Sawdust by Deborah Kay

Author:Deborah Kay [Kay, Deborah]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: incest, child abuse, sexual abuse, Australian memoir
Publisher: IP (Interactive Publications Pty Ltd)
Published: 2013-05-26T12:00:00+00:00

27.

If there was one thing I had achieved with Dad that night in the car, it was an end to any sexual relationship between us. Not that he didn’t try again, he did. But by now I had become forceful, and I was saying that word NO with power and confidence. It was rattling him, it was shaking the whole house. Our world was changing.

And yet still Dad would continue his advances. A jilted father? A jilted lover? The last I can remember was him coming into my bedroom one night, turning me onto my back and straddling me. ‘No!’ I yelled at him. ‘No!’

In the dark night I shouted it into his face in that assured way I was becoming used to. It rose from my gut and bellowed through my throat. He reared back like a horse and grabbed me with all his strength in his rough hands and squeezed my brittle shoulders. Then he shook me and shook me and shook me some more.

But in the end he trotted out of the room, empty-handed.

The next day my neck was in such agony that even he could see I needed help. He drove me to the doctor and told the physician it had happened while riding with me on his motorbike. He had suddenly jerked the bike to avoid something on the road, and my head had lurched forwards. In front of the doctor, I did not have it in me to defy Dad. I listened in silence, nodded, and let Dad have his lie.

On some indefinable level in my head, he had the decency to take me to a professional person for help and I appreciated that. By doing so he had made amends and a connection on that mysteriously close father-daughter level had somewhat been re-established.

But it was over now, the sex and abuse was all over now. Or was it? Can it ever be? Like my sore neck, he would live in my head, daily, nightly, weekly, forever, and at this time he would still loom large. So very, very large. The things he had done and their effect would carry over into my everyday life. Into every second of my life.

The things he did – the things he and Mum did.

While Mum and Marge had been away around this time, they were back now, and I was feeling generally contented. But Mum, seeing my close relationship with my boyfriend, Brad, the steadiness of it, the sheer fun and enjoyment of it, had other ideas.

One day when I was not around, she made a point of giving Brad some clues about my past. About my relationship with Dad. About why I may even have had a sore neck. She did it like it was her duty as a mother to do so, to let her daughter’s boyfriend, perhaps a future son-in-law know I may not be all that met the eye. That maybe I belonged to someone else and he should watch it. He should at any rate be aware of it.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.