Holly

By Val Sterley

Holly is the story of a girl with locked-in syndrome denying her speech, she is also spastic and has limited control of her body. She is sent to various homes and institutions. Holly is abused, and the really frightening fact was that there could never be restitution.
But she is in there, inside her lolling head and silent mouth, and her bright mind struggles to make sense of her life. She retreats into an imaginary world until a catastrophic event changes her world forever.
Holly is written in a stream-of-consciousness mode. I have tried to get into Holly's innermost thoughts and emotions, but it is all conjecture as nobody is privy to another's mind.
The book is based on the life of my only sibling, Vonda. Due to an accident of birth, Vonda was hopelessly physically and mentally challenged.
It is a heartrending choice of parents who have these children whether the child should go into an institution or to keep them at home. Vonda was kept at home and became my mother's magnificent obsession. But the burden and worry for the future of the child grew daily, and eventually, my mother died, worn out with the care of Vonda.
Someone once said you can judge a country by the way it cares for its animalsand you could addand its unwanted and stigmatized children.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Partridge Publishing Africa
• Release date: Oct 30, 2014
• ISBN: 9781482803914

Val Sterley

Val Sterley was born in the UK but spent much of her life in Central and South Africa. She has had a most interesting life in a pristine Africa. Alas, no longer. History is her passion. She was the curator of Macrorie House Museum in Pietermaritzburg, KwaZulu-Natal. Her book “A Gentle Alternative” contained recipes for health and beauty using eco-friendly ingredients. Now widowed, she lives in the quaint village of Napier, Western Cape, South Africa.

Book preview

Chapter 1

H olly awoke early. It was still dark and the noises of the morning routine had not yet started. She listened to the heavy breathing of Jane, the girl in the next bed. It came in sonorous, hypnotic intervals. Another girl moved restlessly, whimpered and was still once more. Holly wondered in what mysterious place the girl’s dreams were taking her. Thoughts began to whirl through Holly’s mind. She tried to dismiss them but, as always, they clamored for her attention.

When had the realisation that she was different first penetrated into her consciousness? Her earliest cognition was somehow warm and comforting. Had she been loved - though what was love? What was warmth, comfort? Was she only aware of it as it was opposed to her present discomfort? It was hard to think. Her vocabulary was limited and sometimes she had to think in images for her brain contained few words to express her feelings.

Slowly she managed to tum her head to the small window at the end of the long, narrow room. The first soft grey fingers of dawn caressed the grubby panes. She did not exult in the coming of the new day for it would be the same as all the others. Her mind clawed back into the past. Nothing would take visual shape; there was only the empirical comprehension of a time better than this. But whatever had been, the loneliness and bleakness of her present existence had replaced it. Had the knowledge been slow in coming or had it always been there?

The chill dawn of a winter’s morning continued to touch the window gradually lightening the room. How long had it taken for her to conceptualize herself and her surroundings? Time here was inconsequential. Day followed night into a blur of endless duration. Almost imperceptibly she had began to question the how and why of her existence. As she left sleep further behind her she lay as still as she could but the involuntary jerking of her limbs began. She knew they would not cease until sleep claimed her once more. A desolate feeling of hopelessness seeped into her very being.

With a clatter the door at the end of the dormitory was flung open and a draught sneaked in beside the ample figure of the brown woman named Sophie. Holly shivered. It was a coldness to add to the other coldness. The cold was a relentless foe against which she was helpless. But warmth did come at times. How she longed for the warm days for they were light. When would they return? Perhaps never. Holly shuddered at the thought.

Sophie made her way down the row of beds. Her plump brown face beamed with kindness and she smiled a small conspirational smile as though she understood something of the dark world Holly was in. But how could she? She was one of the women not one of them. Holly tried to return the smile but felt her mouth grimace with effort and a drool of spittle run down her chin.

‘Here, Holly.’ A dress was thrust into her lap. Did Sophie really think she could put it on? Oh how she wished she could. Desperately she willed her hands to move as she wanted but they were controlled by power other than hers. They did not, would not, respond to her brain. What was this useless shell that encased her? This was why she was different. This was the reason. At first she thought that they, the women, were different and so they were. Why, why were she and the others here so helpless? Why? Why? There came no answer. Her body was a separate entity with a will of its own. To whose commands it listened she did not know. Her tenuous link to it was pain. If there was a hurt it was she who suffered the pain. For what did she need this fleshy casing? Could she exist without it?

