The
breathing is what I remember noticing first. Heavy, rapid, and sharp
intakes of breath increasing in volume as whoever it was came closer. It
struck me as odd in the library setting I was in, sitting at a
computer. I looked up from processing my Internet banking and hesitated.
Then
I heard a female voice speaking rapidly and heard fear and panic
intermingled in her words. “Someone tried to abduct her. He had her by
the arm and on the ground.” The voice rose in volume. I stood up as the
breathing became louder and laced with sobs, and a stab of pain went
through my chest and caught there within a block of fear as I recognised
the sobs were coming from my eleven-year-old daughter, Rose. She
suddenly materialised, walking out from an aisle to the right of me,
with a lady alongside her, holding on to her.
Everything then erupted.
Rose,
the instant she saw me, became hysterical, screaming out, “Mum, Mum.”
She took great gulps of breath, and the only clear words I could hear as
she forced them out of her lungs, which were constricted by a lack of
oxygen and panic as she hyperventilated and collapsed on the ground in
front of me, were, “Man….He was touching me, Mum….I couldn’t get away.” I
was holding on to one side of her, with the lady I didn’t know on the
other side, trying to pull her up.
“Mum,
my legs don’t work,” Rose said. She was heavy in my arms. A chair
appeared in front of us by the information desk, and we half dragged and
half carried Rose the last few feet to sit on it. I stood up and kept
my hand on her shoulder.
People
were moving around, appearing in front of me and disappearing. I could
hear voices around me, but wasn’t aware of their meaning. It must have
been only a couple seconds, but it felt like minutes until a lady tapped
me on my shoulder. She had two policemen by her side. Suddenly all the
sounds and voices became louder and clearer to me, and I was conscious
of all the people looking at us. I felt like we had to get away.
“Please,
can we move somewhere more private?” I asked, and this time all the
held-back emotion came through me and sounded in my voice. I nodded to
the doorway I thought led to the sorting room.
“Yes,” said the lady.
I
remembered my handbag with everything in it next to the computer about
ten feet away. I said, “I just have to get my bag,” and I ran back and
grabbed it.
I
was conscious of about four other people at each side of me and behind
me, staring at their screens and typing. As much as I was grateful that
they didn’t meet my eyes or speak to me, as I wanted to rush as quickly
as I could, I was also silently asking myself, What are they thinking? Why aren’t they talking to me? Do they blame me? And the huge question, What happened? I could feel my face burning and my heart pounding as I turned and ran back to Rose.
We
walked through the door into the back room, and I felt the relief of
not being on public view. I could feel that Rose was starting to shake
all over. I wanted to pull her onto my knee and hold her and ask her
what had happened, but I didn’t.
We
sat down at someone’s desk, and papers and items were moved from in
front of us. I put my bag on the floor, under the legs of the chair, and
suddenly a librarian appeared and said, “Sorry, but we need to ask you
these questions quickly so we can try to catch him. What was he wearing?
What did he look like?”
Rose
said, “His hands were dirty and felt rough on my legs.” She started
crying. “He was kissing me all over and on my neck, and I kept telling
him to stop, and he wouldn’t.”
The
minute she said his hands were rough, I went cold all through me. When I
had been assaulted as a child, one of the main things I remembered at
the time was how sharp his fingernails had felt and how dirty his hands
had been.
It
was all swirling around in my head, emotions from past and present. My
own emotions and awareness of them and my awareness of my daughter’s
emotions and how I needed to keep mine in check for her. The heaviness
and weight in my chest tightened, and my head felt light and dizzy.
Someone
called out that a librarian had chased him, and they had the
registration number of his car. I immediately felt so relieved and
grateful for whoever had done this, as I knew it could make a big
difference in catching him. Two other women came over with the police
and sat down next to us. One of them was about seventeen years old and
was crying. They introduced themselves as Julia and Candice, and the
older lady said, “Candice saw what happened. She called out to me, and
when I came around the corner the man started pulling on Rose’s arm and
trying to drag her with him. Then he dropped her and ran out the door.”
Then
one of the police said, “We need to speak to Rose on her own and take a
statement.” The librarian showed them the kitchen next to us, and they
went in there with Rose. It didn’t feel right letting her go in with
them on her own, but when she hesitated and looked nervous, one said to
her, “It’s all right. Your Mum is right next door, and you can go back
to her as soon as we have finished speaking with you.” I gave Rose a
quick kiss and hug, and she went with them through the door.
When the door shut, and I was left with Candice and Julia, I asked them, “What did you see happen?”
Candice
said, “I came around the corner and looked up, and I saw Rose crouching
on the floor with her arms over her head. The man was leaning over her,
and she was saying, ‘Leave me alone, leave me alone.’ I first of all
thought he was her Dad, the way he had hold of her, but something didn’t
feel right or look right about it. He said to me, ‘What are you looking
at?’ and I looked away, but Rose was crying. I just called out, ‘Mum’
as she was in the next aisle. Mum came around the corner, and I started
to cry and point. The man was dragging Rose by the arm toward the door.
