Feelings
Broken Child
By Emmanuelle
STORIES like this are many and too true and too often told. In fact, these stories became too many these had stopped being told.
This child’s mother had a family of her own when she went to the Middle East to work as a domestic helper. Whether it was rape or with consent she did not make clear; she was pregnant when she went home not to her husband and kids, but to the barrio of her birth. She left her newborn with her grandmother. In this case, a better word for “left” is “abandoned”.
Rose’ birth was never registered. When the grandmother died, she was bundled from one relative to another. At seven years of age, the most popular and respected member of the barangay council offered to adopt the child. He and his wife had two children of their own, both grown up.
The couple sent her to a public elementary school where Rose, although darkly exotic with her half-foreign blood, became just one of the quiet and unremarkable ones.
At eleven years and in her fourth grade, Rose exhibited some surprisingly disturbing habits. She began to talk a lot, even rumbling senselessly on and on. When she ran out of words, she would raise her skirt and show her privates to friends and classmates. Her teachers became worried, then alarmed. When interviewed, Rose readily told her story: since third grade, when she was ten, her stepfather began raping her at lunchtime, five days a week. Not on weekends though; her stepmother, who was a businesswoman, would be home.
From Monday to Friday, she arrives home from school at twelve noon. The stepfather orders her to lock and remove the keys from both front and back doors. He would strip her naked and slowly bathe her himself. For an hour Rose becomes his sex slave. To keep her from screaming, he places a sharp knife within warning distance. After the hour, he gives her lunch.
Once, she tried to make sumbong to her stepmother. The stepmother refused to believe her story. She whipped Rose instead with a bolo that left a big scar on her hip.
The teachers gawked: so, that was why you were late every afternoon class?! Rose nodded amidst her tears. After so many telling, though, she lost the tears, and enjoyed the re-telling. The teachers called on her relatives. The relatives reported the rape to the Municipal Social Welfare Office. In the official interview, Rose intentionally deleted the original data of more than a year of rape. She had reported only two dates, those of the most recent. She also had a raging infection from her lacerated private parts.
To keep her hidden from the adoptive parents while she and her papers were being prepared for transfer to a government sanctuary, Rose was again bundled from one house to another every night. These were homes though, not mere houses, where there were loving and caring families.
Rose stayed with this writer for a night. This writer let her bathe alone with the instruction to scour herself good and harsh. She gave her a new backpack to replace her paper bag of clothes. And because she had none, a complete personal hygiene set. And more clothes.
Rose slept in the same room as the writer, but on a separate bed. At midnight, this writer woke up. The writer’s bag was emptied of all contents. These were scattered on the floor and definitely searched. The most precious (two external hard disks four usb, two salary checks, bankbooks) were clutched by Rose, fast asleep. She gently taps Rose awake. She whispers: and what do you plan to do with those, little girl?
Hopefully, Rose is now where they mend broken children almost beyond repair.
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