A Sister's Secret Read online

  ‘Oh Debbie, your father’s been back and taken all of my clothes to give to his fancy woman,’ she sobbed.

  I didn’t know what a fancy woman was but I could see that Mum’s wardrobe was completely empty.

  ‘He’s taken all of the food vouchers too,’ she wept.

  I knew this was bad news. Every week the Social would give us food vouchers which Mum would use at the local shop. She needed them to feed us all as she could never rely on Dad, who would normally spend his wages in the pub.

  ‘Don’t cry, Mummy,’ I said. ‘You can borrow some of my clothes if you want.’

  At least that made her smile.

  That night as Laraine and I went to our room, I noticed Mum sat on her bed taking her tablets. For as long as I could remember, she always had a brown glass bottle that the doctor had given her on her bedside table. She had a blank look on her face as she calmly popped pill after pill into her mouth.

  ‘Night night, Mummy,’ I said, but it was like she was in a daze and she didn’t reply.

  The next morning I woke up. Normally Mum would be up first, making us some breakfast, but the house was eerily quiet. I went into her room but she was still asleep. Davina was lying next to her in her cot, babbling away.

  ‘Mum, can we have some toast?’ I asked.

  She didn’t stir.

  ‘Mummy,’ I said, tapping her arm. ‘Wake up. I’m hungry.’

  By then David had come in too.

  ‘Mummy looks funny,’ he said.

  Now I was really starting to panic. She was all floppy like a rag doll and I just knew something was wrong.

  ‘Please wake up, Mummy,’ I said, shaking her as hard as I could.

  She started to moan and drool dribbled out of the corner of her mouth.

  Suddenly I heard the front door go and Dad sauntered in, like he’d just been to the shops. I ran to the top of the stairs and shouted, ‘Mummy won’t wake up.’

  He rushed up, took one look at Mum and picked up the empty bottle of tablets lying beside her on the bed.

  ‘Jesus, she’s taken the bloody lot! I’d better phone 999,’ he said, his face ashen.

  The next few hours were all a blur. I remember an ambulance pulling up outside. David, Laraine and I huddled on the stairs in our pyjamas while paramedics rushed up past us to Mum’s bedroom. Dad paced up and down, holding Davina who was howling.

  Eventually they carried Mum out on a stretcher.

  ‘Where are you taking her?’ I asked them. ‘Is she going to die?’

  Nobody answered. Dad took Davina with him and followed them to the hospital in his old blue Humber.

  By then a man had arrived who said he was a social worker.

  ‘What’s one of them?’ I asked.

  ‘Your mummy’s not very well so I’m going to take you somewhere else to stay until she gets better,’ he explained.

  He helped me pack a little bag for each of the three of us. Just a few clothes as we didn’t really have many toys. He led David and me to his car, leaving Laraine looking out of the front window, tears running down her face. She looked how we all felt – frightened, bewildered, confused.

  ‘What about my sister?’ I asked the social worker as he started the engine. ‘Can’t she come with us too?’

  He shook his head.

  ‘I’m afraid your foster mother can only take two children at a time, so Laraine is going to your aunt’s in Gillingham.’

  David and I held hands on the back seat. It felt like we were driving for hours and eventually we pulled up outside a brick terraced house. It was a lot nicer than anywhere we had ever lived but not one single part of me wanted to be there.

  ‘You’re going to stay here with Mrs Mason for a while,’ said the social worker, letting us out of the car.

  He rang the doorbell and waited. David looked terrified.

  ‘Don’t worry,’ I told him, squeezing his hand. ‘She might be kind.’

  But there was nothing kind or welcoming about the woman who opened the door to us. She was smartly dressed in a flowery blouse and skirt with a checked apron over the top but I thought that she looked like a witch. She had a thin, pointy face and her mousey brown hair was scraped back into a ponytail. She didn’t say a word to us, and she and the social worker went into another room to talk.

  ‘Well, I suppose I’d better take you to your room,’ she said finally when he’d gone.

