THE TIP OF THE BRIMSTONE - PART 3
TIMELINE OF ABUSE – PART TWO
1977
I remember a lot of events from my childhood like it
was yesterday. ‘Micha’ came down to the house in [DELETED] with ‘Edward’ and
‘Sharleen’, but ‘Lilith’ took me on ahead. It was my birthday. I was four. It
was one of only a few we celebrated. ‘Sharleen’ always threw a party for me
before the school holidays ended. ‘Lilith’ never bothered. When I was younger I
use to ask why. After the first few years and the beatings I got for asking, I
stopped. ‘Lilith’ would throw big parties for ‘Micha’ though. That day, though,
she drove into a street on the southern side of the [DELETED] Highway and
parked the car. We sat there and ‘Lilith’ smoked her cigarettes while she
watched a house at the bottom of the ‘L’ shaped corner until a car pulled into
the driveway. A woman got out with a little boy. Then ‘Lilith’ took me over and
banged on the door. The woman that answered went very pale when she saw us and
‘Lilith’ pushed her way inside before arguing with the woman in her kitchen. I
was left to play with the little boy and his Matchbox cars in their
lounge-room. He looked almost exactly like me. We could have been twins. His
name was ‘James’. It was his birthday too. They had just returned from a party
his grandparents had thrown for him. His mother gave me one of ‘James’ presents.
It was a plastic sheet with black lines drawn on it to
represent roads so you could drive on it with Matchbox cars and colour it in
with crayons. ‘Lilith’ gave that present to the kindergarten I attended, next
to the council swimming pool in the middle of town, and denied the incident had
ever occurred. And yet my kindergarten teacher, over a decade later, was
stunned by my recall of events while I was there and confirmed that the gift
had been donated. She remembered because I had played with it every day and
asked when I could see ‘James’ again. ‘Lilith’ would often lie about
events, and questioning her resulted in being beaten. She also fabricated most
of her life, adopting the events of her father’s childhood and claiming them as
her own. She had difficulty dealing with reality.
After that visit, ‘Lilith’ drove to the house.
[DELETED] Street. It was one of only a few on a dusty dirt street surrounded by
paddocks. This would be where we lived for the next eight years. ‘Lilith’ would
claim in the years to come that she had purchased and moved into the house in
1979. I don’t know why. I remember though. I remember the painter that lived in
a caravan in the back yard for three weeks while he painted the house. I
remember the beatings and her drunken binges. I remember the fights she had
with Mrs ‘Dunstan’ in [DELETED] (next door). I remember ‘Peter’ [DELETED], the
plumber she dated who would often look after me and ‘Micha’ while she worked at
the hospital or just had some alone time. He’d take us to [DELETED] where he
and his brother and another guy had purchased the latest run-down home they
planned to renovate and sell. He was a good guy and a lot of my own
personality, I suspect, was assimilated from his. I remember ‘Tracy’ visiting
and taking us the zoo out toward [DELETED], and visiting her parents. She spent
a lot of time with us, mostly with me. A lot of my personality is probably hers
too. I remember almost everything.
After the kindergarten year ended, ‘Lilith’ took
‘Micha’ and me to a picnic out at a farm on the road from [DELETED] to
[DELETED]. There were a lot of families there. It was on a hill overlooking
[DELETED] and a Santa arrived in a crop duster and then dropped Minties and
boiled lollies from it when he left. All the kids scrambled to collect them.
‘Micha’ was too small to collect many so ‘Lilith’ instructed me to collect as
many Minties as I could. I only liked boiled lollies but ‘Lilith’ told me not
to collect any. I collected some despite this. ‘Lilith’ searched me and had a
look of glee on her face when she found them. She gave away all of those
lollies and then we left. She was taking us to her parents for the Christmas
holidays. She stopped on the way at a secluded spot and made sure there were no
sounds of approaching traffic, then beat me with a stick for defying her. She’d
yank down my pants and haul me into the air by my left arm, thrashing me as I
dangled and span until she exhausted herself. She always looked pleased with
herself when she was done. It usually left me barely able to stand and I’d
often vomit again from the pain. It wasn’t the only time and happened most
trips.
