Chapter Two: but you!re only a girl

Dorothea carried the innocence of childhood with her into her teenage years. She was always treated as the baby of the family; always kept in the dark about anything that her parents or her siblings thought might hurt her or tarnish her innocence.

When her first period arrived, without warning, and the blood flowed from her unchecked, she was alone in the house. She thought she was going to die; that something inside her had burst and that her life was leaking out of her like the flow from a broken tap. No one had told her about this. Not her mother, her grandmother or even her sister Anne. No one had warned her about the terrifying onset of womanhood. She found an old towel and staunched the blood, lying on the floor so that she’d not mark the bed spread, with the towel bunched up between her legs.

When her mother came home she took Dorothea in her arms and explained to her what had happened. She gave her a crude, bulky tampon and Dorothea was horrified when she explained how to fit it. Inserting the clumsy tube of cotton wool with its string attached, like a teabag, was painful and invasive and wearing it was unbearably uncomfortable.

Growing up she not only heard the term ‘the baby’ often but also the more offensive words ‘but you’re only a girl.’ Her brother said it when she’d wanted to play ball with him and his friends. Her father said it when she expressed an interest in the carpentry that he did in the garage on weekends. And when she told a guidance councillor at school that she wanted to get her BCOM and become an Accountant he said, “But you’re only a girl, you should be thinking about marriage and children.”

Dorothea had a serene soprano voice and sang in the church choir. Because of her height she was placed front centre and her natural talent brought her most of the solo parts. It was as though the choir members were a dim constellation surrounding her bright star.

She was pretty. Prettier than her older sister Anne, who was plain and severe looking but was always a hit with the boys. ‘S****y’ was the word that she used to describe her sister’s looks now. It wasn’t a word that she would’ve used back then. It was in the way that Anne thrust out her ample b***s and in the come hither glance that she gave to every acceptable looking boy over the age of sixteen that said, “I know what you want, and I want it too.” While Dorothea stayed at home in the afternoons, doing her homework and her chores, Anne was always out with some older boy doing God knows what.

With her pretty face Dorothea didn’t need makeup. Her cheeks had a natural blush, her lips an almost bruised look; like grapes that were ready to be crushed. Her long lashes were dark and her blond hair naturally curly, falling about her perfectly oval shaped face in cascading waves. She was tall and willowy. She wasn’t busty like her sister and she used to pray that God would give her the physical attributes that He had endowed Anne with. She didn’t want to be pretty, she wanted to be popular. She’d throw pennies in the fountain and dream of well rounded breasts and the fairy tale wedding to the perfect man. She’d picture her perfect child; a little girl with curly blond hair, peaches and cream complexion and at the right time, a voluptuous figure.

Strangely, because she was so pretty and angelic, or maybe because of the purity and innocence that shone from her, the boys kept their distance. When she was seventeen she had a crush on the minister’s son. He was tanned and buff and a rebellious ‘bad boy’; like the boys that Anne hung around with. She couldn’t believe it when Sean asked her to take a ride with him after church one Sunday.

Sean picked her up after lunch on his shiny Suzuki, wearing tight leather pants and leather boots. Anne and her parents watched from the window as Dorothea mounted the pillion behind him. He took her hands and placed them firmly on his tight, hard abdomen and the machine growled and burst into life between her legs.

So many things happened in that moment that when she thinks about it now she can hardly separate the physical, tactile experience from the emotional upheaval that simultaneously assaulted her. As the powerful bike came alive it was like a living, breathing creature. It had a life of its own, independent of its riders. She couldn’t imagine how Sean would be able to control it.

But somehow he did and as they steered onto the empty Sunday afternoon street and slowly gathered speed past the sleepy post pot-roast and pudding houses, she felt herself merging with the machine and it’s master, becoming one with them as the air rushed through her mouth and into her lungs. Her fingers tightened on Sean’s six pack stomach and the animal beneath her, that roared and throbbed, seemed to work itself into her; into some deep, secret place that she’d never known existed before that moment.

She was afraid at first but as each new sensation overtook her they gathered and swelled and ate up her fear like the giant black panther that so often stalked her dreams, ready to pounce and devour her. Dorothea sank into these sensations, leaning closer into Sean’s back, wishing that this ride would never end. Praying that they could ride and ride until there was nowhere left to go; until the road ran out in front of them.

