We were always taught that family comes before anything else. If someone hurts you, you tell family. Family will stand up for you, go to jail for you, die for you. Unless that family is a woman. The women are useless. The men could do whatever they wanted to you, but nobody else was allowed to.
What happens if it's family hurting you? Nothing. You must've done something to deserve that slap or kick or wooden spoon. What did you do? Nothing. You could have just been in the way and copped a shove.
Why did you never say anything? You were too scared. Eventually though, you did say something. You stood up for yourself. You weren't believed; shunned. Told to stop being dramatic; You didn't remember it the way it happened. Why didn't you run away? You thought about your brothers and what would happen if you left. You didn't want to leave them alone. And besides, where would you go?
What happens if your parents wanted time alone? You'd be locked outside or sent away. What happens if you needed something? Food? Water? Nothing. There's a hose. You won't starve, don't be dramatic. What about if you needed clean clothes or clean dishes? You know how to turn a tap on to run water on a plate. You know how to press 'start' on the washing machine.
But what about if you were under he age of 10 years old? You were. That's the age you were told these things.
But what about when you needed food? You know how to use a toaster. No bread? Too bad I guess. There's fruit there. But what about breakfast? Breakfast? You weren't allowed to leave your bedroom until the adults said you could. You would sneak from your room to knock on their door to ask to leave your room. Best case scenario, you'd be told: Huh? Whatever...
Worst case scenario, you'd be yelled at to go back to bed. Probably hit too.
Were you ever shown love? Depends on who you ask, when you ask and who we were presumably loved by. If you asked me, no. Not by either of my parents and not by the majority of my family. Maybe by my grandparents, and possibly by my aunty Krisa.
If you asked Rob? There's a possibility he'd agree with me and then add Uncle Craig.
If you asked the boys? They'd say yes. They were only very young when all this stuff happened, and I'd like think they felt loved particularly by me and Rob.
Affection wasn't a thing in our house. I never even knew what the word meant until I was a teenager. I hugged my friends more than I hugged family. Sure, my grandparents hugged me, but I think they were the only ones that did regularly to the point it felt normal. It never felt normal to hug any other family member.
Our version of affection was gift giving or cooking food. Even 'please' and 'thankyou' was forced a lot of the time. Those words make me uncomfortable even now, although I think that's mainly because I was too scared to speak as a child rather than the words themselves.
Food and alcohol. That was always a constant in our life. My grandparents would allow us to have red wine with our dinner if it was spaghetti, since 'you can't have it without wine'. They used to ride into town on Bruce's bike, Rexy, and get 2 slabs of Tooheys red when it was still a thing. I swear the Mandela effect got me because I remember the red cans with the deers head. They would buy 2 boxes at a time; basically one slab each for the week.
They would always offer me and Rob a can, but I would say no. Rob would say yes of course. What kid doesn't want to rebel with a willing offer?
We didn't mind our grandparents drinking. They were funny drunks. They'd strip off to their undies and turn the music up loud and dance around. It was normal to see Bruce in undies, but rarely Colleen. That's what made it amusing I think, but it was also fun.
Off topic, but the song that just came on, on my Spotify is Welcome to the Family by Avenged Sevenfold and I had to mention it. It seemed appropriate.
Chris was always a messy drunk and I don't think I've ever seen Leana drunk. I always saw her on the computer or her phone, not drunk. I think I would have prefered her drunk to be honest.
School was easy to pretend. Nobody asked questions, not even the teachers, and they always ignored me.
One day in the metalwork class, I told Laura about my being invisible to people. She didn't believe me so I pointed to the next room over that was being renovated and bet that I could walk in there, steal something and walk out with nobody noticing.
She agreed and so I got up, and without sneaking around, I walked straight into the next room and looked around. There wasn't anything laying around like tools or anything, so I grabbed a handful of pop rivets and walked out. She stared at me as I sat down and showed her. She believed me after that I think.
I took them home and told Leana and Chris. Chris said: Next time steal a tape measure for me, I'm missing mine.
I said ok and Leana told him not to encourage me, but there wasn't much enthusiasm.
I can't remember the start of year 9. There's a blur between when we were still living in Pioneer Street and when we moved to Hiller Lane, the other side of town, behind Monivae College.
I very vaguely remember a boyfriend coming to my house in Pioneer Street, but the memory is so vague, I can't even recall faces.
The year 9's were in the opposite side of the school, across the road. I can still remember the layout of the corridor where the lockers were and where each classroom was, as well as what they were for. There was 2 classrooms on the left going in; our homeroom and the Italian room. On the right was a teachers office, though I can't quite remember which teacher. I remember he was a male. On the left again, was a small corridor to the undercover area. Further down the corridor on the right was another classroom that, at one time, we were in for Maths, but I found out later it was used for Indonesian class. Left again was a corridor to the outside and left in the corridor was another classroom that I have been in multiple times for after school detentions.
I can't remember exacty what happened when I met William Crozier. All I remember is hanging out near the office on the east campus. There was a bubble taps (water fountain), glass door and some painted squares nearby where people played 4-square. A lot of the time I hung out in this corner, I was by myself. I don't remember where Laura was, but I think she either hadn't come to school or she was off with other friends maybe.
