A Family Secret

by Maureen Wood

  ‘We need to get this story straight. You don’t know who it was. You were raped by a stranger on your way home one night. A stranger. Got it?

  ‘What happens in our house stays in our house. Remember?

  ‘Don’t say a word or you’re for it. Mark my words, you are for it.’

  I didn’t say a thing. It hadn’t occurred to me that people would ask who the father was, that people in authority might want to know where my baby had come from.

  In any case, I nodded along with Mum. I had no choice.

  I found myself sitting in front of a middle-aged doctor, with Mum next to me, a warning finger in the small of my back, in case I even thought about speaking out of line.

  ‘We think she might be pregnant,’ Mum said.

  The doctor kept a calm expression but checked my notes and said: ‘She is only thirteen years old.’

  ‘I know,’ Mum nodded, shooting a glare of disapproval at me.

  ‘Oh, I know. It’s disgusting, isn’t it? She reckons she’s been raped. Some stranger, apparently. We want an abortion, don’t we? Don’t we, Maureen?’

  I felt a prod in my back but didn’t speak. I didn’t even nod. There was no way I was playing this game. Now I had my baby to think of. And though I could never have stood up to Mum for my own sake, I found it remarkably easy to do so for my baby.

  I lay on the couch whilst the doctor examined my bump and confirmed what I already knew. He said I was about twenty-two weeks pregnant.

  ‘Your choices will be limited,’ he warned. ‘I’m sending you to the hospital, right away, for an urgent scan. She’s very young so we need to keep a close eye on things.’

  ‘And what about an abortion?’ Mum pressed.

  ‘Let’s see what the scan says,’ said the doctor briskly.

  At the hospital it was pretty much the same procedure. Mum did all the talking and I sat, fizzing with panic at the thought of a termination, brimming with excitement at the thought of seeing my baby on a scan. The waiting room was full of what, to me, seemed like old women. There were pregnant women there old enough to be my grandmother. When my turn came and I stood up, showing off my rounded bump, there were raised eyebrows and tuts. Mum followed behind me, muttering abuse aimed not at them, but at me.

  ‘This gel will feel a bit cold,’ smiled the sonographer, as she rubbed my tummy.

  The monitor was turned away from me so I couldn’t see the baby after all, which was a disappointment. But I broke into a huge smile as I heard the thud, thud, thud of his little heart, echoing out of the machine.

  He was real, after all! I hadn’t doubted it, but to hear his heartbeat, to know that he was in there, cooking slowly, was joyous.

  ‘Hello, darling,’ I whispered silently. ‘I won’t let anyone hurt you. Don’t worry.’

  The scan confirmed that I was indeed twenty-two weeks pregnant. I had no idea of the abortion laws and I could only hope that we were too late. As we walked out into the waiting room, we were met by a social worker, alerted, most probably, by my GP.

  ‘We’re dealing with this as a family,’ Mum said stiffly. ‘We don’t need any help, thank you.’

  I expected that to be that.

  But the social worker replied: ‘That isn’t your decision, Mrs Wood.’

  I looked on in interest. Nobody ever stood up to my mother. When she shouted, the neighbours tended to shut their windows. We all jumped to attention and did just as she said. But not the social worker; she seemed happy to go toe to toe with my mother. This was a revelation.

  ‘Your daughter is a child herself. She is the priority,’ continued the social worker.

  Despite myself, I swelled with pride. I had never been anyone’s priority before. I felt really quite important. I was as impressed as Mum was indignant.

  ‘Are we too late for a termination?’ Mum snapped.

  The social worker nodded.

  ‘She’s far too late,’ she confirmed. ‘So your daughter needs our support, all of our support. We’ll be in touch, Mrs Wood.’

  Relief flooded through me. I knew we had more challenges ahead, I wasn’t stupid enough to think it was over. But I knew my baby was safe, for now at least.

  Seething, Mum dragged me outside and kicked me all the way home. It was as if she was trying to kick the baby out of me herself. But I dodged most of her efforts and ignored her ranting.

