he comes back in and puts the good sheets on my bed. And I’m watching my Daddy go back out again and he’s bringing back a washer and it’s the washer from my bath because it’s yellow and it has a duckie on it and my Daddy is a nice Daddy because my washer is warm and it’s wet; it isn’t a scratchy washer. And my Daddy puts the washer on where the juice blood is coming from. I think it’s because some of my bits are missing. The warm feels good but the water doesn’t because it hurts me but I don’t tell my Daddy that the water hurts me because I don’t want my Daddy to cry.

  And my Daddy gets my jarmies and he helps me put my jarmies on and he taps the side of my bed and I hop into bed and my Daddy pulls the sheet and blanket up and he tucks me in like he used to do all the time and he sits on the side of the bed and he holds my hand, ‘I love you princess; I really do. And you’ve made me really happy. I’ll come back again soon. Would you like that?’

  ‘Yes, Daddy. I love you, my Daddy.’ And my Daddy kisses me on the cheek and he places a fatherly kiss on my cheek and walks out.

  I am eight years old.

  It is hurting really badly between my legs. I get out of bed and go and get my washer and bring it back and put it between my legs on the place where the bits are missing. The washer makes the bits feel better but when I have to get up to go and have a wee my bits hurt me and I put the washer back between my legs. And I have to get up to wee a lot and I put the washer back and I get my Teddy and Teddy stays with me and Teddy makes me feel a little bit better. And when I lie on my back because it doesn’t hurt so much when I lie on my back, Teddy lies on his back too.

  The next time my Daddy comes into my bedroom he wants to do the same thing. I don’t want him to, but I don’t tell him that I don’t want him to because I’m worried about my Daddy; I’m worried about how he sits in his chair and about how he stares and how he doesn’t talk to me in the day-time. I don’t want my Daddy to be sa
d; I want my Daddy to be happy. I’m worried that my Daddy is dying and I don’t want him to die. Maybe if my Daddy doesn’t do the thing to me he will be sad and then he will die and I don’t want that.

  I don’t know what it is that my Daddy is doing to me in my bed with his hard worm and I don’t have anyone to ask what it is, but I want to find out, so one night I sit on my bed by myself with my pants off and I cross my legs like when I’m sitting on the floor for story time at my school. I bend my head down and I look at where it’s hurting between my legs where the bits are missing. I don’t know what it’s supposed to look like between my legs and I can’t tell if it looks bad or not and I can’t tell what bits are missing. I try to put my fingers inside me where Daddy puts his hard worm, but it hurts and I don’t want it to hurt so I take my fingers out.

  I get out of the bed and take my dolly off the shelf. I take her dress and her undies off her and I hold her upside down. She doesn’t have anything down underneath her like I do and there’s nothing to push something into. But I want to push something into my dolly, so I get my coloured pencils and I put them in her mouth and I push. And I push the coloured pencils hard into my dolly’s mouth and I make the hole in her mouth bigger. And when my dolly doesn’t cry I bite my dolly’s fingers because I want my dolly to cry; I bite my dolly’s fingers right off. And I bite my fingers too and I rip my fingernails off and I pick at the bits that are left at the bottom of my nails. It hurts when I pick at my fingers, but it doesn’t hurt as badly as when my Daddy puts his worm inside me and pushes.

  I pick my dolly up and I hold my dolly upside down but she still doesn’t have anything on the underneath of her. I put my clothes back on and walk out of my bedroom to my mother’s sewing machine and I take my mother’s scissors out of the top drawer of her sewing machine and I go back to my dolly on my tippy-toes. I stay as quiet as a little mouse when I’m on my tippy-toes because I don’t want my mother to be angry. I make a hole in my dolly between her legs because when my dolly has a hole she is like me and I can push things inside my dolly’s hole. And I push my pencils inside my dolly and I take the scissors and make the hole in my dolly between my dolly’s legs bigger. I take my hairbrush and I try to put it inside my dolly, but my hairbrush doesn’t go in so I make my dolly’s hole bigger. I push the hairbrush inside my dolly and I push harder but she still doesn’t cry so I take my hairbrush out of my dolly and I put the hairbrush inside me but I don’t push because it hurts really bad so I take it out.