But it did end. Sean pulled into a deserted car park and led her into a secluded grove of trees, her legs still shaking from the shock of the physical and emotional turmoil of the ride. He sat and pulled her down beside him, onto the cool, damp grass and kissed her. It was the first kiss that she’d dreamed of as her pennies spun through the air and splashed into the sparkling fountain water. He touched her inadequate breasts and although she knew that this was a sin, and she would pay for it later, she allowed him to do it; allowed him to guide her hand with his so that she was touching him through the leather of his pants, feeling his desire for her; the desire that she’d always wanted from a boy. If she’d known that this would be her only moment of ecstasy she would not have stopped there; would not have stopped his hand from reaching beneath her skirt.

Sean never asked her out again. She knew that if it had been Anne, she would have given him what he wanted and that he’d have come back for more, like the boys always did with her sister. Now Anne was married to one of the ‘bad boys’; a shiftless bounder who drank and smoked and was making her life a misery.

Dorothea hadn’t thought about Sean for so long. For months she’d pined for him, had lain in her bed at night and dreamed about him; his hand on her breast and her hand on him, wondering what it would have been like. When she met Daniel she banished these thoughts from her dreams and now, when they arise unexpectedly, she forces them away because the pain they bring is just too much for her to bear.

At night Dorothea lay awake; listening to her husband’s gentle snoring. She prayed that he wouldn’t roll over to her side of the bed and demand his conjugal rights, like he sometimes did in the middle of the night when she was trying to sleep.

It was always the same. He would press himself against her, making his erection and his intentions blatantly clear. And then wordlessly, without ceremony or consideration, he’d take her. It was always the same. No foreplay, no gentle, loving affection afterwards; strictly missionary position and that was that.

She remembers her disappointment on her wedding night. She was a virgin and had kept herself that way, for Daniel. Somewhere, in the back of her mind, she knew that as a sailor during the war he’d undoubtedly had sexual experiences, but he swore that he’d never had sex with a woman and she tried to believe him because he was a man of God. Everyone in the congregation knew that he was a prophet. He spoke in tongues and interpreted the unknown tongues of others. He preached, when he was offered the pulpit, with a fierce intensity that left no doubt about his devotion to the Lord or that he had been ‘called’ by God.

Although Daniel was almost a decade older than most of the young women of the congregation, they were all secretly in love with him, but he’d chosen her. And he was so handsome, in a rugged, slightly rough and unpolished sort of way, with just the right amount of mystery and intrigue about his past. He was brought up in a Home, although his parents were still alive. He’d told her that much but didn’t explain why. Not until much later.

She really loved him. He was so solid, so reliable and right up until they said their ‘I do’s’, so affectionate. He would hold her hand when they were out walking together on a Sunday afternoon and kiss her chastely on the check when they parted. And her parents loved him too. Her mother told her, “Don’t let this one get away Dorothea, you’re so choosey. He’s perfect for you and he has a steady job and he’s a Christian.” Anne had been married the year before and now it was her turn.

Their wedding was a fairy tale but their honeymoon brought her crashing back to reality. He’d booked them into a cheap hotel in Muizenburg. She’d been there before and she’d loved it; the mountain, the sea (although it was too cold to swim in July) and the picture perfect, brightly painted cabins on the edge of the ocean.

They travelled to Cape Town by train, he had access to travel concessions because of his job on the Railways and it was cheap. And so it was that their first night together was in a cramped coupe. The window was open and as she lay on her back beneath his heaving body she could smell the soot from the coal engine and hear the wheels screeching against the rails as they hurtled through the night.

He insisted on the light being off and they weren’t even completely undressed. He wore pyjamas, his top buttoned up completely, only the slit in his shorts exposing his member that she felt moving painfully inside her but never saw. He’d pulled off her panties but she was still wearing her nightie that was beginning to bunch up under the small of her back and add to her discomfort.

The spit he’d used for lubrication wasn’t adequate and when he entered her without a caress or a kiss, the pain was almost unbearable. But she dared not cry out or complain. Her mother had told her that interrupting her man while he was ‘doing it’ would diminish his pleasure. And she wanted to pleasure him, didn’t she? So she lay there quietly as he chaffed in and out of her.

When he came he gave a groan that sounded more like pain than pleasure, rolled off her, climbed onto the top bunk and went to sleep. And that was how she’d finally lost her virginity to the man that she’d thought she loved.



When Dorothea returned from her honeymoon she told her mother that she’d made a terrible mistake and that she wanted to leave Daniel and move back home. The old woman scowled at her. “You’ll do no such thing. You’ll stay with your husband and honour the vows that you made to love and obey him till death. This is the bed that you’ve made for yourself and you’re going to damn well lie in it. These are the promises that you made before God and I will not have you disgracing the family name with talk of a separation or, heaven forbid, a divorce. We don’t break our promises in this family, we don’t leave our husbands. Daniel’s a good man, a man of faith and he chose you from all the others. Don’t disappoint him, or me.”