He just came up to me one day and started talking to me. I can't remember if I was reading a book, but I probably was.
I do have some memories of before that, somehow. I'm not sure what order they go in though so I'm just going to write them as they come.
We used to hang out near the east office, off to the side where the driveway was. Me, Laura, Sam Goodluck, Briana Dean, a girl a remember the face of but not her name. I should, she used to be Briana's best friend, and we known each other from year 7. Sharna. Apologies, I should've known that. There were other people too, but a lot of the time, it was just a small handful of us.
One day, a year 7 or 8 girl came up to us with her friends and asked me if it was true I was Bi. I had no idea how she knew, since I didn't know her, but I said yea. She wanted me to prove it for some reason. I feel she wanted to try and bully me for it, but it didn't work.
She said: Prove it by kissing her.
She pointed at Laura. I looked at Laura and we kissed cheeks.
The girl said: No. Kiss on the lips.
Me: I'm fine with that but Laura's straight. I'm not going to make her do that.
The girl kept pushing but I can't remember exactly what she said.
I said: I could kiss you, if you like.
She stared at me for a second then turned around and walked away with her friends. Me and Laura had a laugh about it and Laura said she would've done it.
I said: Yea, but that's not the point. She was being rude for pushing. It's the principal of it.
Another memory I have is when a boy named Allan Martin moved to our school. He become good friends with Alex Dean, Briana's twin brother. At one stage, there was a decent group of us hanging out.
Me, Laura, Briana, Sharna, Sam, Allan, Alex, and a few others. Obviously we all weren't together all the time, but there has been times we were.
The boys would go to ECC, East Computer Centre, at lunchtime to play Warcraft and I went in there a few times to check it out. It was my first time to my memory, of being introduced to gaming. The area outside the ECC was where we would hang out a lot of the time.
There was a tree, bubble taps next the wall, benches and a corridor to the toilets, and across from that was a corridor with classrooms. I had a maths room up that corridor.
I remember once, a girl in my class, Kirsty Reece, talked me into wagging maths class with her. I agreed, but only because the teacher hated me anyway, and I doubted he would've looked for us unless the wanted to get us into trouble. I didn't want to walk into town, so we just hid in the toilets. Nothing happened, we just sat there. I never wagged again, simply because it was boring and I didn't want to get into trouble at home. I'm pretty sure I told Leana and Chris anyway.
One day, Allan decided that he was going to show off to everyone and do a back flip off one of the benches. I told him he'll hurt himself, but he did it anyway and I'm pretty sure he knocked himself out for a few seconds before jumping up again.
Another time, Rob was now in year 7, but the year 7's weren't allowed on the east campus for some reason. He came over to the area we were hanging out, but there were 2 boy's following him. He was over next to the bubble taps and I was talking to 2 friends, with my back to him. I heard a crack and turned around to see one of the boys pulling his arm back from Rob and Rob holding his face. I don't really remember much of what happened next. I remember getting up but the next thing I remember is facing the 2 boys with a group of friends around us. I was yelling, but I only remember snippets of what I said, like when they tried to justify why they punched my brother and I said didn't care and that they can't just punch someone for something as stupid as splashing them with water.
I remember Laura telling them not to worry about all the other people there, that they needed to worry about me. Then next thing I remember is yelling at them to walk up the corridor, not around the building, and if they turn around I will come after them. They believed me. I also remember threatening them, but not what exactly I said.
There was also a time where Rob was trying to avoid some boy I can't remember the name of. He came to the ECC area and a group of boys followed him. One boy punched Rob and his head went back and got another boy in the face. It was an accident, but I don't think the boy realised. The boy, I can't remember his first name, but his last name was Kenny, went and told his sister who I knew. She came over to where we were, ready to fight. I talked to her and explained what happened since I was there. She calmed down and accepted what happened.
I also remember hanging out in a room with Sam that had a pool table. That was cool to do. That I only have one memory of.
Another memory I have is when me and Laura were on duty to basically 'work' for the school. I can't remember what we called it, but we would go around around and do odd jobs like collecting the roles and pieces of paper with the names of absent kids etc. We always went in pairs and everyone got a chance eventually to do it. It was an all day thing.
When me and Laura did this, we were in the year 9 corridor. I was waiting for her in the corridor while she went into one of the classrooms. We had a friend who was in year 12, Matt Frost, or Frosty as everyone knew him as. He was in the teachers office. There were 2 parts to that office; the outer office with a leather chair, and his normal office. Frosty was sitting on the chair and called me over. I walked over and he grabbed me and pulled me down on top of him. He put his hands on my breasts. I can't remember if he put them anywhere else. I know I dissociated because I can only remember from 3rd person point of view. Laura came and stood in the doorway, staring. She was in shock I think. I remember saying help me, and she ran forward and pulled me away. We walked quickly down the corridor and I said: Thankyou.
I don't remember ever speaking about it again. I mean, why would I try to tell anyone? I was still being bullied, I felt as though the teachers were either targeting me or just didn't care what was happening, and I wasn't believed at home. What part of any of that screams: I should tell an adult.