This is the second day that I have been attempting to write this book I have sat for hours staring at a blank word document, words seem to fail me, and I cannot think of where to begin, but as tears fall from my eyes and images flash in my head I know that there is only one place I can start. That is the beginning
Well, it all started on the fourteenth of June in the year 1992 or so I am told because this is the day they say that I was born "They" being my so-called parents! I find that unless you have evidence that people are telling the truth you simply cannot trust them, every word my parents utter to me I tend to disbelieve them. I was born with a different name than I am now, but that is top secret.
They say that I was born in Gravesend, which as some of you may know is a historical riverside town in the midst of Kent – of which is supposedly meant to be the garden of Kent; or yard as they say in the United States of America.
I was apparently born to a man called Patterson; whom at the time is to have been believed to be a builder or at least he claimed to be. See this man dropped out of school in his teens to work with family, with no qualifications and no certificates allowing him to be a self-employed builder he set to work lying to people in order to cheat them out of their hard earned cash. He soon was getting himself into fraud and cheating benefits without a care in the world for those who had worked hard to allow them to get what they wanted in life.
He was born in Ireland, and had moved to England with his parents, (whom were smoking alcoholics with a lack of education) along with his three brothers and one sister.
He constantly fought not only with his siblings but also other people, whether they were friends or simply strangers he seemed to need to fight. Beating them for no apparent reason or being at them to get them to fight with him. I can't say for sure whether this was the result of alcohol or smoking or whether he was simply an angry man. Maybe we will never know? Then again I doubt even he knows because even to this day he still drinks, and smokes.
He met my so-called mother in a pub located down by the river; he became friends with her as well as my aunt.
My 'mother's name was and is Tara, and no that isn't short for anything, although many assume it is. She was a typical Gravesend girl, went out drinking with her friends and completed school with decent grades. She had curly dark hair when she met my father, although that was unnaturally curled. She herself was born into an ordinary English family, non-religious and moderately educated; with only one sister she had a rather easy life, and attended a local Grammar school.
She was only one year younger than my 'father' and was constantly bailing him out of jail, and patching up his wounds after a fight. She was on call for whenever him or a member of his family needed patching up; from split knuckles to split lips! There were many injuries, and still often is although it is not her on call anymore to fix up the fighting and often drunk men.
Before her pregnancy with me she was a modeling agent, as well as the other various jobs she held at different times. They both were; he had a modeling portfolio and often they would have different clients. He would often tell me about how they used to run their own agency and in the old days of his modeling.
My 'mother' gave me a portfolio when I was younger of him, dressed in a limited number of clothing and posing in various ways. Not something his daughter should see, and it is something I would never allow a child of mine to see.
He claims that they were forced to give up their modeling agency when my 'mother' became pregnant with me, something that always made me feel awful. He would repeat it a lot, right up till the last time I spoke to him.
No child should have to know what their parents gave up for them, in a child's mind that is them saying they wished you were never born cause they would have had such a better life without you in it. So if anyone is reading this and has a child, tell them you chose them over it, not the way my father said it. He always said I had to give it up because of you. His voice accusing in my head as his words swirl around and around torturing me slowly as he puts the blame on me. Even though I was not even aware of my actions and not accountable for them in any way, he found a way to ensure that I felt I was, a way to make sure I would feel guilty for his actions.
Now I think back to how he would say it and his words I realize that it was not my fault, I mean how could it be? How can a newborn baby be held responsible for two people giving up their modeling agency?
In my mind I am glad that the agency was given up, because nowadays I look at various agencies and they have young women posing, some clothed and some aren't and I realize that it was never safe for them to be associated with their agency. They were being used as pawns in my father's mind games, in order to get him into better London nightclubs, with young women on his arms. He repeatedly gloated to people about his conquests as a business owner of a modeling agency, about how he always had a different woman on his arm, or more than one. I try not to think what those poor girls may have gone through at the hands of my father.
He would constantly have affairs with various women and continues to do so right up until this very day! His violent temper and habit of drinking puts anyone who is in his company in danger no matter what your age or gender. Right now I am unaware of how many siblings I have, the behavior of my father makes it impossible to know the true number of women he has managed to get pregnant, and that were forced to have his child. It is one worry I have about marrying, because I have no way to know that they are the child of my father.
It is a worrying concept, to not be able to meet men due to the fear of it being a sibling. When I look at men, I don't look at them like most. Most would see a man as just as man, I look at them and wonder 'What if they are my brother?' or I see a girl and begin to wonder 'Could she be my sister?' It is daily torture, knowing the places of which he has been, and not knowing if I have a sister or brother there.
I doubt that I will ever know how many siblings I have. No child should have to have that, to wonder if the person sitting next to you on the train is a sibling, to wonder if your best friend could be your brother, or to wonder if your best friend is sleeping with your father! (That part I will get to much later – and yes she did do it).
I have one half-brother, one step sister, five half-sisters and one full sister according to them, and we are all in the same boat when it comes to not knowing about whether we have siblings in another county or even another continent!
There are possibilities of siblings across the world; Germany, America, England, Republic of Ireland, France, Spain, Morocco and all the other countries that he has visited. I highly doubt he did not have an affair in each, if not then more than one!
My step-mother was told that he has a child in Germany, she tells me how he has a son that is around my age. I always wonder about my brother. I wonder if I will ever meet him, or maybe I have met him before. How could I know for sure? I wonder what he looks like sometimes and wonder what his life is like.
I contemplate trying to find out more about him, and wonder if he would want to know me at all. It is torture to wonder whether your own brother is alive, what he looks like and to wonder if he would even like you. I always wonder what it would be like to have an older brother and I wonder what he would be like to meet, and even to have grown up knowing.
My whole life has been and will be like that, wondering how many siblings I have and never having an answer to that.
Before my birth my father was travelling to and fro Germany a lot with 'work' but I highly doubt it was just that.
They were living together unmarried when my 'mother' became pregnant, this is something I have never agreed upon. I have never had belief in se before marriage, or having children before marriage. Then again it was not until recently that I actually was opened up to the idea of having children and getting married.
When I was younger the concept sounded stupid to me. Why marry when everyone around you is getting divorce? You pay to get married and then pay to get divorced, so why bother? The idea of having children seemed daft, I had decided at a very young age not to have them, because due to a lot of contemplation concerning children I had decided that I would not have children because I know that I would be very protective of them unlike mine were with me. If I was able to wrap my future children in cotton wool and bubble wrap I would do happily.