Broken (19 page)

“
Mom.” I
said, my voice shaking with shock. “I know that I can’t legally
leave here until I’m eighteen but I don’t care. I’m leaving
tonight.”

My mother nodded.

“
I
understand, Cindy.” she said. “And I won’t try and stop you. But
where will you go? Can you afford to live on your own?”

“
No, I
can’t.” I said. “But I will not stay here a minute longer. Garth
Gilmore, the boy I was at school with and have been going out with
since we left school, has offered to let me live in his house. You
know; the house that he inherited from his aunt in Zinnia Street.
I’m going to take up his offer.”

“
Is that
wise?” my mother asked. “He can’t be much older than
you.”

“
Yes, he’s
the same age as me.” I said. “In fact, I’m a few months older than
him. And apart from the house, he also inherited some money. So
it’s not as if I’ll be a burden to him.”

“
But what
will people say?” my mother asked. “Two seventeen-year-olds living
together.”

“
Mom.” I
said. “This is two thousand and seven; not nineteen fifty seven.
Lot’s of young people live together.”

“
Your father
will try to stop you.” my mother warned.

“
If he does,
I’ll lay an assault charge against him.” I said. “I’ll fight him
with everything I can; but I’ll never come back here!”

My mother looked down at me and
I could clearly see the helplessness and despair in her eyes.
Slowly she struggled to her feet and leant down to help me
stand.

“
Try and
stand up.” she said.

Slowly and painfully I stood up,
holding onto the kitchen table to steady myself. My whole body
shook from shock and pain.

“
What do you
want to do?” my mother asked. “You must get your eye seen
too.”

“
I’m going to
‘phone Garth and ask him to come here and help me move.” I said.
“But I think that you should lock the bedroom door. When Garth sees
my eye he’ll be very angry.”

My mother’s
eyes opened wide with fright.

“
Don’t worry,
mom.” I said. “I’ll see that Garth doesn’t do anything silly. But
lock the bedroom door in any case.”

“
I think that
you should get Garth to take you to the hospital first.” my mother
said. “Your eye looks terrible.”

I nodded and
walked uncertainly to my bedroom. My cell phone lay on my bedside
table. I ‘phoned Garth.

“
Garth, it’s
Cindy.” I said when he answered. “I need your help. There’s been
some trouble at my parent’s house. Can you come here
please?”

“Okay.” Garth said. “I’ll be
there in a couple of minutes.”

By the time Garth arrived at the
house my mother had locked the door to the bedroom where my father
lay on his back on the bed snoring loudly. I had also had enough
time to bathe my eye in warm water and cover it with some cotton
wool.

“
Christ! Who
did that to you?” Garth said when I opened the front door and he
saw my damaged eye. “I’ll kill him!”

“
Please,
Garth.” I said. “Don’t make a fuss. It was my father and he was
drunk. He’s passed out in the bedroom. Will you please take me to
the hospital casualty department so that I can have my eye seen to?
I don’t think it’s been damaged; it’s just badly
swollen.”

Garth took a deep breath and
nodded.

“
Okay.” he
said. “Let’s go.”

As we walked to the nearby
hospital I told Garth what had happened.

“
Christ,
Cindy.” Garth said. “You’ve got to get out of that house. You know
that my offer still stands. Come and stay with me.”

“
Okay,
Garth.” I said. “But only until I’m able to afford my own
apartment.”

“
That’s fine
with me.” Garth said. “I’ll help you move your things after we’ve
been to the hospital.”

“
Before we go
there,” I said, “Have you got a camera?”

“
Yes.” Garth
said. “My aunt had a small digital camera. It’s in the bedroom
cupboard. What do you want a camera for?”

"
I want to take photographs of my
eye so that I can use them to threaten my father if he tries to
force me to come home” I said. “I’ll threaten to lay a charge of
assault against him and use the photographs as
evidence.”

“
Good idea.”
Garth said. “Let’s go and take the photos now. Then we can go to
the hospital.”

We hurried to
Garth’s house where he took a number of photographs of my swollen
eye. He then loaded them into his computer and printed them. He put
the prints into a large envelope.

“
Okay.” Garth
said. “Let’s go to the hospital.”

The doctor at the casualty ward
inspected my eye carefully.

“
The eye
itself isn’t damaged.” he said. “You must have been able to close
it before the blow struck. I’ll cover it with a bandage and give
you some anti-inflammatory ointment to help reduce the swelling.
You’re also suffering from very mild concussion as a result of the
blow to the back of your head.”

“
Can you give
me a sick note?” I asked.

“
Yes.” the
doctor said. “You must give the eye a chance to recover without
straining it. Stay at home for three days and then come back here
and I’ll have another look at it. As far as the concussion’s
concerned I want you to rest as much as possible. Don’t do anything
strenuous and if the headache persists for more than a day come
back here. I’ll give you some tablets that will ease the
pain.”

With my eye
heavily bandaged, a large tube of ointment
, a container of painkillers and the sick note, we left the
hospital.

“
I don’t
think that we should go to my parent’s house now.” I said. “My
father may wake up and try to cause trouble. I’ll ‘phone my mother
and tell her that we’ll fetch my things tomorrow morning after my
father’s left for work.”

“
Good
thinking.” Garth said. “Because if I see the bastard I’ll probably
break his neck!”

“No, Garth.” I said. “You
mustn’t think of doing anything to my father. You’ll only make
things worse. Just leave it. What happened can’t be changed. The
important thing is that I get out of their house. And we’re doing
that now.”

