It sounds quiet downstairs, and that is normally a good sign. Daddy is ignoring Mammy, and she’s not speaking either. That’s very good. I hate it when I hear their voices get louder, because then the fights and arguments start.
It scares me, because when Daddy is cross it usually means bad things for me. Despite the good signs, I still can’t relax. I listen out for sounds that tell me he is on his way upstairs. I never know what he’s going to do, and every time I hear the bedroom door open I start to shake.
Daddy’s in the room now. I hear him use the toilet bucket at the end of the bed. The smell is terrible. It makes my eyes sting even when I’m hiding under the covers, and my stomach starts to churn so much it hurts.
There’s no lid on the bucket, and we never have anything to put in it to make it smell better. We don’t even have toilet paper.
I’ve buried myself deep under my covers, but I can’t escape the stench. It seems to follow me, clinging to my skin and sticking in my throat. I can’t get away from it.
I can hear Daddy stripping off his trousers. He always sleeps in just a shirt, or sometimes nothing at all.
My throat goes very dry now, and I’m trying to pretend I’m fast asleep, even though I’m shaking so much the covers must be moving up and down, telling him I am wide awake.
Maybe Daddy will leave me alone tonight?
He wasn’t staggering about like he does some nights, and he didn’t shout at Mammy. Maybe he will fall into bed and start snoring loudly, giving me the sign that tonight I can go to sleep knowing he’s too drunk to do those horrible things to me, that just for tonight, he will leave me alone.
I always prayed hard, but it didn’t seem to make any difference whether Daddy was in a good or bad mood. It didn’t matter if he was laughing and joking or ranting and raving when he came in, I never knew what would happen next. Sometimes he got into bed and fell straight into the deep sleep I prayed for, but mostly he didn’t.
It started when I was seven years old.
‘Cynthia, you’re to sleep in the double bed, d’you hear me?’ Mammy ordered.
Normally, I slept in the single bed in the same room, but I didn’t argue with Mammy. She didn’t like it if I argued, and so I always tried hard not to. If I made her cross she hit me round the head or called me horrible names, so I always did as I was told.
When Daddy got into bed he started to tuck himself up right behind me. He was very close, and I didn’t like it. I could feel his bare legs against mine and they felt horrible.
This wasn’t what I had expected at all - and now what was happening?
Daddy was moving in a strange, shuffling way behind me. I felt frightened of him, petrified whenever I heard his footsteps on the stairs at night. When Daddy started doing other things too, much worse things, I absolutely dreaded going to bed and would lie there every night shaking with nerves and feeling sick with fear.
I never knew what he would do, and even if he did nothing I expected the worst and lay there feeling terrified, especially when he would come in drunk and raging.
‘You’re a fuckin’ whore,’ Daddy would shout. ‘You’re nothing but a stupid bitch.’
I’d squirm under the covers as I heard her scream back at him. She wasn’t frightened of him and always gave him the fight he seemed to be looking for.
‘You bastard! Don’t call me a whore! I bet you’re the one who’s been sleeping around. Don’t you come near me …’
She would totally lose control of her temper.
‘Where’s the money? Have you been gambling again, you stupid bastard?’
Mammy looked fiery, with long red hair and blazing green eyes. I’m sure she drank more than Daddy, and she certainly matched him insult for insult.
They never had ordinary conversations and seemed to really hate each other. They tried to avoid each other as much as possible, but whenever they were in the same room they seemed to be fighting and arguing.
‘Fuck off, woman!’ Daddy would shout as he slapped Mammy across the face or punched her body. ‘Leave me alone, you stupid cow.’
Daddy was quite a small man, and he and Mammy looked like an even match for each other in their fights. But she always came off worse. Neither got really badly hurt, they just got madder and madder with each other.
It was like watching a wrestling match that had burst out of the telly and landed in our living room, and it just went on and on as they traded insults and blows.
At nightime I covered my ears when their voices rose through the old lino on the bedroom floor and bounced off the wood-panelled walls around me.
I hated listening to it, but the house was so small that however hard I pressed my hands over my ears, I could never seem to block the noises out.
I would lie in bed picturing exactly what I was hearing.
Mammy would be stalking round in her dirty, floral dress with her knitted cardigan swinging wildly across her bosom, and Daddy would be swaggering around in the same saggy black trousers he wore every day.
I never really knew how or why the argument started, and I wondered if they did themselves. It seemed that even just the sight of each other made them so angry they wanted to hurt and lash out.
I said lots of prayers to God asking them to stop fighting, but no matter how much I pleaded nothing changed.
Once my father had got into bed with me that first time I prayed even harder for them to stop. I was scared his fights with
