Caged Bird Read online

  ABOUT THE BOOK

  I was the shadow child

  no one ever saw …

  From the day she was born until she escaped three decades later, Katy Morgan-Davies knew nothing but a life in captivity. Raised in a cult led by her cruel, deluded father, Katy was kept hidden from the world, rarely permitted to set foot outside the house. From a young age she was subjected to violence and mental abuse, and never experienced love or friendship.

  When Katy finally found her freedom, she was shocked at just how little she knew of the world. Something as simple as having the freedom of choice was overwhelming, but, step by step, she learned the skills she needed to exist in a society that, to her, was completely unfamiliar.

  In this gripping and remarkable memoir, Katy shows how she rose above what she suffered and found a way to escape through her love of reading and writing. Expanding her understanding through the words of others enabled her to see her captivity for what it truly was, and writing gave her a voice when her own was silenced.

  Contents

  Cover

  About the Book

  Title Page

  Dedication

  Author’s note

  Prologue

  Part One: Faith

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Part Two: Insurrection

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Part Three: Clipped Wings

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Chapter 31

  Chapter 32

  Chapter 33

  Chapter 34

  Part Four: Enlightenment

  Chapter 35

  Chapter 36

  Chapter 37

  Chapter 38

  Chapter 39

  Chapter 40

  Chapter 41

  Chapter 42

  Chapter 43

  Chapter 44

  Chapter 45

  Chapter 46

  Chapter 47

  Chapter 48

  Chapter 49

  Part Five: Learning to Fly

  Chapter 50

  Chapter 51

  Chapter 52

  Chapter 53

  Chapter 54

  Chapter 55

  Chapter 56

  Chapter 57

  Chapter 58

  Chapter 59

  Chapter 60

  Chapter 61

  Chapter 62

  Chapter 63

  Epilogue

  About the Author

  Copyright

  For you who have helped me find my wings.

  You know who you are.

  Author’s Note

  Although everything in this book is true, and much of it a matter of public record, I have changed some names, physical descriptions and locations so as to protect the anonymity of some of those involved. With Leanne and Cindy, this is a legal requirement given the nature of their evidence in court, but with others it is to respect their privacy, something that was never afforded to me.

  From childhood’s hour I have not been

  As others were – I have not seen

  As others saw – I could not bring

  My passions from a common spring –

  From the same source I have not taken

  My sorrow – I could not awaken

  My heart to joy at the same tone –

  And all I lov’d – I lov’d alone.

  ‘Alone’, Edgar Allan Poe

  Prologue

  Clapham, London

  1983

  Cries were emanating from the baby’s crib, but none of those gathered round it moved to comfort. They had eyes only for the single man among them.

  With reverence, they stared at him, eyes shining not with happiness but awe. They trembled in his presence, bodies alert, ready to serve him better. Not a word crossed their lips: they waited instead for him to speak.

  Still the child cried: disrespectful. Irritated, the man seized the cot and shook it roughly. Silence fell. He opened his mouth to fill the void.

  ‘This child,’ he began in his commanding voice, looking down into the cot, seeing far into the future, ‘will be my worst enemy.’

  Part One

  Faith

  1

  I carefully finished shaping the curve of the ‘a’, my three-year-old hand clasped tightly around the pencil, and sat back on the cushion on my chair. These were the first words I had ever written.

  Although, secretly, I was pleased with myself, I didn’t glance up at the comrade teaching me for praise: the achievement wasn’t mine, it was thanks to Comrade Bala, and it would be self-love to think otherwise.

  Bala was the star of our lives; the only person in the world who could be praised. That was why the comrades were teaching me to write, so I could celebrate him using the written word. I would no more have written my own name – Prem Maopinduzi – on the paper than I would a swear word; the actions were comparable.

  Writing was a way of life in our house – people wrote reports and rotas all the time, and comrades often had to write things down rather than saying them aloud, in case fascist agents were listening – so it was a thrill for me to learn, especially because I’d always loved words; I felt as if I’d been born reading. Yet Comrade Josie soon corrected the angle of my letters. My words sloped backwards, which meant I was backwards too. My handwriting had to be just like Bala’s: anything else was a sign of revolt.

  Beloved Comrade Bala’s full name was Aravindan Balakrishnan; we also called him AB. He lived with me and six adult comrades – Josie, Sian, Aisha, Leanne, Cindy and Oh – leading our Communist Collective (CC) in south London, which at that time was called the Workers’ Institute of Marxism Leninism Mao Zedong Thought. AB’s wife, Comrade Chanda, and her disabled sister Shobha also shared our home, but as a small child I saw very little of them. Cindy and Leanne were marginal figures in my life too because they went Outside to work, earning Big Units for AB’s CC. The rest of us, me included, spent our time working for AB: our lives were dedicated to his service.

