She found me in the garden, stripped to the waist, swearing like hell as I pulled and strained at what was left of the tree stump.
"You son of a bitch, you will fucking well come up, you fucking well will!"
"Having trouble darling?"
I grinned at the sound of her voice, it belonged to the one woman in the world who I knew I could trust.
"Hi mum," I turned round prepared for the usual kiss, "Oh my God."
Her short blonde hair was in clumps as if it had been pulled out, one eye was completely shut, the other one-half way to being shut, dried blood had clotted beneath her obviously broken nose, and her whole face was just a mass of bruises.
"Can I stay for a while darling?" she asked as she collapsed in a heap at my feet.
She weighed next to nothing, and I was a big lad anyway, I picked her up and carried her into the house, I'd intended laying her on the couch, instead though I carried on upstairs and put her down gently on the bed.
The bruises were all over her legs as well, her skirt slid up over her thighs, and I was shocked to see that she was naked beneath it, even her inner thighs were black and blue with the bruises.
"Don't worry mum," I whispered as I brushed away an errant strand of hair from her forehead.
"You've had the last beating you'll ever have to take from that bastard."
That bastard was my father, a drunken bully, an idle layabout and the reason that at just sixteen, I was living in a small rented house and working in a local factory.
Mum was just thirty-three, he'd put his seed in her belly when she was sixteen, and I was the result of it. In spite of my father, I'd grown into a big lad, bigger than him and one Monday afternoon when I came back from work, he was just about to eat what mum had cooked for me.
"You're too fucking late," he laughed drunkenly. "You can do without."
I just looked at him with the total disgust, he'd never held a job for more than a week before being sacked for lateness, non-attendance or shoddy workmanship. But it was never his fault, in short, he was a complete fucking loser, and I detested him.
"Give your mother some money, she can go to the shop for me, I want some fags."
"Try giving her some of your dole money," I said quietly, "If you've got any left after the pub that is."
"Don't fucking answer me back boy."
Mum was gesturing to me behind his back to leave it.
"I'll get some on the slate," she said and went to put her coat on, but I stopped her with my hand on her wrist.
"Let the idle bastard fetch his own cigarettes mum."
He let out a roar and shot up from the table scattering plates and cutlery all over the floor.
"You cheeky little bastard," he roared, "I'm your father, and I'll teach you some fucking respect."
I'd had enough, more than enough, I'd lain in bed many a night listening to him rutting; he'd never made love to my mum, it had been more like rape. When I was younger, I'd cowered and watched as he'd beaten her, sometimes with his fists, sometimes his feet as well. I'd had sixteen years of it, and I wasn't about to take any more.
I ducked under his wildly flailing fist and hit him on the chin, his head snapped backwards, and mum screamed.
"You can't demand respect, you piece of crap," I hit him again, "You have to earn it."
His eyes glazed over and he looked as if he was about to fall asleep, so I helped him on his way with a fist on his jaw, and he slid to the floor, either drunk or unconscious or a combination of both.
Mum went to stay with her sister that night, Janice and her husband Pete, were used to having her every so often, but Pete for all his kindness was no match for my dad. So he was always quietly pleased when she returned to the living hell that was her life with my father.
He was still in a foul mood when he awoke an hour after I'd put him to sleep.
"Gimme a drink," he demanded as he struggled to his feet. "Where's your fucking mother?"
A gentle slap on his cheek did wonders to change his attitude at least for the moment.
"She's gone to Janice and Pete," I said roughly, "And you're going to bed."
I think that accepting my superiority over him hurt him more than my fists had, but he saw the expression on my face, I was ready to belt him again.
"Go to fucking bed, I'll be gone in the morning, but I'll promise you this, if you beat her again, I'll kill you.”
I didn't shout or yell, I spoke quietly, but there was a menace in my voice, and I hoped sincerely that the fear I was really feeling didn't show on my face.
I'd worked at the factory for about six months, and I was quite well thought of so I left a message on the company answer phone saying that I needed some time off and that I'd phone the following morning.
In fact, I didn't have to, the boss himself was at the door just after I woke up on the sofa.
"What's wrong Terry?"
He knew a little about my circumstances having once employed my father, in fact, I only got my job because he failed to make the connection. To his credit, once he found out who I was, he'd kept me on and even approved my permanent employment after I'd finished my three month's trial, he was a nice man, if a bit gruff and curt and I respected him greatly.
I told him everything, and on the spot, he offered me a little-terraced house to rent, one of many that he owned across the city.
