No Place Like Home

I don’t like it here, but they say I can’t leave. Last night one of the bigger girls hit me. I think her name is Jo, not sure though? I don’t really know anyone’s name; it’s not the kind of place you go around introducing yourself. I still don’t really know why she did it? Emily said it was because I looked at her funny, Jo that is. Emily is my only friend in here, she shared her pudding with me on the first night. She’s been here a really long time and says she can’t remember living anywhere else. I often hear her screaming in the night and when the morning comes she needs to find one of the people in charge to change her bedsheets. Some of the other girls laugh at her, but I don’t think there’s anything funny about it. A couple of nights back, she climbed into my bed and fell asleep next to me. Part of me was worried she would do a wee in my bed, but it was nice to have someone close to me, so I let her stay. 

  Anyway, back to Jo. Everyone is scared of her and do their best to avoid her. I didn’t think she would bother with me because I’m so much smaller than she is, but I guess I learned my lesson. I should have known that rule doesn’t apply, after the months I was forced to live with Mum’s old boyfriend, Mike. I knew he wasn’t a nice man the minute I met him, you just get that sense don’t you? Anyway my mum wouldn’t hear of it and brought him in to live with us, telling me that without Mike we would both be living on the street and that life on the street for a little girl is far worse than life with Mike. As soon as he moved in my mum kept having accidents: she fell down the stairs, walked into a door, bumped her nose while she was brushing her teeth and even broke her arm falling off my trampoline. She would often drink her special adult juice that I was never allowed to touch, that always made her clumsy. I never understood why Mike shouted at her when she hurt herself though? The other day Emily fell over in the little playground and the last thing I wanted to do was shout at her. One day I broke Mike’s favourite cup and he hit me so hard that my eyes started to blur. That time he didn’t shout, my mum did, she shouted and screamed and hit him until he ran for the door, and that was the last time we ever saw Mike.

  Jo reminds me of Mike in some ways. She’s very twitchy and gets angry over silly things, and last night was a very silly thing to get angry about. After Mike left, we did end up on the street and my mum was right, it wasn’t somewhere I wanted to be. We slept in lots of different places and would often be woken in the middle of the night, usually when someone who couldn’t walk in a straight line would come over and bother us. From time to time my mum would disappear with men, all kinds of men: fat men, old men, young men, tall men. They would never say very much and could never look me in the eye. She would come back a little while later, with that strange look she gets in her eyes, then she would hold onto me; sometimes she would hold me so tight it would hurt, but I could never pluck up the courage to tell her. One day we were approached by a nicely dressed lady, with clean and straight teeth. My mum called her the nasty witch, or something like that. She said she needed to speak to me alone. My mum screamed and spat at this perfectly nice woman, which was a little bit strange? Anyway that lady took me away from my mum and that’s how I ended up in here. 

  Last night I was telling Emily that my mum was coming to take me home. Emily reminded me that my mum had told me this lots of times before and that I should stop getting my hopes up. I knew this time would be different, my mum had called a few weeks ago and told me that she had managed to find somewhere for us to live, that she wasn’t drinking any of her adult juice and that it would just be the two of us this time. I could see Jo sitting on her bed and glaring at me. Then I told Emily that maybe she could come and live with me and my mum and that my mum would really like her. It was at this point Jo jumped off her bed, walked across the room and hit me in the head. I fell backwards and the next thing I remember was Emily stroking my hair. Jo was back on her bed when I looked up and she was still glaring. When I asked her why she did that, she told me that I need to stop getting my hopes up and that I was a witch, or something that sounded like that, for telling Emily she could leave with me. 

  Well another week has passed and I’m still here. I waited at the front entrance all day with my bags packed, but my mum didn’t show up. That night I dreamt I was locked in a tiny box and there was no way out; I woke up covered in sweat and crept out of bed, tiptoed past Jo, and got into Emily’s bed. I spoke with my mum again the other day. She promised me that next time she will come and get me and I can come home with her. This time it will be different. This time I know she will come and get me.