1978
My Prep teacher at Primary School was Miss Brown. I
liked school. It was like kindergarten and meant time away from ‘Lilith’. I was
very small, pale and thin with bruises and welts all over me. The teachers
never commented on them. I was one of only a few kids that wore the regulation
uniform. Grey shorts, blue, short-sleeved button-up shirt with a collar, and
pale brown socks with (of all things) sandals. It made me an even more obvious
target for bullies. [DELETED] and [DELETED] were the worst, but there were
others, and the teachers rarely intervened. Despite that, I excelled at school
and maintained relatively good grades despite ‘Lilith’s’ brutality and then the
bullying at school. I spent a lot of time in the library, reading. I can still
name and describe almost all of the other kids that were in my classes. I don’t
have any photographs. ‘Lilith’ never let me keep any copies of the ones from
school or the ones she took. She rarely let me look at them but I can still
remember those faded pictures from the few times I did see them. A lot of the
other kids liked me but I found it hard to make friends, especially with
‘Lilith’ doing her utmost to isolate me.
Apparently, I wet the bed until I was four. I never
slept well. ‘Lilith’ would blast music out on her stereo-record player until
the small hours of the morning. I’d sneak out to take the needle off when it
started scratching, put out the cigarette clamped and burning between
‘Lilith’s’ fingers, move the (often broken) glass away from her feet, and turn
the radiator off. Her legs were often burnt due to the proximity of the thing,
and many times she would cut her feet on glass and bleed all over the carpet in
her drunken meanderings. She often smashed things (she had a small fish-tank on
the toilet that would end up shattered in the bowl every few weeks), throw
linen out of cupboards onto the floor or simply come in and lie on top of me
during the night. I remember once she held me down and I very nearly passed out
because I couldn’t breathe with her on me. She’d eventually get off and either
stand there glaring at me, or just start hitting, then leave the room.
In the morning, she’d blame me for whatever mess she’d
made and beat me with whatever came to hand, hauling me into the air by my left
arm and just swing away with her weapon of choice while I dangled, helpless.
That was the year she purchased her riding crop. Those things can’t even be used
on horses anymore, so I’ve heard, but ‘Lilith’ would haul back and lay into me
with it almost every day. I’d go to school with three or four stripes visible
on my arms and legs, and a whole bunch more under my shorts and shirt. The
teachers never commented on the welts and bruises. If I made the mistake of
waking her from her drunken slumber by turning off her stereo and cleaning up,
she would scream abuse and lay into me until she passed out and I could crawl
back to bed.
And yet when I stayed at my grandparents during the
few visits ‘Lilith’ allowed, I did not wet the bed. I always felt safe there.
So the bed wetting, it seems, may have been a psychological response to fear.
Or it may not have been me at all. But ‘Lilith’ used it as part of a vindictive
campaign to isolate me from other kids. She’d insist ‘Micha’ be allowed to play
with my friends and then tear me down in front of them even as she built him
up. Telling people I wet the bed was just one of her nastier methods. Accusing
me of being lazy and jealous of my brother, belittling me, calling me
derogatory names, and telling people I couldn’t be trusted were others. She
projected her own and ‘Micha’s’ worst qualities onto me to destroy my
relationships with relatives and friends for no other reason than she could, as
far as I can tell. She seemed to enjoy it. She rewarded ‘Micha’ with toys and
lollies if he adopted the same practices. This went on my entire life.