"You can have it for six months rent free Terry, but it needs a lot of work. It needs the walls plastering, it needs decorating, and there's next to no furniture in it."
I accepted it immediately, and we shook hands on the agreement.
"I expect you back at work next Monday Terry," he said and added quietly. "You'll be paid for this week, good luck, you're worth more than your father ever could be."
It took me half an hour to pack all my worldly goods into a sports bag and two suitcases. I called for a taxi to take me over to Janice's house to see mum and tell her I was leaving.
Her reaction was predictable, she burst into tears and clung to me.
"I'm not going to ask you to change your mind darling," she said between sobs. "You deserve better than I've ever given you."
My own tears were rising as I held her tightly.
"Mum," I said gently. "You were never allowed to give me anything, he's so used to being an idle bastard, he expects his own wife to be the same, but you're not mum, I know you're not."
I'd written my new address down on the back of an envelope which I pressed into her hand along with a twenty-pound note,
"Don't let him get hold of either of these mum and please think seriously about what he's doing to you, mine's only a small house, but it's big enough for both of us."
A quick peck on the cheek and I left before her tears got to me and I changed my mind.
The house wasn't bad at all, but it was cold and a little bit damp, so I turned the gas and electricity on and went down to a little charity shop just down the road where I purchased a pile of bedding, a kettle and a few bits of crockery.
Dropping them off at the house, I went to the corner shop and bought some tea and coffee, milk and sugar and a few bits to eat. When I got back, I saw my boss's car outside, and he was just unloading the last of eight big boxes of blankets, crockery, and food as well as a second-hand microwave oven, a television set, and a video player.
"Here," he said in his usual gruff manner. "You might be able to use this lot, we were going to chuck it out anyway."
"Do you always throw out perfectly good bacon and eggs, or fresh fruit and vegetables, boss?"
"Smart little twat," he growled and got back into his car, just as he put it in gear he shouted through the window. "My missus, who seems to like you, the daft bitch, sent you this." and he thrust an envelope into my hands, then he roared off like a bloody formula one driver, throwing a, "Tidy the bloody garden up." at me as he did so!
"Jesus." There were five crisp twenty-pound notes in the envelope along with a note.
"Just to help you get started, it's a gift, not a loan.”
ooOoo
I spent the rest of the day just organizing things, the food had to be put away, the television and video installed and I cleaned all around with an old vacuum cleaner Jack and Brenda had given me. Their gifts had been entirely unexpected, and although I wasn't particularly hard up for money, the cash had been greatly appreciated.
The house didn't have a phone, so I invested half of it on a cheap, pay as you go mobile and then couldn't think of anyone to ring!
Oh well, at least I had one.
I was up bright and early the next morning and explored the large garden. In a rickety old outhouse, I found a spade and a garden fork, so I set to work clearing it because I had an idea of making money out of growing stuff there. But the trouble was, there was a dirty great big stump growing right in the middle of what I'd already decided was going to be the vegetable patch.
An axe set me back five pounds from a junk shop, and the tight old sod behind the counter even charged me a fiver for a length of rusty old chain that I thought I might need to pull the stump out.
I worked hard until the early evening and then washed and decided to try my luck down at the local pub on the next corner. Well, I was more than big enough to pass for eighteen, and true enough the landlord served me a pie and a pint without question.
The pie went down without touching the sides, and he beamed when I asked for another one which went down almost as quickly as the first. Briefly, I wondered if mum had gone home yet and if she had, would he take my leaving out on her?
There wasn't much I could do about that, so I drank another pint and went home completely knackered. I was determined to watch something on my television, but the next thing I knew was waking up and seeing my watch displaying 02:00, so I crawled into bed and fell asleep again immediately.
The following morning I attacked the stump again with renewed vigour and had actually got it half out of the ground when mum's voice behind me made me stop!
ooOoo
It was almost teatime before she awoke again and by then more bruising had appeared around her face and arms, she looked a right bloody mess, and I told her so.
"Thanks, Terry," she said weakly. "That's just what I wanted to hear."
I grinned at her and touched my lips to her forehead, the only place that seemed to be unmarked.
"Fancy anything to eat mum?"
"Why, have you got anything?"
I told her about Jack and Brenda and their gifts, and she agreed with me that they seemed like nice people.
"It must be nice to have friends, we haven't got any."
I held her in my arms and stroked her head.
"We have got friends, mum, everybody out there is a friend that we haven’t met yet. It's you from now on and me, that's who we are, you're never going back to that drunken bastard again, never."