  ‘You’re a disgrace. You’ve brought shame on this family. Your father’s at work. Wait till he hears about this. Just you wait.’

  We reached our front door and my backside was stinging. And inwardly I was railing against the injustice. She had abused me, and my brother and stepfather had raped me. Yet I was the disgrace. I was the one who had brought our family to its knees.

  ‘It will have to be adopted,’ Mum announced. ‘There’s no way you’re keeping it.’

  She and John Wood were waiting for me as I came down the stairs the next day. One hand went to my stomach, the other was clamped over my mouth.

  ‘Please,’ I breathed. ‘Please let me keep my baby.’

  But Mum waved me aside angrily. I wasn’t even permitted to have a point of view. It was my baby, my body, yet I didn’t matter. Nothing had changed.

  ‘You’re going up to Scotland tomorrow,’ Mum said. ‘Get packed and make sure you’re ready. It’s an early train.’

  ‘Why?’ I asked, but Mum’s lip curled and I knew I was pushing her too far.

  That night, with my overnight bag waiting by my bed, I barely slept. And when I finally managed to doze, I dreamed that I was pushing my baby along a London street, snuggled and safe in a cosy pram. But then coming towards me, her gimlet eyes blazing, was my mother. She poked her long nails into the pram and, as she leaned over, I caught a whiff of her Charlie perfume.

  ‘Where is it? Where’s the baby?’ she demanded. ‘You can’t keep it.’

  I was panic-stricken, looking around me wildly, praying that help would come. But then Mum began to cackle, her head thrown back, her thick white throat exposed.

  ‘There is no baby, you stupid little bitch,’ she sneered. ‘You must have left it somewhere.’

  And she was right. The pram was achingly empty.

  ‘What have you done with my baby?’ I sobbed. ‘It was mine. You had no right.’

  But Mum was doubled over laughing; so loudly, it gave me a ringing in my ears. And then the alarm clock was bleeping and it was time to get up and catch the train to Glasgow.

  The journey was miserable. Mum sat in the seat opposite and glowered at me as though I was nothing more to her than an inconvenience. And if I had hoped for any compassion from my Scottish relatives, I was sadly mistaken.

  ‘How could you do this to your parents?’ snarled my aunt, when we arrived. ‘You are a disgrace, my girl.’

  No doubt she had been fed the same story about me being raped by a stranger, but she did not mention it or question it.

  I gathered, from eavesdropping, that she knew a childless couple and that they would be willing to adopt my baby. My mother wanted the whole affair done privately, so that nobody found out. My trip to Scotland was so that I could meet the adoptive couple, presumably so that they could vet me in some way. It certainly wasn’t for my benefit. The blood thudded in my ears as I pieced together their plan. How on earth would I get through this?

  ‘Don’t worry, angel, I’ll think of something,’ I said automatically, but without any real conviction.

  I was determined not to let my baby go. The idea of handing over a part of myself to complete strangers was abhorrent. I wanted this baby. I knew I couldn’t give up my child. I reassured my baby, constantly, that I would keep him with me. That nothing, and nobody, would ever separate us.

  ‘I promise, I promise,’ I said quietly.

  But though I repeated platitudes, for the baby’s sake, deep down, I was
panic-stricken. I didn’t know how I was going to get out of this mess. The next day, Mum took me across the whole city, to different social services offices, to try to arrange the adoption. But we got the same answer everywhere we went.

  ‘You can’t arrange a private adoption,’ said the social workers. ‘It isn’t legal. This has to be done through the proper channels. If you want to place a baby for adoption there are rules you must follow. And we’d need to speak to your daughter first, above all else.’

  And no matter how much Mum argued, they wouldn’t budge. She frogmarched me back to my aunt’s house and I could barely keep the smile off my face. It was a tiny victory, but a victory all the same, and I felt quietly thrilled. This was another hurdle overcome. Mum furiously packed her case and announced she was returning home – alone.

  ‘What about me?’ I asked. ‘What’s going to happen now?’