I was never allowed to play with any of ‘Micha’s’ friends
and, more often than not, my friends would soon be his and no longer speak to
me. Worse, many would soon start bullying me. “Why didn’t you tell me you’d wet
the bed!” ‘Lilith’ would scream so the whole street could hear. This accusation
was made with no cause and one that continued until I was ten. It was a tactic
designed to humiliate me and leave me a target for mockery and bullying. When
‘Micha’ realised he would get rewards for dobbing me in for whatever ‘Lilith’
considered an infraction worthy of a beating, he began making his own unfounded
accusations. That’s what shaped his personality. He quickly began to adopt the
same behaviour, belittling and bullying others to make himself look better.
I started washing my own sheets at the age of three-and-a-half.
I’d watched ‘Lilith’ do it and used a chair to reach the machine and
clothes-line. If I was lucky, I could wash and dry them, then get them back on
the bed before she woke up around noon. If I was unlucky, ‘Micha’ would tell
her what I’d done and the hairbrush would come out. As a punishment for trying
to “deceive” her, ‘Lilith’ decided I could do all the laundry, dishes and other
domestic tasks. By the time I was five she no longer did any of the household
tasks. They became my “chores”. ‘Micha’ never had to do these things. “It’s
because I wanted him,” she would tell me, “and I never wanted you!” The “I hate
you”, “You ruined my life”, “you’re just like ‘Claud’”, and “you’re an ugly,
stupid little toad” comments were repeated every day. That’s what she called
me: Toad. She’d sneer the word and then smirk as other kids mocked me. I once
asked her, years later, why she did those things, the beatings and
psychological nastiness. “Because I can and nobody will stop me,” she had said
and smiled vindictively.
The teachers told at the kindergarten had told
‘Lilith’ that I might be gifted. I was reading by the time I started
kindergarten. ‘Sharleen’ had read to me every day during the few visits
‘Lilith’ allowed. When ‘Sharleen’ wasn’t around I’d repeat what she had read to
me. I just memorised the words, but when I started kindergarten the words on
the pages just made sense. The kindergarten teachers had asked me to read other
books, and I did. They’d been impressed. It was like the words were just
already there in my head, just waiting to be accessed. The teachers at the
school also thought I might be gifted, and when I was in Grade One the sports
teacher recommended Little Athletics. ‘Lilith’ took me to only a few meets. The
instructor was impressed with my abilities and asked if he could coach me and
enter me in some competitions. ‘Lilith’ looked thrilled. She enjoyed being the
focus of attention. She insisted they let ‘Micha’ try out as well. He was only
three but she insisted he was much better than me in everything. He was not. He
rarely moved and even then would only walk. He was idle and overweight even
back then. The instructor had suggested ‘Lilith’ not smoke around me and ‘Micha’
because it could damage our lungs. Then he asked about the bruises and welts
covering my limbs. ‘Lilith’ never took me back to Little Athletics again.
She said it was too far to travel. The meets were held
at an oval beside the railway line on the east side of [DELETED]. It was near
where Mrs ‘Stain’ lived. She was a war widow who provided looked after children
for cash wages so she could still claim the full pension. ‘Lilith’ had tried a
number of people before she found Mrs ‘Stain’. When ‘Peter’ broke off his
relationship with her she had tried getting her next boyfriend to look after us
like ‘Peter’ had. ‘Jeff Hills’ was the former husband of ‘Barb’, a nurse
‘Lilith’ had worked with. That didn’t last long either. ‘Lilith’ wasn’t a very
nice person and most guys took off as soon as they could. ‘Jeff Hills’ actually
rescued me after I was stung by a jellyfish at [DELETED] during a gathering of
families for a picnic. Three kids had been stung and it was so severe we all
went under, unable to even tread water. I remember ‘Lilith’ just standing
there, on the shore, watching me. She never said a word, just stared with those
cold, empty eyes. ‘Jeff Hills’ saw me go under and didn’t hesitate, rushing in
and dragging me out.
