Chapter 1
This is not a ghost story. I lived as I lived then dissipated left. There was not much to look forward to. Being a child who was going to get it no matter how I beaver at the trade. Something made and unmade. That dad practised made me who I am today.
"You can drag them in here and the hookers can do the rest."
I got dressed in a dress of frilly and had neat sense. I was going to float in and out. I made off with the parasol and made up. I looked very pretty.
First time I had shiny shoes.
Dad is an uneven boss so traumatic to work for. In Cyprus dad had a whore house and he worked the whores to death.
He liked to.
He thought there was nothing like a dead old whore.
There were days when we all thought we would die from the work. I am fetching and carrying and the whores working their heads off. One had to have some relief. If you want relief then to get out.
We all thought we would be out the moment our strength failed us. The goings on and then him. He the supreme evil. I thought I would not enjoy being a whore. So stashed some money.
He thoroughly enjoyed the cat and mouse chase.
"One day I am going to claim the produce."
"Drop it dad I am doing something more important."
"Tell?"
"I am making the bed warm."
"Why?"
"So that the gentleman can feast better."
"Spending my money on soap?"
"Not true." said Mess. "The cleaner it is the better they get sexed."
Then one day I failed and I failed to answer with the right button. I got over the discomfort, but dad was very amused.
Life is not only one thing one thought one event it does not run evenly it does not run at all.
"I am here doing the beds."
"Hurry I want to rest for a while."
"I will be as quick as I can."
I was quick but not quick enough and the girls next customer came, and she bled through the nostrils. There was not much left of her as she was carried to the hospital where she was condemned with VD.
"What will happen to us we are a girl short."
"Well in case you did not realize I am a woman too." said Auntie Mess.
"Auntie no."
"Yes, I can be."
The men ran out of her room as if wild horses were after them. She was not asked again.
One falls in love and I did. Like everyone else I did I did. I am not ashamed to have. Because he was so nice and wholesome and then he met her.
He dumped me without realizing that he had. He just shifted away as if he met someone more interesting. He had to be with her all the time. As if there was no other thought in his mind.
Which he said I deserved for being me and nothing but I. I did not repent I rebelled and bellied it.
Then had my full of it. The days and the skies looked the same for me as everyone else yet they were not for me. People drove and people wept for me from afar. Yet they did not reach me.
Did I repel? I did not know like any other whore or would be whore? I was dependable always there and people just assumed I was well looked after. Because I was independent and useful.
"I would make him pay. "
He never wasted his money he said. I just went to work as a chef and did not look back. The pay was useless and the customers soon cottoned on because Z told them.
"She worked in the whorehouse." sat down Z. Being a dragon of meanness she left me so bruised.
Life startled me.
The crash happens sooner or later the strength just leaves the body and after 13 years as the main chef. I had enough. So went on and on as if the whole thing is a joke. The chef has to be killed or kicked out they did not want to pay.
In fact, nobody likes to part with their money.
To buy groceries one pays but not if one is a chef then one has too much so do not pay?
When he said goodbye for some years that is what it felt like and I crashed back to myself as myself was there all the time. I brought the child to see there was no other way. And I cried. The child only resumed inside me when I reached so often and retched then I became that child again.
I will never again love as I did. I did not for a number of years.
That is grown upside of me.
I came on a bus walked back. I remember that day he left me stranded alone and in tears.
You see I had two pounds bus fare, and I bought my siblings books from the book shop and they devoured it as if devouring the pleasures of the flesh. One was Heidi and the other was burn witch burn.
I did not know why I did that I could have been comfortably seated on a bus and doing nothing but crying. Instead, I was walking down the Old Kent Road raging. The thoughts behind the thoughts were how I was going to live without that man?
I was remembering. The good old past the past that set me afire the past that mattered the past that could be mine again. I did not want the past to come out.
He appeared to have go then when the evening was too drunk to remember he settled on the plan. He had a lot of papers when he called me. A lot of them I could not read but he said I had to concentrate as many ice creams depended on it.
The women all laughed at him making him comfortable.
The women sneered at him behind his back they did not do anything about it. They always huddled together because they had no other friends.
Then I was supposed to get the shopping because most shops did not serve them. There was almost always theft. I was totally clueless as I was learning to support them.
When I returned from shopping, they were still at it when I went, they had been at it. I am almost certain they disliked me but then they almost did not care to hide it.
Auntie Mess came and said very brightly," Did you buy the cabbage?"
"No, I could not find any."
"Go to the next shop and find some."
"Rotten luck." I said closing the door very quick.
Some men came and showered and said some more words and I was unkindly showed his penis. When that did not do it for him, he almost attacked me. But being in the shop I forgot all that I was looking to find a bargain.
The man behind the counter was looking for ways not to serve me as I was never going to leave the shop unless served, he did as he was told.
Look if that is a penis then he should not be showing it to me as I was only seven. Mother Zeks came to oblige she took all my rejections and made money out of it. Placing the money inside her breast she silently said worst things were going to happen to me.
"Zeks she is doing you a favour."
"Refusing all of them gents."
"Never heard a bad word said about you at all." said Mess.
"She is supposed to be my aunt and nan's child."
"Look I am supposed to be your uncle is it not shame that we have no shame?"
"I don't have an uncle dad is an only child."
In the sunken garden of sin, I was the child who was molested and not molested. I do not know what to do about all the thoughtless actions I did the kindness and unkindness I suffered. I suffocated too much.
"Loser."
Daydreaming then out of the shop with the sweets and then left that street went to the next shop and then the next. I then sat down to eat the sweets and that made me happy.
After all that my feet did hurt so I left them at it the pigeons and that made me sad. They can fly away they can fly but not us.
I forgot time and place. There is no time and place when I was shopping. I became the victim again dad had a whip in his hand he used it to discipline. There was no fear back than I did not fear him. I almost conned myself into thinking this.
"What did you say. Come here whipping is too good for you."
"Kept the whole house waiting for their dinner because doodling?"
"I lost time."
"You should have looked at all the men praying what time do they pray?"
"I don't know?"
"Heathen."
"I have no violence in the house." said Mess.
"She is my daughter of course I can give her violence."
"Not without pay," My eyes brightened.
I thought she lost it but he got the point then I studied everything and learnt.
He lost interest.
"I will not give what I earn not with no good reason and god is my witness if she answers me back I will get her for free."
"Now put a seal on it."
"Yes pa."
Fumbling idiot I thought.
Days passed like there was nothing to do but the lease of life in me is not working I am worn out with worrying because I am in trouble.
I am in love.
He is in his early forties and so rich and handsome. He is much taller than I am and he does exist outside the comic books. I am so involved I gave him a handkerchief of Mother's the Gold inside them stitched so fine.
Menderes. A politician we were after I did not tell him about the trap. He should not be where he was. I am a child a child does not fumble in the dark with forty something males. I was out for revenge I had grown cruel. I did not know what else to be a rat hungry angry and annoying.
I am only seven and small for my age but the whole thing is useful. It gives me something to look forward to.
Revenge.