  But she didn’t reply. She stalked out of the house and up the street with her bags, and I watched from an upstairs window. I saw her shoulders sag with relief as she walked away. And it hit me that she was glad to be rid of me. I was a problem to be solved. An embarrassment to be hidden away.

  Two long, lonely weeks passed and there was no word from Mum. She had simply washed her hands of me completely.

  ‘So what should I do now?’ I asked.

  But nobody seemed to know. Then my maternal grandmother took charge. She was a lovely woman and I could never reconcile that she was my mum’s mother. They seemed to be such completely different characters. Granny Kelly wrapped her arms around me, smiled, and said: ‘You have done nothing wrong, my darling. It will all be OK. Remember how much I love you.’

  Her words were so warm. Such a comfort. She was the only person who had shown me any kindness at all since my pregnancy was confirmed. But she also rang my mother and ordered her to face up to her responsibilities and take me home.

  ‘The girl needs her family,’ she told my mother sternly. ‘Stop ignoring the problem.’

  Before I knew it I was on a train, back to Stoke-on-Trent.

  In the days that followed, it would become so hard to remember that Granny Kelly loved me. Because it felt like nobody loved me at all.

  When I got home I readjusted quickly to the routine, and when Saturday night came around I was on tenterhooks. I didn’t see why the abuse would stop just because I was having a baby. Why would they care? But Saturday night came and went, and nothing happened. I braced myself for the following Saturday, but again I got through the night undisturbed. And just as inexplicably as it had started, the fortnightly cycle of abuse came to an end. It was never spoken about or referred to in any way. It simply stopped. And I was eternally grateful. Such was my mentality that I was grateful when I was not being raped.

  I never felt completely safe; there was always a worry, especially when I was in bed, that I might be plucked out and savaged. But as time went on that threat diminished, and for the first time in my life I began to look to the future.

  My pregnancy seemed to be absolutely textbook. It went like a dream. I had been so skinny before that my bump was very much accentuated. As the weeks passed, I looked comically rounded and I felt like a beached whale. But I loved it. I wasn’t tired or hormonal. My ankles didn’t swell, I didn’t get stretch marks or swollen ankles. I just seemed to bloom. And I chatted away to my baby every day, as though he was already in my arms.

  ‘And after my bath we’ll have a little walk,’ I told him. ‘Fresh air will be good for us both.’

  I was no longer alone. I had a best friend – better than that, a soulmate.

  Every two weeks I was sent for a scan, to check the baby’s growth. And at thirty weeks, when I arrived for my usual check-up, I noticed that the monitor was turned facing towards me. I felt a thrill of anticipation. I was about to see my baby for the very first time. His image flashed up, his short arms and legs, and his fluttery fingers and toes, and every bone in my body melted. And I knew in that moment that I would do everything I could to protect him. I would die for him if I had to.

  ‘My little angel,’ I whispered. ‘I love you so much.’

  I had no idea how I was going to stop the adoption. But I knew that if I had to run away from the hospital, in the dead of night, I would do it. If I had to sleep on the streets, with my baby held close, I would do it. I was prepared to go to any lengths at all to keep him.

  ‘No matter what it takes,’ I told myself.

  Mum was hostile from the moment I got back from Scotland, but then I was well used to that. The lack of human warmth from my family didn’t bother me too much at all, especially when I had such warmth and comfort in my belly.

  That September I wasn’t allowed to go back to school, and instead social services arranged a home tutor for a couple of hours a week. When she arrived, my first thought was that she looked just like Mary Poppins. Her clothes were rather formal and matronly, but she had a kind twinkle in her eye. I had tuition every Monday, Wednesday and Friday, working away at the pine dining table, painfully aware of Mum tutting loudly every time she walked past me.

  ‘You’d be at school if you hadn’t got yourself knocked up,’ she would say. ‘You dirty little cow.’

  Life was very lonely. I wasn’t allowed to see my school friends, and I missed them more than I would have thought. I didn’t see any of the kids on the street either. I no longer fancied playing manhunt or swimming in the pond. Things had gone past that. Mum would send me to the shop for cigarettes when she ran out, but she rarely spoke to me. I felt like I was ostracised, like she was trying to strip away my identity.