  His standing could be gauged in our united deference to him. We stood up when he entered a room; always said ‘hello’ if we passed him in the corridor; offered him the first helping of whatever food was being served. We could not enter his room without knocking and awaiting a response, and were required to face him when in his presence, making continuous, unbroken eye contact as a sign of our respect. Comrade Bala was a very important man. He may have looked rather ordinary – 5 foot 3, black curly hair and brown skin, his dark eyes framed by thick square glasses – but that was an illusion.

  Comrade Bala was the future leader of the world.

  Presently, he was in a kind of exile, with just us comrades as acolytes, but his was the new world in the making. One day, when his covert leadership became Overt, he would overthrow all governments and assume his rightful role.

  Every day I was told how lucky I was to be the first child of AB’s new world. The comrades would exclaim how jealous they were because I had none of the disadvantages of the old world – such as family or friends. Unlike the comrades, I had no parents. I was told that, on 7 January 1983,
I had ‘jumped on to Comrade Bala’s hand’, and ever since then experienced the benefits of his sole influence. Although all members of the Collective participated in my ‘controlled development’, it was AB to whom I was promised; AB for whom I had to build a temple inside myself: my self was AB’s. The nature of my upbringing was dubbed Project Prem: a blueprint for how all children would be raised in future.

  Yet for all the advantages of my pioneering life – in fact, because of them – I was also in great danger.

  ‘Comrade Prem!’ I heard time and again, as a comrade hissed or shouted at me in alarm. ‘Don’t look out of the window!’

  For if I looked out of the window, someone Outside might see me. The current governments, I was told, would stop at nothing to prevent AB from overthrowing them. The evil British Fascist State (BFS) was obsessed with finding him and preventing his leadership from becoming Overt, and kidnapping and killing me would strike a blow at the heart of AB’s new world. So, in our terraced house on a tree-lined street in suburban south London, we operated in a constant state of war.

  I was never allowed to be alone, for my own protection. Comrades accompanied me everywhere, taking turns to lie beside me in bed or stand guard in the bathroom as I went to the toilet. I could not set foot outside the house without a minder, even – or especially – to the back garden, for the neighbours living beside us were the very agents we feared most. What opportunity they had to snatch me! I was told that the Collective had once looked after another child, Eddie, whose destiny was in his name: Ed-DIE. He’d climbed over the wall in the garden, was taken by the ugly dirty white neighbours and killed. If I didn’t want to meet the same fate, I was not to look over the wall or wave or talk to anyone Outside.

  ‘Under no circumstances should anybody ever come into the house and breach the defences of the Collective.’ This was perhaps the most sacrosanct of AB’s many guidelines for how we should live – and it was taken seriously. The front door was rarely opened; comrades would shout through it instead and tell people to go away. I was warned not to go near the telephone, for fear enemies might send waves through it to harm me. If ever I happened to be close to the phone when a call came in, I was instantly hushed: a child’s voice in the background would alert fascist agents to my presence; the Collective didn’t want anybody to know I was in the house.

  From birth, I knew I was something to be hidden. The comrades told me that was because I was so special and precious and lucky … but I didn’t feel lucky.

  I felt scared.

  It was terrifying, knowing that everyone Outside was an enemy and the only people I could trust were the few comrades in the house. I had nightmares about the fascist agents surrounding us: faceless figures in black suits and hooded masks. When they lifted those masks in my dreams, they had the faces of our next-door neighbours.

  Sometimes, those neighbours were shameless in revealing their monitoring of our lives: ‘I haven’t seen him for a while,’ a neighbour once remarked to Comrade Sian of me – believing I was a boy from my masculine clothes and haircut – when to protect me the comrades had kept me indoors for several weeks. As time went on, AB decided the best method of protection would be to let me go out as infrequently as possible: the risk was simply too great.

  Shut inside, I felt the enticement of the windows deeply. Though I knew it was dangerous, I was nevertheless drawn towards the natural light that poured through the net curtains. Despite my fear of Outside, I still wanted to see it. I think I had a natural curiosity, but I wasn’t stupid. If I dared draw near to a window – keeping a close eye on whichever comrade was minding me, in case they spotted my transgression – I was always careful to avoid being seen by anyone Outside.

  I had opportunity only to sneak peeks. But I was glad I did. To see all the people Outside walking past our house, on their way to destinations I could not imagine, in clothes that seemed so colourful compared to those worn in the house, seemed almost magical. There were Indian people like AB and Chanda, black people, and ugly dirty whites. Despite what I was told, I thought they all seemed nice. It was hard not to like the sight of people laughing and talking as they strolled along.

  Laughing was banned in the CC. I was disappointed, because I had a natural sense of humour with a fondness for pranks, but I wasn’t permitted to say silly things, fantasize or giggle. Talking was frowned upon generally: AB said if something was important, write it down and KQ (Keep Quiet). He’d hook a finger to his ear or shape his hands into binoculars to remind me fascist agents were always keeping tabs. Mealtimes were held in silence, ‘no talking when eating’; we’d have to sit like statues round the table instead.

  In contrast, Outside seemed … freer, somehow. People threw their heads back and roared with laughter or smiled easily at one another. Standing behind the net curtain, behind the safety of the glass, I felt a peculiar emotion, given all I’d been told.

