Mummy's Little Girl, JANE ELLIOTT [mini ebook reader TXT] 📗

what was said between them, or what she did; all she knew was that after a little while a terrible sickness hit her, a nausea that seemed to run through her whole body. She felt dizzy, the blood in her veins ran hot and she lost control of her limbs as she fell to ground.
And falling to the ground was the last thing that she remembred.

When she woke up, her head was pounding, as though someone was beating the inside of her skull. But the pain in her head felt nothing compared to the shocking, sinister stabbing stabbing she felt in her stomach, as though hot knives were slashing into her. She looked down and saw, to her horror and sham, that the bottom half of her body was naked. She was lying on one of the mattresses; the two boys were on the other side of the room, fast asleep.

She started to tremble with a mixture of sickness, fear and self-loathing. Slowly she sat up, and as she did so she became aware of streaks of blood down her legs.

Her jeans and underwear were lying on the floor near the boys. Wincing with pain, she got on her feet and crept towards them, quite and terrifed, to pick thwm up. As she started to get dressed, tears came to her eyes: her jeans became tangled as she pulled them on, and the more she sturggled, the slower she became. She tired desperatley to keep quite, but she couldnt help a sudden, loud sob escaping her lips.

The toothless boy stirred and drowsily open his eyes. Hayley froze, her jeans still only halfway up her legs.
The boy leered at her, and then pushed himself up to a sitting position. “Get over here” he said.

Hayley’s body started to shake. She pulled her jeans up over her hips and walked towards him He grabbed her hand and pulled her down to the floor; she did her best to master another wave of nausea asd he took her face roughly in one of his hands. It hurt, and she whimpered. They were face to face now, and she could smell the tobacco on his breath “ You can come back here any time bitch”, he whispered “But tell anyone and i’ll kill you UNDERSTAND”?
Terrified, hayley nodded her head.
“Then get the fuck out of here”.
Hayley fled.
The sickness lasted for several hours, the disomfort in her belly for a few days; the shame endured for much longer than that. Hayley barely left her bedroom for the whole of the school hoildays- she was too scared of seeing either the boys or the girl who had threatened her, and not even the prospect of a beating from her mum was enough to get her to leave the flat.

Hayley was not worldly girl, but she wasn’t stupid. She knew she had been raped that night, probably by both boys. She knew sh should tell someone, but there was no one to tell, and anyway, she was scared. Scared of the boys who had done it to her, and scared of what people would think. Much better to forget about it. Pentend it had never happened. Put it from her mind.
But that was no possible.

When her period was late, she ignored the little vioce that nagged inside her head. Hayley was only young, and far from regular; it was nothing to worry about. But week passed. and then two. She started to feel sick. Of course, she kept it from her mum and dad. Mum especially always reacted badly when she said she felt unwell. She didnt go to the doctor, and even if she had the courage to walk into a pharmacy and ask for a pregnancy test, she had no money to buy one.

And so the pregnancy progressed. Hayley knew she couldnt keep it a secret for ever, but nine months was long time. Maybe by the time the baby was born, something would have changed in her life.

But it hadnt been nine months. Only five, when once again she slipped out of the flat without her mum and dad knowing. The pains were happening every fifteen minutes, and when they came she felt like doubling over in agony. There was no way she would be able to hide this from her mum, so she had to get out ov there.

It was raining outside, a heavy, cold, persistent rain that saturated her clothes almost immediately. The sun had set, and there was no one outside in this weather- no one to see when hayley bent over, clutching her belly and crying out. She staggered out of the estate and on to the main road that ran alongside it. There were a few pedestrains here, but plenty of cars and buses, their headlamps on as they splashed their way through the rain.

If any of them saw the fifteen-year-old girl, stumbling along the puddle-ridden pavement with a look of unabated agony on her face, they didnt stop to help.