  Did I exist – or not?

  Occasionally she’d erupt into an outburst and I had no choice but to listen quietly.

  ‘We’ll never live this down,’ she snapped. ‘You’ve ruined the whole family.’

  The police came to interview me, because the story Mum had concocted was that I had been raped on my way home from a school disco.

  ‘Stick to the story,’ she warned me. ‘Or else.’

  I was terrified enough and smart enough to do as she said. And I didn’t find telling lies as hard as I’d expected, because of course I had been raped. The circumstances were different, but the crux of the story was essentially true. I kept the details vague, mumbling something about a man attacking me in a field on my way home in the dark.

  Looking back, I feel sure they must have seen through my story. They must have had their suspicions. I was a young girl, with a baby inside me, and I was unable to give them any specifics about the attack. Surely alarm bells were ringing?

  ‘I’m sorry,’ I muttered. ‘I just can’t remember too well.’

  There was certainly no investigation, no public appeal, no widespread search. I think the police probably had a good idea of what was going on at home, but without evidence they couldn’t do anything.

  ‘Are you sure it was a stranger who attacked you on the field?’ asked one policewoman.

  I nodded firmly. Years of indoctrination, of living in fear, of being made to believe that I was worthless, were coming to fruition. My mother had done her job well. Yet deep down a part of me was crying out for help. If only the police officer had asked the right question. If only she had asked if anyone at home had ever attacked me too. I wanted to tell her. Yet I could not find a way to tell her myself, without a prompt. If she had drawn it out of me, I could have passed the blame onto the police. It would have been their fault, not mine, when my family fell to pieces.

  I had to be examined by a police doctor, too. I was taken to a specialist unit, so sterile and clinically clean it felt sinister to a young teenager like me. I worried that the examination might somehow throw into sharp relief my lies about my attacker. As if perhaps the police doctor might smell the Old Spice and the Charlie perfume and work out what had really been happening to me.

  The examination was in fact more traumatic than I
had expected. To me, it felt like another episode of abuse; less invasive, more clinical, but another violation all the same. Mum was in the room, holding my hand like the devoted parent, making sure I didn’t stray from the script. A slight trace of a smirk played around her lips as the swabs were taken. She was a beast, a fiend hiding behind her sensible sandals and her floral blouse. A monster disguised as a mother.

  She thanked the police doctor and made sympathetic little murmurs as they discussed my predicament. She helped me to get dressed again and put a warning hand, disguised as protection, on my shoulder as she steered me outside.

  ‘You remember what I said about keeping your gob shut,’ she hissed, as we walked back to the bus stop. ‘One word out of you, young lady, and you’re in for a good kicking.’

  Deep down I felt almost certain that Jock was the baby’s father. John Wood had drummed it into me that he couldn’t get me pregnant, and I suppose, because I wanted to, that I believed him. But it wasn’t just that he’d had a vasectomy; I felt instinctively that the baby was Jock’s. It was nothing to do with dates of my periods or the rapes; it didn’t even occur to me to work those out. It was just a feeling I had; visceral and intuitive.

  I had no idea if Mum even knew that Jock had raped me, and whether she presumed that John Wood was the only suspect in the frame. And in our family there was no communication and no truth. Ours was a tangled and sordid web, with layer after layer of lies and deceit.

  John Wood kept his distance whilst I was pregnant. He could hardly bear to be in the same room as me; if I walked in, he would walk straight out again. He didn’t make eye contact and never spoke to me at all. Sometimes I would catch him sneaking a look at me, his face creased in worry. And I knew his concern was all for himself, not for me. Possibly he was worried his vasectomy had failed after all, and this was going to come back on him. The due date I had been given was 27 October 1984 – John Wood’s forty-first birthday. Did he see that as a sign – a clue from the womb? Or maybe his concern was that I might spill the beans about his abuse to a social worker or a midwife. I had access to so many childcare professionals now, so many people in positions of authority. Perhaps he wished I simply did not exist. It might have been his baby. It might not. Neither of us could know for sure.