(Continued from) 

 

When Peter and Anna finally reached the stage where they could be satisfied with the income they generated from their business and the way they managed it, Peter suddenly announced that he could make them “really rich.”  He was going to expand their business by merging it with the much bigger business of two partners; a younger man and his mother.  He gave Anna no opportunity to disagree, think it through, or gain insight into the matter.  He made a totally autonomous decision and simply cut her away from everything to hand their business over to strangers.  Anna objected his discard but did not try to force her cautiousness on him, as she was still in the mindset that she would support him to reach his full potential as a person, and in the business world. 

However, from then on, he had less than a moment to spare for her and the boys, or to take notice of his parents’ “nonsense.”  Consequently, he aggressively refused to hear about their nastiness, and “Anna’s problems with them and the children.”  Peter was now even more entwined with whatever kept him busy besides the well functioning business they  once had.  He totally abandoned Anna to the mercies of her in-laws, and the job of running everything at home while raising their two beautiful boys all by herself.  He left by five o’clock in the morning and often came home late at night, most weekends and holidays included. 

Systematically, as the months crept by, the many burdens began to crush Anna’s positive resilience.  She was now also alienated from the business she helped to build, and had nearly no interaction with Peter as a result.  She felt isolated, overburdened, exhausted, and more alone than ever before.  She knew Peter had forsaken her as if she and the boys never existed and none of all this was his responsibility. 

 

In addition, Peter’s drinking habits have also been worsening.  He always drank too much alcohol over weekends, but he did not ‘merely’ slink into drinking weekdays too, he was literally chained to the bottle.  He usually drank alone but during the short periods he was home, he preferred company and non-stop madness.  He openly replaced her and the boys with other people and the liquor bottle.  He saw to it that he had very little time to spend with them. 

Over the years, their social life had become a nightmare for Anna.  She appreciated a glass of wine with fine food, but detested drunkenness and irresponsibility.  But it was always like that.  No matter whether they were visiting or entertaining visitors, Peter always drank himself to a standstill.  Life with Peter and her in-laws became increasingly unbearable.  Like emotional leeches, the three of them were sapping all life from her soul and happiness from her life. 

 She suspected he was cheating on her and not working that hard, but did not have the time and recourses to prove he was partying behind her back.  Her responsibilities consumed her in her fight to singlehandedly keep body and soul together. 

 

Time proved that merging their business with another one actually caused the income from her and Peter’s business to dwindle.  Again, just as in the time when they started the business together, Anna pumped her earnings into their home to keep everything afloat.  When she could get hold of Peter, she reasoned, explained, and eventually fought with him in vain to get clarity on what was happening to the business, which was flourishing until that merger.  He callously told her to “get off his back; he was having issues with his business partners, but he will sort it out.” 

She urged him to seek legal advice and not be misused, but he again insisted on ignoring her and doing it all his way.  According to what Anna could figure out, his partners absorbed her and Peter’s business and were laying claim to it without compensation, as there was no legal contract drawn up between them. 

Circumstances could be unintentional.  But deep down, Anna knew what was much worse, was the fact that Peter completely discarded her and the boys.  She lived in a devastating, deep sorrow that could not be otherwise explained.  It felt as if Peter had died, and she could do nothing to save him.  When she opened her mouth to protest, he was suddenly not ‘passive’ anymore.  He did not hesitate so assault her verbally and physically when she demanded to know what was going on, and why he was endangering their marriage and family for the sake of, as he put it, “getting really rich.” 

During heated arguments, she constantly had to hide to escape his attacks.  He damaged most of the doors in the house by  beating or kicking them open to “shut her up,” as he called it.  He refused to take responsibility for anything, even his willful neglect of the boys, his depletion of their finances, and as he made her see it, the theft of “his” business. 

