Episode 31 - Innocence Lost
Friday: noon
Jez lay on her sofa fondling the locket she wore around her neck, as she often did when she was thoughtful. Inside was a photo of a small baby...her baby...that she had given up when she was only a child herself.
For the past 2 years Jez had gone to all extremes to find her child. Because of bureaucratic red tape, finding her had become a maze of dead ends. Jez had put her last cent in the pocket of a private detective to find her daughter.
The PI was as dodgy as Hollywood had portrayed and she had nervously handed over her cash. He phoned her every month, telling Jez he was getting closer but needed more money.
He had left a message on her machine the night before, telling her he had some news. She had heard the same story dozens of times and knew not to hold her breath. Still, she had got the jitters and nervous expectations and called in sick.
Jez had become pregnant at the age of 15 to a boy several years older than her that had asked her to a party. She had sat in front of the mirror for hours applying her makeup and surveying herself so she would be perfect. He had picked her up, talked pleasantly to her parents and drove them to the party.
He had urged her to drink some whiskey that he had in a small hip flask. She thought it was foul but it made her feel somehow sophisticated and adult and she forced herself not to grimace as she drank.
The world had begun to spin and she had suddenly felt very warm. Her date lead her outside to "get some air" and she had thrown up in the bushes beside the house.
Jez's legs had collapsed underneath her and she lay retching on the dewy grass. In the back of her disorientated mind she had wondered what he must be thinking of her.
She had felt her skirt being pushed up about her waist and had weakly protested. Her date had told her to shut up and lay on top of her. She had struggled beneath him at first but his weight pinned her down. She had given up her futile struggles and stared upwards at the stars and tried to transport herself away from this terrible place.
When he had finished, he had pulled up his pants,thrown her a $10 note and grunted something about catching a taxi home. She had lay there for what seemed an eternity after he left. Eventually, she had rearranged her clothes and staggered towards her home, leaving the $10 bill to be carried away by the night autumn breeze.
She had snuck into her house and showered until the water ran cold and crawled into bed, pulling the blankets up tight around her neck. She had squeezed her eyes shut tight, trying to push away the shame and terror that she felt.
Five months later, when she could no longer hide her growing belly, she told her parents that she was pregnant. Jez refused to tell them the details of the conception out of shame and self hate. She remembered the look of pity and sorrow in her father's eyes and the pure loathing in her mother's.
She had been sent off to her grandmother's in the country where she had given birth to a premature baby grrl. Jez wanted nothing to do with it. Her grandmother had tried to get her to care for the baby, much to her mother's protests, who wanted "it" out of their lives forever.
Jez remembered the argument that had ensued and how Nanna had shouted at her mother that she had been conceived out of wedlock and how would she have liked being tossed away to some strangers? Jez's mother had gone pale and they never spoke of it again.
Eventually the baby had been quietly given to some social welfare people who had passed her on to a childless couple. Jez had feigned disinterest as her daughter was taken away when secretly inside her she fought the confusion and heartache that she felt.
Jez dragged herself off the sofa and dialed the PI's office, numbly resigned to the fact that he would only want more money that she could not give.
'I've found her,' he stated simply. Jez nearly dropped the phone.
'You have?' she whispered disbelievingly.
'You won't believe this,' he said excitedly, 'she lives at 181 Carlisle Street.'
to be continued... |