  We followed her up the stairs to a bedroom. It had nets on the small window as well as thick curtains and it seemed so dark. There were flowers everywhere – on the wallpaper and the curtains, and even the bedspreads on the two single beds had a chintzy floral pattern on them. It made me feel dizzy.

  ‘I want my mummy!’ sobbed David.

  ‘Well, she isn’t here and I don’t want any moaning,’ she said. ‘If you’re going to make a fuss then you can stay in your room.’

  We sat there for hours until it got dark. David cried the whole afternoon.

  That night a man came in to see us. He was a tall, stocky bloke with a bushy dark beard and moustache.

  ‘This is my husband,’ Mrs Mason told us. ‘Say hello to him, children.’

  ‘Hello, Mr Mason,’ I said.

  ‘Oh no, child, we would like you to call us Auntie and Uncle,’ she insisted.

  David just scowled.

  ‘I’m hungry,’ he told her.

  We hadn’t eaten anything all day.

  ‘Well, you’ve been very naughty, carrying on and making a fuss, so you two will be having tea on the stairs.’

  She led us down the steep wooden staircase which had an orange and brown paisley runner on it. We sat down at the bottom on the garish carpet.

  ‘No,’ said Auntie. ‘Sit on the wooden bits either side.’

  She gave us a marmalade sandwich each and went into the front room. As we sat on the hard, wooden stairs, shivering with cold, I could see her and Uncle through a crack in the door. They were sat around a huge dining table, tucking into some sort of stew that smelt delicious.

  I was scared and miserable but I knew I had to be brave for David’s sake. That night I couldn’t sleep because I was so worried about Mum. Was she dead? Would we ever see her again? Was Laraine OK?

  I could hear David sobbing.

  ‘I want Mummy!’ he wept.

  ‘Come and sleep in my bed, Davey,’ I said and we cuddled up under the scratchy sheets.

  Time passed so slowly and every day was the same. Auntie would make us sit in our bedroom all day. We didn’t have any toys to play with or anything to do and the curtains were always closed, so we never saw daylight. I’d never felt so sad. Auntie would bring us up a plate of marmalade sandwiches twice a day. That was unless she said that we’d been naughty and then we had to sit on the stairs for hours.

  We’d been there a week, I think, when one evening Auntie came into our bedroom.

  ‘I thought I would read you both a bedtime story,’ she said kindly.

  She carried David across to my bed and she sat in between us.

  ‘That’s what my mummy does,’ I told her.

  Auntie had a big book of nursery rhymes and she read us one about some children called Jack and Jill. Maybe she’s not so bad, I thought.

  The next night she came in and read to us again. This time she had a book called The Famous Five. It was about four children who went on lots of adventures and my favourite bits were about Timmy the dog.

  ‘Thank you, Auntie,’ I said. ‘I love doggies.’

  Perhaps she did like us, after all. One evening Auntie came into our bedroom for stories wearing a long nightdress and a pink quilted dressing gown. I didn’t think there was anything odd about this as we were in our nightclothes, too.

  This time she got into bed with us rather than sitting on top of the flowery quilt.

  ‘Oh, Auntie loves you both so much,’ she said.

  I closed my eyes and pretended it was Mum putting her arm around us and not Auntie.

  The following nig
ht she took off her dressing gown and long flowery nightie before the stories started.

  ‘Auntie, you’ll get cold with no clothes on,’ I told her.

  ‘Well, we’d all better cuddle up then to keep warm,’ she said, getting into bed with David and I.

  She snuggled up to us and read us a story.

  ‘I love you both so much,’ she said afterwards.

  Suddenly I felt her hands rummaging beneath the sheets and I realised she was touching me under my nightie.

  ‘Auntie, that tickles,’ I said at first.

  But I was frozen with fear as her cold hands wandered from my tummy to down between my legs.

  ‘Auntie loves you both so much,’ she said, turning her attentions to David.

  I was four years old. I didn’t understand what was happening but I knew I didn’t like this touching game. David and I were too scared to say anything.

  Another evening Auntie was in bed with us when Uncle came in. The door to our bedroom was a big double door with a panel at the top and I saw his piggy eyes and bristly moustache peering through the glass at the three of us. He must have just got in from work because he was wearing a suit.

