To Keep You Safe

by Kate Bradley

  But they can’t help, because I still have the loss of him. My life stopped when he died and I’ve never been able to find the answer of how to get him back in any conversation, any therapy session, any leaflet, because there is no way of getting him back. There’s only one possible thing that I can do to make me feel better and I’m going to do it tomorrow. Wednesday.

  After she’s done her checklist, I think that’s it. I’m already half out of my chair. I don’t like goodbyes and I think Val is the type of person that might try to hug me. I’m small and I guess, since I’m too thin, that I look to some people like I need a hug. Or maybe they do it because they feel guilty that after a life in care, nothing good ever happened for me, that I failed all my exams despite the predictions of nines in most subjects – because how could I think of measures and Macbeth and molecules when I was dead with grief? – and now I’m the no-hoper that they always feared I would become.

  ‘Dee,’ Val says, ‘stay for one more tea.’

  I can’t argue, because she’s playing me at my game and is already out of the chair and across the office, putting on the kettle. I settle back in the chair and accept that I’ve got nowhere else to be today. The fact that I wasn’t working on my birthday, or today, is a coincidence; I would’ve been happy to turn up to work, but it was not to be as I was rostered three days off after a nine-day run. That’s why I am sitting here. I should’ve been in this meeting last week but Val was off sick. As she makes my tea, she apologises again for this, and the fact I’m here after my eighteenth birthday. She obviously believes my crap that I’ve got better places to be.

  She puts the tea in front of me. ‘Of course you’re all grown up now.’ She regards me like I’m something interesting under a microscope. ‘Maybe that means we can have a different kind of chat.’

  I take the mug and sip. I have to hand it to Val, she knows how to make a fab cup of tea. ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘I mean that, as of yesterday, technically you’re no longer my case. You’re an adult now, so I wondered if we could have a talk.’

  ‘About how I’m different?’

  She gives me a polite smile. Her gentle eyebrow raise suggests she doesn’t understand me.

  ‘Now I’m grown up,’ I explain. ‘Now I’ve left my past behind.’

  She looks at me and it’s an analytical look as if she suddenly sees me differently; perhaps she finally sees me.

  She purses her lips. ‘I’m going to be frank,’ she says as if she’s suddenly decided an approach which was different to one she had thought of before. ‘I’m going to come at this issue straight on.’

  I shrug like I don’t care. I guess I don’t. ‘What issue?’

  ‘I wanted to talk about what happened to you when you were fifteen.’

  I shrug again, but this time it feels jerky to me; I wonder if she noticed. I don’t speak in case my voice gives me away.

  ‘That was quite a thing you went through back then.’

  She makes it sound like an obstacle course. I nod when it becomes clear that she’s expecting some sort of response.

  ‘A terrible thing, being taken like that.’

  I drink my tea. ‘It’s difficult for me to talk about.’

  ‘I understand that. That’s why I’ve never mentioned it to you. Nor did Norma before me.’ She’s talking about my previous social worker who was a drip and was always breaking appointments. The only reason Norma wouldn’t have mentioned it to me was because she wouldn’t trust me not to break her nose if she did.

  ‘I had therapy.’

  ‘Was that successful, do you think?’

  ‘Yes.’ I say this because this is what you are supposed to say. The NHS rarely pay for the type of therapy I had, but my psychiatrist felt that nothing else had worked, and as I was still trying to kill myself, I think they were becoming desperate. They splashed out on me because I was in care. Guilt money. You have a shit life, so take this. Afterwards, I made sure I smiled more. It was easier because I had developed my plan – in a funny way, that’s how I got my plan because my therapist asked what I needed.

  What do you need, Destiny?

  I’ll tell you what I need, but you won’t like it.

  ‘Why do you say that, Dee?’

  I blink, coming back to her. ‘Why do I say yes?’ She’s surprised me – she’s gone off on a tangent I hadn’t expected. ‘Because it worked?’ But I sound hesitant, like I’ve asked her, because I don’t know myself.

