historical costumes that I was influenced by, were obviously touching a nerve with people, because the next thing I knew I had an agent in Belfast who started selling our dresses all over Ireland.
The business was doing well and everything was OK on that front. But things with me and Kenny were getting worse. The more successful I became, the more strained things were between us. Kenny, you see, always liked to be in control, and as I became immersed in my own thing I was becoming more independent.
Then I had another setback. The main shop in Liverpool kept getting broken into, and this put a massive strain on the business because it was becoming increasingly hard to get insurance. Eventually the only way I could keep things afloat was to close all of the shops except two. Looking back, it was probably too much having six of them and trying to make clothes and sell them at the same time.
There had also been a dispute over outstanding rent at the Ormskirk shop that we had sub-let. The woman who took it on refused to pay the rent because of a repair that had not been done. She moved out and left us with the bill. So, in what would be the first of many court appearances over the coming years, I was made bankrupt. I was distraught. But when I got my head around it I realised that things weren’t as bad as I had at first thought.
By this time Kenny had sold his business and he suggested that I put my business in his name, which of course meant that, effectively, I would be working for him. Businesswise it did seem to be the only way forward. We had a big house with loads of land, and a big garage too, so I was able to bring all the girls to work there, and that meant we could cut down on overheads.
The only difference was that when I had to go and buy fabric in Manchester Kenny would have to sign blank cheques for me to take, as he was in charge of the business bank account. Eventually it became impossible for me to have all the cheques I needed every time I wanted to buy something, so I would just sign them in his name. I thought he was fine with that – it wasn’t a big deal. Not then, anyway.
After the last robbery at the Liverpool shop, the police finally caught the thieves, so as part of the insurance claim I had to go to court to confirm that these people had no permission to be in my shop. As I was going up to the courtroom in the lift, two policemen and a young lad got in. I heard them talking and this lad – he must have been about 20 – looked at me and said: ‘Was it your shop we robbed?’
‘Yeah,’ I said, looking at him, surprised.
‘No offence, love, but you didn’t half pile it on there, did you?’ he said, trying to make out that our claim was higher than the shop stock was worth.
‘It’s all expensive designer stuff, you know,’ I said, affronted.
‘Ah well, nothing personal,’ he smirked.
Then, as the lift stopped and the police started to usher him out, do you know what the cheeky little get did? He turned to me and asked: ‘Sure you don’t want any videos or owt?’ Some people just can’t help themselves, can they?
But it was around this time that everything started to really go wrong. Since Kenny had sold his business he wasn’t working and so he was getting up at around midday and then going out and not coming back until early hours in the morning. I’d still be working in the garage, and he’d pop his head around the garage door and say, ‘You still working?’
‘Yes, I’m still working,’ I would think to myself, looking at him. ‘I’m the only one in this house working.’ In fact I was working all hours to try and rebuild the business and to keep the family going, after he had sold his business. But the bank account was in his name. I was still bankrupt and now Kenny was in control.
Our marriage had been rocky for a while, and the children were growing up. Hayley, my youngest, was now 12, Tracey was 19, and my son Kenny was 20. He had moved into a flat with his girlfriend, and they had just had a baby, Daniel – my first grandchild.
So, after years of always being at home or working all hours, I started going out with Pauline on Friday nights. Pauline understood what I was going through with Kenny and tried to take my mind off things. She is a good singer and she liked to enter all the pub karaoke competitions. They were a really big deal in Liverpool pubs at the time and you could earn good money if you won.
I started going with her on Sundays too, and Kenny didn’t like it. By this time, though, I didn’t care that we didn’t do anything together. Then I heard that he was seeing someone else. Had I been told that a few years back I would have been devastated, but I had started building a life of my own by then and I was enjoying my evenings out with Pauline. In the end, me and Kenny were just keeping up appearances, but because we had Hayley, who was still quite young, to think about, we kept going. I wanted her to be brought up by two parents, her mum and dad, like her brother and sister had been.
And, on the face of it, me and Kenny had the perfect marriage – big house, nice car, lovely kids. But he had let me down time and again. He just couldn’t take the responsibility of looking after a family, and I was the one who was left to do that. But boy, did he make me suffer.
Still, we lived in a lovely house in a nice area. How could I take that away from my kids? The thought of it made me stay in my marriage far longer than I knew I should.
Then, one Friday night, Kenny came home and said he wanted to talk. He was all dead nice and said, ‘Listen, I don’t want to keep going out on my own, and I want you to stop doing that too.’
I looked at him and said, ‘No, I don’t want to stop. If you want to stop going out then that’s up to you, but I’m not.’ I knew then that there was nothing left between us. It was the end. I had spent so many years doing what he wanted and being frightened not to. Now it felt easy; I wasn’t scared to say what I wanted.
The following Monday morning, me and Pauline and the other girls in the Central Station shop were all standing around talking and catching up on the weekend. No one was more surprised than me to see Kenny coming up to the shop. He opened the door and walked right up to me. ‘My shop – give me the keys,’ he barked.
His shop! Yes it was in his name, but it was my mum’s money and my hard work that built up the business. Still, I picked them up, looked straight at him and said, ‘Here you are.’ Then I turned around and said, ‘Come on, girls,’ and we walked out of the shop.
Kenny just stood there, watching. Me and the girls, who were a little bit in shock, went around the corner to this little café. Then we phoned the Indian fella who owned the shop opposite ours and asked him to look across to see what Kenny was doing.
‘Can you see anything?’ we kept asking him. ‘What’s he doing now?’ He said he could see loads of women coming into the shop. It was Communion time, so it was one of our busiest periods. We were all laughing at the thought of Kenny standing there with his hands open, not knowing what to do. But I just thought, ‘You know what, let him have it.’ And I did. He got the shop, but I felt free.
Just after that Kenny moved out and set up home with his girlfriend.
Apart from the kids, the business was his last hold over me. He couldn’t do anything then. Nothing. The shop closed down pretty soon after. But I couldn’t sleep for thinking about the customers who had come to us to have their Communion dresses made. I still had all the numbers and all the books, so I chased up the girls who had left deposits and said, ‘OK, no problem. I’ll do your dress for you and deliver it when it’s done.’ But we hadn’t managed to contact all the people, so I rang the local radio station and asked them if they could do a little appeal, asking the people I couldn’t contact to get in touch with me. They read it out over the air, and it worked! I managed to finish every order. At night, I’d jump in the car with Pauline and go round delivering them all.
Kenny still came to the house, and each time he came he would take more and more away with him. One September night he came to the house, picked up my car keys and drove off in our car.
It was my car too – I had bought it with money I had earned – but it was in his name. The worst thing about that was that we lived in