There were a few other people who looked after me and
‘Micha’ but I don’t remember their names. One family lived near the centre of
town, on the south west side of the [DELETED] Highway that passed through
[DELETED], not far from where Ollies Trollies use to be. They had a whole bunch
of other kids there. Some were theirs and others weren’t. They bathed us all,
one after the other, in an old, concrete sink in the laundry. They used yellow soap
to wash our hair. We’d all watch The Hulk and Spiderman cartoons before going
to school. ‘Lilith’ would later deny this ever happened. She did that a lot.
She’d claim things that had happened hadn’t. I don’t know why. Another family
were an older couple with a teenage son that lived right across from the School
Crossing out the side of [DELETED] Primary school. Their son let me play with a
model of an aircraft carrier he had. ‘Micha’ and I would watch the cartoons on
their television in the morning and then go to school when the bell rang. And
there was also ‘Tracy’ who would visit, look after us or take us places.
I have often wondered if how ‘Lilith’ knew ‘Tracy’,
and even why they were friends. They didn’t seem to have much in common. Years
later, ‘Lilith’ would tell us that ‘Tracy’ wouldn’t be visiting anymore, and we
should not speak to her, because she was a heroin addict. ‘Lilith’ said that
about a lot of people. Usually people she didn’t like, or who said things (or
knew things) about her she didn’t want other people to hear. I have often
wondered if ‘Lilith’ and/or ‘Claud’ are actually my biological parents, or if
there’s some deep dark secret behind the efforts she and ‘Claud’ have made to
ensure I never speak to any of their relatives or even ‘Tracy’ ever again.
There has to be a reason why a former police officer and nurse have inflicted
such misery and hell upon their own son other than purely the financial gains
they made by manipulating and deceiving their parents over matters of inheritance.
But given that “allegations” of defamation, stalking, harassment, elder abuse
and potential fraud and suspicious deaths are not the jurisdiction of the
police, and someone like me cannot access private legal assistance to even find
a means to get answers, I guess whatever these secrets are (and what open cases
these might close) will forever remain a mystery.
But when ‘Lilith’ found Mrs ‘Stain’ things became more
organised. She had been looking after a girl called ‘Lauren’ before she agreed
to look after ‘Micha’ and me. ‘Lauren’s’ mum was a nurse too, a single mother
from what ‘Lilith’ said. ‘Lauren’s’ father had taken off, just like ‘Claud’.
‘Lauren’ was a couple of years younger than me, about ‘Micha’s’ age. She was a
pretty little kid with dark brown eyes and spiral curls to match. Her mum would
sometimes look after ‘Micha’ and me and then ‘Lilith’ would return the favour
by looking after ‘Lauren’. The arrangement broke down after about a year when
‘Lilith’ couldn’t be bothered looking after ‘Lauren’ but still expected
‘Lauren’s’ mum to look after me and ‘Micha’. When ‘Lilith’ offered Mrs ‘Stain’
more money to look after both of us instead of ‘Lauren’, the friendship between
‘Lauren’s’ mother and ‘Lilith’ ended altogether. By that stage, ‘Micha’ and I
had spent a lot of time with ‘Lauren’. It was like losing a sister. According
to ‘Lilith’, ‘Lauren’s’ mother was a drug addict and we had to stay away from
them. It’d be almost five years before we saw ‘Lauren’ again.