And so she’d returned to Daniel and they’d settled into their suburban house and she began to accept that this was all that life and God would offer her; being a dutiful and obedient helpmate. Not interrupting him when he was ‘doing it’. Not asking for more. Not demanding that he consider her needs and desires.

Daniel opened the tumble down church, preaching to his racially mixed, heathen congregation about the redemptive power of the cross, praying for healing from their sicknesses and casting out the many demons that plagued them. Dorothea would watch as he laid his hands on the head of a congregant and pray to God to release them from the power of Satan. They would growl and scream like animals, writhe and twist beneath his hands, froth at the mouth and finally collapse; giving up their struggle against the mighty power of God and whimpering from their sudden release from Lucifer’s enslavement. She watched all this and blasphemously and longingly wished that Daniel could bring this same power and charisma into their bed.


When she fell pregnant, Dorothea felt sure that Daniel’s terrible jealousy of her would subside with the birth of their child. And at first it did. He was proud of little Phillip and the part he’d played in creating him. He used to bathe him and play with him but suddenly that all stopped and his pride turned to irritation. He couldn’t stand the messiness of child-rearing; the bottles of formula that had to be prepared; the changing of the dirty nappies; the disruption of the routine that he was so used to. Everything had to be just so for Daniel. Everything with its place and in its place; his life neatly compartmentalised.

If Phillip cried while Daniel was preparing his sermons or praying, it annoyed him. “Dorothea, please keep that child quiet, I can’t concentrate.” If the daily schedule was disturbed because of some mishap or emergency with the baby, it ruined his day. And then there was the time and attention and affection that Dorothea lavished on her son, diminishing the energy that she could devote to him and taking care of his needs. He would never have admitted it but he was jealous of the boy.

Dorothea, however, was delighted at having this tiny little being completely dependent on her, needing her simply to survive each day. Her initial disappointment that Phillip was not the daughter that she wanted evaporated when she first held him in her arms at the hospital; he was so beautiful. She knew that every mother thought that of their baby, even if they were as ugly as sin, but Phillip was truly beautiful. And when his curly, golden hair grew and the blue of his eyes deepened he became even more so. He charmed everyone that he came in contact with when he gave his delighted smile and her heart would swell with pride when others confirmed what she already knew; that her child was the most angelic child that they’d ever seen.

When Phillip was four, Daniel began to complain about her constant fawning and fussing over him, “You don’t want the child to grow up to be a sissy do you?” She continued to dote on him but for some unfathomable reason the things that she did for him began to become a chore rather than a pleasure.

Daniel’s daily, constant nagging about Phillip was like Chinese water torture for Dorothea. She anticipated each word, waiting for it to hit her ear; the waiting was worse than the words themselves. “You’re too affectionate with the boy Dorothea, it’s not natural.” Drip! “Why do you let the boy play with dolls Dorothea; he’s going to become a mommy’s boy, is that what you want? Where are the cars and guns that I bought him?” Drip! “Why is my dinner late Dorothea, why is there dust on the dining room table, why isn’t my church shirt ironed, why, why, why?” Drip! Drip! Drip!

The sound of his voice grated on her nerves, every word splashing onto that little garden of tenderness that she was cultivating in her heart. She lay awake at night anticipating the next onslaught. She waited for him in the evening, wondering how long it would take before the drip, drip, dripping of his corrosive words would come.

In front of Daniel she began to withdraw from Phillip and on the day that Phillip dropped her precious perfume into the bath, all Daniel’s words had gathered and gushed into her heart in a roaring flood, and the seeds of affection and love that she’d begun tending were drowned. All at once, in the great deluge of Daniel’s accumulated words, her ability to love was washed away. Everything Phillip did annoyed her. Instead of her angelic darling he became a snivelling, whining brat. She began to make him do the things that she used to do for him �" for himself. She found fault with everything he said, everything he did; his bedwetting; his crying at night; his manipulative smiles. His cupboard love and charms no longer worked on her.

She knew that he felt the change in her. She could feel him looking at her when her back was turned and felt that his stares were accusing. Sometimes she felt a tiny twinge of guilt, but she couldn’t help herself. She couldn’t pretend a love that she didn’t feel. She felt that her love had drowned, that she had no love left to give. Not to her parents, her sister, her brother, Phillip or Daniel. Not even to herself.