 

ANNA BECAME TOTALLY DISILLUSIONED, AND PETER CRASHED THEIR BUSINESS AND HIS PARTNERSHIP

The warm-hearted man Anna thought she married, had revealed himself as another stone cold Charles Manson.  In reality, Peter’s actions were just as unreasonable, unthinkable, illogic, and unacceptable as Charles and Zeena’s.  In time gone by, Peter pretended to be humble, soft hearted, and trustworthy; but behind closed doors he listened to nothing, which did not suit his demented frame of mind.  Now all his devils were loose.  He even wanted to take a second bond on their house to feed the partnership he was engaged with.  Anna flatly refused.  Fights erupted spontaneously between them.  It was a time of total uncertainty and chaos.  There was nothing he would overlook to do whatever he was doing. 

She feared for the future of her two bright boys. 

It was during this time that Anna began to contemplate suicide. 

Without realizing that she was in Peter’s deceptive power and totally under his evil control, Anna believed she could not live without him.  Even more horribly, she began to believe she could never leave her two boys behind to face this mad life as orphans.  She knew their father was not interested in taking care of them in any way. 

She told only three people of her terrible intent: Peter, Charles, and Zeena.  She never thought of telling her parents or anyone else, because she was too ashamed, and none of them knew what was really going on in her home. 

Peter simply ignored her cry for help as he did with everything else; not even caring anything about the fate of his two innocent sons.  Charles and Zeena simply changed the subject and afterwards, Anna realized how they must have revelled in the possibility of finally getting rid of her — and the children. 

 

During this time, Peter’s efforts to build a bigger, “really rich” business, suddenly crashed.  With the huge financial loss of her and Peter’s business and an estimated R100,000 (or more than two million rand today,) which his “business partners” owed him, he walked away from them without any explanations or apologies. 

Anna could not make sense of anything.  Their well-paying business was gone and his “partners” owed them a huge sum of money, which Peter could not recover legally as he had nothing on paper.  She strongly felt he was covering up something bad for which he was not prepared to take responsibility. 

Yet, as always, she forgave him, gave him the benefit of the doubt, and decided to pull herself together.  She decided to remain positive that he would recover what he had destroyed between them and him the boys, and eventually, also do restitution for the loss of their business and so much money.  But in later years, she realized there was much more involved from his side to break up their business as well as his partnership in another business, than what he was prepared to tell her.  As a survival mechanism, she again suppressed his one-sided narratives.  But looking back much later, she understood that he did inconceivable things to her and the boys from behind her back during that time and actually, throughout their whole life together.  The fact that they got through it without disintegrating financially or otherwise, was pure grace from God. 

 

Even worse, destitute and without any prospects after he made their business and his partnership fall, someone else with an established business appeared on the scene.  Peter directly joined himself to another business partner; again disregarding Anna’s advice to make everything legal and above board.  When that business eventually went exactly the same way, (this time without any means to calculate the loss,) he again piled all the blame onto his business partner. 

Peter, again with the help of Anna, eventually began a fourth business.  She again joined in as his aid and secretary, taking more and more responsibility upon herself.  They struggled like in the beginning with the first business, but she kept on working at their own career as well and pumped everything she could earn into their home, so that eventually, Peter could find his feet.  Just as the first one, this attempt also began to pay off.  Anna stuck to her commitment, and together, they slowly brought this business to maturity.  She gave Peter absolute free reign to do his job; consciously evading every thought that he was again taking advantage of her trust, hard work, and dedication, and overlooking and constantly forgiving his strange disappearances when he was out on quotes, etcetera, and his incomprehensible inconsistencies when he had to explain his actions. 

Even then, living in denial, Anna could not accept that Peter, from the very beginning, violated all her trust, hope, help, and support to do exactly what he wanted, as much as he wanted, and for as long as he wanted. 

THE SOBER ‘FATHER’   

However, before they began the fourth business, while Peter and Anna’s marriage, family, and finances were disintegrating because Peter disregarded her, abused her trust on a multilevel, and also linked their first business to his two shady business partners, Charles Manson kept on swearing and shouting about everything possible.  As if on a treadmill leading to nowhere, Anna insistently kept on pleaded with Manson to stop his abuse and get sober “for the boys’ sake,” as he had promised he would do.  She had no desire to see the boys go the same way as Charles and Peter. 

