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Chapter Twenty // Pastel Palace

~~~ The 20th Of September 2005 ((Eleven years ago)) ~~~

- Priya's POV -

I had started school a week ago and I loved it, I already had so many friends and one best friend. This certain day in school we got put in partners and were told that we would be making our 'dream house' together, obviously me and Carrie-Anne were put together and we had already planned the pastel palace we would be creating. I was so excited to get home at the end of the day and tell my parents about it, I knew my mum would be overjoyed because she is very artistic and would help us.

Carrie-Anne's mum gave me a lift home from school, I thanked her and headed into my house with a smile on my face as I had a great day. I closed the front door behind me still with my cute smile plastered on my face until it instantly disappeared as I heard my mum screaming and crying from my parents bedroom upstairs. I set my school bag down on the floor and climbed the stairs before peaking through the door to their room and seeing my mum on the floor with her hands covering her face and my dad standing before her while repeatedly hitting her and swearing at her. I watched with my mouth wide open and my whole body shaking, I was so young and I didn't know what to do.

Suddenly I pushed the door open slightly by accident which made it creak, dad glanced over at saw me watching. He immediately stopped before charging over to the door where I stood, I stepped back as he approached me.

"Can you go to your bedroom sweetie?" He asked me in a calm voice, I nodded slowly and walked across the hall into my room. Dad slammed their bedroom door and continued to shout at my mum. I sat down on my fluffy pink bed in shock, what is happening?

I didn't understand any of it, did my mum do something wrong?

My mums crying stopped a few minutes later, the exciting project I had in school had left my head. I climbed into bed in my school uniform and drifted off to sleep. I felt like I didn't want to be awake and at this time I was only five years old.

A few hours later I had been woken up by my dad, he was sitting at the side of my bed shaking me by the shoulders until I woke up. I stared at him in confusion as it was 3:00am and I shouldn't have been awake at that time.

"Mum was being very rude to me earlier and that's why I had to punch her" He whispered to me, I shuffled across my bed slightly so I was as further away from him as I could be. I was terrified of my own dad, was he going to punch me too?

"What did she do?" I asked him, he sighed and lit a cigarette in my bedroom.

"That doesn't matter. I'm allowed to do this because boys can only punch, see?" He said, I nodded as he explained. Little five year old Priya was being told by her dad that boys are allowed to punch girls because they deserve it and she believed him because he is her dad.

"If you tell anybody in school about this.. Your friends or your teacher, you will be punched too Priya. Do you understand? No telling" Dad told me while pointing in my face, I nodded quickly and pulled my blankets over my face so I could hide from him. He left the bedroom and I sighed with relief, I was safe for now.

I woke up the next day with a headache because of my dad getting me up early hours of the morning to lie about abuse. After I got up I tip toed down the stairs in fear that my mum could be getting attacked by my dad again.

When I got to the bottom of the stairs I noticed my mum sitting alone in the living room, she was staring at the wall wide eyed. She had a black eye and her face was swollen, I stared at her as my heart thumped. Mum picked up her phone and dialled a number, she waited for whoever it was to answer.

"Hi, it's Lois. I can't come into work today I have an awful bug.." She said to the person on the phone, I knew it was a cover up for what my dad did.