He looked up and saw my Mum, and both of us called out, ‘Hey,’ and he
dropped Rose’s arm and started to run out the door. A librarian heard us
both call out and saw the man run and Rose on the ground, and she
chased him out the door.”
I
thanked Candice and her Mum repeatedly for what they had done and for
helping Rose. I said to Candice that if she hadn’t come around the
corner when she did and taken notice of her gut feeling that something
wasn’t right, who knew what might have happened.
When
Rose at last came out of the staff kitchen after having given her
statement to the police, I was so relieved to see her again. She seemed
calmer. She sat next to me and smiled, and laid her head on my shoulder.
Candice said, “Are you all right, love?”
Rose said yes and smiled at them and me.
She
told me he kept kissing her neck and face, and his hands were all over
her breasts and legs and up her skirt. He kept saying something under
his breath like, “So beautiful, so beautiful….” Then she started crying
again. I felt like crying, but nothing would happen.
I
just held on to her. I felt sick and upset and angry and in shock. I
couldn’t believe this had happened to my girl, and even more, going
through my head was the question, “Why Rose?” Why, out of all the people
in the library, did he have to pick on Rose?
She
was the only one out of my three eldest children who had not been
sexually abused, and now she had. It seemed unbelievable, especially as
it was ten o’clock in the morning, and we were in a public place. We had
to keep waiting in the library until police took all the statements
from everybody concerned. Rose had to walk the police through the
library and show them exactly where everything had happened. They took
her books, which the man had held on to, for fingerprinting reasons, and
that upset Rose again as she had been looking forward to reading the
ones she had chosen. The police surveyed the closed-circuit television
camera footage and identified the man walking directly behind Rose and
me as we had entered the library, and following her as she went to the
young-adult section.
We
both were hungry, and the police let us walk over to the shopping
centre, which was five minutes away, to buy something to eat and come
straight back. Once we were in the mall, I noticed Rose’s head moving
around, looking everywhere, and she clung to my hand tightly.
“What happens if we see him, Mum?” she whispered to me with tears running down her face.
I
held her hand tightly and said, “He can’t hurt you anymore. I am here,
and he would run a mile if he saw you now, as he would know he is in
trouble.”
When
we were standing in line, people were walking past behind her and
bumping into her. She kept grabbing me; she was terrified. I was so
upset and angry that this man, a stranger, had in one instant taken away
her sense of safety in the world. Her ability to stand in a public
place and feel safe and not worry about whether someone would grab her
or touch her inappropriately had disappeared.
After
we walked back to the library, we had to go down to the police beat for
Rose to describe the man to a sketch artist, who would do a “wanted”
poster from it. After we had done that, we were allowed to go home. By
that time it was nearly three in the afternoon. We had been at the
library since ten that morning. Both of us were exhausted. I had rung
Rose’s Dad and arranged for him to go pick Thomas from school, and to
let him know what had happened. It was a boiling-hot day. We had parked
just down the road from the library, and as we got back into the car to
start it, I couldn’t help but think how much had changed from when we
had parked it there that morning.
Then the car wouldn’t start.
I
turned the key in the ignition for half an hour. Both of us sat in the
car with sweat pouring down our faces and backs as the sun poured in the
windows and I tried to start it. I felt like bursting into tears. I
wanted a cold drink, and I knew Rose did too, but I had no money left to
buy one. I desperately wanted friends and family around for support.
Eventually the car started, and we drove home.
***Award winning book (finalist) in 2014 Beverley Hills International Book Awards***
Jenny
Hayworth grew up within the construct of the Jehovah’s Witnesses, which
she describes as a fundamentalist cult-like religion. She devoted her
life to it for over thirty years. Then she left it. The church
“unfellowshipped” her-rendering her dead to those family and friends
still committed to the church.Hayworth is a sexual abuse survivor. The
trauma changed her self-perception, emotional development, trust, and
every interaction with the world.
Inside/Outside
is her exploration of sexual abuse, religious fundamentalism, and
recovery. Her childhood circumstances and tragedies forced her to live
“inside.” This memoir chronicles her journey from experiencing comfort
and emotional satisfaction only within her fantasy world to developing
the ability to feel and express real life emotion on the “outside.”
It
is a story that begins with tragic multigenerational abuse, within an
oppressive society, and ends with hope and rebirth into a life where she
experiences real connections and satisfaction with the outside world.
Those
who have ever felt trapped by trauma or circumstances will find
Inside/Outside a dramatic reassurance that they are not alone in the
world, and they have the ability to have a fulfilling life, both inside
and out.
Foreward
Clarion Review – “What keeps the pages of Hayworth’s life story turning
is her honesty, tenacity, and sheer will to survive through an
astounding number of setbacks. Inside/Outside proves the resilience of
the human spirit and shows that the cycle of abuse can indeed be broken”
Kirkus
Review – “A harrowing memoir of one woman’s struggle to cope with
sexual abuse and depression while living in – and eventually leaving –
the Jehovah’s Witnesses”
Readers Favourite 5 Star Review – “The book is an inspiring story for those who are going through traumatic times…”
Genre – Memoir
Rating – PG-13
