Living With Evil by Cynthia Owen (ap literature book list txt) 📗

sighed and felt sad when Granny left. Mammy was already back upstairs.

‘Come straight up and help me now, Cynthia,’ she shouted. I couldn’t tell her mood from her voice, and I felt a bit worried. Was she angry with me? I wasn’t sure.

As soon as I walked into the front bedroom, Mammy marched over to the bed I often shared with Daddy and pulled the bedclothes off in a fury. My heart sank. She was in a bad mood, and I was about to find out why.

Her eyes were flashing, and she was dragging furiously on a cigarette. I picked up a doll off the floor and started playing with it absentmindedly.

Mammy started talking to herself, saying something about Daddy ‘playing with himself ’. I didn’t know what she meant, and I didn’t know whether she wanted me to say something, so I sat on the floor and carried on playing with my doll, keeping my head bowed.

‘Dirty bastard!’ she complained. ‘Playing with himself!’ What could she mean? I never saw Daddy play any games. He never played with me, so what game was he playing with himself? I didn’t dare ask.

‘Can’t you hear me, Cynthia? Can’t you hear what I’m saying?’

‘Yes, Mammy,’ I muttered.

‘Your father’s a dirty bastard. He’s playing with himself, didn’t you hear what I said?’

‘I don’t understand, Mammy. Are you cross because he’s playing by himself and he doesn’t play with us?’

‘No, Cynthia, not playing by himself, playing WITH himself.’

She was absolutely furious now. She threw a pile of bedclothes on the floor and started moving her hand up and down dramatically in front of her private parts, to act out what she meant. It reminded me of the way Daddy made me rub him up and down on his private parts, but surely Mammy wasn’t talking about that? I felt hot and embarrassed.

‘Why would he do that?’ I asked, totally at sea.

‘To make stuff come out of him!’ she screeched. I was getting frightened now. ‘Come and look! Come and look at the sheets!’ I trailed to the bed, the doll dangling by one arm at my side, and dutifully looked at the pale stain on the grey sheet. There was blood on the sheet too, and I realized it was my blood, because Daddy hurt me so much sometimes I bled.

I didn’t know what to say. Mammy was livid. She was spitting when she spoke, just like Mother Dorothy did when she caned me, and like Daddy had done once when he couldn’t get the leather belt buckled across my chest.

I said nothing at all and looked at the floor, waiting for the moment to end. Eventually Mammy wore herself out with her ranting and raving and went downstairs swearing and cursing my father.

The next night, I dreaded the moment Granny said, ‘I’ll be off now!’

As soon as the words came out of her lips, I shot to my feet and offered to walk her home. ‘No, Cynthia,’ Mammy glared. ‘You’re to help me with the beds again.’

I started to tremble when I walked up the stairs.

This time Mammy searched the bedclothes and seemed to find nothing. ‘Where is it?’ she said frantically. Then she started rummaging in the chest of drawers by the bed.

‘Is it on his shirt? Dirty bastard! What’s he done with his dirty shirt?’

I felt very scared of Mammy. While she rummaged and cursed, her eyes darted around wildly and her red hair shot out around her like wildfire.

‘I don’t know, Mammy,’ I said, whenever I thought one of her questions was directed at me. I just wanted this to stop.

This frightening routine went on for many weeks. I started to see that if Mammy couldn’t find a stain on the sheets, that was the worst possible thing. She went mad and started clawing through all of Daddy’s shirts saying, ‘I’ll find it! Dirty bastard!’ Whenever she did find a stain, it calmed her immediately.

But on one occasion she found no stain at all, anywhere. ‘What’s going on?’ she demanded of me. I sat wide-eyed on the floor, picking at my feet nervously.

I thought back to the night before. Was she asking me if Daddy had made a stain in bed last night? How could I answer? When I told her I didn’t like what Daddy did in bed she told me it was all in my imagination, he was just rolling over drunk, so what could I say? What did she want me to say? A horrible wave of panic crept over me. Was she cross that Daddy hadn’t touched me last night?

Suddenly Mammy was standing over me. My mind panicked and whirled so much, little black patches appeared in front of my eyes. Something was happening I really didn’t like.

I was on the bed now. I had clothes on the top half of my body, but my skirt and knickers had gone. What was happening? I was trembling. What was Mammy doing? What was she looking for?

Her head was between my legs. I looked at her face in horror. There were deep, angry frown lines etched into her forehead.

I let out a shrill cry. Mammy was biting me in between my legs. ‘Mammy, please…’

‘Shut up, you little bitch!’

‘But Mammy I don’t like it.’

She carried on, gnawing at me. I wanted to shrivel up and die. Not Mammy as well. I started to struggle and begged her to stop, but Mammy gripped my hips tight with her fingernails, just like Daddy did sometimes.

‘Lie still, or I will make it hurt! Lie still or I will bite you!’

When she finally left me alone, I tried to get my brain working again. It felt thick and clouded, like it usually did these days. But I thought I had worked it out. If she thought Daddy hadn’t done anything to me the night before, she did that the next day.

It went on for a long time. I started to stagger round like a zombie at school. I mucked about with my friends