GOING STRONG
TV’s Tracy bounces back with her story
When South Africa’s golden girl of broadcasting Tracy Going’s battered face was splashed across the media back in the late 1990s, the nation was shocked. Sensational headlines of a whirlwind love relationship turned horrendously violent threw the “perfect” life of the household star into disarray. “As I stood before him all I could see were the lies, the disappearing for days without warning, the screaming, the threats, the terror, the hostage-holding, the keeping me up all night, the dragging me through the house by my hair, the choking, the doors locked around me, the phones disconnected, the isolation, the fear and the uncertainty.” Just five months after meeting her “Prince Charming” she staggered into the local police station, bruised and battered.
In Brutal Legacy she tells the tale of the fairytale romance that quickly descended into a violent, abusive relationship. The roots of violence form the backdrop of the book, tracing Going’s childhood on a plot in Brits, laced with the unpredictable violence of an alcoholic father who terrorised the family with his fists of rage. Turn the page to read an extract . . .
‘You’re not allowed here,” I warned him.
“I. Don’t. Give. A. F**k.”
Those were his words as he lumbered towards me with that loose, loping gait of a tall man. One who has spent a lifetime trying to shorten his stride so that others can keep abreast. He was not a man who could be quiet. His hands were lashing at the air, his shoulders twisting like shifting puzzle pieces. I was trying to put the pieces together, trying to make them fit, not quite certain how. My hands were still suspended, fixed in mid-flick, adjourned, a deferred gesture indicating that he may not enter, when I pressed the remote and soundlessly closed the garage door.
Perhaps he heard my silence because suddenly he calmed, the tension draining from him as his shoulders dropped. He ran his fingers through his tousled fringe and looked down at me with such tenderness.
“I’m so sorry for what I’ve put you through,” he said, tilting his head. “Is there any chance of us getting back together?”
I was quiet.
“Please give me another chance.”
I said nothing as I absorbed his now familiar words.
“Don’t make me beg . . . But I’m asking you to give me another chance.” His voice a little harder, more determined. He was looking down at his feet.
I watched him. I wanted to see the truth in his eyes. I wanted to see whether I could believe him, whether I could trust that this time he truly meant what he said. I wanted to see my pain reflected there. But I couldn’t. He was still looking away.
Then suddenly something deep inside me shifted. I was no longer lost in his dark, brown eyes with their thick, solemn brows. I no longer saw the definition of his chiselled jaw, his high cheekbones or the endearingly flattened tip of his broad nose. As his words melted and morphed, and the last five months moulded as one, his boyish nonchalance, his charm, dissipated.
All I could see were the lies, his disappearing for days without warning, the screaming, the threats, the terror, the hostage-holding, the keeping me up all night, the dragging me through the house by my hair, the choking, the doors locked around me, the phones disconnected, the isolation, the fear and the uncertainty.
I realised that it was never going to change. Never. As I stood there in my own stillness, I knew that I had been holding onto something that never existed. I finally understood that this could no longer be my journey. I could no longer give credence and value to his distorted perspective.
Was there any chance of us being together? No, there wasn’t. There would never be. Not anymore. It was finally over.
“No, I don’t think so,” I said softly, trying to find my voice. I didn’t want to anger him.
It took a moment for my words to register, then his face contorted in fury and his rage erupted in a deadly torrent of vile.
“You bitch! You f**king c**t,” he screamed. “Give me the f**king air tickets.”
He’d bought two air tickets for me and my son to go away for a few days. It was supposed to be a healing getaway, to win me over after the night he’d driven me straight into my garage wall, shouting: “Tonight you’re going to die!”
It was an admission of guilt, a bartering for forgiveness, but I had preferred to accept it as a selfless and thoughtful expression of love and apology. He had also sent a bouquet of flowers, which had long since lost their allure and been discarded. The tickets were on my bedside table.
“I’ll get them,” I said quickly.
It was a short distance to my bedroom, but I moved slowly. I put one foot before the other and trod deliberately away from him. It was only once I was in my bedroom, out of sight, that I rushed forward and reached for the tickets. As I did so I snatched at the remote panic button alongside. I’d recently installed the alarm system and kept the panic button poised and ready just in case. I grabbed it and pressed down frantically, counting, one . . . two . . . three.