  She smiles and nods, coral earrings swinging in pudgy lobes.

  When she doesn’t say anything, I feel compelled to add, ‘Because . . . because . . .’ but I falter, because I don’t know what to say. It didn’t work, because if, by working, I’m meant to be different or better, an improved version of myself, then it’s not true and she knows it’s not true. Because I weigh six stone and I cry every night, and if I can afford it, I smoke and drink until I pass out and if I can’t, I climb into a hot bath and sink under the water leaving my nose above the waterline, before slowly dipping under, feeling the water edge closer and closer to my nostrils, fantasising that I might not come back up. But it’s hard to drown yourself in the bath. There’s an automatic choking point where I end up spluttering and coughing and crying with the failure of living and the failure of trying to die.

  And then yesterday I find out that I’m just like my mother. And her mother before that. No doubt I’m from a long line of fuck-heads. So this isn’t upbringing: this is fate. Then I understand there’s no escape. This is what Shakespeare wrote about; this is destiny. Me. I’m not just star-crossed: I’m star-locked; star-imprisoned.

  I’m star-fucked.

  And I guess, when my mother gazed down at me and named me, she knew that all along.

  The social worker doesn’t say anything, but at least she can read my mood enough not to smile. Smiling would not work for me right now. Instead she reaches for my hands and takes my right thumb where I have been digging it into my left palm. We both look at the deep mark I have left and she says: ‘You mustn’t let your anger drive your actions, Dee.’

  I pull my thumb free from her gentle, but firm grasp. All this is bullshit.

  All that happened when I finished therapy was that I thought up yours, world and formulated my plan. A plan I have been putting into action ever since. One that could’ve taken several years, but instead has only taken a year.

  She doesn’t know about this plan. How could she? I only doubt it for a minute because she’s looking at me like she’s got me worked out. I can see she’s smart – not regular smart, but possibly super smart and definitely smarter than I gave her credit for, which is stupid of me because smart people can tell other people are smart, too. Average people don’t notice if other people are smart because they don’t know. But smart people are in this little secret club of understanding. It’s like we can smell each other.

  I wonder why she ended up in this job if she’s as clever as I suddenly suspect. ‘How come you’re a social worker?’ I ask, trying to divert her with my new train of thought.

  ‘Because I had a tough childhood, Dee, and I wanted to help other people.’

  I blink, disconcerted. ‘As tough as mine?’

  She pulls a little face as if she’s considering it. ‘Well, no one can know how tough someone else has had it, can they?’

  ‘You’ve read my file,’ I challenge.

  ‘Yes, of course, and there are lots of similar features you share with my childhood. I can say this now,’ she reminds me, ‘because I’ve finished your paperwork, so I’m no longer your social worker’ she checks her watch, ‘and this is now my lunch break.’

  ‘You don’t have to talk to me?’

  ‘No. Does that surprise you?’

  Of course. No one talks to me unless they are paid to talk to me, like Robert or Val, or when I’m at work and I am paid to talk to them. A conversation with my own mother costs me forty quid. But I don’t tell her that agonising, humiliating fact. Instead,
I say nothing.

  She sips her tea. ‘I realise that, and I feel like I should be transparent, which is why I say it. But I do want to have this chat with you and I won’t write down what you tell me. We are simply two adults talking about the things we have in common. And most people don’t have the things in common that we do, do they, Dee? Which, I hope like me, you’re jolly pleased about.’

  I nod. This is true. All my life I’ve been on the outside. Locked out of the world that other people live in. A world where only moderately shit things happen to them, if at all. I don’t know what it’s like to only have moderately shit things happen. The best metaphor to describe my life is that I stand alone in the cold shade watching everyone else enjoy a picnic in the sunshine, all laughing and chatting together. But maybe Val has been standing in the shade with me the whole time and I didn’t even notice.

  Maybe that’s why she smiles at me the whole time, because she knows that we stand together.

  I’ve finished my tea. ‘Can I have another one please?’