1979
My Grade One teacher was Mrs ‘Grunt’. She was a
vicious, spiteful old bag of a woman whose bitter divorce left her with a
hatred for all things male. She treated the girls in her class like little
Princesses and made life for the boys miserable. Lunchtime detentions, lines,
and missing art classes were just some of the punishments handed out to all the
boys if even one did something she decided needed punishing. One time I sliced
my knee open on a bin during a game of rounders. It was deep, an inch long, and
bled everywhere. Mrs ‘Grunt’ wouldn’t even let me go to the office for a
band-aide. I had to sit there and hold my hanky on it. I still have the scar. I
was six. The only happy moment, aside from holidays with ‘Edward’ and
‘Sharleen’, was a fishing trip with ‘Harley’ [DELETED]. He had been a cop with
‘Claud’ and eventually became the Chief Prosecutor in [DELETED]. At that time
though, he and his family would often camp on The [DELETED] (about 80 acres on
the [DELETED] River that ‘Edward’ owned) during school holidays. ‘Harley’ took
me fishing on a Monday. I got to cut school for the day. He took me to a
secluded spot on the [DELETED] River beneath the [DELETED] Road. I caught
thirteen fish (he called them Brim) on my line and he caught one on his. After that
he took me for a counter lunch in an east [DELETED] pub. I hated fishing but I
was glad to get out of school for the day. ‘Micha’ was four that year. He was
as big as me by then though. ‘Lilith’ stopped dressing us in matching clothes
around that time. She had been relentless in that practice until then, as if
she was trying to convince everyone we were brothers. But while I was still
malnourished and pale, ‘Micha’ just got bigger.
Meals were something I hated. I was always hungry, but
‘Lilith’ would cook things ‘Micha’ and I didn’t like and mix them in with
things we did. I hated nights where there was liver (with all the wobbly tubes
still in), broad beans, or sprouts, but ‘Lilith’ insisted I eat those before I
got to eat the things I liked. Not ‘Micha’ though. He could eat what he wanted,
and he always got seconds. I got by though. I was able to sneak into the garage
and get into the dry dog food. We had a Labrador called ‘Patrolus’. ‘Lilith’
had named him after ‘Claud’s’ father’s father, who had died the year before I
was born. It was just another one of her nasty, spiteful acts. ‘Patroclus’
didn’t mind me eating his food as long as I shared it with him. But many nights
I’d get a beating and sent to bed hungry. “Eat it, you ungrateful little shit!”
‘Lilith’ would scream. “Or I’ll ram it down your throat with the f**ken broom!”
Most of the time she just hit me with it. One time she actually beat me to my
knees and shoved that vile kidney stuff in my mouth and pushed the handle of
the broom between my teeth. I remember it hurt, a lot. I choked and nearly
fainted. She just gave up and laid into me with the broom handle though. I
hated banana most of all. It’d make my tongue and throat swell up and sting.
Turns out I’m allergic to the stuff. You’d think a nurse would have realised
that, but ‘Lilith’ would still force me to eat it and then lay into me when I
couldn’t swallow.
Her father, ‘Edward’, swore like a shearer. He
actually worked as one for many years, so it made sense. I picked up a few
words as a kid but only used the least offensive. ‘Sharleen’ would look
disappointed and encourage me not to use the words. She’d bribe me with travel
sweets, little boiled lollies she and her mother always seemed to have in a tin
somewhere nearby. One day when I fell off the trampoline I called it a “bastard
of a thing”, one of ‘Edward’s’ favourite expressions. ‘Lilith’ decided I was
such a “f**ken foul-mouthed little shit” she decided she needed to teach me a
lesson. She dragged me inside and shoved a heaped table-spoon of mustard powder
into my mouth, clamped her hand over my face so I couldn’t spit it out, and
demanded “swallow it, you little bastard!” No matter how hard I tried to
swallow, the powder was just too dry and hot and I couldn’t. She laid into me
for disobeying her. That was the year she had purchased her riding crop.
‘Lilith’ had won many ribbons when she was a child
participating in the Pony Club. ‘Edward’ had made sure she could attend the
events because that was what she wanted. He always gave ‘Lilith’ what she
wanted but, sadly, very little of what she needed to mature into a decent human
being. ‘Lilith’ was determined to enter ‘Micha’ and me in Pony Club events in
what seems to have been an attempt to relive her own childhood glory. I really
didn’t like riding much. ‘Edward’ purchased a pony for ‘Micha’ and one for me
because ‘Lilith’ wanted it to happen. Then she put us on and within a few
minutes demanded we trot the animals, and then canter. ‘Edward’ wasn’t around.