Not breathing. Four.
I hoped it was long enough to activate the signal, but not long enough to raise his suspicion.
I tossed the panic button aside and bounded back across the room, to the doorway, making up time before slipping back out into the passage. I was still trying to catch my breath as I glided back towards him, eyes lowered. The tickets were in my left hand, carefully caught between thumb and index finger, and I was holding them up high, presenting them ahead of me like a floating, paper peace offering.
But he was having none of it.
He was in the hallway shuffling from one foot to another, immersed in a private dance of rage, as he fuelled his own fury. Somehow, I met his rhythm, instinctively mirroring him, rocking ever so slightly from one side to the other, trying to make myself part of his harmony, trying to placate him, to send out a silent signal that I was not a threat and that I meant no harm. But it was a hollow synchronicity.
As my three-metre journey came to an end I didn’t need to look at him, to meet his eyes, to know that his huge, rough hands were splaying and fisting, that his jaw was clenched tight, his teeth grinding. But I lifted my head anyhow and as our eyes locked I saw the shine. I saw how his pupils had brightened with the icy glow of anticipation.
“Please don’t,” I said, my words nearly silent.
Please don’t hit me.
But he did.
He slammed his right fist into my eye.
The pain was instant. I screamed. My hands flew to my face and I spread my fingers wide as I tried to mask myself, but it was too late. He hit me again. I stumbled backwards, but quickly scrambled to my feet and fled to the lounge. I was in the corner, the curtain caught around me, when he upturned the coffee table. I was still screaming when he hoisted the TV cabinet off the floor and hurled it across the room. Then he lunged at me, his hand clamped over my mouth to keep me quiet. But I wouldn’t be quiet. He gripped my head and pounded it down into the door.
He was over me, his face so close to mine that I could feel his spit on my cheek as it sprayed.
“You need your f**king face, don’t you?”
I felt the cold glass. A shard from the shattered coffee table, and he was holding it tight against my cheek.
Oh my God! He wants to cut me. Cut my face.
It took everything I had to twist myself from his grip.
And then I ran.
It was my own dance of survival as I dodged him, the broken furniture, and my dog Garp.
I made it past the veranda, back out into the garden, before he caught up and I felt his hands slam down on my back and shoulders. He threw me to the ground and Garp moved in to protect me. I was caught, tied up in a frenzy of my flailing arms, his kicking feet, and a black furry body with a wagging tail. It was impossible to fend off the blows and recoil from wet dog licks at the same time. So I tucked my head in deep, curled up small and hugged myself tight. I left Garp to his nuzzling and him to his heaving, kicking and grunting as I drew my arms in to shield me. Each time I gave in to a strike from his foot I was grateful that he was wearing his brown suede and not his usual heavy, leather boots.
I was still screaming when I heard voices from over the wall. My neighbours.
“Hey, what’s going on?”
Shouting. Muffled voices.
“Call the police.”
I heard pounding at my door, outside on the street. “Open up. Open this door!”
Thump. Crack.
I heard the wood splintering and I knew it was over.
I was safe.
I stumbled to my feet and collapsed into the arms of my neighbour and his son. I sagged into them as they carefully lifted me and dragged me through the fractured wooden door. I dropped my head and brought my shaking hands up to hide myself from those who had already gathered on the pavement outside. My shouts had drawn passers-by. There were people standing on the other side of the road. The security guards had arrived and they too stood staring.
My neighbour and his son half dragged, half carried me past the gawking crowd, to the safety of their property. When they placed me gently on a chair it was only then that I looked up at them.
They looked the same, both earnest and burly, just many years apart.
The kitchen was a cold, stark room, not the warm, cosy hub expected of a family home. It was immediately obvious there was no woman in the house. The linoleum floor was dated. So too were the chairs, with their spindly steel legs and black rubber tips. Remnants of an era long gone. But the kitchen was spotlessly clean, clinical almost, and I was glad. I didn’t want clutter. I wanted space and quiet so that I could try to gather my thoughts.
The son bundled a crumpled, wet dishcloth to my face, and I held it tight to my burning eye. The pain was throbbing through me and the cold cloth pressed against the heat of the swelling brought some relief. He then made sugar water but it sat swirling in the mug. I was unable to hold myself still enough to drink it.
