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wrapping paper I’d brought in from the living
room.  There was no way I was handing over such a miserly present from my
mother.  I went back in and gave my present to Alison.
    ‘It’s not as nice as yours to me, but I hope you like it.’
    Alison unwrapped the present and squealed with delight at the leather
purse she had admired when we were window-shopping in town a few weeks before.
    ‘Katie, it’s exactly what I wanted, thank you.’
    Do you know, I think even to this day, that’s still the best Christmas I
have ever had.
    By Easter of the following year, I had begun to notice a change in
myself.  Having been exposed to what family life should be, I felt myself
growing increasingly angry with my mother.  I wanted to know why, after fifteen
years, she still seemed unable to stand my presence.  It all finally burst
forth one evening as we were sitting in the kitchen eating our dinner.
    ‘Why do we never talk, Mum?’ I asked.  The question, voiced into the
silence of the room, startled my mother; she placed her cutlery on her plate.
    ‘What?’
    ‘I asked why we never talk, do you realise we never actually have a
conversation?’
    She seemed taken aback and it took her a moment or two to recover.
    ‘But what would we talk about?’ she asked, genuinely puzzled.  ‘You have
no interest in what I do and I have even less in you.’
    ‘Anything.  The weather, school… just normal stuff people who live
together talk about.’
    ‘Katie, this is a ridiculous conversation and I have no intention in
carrying on with it.  Get on with your meal,’ she said, picking up her knife
and fork again.
    ‘No.’
    ‘Pardon?  Did  you just say no to me?’
    ‘Yes, I did.  I want to know things.’
    My mother’s cutlery hit the plate with a crash. ‘Just who do you think
you’re talking to, girl?  How dare you speak to me in that manner?’
    ‘I dare because it’s the only way to actually communicate with you. 
Unless you’re telling me off, it’s as if I don’t exist.’
    She was silent then, she sat across the table from me, and for the first
time in years, I had her full attention.  Her pale grey eyes were like chips of
ice, I couldn’t see the tiniest spark of warmth in them, they appeared
soulless, dead.
    ‘So what are these things you want to know?  You have my attention, although
you don’t deserve it.’
    ‘Why do you hate me so much?’
    Her eyes didn’t flinch, her expression didn’t change.  ‘Because you
ruined my life.’
    I stared at her.  ‘So you don’t deny you hate me?’
    ‘Is there anything else you’d like to know, Katie?’
    ‘Probably not.’
    ‘Exactly, so now, get out of my sight and if you ever again cheek me the
way you have done this evening, make very sure you are ready for the
consequences’.
    As I trudged upstairs to my room, I was aware my world had just tipped on
it axis.  The strange thing is: I’m only realising now, that it has probably
never righted itself since.
    Two months after my sixteenth birthday, I left school. My exam results
were decent enough to get into college, but I wanted to get out into the world,
earn money and get some independence.  However, I wasn’t expecting the haste at
which my wishes were granted.  I arrived home after a weekend camping on Bodmin
Moor with Alison and a group of our friends, which incidentally, I’d been
amazed my mother agreed to let me to go on.  As you know, she had an aversion
to allowing me do anything I might enjoy. 
    She was sitting on the sofa with a number of items neatly stacked beside
her.  The first things my eyes latched onto were a pair of suitcases.  For one
glorious moment, I thought my mother was off on holiday for the first time in
memory.  My euphoria lasted about two seconds.
                ‘Sit down, Katie, I want a word with you.’  Her voice was
unusually pleasant, which gave me the first inkling that something was
definitely amiss.
                ‘You are