Straighten Up Soldier
daddy's gonna buy you a mockingbird
The sunlight reflected in all different directions and split into the rainbow as it hit the hard diamond that was settled neatly on the ring on my middle finger.
This was the one item that hadn't been taken away. This was what my dad buried into my hand as he kissed my cheek before being marched to the car with the flashing lights on top. He promised me everything was going to be okay. He promised I was going to be safe and promised that he would be back.
Ten years later, the rock was all I had.
At first, I missed him so much. I'd play up every night just crying for him. Sirens screeched through my dreams as the memory remained sore and I would cry some more. I moved care homes three times before I realised that no matter what I did, daddy wasn't coming back just yet.
The stealing was just the tip of the iceberg. We needed the food, so he'd go up the local Sainsbury's and take a few loaves. On the walk home, he'd decide to pick me up a treat from the corner shop and I'd get a little bar of chocolate for afters. I was blissfully unaware of the outside world, kept at home with mummy who’d teach me everything I’d need to know. She always told me that she loved me.
Then mummy left for another man. Another man with money and a car and a house that didn't smell like next door's cat on a damp day. A man that didn’t want a child to mess up the house, especially if said child was from another man. Then mum didn’t love me anymore. I stayed put with my dad. He started to get angry and when I wasn't looking, he'd make a little hole in the plaster board that were pretending to be walls.
The anger left him jobless. We were left moneyless.
Before long, bills were collecting on the floor and people were knocking on the doors. We pretended not to be home. Then one day, the letters were gone. We stopped getting visitors with bad language and the light bulb in the kitchen was suddenly able to glow the colour we needed to see at night.
There was just one night where he came home earlier then usual. He used to think I was asleep when he went out, but I always lay awake until I heard the front door click and I knew he was in the house.
I heard that front door click and giant leaps up the creaky stairs. He burst into my room.
"I've been here all night, Gracey. Tell them I've been home." He said as he sat me up and looked straight into my eyes. He needed help and his seven year old daughter was the only one clever enough to lie for him.
Downstairs, the front door rattled in the same way it used to when people wanted the money and he took in one long breath. He took my hand and sat me at the top of the stairs as he opened the door.
The bright lights flashed and for a moment I was dazzled. Two men in beautiful navy suits stepped in and their badges gave a little glint as they held it to my dad in the dull light that the hall bulb would produce.
My dad kept shaking his head.
"I've been here all night." He said, like he had told me, "My daughter can tell you, I haven't left the house."
The two men looked up at me sat in my thinning nighty and my scrawny legs that dangled down the stairs and tried to smile.
"There's CCTV footage, Mr Edwards. The shop owner has been taken into hospital and you can go in for attempted murder."
I didn't take in their words, I just listened to their voices as each letter was pronounced properly and there wasn't 30 years of smoking clinging onto their lungs or the need to keep hushed.
"Grace, come here. Tell them I was here."
I jumped to action, following the orders I was given like the good girl my daddy had always told me I was. I let my little seven year old hand find his as I stood before these two men that had grown to a giant’s height and looked less like they wanted to be our friend from down here.
I let my little voice tell them he was at this house. He never left the house. They weren't buying any of it. They had evidence and that was that.
That night I didn't cry. I watched him be driven away with his hands in metal loops and his head ducked down. That night daddy did cry. They knew he never meant to hurt anyone, but that wasn't the point of law and justice, was it? There was a tape. An elderly lady was taken into surgery that night to put her lungs right and daddy was to blame. My daddy who had shown nothing but love and devotion to his daughter was going to be locked away forever. Like a princess in a tower.
Right now? I sit in the back of a van aged seventeen, with the door slid open to let the August sun burn the surface of my black costume. I flicked the cigarette butt to the floor and jumped onto the pavement.
The gorgeous ring was passed to Dave who in return handed me the baseball bat and I smiled to the 40 year old man.
"Like father, like daughter." He grinned.
I laughed and shook my head, "Not quite. I don't get caught."
Taking five steps round the corner, the bat struck the shop front window and already shrieks from inside could be heard. The black mask covered all but my eyes and mouth and the delicate bell tinkled as I entered the little corner shop.