  I felt sad that I wasn’t a part of it.

  One day, when I was three, I watched a white family ambling along. They seemed so happy and their joy touched my heart. Unthinkingly, I shared my thoughts aloud: ‘I like ugly dirty whites,’ I announced.

  ‘WHAT did you say?’ AB’s voice was loud and aggressive, and I felt my stomach clench, as it always did when he roared.

  In a flash, he was across the room and beside me. He could move so suddenly; it always took me by surprise. I risked a look up at him and his face was dark, dark like a thundercloud.

  Though the danger was Outside – or so I’d been told – I felt suddenly fearful … of him. For his eyes were ringed red and burned like black coals flaming with rage. Before I could speak, before I could move, his hand was upon me, beating his guidance into me with unstoppable force.

  I cried out with the pain – but not with surprise. I’d been looking Outside; I’d said I liked ugly dirty whites, whom AB abhorred. My words had been a direct violation of AB’s guidelines, which was the worst thing anyone could do. If ever I liked something he didn’t, it was going against him – whether it was a person or a piece of fruit. (Once, I gagged on a raw persimmon and threw up; Comrade Sian was so horrified at my disrespect for AB’s favourite fruit she fed my vomit back to me, telling me all the while how ungrateful I was.) ‘AB knows everything,’ I was told repeatedly. His opinion was always correct and you couldn’t ever offer an opposing view. ‘Two plus two equals four,’ he would say contentedly, meaning his assessments were as irrefutable as arithmetic.

  I cowered under his hands as he beat me black and blue. Though I was only three, I knew my age was no protection. I was no innocent. As Bala told me almost every week, I had fallen from grace when I was eighteen months old: he’d been holding me and I’d wanted to be put down, so I’d wriggled in his arms, flailing, and struck him as I did so. He hit me all over my body in return, to teach me ‘don’t ever show anger towards Bala’.

  He wasn’t being cruel, in beating me: he was being kind. It was for my own good. That’s what the comrades told me: AB was saving me through beating me; hands-on medicine to make me well. As a little girl, I thought it necessary. ‘Love is a practical thing,’ AB pronounced – the beatings were a sign of how much he cared; my discoloured bruises marks of love. When he beat me, he called it a Good Struggle, as he battled against my internal negative forces to put me on the rightful path towards the ways of the new world.

  Violence dominated my earliest memories – and not just against me. For my fellow comrades also had to follow AB’s guidelines, and they often needed to be taught lessons too. I remember seeing Sian thrown down on to the sofa by the force of his blows; him pulling Cindy towards him so hard that all the buttons pinged off her purple blouse; Oh’s face squashed beneath his big black boot; thick trails of blood trickling from countless noses and ears over the years. The worst, for me, was seeing Comrade Aisha beaten, because she was a tiny woman, only 4 foot 8, and she seemed so defenceless. I remember flinching when Bala hit her, unable to watch.

  Though I was told it was neces
sary, and no one else seemed alarmed, I found the violence terrifying. There would be horrific screaming and shouting and then the beatings would begin. I never intervened – what could I do? I used to hide away, try to make myself as invisible to the Collective as I was to the Outside. Once, one of the cult members intervened when AB was beating Sian, but he just flung her off and beat Sian ten times harder for her interference. After that, no one ever stepped in or spoke up for anyone else. We’d all just stand in a circle and watch.

  In truth, the likelihood of a comrade leaping to another’s defence was remote anyway because most of the beatings arose precisely because someone had reported. Everyone kept a hawk’s eye on everyone else in case of any tiny transgression, and if one occurred the comrades would eagerly write down their colleague’s misdemeanour or have a quiet word in AB’s ear; sometimes somebody would haplessly share a secret and the information would go straight back to Bala. I saw a terrible jealousy between the women, a desire to prove that they were AB’s most loyal follower, so each one was always trying to put the others down to get herself higher on his list of favourites.

  To my unlearned eyes their behaviour seemed ugly, but AB seemed to think it noble. The truth was that everybody disliked everybody else, and everybody was scared of everybody else, and if ever two people happened to get along it was for the sole purpose of putting down a third. Yet if two comrades ever seemed the least bit friendly towards one another, AB would declare they were forming ‘an anti-party clique’ and abruptly issue punishment for not focusing solely on him. It was a house full of hate.

  Whenever AB beat us, he would be frenzied, vile and violent. ‘Twenty-one beats,’ he might spit out, ‘seventeen more to come.’ Yet despite his sadistic pleasure, the understanding within the Collective was that we had pushed this gentle, good man to rage because we had done unspeakable things. The comrades, to my mind, seemed thankful to be hit; Aisha kept murmuring, ‘Yes, yes, yes!’ I only ever remember Oh talking back to him, unexpectedly defending herself against whichever charge had been brought: an absolute no-no because AB was judge, jury and executioner and no mercy would be given. Secretly, very secretly, I admired her for having an independent mind – but she was always crushed in the end.