Editors Note: The following snippets are three stories of child abuse derived from interviews conducted by Team Bendr. Warning, the content features graphic descriptions of abuse.
My favourite game is cricket. Who doesn’t like cricket. I could bowl like Murali and bat like Sangakkara. Or I hope to one day.
Uncle Jagath downstairs usually plays cricket with me. That is when he’s not busy guarding the building. Why does a building need to be guarded? I don’t know. I am only 8 so there are a lot of things I don’t know, I guess.
He wears the same thing every day and sits on a plastic chair and waits. I think he’s bored. Sometimes he falls asleep on that chair. He’s always happy to see me. “Ah chuti baba” he says, when I return back home from school. The building I stay in doesn’t have many people my age, so I sometimes head downstairs with my bat and ball to play cricket. Uncle Jagath is the bowler and I’m always the batsman. We use plastic bottles as wickets.
One day he asked me if I wanted to play a different game. I eagerly agree.
He says we have to play it in his guard room. We walk in and he quickly shuts the door.
It may have been a few minutes, but it feels like hours. I am in pain.
He tells me not to tell anyone about the game we played, while he pulls his pants back up and buckles his belt.
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She hopped on outside, excited to spend a few hours prancing about, leave her homework behind. School was a distant memory; the only thing occupying her mind right now was how high she could swing on her colourful swing set, what new games she could come up with today, with her two friends Timmy and Simon.
Simon and Timmy were her best friends.
Timmy was big, orange, furry and didn’t speak much. Simon on the other hand was her friend who spoke to her. He was tall, old with thinning grey hair and drove her to and from school. They would spend hours together, telling each other stories and playing pretend.
She had the perfect set up. Simon would pick her up from school, she would have lunch with her parents and do her homework. After an hour of grudgingly doing Maths, she was once again free to go play with the only two people she trusted.
They would play. She would sit on his lap. And he would touch her.
She knew it wasn’t right but what did she know and she didn’t want to lose Simon.
This was their routine. After all, Simon was her older friend and her parents trusted him.
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Being ten wasn’t easy. Darni was finding it hard to make friends at school. All she wanted was to come back home and read her books. It wasn’t because she didn’t want to make friends, it was just that no one spoke to her.
Only Malith Aiyya did. He was her favourite cousin. He was much older but he always took time to come and speak to her. Spend time with her when no one ever did.
He was liked by everyone and she felt so special that he liked her the most.
Their favourite game would be ‘hide and seek’.
She would always win.
But there was one day, one game that she would lose.
She counted to ten.
She searched everywhere but could not find him. She gave up and walked into her room.
There she sees his shoes slightly slipping out from behind the curtains.
She walks up to him ‘GOTCHU”
He laughs and grabs her. He starts kissing her. She feels uncomfortable and tries to wriggle out of his grip. He says “SHUSH, be quiet”, and pushes her on to the bed. He quickly walks to the door and closes it shut. And turns his gaze towards her frightened shaking body, now huddled in a corner of the bed.
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