I was terrified. I didn’t like being up that high. Fifteen years later an
optometrist told me I was short sighted. That explained a lot. But then, I was
happy for the horse to just walk. ‘Lilith’ wasn’t. She struck the horse with
her riding crop every time I rode past her, causing it to whiney in pain and
lurch forward to get away from her, but I’d haul back on the reins to stop it
cantering. ‘Micha’ didn’t want to canter so she left him alone. ‘Lilith’
decided on a new tactic and started hitting me with the whip each time I rode past.
‘Edward’ arrived in time to see what ‘Lilith’ was doing and told her to stop.
One of her strikes had hit me on the right cheek near the corner of my eye and
by that time my eye was puffed closed.
‘Lilith’ had just stormed off and told him to mind his
own business. The next day ‘Lilith’ decided to take ‘Micha’ and me for a ride
on her old bike. It was a huge, thick-framed, heavy thing that had been stored
in a shed behind the chook-house for over a decade. She went to the top gate
and put ‘Micha’ on the frame in front of her before letting it speed down the
gentle slope of the hill to the back gate of the house. Then it was my turn. I
really didn’t want to have a go. She put me on the pack-rack behind the seat
and told me to lift my legs and keep them out. There was no padding on that
rack and half-way down I begged her to stop because my legs were tired. “Shut
up, you gutless little bastard!” She snarled, and kept going. The bike stoped
when my legs dropped and my right foot went into the spokes. My foot was
twisted at an awkward angle. The pain was intense. The little boot I wore had
been pulled off into the spokes and the right side of my foot was all ripped
and torn, the skin grated off and leaving raw meat underneath. Then it started
to bleed. “Next time I tell you to canter, you better f**ken do it!” ‘Lilith’
said, then left ‘Sharleen’ to look after me. I spent the next six weeks on
crutches with my foot all bandaged up.
1980
Around this time, ‘Lilith’s’ father purchased land at
[DELETED] Hills, just outside [DELETED] on the road to [DELETED]. It had been
owned by the ‘Mutton’ family. ‘Edward’ had worked for them for years. I
remember him buying it. ‘Micha’ and I were with him. ‘Tom’, one of the sons,
had been a teenager and used his pocket knife to cut an apple into pieces for
me. ‘Lilith’s’ father had told Mr ‘Mutton’ he wanted the land for ‘Micha’.
‘Edward’ had raised us with stories of his plans for a legacy. When I was old
enough, he said, he would give me the 180 acres around the house and “The
[DELETED]”, the 80 acres down the road. While he and ‘Sharleen’ planned to give
me the two properties on [DELETED] Road, they planned to buy land for ‘Micha’
too, so we could live near and help one another, hence the 260 acres at
[DELETED] Hills. It was the only thing that made me happy. One day I would get
to live on the farm all the time, with my grandparents, and no ‘Lilith’. When I
was younger, I thought how good it would be to have ‘Micha’ there too. My whole
world comprised of only him and ‘Lilith’, with the occasional visit to ‘Edward’
and ‘Sharleen’, and exceptionally rare visit to see ‘Claud’s’ relatives every
few years. As the years passed, however, ‘Micha’ became less a brother and just
another version of ‘Lilith’, and ‘Edward’s’ plans that were the only thing I
ever wanted became less and less likely to ever happen.
That year ‘Lilith’ decided ‘Micha’ and I would become
musicians. She purchased a piano keyboard, a small one, and took ‘Micha’ and me
to two night lessons. The lessons lasted an hour each, but when we were unable
to play music by the end of the second lesson, that was the end of it. ‘Lilith’
beat me for wasting her time and money. I remember her laying into my hands
with her hair-brush. They were so sore and swollen the next day, and for the
rest of the week, it hurt just to move my fingers. To this day my fingers are
still crooked, unable to open completely to press them flat against a surface.
