Leaving home
extract from the memoir, 'You Are My Rock'. Used by kind permssion of Pamela Hodge.
Something had changed in the world around me, too. Doors opened. Choices came along. I had more confidence. I was still in a deep, dark place at home, but when I was outside our house, I could reach out and find people who seemed more receptive to me. In this way, God finally sent me help.
Dorothy was my new friend at church. Well, ‘friend’ might be too strong a word. I hadn’t known her for long and I didn’t really have friends, but I was always glad to see her when I went into church. She was an older lady, in her 40s, with a lot of life experience, and I guess she could see I was in trouble. She could certainly tell that I was far too fearful for my age, and so she had tried to get close to me.
It had taken me a while to trust her, but I’d grown to look out for her. I’d sit next to her in church, and we’d have a chat. God had changed me, and I found the means to open up to her, until, over time, she understood something of what my life had been like. More importantly, what it was like now. I spoke more and more freely about what life was like at home. How my mum and dad were. How sad it made me. How I couldn’t see a way out; how trapped I felt.
One day she told me that if I ever needed somewhere to go, then I could just turn up at her house. I could stay there with her while I got things sorted out.
I listened to what she said, thanked her, assumed she didn’t mean it, and tried to forget it. I could never go anywhere. My life wasn’t like that.
Towards the end of summer, my aunt came to stay. She arrived in the usual way, on the train second class via Manchester and Sheffield, and Dad went to pick her up at the station. Mum and I savoured our last few minutes of peace. We groaned as she came up the path, and then she barged in, brash, full of herself and intrusive as ever. We were prepared for this, and I did what I had to, saying a polite hello before escaping up to my room. I felt sorry for leaving Mum down there with her and Dad, because Dad and my aunt would always gang up on the rest of us, but I just couldn’t be in the same room as her.
Over the next few days, I realised something strange was happening. This time, my aunt was different. Something had changed between us. She seemed interested in me. Maybe it was also that I’d grown up, and I was interested in her. I don’t know. But I slowly realised that I could talk to her. Over the next few days, with everything she said to me, I trusted her more and more. I’m naturally inclined to be open. Even today, I find myself too open. That’s because I’ve got nothing to hide. I don’t believe in secrets. But that week felt special. At last, someone normal in the family I could talk to. I leaped at the chance. We even had a laugh together. This all rebuilt the scattered crumbs of my confidence, and the darkness began to lift. I saw how things might get better. I got more and more confident, and she noticed how I was unhappy with Dad. Frowning, with a worried look on her face, she subtly asked me to go out for a walk with her. We went down Carr Lane, all the way to the allotments. We walked for a while, then found a bench to sit and talk. We spent hours there.
That afternoon was one of those watersheds in life. I danced around the subject for a little while, but she was patient, and listened, and waited. I finally felt brave enough to confide in her about Dad. I told her the way he was, the way he was with me. I opened my heart to her and told how much he had hurt me. She listened, wide-eyed at the beginning, then solemnly when she saw how serious I was. She even talked about how she had always thought that he had mistreated me. The flood gates opened, I poured out my lifetime of pain, and we walked and talked for hours.
Later that day, Philip was out at a club, and so it was just Mum, Dad, my aunt, and me. Over the evening meal, Dad made one of his usual sarcastic comments to me. Feeling stronger, for once I wouldn’t let it go, and I spoke back. This escalated quickly and ended up in a row. Even that amazed me, but then I went one further. I finally told him what I thought, all the time knowing that my aunt was on my side.
Except she wasn’t. The truth was the very opposite, in fact, and I realised I’d made a terrible mistake in trusting her. Instead of supporting me, she went for me. She mocked me, then started laughing at me. Said it was all me. Said I wore my heart on my sleeve because I was ‘mentally retarded’. She turned on me so viciously. She told Dad everything I’d said and laughed more and more at me. Mocking me, mocking how sorry I felt for myself. I couldn’t believe it. Everything had just been made one hundred times worse.
I don’t know how I did it. I stood up, left the table, and went to the phone in the hall. Aware of their amazement behind me, I scrabbled through the Yellow Pages, found the number, and made a phone call.
‘I’d like to order a taxi to 41 Carr Lane.’
My aunt cackled out loud.
‘I’d like to order a taxi. Who do you think you are? Lady Muck?’
‘Shhh, you’ll upset her,’
Dad said, trying not to laugh.
‘Think you’re all grand, do you Pam love?’
‘You two —!,’ said Mum, trying to stick up for me.
‘She’s not grand. She’s just a little bit of nothing getting above herself,’ said Dad.
‘She’s getting mad now. Look at the face on her,’ said my aunt.
I looked round at them in the dining room as they fell about in their chairs. I could see how upset Mum was, and how hard Dad and my aunt were laughing at me. I couldn’t believe it.
I reached forward and slammed the dining-room door shut. My heart was pounding in my chest. I was so angry I was shaking. I went upstairs to my room. In a wave of emotion, I grabbed an armful of clothes, threw them into a suitcase, and came down to wait.
I sat in the front room, my coat on, my bag beside me, and counted the money in my purse. I had enough. For a while anyway. And I’d get paid in two weeks. I’d survive.
I listened to their voices, muffled in the dining room. Mum was muted, but Dad and my aunt had obviously forgotten about me pretty fast and had gone on to complaining about some incident to do with the extended family over in Liverpool. I couldn’t really hear, and I thought about what I was doing. Was I really going to go through with it? Could this really be the moment? It was too big a thought. My mind couldn’t handle it. I was both scared and eager. The big wooden clock on the mantelpiece was so familiar I couldn’t bear it. I looked away and saw the picture of Pilgrim’s Progress on the wall. It reminded me of a happy morning in Sunday School in Belfast nearly fifteen years before. I’d done a big painting all on my own, and Mum and Dad had both made a fuss of me. I felt like crying. Why had things gone so bad?
The taxi was late, and I waited, and waited, staring out the window. It was getting dark. I sat, looking at the house over the road, looking at clouds, eventually not thinking about anything too much.
A knock on the front door brought me back to earth.
‘Pam? Door!’ shouted my dad from the kitchen.
I couldn’t believe it. He’d opened the dining-room door to call me but couldn’t be bothered to take the extra six steps to the front door.
‘It must be her chauffeur,’ said my aunt.
They both laughed again, and I remembered where I was and what was happening. I got out of the chair, put my purse in my pocket, picked up my bag. Out in the hall, I headed for the front door.
‘Aren’t you going to say goodbye then?’
My dad stood at the doorway to the kitchen behind me.
‘Leave me alone,’ I said, my voice harsh with fear.
My aunt appeared next to him. ‘Where are you going, anyway?’
‘None of your business,’ I said.
‘Wooooh’s’ from both of them.
My mum came out past them both and came towards me.
‘Pam, love. What are you doing?’
I shrugged her off and turned away.
‘Ray. You can’t do this,’ said Mum behind me.
I opened the front door and stepped outside.
‘Pam.’ said Mum.
‘She’ll be back,’ said Dad to my aunt.
The taxi was waiting by the kerb.
‘You’ll be back,’ Dad called to me as I walked down the path to the gate.
‘I give her two hours,’ said my aunt.
‘She’s a mental case. She’s got nowhere to go.’
I looked back in one last moment of outrage. My mum stood to the side, looking like she was in shock.
I got in the car. Took a breath.
‘Yes, love?’
‘Hello,’ I said. ‘Cleethorpes please.’
The taxi pulled away, and I didn’t look back.