Suddenly she felt the warm flow of urine running down her leg. She wished she didn’t have to pee but it came when it liked. Worse still was the poo. How she hated the poo…. That’s what they called it wee or pee and poo or shit. They called other things shit too so it was confusing. Sometimes she was slapped for these involuntary actions It depended on who was on duty.

The edge of her dress was absorbing the pee. The grey material becoming darker. Experience had taught her that the dark patches would become cold and wet against her skin. She tried to move the garment but her hands yanked uselessly into the air. The pee was running down her legs and the little rivulets were now icy cold.

In the next bed, Jane sat up. She started to laugh at a point somewhere above Holly’s head. There was no humor in the wild laughter. Another woman, Ria, had joined Sophie. Ria had very white skin, a harsh, grating voice and hard, quick hands. ‘Jane!’ For some unfathomable reason the name caused a tiny flicker of warmth within Holly.

‘Jane. Shut up! Do you hear me? Shut up!’ Ria said. But Jane’s laughter continued, inane, merciless, on and on…

Ria approached Holly. She forced the dress on Holly’s twisting body carefully avoiding the wet patches. ‘This one’s peed on already. Oh well, saves putting her on the lavatory Ria wrinkled her nose at the acrid smell of the urine but the smell so pervaded Holly’s senses that she was barely aware of it. The woman took hold of Holly’s foot to put on a shoe but her leg kicked out involuntarily. The shoe shot upwards and hit the ceiling then landed on Jane’s bed.

‘You stupid bitch.’ Ria was furious ‘What did you do that for!’

Sometimes her legs got confused and she would come to a halt. She had to double her concentration to continue her shambling gait. But the women were impatient and sometimes pushed her. Her balance was already precarious and she often fell.

She hated the ablutions. They were the worst part of the day. Her humiliation was extreme but passed unknown.

Then came breakfast. The dining room was unadorned. Chairs, tables, plastic cloths, rolls of toilet paper to wipe faces. A woman called Matron stood at the head of the top table. Matron had kind hands and she smiled at you but the smile did not reach her eyes. Her voice could be sharp. Like Ria she was pale but pinker and had hair the same colour as the early morning window.

Matron’s words were always the same. For what we are about to receive may the Lord make us truly thankful, Amen. This confused Holly a little as cook had once been brought someone from the kitchen and thanked her for the food. She had been brown and fat and sweaty with a lovely bright head covering, in fact Holly had noticed that all the brown ladies wore some sort of head covering and she wondered why but as her whole existence was a succession of questions it mattered little. Cook was thanked for the food but then who was Lord? And who was Amen? She tucked this further puzzle into her mind alongside all the other unfathomable items that inhabited her head.

Ria had started to feed her and spooned the food relentlessly into her mouth. There was no pause between spoonfuls and sometimes Holly gagged on the sticky mess. Ria would pause with her shoveling and click her teeth in annoyance. Ria’s teeth fascinated Holly for they seemed to move around in her mouth. Breakfast was always the same. Salty porridge then toast. Those lucky enough to be able to feed themselves ate all their toast but the others did not for the women were in too much of a hurry to finish feeding them the hard squares. Holly wished desperately to feed herself. Then life would be so much better. She loved her mug of tea when it was warm but more often than not it was cold and had a skin on it. Still it was welcome even though much of it spilled down the front of her dress only adding to the wet discomfort of her clothing.

Breakfast over they were led out into the garden. It was quiet here except for the occasional bizarre voicing of one or other of the group. A large wall surrounded the garden. Beyond lay an unknown world. She had been beyond the wall twice but they were dimly remembered frightening experiences that were shut up tightly in her subconscious. Sometimes faint, unidentifiable noises penetrated the quiet. The inmates sat on wooden chairs, once painted in bright colours but now faded by weathering to dull, muted shades. Of varying ages they were placed in a rough semi-circle with the woman in charge sitting in the center. Holly had no way of knowing how time was measured and in her restrictive world it was usually measured in terms of discomfort. The more the discomfort the slower time passed.