The same problem is present in my left arm, the one ‘Lilith’ use to dangle me
in the air by while she hit me. There is less movement in it than the right
arm, and I have a permanent shooting pain that radiates down it through the
inside of my elbow to my wrist that will often be there in the morning and last
for hours or even days, the pain lasting for a few moments or even minutes at a
time. The abuse might only last for a brief moment in time, but the memories
and injuries last a lifetime. The most irritating part is not just the pain and
memories, but that nobody cares or wants to hear about what you suffered as a
child, and will treat you as a liar and tell you there’s nothing they can do,
or to “get over it”, because they have no intention of doing anything to help.
But the start of 1980 began with a special treat.
‘Lilith’ had, for no apparent reason, allowed ‘Claud’ to take me and ‘Micha’
over to [DELETED] to see his parents. We hadn’t seen him for years. The last
time had been a short stop on the side of the road between [DELETED] and
[DELETED], just past the [DELETED] Road junction near where the ‘Gibson’ family
use to live. He picked us up in [DELETED] and then drove to Melbourne to see
the secretary who worked for the same sales company he did. He was a [DELETED]
salesman. He sold the shops the machines. The secretary was the widow of one of
the five reporters murdered by the Indonesian army, or so ‘Claud’ said. After
that he drove to a car yard and went inside for about an hour while ‘Micha’ and
I waited in the car. We were bored. ‘Micha’ was only five. Then we went back
through [DELETED] to [DELETED] and then over the hill to [DELETED]. I think
‘Jeff’, ‘Claud’s’ brother, came with us that time. They drove over in a
dirt-buggy he and ‘Claud’ built from a Volkswagen. It wasn’t registered and it
broke down on the way. We spent hours on that lonely dirt road until ‘Jeff’ got
a lift and came back with a truck. I remember the floor-plate beneath the
truck’s pedals fell out on the way to ‘Elisa’ and ‘George’s’ place.
After that visit though, ‘Claud’ went off the plan. He
took us to [DELETED] to visit his sister ‘Maurisa’ and her family. My cousin
‘Myshell’ and I had spent time together four years earlier, and she was pleased
to see me and ‘Micha’ that visit. ‘Claud’ hooked up with some woman he knew and
took her, ‘Micha’, me and ‘Myshell’ to see The Muppet Movie in
a cinema in [DELETED], then to lunch at a bar. After he dropped ‘Myshell’ off,
he drove me and ‘Micha’ to [DELETED] to see his sister ‘Lorynne’ and her family
instead of taking us back to his parents in [DELETED]. Then he left us there.
He said he’d be back the next day, but almost a week went by before someone
came to get us. There was no word from ‘Claud’. ‘Lilith’ had called his parents
to ask why we hadn’t come back. They’d called everyone they could think of but
hadn’t even considered calling ‘Lilith’. It was actually ‘Lorynne’ that called
them to ask where ‘Claud’ was and when he was going to collect us. That visit
was terrifying. ‘Lorynne’ and her husband left ‘Micha’ and me to sleep in the
bungalow at night. It was behind a shed outside their house. ‘Lorynne’ had even
threatened to beat me after ‘Micha’ had thrown a plastic shovel onto the shed
roof during the second day of our visit. I didn’t know if she was serious. I
was very relieved when I saw ‘Claud’s’ brother ‘Lorenzo’ coming up their long
driveway in his ute. He looked relieved to see us. ‘Lilith’ and ‘Patroclus’
were with him. The dog was pleased to see me and ‘Micha’, but ‘Lilith’ looked
sullen and then furious. The next day ‘Lilith’ drove ‘Micha’ and me back to
[DELETED]. The school year started the next day. My teacher was Mr ‘Gork’.
Nobody heard from ‘Claud’ until Christmas of that year. Apparently, he never
even mentioned what had happened, and refused to answer questions. I often
wonder why he did that.
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