Father and son had raised the alarm when they first heard my screams but the police were yet to arrive. I gave them my sister’s number. I knew my mother and her husband, John, were in Johannesburg for the afternoon and I wanted my sister to contact them so they could be with me.
There was no conversation between us as we sat there, waiting awkwardly. We just stared and waited.
“Where is she? Where?” my mother shouted. “I need to see her!”
I was deep within my own place when I heard her words cut through the white noise that engulfed me. I lifted my head to see her bounding down the stairs towards me, her husband, John, close behind.
“I knew it,” she announced to no one in particular. “I couldn’t stand him from the moment I first saw him!” As she moved closer I saw her expression turn from concern to horror. I could see in her eyes what I must look like. “Look what he’s done to you!” she wailed. But I didn’t want to see what he’d done to me. I already knew.
Once John and my mother were confident that all was being managed efficiently, they quickly bundled me into the car. None of us spoke as we made the short drive through the leafy avenues to Rosebank, to the closest hospital. As the soft hum of the engine eased our silence and we passed the garage and the trendy restaurants with their revelling patrons I sat in the back clutching my eye. My jaw clenched, I was trying hard to keep myself together and saw nothing beyond what was directly in front of me. My mother, her shoulders square, resolutely holding onto the J88 and SAPS 308 forms the police had given her to be completed by the attending district surgeon. John alongside her, his hands firmly on the wheel, sitting tight in the middle of the lane steering us forward, his neck still flushed where his collar creased. John was angry and his parting words at my house played over in my mind.
My phone had rung just as my mother, John and I were heading to the car.
Him.
I had pressed the green button and held my hand open, allowing his invective to effortlessly ricochet around my palm.
His words were rough and coarse.
“You f**king bitch . . .”
I had passed my phone to the police officer to bear witness. I then passed it to John.
But John remained completely undeterred by the rant reverberating from the phone, and he joined the shout-down.
“You get to the police station now,” John shouted back. “Now!”
Garbled echoes from the handset against John’s ear.
“Do you understand me?” John’s anger struck at the air. “We will be laying charges.”
John was right. We would be laying charges. I would be laying charges. It was the only way, and I was calm in the knowledge that it was procedural and necessary.
I was immediately ushered through to a ward. Blue curtains were pulled together around me and the next hour became a blur of paperwork and purposeful process. Between the district surgeon, Dr McKenzie, and the nurses, there were many carefully tending hands as they lifted, probed and touched.
It was dark by the time my mother and John led me into the brightly lit police station.
We were not the only ones there to report a crime. It was an average Saturday night in a suburban neighbourhood, with regular weekend complaints. A house burglary, a smash-and-grab incident, a broken car window, other petty crime. It was only me who’d been beaten up.
It was busy and there was nowhere to sit. All the seats in the charge office were occupied so we were directed out into the passage, past the peeling, oneway mirror into the overflow area. My mother was still holding me tight as we shuffled through and settled ourselves into the chairs, tufts of hardened yellow foam escaping through the cracks in the blue faux leather. We waited our turn to make a report.
I was stiff from the cold and the pain when his words crashed through, raining down on me.
“Get those motherf**kers out of my sight!” he bawled, his words reverberating down the passage. It was him. In the charge office.
“Don’t let them be near me,” he shouted.
I sat upright. I could make out the scuffling and jostling and, although I knew I’d be safe, I backed up into the wall, trying to make myself disappear. I watched as police officers rushed towards him and held him in place. With some force, they managed to form a human cage, a barrier between him and us, out in the passage.
“God forgive me, but he’s awful,” my mother groaned. “What a dreadful man.”
The police officers were having none of it. They restrained him and funnelled him through to the process room somewhere at the back of the station where he was charged with assault and the intent to do grievous bodily harm.
All I wanted to do was sleep, and as soon as I was back in the comfort of John’s car I folded myself into the leather and surrendered myself to the remainder of the night. I was too scared to be alone, in too much pain, couldn’t face the destruction in my home, so I went back with my mother and John.
As I stood there in my own stillness, I knew that I had been holding onto something that never existed. I finally understood that this could no longer be my journey