  ‘Oh look, Uncle has come to say goodnight, too,’ she said.

  David and I watched confused as he took off his jacket, trousers and shirt until he was stood there in his white string vest and purple paisley underpants.

  He got into the bed with us.

  ‘Have you had a lovely story, children?’ he said, pressing himself up against me.

  ‘Please, Robert,’ Auntie told him. ‘Don’t hurt the children. Let me do it.’

  ‘No, Ruby, it’s my turn,’ he said. ‘Why should you have all the fun?’

  Then to my horror, I realised he was touching me and then David too. He was rougher than Auntie and he had fat hairy fingers like sausages that really hurt me when they poked and prodded inside me.

  We were both terrified. Afterwards David stayed in my bed, shaking like a leaf.

  ‘I want to go home,’ he told me.

  ‘Me too,’ I said.

  This happened night after night. It was always the same routine. Auntie would come in first for stories and Uncle would arrive later. He did things to me that hurt so much I was almost grateful when it was just Auntie doing the touching.

  One night I even thanked her.

  ‘Thank you, Auntie, for not letting Uncle hurt us,’ I said.

  She smiled and said, ‘You know we’re only doing this because we love you.’

  Afterwards, without saying a word, they would calmly get dressed and walk out. It was miserable. The days were so long and boring but I dreaded it getting dark because that meant it would be time for bed.

  ‘I don’t want no stories, Deb,’ David would tell me.

  But we were both too scared to say that to Auntie and Uncle.

  One morning, when we had been there for two months, Auntie came into our bedroom.

  ‘Come with me,’ she said to David and I.

  She led us down the landing into a tiny box room. There was hardly any furniture in there except a tatty wooden cot in the corner and stood up in it was a little girl.

  ‘Laraine!’ I yelled.

  David and I were so pleased to see our little sister and she gave us a big grin. She’d always been small for her age but she looked so tiny and frail.

  ‘She’s been very unhappy and refusing to eat at your aunt’s so the social worker thought she might be more settled here,’ Auntie told us.

  I was so happy to see her but at the same time my heart sank. Please don’t let them read stories to Laraine, I prayed. She was two years old, practically a baby.

  But we didn’t see much of Laraine. Auntie wouldn’t let her come into the bedroom with us during the day. She had to stay in her cot in her room. Sometimes we could hear her crying and one afternoon, I couldn’t take it any more.

  ‘I’m going to check on Laraine,’ I told David.

  ‘Auntie will be cross,’ he said.

  But I didn’t care. I just needed to know that my baby sister was all right. As I crept across the landing, my heart thumped out of my chest as I heard Auntie in the kitchen downstairs.

  Poor Laraine was just stood there in her cot. It was freezing cold but all she was wearing was a terry-towelling nappy which was so heavy with wee, it was hanging down to her knees.

  ‘It’s OK, Lal,’ I said, giving her a kiss. ‘Don’t cry. We’re only down the hall.’

  Laraine smiled but her big brown eyes looked so sad.

  ‘Mummy,’ she said.

  ‘I know, I want Mummy, too,’ I told her.

  Every day I hoped and prayed that we would see Mummy again but Auntie wouldn’t answer any of my questions. I didn’t know where she was or if she was alive or dead.

  But I was the eldest and I knew that I had to be brave for David and Laraine. I would only cry when I was sure that David was asleep, then I’d let the tears fall until my pillow was soaked through and my eyes were puffy and swollen. I hated this place and I hated Auntie and Uncle and everything they did to us. I was terrified, too. Terrified that we would never see Mum again and that we’d have to stay here forever. Would we ever get out of here and go home?

  Chapter 2

  Going Home

  It was three long months before we finally received a little ray of hope.

  Auntie came into our bedroom one morning and said, ‘I’m taking you to see your mother today.’

  None of us could believe it, we were so happy. I was just relieved that she was still alive. I was allowed to go and tell Laraine.

  ‘We’re going to see Mummy, Lal,’ I said, picking her up out of her cot and swinging her round.

  Her little face lit up. Poor thing must have been so confused by everything that had happened to her.

