And No One Stopped Them | Part 6

My Sociopath Brother’s Relentless Reign of Terror Reaches New Lows

I was five when he became a master in the art of torment

I was five.

Crouching down behind my bed in my undershirt and panties, I prayed that my parents had forgotten it was the first day of school. I’d been dreading it for as long as I could remember.

“Just wait’ll you get to school,” my older brother, Paul, had said. “They have a dungeon there, and a torture chamber. It’s horrible and dark, cold and smelly. They’ll hang you by chains from the walls and you won’t be allowed to eat. They’ll whip you and beat you!”

His eyes twinkled and danced. “Your teacher will look like a nice little old lady with grey hair. She will say she is called Miss Sparling. The room will look really cheerful with lots of colours and toys and little desks. But as soon as all the parents are gone, Miss Sparling will turn into a huge, scary monster with really big teeth and claws. And there will be a big trap door in the floor that opens up and you’ll fall into the dungeon.”

He grinned sadistically from ear to ear.

I was too shocked and far too terrified to speak. My heart raced a million miles an hour in my chest, like that of a tiny sparrow, caught in the teeth of a big, fat cat.

“And they hardly ever let you come home! You’ll be trapped there for months on end!” he said, doing his best to be threatening.

“I don’t believe you!” I cried, folding my arms across my chest. “You come home every day!”

“Yeah, but that’s because I know the secret of how to get out!” he said.

“Tell me what it is! Please!” I begged.

The only response I got was more sinister laughter and dancing eyes.

“And if you ask Mum and Dad about the dungeons and all that, they’ll lie and say it’s not true, just so they can get you there ’cause if you don’t go, the police will put them in jail, and then they’ll put you in jail, too!”

My heart hit the floor. It’s hopeless and I’m doomed, yes doomed, that’s the word.

So I hid on that first day of school, hoping my parents would forget about it but of course, they remembered. And they found me.

My dad walked with me to school and I cried all the way. He wanted to know why and when I told him, he said it wasn’t true.

My stomach rolled and my knees buckled under me.

It was just as Paul had predicted.

I clung to my dad’s leg when we arrived at the classroom. Just like driving past a car accident, I was terrified to look inside but couldn’t help myself. I thought I would throw up when I saw the little desks, the cheerful colours and toys, just as Paul had described.

And then I spotted her. A sweet-looking, grey-haired old lady, smiling as she came to greet us. My mouth was parched. My heart was banging in my chest and my palms were sweating like mad.

“Hello! I’m Miss Sparling!” she beamed.

I froze in terror, crying and desperate not to be left there but after he spoke to the Monster in Disguise for a few minutes, my beloved Daddy peeled me off his leg and strode down the hall. Leaving me behind, I was completely distraught about being tortured and starved for months till I would see him again. That’s it, I am doomed, I am dead!

And I waited. And nothing bad happened. And Miss Sparling didn’t turn into a scary, horrible monster. She let me go home and I couldn’t remember ever being so relieved. Or so furious with my brother.

I saw Paul after school.

“You’re a liar!” I shouted. “None of that bad stuff happened! You made it all up!”

Paul laughed. “No, I didn’t! Sometimes they make you wait and spring it on you way later. It could be weeks or even months before they do that stuff to you!”

My stomach churned and my heart sank with my powerlessness, helplessness and hopelessness. Being just a small girl of five years old, Paul’s words kept me waiting and fearing and dreading and feeling doomed, yes, doomed, every minute of every day for a very long time.

I was naked except for a piece of tissue that covered the parts I didn’t want Dr. Emery to see, the parts where my mother did that horrible private thing to me so often. I wished I didn’t have to be naked-except-for-the-tissue in front of him because he was Katherine and Laura’s dad and I would have to see him when I played at their house after this.

“When did she start having these stomach aches?” he asked, his kind face smiling down at me while he pressed ever so gently on my tummy.

“I don’t know. She’s been complaining about them more and more often for a while. Especially first thing in the morning, worse on school days.” She was trying to sound like a Nice Mummy Who Cared.

“She can’t be having trouble at school,” he said. “She’s extremely intelligent.”

“I think she’s just lazy and looking for an excuse not to go,” she speculated, her lips stretching across her teeth in a fake smile at the doctor, trying to make him think she was joking. But I knew otherwise.

“There aren’t any other stresses, are there? Say, at home?” he asked, turning to smile down at me as he pressed softly here and there, up and down, side to side on my belly.

“Oh, no, absolutely not,” she assured him, smiling that sickly sweet, phony smile of hers.

As he turned back toward me, she pursed her lips and squinted at me from across the room.

He finished poking around on my belly.

“I can’t find anything wrong,” he said, finally pulling up the thin paper sheet a little more. “I think she’s just very anxious and nervous. People as intelligent as she is can be rather high-strung.”

He smiled at me and patted the back of my hand reassuringly.

As soon as she’d finished smiling and nodding and thanking and pretending to be the Nice Mummy Who Cared, we left his office.

“Hmph! What have you got to be anxious about?” my mother asked, her piercing eyes boring holes right through me the second we stepped out into the hall and she had pulled the door shut behind us. “This is all your fault! Now he’s going to think there’s something wrong at our house or in our family! He’s our neighbour! What’s he going to think of us now, thanks to you?”

She gave me a shove. I stumbled but she hadn’t managed to push me down that time.

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