David Thomas - Tell Me Why, Mummy - A Little Boy’s Struggle to Survive. A Mother’s Shameful Secret. The Power to Forgive.

A little boy’s struggle to survive A mother’s shameful secret

DAVID THOMAS

To my children Molly, Nathan, and Danielle who have shown me the greatest pleasure of all is being a parent

Cover

Title Page Tell Me Why, Mummy Contents Cover Title Page Dedication Prologue Part 1: The Chosen One Chapter One: Living In The Shadows Chapter Two: My Dark Mummy Chapter Three: A Man Called Reg Chapter Four: Smashing The Dream Chapter Five: Easy Access Chapter Six: Interlude Chapter Seven: Fair Game Part 2: Rage To Forget Chapter Eight: Teenage Blues Chapter Nine: Night-Runner Chapter Ten: Loose Cannon Chapter Eleven: Master Criminal Chapter Twelve: On The Scrapheap Part 3: Another Kind Of Memory Chapter Thirteen: Into The Fire Chapter Fourteen: Heartbreaker Chapter Fifteen: Down Memory Lane Chapter Sixteen: Sparks And Embers Epilogue Inspired by David's story? Acknowledgements About the Author Copyright About the Publisher A little boy’s struggle to survive A mother’s shameful secret DAVID THOMAS

Dedication Dedication Dedication Prologue Part 1: The Chosen One Chapter One: Living In The Shadows Chapter Two: My Dark Mummy Chapter Three: A Man Called Reg Chapter Four: Smashing The Dream Chapter Five: Easy Access Chapter Six: Interlude Chapter Seven: Fair Game Part 2: Rage To Forget Chapter Eight: Teenage Blues Chapter Nine: Night-Runner Chapter Ten: Loose Cannon Chapter Eleven: Master Criminal Chapter Twelve: On The Scrapheap Part 3: Another Kind Of Memory Chapter Thirteen: Into The Fire Chapter Fourteen: Heartbreaker Chapter Fifteen: Down Memory Lane Chapter Sixteen: Sparks And Embers Epilogue Inspired by David's story? Acknowledgements About the Author Copyright About the Publisher To my children Molly, Nathan, and Danielle who have shown me the greatest pleasure of all is being a parent

Prologue

Part 1: The Chosen One

Chapter One: Living In The Shadows

Chapter Two: My Dark Mummy

Chapter Three: A Man Called Reg

Chapter Four: Smashing The Dream

Chapter Five: Easy Access

Chapter Six: Interlude

Chapter Seven: Fair Game

Part 2: Rage To Forget

Chapter Eight: Teenage Blues

Chapter Nine: Night-Runner

Chapter Ten: Loose Cannon

Chapter Eleven: Master Criminal

Chapter Twelve: On The Scrapheap

Part 3: Another Kind Of Memory

Chapter Thirteen: Into The Fire

Chapter Fourteen: Heartbreaker

Chapter Fifteen: Down Memory Lane

Chapter Sixteen: Sparks And Embers

Epilogue

Inspired by David's story?

Acknowledgements

About the Author

Copyright

About the Publisher

I know she has been drinking again. I can hear her crashing around upstairs and then, suddenly, she’s in the kitchen. She can barely stand as she staggers through the door and gropes her way along the grubby kitchen cabinets, trying to get to me across the room .

I’m playing with my bricks on the lino floor. She starts tottering towards me, falls over, and then tries to lie down next to me. She is completely naked, her eyes glazed and unfocused as she emits a low drunken moan .

‘David,’ she says, her voice alternating between an inaudible moan and a loud drunken shout, ‘come over here .’

She doesn’t seem to realize that I am already close beside her. When she tells me to do something I always do it at once. I love to please her and I hate to displease her. If I don’t do as I’m told she may stop loving me. She won’t smack me or hurt me, but I think she will be angry. So I stand up and then sit down again, so that she can see that I am there, next to her .

When she sees me near her, she looks up and pulls me down towards her. She then takes my hand and places it between her legs, which are spread wide open. It feels strange and I don’t understand why she’s doing this. She rubs my hand up and down between her legs and starts to moan again. She is sighing and keeps moving my hand inside her and then – I don’t know why or how – I start to realize that the loud moaning noises are not, as I first thought, signs of distress but of pleasure .

As this dawns on me, and because she continues to moan, I take it that this game is good and so I’m happy to continue to do it as long as she wants to. She carries on rubbing herself with my hand for some time until she has had enough .

Then she pushes my hand away and without saying a word, my mother picks up her bottle and staggers back across the kitchen to make her way upstairs, while I go back to playing with my bricks on the lino floor .

PART 1

1

Most of the time you’re the best Mummy in the whole world. But then you change. You get angry and make me do things I don’t understand. Why do you want me to do those things? Please tell me why. Why can’t you make my dark Mummy go away? I’m afraid of her. Don’t you see what she does? Don’t you see what she makes me do? Why do you pretend you don’t know?

I am only five but I’ve already got so many questions I can feel them pressing on my heart. Sometimes it’s hard to breathe. There aren’t any answers, just more questions. I don’t know if I will ever have the answers. All I know is that my questions are piling up inside me. I try to bury them but there are too many. I feel like an unexploded mine.

* * *

The house in which I am born, on 6 April 1968, is in an idyllic setting: the small rural village of Calder Bridge, near Halifax in West Yorkshire. The village is picture-postcard perfect with beautiful cottages made from Yorkshire stone, a small village pub and post office, all wrapped up in the incredible rolling landscape of the Pennine Hills. I love the glorious countryside feel to it – the large wide-open spaces, the rolling fields, the luscious woodland, the sense of freedom. Even aged three or four, my mother lets me wander through the woods to play with other kids. Everyone knows everyone else and there’s a real sense of community.