  Auntie drove us there in her orange Austin Allegro. It seemed to take forever before we pulled up outside a big brick building that she said was called Redhill General Hospital. We walked down lots of corridors until we got to a big room full of people. They were all sat in chairs chatting and there amongst them I spotted Mum with Davina lying next to her in a yellow carrycot. I couldn’t believe it was really her. She looked happy and Davina had got so big.

  ‘Mummy!’ I said, running over to her.

  We were all crying by the time she threw her arms around us.

  ‘I’ve missed you all so much,’ she said, showering us with kisses. For the first time in months, I felt safe.

  ‘Did the doctors make you better, Mummy?’ I asked as Laraine clambered onto her knee.

  She smiled and said, ‘Much better, darling. They’ve given me some medicine and I’ve had a good rest.’

  There was so much I wanted to tell her about Auntie and Uncle, the marmalade sandwiches and the horrible bedtime stories. But Auntie insisted on sitting with us in the visitor’s room, her beady eyes never leaving us for a second.

  ‘Daddy’s been writing to me in hospital and he said he’s going to get us a new house,’ Mum told us. ‘It’s going to be in London, near to Granddad George. Won’t that be nice?’

  Even the thought of having to live with Dad didn’t dampen my spirits as long as we were far away from Auntie and Uncle and back with Mum again.

  ‘Did you like the parcels I sent you?’ Mum asked. ‘I know you all love sweeties and I put some colouring books and pencils in there so you could do some drawing, Debbie.’

  I was about to tell her that we’d never got any parcels when suddenly Auntie jumped up.

  ‘Right, time to go now, children, your mother needs to rest,’ she said.

  I saw the panic in Laraine’s face.

  ‘No!’ she screamed, clamping her arms tightly around Mum’s waist. ‘Stay with Mummy.’

  Auntie had to literally drag her off Mum’s knee as she kicked and struggled with all her might. I didn’t want to go either, but I was too scared to say anything.

  Mum started to cry.

  ‘I’m so sorry. I
love you all so much and it won’t be long until the doctors say we can be together again.’

  She gave us all a hug and a kiss before Auntie ushered us out. I took Laraine’s hand and I literally had to drag her down the corridors and out to the car. She was crying so much, she could barely breathe. Her and David sobbed all the way home but I just felt numb. I missed Mummy so much and as we pulled up outside Auntie’s house, I felt sick.

  I didn’t want to go back there. I didn’t want to sit in that bedroom hour after hour, dreading it getting dark because that meant it was time for stories.

  ‘You’ve all been so naughty you can go to bed without any sandwiches,’ Auntie told us.

  But I didn’t care any more. I was too sad to even feel hungry.

  When you’re four years old you have no concept of time but it felt like we had lived with Auntie and Uncle forever. Being in that house had affected all of us. David started to stutter so badly that he stopped talking altogether. Laraine became more and more withdrawn and would sit in her cot, hardly making a noise. I tried to be brave for the two little ones but it felt like I had a big knot in my tummy that wouldn’t go away.

  One day Auntie took us out to the local shops, which only happened once in a blue moon. Even though it was a cloudy day it was nice to be outside in the fresh air, away from our flowery bedroom prison. Auntie pushed Laraine there in a blue and white pushchair but on the way back, she put her shopping bags in it instead.

  ‘You’ll have to walk,’ she said to Laraine.

  ‘Pushchair,’ said Laraine, pointing at the buggy but Auntie shook her head.

  ‘I said walk,’ she told her.

  Laraine started to cry and stopped dead in the middle of the pavement.

  ‘Want pushchair,’ she said, stamping her feet.

  I could see Auntie was furious and she marched over and kicked her hard up the bottom. Laraine fell over and landed head first onto the cobbles.

  ‘Leave my sister alone!’ I shouted, rushing over to see if she was OK.

  Poor Laraine had cut her head and was beside herself. Auntie marched us all home without saying a word. As soon as the front door closed, she lost it.

  ‘Get up to your room,’ she yelled at Laraine. ‘And you two sit on the stairs until I say you can move.’