Pieces of Me

By Katherine Harold

Destiny sometimes does not start out pretty. There are many twists and turns. But when destiny finds you, your life is forever changed. Abuse, rejection, low self-esteem, and death—all seemed to conspire against her, and she almost lost everything, including her own self. But somehow she survived—until she walked into her destiny. This is her story. This is my story.

• Language: English
• Publisher: AuthorHouse UK
• Release date: Oct 27, 2018
• ISBN: 9781546297710

Katherine Harold

Katherine Harold was born in Trinidad, West Indies, and came to London in 1998 to pursue her dream of nursing. She is a woman of many talents: psychiatric nurse, trainer, teacher, singer, songwriter, worship leader, and pastor. She now pastors a thriving ministry, Kingdom House UK, in South East London. This is her first book.

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© 2018 Katherine Harold. All rights reserved.

No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted by any means without the written permission of the author.

Published by AuthorHouse 09/05/2018

ISBN: 978-1-5462-9768-0 (sc)

ISBN: 978-1-5462-9771-0 (e)

Any people depicted in stock imagery provided by Getty Images are models,

and such images are being used for illustrative purposes only.

Certain stock imagery © Getty Images.

Because of the dynamic nature of the Internet, any web addresses or links contained in this book may have changed since publication and may no longer be valid. The views expressed in this work are solely those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of the publisher, and the publisher hereby disclaims any responsibility for them.

CONTENTS

Acknowledgements

Chapter 1 The Making of a Legend

Chapter 2 I’m Coming Out

Chapter 3 And the Winner Is …

Chapter 4 I Remember Mama …

Chapter 5 Papa and Me

Chapter 6 … And Then There Was One

Chapter 7 London, Here I Come!

Chapter 8 Musical Chairs

Chapter 9 Clifton

Chapter 10 Big Mistake

Chapter 11 Kenneth

Chapter 12 Paul

Chapter 13 Trials and Tribulations

Chapter 14 Here Comes the Pain

Chapter 15 Haunted

Chapter 16 The Show Must Go On

Chapter 17 Jerry

Chapter 18 The Aftermath

Chapter 19 End of the Road

Chapter 20 A New Beginning

Chapter 21 The Birthing of a Kingdom

About the Author

Names have been changed to protect the identities of others.

Any relation to any real person is purely coincidental.

This book is

dedicated to my Destiny Joy—

my beautiful girl whom I never got the chance to hold. I never got the chance to sing to her. I never got to see her smile. But one day I will.

Mummy loves you and always will, Precious One.

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

I want to give thanks to my Lord and Saviour, Jesus Christ, without whom I could not have put my pieces back together.

My friend, counsellor, and now adopted brother, Marcus Morgan-Valentine, who challenged me that I had a story to tell—thank you.

My family, who helped me to become the person I am—my thanks to you.

David and Winifred Miller and Pastor Lorna Clarke, thank you for believing in me when I didn’t believe in myself

To my Kingdom House UK family, your support and prayers have meant a great deal to me, and I thank you.

To all the people who have spoken into my life over the years—Linda Mohammed, Irvin Celestine, Gwen Belfon, Denise Rush—thank you.

Carlo Dano, my publishing consultant, who took a chance on an unknown, first-time writer and believed I could be a published author. Thank you.

AuthorHouse, thank you for standing with me and stepping out.

There are many more names that cannot fit on this page, but to each of you I say, Thank you.

CHAPTER 1

The Making of a Legend

I grew up in Trinidad, an island filled with storytellers. In fact, I would venture to say we can make a simple story extraordinary. Such was the case with my birth.

Picture a little house near the sea. You could hear the waves crashing in the background. The sun cast its shadows on the sand through the leaves of the trees, and cool sea breezes wafted up to the houses nearby. It was picturesque, until the high-pitched scream.

In that little wooden house near the sea, a woman was having a baby. To the house came the old village midwife, Miss Cecile—I think she was born old! There was a problem. The woman was petite, and the baby was huge and would not come out. Miss Cecile, in a panic, took a swig of the homemade bush rum made by the best distillers in the village. Then she took another swig. And another. Pretty soon, she was a little more than tipsy—so much so that she pissed on the floor.

The woman, meanwhile, was still screaming in pain. No one was sure whether the baby would come out. It was Christmas Eve, and, somehow—the details are still sketchy—the baby emerged, wriggling and screaming to announce to the world that she had arrived.

She was me. And, of course, that petite lady was Mama.

I was their Butterball—ten pounds of creamy, light-brown skin and thick, dark hair with cheeks for days. But little did we know what this little Butterball was destined for. (I still don’t know why they called me that!)

