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  Glynis Baxter

  First published in Great Britain in 2018 by

  The Book Guild Ltd

  9 Priory Business Park

  Wistow Road, Kibworth

  Leicestershire, LE8 0RX

  Freephone: 0800 999 2982

  www.bookguild.co.uk

  Email: [email protected]

  Twitter: @bookguild

  Copyright © 2018 Glynis Baxter

  The right of Glynis Baxter to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted by her in accordance with the

  Copyright, Design and Patents Act 1988.

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, transmitted, or stored in a retrieval system, in any form or by any means, without permission in writing from the publisher, nor be otherwise circulated in any form of binding or cover other than that in which it is published and without a similar condition being imposed on the subsequent purchaser.

  This work is entirely fictitious and bears no resemblance to any persons living or dead.

  ISBN 9781912575244

  British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data.

  A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.

  Dedicated to

  Ian Baxter. My husband. My world. My inspiration.

  Contents

  Prolegomenon

  1

  2

  3

  4

  5

  6

  7

  8

  9

  10

  11

  12

  13

  14

  15

  16

  17

  18

  19

  20

  21

  22

  23

  24

  25

  26

  27

  28

  29

  30

  31

  32

  33

  34

  35

  36

  37

  38

  39

  Prolegomenon

  A new life, a new spirit, a new beginning. Should be something to embrace, to celebrate and rejoice in.

  Not to take for granted, abuse, spoil or control.

  People always ponder on which is the greatest, is it nature over nurture, or nurture over nature. Or does a being, a soul have its own imprint before it enters the world, and no matter what, that can’t be changed or controlled by outside forces.

  People can become desensitised by witnessing horrific events, or working in certain professions; ie, fireman at the tragic loss of children etc. Does this stop them being human, or is it a shield to allow them to continue with their everyday professions.

  This story will test these theories, as a child with no control is lead down a path of events by a controlling, vindictive, spiteful parent. Who only cares about themselves and not about the outcome on the people they are meant to protect or care about.

  Was it their bad choices or circumstances out of their control.

  What will be the outcome, who knows…

  1

  “Robbie, phone, it’s your Mrs.”

  “Cheers Billy, I’m coming.”

  This was becoming a bit of the norm, and I was getting sick of it. We had moved down here two years ago, to be honest we had no choice the mining industry had dried up in the north and if I wanted to continue in the same line of work we had to sacrifice leaving everything behind, our families, home etc., and make a fresh start.

  The National Coal Board had made it an attractive offer: a full moving package. Included in this was the cost of the removal men, a van to settle us into a brand new Coal Board property. With all the mod cons an inside privy the lot, no more freezing in the winter, and late at night walking to the bottom of the garden to relieve oneself.

  The new colliery had a good future, a life expectancy of forty years plus, which would easily see me out, and the perks of a good miners pension scheme that would secure a not wealthy but comfortable retirement.

  So we took the plunge, did the tearful goodbyes to our families. I can’t say friends as they had all moved with us as a miner your life revolves around the industry. This includes your social life, with the weekend at the miners welfare with your colleagues and their significant other halves.

  Billy was my best mate, we had been to school together and knew everything about each other. We had got up to all the usual schoolboy pranks. Once leaving school we both went into the mine together at Hauxley. Billy also had been given the option to relocate. So when he said he was moving it had made it all the easier to have an allie and someone to lean on in the early days.

  Moving in 1961 from a small fishing village Sea Houses in the north, to live in Clipstone in Nottinghamshire was pretty traumatic. I missed the sea air, the ocean, the sounds of the seagulls, even the smell of the sea air was embedded in my memory.

  Clipstone, though it was not a big village by any stretch of the imagination, had your village green, rows of colliery houses which we all rented from the pit. The rent was insignificant and taken from our weekly wage, it included our electric which was supplied direct from the colliery, so once I got my pay packet it was ours to do with as we pleased. Plus as a perk of the job I got monthly deliveries of coal which were impossible to wade through, and was full to the rafters in the coal house and was spilling out onto the yard.

  The house was a three bed semi detached on a nice street, there was a scullery, parlor and kitchen downstairs, and upstairs two double bedrooms, a single and fully fitted bathroom, a coal house plus a generous front and back garden. The house we had left was a typical two up two down terraced seaman’s cottage, front door leading straight onto the pavement and a small backyard which incorporated the dreaded privy.

  Laura my wife on the surface, had appeared to have settled in well. Obviously loved the new house and all its mod cons and was pleased people she knew had relocated too. Soon after we were settled in to the new house she had managed to secure a job at the village welfare, as a barmaid and loved the banter and getting the latest gossip from the punters.

  We had been married four years so our marriage was strong and healthy, and Laura had been supportive regarding the move. The only thing that would make our marriage complete would be the birth of our first child. We had not used any form of contraceptive from the day of our marriage, though we had a healthy sex life for some reason the baby eluded us.

