Free Gypsy Boy by Mikey Walsh Page A

Frankie it was Jesus, the Barbies and the brand-new Cabbage Patch dolls she continued to receive courtesy of Old Noah. For me, apart from my Action Man tank, which I was using as a urinal, there was a glow in the dark Dracula doll, a crocodile oven mitt I named Grandma Buggins, and, of course, my He-Man figures. My favourite toy of all was He-Man’s arch nemesis, Skeletor, the muscle-bound, blue-skinned villain with a skeleton’s face and a goat’s head on a stick as his choice weapon. I loved him so much, that the only reason I wanted the others was so that he could beat them up or bury them alive in the garden. I never left the house or went on a trip without smuggling him in with me somewhere.

    Most days Barbie and her friends invited He-Man and his pals to dinner. I’d even raid Frankie’s dolls’ clothes box to dress them formally for the occasion. The problem was they had such muscle-bound torsos that nothing fitted, so I improvised by cutting three holes in the end of each of my socks to make evening gowns for them.
    But our favourite game together was still the forbidden Aunt Sadly. I would wear one of Frankie’s nightdresses and her now disused navy school tights, with small stones shoved down the legs to look like varicose veins, just like Mrs Trout’s. Then, after Frankie had taught me how to behave like a lady, I would stay in the shop, while my ‘niece’ went off on a shopping spree around the house.
    Early one morning we were at this game while our parents were still asleep. Frankie was putting on my make-up in the bathroom, when we heard stirring from the main bedroom. Our father was awake and was making his way through the house to the bathroom. I fell backwards into Frankie, wriggling my shoulder blades and pointing towards the knot where the nightdress was tied on at the back of my neck. ‘Untie it, quick,’ I whispered.
    Frankie’s fingers fumbled and tugged, pulling it tighter in her panic, and half-strangling me. I rammed my face into a dry bath towel and scraped frantically at my make-up.
    ‘What the fuck, are you doing in there?’
    Frankie pushed out a grunting sound, ‘Can you wait a minute, Dad, I’m on the toilet.’
    ‘I know you’re both in there. Open the door – now.’
    Reluctantly Frankie unlocked the door.
    He barged in to find us both in glamorous dress and full make-up, only mine was now smeared all over my face.
Our father’s violent outbursts were becoming more frequent and more vicious, not just when he was training me, but whenever the monster within took him over. And this was one of those times.
    I was pulled into the beating room, the new and well-deserved name for my bedroom. And after the thrashing I got that day we had to kill off Aunt Sadly; her presence around the house was far too risky. We gave her a funeral, and laid her to rest out in the garden along with the rest of the bodies. We both missed her.
    I envied my sister. She was untouchable because she was a girl. I adored her, worshipped her and hated her all at the same time. She was never at the end of a punch, a belt, or a boot, never hated, humiliated or jeered at. She was my father’s daughter, more like him than I could ever be, and safe, because of her sex.
    Old Granddad Noah was looming over my father like a spectre, reminding him constantly of his lack of worth compared to Tory and now Tory’s strapping sons. And I just rubbed salt in the wound. Day by day my father’s revulsion for me grew and my body became a mass of bruises, new layered on top of the old.
    Still, in some respects the training worked. In time I learned to withstand most of his punches without crying out or flinching. But rather than being pleased with me, he saw this as a fresh challenge. If I didn’t scream with pain, he wouldn’t be satisfied. He searched for ways to ‘test’ me, with belts, sticks, boot-heels and even Barbie dolls, whipped across my legs, leaving marks that made the blood rise from my skin. In truth,