Today it was cold. The slats of the wooden seat bit into her buttocks. She squirmed but was unable to change her position to obtain any degree of comfort. Sometimes she envied those in the wheelchairs for at least they had comfortable seats, though she questioned whether they could feel either comfort or discomfort. Slouched in their wheelchairs, heads lolling, mouths agape, staring straight ahead they inhabited their own private realms.

Holly’s spatial awareness was slight. Above her the sky was filled with leaden clouds scudding so low across the sky that she felt she could almost reach out and touch them. The woman, Mimi, was in charge today and sat looking down at the book open on her lap. Holly knew that somehow the spoken word was in the pages of the book for sometimes a woman would read to them. She loved these times for whatever was said she could add to her meager store of knowledge. The readings were random and it was impossible to sort them out. They mostly swam around in her mind, fragments and patchworks of knowledge bearing little relation to her circumstances or cognizance.

A strong chill breeze sprung up and tugged at her fellow inmate’s hair sending weird patterns around their heads. The breeze moved on into the trees. Holly watched the intricate, changing patterns of the leaves against the sky mirrored by the moving shadows on the grass and, for a moment, her discomfort was forgotten. But soon the misery crept to the surface again. Her foot ached where Ria had jammed her shoe on that morning. She wore no socks and her feet were cold. Her shoes were too tight and her toes were pinched and sore. The seat bit ever deeper into her bottom until she could stand it no longer and let out a scream of hurt and frustration. Merely emerging as a strangled cry it produced no response whatsoever. Holly was getting colder, her thin jersey affording little protection against the chill. Mimi glanced at her arm and Holly waited. Yes. She was getting up from her chair. Without a word Mimi pulled the inmates from their seats and arranged them in a line, a ragged crocodile of broken dolls. Those who were able pushed the wheelchairs, prams and pushchairs. The babies were awful to watch. Tiny limbs twitching, large vacant eyes, rosebud mouths slack or molded by cries. At night Holly would often hear the babies crying for their accommodation was near her own dormitory. It was the most pitiful and terrifying sound, unrelenting and heartbreaking. When she heard it she wanted to block her ears, to escape it at any rate. But there was no escape.

It had taken her a long while to piece together the progression of life. She saw the changes in her own useless body and realised that she too had once been a baby and now stood poised between child and woman. Around her were all ages, the babies, small children, older children, others like her and the old people. Cackling old women with wispy, colorless hair and empty rheumy eyes. Thin claw like hands picking endlessly picking. One had a doll, an old, dirty doll that she clasped close to her thin, sagging bosom. Holly wondered, if this would be her own eventual fate? And what became of these old women? How long to grow old like them? How many days sitting in the garden? How many long nights? So many questions.

Chapter 2

I t was the morning for one of the women to talk to them out of a book. She had heard the square object with thin, rustling leaves was called a book so she knew that much but she could not understand how the process worked, how the words on the paper came out of the women’s mouths. However she delighted in these book times. Often the women talked without feeling, swallowing words and rushing through for they knew they were wasting their time. Ria was one such, abruptly voicing the words in her guttural voice so that most were lost to Holly. There were other times when a pretty lady came and talked slowly from the book. She often described what she was talking about. Eventually Holly learned that this talking from a book was called reading. During these times of reading she added word, by precious word, to her hoard. Slowly she built up a store of words many meaningless or dimly understood, many vivid, some given her own interpretation. Holly noticed that the brown ladies never read to them.

Enchanted she passed through the woods with Toad and Rat and Mr. Badger. She understood that they were animals but was delighted to know that animals could talk. Oh how she longed to communicate too, how she envied the animals their power of speech. The cat at the home did not speak but then perhaps that is why it was there, it was a cat like herself, unable to speak.

When the women held up the books to show them pictures Holly looked at them and marveled that such beautiful colours and wonderful people live in the world outside. Some were not so nice and the wolf animal in ‘Little Red Riding Hood’ filled her with fear. She just hoped that the walls around the garden would keep