Chapter One
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Friday 25th October 1996
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I scanned the local weekly newspaper for the story. I had bought the paper on the way home from school, stuffed it in my school bag and took it to my bedroom so that father wouldn’t see it. It was on page three, not quite front-page news; that had been taken by the account of the visit by the Queen and the Duke of Edinburgh to the town that week. I read it slowly devouring every word, wanting to make sure that the details were correct.
Local woman hangs herself. Betty Nicholson was found hanging from the rafters in the kitchen of the family home on Wednesday 23rd October 1996 by her daughter, who tried without success to halt the attempt. The woman was described by neighbours as quiet and a loving mother to two adorable children who kept herself to herself. Her husband, a man of few words, has said it was a terrible accident.
Huh, I sneered, the article made her sound like a brilliant mother, if only they’d known what she was really like, quiet yes, unless she was shouting at us, loving, no, certainly not how we would describe it. I don’t remember much of my early childhood at all but what I can remember is not feeling happy. I didn’t know happy existed except at school. I loved going to school, it was a place I could escape to and feel safe, I could ask questions and not get a slap for being silly or asking a stupid question. I could laugh with my classmates and play games in break times; I could be myself. It wasn’t until I left home altogether that I found that happy wasn’t just a school thing. Looking back, I would describe home as dark and school as light.
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I have no idea why our parents had my brother and me, they didn’t seem to show us the love that I’d seen friends receive from their parents. Birthday presents were a box of Maltesers and a cheap birthday card, the price was often left on the back of the card, while Christmas presents were never the longed-for toys we’d seen advertised on the television or in newspapers or that our friends talked about. If we were lucky, we got a book each and a single game between us. I don’t think it was because money was hard to come by. Father worked at the same place many of our friends’ fathers worked at, and they seemed to have good presents for birthday and Christmas, some of them at Easter as well. We never had chocolate eggs at Easter, but we did both receive new clothes. Mine was always a single dress, as I’d be growing out of the previous year’s offering and my brother always received a new pair of trousers.
We both detested going back to school after Christmas when everyone discussed the wonderful presents they’d had. We soon became aware of our shortcomings in the world of gifts and learnt to make things up, generally the gifts we would have liked to have received. Our friends would never know if we were telling the truth or not as they never came to our home. Of course, we never had birthday parties either and most definitely not allowed to go to our friends’ parties.
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We were never really naughty, just inquisitive, as children are. Our parents thought they needed to chastise us every day and this was usually left to our mother who would use one of our father’s leather belts to give us a good hiding, ends held together often gave a double strike.
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One occasion I got the belt for was just for asking why my brother and I had different surnames. ‘Because those are the names you were given.’ She said without any further explanation. ‘Now I don’t want you asking questions like that again, stand still so I know you won’t forget.’ With that I felt the belt sting the back of my legs, not once, but twice. Looking back, I can only think that this was how they’d been treated by their own parents, so they didn’t know to treat us any different, perhaps to them it was the norm.
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It was the school holidays; October half term and we were bored stiff. Family outings were something that our friends enjoyed, not us. We weren’t even allowed to go on outings with friends when invited. Our mother would politely decline and say she’d already made plans for us. This usually meant we were doing housework under her strict scrutiny.
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This particular day, I’d been cleaning the copper-based pans. I’d done such a good job of them that I could see my face in the bottom of them. I smiled, pleased with myself. This was a huge mistake on my part. My mother had come into the kitchen and seen me. ‘That pan is far from perfect, give it another clean, or I’ll give you something to smile about.’ She had snarled.
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I was daft enough to respond. ‘But if I scrub it any further it will have a hole in it.’
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She saw red and came at me with the broom she was holding. If looks could kill I would certainly have been dead in an instant. In defence I walloped her with the pan. She fell to the floor in a heap and didn’t move. The only sound was the broom clattering onto the floor tiles beside her. My brother who had been watching through the kitchen windows flew in through the door his eyes and mouth wide open.
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‘You’re for it now,’ he whispered, ‘she’ll never let you forget this, she’ll beat you till you bleed, or worse.’
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‘I’m not going to give her the chance,’ I hissed. ‘I’ve had enough, she has to be stopped. There’s some rope in dad’s shed, go and get it quickly.’
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He stood there looking at me, grinned and ran off, returning minutes later with the rope.
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‘What happens now, we never speak of, right?’ I spat in my hand and held it out to him.
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‘Agreed.’ He smiled.
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He spat in his and we shook hands to form a bond then held each other tight.
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‘First of all,’ I took charge, ‘we need to get this rope over that rafter.’
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My brother leapt up onto the table and managed to get the rope over the wood. I managed to tie a noose on one end and put it over our mother’s head.
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‘Right, now help me pull on this rope and we’ll tie it to the range. Then I want you to get out of here. You can come back when Dad gets home.’
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He looked at me and smiled at me in a way that said thank you. He’d always received more beatings than I had, perhaps because he was older than me. I pushed the table out of the way and knocked a chair over so that it looked like she’d stood on the chair and kicked it out of the way, and then I pulled on my mother’s legs to make sure the rope had done its work. I heard the garden gate swing open. Our father was home from work. When he came into the kitchen, he found me trying to support my mother, and I was sobbing hysterically.
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‘I tried to stop her, I cried, I really did.’
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He pushed me out of the way and pushed the chair underneath her feet then found the carving knife in the kitchen drawer and cut through the rope. My mother flopped down onto the floor completely lifeless.
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‘Go and find your brother then run next door and tell the neighbour I need her to call the police and an ambulance.’
I honestly don’t think I’d ever heard him speak so many words in the same sentence before. I stood looking at him, wondering if I’d really heard him.
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‘GO.’ He shouted.
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I looked back as I left the kitchen. He was stroking her face and hair, tears rolling down his face. Oh how I wish he’d shown me and my brother that sort of love. I can’t remember being hugged or kissed by my parents.
Child of integrity, hath from my soul
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Wiped the black scruples, reconciled my thoughts.
The neighbour called the police and we were ushered away lest we see the grisly scene. I rather think they’d forgotten I was there having supposedly found her. We were treated to sandwiches, crisps, chocolate finger biscuits and trifle by the neighbour. We ate well that night. That’s not to say that our parents didn’t feed us well, but it was always quite bland and never chocolate finger biscuits and trifle. The police interviewed our father and came to the conclusion that our mother was depressed and had taken her own life. Thankfully, we children were never interviewed.
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We didn’t go to the funeral, father thought we were far too young to attend, so we went to school as usual. The best outcome from all of this was that the beatings stopped, and we were allowed to visit friends and go out with them on outings. I guess father found it easier for other people to look after us, especially in school holidays. My brother left the family home before I went to university. He’d done an apprenticeship at an engineering firm and was slowly working his way up the corporate ladder. He married when he was eighteen and had a daughter. He checked on me every day until I went to University to make sure I was ok. We both felt the need to escape this chapter of our lives.
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If it were done when ‘tis done, then ‘twere well
If were done quickly: if the assassination
Could trammel up the consequence and catch
With his surcease success: that but this blow
Might be the be-all and the end-all - here.