  Finally after actually accepting we may be a childless couple, she broke the news. I was ecstatic, scared an emotional mess, until the news finally registered we were going to be parents. Laura didn’t have an easy pregnancy, she was constantly hanging off the toilet bowl with her head down it vomiting. In the end she went to the doctors who prescribed Thalidomide the so called revolutionary drug of the ’60s to cure morning sickness.

  Thankfully, she was in contact with her mother on a regular basis via the local phone box. Her mother managed to persuade Laura to bin her prescription and drink a herbal concoction that seemed to take the edge of her condition. So on the 4th August 1963 Laura went into labour, the midwife was called at 5pm and arrived promptly on her bicycle and took charge. I took the usual towels and hot water up to our bedroom only to have the bedroom door slammed in my face. It left me with nothing to do but march up and down the landing like a queen’s guard on duty, ringing my hands and muttering under my breath.

  I could hear them talking and strangely enough laughing and joking. At 2am in th
e morning of the 5th I heard the slap and the howls of our new born. I wanted to rush in and see, but I waited patiently to be called in. Laura was sat up cradling a baby wrapped in a towel, she was red faced and sweaty her fringe stuck to her face as I approached she sleepily smiled and announced we had a healthy baby girl.

  I felt my eyes fill I couldn’t believe it I finally had it all, the loving wife, a new home a well paid job with a future, and now the child we had longed for. The midwife passed me a bundle covered in blood and told me to go outside and burn it. I stood there in a daze, looking at the bundle, not really taking it in. “It’s the afterbirth; you need to get rid off it, burn it now in the bin.” I looked at her blankly, looking for the words, but she didn’t seem the sort to take any messing, so I followed her command to the letter carried the bundle to the small metal bin outside, stood back and watched the flames take hold. I glanced at my watch it was just after 2am and here I was stood in the middle of my garden doing the midwife’s bidding.

  Laura soon adapted into the perfect mother, she decided to work part time at the club, as she wanted to keep some of her independence and not get lonely with me working long hours down the pit. Danielle Margaret Foster, as we decided to call her was an easy going baby happy as long as she was dry and fed. We had no real sleepless nights until she started teething at around six months, her little red cheeks all red and swollen. Laura had got into the habit of dabbing whiskey onto her gums to help her settle.

  When our shifts overlapped we had a young girl from over the road baby sit for a bit of extra pocket money. She had been reliable, trustworthy and dependable for the last eighteen months, but recently she had become lacksey daisy since catching the eye of a young local lad. She had been crying off, making excuses, or simply not turning up. Hence the phone calls to get home sharpish as she needed to get to the club.

  Working down the pit was easygoing, and you had a laugh with the other guys you worked with. Some only did three days a week and called in sick the rest of the week and nothing was ever said. So when I went up the pit early it was not a problem, I just made my excuses and left, catching the first available paddy out of there.

  Arriving home Laura would be finishing applying her make up, doing her hair, making herself presentable for work. She always looked stunning when she left and I was left with Danielle. It was the same story: she would be crying in her cot either because she needed feeding because she was sodden. I would pick her up and the smell of ammonia would hit me, and her rubbers and nappy would be virtually hanging down to her knees she was that wet. I would complain to Laura about the state of her and that she was getting sore but she would just brush it off, saying she was late for work. I would clean her up but I was no expert. The folding of the nappies was beyond me: faffing with the huge nappy pin, I was always worried I’d prick her so in the end it was on that loose, that if she wriggled to much or if I picked her up the chances were it would drop off.

  Finally getting Danielle settled I turned in myself, setting the alarm for the early shift. The trill of the alarm blasting through the darkness woke me with a start. I instinctively turned to put my arm around Laura, but my arm fell flat onto the empty cold sheet. Searching for the lamp switch I flicked it on and sat up with a start, the bed was empty – my god, where was she? Was she alright? I frantically pulled on my work clothes and rushed downstairs, she wasn’t there. It was 4.30am. Where could she possibly be? It made no sense. What was I going to do? The club she worked at closed at 11pm and by the time she closed down she would normally be back just after midnight. So it was no good calling them as they’d be shut.

  Danielle began to cry. Entering her bedroom, I felt a sense of dread and panic. What was I going to do? I picked her up, and instantly felt her tears on my cheek and the warmth from her tiny body. Cradling her, I suddenly heard the front door open and it sounded like something heavy had fell over the step. Still carrying Danielle I went to the top of the stairs, there was her mother: her hair all over, disheveled to say the very least. As I went down the stairs the smell of the alcohol hit me, she was totally out of it. I helped her upstairs into bed, resettled Danielle and headed for work. All shift I couldn’t stop worrying about what was happening back at home.

