Kate Skylark - Daddys Wicked Parties: The Most Shocking True Story of Child Abuse Ever Told: Skylark Child Abuse True Stories, #2

A Note from Kate

I t may seem a funny thing for a child abuse victim to want to relive past horrors, to recall the intimate details of the worst parts of her life. But I do understand it. For I, too, am a victim of abuse.

I have scoured the bookstores and bestseller lists for stories of child abuse. I have tuned in to the late-night documentaries on the most horrific abuse cases. I know that, far from avoiding all mention of abuse, we victims often seek it out, looking, searching for something: justice, vindication, empathy, connection. Sometimes in reading the stories of others I have felt the greatest comfort of all.

I know that telling ones own story, getting it all down on paper gives a type of vindication, a catharsis that allows a lot of the horror to be let go. Perhaps one day, I will find the courage to publish my own disturbing memoir.

Lucy and I had been friends and confidants for some years before we made the decision to write a book together detailing the shocking story of her early life. Although this is the second book published in the Skylark True Child Abuse series, it was actually written some time before the first book, Dirty Little Dog.

When I interviewed Lucy for this book, she spoke only in the present tense, as if the events were happening now. She spoke as an adult, but sometimes with the words of a child. As if it were still so fresh in her mind that the memory was still completely present. I decided to preserve that sense of immediacy and have kept her words in the present tense.

I have changed very little of Lucys story. Obviously, names and places are changed to protect the innocent, and I have edited and altered sections for the sake of understanding and readability. But for the main part, these words are Lucys, just as she told them to me.

Lucys Story

W hen you see a child walking , perhaps looking happy, perhaps looking forlorn a beautiful innocent little child you can never know what lurks in its once pure and sweet mind; you know not what monsters haunt its thoughts and dreams. Child sexual abuse is so prevalent that, statistically speaking, every one of us has looked into the face of a secretly abused child. Just think about that as you look around the streets of your hometown. Some of those children you see have been abused, are being abused, or will be abused tonight for the very first time. That thought makes me so sick I can hardly bear it.

Perhaps one day you saw a particular little girl walking home from school on a Friday afternoon in North London. She would have appeared like any normal little ten-year-old girl. A bit taller than average. Brown straight hair. Rumpled blue dress. Crooked front teeth.

She would have been dawdling along, dragging her tired feet, her bag slung over one shoulder. If you happened to notice her, you probably imagined her weariness was just down to ordinary tiredness after a long day. Perhaps inside she is filled with excitement and relief that the weekend is upon her with all its promise of fun and entertainment.

But not this little girl. She is in no hurry to get home. She is doing her best to make the journey last as long as she can. As she turns the corner into her own street, she starts to feel a familiar dread: it is Friday once again and the weekend is here. There will be no picnics for her this weekend; no friends to stay, no trips to the zoo or the beach, no visiting granny or watching films at the pictures.

But there will be a party. Oh, yes, there will be a party