08-26-2021, 12:57 AM
(This post was last modified: 08-26-2021, 08:34 AM by Anne Ward.)
[CW: emotional child abuse and reference to indecent exposure to a child]
Anne didn’t know what to do. Her heart was racing, and her mind even more so with thoughts of all the terrible things that could happen. She had seen her employer naked from the middle down, had knocked a painting over, and had completely forgotten orders. They had sent her home and surely that was because they wanted to fire her. And what would she tell her father? She was far too ashamed to tell him what had happened. She felt that it was somehow her fault and she would be blamed for the indecent encounter and its consequences.
Still shaking and fighting back her tears, she had gone to Oswy street, but had found Mrs. Blacke gone. That had made the tears come. She had sat down on the doorstep, crying quietly and looking at each corner in turn, praying for the woman to come round the corner and comfort her. But the things she yearned and prayed for never happened. She knew that by now.
When she had dried her tears and had given up, she had walked around town, trying to steady herself before she went home. She would tell her father that the work was done already and she had been sent home early. That way, he wouldn’t ask questions. If she could slip away on an errand, he might not read her face.
She stepped in and her heart sank when her father looked up. She knew that dark, grim look in his eyes, the brooding tension that seemed to hang around him like a growing thunderstorm, and she cast her eyes down. “Work was done already and so I was sent home…” The words rolled out of her mouth without any natural melody. Anne was certain her father could tell merely by looking at her face what had transpired in Lord Gordon’s home.
He stood up, picked something off the floor and cast it down on the table with such force that Anne jumped. “That was yours?”
Anne looked at the garment and her heart skipped a beat. She froze. The humiliation. He knew. What would he think of her? She wanted to hide.
“Explain yourself,” her father demanded with an anger in his voice that made Anne shrink. And in that moment, she remembered a sock with money in it lying on the table while Simon stood where she stood now, and her father demanding he’d explain himself, and what had happened after. She broke out in cold sweat.
“Ye didn’t tell me ye needed a new one and instead ye went begging! Have you no shame!?” her father thundered.
Anne wanted to defend herself and tell her father that that was not what had happened, but she felt too humiliated and frightened and small to speak. She shook her head lightly.
“I did not raise ye to be a beggar! Ye humiliate us all in front of the Blackes! What were ye thinking getting’ ‘er to buy ye clothing like we have nowt!” the tirade continued. “Them all makin’ sacrifices to get ye clothes. And you’re alright with takin’ that!? Do ye not think of others?! And what’s with ye lyin’ and twistin’ truths and withholdin’ information all the time. Did I not make it clear that needs to stop!?”
Aye, she well remembered. Anne trembled. She was suddenly aware that she was crying.
“Well!?” her father shouted even louder. “Have ye lost yer tongue?! And what of ye bein’ sent home early!? I don’t believe ye!”
Anne opened her mouth, but when she tried to say she was sorry, she felt her mouth twist and a something between a gasp and a wail came out instead. She turned on the spot and darted out the door. She ran despite her vision being blurred with tears. She was so ashamed. She was sure she could never go home again.