When I was two or three years old, Mama took my brother Carson and me to the city to visit my uncle BB. Mama always had trouble combing my hair. I never sat still and would always run away. The only way I would agree to comb my hair was if they told me there was going to be a beauty contest. Carson was five years older than I, and I was told that whilst he was melancholy, missing home, I decided to do something about it. I wanted to escape the painful task of combing my thick, black hair. So, I escaped. Of course, Mama, Uncle BB, and everybody else all were frantic, wondering where this child had gone. They searched and couldn’t find me.

Have you seen a little girl go by? they asked the neighbours.

Yeah. I saw little Butterball pass and go up the hill.

They headed in that direction, and, sure enough, they found me with my little Afro, sitting quite calmly and peacefully—in a church. I was waiting for something. Perhaps that was a prophetic statement that my young spirit was making before my lips could form the words. Maybe, even then, I was expressing a yearning that I could not articulate, which was that my safest place, my most peaceful place, was the house of God.

Nah. I was told that I said I was waiting for the beauty contest. I only agreed to leave the church with them because they told me that they were going to get me ready.

My sister was born four years later, and we were the best of friends and the worst of enemies. We had an older sister and three older brothers, but she was the baby, and I felt sidelined and left out.

So, I did what any sane child would do: I acted out. I never intended to get up to half the mischief that I did. It just happened. And in those days, I learnt to run, because my life and my little behind depended on it.

When Mama bellowed my name—Katherine!—I knew it was time to run. It was time to run for sanctuary to Mr Henry, my godfather, who didn’t live far away. I always knew that if I crossed his boundary, I would be safe from the licking I knew was coming. I probably deserved each of those lickings—now that I look back. But in my mind, back then, I was innocent. My only defence was Mr Henry. When he spoke up for me, I was spared—until the next incident, when I had to run again. I spent a lot of time running away from things.

Whenever I had a disagreement with anyone, especially Mama, or if I felt that someone was being too cruel or judgemental or just plain mean, I had a plan. It was always the same plan: to run away. I would pack all the clothes I could carry in a brown paper bag and then announce that I was leaving and not coming back.

I would then walk across the yard, bag over my shoulder, towards the mango tree that stood as a boundary to our yard and the track that led to the outer street. Then, I would stand there and contemplate my life before deciding to give them one last chance. (The reality was that I didn’t know where the heck I was going!) Mama told me later that she could never find my clothes because they were in different places in paper bags.

All that said, I had a great childhood. There were five of us at home: my three older brothers, my little sister, and me. My eldest sister lived in the UK. She was the one, I was told, who came up with my name, Katherine, but everyone called me K. My eldest brother called me Biggs. He was crazy. He often took my little sister and me to cinema. When the lights went down, he would shout at the screen or insult someone under the cover of darkness. We found it funny.

Back then, Mama was running the kiosk at another cinema that showed kung fu double features on the weekends. The three of us and Papa got in free. On Sunday evenings, we would watch Jackie Chan, Bruce Lee, the Silver Fox, and Bolo Yeung light up the screen. We got lost in it—so lost that when we came out, we thought we had been trained by the Shaolin monks ourselves. We would shout, Hi-yah! Our fists and kicks would fly everywhere.

We’d run around in the sand, bathe in the rain, catch butterflies, and explore the bush around us. I always had a vivid imagination. My little sister and I would create games and make up stories when the lights went out and there was nothing but candlelight. On Saturdays, a group of my brothers’ friends from the neighbourhood would come over and line up in the gallery. The living room door would open, and the TV would be placed at an angle to make our very own home cinema.

But, despite all this—siblings and neighbourhood kids to play with—I somehow always felt alone. Different. Never understood why. I looked at my siblings and my parents and somehow used to think I was adopted. Maybe I was switched at birth. It was a coincidence that I happened to resemble them. Sometimes it was like going through life in slow motion. It was like I was watching a TV show with characters I knew. I always seemed to be on the outside looking in.

Then, we moved. We weren’t moving far—just to a bigger house around the corner. We were moving away from the sea and my mini mangrove to a place with a lot more houses. I looked at it as an adventure. I looked at everything as an adventure. I can’t remember ever feeling bored. I was seven years old, and life was exciting to me.

Then it happened.

One Sunday afternoon.

I should have stayed inside. I should have stayed away.

It was a lazy Sunday afternoon, and it seemed the whole neighbourhood had stayed indoors to watch wrestling on TV. You could hear the shouts from different houses: Beat him! Kill him! Give him the sleeper hold!

Normally, I would watch with my family, but this time, I thought, Nah. So, I went out and sat on the back stairs. The air was filled with warm sunshine and a light, cool breeze. I liked Sundays like this.

Then, he called me over. He was one of the boys in the neighbourhood. He used to come to our house to watch TV with a whole group of other boys, all my brother’s