Читать книгу Violated: A Shocking and Harrowing Survival Story From the Notorious Rotherham Abuse Scandal - Sarah Wilson, Sarah Wilson - Страница 8

It was in early 2003, a few months before I left the primary school I hated so much, that I first met Nadine.

With four of us to support on her own, Mum was taking all the hours she could get at the pub and was soon doing double shifts. This meant she often worked from the early afternoon right through until closing time, and sometimes she couldn’t find anyone to babysit us. By this point, the boys were old enough to fend for themselves, but Laura and I would have to go and sit in the pub after school while we waited for Mark or one of my aunties to pick us up and take us home for dinner. No one seemed to mind; it was a pretty relaxed place and most of the staff brought their kids along. I can’t deny that we were bored out of our minds. We were desperate to be out with our mates, but Mum insisted on keeping an eye on us as we were so young. Given my recent behaviour, I suspected it was also because she didn’t want to let me out of her sight.

The pub was around half an hour’s walk from our primary school. It was owned by a woman called Carole, who had a right mouth on her. It had been there for as long as I could remember, but Carole and her husband had only owned it for a few years. They gave it the odd lick of paint but it still looked a bit shabby. Back then, everyone smoked in pubs and the white walls quickly became yellow and stained. Not that anyone minded – it was hardly like there were loads of better places to go round our way.

Some of the customers were okay, but others were a bit dodgy. It was always dead quiet during the day because most of them only came in at night. It wasn’t like some pubs, where you could go for dinner or a nice bar snack. It didn’t even have a kitchen. The best you could hope for was a packet of crisps.

There were two rooms: the main bar area and a lounge we called the ‘tap room’. In the tap room, people of all ages would sit and smoke weed openly. It was a funny sight: scruffy teenagers and wayward old men passing joints around for hours on end. There were always tons of underage people in there, some of them barely older than Laura and me. Carole turned a bit of a blind eye to it. I don’t think she was really that bothered, and in all the time Mum worked there I never saw the coppers come in.

Laura and I usually hung around in the tap room while we waited for Mum. Its saving grace was that it had a pool table and we were allowed to have a few games, provided none of the regulars wanted to use it. But that day, some had come in early, so we’d been told to sit in the bar instead.

‘This is shit,’ I moaned to Laura, and she rolled her eyes in agreement.

It was then that I saw Nadine for the first time, standing at the back door. Nadine was a big girl, much bigger than Laura or me, but it wasn’t just her size that drew my eyes to her. She had frizzy, mousy brown hair with cheap blonde highlights that needed topping up. She was still wearing her school uniform, and her stomach spilled out of her white shirt over her short black skirt, which barely covered her bum. She’d only fastened a few of her shirt buttons and I tried not to stare at her huge breasts – I realised I could see her bra. I could tell from her school tie, which she’d carelessly fastened in a loose knot round her neck, that she was at one of the local high schools, or the comp, as we called it. She looked much older than me and I soon discovered she was fifteen and in Year 10. She intimidated me, but not just because of how big she was. There was just something about her. Even before we’d spoken a single word, I knew she was the kind of person you had to respect, or there would be trouble.

‘Who are you?’ she asked, eyeballing Laura and me. It sounded like an accusation. Laura looked to me helplessly.

‘I’m Sarah and this is my sister Laura,’ I replied, trying not to sound nervous. ‘Our mum works here.’

‘Yeah, I’ve seen you around,’ Nadine said to me, ignoring Laura.

‘So who do you chill with, then?’

Around Rotherham, ‘chilling’ was code for drinking and taking drugs. It sounds silly, but I instantly felt proud that Nadine was speaking to me, almost like I was her equal. Knowing they were around her age, I rhymed off the names of some of the boys from Elaine’s, desperate to seem cool and grown up.

‘Oh, yeah?’ she said. I hoped that she was impressed, but I wasn’t sure. ‘Anyway, I’m off. It’s shit in here tonight.’

There was no one serving at the bar so Nadine barged behind the counter and grabbed a litre bottle of vodka. She obviously did it all the time, because she didn’t even look round to see if anyone was watching her, and Carole wasn’t exactly the kind of person who’d pay to get CCTV installed. Then she swung her handbag over her arm and disappeared out of the back door.

The next evening, I saw Nadine again. Laura and I were waiting for Mum in the tap room when she swept in and planted herself down next to me. She smelled of fags and cheap perfume.

‘So, how old are you, Sarah?’ she asked. She lit up a fag and took a puff, before passing it to me. I took it from her as Laura shifted uncomfortably. I knew she felt weird about me smoking, but I didn’t feel bad. Instead, it gave me a bit of a buzz. There were just two years between us but I suddenly felt much older and cooler.

‘I’m in Year 6,’ I said. Nadine raised her eyebrows.

‘Year 6,’ she snorted. ‘God.’

‘Yeah, but I fucking hate it,’ I replied, before proudly adding: ‘I’m always getting excluded.’

‘Right,’ Nadine said. ‘You at Ferham Primary?’

‘Yeah,’ I replied, stubbing out the fag she’d given me as I blew out the last of its smoke. ‘What a shithole.’