  She beams like I’ve pleased her and gets up. She finds a biscuit tin and takes the lid off. ‘Help yourself.’ She pats her stomach. ‘The more you eat, the less I do and trust me, you need to help me out.’

  I hesitate, thinking of the carrot cake. But I suddenly fancy one. I take a chocolate digestive and realise as I eat it, careful to catch the crumbs in my hand, that I like this, sitting talking to someone just because. Even if the subject matter feels dangerous. Or maybe because it is dangerous. It feels real, like it’s important, rather than blandly commenting on the weather or how late the trains are, those things that people say to each other to fill the silence they’re afraid of.

  She gives me another cup of tea.

  ‘How was your childhood the same as mine?’ I ask her.

  Val speaks and now she isn’t smiling. I feel bad for doing this, but I don’t want to stand alone in the shade any more. I’ve done it my entire life. Even though I’ve lived in care homes with other kids, we didn’t talk about the bad stuff. Or if they did, they didn’t with me.

  ‘I was put into care at two, because my parents either didn’t want me or because they couldn’t look after me. I don’t know which, because I never met them.’

  I’m surprised by this bald statement. She hasn’t tried to dress it up.

  ‘I went to a care home that was very abusive. I’m nearly sixty. I’ve never got over it. But . . .’ she looks at me very closely as if it is me saying something interesting, not her, ‘I have learnt to live with it in a way that I have peace.’ When I don’t speak she adds: ‘There’s no thunder in my heart any more. Only blue skies.’

  I don’t say anything for a while, then: ‘What is your life like now?’

  She smiles again. ‘After I found a therapist that worked for me – you see, if the first one doesn’t work, you can try again with someone else, a different approach, a different time in your life, and that can make all the difference – I found I could move on. But the real difference was meeting someone, falling in love and having my babies.’

  ‘You have babies?’

  When she laughs and tells me, ‘My babies are twenty-five and twenty-three now,’ I feel a little foolish.

  ‘I was in love once,’ I tell her. Now I’m on dangerous territory. No one knows about me and Aleksander now – no one but Ollie and Jay, and Ollie is in prison for drug dealing – the only charge that stuck after a kilo of resin and several ounces of white was found in his flat – and won’t be out for another six years. They found the modified van, which told a story, but by the time they got to it, Ollie and Jay had washed the inside of it with bleach and stuck it through a car wash several times before dumping it. It was registered in Aleksander’s name and he was dead.

  Jay went to court on charges of drug dealing and trafficking, but the evidence was thin on him as his brother refused to squeal, and so Jay walked. The rabbit never saw the brothers, so there was nothing to link them to her. I still watch Jay through my fake Facebook account; he moved to Cornwall last year and married an Australian woman, retrained as a plumber and spends his free time surfing off Newquay, so I don’t think he’s ever going to care about any of it.

  I stuck with my story that I was another victim and was treated like that. The rabbit was found and at first she tried to blame me, but in the end, all she knew was I was another girl at the party and rescinded her accusation. By the time she stood in the witness box, my name wasn’t even mentioned.

  ‘“Once” suggests that it’s in the past.’

  I bite my lip. I want to tell someone. I want to have a proper conversation. I’m tired of living my life. I take a deep breath and remind myself that it’s all going to change tomorrow.

  ‘He died.’

  ‘Dee, I’m so sorry.’

  ‘The worst thing is that he didn’t have to die. There’s someone whose fault it is and I can’t get over that they are still alive and he’s not.’

  ‘That sounds very painful.’ She pauses. ‘Dee, did this happen before you had therapy?’ When I nod, she continues, ‘Did you share any of it then?’ When I shake my head, she adds, ‘Do you think that’s why the therapy didn’t work?’

  I hesitate, ready to fib and tell her it did work – what are you talking about? I’m cured! – but I don’t. The shade is too cold. And it’s so fucking lonely. ‘Probably. I just wasn’t ready to talk about it. But now I’ve decided what to do, I feel like I can.’