Finally, Charles reluctantly agreed again, but this time, he joined a rehabilitation center and Zeena stood by him every step of the way.  The alcohol had decimated his body.  At first, he had to live on energy drinks and vitamin injections.  

However, this relief was also short-lived.  He backslid another few times and got sober another few times.  Problem was, whether drunk or sober, Manson remained the same commanding, trouble-making, so-called ‘perfectionist’ he always was.  He still lived by his self-declared gospel, “God forgives, I don’t,” and revered the Frank Sinatra song, “I did it My way!”  Once, he did not speak to his own brother Sinny for more than 7 years because the man ‘dared’ to flick a cigarette butt onto his ‘perfect’ green lawn.  When his sister Hannah died, (the aunt who rebuked Zeena that day when Peter announced their wedding plans,) he flatly refused to attend the funeral, and slobbered drunkenly, “I won’t even get out of bed to bury my own mother!”  His mother was 96 years old at the time and died a few months later.  Charles kept his promise and did not attend her funeral either, but spent the day in bed with his bottle of booze. 

 

Through the years, many deceived family members laughingly, yet admirably told how this lunatic controlled his mother from an early age.  Charles was just a little boy when his mother failed to place his cup of coffee in exactly the right spot next to him on the table.  He firmly pointed to where she had to move the cup, hissing through his teeth, “Bliksem, [Afrikaans for ‘you damned, infernal, blasted scoundrel,’] I said here!”

When Manson began to stay sober for a few weeks at a time, Anna made a genuine effort to regularly visit them in the cottage.  At that stage, Peter still insisted his business kept him too busy to give any of them attention.  So, early Saturday mornings, after attending to the front garden with the help of the boys, and before she took them to play on the farm while visiting her parents, Anna and the boys would  have tea with Charles and Zeena. 

It was wonderful to see Charles ‘reasonable’ again. 

Very naively, Anna believed all the fighting and frolicking behind her back were washed away in Charles’ disappearing stream of liquor.  She was prepared to forgive and forget all the interference, humiliation, and heartache, and to work on a relationship with the two of them once more.   

They chatted normally and happily - or this was how Anna perceived it anyway.  Even after all they had done, she still openly shared her life with them.  This time she believed, once Charles fully came to his senses, he would be able to speak to Peter, to try and undo all the harm he and Zeena had caused Peter since he was a little boy.  She expected his parents to be wiser now, having lived through all their self-inflicted trouble and terrible discord.  She thought they could become her allies in rescuing Peter from alcohol addiction, returning him also to sanity.  Of course, she did not know that he never even kicked his drug habit, as he promised he would do many years ago.  In fact, she did not know Peter at all. 

 

Eager to have sincere parents-in-law in her life, Anna even made time to invite Charles to a cup of tea during the day while Peter and his mother were at work. 

One day, Charles said something that made her frown.  Something she would not understand until long afterwards. 

Charles shook his head and sighed sadly, staring at his teacup, “You know, it’s really bad when you eventually get sober, just to realize you have absolutely nothing left...” 

Anna looked at him in puzzled surprise.  Her first thought was, he was referring to his non-existent relationship with Peter; Charles was regretting his rabid abuse of them all.  But before she could follow up on the thought, he changed the subject.  Charles’ moment of ‘regret’ had passed. 

Nevertheless, Anna could not believe what she just heard.  She thought, now that Charles was sober once more, he could find a job again.  He and Zeena could be happy - they could all be happy together.  In reality, Charles and Zeena had so much more now than ever before!  They had their only son living right next to them.  They had their grandchildren with them all the time.  They had a beautiful cottage of their own with nearly no living expenses.  How could Charles say he had “absolutely nothing” left? 

Anna, never being as carnally minded as they were, did not realize Charles was not referring to the wonderful gifts from God, which no amount of money can buy.  He was referring to allegedly “giving the house to Peter,” as if the cottage and all their other priceless benefits did not exist. 