‘I sometimes go chilling there at night with my mates,’ Nadine said. ‘It’s a laugh.’ She lit up another fag, blowing smoke in my face. I tried not to flinch. ‘Actually, I’m going there in a bit. Want to come?’

‘Okay,’ I said, as casually as I could. ‘Cool.’

To this day, I can’t explain why I was so hypnotised by Nadine. Perhaps it was because she was so loud and confident. She was hardly a good role model. As I replay this scene in my head almost thirteen years later, I desperately want to give myself a shake and tell myself not to go; to stay at the pub with Laura and Mum and forget all about her.

But that’s not what happened. Of course, I did go with Nadine. For as long as I could remember, my classmates had made me feel like a freak, but now this cool older girl wanted to be my mate. Sure, I had some older mates from Elaine’s, but Nadine seemed different. I was already under her spell.

I had no way of knowing that my new friend would soon open the door to another world, a world I really didn’t want to enter. For all my bravado, my eleven-year-old self had no idea what horrors lay in store. Nadine and I weren’t going to swap CDs and talk about nail varnish like other young girls.

Nadine was someone to hang around with, someone who might even give me some of her stolen booze.

I went into the back of the pub, where Mum was cleaning some glasses.

‘Can I go to the park for a bit?’ I asked.

I explained that I’d made a new friend called Nadine, but I didn’t let on how old she was, so Mum said yes. Her shift didn’t finish until late that night, and I knew Mark was babysitting because he was due to pick Laura and me up soon to take us home for dinner.

‘Don’t stay out too late – you’ve got school tomorrow,’ she told me, but I didn’t pay much attention. I knew Mark wouldn’t be bothered if I came in a bit later than I was meant to.

Half an hour later, Nadine summoned me to the back door of the pub. She’d obviously been home because she’d changed out of her school uniform and was wearing jeans and a hoodie. I grabbed my school bag, feeling a mix of nerves and anticipation. I expected her to nick another bottle of booze from behind the bar, and I was a little disappointed when she didn’t.

‘Let’s go,’ she said.

But as we walked along the road towards my school, Nadine fished a crumpled £20 note out of the pocket of her jeans.

‘I took this from my mum’s purse,’ she boasted. ‘Daft cow. What do you drink?’

‘Cider, usually,’ I replied.

‘We’ll get vodka,’ she said. ‘It’s well better.’

I’d never tried vodka before but I got the impression I didn’t have much say in the matter. We stopped at a local corner shop and there was a scruffy looking man stood outside, asking people if they had any spare change.

‘I just pay the smackheads to go in and get my booze,’ Nadine said.

I watched as she handed the man a handful of change – it couldn’t have been more than a pound in total, but he seemed happy.

‘What you after?’ he asked.

‘A litre bottle of vodka and two bottles of Coke,’ Nadine replied.

A few minutes later, the man reappeared with a blue carrier bag and we walked to the playground. The sun was beginning to set and it looked a bit different at night, without all the kids buzzing around.

‘Looks like it’s just us,’ Nadine said. I felt a surge of satisfaction as I realised she’d chosen to hang around with me, on my own.

Some people might find it shocking that all I wanted to do at eleven was mess about with older people and get drunk out of my head. Some girls my age were still playing with dolls. But back then I was so desperate to fit in, I’d have done anything to feel accepted. Plus, it wasn’t like we had much else to do. We could rarely afford cinema trips or fancy toys like some kids could, so we had to make our own entertainment somehow or go mad with boredom. In a town with lots of poverty and not much hope, drinking and taking drugs often seemed like the only option.

Nadine took a Coke bottle from the carrier bag and poured half of it onto the ground. It fizzed as it made a puddle at my feet. She then topped it up with vodka and handed it to me, before making one up for herself. I took a huge swig and it took everything in my power not to gag. The vodka was much stronger than the cheap cider I was used to. Even mixed with Coke, it tasted foul and burned my mouth. Nadine laughed so much she snorted.

‘You all right there?’ she said.

‘Yeah,’ I said, screwing up my face as I took another sip. ‘I just always drink cider, that’s all.’

‘It tastes minging at first,’ she admitted, gulping from her own bottle. ‘But you get used to it. And it gets you pissed faster.’

I figured that the more drunk I got, the less I’d be able to taste the vodka, so I necked my bottle as fast as I could and soon Nadine was topping me up again. But this time there was no Coke left so I had to drink the vodka on its own. It tasted even worse, but it didn’t stop me.

I quickly realised that Nadine was absolutely obsessed with boys. She was way more experienced than I’d imagined. Back then, it didn’t occur to me that she was still underage and that the men she spoke about were probably taking advantage of her. To me, it just seemed like she loved sex, and loved talking about it even more. At first, I thought the lads she said she’d slept with were in her class at school.

‘Who do you think the fittest lad round here is?’ she asked me. The vodka had made her pasty face flush red. I’d always been a bit of a tomboy and I’d never done anything more than hold hands with a boy – when I’d pretended to be going out with John back in East Dene when I was just six. I was still a kid and boyfriends were the last thing on my mind, so I just shrugged.