  On my return Laura made her apologies and excuses saying it was a one-off. Sadly it wasn’t; it became part of our daily pattern. She would call me out of work. Go supposedly to work, then not reappear till the early hours, she always had some reasonable excuse: took her longer to close down, a party went on late, manager kept her after hours, and so on and so on. Obviously I was getting suspicious, I was listening out at work to grasp the ends of any rumors but none came to light. So I decided today’s the day, I would go to work as normal, fake illness and go home early and may be get to the bottom of whatever was happening.

  As I approached the house it was in total darkness except for the landing light being on. I took the key from my pocket, my hand was shaking as I placed it in the lock and turned the key. The key wouldn’t turn, I couldn’t figure it out, but looking round I noticed the top kitchen window was ajar so I levered myself up and managed to get access through it.

  All was quiet inside, I looked back towards the front door to see the key had been left in that’s why I could not open it. For a moment I wasn’t sure if anyone was actually in, and was actually starting to feel relieved, when a figure appeared at the top of the stairs. “Shit, Robbie, what you doing here?” The panic was obvious as he fled back into our bedroom. I slowly went up, Laura was in bed with the covers up to her chin, and frantically retrieving his clothes off the bedroom floor was my so-called best mate Billy.

  I saw red, grabbed him by his arm that he was frantically waving about, and marched him out onto the street. He was screaming at the top of his voice, “It’s not how it seems, honest, it’s all a misunderstanding.” I raised my fist and hit him squarely on the chin, sending him crashing through the picket fence and falling backwards into the neighbor’s garden.

  I returned my focus back on to Laura. I was furious with her, with both of them. She was still under the covers looking at me like a rabbit caught in the headlights. “Robbie, I’m so sorry,” she managed to mutter. I wasn’t listening, I was packing. I was done with her, with all of them, with this whole sad situation.

  2

  When people ask you about your first memory, no matter who you are, you have to stop, ponder, reflect, and search the deepest crevices of your mind figuring out how far back you can recall.

  A lot of mine I may have blanked out, but my earliest one would be, I am guessing, around two years old bouncing up and down in a cot. My mother was speaking to a man saying, “I don’t know how she got out, one minute she was here, then she was gone.”

  The man wasn’t looking at her, he was looking at me; he was older than my mum and wearing a tweed jacket and flat cap. “Well you better keep a better eye on her, and make sure it doesn’t happen again.” My mum carried on making her apologies and he left. The room seemed dark and hazy, and as they made their farewells, I had my arms over the side of the cot clinging on to a toy, possibly a teddy, I’m not to sure. Then the memory just fades away, I don’t remember feeling anything recalling this memory I didn’t feel happy, or sad it was just like recalling a dream from the night before.

  My next memory is imprinted deeper in my mind, I’m guessing aged around four. A tune is being hummed really loudly by my mum and I’m undressing in the middle of the sitting room, throwing each item off over my head. I am spinning around and laughing, suddenly a voice hollows out, “Bloody hell, Laura, can’t you control that brat. Look what the silly bitch as done now.” He was pointing towards an open fire, an item of clothes had fell into the fire. “Get her out of my sight and put the bitch to bed.” My mother never responded, simply took me by the hand and led me away.

  He was the first significant male I can remember, who was a major influence in my life. He wasn’t around much,
but when he was, there were rules to follow. He was constantly chewing gum, there wasn’t a point when he was not chewing the foul stuff. He was always smartly dressed, a wiry man around six foot tall. With ginger hair and an evenly trimmed mustache. I had learned to be terrified of him, he had taught me the boundaries and the consequences of stepping out of line.

  When he came home from work, as a four-year-old I would rush up to him hoping to be noticed, or at least receive a few crumbs of recognition I existed. I would occasionally forget myself and reach out to him. Simply to be slapped down, “Don’t touch me, never ever touch me. You’re filthy, get off.” I would feel myself drawing into myself. I didn’t have the words to respond I just felt scared, lonely and intimitated.

  The house was a two-up two-down terrace with a long garden on the back; the front opened up straight onto the pavement. It was run-down and in need of repair. We had no visitors to the house and family only visited on one occasion. There was no laughter in the place, it was soulless, and my mum never cuddled or told me I was special, pretty or that she loved me. As I didn’t get the attention, or played with, I was mainly just ignored so I didn’t miss it. After all you can’t miss what you never had.

  My mum was hardly ever around, she worked long hours at a public house. So I was left with a sitter or my dad, Jerry. I liked the sitter she was nice, my mum would drop me off in the mornings, on her way to work at the pub, then collect me when her afternoon shift had finished. There were three other children there and we were all similar ages so I enjoyed letting off some steam and playing with them. She had a golden retriever that was gorgeous, she would let us dress her up and do piggy backs on her as she was very tolerant. The sitter made proper children’s meals – fish fingers and beans, burgers and chips etc – not like at home where I had to eat what I was given or go without. At four, being given liver and onions or faggots was not really going to entice the appetite of a child so I hardly ate at home, and as a consequence I was a small, skinny child, pale but never sickly.