 

Miraculously, Charles landed a well-paying morning job.  He and Zeena began to save every sent and sold everything else they could lay their hands on.  The parents’ finances rapidly grew in their nearly financial free environment.  However, whether sober or stoned, Manson remained the same psychopath he always was.  Anna and the boys still found themselves crushed together on a small property with those two ‘perfect do-gooders,’ who supposedly “gave Peter everything,” but shouted at his family’s every move and tolerated none to breathe on their two new, shiny vehicles, or touch anything that might belong to them. 

Zeena continued to support Charles in every wrongdoing.  She actually added to his abusive activities by supposedly remaining passive about his despotic rule over Anna and the children.  And she fiercely defended his unacceptable behavior with silly arguments such as, “J***s man, [taking God’s Name in vain] why all the fuss?  You know that’s just how Charles is!  He means nothing by it...” 

Manson, as the maintenance supervisor of a large office block, stole everything he could find.  He brought home countless packs of toilet rolls, which he stacked from the floor to the ceiling in the garage; soap of all sorts, a video machine, an electric typewriter, boxes of typewriter paper, etcetera, which he either sold or gave to Peter and Anna. 

In this way, Charles sold a stolen electric desk calculator to Peter in another kind of trade.  Peter had to buy him a vacuum cleaner in return.  That day, when Peter brought Charles the new vacuum cleaner and placed the box on the floor of the cottage lounge, Anna called him to attend to a telephone call.  Peter had scarcely put the phone down, when Manson burst into their home like a raging tornado.  He flung the box containing the vacuum cleaner across the kitchen floor, shouting and screaming berserk.  He accused Peter of being “a f****n thief,” buying him f****n rubbish for such an expensive calculator!”  Before Peter could say a word, Charles grabbed the calculator from the kitchen table, flew out the door, and slammed the door of the cottage shut behind him; rattling the windowpanes in their frames. 

However, this was not the last of Charles’ deals with Peter. 

A short time later, Peter bought a video machine from Charles but, as usual, never received any paperwork or even just an owner’s manual.  Six months later, at five o’clock in the morning, exactly the time Manson unlocked the driveway gate to leave for work, someone burglared Peter and Anna’s home.  The person sneaked in while they were still asleep.  Neatly forcing open the sliding door, he unplugged the video machine behind the big television cabinet and carried it off.  Nothing else was touched.  The thief came just for the video machine.  Peter nearly caught the thief in the act while he carried out the video machine, as the thief’s helper accidently stepped onto the cat’s glass bowl on the veranda a few paces away, waking the couple.  They came out to look for the thief just as Manson pulled his vehicle out of the yard on his way to work.   He claimed he did not see anyone in the yard. 

The police opened a case but shut it right away, thinking the couple was planning insurance fraud.  It was very strange that the thief would focus on the video machine but not even look at the expensive television set next to it.  Peter and Anna did not have an owner’s manual or a single receipt to prove the video machine ever existed.  Completely innocent and naive, they then paid thousands to install burglar alarms – not just to the house, but also in the cottage to ‘secure the parents safety as well.’ They even installed a two-way telephone between the house and the cottage “in case the parents were attacked there, or needed something at night.” 

Manson and Zeena must have laughed themselves into stitches.  Later, it came to light that the police was investigating theft in the complex where Manson worked; hunting for missing appliances.  Still, many years passed before Peter and Anna grasped the truth of the grave danger to which Charles exposed them to satisfy their vile greed.  It must have gotten very hot for Manson at that time, and he and Zeena broke into Peter and Anna’s home that morning shortly before he left for work to dispose of the stolen video machine.  Zeena was the watch, they then realized, who accidently stood on the cat’s bowl while Manson was stealing the machine to destroy all evidence against him. 