‘Come on, Sarah,’ she said, prodding me in the ribs. ‘You must fancy someone.’ She ran through the names of some boys we both knew, telling me who she thought was fit, who would be good in bed. I hoped the darkness hid the shock in my eyes. Of course, I knew the basic facts of life, but I didn’t need details. I was only eleven, for God’s sake.

‘I shouldn’t even be saying this,’ Nadine went on. ‘Not now I’ve got a boyfriend.’

‘Is he in your year at school?’ I asked.

‘Ha!’ Nadine replied. ‘No, he’s way older. He’s a great shag. Older guys are much better in bed.’

‘Oh, right,’ I said.

‘Just wait till you lose your virginity, Sarah,’ Nadine said. ‘You don’t know what you’re missing.’

When we’d finished the vodka it was time to go home. I stumbled when I tried to get up and Nadine snorted with laughter again.

‘You’re fucking smashed!’ she said.

Mum wasn’t home yet when I got in and Mark was watching telly in the living room.

‘You all right?’ he called after me.

‘Yeah,’ I said, trying to say as little as possible as I made my way upstairs. As usual, Laura was already asleep, and I passed out as soon as I climbed into bed. But a few hours later I woke up, my stomach churning violently. My head was pounding too. I could feel the vodka rising in my throat and I ran to the bathroom. I’d just opened the door when I vomited everywhere, not quite making it to the toilet bowl. Mum was home and in bed by this point, but she woke up as soon as she heard the commotion.

‘Sorry, Mum,’ I said. ‘I feel terrible.’

I thought she would catch on straight away – that she’d realise I’d been drinking with Nadine – but she seemed none the wiser.

‘Oh, you poor thing,’ she clucked sympathetically. ‘You must have a stomach bug. I’ll get this mess cleaned up and you go back to bed.’

The next morning, I could barely lift my head off the pillow. My mouth was dry and sticky and my head was still throbbing. Mum opened the curtains and sunlight poured through the window. It hurt my eyes so much I pulled the covers over my head. The vodka had given me a much worse hangover than I was used to with cider.

‘How are you feeling?’ she asked.

‘Terrible,’ I groaned. ‘I’m not going to school today.’

‘Probably a good idea,’ Mum said. ‘Best not to spread your germs.’

From then on, I chilled with Nadine most nights. I still saw Lynsey occasionally, but a few months after I met Nadine the council moved Elaine to another house. Lynsey and the boys went there sometimes, but by this point someone had told Mum that Elaine took cocaine all the time. She went mad, telling me I wasn’t allowed to help with her kids any more. Before, I’d have put up a fight, but now that I had Nadine to hang around with, I didn’t need my old mates so much. It sounds bad, but I was just a kid and all caught up in this new, exciting friendship.

Nadine would meet me at the pub or the park after school. Sometimes she’d invite some of her mates from school, but mainly it was just the two of us. Nadine would usually steal a bottle of spirits from behind a bar or help herself to some money from her mum’s purse so we could get someone to buy us cider, vodka or MD 20/20 – cheap fortified wine better known in these parts as ‘Mad Dog’. We’d drink anything, as long as it didn’t cost much and it got us pissed quickly.

I didn’t think it was a big deal that Nadine stole from people. I just thought it was cool that she had the guts and she never seemed to get caught. Her parents must have noticed money going missing, but she never mentioned it. As for the bottles of booze from the pub, the place was full of dodgy characters so Nadine was never the prime suspect any time Carole noticed something had disappeared.

Nadine and I didn’t do much apart from smoke and drink, either in the school playground or at the local park. It was all we had in common, really, but that didn’t seem to matter. There was nothing else to do anyway. The police would often drive past us and I’m sure they knew what we were up to, but they didn’t seem bothered. They probably thought we were just a nuisance and that stopping to tell us off was more hassle than it was worth. Most of the time Mum would still be working when I got home and Mark and Robert never said anything about my drinking. If Mum was in, I went straight to bed, hoping she wouldn’t notice I was slurring my words and unsteady on my feet.

The only nights I didn’t see Nadine were when she was with her boyfriend. She talked about him lots and said his name was Amir. I didn’t ask too many questions as I was scared of saying something silly. I knew nothing about having a proper, grown-up boyfriend. To me, it seemed years away. I wondered if I’d ever get to meet Amir, but I assumed Nadine was too embarrassed to introduce us. After all, he was even older than Nadine. She said he’d left school ages ago, so I guessed he must be seventeen, maybe even eighteen. She was probably scared I’d make her look babyish.

But one night, we were walking to the playground, clutching our bottles of cider, when Nadine’s mobile phone started buzzing in her pocket. Her face lit up when she glanced at the screen. Over her shoulder, I saw that Amir’s name had flashed up. The conversation was short.

‘Okay,’ she said. ‘See you soon.’ She hung up and a smile spread across her face.

‘What is it?’ I asked.

‘Oh, Amir’s going to come and chill with us,’ she replied. ‘He’s bringing some mates. You’ll like them.’