Spending a
whole
night in bed with someone I loved
was an amazing experience and I was surprised at the feeling of
assurance that Garth’s presence next to me gave me. I woke up
several times during the night and carefully put out my hand to
assure myself that Garth was really there. For the first time in my
life I felt really safe and, when I woke up in the morning I
experienced a wonderful feeling of tranquillity. It was if a huge
load had been removed from my shoulders. Garth’s steady breathing
next to me as he slept made me feel utterly protected.

My eye was still painful but my
headache had gone. Garth woke up and we made love. Then we showered
together, dressed and had breakfast in the kitchen. I washed the
dishes and looked at my watch.

“
My father
will have left for work by now.” I said. “Let’s go and get my
things.”

Before we
left the house I ‘phoned Misses Hawkins at Checkers and told her
that I’d had an accident and wouldn’t be at work for the next three
days at least. As we left the house Garth handed me the envelope of
photographs that we’d taken of my swollen eye.

“
Take these
with just in case your father shows up at his house while we’re
there.” he said.

We walked
towards my parent
’s house.

“
Garth.” I
said. “Before we go any further we have to discuss the terms under
which I’ll be living in your house. There’s no way that I’m going
to live with you without paying you rent. I’ll pay you what I was
paying my parents to live in their house. Okay?”

“
Yes, that’s
okay.” Garth said. “It’s not necessary, but if you insist, then
we’ll do it that way.”

We arrived at
my parent
’s house and my mother let us
in. We began packing my clothes and the items that I’d bought for
my flat into a large cardboard box. I was surprised at how few
possessions I actually had.

“
Won’t dad be
angry at you for letting us into the house?” I asked my
mother.

“
Probably.”
my mother replied. “But knowing that you’re safely out of his
clutches will be worth anything that he does to me.”

Just as Garth was about to pick
up the box with my possessions in it the front door opened and my
father walked into the house. He glared at me.

“
I thought
I’d find you here, you dirty little slut.” he said and then turned
his attention to Garth. “Get out of my house. You’re trespassing
and if you’re not out of here in ten seconds I’ll lay charges
against you.”

Garth stared
at my father defiantly but before he could say anything I put my
hand on his arm.

“
Wait
outside, Garth.” I said. “I can handle this.”

“
Are you
sure?” Garth asked. “I don’t trust him.”

“
I’ll be
fine.” I said.

Garth shrugged his shoulders,
walked past my father without looking at him and left the house. My
father closed the door.

“
What’s in
that box?” he asked.

“
All my
things.” I said. “I’m leaving.”

“
Oh no,
you’re not!” my father shouted. “You’re still under the age of
eighteen. You can’t leave this house without my consent and I won’t
give it!”

I leant down and picked up the
envelope of photographs of my swollen eye. I took out the pictures
and handed them to my father.

“
If you try
and stop me from leaving I’ll lay a charge of assault against you
and hand those to the public prosecutor.” I said quietly. “With
evidence like that the charge will stick.”

My father stared at the pictures
and then looked up at me, his eyes filled with hatred.

“
This is
blackmail.” he said.

I shrugged my shoulders.

“
Call it
whatever you like.” I said. “But with those pictures as evidence
you’ll very likely go to jail.”

As my father stared at me I saw
defeat begin to fill his eyes.

“
Take your
things and get out of my house!” he shouted. “That my own daughter
would stoop so low as to blackmail her own father is shocking! Get
out of my house, you piece of trash!”

I smiled at my father and I
walked past him to the front door. I opened it. Garth looked at me,
his eyebrows raised.

“
Garth.” I
said. “Please come in and help me take away my things.”

Garth stepped into the house,
walked past my father and picked up the box with my possessions in
it. He turned and walked to the front door, completely ignoring my
father who stood glaring at him in silence. I followed Garth,
closing the door behind me.

I strongly
be
lieved that by living with Garth our
relationship would flourish and that the indifference that he had
shown towards me would disappear as we got to know each other more
intimately. Unfortunately this didn’t happen and I could only
imagine that this unresponsiveness stemmed from the abuse that he
had suffered as a child and which he had mentioned the first time
that we’d made love together. I knew that at one time I had also
shown strong signs of indifference to other people but I believed
that I was more outgoing in nature than Garth was and I would be
able, over time, to hide this trait. I decided to bring up the
subject in the hope that it would help the two of us to become
closer.

One Sunday morning, as we lay in
bed together, I took the plunge and, with considerable trepidation,
brought up the subject of our pasts.

“
Garth.” I
said. “Please don’t think that I’m prying, but when we made love
the first time, you told me that you’d been abused by your father
as a child. Well, I was also abused as a child and also by my
father. That’s why I wasn’t a virgin when we made love. Ever since
I first saw you I’ve had this strange affiliation towards you and I
think that you’ve had the same feeling towards me. Do you think
that our both being abused as children could have brought us
together?”

“
I’ve never
spoken to anyone about what my father did to me when I was a
child.” Garth said after a long silence. “It’s too painful and I
would prefer to leave the past behind me. But I do agree with you
that our coming together wasn’t purely by chance and that it was
probably because there’s something in us that attracts the other;
something much deeper than simply a physical
attraction.”

We lay next
to each other in silence. After what Garth had just said about his
reluctance to bring up the past, I was scared to take the matter
further, but the need to break through Garth’s indifference was too
strong.

“
Garth.” I
said, taking his hand in mine. “Please don’t get angry at what I’m
about to say, but I do think that it’s important. I love you very
much and I believe that you love me, but I can’t help seeing an
indifference in you towards me and I desperately want to remove
it.”

“
Indifference?” Garth said. “I don’t feel indifferent
towards you. That’s nonsense. I love you.”