EVENTUALLY, ANNA MADE AN EXECUTIVE DECISION

Caught in the tornado of Charles’ frenzies and Peter’s alcohol abuse, persistent treason, and emotional neglect, Anna finally decided that this madness had to be resolved — and soon.  Peter’s business tenacity, (at that stage he was still yoked to his business partners,) and heartless rejection proved to Anna that he was controlling her mind and life by pretending ‘passivity’ to other people to make her into a so-called “controlling witch.”  Actually, Peter had been manipulating her all their life to allow him to drink too much, to allow him not to deal with his parents’ insanity, to allow him to be his parents’ demoralized puppet because their degenerative lifestyle suited him, and to allow him to hide behind his work whatever was actually causing him to break every commitment to her.  While Anna remained focused on Manson and Zeena, Peter could go his own merry way.  By neglecting to do his part in everything right, especially in the upbringing of the children, Peter was actually compelling her to submit to his, as well as to his parents’ recurring, obliterating abuse. 

Suicide and infanticide were definitely not the answer. 

Anna knew she had only two choices.   She could either disintegrate under their pressure or stand up to them all. 

She carefully calculated the cost of both alternatives. 

She could keep on tolerating Peter and his parents’ collective abuse, which would surely end in ruining her and the children completely, or she could fight until they either yielded, or kicked her and the boys out of “the house.”  But one thing they all knew: Anna would never surrender the boys to them. 

She knew she risked losing Peter, but understood she “was losing” him anyway — if ever he were really her husband. 

 

She decided to put her foot down real hard.  She decided not to be ensnared into failure and shame through their emotional carnage any longer.  She would choose her battles for a change. 

Time was passing quickly; she realized the children were growing up fast.  She could not allow Charles and Zeena, with the help of Peter, to chain the children too, in their dark dungeon without doors and a slighter of light.

So, she told Peter this is enough.  He will either change and deal with all his problems, or she will divorce him. 

Finally, Anna decided not to allow the liquor god and all Peter’s infidelity and chaos to rule her life any longer.  

She chose to continue the fight for as long as it would take to overcome. 

From the beginning, her in-laws compelled her to walk through fire for Peter.  Should the flames consume her now, at least, she knew she would die trying to save her sons. 

Anna refused to be a walkover anymore. 

She began to meet continual abuse with constant and open confrontation. 

She fought all three of them fearlessly on all fronts of attack. 

She unflinchingly endured Peter’s furious rages.  She stood firmly by her decision.  She defied his drinking sprees no matter his reaction.  She insisted to know where he works and exactly what he does, no matter his lies and manipulation. 

 

Anna also refused to pamper that roaring pooch Charles Manson for just one more day.  She always abhorred Peter and his mother’s ridiculous submission to that madman.  She began to fight fire with fire.  When Manson swore at her, Anna swore back at him.  When Zeena reviled her character at the pitch of her sharp voice, she reviled her character in return.   Anna refused to let the boys near Charles and Zeena until they change.  She would not let them come near her house and kept her doors locked.  She did not speak to them when they began to affront her or the boys, and turned a deaf ear to their familiar nonsense. 

Anna was in for the fight of her life —  battling for her sanity and the lives of her boys.  For peace in her home.  For a moral lifestyle with Peter and her in-laws, and the preservation of her marriage to Peter.  To eventually set firm boundaries for this deadly threesome; this narcissist clan, (although she knew nothing about narcissism at the time,) she realized she had to stand her ground no matter what they decided to do.  As long as they could shift her around like a pawn on a chessboard, this mess could never be resolved. 

 

Anna’s stubborn resistance ‘offended’ her in-laws beyond measure. 

They realized they had lost control of “the witch.” 

Moreover, Charles Manson believed a woman, like children, should be seen and not heard.  A woman should never question a man and has to submit to his every whim.  (As this entitlement pertained to all men on all levels of life, Manson was ‘the man’ in this case.)  Hence, with Zeena’s help, Manson persistently built on Anna’s “nasty reputation” as a devious, domineering witch, a bad and hateful woman, supposedly in “total control” of the ‘poor, defenseless’ Peter – slandering Anna’s name behind her back as usual. 

However, the gloves were off. 

Over the years, Peter and her in-laws violated every promise and ceasefire agreement. 

A sweltering war was about to erupt with an explosion that would rock their unstable world. 

(Continue)

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