DING DONG went the door, Natalie got up to answer it. “Hey babe,” the man said as she opened the door. It was the same guy as in the shop. He gave her a kiss and she put on a fake smile. “What’s wrong, babe?” he asked, “I thought you liked that?” he looked at her confused and tilted his head a little. She took a deep breath and smiled at him “just been a weird day that’s all”



“You can always tell me,” he smiled at her, “We tell each other everything” but nothing could prepare him for what she was about to say. She put her wine on the table and looked out the window. “I have a daughter, James,” she said bluntly, she then let out a big sigh of relief, it was out in the open now. Shock appeared on his face as he shaped the words together in his head. “Hang on, what?”



“She’s upstairs,” she said, “just moved here by the looks of things…” she lowered her voice volume as every word came out. James couldn’t believe what he was hearing. He looked straight through her and said “You could have told me…” but she just breathed in again, and out. “It’s been my biggest secret for sixteen years. Only Julie knew.”



He counted the fingers on his hands over and other… “thirty-one… take away… sixteen… no… wait… did she… did…” he kept muttering. He finally looked up from his hands and gave her a huge stare, “That makes you fifteen when she was born…” he stayed silent a moment, as did Natalie until he said “You were a child”

“I’m well aware of that,” she tried to hold her tears in but there was a crack in her voice as she spoke, “Her father was… I can’t…” but James didn’t take “I can’t”, he wanted more from her. “You can’t what? Tell me please Nat, I can’t let you do this alone”
She turned around to him and said “Her father was much older than me, pretended he was younger until we were… together... until he started taking advantage of me”
James stood there, speechless, his girlfriend was taken advantage for at such a young age but there were so many questions that he needed from her to get the full picture, “How old-” he began.
“Thirty-two,” she interrupted abruptly, “Thirty fu***ng two” and her voice was cracking even more now. She sat down and pointed at the seat, he sat down too. “the whole story, coming up” she sniffed in and began.



“We met in Pondes, we both lived there and he was so… I don't know, nice to me, no one else treated me like he did. I loved it. We met in this shop on the corner of my house and he looked quite… young. He told me he was just an old looking eighteen-year-old, and like the gullible teenager I was, I fell for it. I was head over heels and that day, he asked me out and then well, we did. The date went well and we had more. One day he caressed me and it felt so good. I felt like a woman, and he didn't once ask my age. That was until we were at school and the teacher announced that a man was coming to talk about the dangers of fire or something, then I froze, sick as he walked through the door, him also freezing when he saw me. After the session of pure hell, we met behind the school to talk. We were both mad that we weren't who we thought, but after a while, he simply said ‘oh, maybe a younger model isn't so bad’ and i was relieved, he told me sweet nothings about how he loved me and I was his girl and days later we went back to his”



James cringed with the thought of what he was doing to her back then, but she continued, getting it off her chest.

“He told me to do things, things I didn't want to but I loved him, so I did. I didn't like it but he told me that I had to, or I would get in trouble and be arrested, so I continued until finally, we did it, I didn't feel that good after but I pretended. That was the night that Caitlin was conceived. I was so young that when my period was late, I didn't think much until I was sick practically every day, then I knew. I knew. I told Julie, she was eighteen at the time, so I could trust her. She asked me about him and asked if he was from school, but I said ‘no he's more mature than that’, then horror spread across her face. She asked me his age and I told her, thirty-two. She cringed and was like ‘we have to get you a test immediately, and you've gotta get away from him’ but I refused, claiming I loved him.”

Natalie wiped a tear and took a breath.

“We took a test and it was positive, in which I panicked, until I went to tell him, but he acted annoyed, saying he's gotta waste his money on an unwanted being, I told him I was keeping it and he grabbed me, saying that I would have to move in and say it was my idea. My parents were horrified but I went anyway. Months through the violence started, he would hurt me but say he'd kill me and the baby if I ran or told”



“I was heavily pregnant and one day he burst out at me, causing me to go into premature labour, but Caitlin survived after nineteen hours of pure hell and pain for me, but I loved her. He didn't though. He hated her. Months passed and the violence grew, I didn't mind as long as he didn't touch Caitlin. He only claimed to be a friend for ages, so he got away with the underage bit. As Caitlin was six months old, she was just making funny noises when he was watching his cheap sports and drinking his cheap off-licence vodka when he snapped, flipped, he hit her and she screamed, I told him to stop but he pushed me down. He then called the police, saying that he just watched me hit their child for the last time. I was terrified, pleading to tell the truth, but he just hit me and they were around the house quickly. I was taken in and they said that they will give her to her dad, so I told them he had me at a young age and when they questioned him? I lied about my age and he got away with it. When we got home, he told me that if I left and never came back he'd drop the charges BUT I had to leave him with her, I said no and he threatened to hurt Caitlin and he said he wouldn't touch her if I went, so for her safety, I went to my sister and we left together, to here”

It was so much for James to take in, but as Natalie started to cry, he held her, for hours and they sat and cried together.