Charity Thomson took the lift down from the maternity ward and walked through the clattering corridors of the hosptial to the cafe by the entrance on the ground floor. She could get a coffee on the ward, of course, but sometimes you just had to get out of there, away from the stress and the urgency and the shouting. Fifteen minutes of time to herself and she would, she knew, be re-engerised and ready to bring a few more souls into the world.
Charity had been a midwife- thirty years, near enough. In all that time she had never met a colleague who didnt have some complaint to make about the job- the conditions, the pay, the hours- but Charity had always loved it. There were difficult days, of course; there were deliveries that went wrong, that eneded in heartbreak: and she would never be a rich woman. But on the whole Charity felt blessed to be doing what she was doing.
She bought her drink and took a seat on one of the plastic chairs. It was seven in the evening, but the hospital was still busy, and she watched as people rushed in and out of the large main doors- visitors, doctors, patients- all of them creating a throng of activity. Charity sar quietly for five minutes, absorbing it all in a kind of daydream.
It was the sight of the girl that bought her back to her senses. She was standing in the doorway, her clothes sopping wet and her matted black hair stuck to the side of her face. She was pale- deathly pale- and she looked around her as though she was completely lost and confused. Then she doubled over, her hands clutching the side of her belly. She stayed like that for perhaps twenty seconds. When she straightened up, she looked so scared that it caught Charity’s breath.
Charity had been a midwife for long enough to know what those twenty seconds of agony were. She got to her feet and hurried over to where the girl was standing.
“come on love”, she said her voice automatically slipping into the kindly bedside manner she used with all pregnant women. “Lets get you upstairs.can you walk? best if you do eh”?
The girl stared at her as though she hadnt understood a word.
Charity put her arm around the girls shoulders and started ushering her in “look at you”, she said carrying on talking brightly. “You’re wet through. Sooner we get you out of these clothes and into something dry, the better, eh? Got someone here with you, have you love? Baby’s father?”
The girl shook her head violently.
“Mum?”
Again she shook her head. Poor dear, Charity took a better look at this strange girl with the matted hair and the soaking wet clothes. She seemed young, and her belly was barley swollen. It wasnt so uncommon for that ti happen- you might not even have known she was pregnant if you hadnt seen the signs- but Charity couldnt help woundering how far gone she was. “How many months love”? she asked as the doors hissed open on to the maternity ward.
“Five”, the girl replied hesitantly.
It was all charity could do not to let the worry show in her face. She held her security card up to the panel by the entrance door and, when it clicked open, hurried the girl through.

“What is your name, love”? she asked.
No reply.
“How old are you”?
“S-seventeen”, the girl stuttered a bit too quickly. It was obviously alie, but charity couldnt worry too much about that just at the moment. Her job was to look after the girl everything else could wait until later.

A nurse was standing at reception. “we’re going to need a doctor”, Charity told her quietly. “and make sure there’s room in special care”.

The nurse looked at her quizzically.
Five months. Charity mouthed the words silently to the nurse, whose expression immediately changed to one of concern. The midwife nodded meaningfully, and then continued to walk the girl towards the delivery suite.
Her patient was shaking violently, and charity knew she wasn’t far off now.

Hayley didnt get chance to hold her baby girl before she was taken away. But she saw her in the hands of the midwife, and she heard the tiny squawk of her little voice. She was so small. So desperately, impossible small- barely larger then the midwife’s hands- and, despite her absolute exhaustion, Hayley felt an overwhelming need to reach out and touch the child. She pushed herself up on to her elbows, but her strength had left her and she could do nothing but look as the baby was placed in a clear Perspex cot and wheeled out of the birthing room.

Then the nice midwife was there, standing by her bed and tightly holding her shaking hand.”you can see her in a bit, love. She’s very frail and we need to take her into special care and put her on respirator. You’re going to have to be very brave, but the doctors will do everything they can to give her the bes chance”.
Hay looked up at her with wide eyes, feeling them brim with tears. She was so kind. Nobody was ever that kind to her, and she was glad that her baby was being looked after by people like that.
“Thank you”, she said.
“Now listen love”, the midwife continued. “I know you’re not really seventeen. No one here is going to judge you or think the worse of you. All we want to do is look after you and make sure you and your baby are all right. But we need to know your name, and we need to get in touch with your mum and dad to let them know what’s happened. You do have a mum and dad, dont you, love”?
Hayley nodded.
“Good girl”. The midwife squeezed her hand. “Now we dont have to hurry. I’m going to leave you to rest for half an hour. You need anything at all. you press this button here. When I come back, we’ll go down to Special Care to see your baby, and then we’ll fill in all the pieces of paper that we need to. Then we’ll call your mum and dad. Do you want to do it or shall I”?
Hayley didnt answer
The midwife squeezed her hand “You think about it, love”, she said with a reassuring smile. “I’ll be back in a bit” She squeezed her hand a second time, and then left.

Hayley lay there, alone and confused. In the last hour, her world had changed. For months she had been terrified- terrified of what her parents would say and do