Life Under the Tyrant’s Boot
When life backed my husband and me into a corner, we had no choice but to move in with his father in a sleepy village just outside Manchester. It seemed a temporary fix, but within months, I knew I wouldn’t last a year under the same roof as that man. I felt like a slave in the house of a merciless lord, and now, even if we had nothing left to eat, I’d never return. His cruelty shattered any hope of peaceful coexistence.
My husband’s parents had divorced long ago. He was raised by his father, Harold Whitcombe, while his mother remarried and faded from their lives. Perhaps that’s why the old man despised women. When we first met, he struck me as nothing more than a grumbling, reclusive pensioner. Out of respect—for raising my husband alone—I tried to find common ground. In vain.
We didn’t own a flat. In Manchester, we’d rented a single room, saving for a place of our own, but when I fell pregnant, our plans collapsed. Money was tight, and with the due date looming, we swallowed our pride and asked Harold for shelter. Within days, I regretted it, as if sensing the nightmare ahead.
The chores were endless. Cleaning, cooking, ironing—it all crashed onto me as though I were some meek housemaid, not a woman heavy with child. By the eighth month, my back ached, my belly dragged, yet rest was forbidden. I dragged myself to work, desperate to save before maternity leave, only to return to fresh demands.
“What, playing the lady of leisure?” Harold would bark if I dared sit or lie down. “Pregnancy ain’t an illness! No one’s running round with a mop for you!”
Gritting my teeth, I’d scrub floors, dust shelves, wipe windows, scour neglected corners. He showed no mercy, inventing tasks until I nearly collapsed, always when my husband was out. Lingering outdoors didn’t spare me.
“Home from work, and where’ve you been loafing?” he’d snap if dinner wasn’t ready. “Floor’s filthy, crumbs underfoot, and she’s off gallivanting!”
His words cut like knives. He belittled me at every turn, and I bit my tongue, unwilling to burden my husband. Edward was already working himself ragged at two jobs. I tried to endure, hoping Harold might soften. Instead, his nitpicking swelled—soup too bland, plates streaked, sheets poorly tucked. Sometimes his demands were so absurd I choked back bitter laughter. Floors mopped twice daily, his shirts ironed—as though service was my birthright.
“Why should I lift an iron when there’s a woman in the house?” he’d roar. “If my son married a useless lump, he ought to divorce! Lazing about all day!”
Living with Harold, I understood why his wife had fled soon after their son’s birth. Enduring him defied human strength. I grew to admire the woman who’d lasted even a few years—she’d been a saint. But one day, my breaking point came.
I was scrubbing a pot when he ambled in, lecturing me, as usual, on how I “couldn’t do a thing right.” The contempt in his voice tipped me over. I slammed the pot into the sink, dried my hands, and wordlessly marched off to pack. Better to starve than let that tyrant grind me into dust. I thought not just of myself, but the child who deserved no part in his venom.
“Sod off, then!” he bellowed after me, hurling curses.
Just then, Edward returned. Seeing me shaking, he barely restrained himself from lunging at his father. I pulled him away, and by the next day, we’d rented a tiny room. Edward hasn’t spoken to Harold since. The old man sent vile messages, railing about “choosing some tart over blood.” That was the end.
To this day, I don’t know how such a man raised a kind, gentle son. Maybe bitterness or loneliness twisted him. I’ve no desire to dwell on it. We’re free of him now, and I pray it stays that way.
