Anne's Song by Anne Nolan Read Free Book Online Page A

distinctly remember we were all watching a programme on child abuse on the television. 'How on earth can people do something like that?' he said. 'It's just plain disgusting.'
    And I was thinking, 'Am I making this all up? Am I dreaming?' But I knew I wasn't making any of this up. I knew I wasn't dreaming.
    I still don't understand how I could have kept my silence about everything my father had done to me. Part of the explanation, I suppose, is that I was frightened of how he'd react. I didn't fear physical violence at his hands – that wasn't his way – but he was a powerful and persuasive man. Who was going to believe this teenage girl when he dismissed, as I knew he would, my accusations as mere fantasy? Anyway, if I'd endured months and months of sexual abuse in Uncle Fred's house, why had I never said anything to anyone; It would have made no sense. The fundamental reason why I protected my father's grubby secret was that I was scared of him.
    I was terribly unhappy and unable, however foolish that may sound, to find a release for my unhappiness by unburdening myself on anyone else: my mother, my Aunt Teresa, one of my sisters, a friend. So I tried as hard as I knew how to fill my mind with positive thoughts. They didn't entirely obliterate what had happened – how could they? – but it is possible to separate different aspects of your life. Otherwise, you'd go mad. That didn't mean I found it easy to deal with; it was particularly hard when I was on my own or lying in bed at night, turning it all over in my mind.
    My mum was out at work during the day and my father was singing most evenings, so it was rare to see them together. If they were, she'd be busy doing things – cooking or cleaning or washing or getting the little ones ready for bed – while my dad would be watching TV. There was very little obvious interaction between the two of them. They dealt with the day-to-day demands of keeping a large family together, but there was precious little time left over, even if they'd been inclined, to sit around and chew the cud.
    Certainly, if my distress was apparent to my father, he didn't show it. None of this seemed to be bothering him. Perhaps he just didn't care. Or perhaps he was an undiagnosed schizophrenic. He appeared, in fact, to be in complete denial, a man with the ability, apparently, to blot out anything inconvenient from his mind. He made the bold statement, for example, about the paedophiles paraded on television.
    He was reacting as any normal person would react except both he and I knew he wasn't normal. He couldn't have been to abuse me day after day, month after month, whenever the opportunity had presented itself. Because I knew what he'd done to me, I always felt a tension between us, but he seemed to be able to carry on a perfectly normal coexistence with my mother. I never heard them quarrelling or even bickering. Part of the reason for that, of course, was that she always deferred to him, bolstering his view that he was the head of the household. This suited my father, a man who liked to be in control.
    Once we'd moved from Uncle Fred's, that attitude extended to our lives beyond our own front door. From the time we'd all moved to Blackpool, boyfriends had been off the agenda as far as he was concerned. He'd always claim that it wasn't us he didn't trust; it was the boys. If word got back to him – usually via one of my younger sisters – that I'd been seen talking to a boy, I wouldn't be allowed out for a week. He wouldn't scream and shout, but his face would be like thunder and then he'd denounce me in front of the rest of the familv.
    'You're no better than a tart,' he'd say, and then he'd ostracise me.
    That meant he would deliberately not address a single comment to me until he considered I'd learned my lesson. He could ignore me for anything up to three weeks. He just blanked me, so I did the same back to him. To be honest, I found it embarrassing. He was behaving to me almost as though