  ‘What have you decided to do?’

  This is the question I cannot answer. Instead, I say, ‘Can I tell you about him first?’

  She smiles and nods. ‘I would love to hear about him.’

  I close my eyes as I remember. ‘He was handsome and strong. He had a terrible sense of humour – he couldn’t understand my jokes at all, but he wanted to, and that was what was so endearing. I love that he wanted to, wanted to be better, wanted to always improve himself. And he used to really encourage me, too, he found out about degree courses for me through the Open University, and told me it didn’t matter if I didn’t do well in school, I could still do my degree in English Literature.’

  ‘He sounds amazing. And of course that’s still true, you could do that and get a good job.’

  ‘I never wanted to do that,’ I say, not keeping the disgust out of my voice. ‘I didn’t need to get a normal job, as he had got his own business in trade and I was his partner and it was doing really well. He used to say that he was a true capitalist, when most people didn’t understand what that meant. He said exploiting the market stopped the market exploiting you.’

  She purses her lips at this.

  I felt the need to defend him. ‘He was going to do a degree in business and economics, even though he was a natural. He was going to move into new avenues of trade and in five years we would’ve been raking it in as well as trading in new things, which would’ve meant we were one hundred per cent . . .’ legit, I was going to say. ‘Independent,’ I say instead. ‘He wanted good things for us.’

  ‘Dee,’ she spreads her hands out in front of her on the desk, fanning her fingers. She stares at them for a moment as if the answer is in the gaps between them. Then she snatches them up, decision made. ‘You may not have been told this because of both your age at the time and because of the frailty of your mental health, but the police wanted to bring charges against you.’

  I don’t move. I don’t even breathe. I did not know this.

  ‘The CPS wouldn’t take it forward – insufficient evidence, they said, as it was only Oliver Forth-Standing’s word against your statement of events.’

  I don’t even swallow, blink or breathe. Ollie, what did you say?

  ‘The police alleged that you were part of Aleksander Baranoski’s gang – the man who your mother said was the nephew of a former boyfriend of hers and one of the men who died at the scene where you were found.’

  I can hear in her careful selection of words that she wants me to know that we are both
talking about the same person – my lover and Aleksander. She knows.

  ‘Oliver Forth-Standing alleged that you were an essential part of the gang; that you helped lure girls to the gang who were then trafficked out of the country. He even said it was you travelling with Aleksander that made it possible for him to cross the border multiple times. Customs are less likely to suspect a young couple. As, I suppose, girls are more likely to be trusting of other girls their age.’

  I’m so stunned, I cannot speak. So Ollie did rat me out. I feel nauseous: he tried to fit me up.

  I wait for her to say something else – a direct accusation, perhaps. Perhaps she wants me to deny it. But I couldn’t deny Aleksander. I wouldn’t deny him or the world we created.

  Somewhere a clock ticks and a phone rings in a different office.

  ‘You look different when you talk about him,’ she eventually says. I see the twinkle in her eyes. Although her skin crepes with age, I can see the intelligence and youth in her eyes.

  I realise I’m breathing again. ‘It’s nice to talk about someone who was and still is, so important to me.’ This is my badge of loyalty to him. ‘I haven’t talked about him in a long time.’

  I’m unprepared for the avenue she has led me down. ‘So, Dee, what’s changed now?’

  I can’t tell her. She’ll never let me leave her office without calling for the police and a psychiatrist if I did. Instead, I put down my tea cup and stand, holding out my hand.

  She shakes it, her smile replaced by a slight frown. ‘Stay in touch, Dee, please let me know how you go.’

  I smile back, not wanting to make promises I can’t keep.

  Her frown deepens. ‘It’s not too late, you know.’

  ‘Too late for what?’

  ‘To do that degree. To fall in love with someone else. To find a new life. To have babies of your own.’ She smiles a little, but it doesn’t reach her eyes. ‘To fly free, Destiny. That’s what I want for you.’