Daddy would be proud.
This was the one item that hadn't been taken away. This was what my dad buried into my hand as he kissed my cheek before being marched to the car with the flashing lights on top. He promised me everything was going to be okay. He promised I was going to be safe and promised that he would be back.
Ten years later, the rock was all I had.
At first, I missed him so much. I'd play up every night just crying for him. Sirens screeched through my dreams as the memory remained sore and I would cry some more. I moved care homes three times before I realised that no matter what I did, daddy wasn't coming back just yet.
The stealing was just the tip of the iceberg. We needed the food, so he'd go up the local Sainsbury's and take a few loaves. On the walk home, he'd decide to pick me up a treat from the corner shop and I'd get a little bar of chocolate for afters. I was blissfully unaware of the outside world, kept at home with mummy who’d teach me everything I’d need to know. She always told me that she loved me.
Then mummy left for another man. Another man with money and a car and a house that didn't smell like next door's cat on a damp day. A man that didn’t want a child to mess up the house, especially if said child was from another man. Then mum didn’t love me anymore. I stayed put with my dad. He started to get angry and when I wasn't looking, he'd make a little hole in the plaster board that were pretending to be walls.
The anger left him jobless. We were left moneyless.
Before long, bills were collecting on the floor and people were knocking on the doors. We pretended not to be home. Then one day, the letters were gone. We stopped getting visitors with bad language and the light bulb in the kitchen was suddenly able to glow the colour we needed to see at night.
There was just one night where he came home earlier then usual. He used to think I was asleep when he went out, but I always lay awake until I heard the front door click and I knew he was in the house.
I heard that front door click and giant leaps up the creaky stairs. He burst into my room.
"I've been here all night, Gracey. Tell them I've been home." He said as he sat me up and looked straight into my eyes. He needed help and his seven year old daughter was the only one clever enough to lie for him.
Downstairs, the front door rattled in the same way it used to when people wanted the money and he took in one long breath. He took my hand and sat me at the top of the stairs as he opened the door.
The bright lights flashed and for a moment I was dazzled. Two men in beautiful navy suits stepped in and their badges gave a little glint as they held it to my dad in the dull light that the hall bulb would produce.
My dad kept shaking his head.
"I've been here all night." He said, like he had told me, "My daughter can tell you, I haven't left the house."
The two men looked up at me sat in my thinning nighty and my scrawny legs that dangled down the stairs and tried to smile.
"There's CCTV footage, Mr Edwards. The shop owner has been taken into hospital and you can go in for attempted murder."
I didn't take in their words, I just listened to their voices as each letter was pronounced properly and there wasn't 30 years of smoking clinging onto their lungs or the need to keep hushed.
"Grace, come here. Tell them I was here."
I jumped to action, following the orders I was given like the good girl my daddy had always told me I was. I let my little seven year old hand find his as I stood before these two men that had grown to a giant’s height and looked less like they wanted to be our friend from down here.
I let my little voice tell them he was at this house. He never left the house. They weren't buying any of it. They had evidence and that was that.
That night I didn't cry. I watched him be driven away with his hands in metal loops and his head ducked down. That night daddy did cry. They knew he never meant to hurt anyone, but that wasn't the point of law and justice, was it? There was a tape. An elderly lady was taken into surgery that night to put her lungs right and daddy was to blame. My daddy who had shown nothing but love and devotion to his daughter was going to be locked away forever. Like a princess in a tower.
Right now? I sit in the back of a van aged seventeen, with the door slid open to let the August sun burn the surface of my black costume. I flicked the cigarette butt to the floor and jumped onto the pavement.
The gorgeous ring was passed to Dave who in return handed me the baseball bat and I smiled to the 40 year old man.
"Like father, like daughter." He grinned.
I laughed and shook my head, "Not quite. I don't get caught."
Taking five steps round the corner, the bat struck the shop front window and already shrieks from inside could be heard. The black mask covered all but my eyes and mouth and the delicate bell tinkled as I entered the little corner shop.
Daddy would be proud.