The Girl with the Suitcase

by Angela Hart

  ‘You OK, Grace?’

  ‘Can we have our picnic now?’

  ‘Not long. We’ll stop when we get to the next-but-one field. There’s plenty of benches there.’

  Grace ate the savoury food very quickly and asked for cake while Jonathan and I were still eating our sandwiches.

  ‘Just a minute,’ I said.

  ‘Oh forget it!’

  ‘Grace! What’s wrong? I’m just finishing my sandwich. Then we will all have a piece of cake.’

  ‘Grrr! Why do I have to wait all the time? Can I have another drink?’

  I gave Grace some water, which she also pulled a face about. ‘Is that all you’ve got?’

  Something had definitely niggled Grace, and it was obvious that nothing I said or did was going to be right at this point in time.

  ‘Please don’t be rude. I’ve got a flask of tea. Would you like a cup?’

  ‘What?’

  She was now scanning the horizon and she started looking up at the sky.

  ‘What’s that bird?’

  Jonathan got to his feet and followed Grace’s gaze.

  ‘Good spot, Grace,’ he said, squinting into the sky. ‘It’s definitely a bird of prey. Let me see. Its wings are slightly rounded, see that? It’s got a huge wingspan. I think it may be a buzzard. What do you think? Grace?’

  He turned and looked down at Grace, only to see that she was now staring into space, in the opposite direction, and fidgeting with a button on her top. She was also kicking the ground. By now I’d worked out why the toes of all her shoes were scuffed. Grace had a habit of lifting one leg up behind her and repeatedly bashing her toes up and down into the ground, as she was doing now. She often did this when she was standing up, doing nothing else in particular, which meant she rarely stood completely still. When she tired of kicking one toe into the ground she swapped legs and had a go with the other shoe.

  ‘Can I climb that tree?’

  She pointed to a tree across the field that looked a similar shape to the one the boys had been climbing earlier, with plenty of low, horizontal branches.

  ‘I tell you what, Grace. If you sit down while we finish the picnic, you and Jonathan can go over there while I pack up. Do you want some tea?’

  She didn’t reply but sat down cross-legged on the blanket next to me. While I got the cake out she flapped her knees up and down and hummed a tune to herself. Then she quickly ate the slice of cake I offered, said thank you and helped herself to some water. Though she’d ignored my question about the tea and hadn’t responded to what I’d said about her and Jonathan going over to the tree together, the main thing was she was calm now. I’d seen that her mood could switch at any moment, and I was grateful she wasn’t being belligerent.

  ‘I’ll tidy up here and I’ll mind the bikes, if you like.’

  Jonathan agreed. ‘Come on, Grace. Let’s go and check out that tree!’

  She jumped up and started sprinting towards the tree. Jonathan chased after her.

  ‘Wait for me!’ he called. Grace was already on the lower branches when he reached her. I watched as he hopped up onto the lower branches too, and Grace immediately started to climb to the next branch, and the next. She didn’t speak to him and didn’t look back: all her energy and concentration was going into climbing the tree. Jonathan told me later that he suddenly had a horrible feeling in his stomach, the kind that grips you tight when you sense something is about to go wrong.

  ‘Grace, don’t go any higher.’

  She continued to ignore him and started climbing the tree even faster. She was sure-footed, thank God, but she was quick too.

  ‘Grace, can you hear me?’

  Nothing. She didn’t even flick her head around.

  ‘Grace, I don’t want you to go any higher. It’s dangerous. I don’t want you to fall.’

  From where I was sitting I couldn’t hear what Jonathan was saying, but I could see what was happening. I was already locking all the bikes together and stuffing the rug and the remains of the picnic into the panniers. I quickly headed to the tree. I didn’t run or shout; I didn’t want to do anything that might alarm Grace or provoke her to climb higher. If Grace’s aim was to scare us – or wind us up, to use the phrase that seemed to follow her around – it was best not to fuel the fire in her belly.

  I was nearly there. ‘Grace, please stop there,’ I heard Jonathan call. Outwardly he kept his cool, but I knew his stomach would be churning crazily, just as mine was. ‘That’s enough now. I can see you’re a very good climber, but please stop now. That’s enough. Let’s carry on with our bike ride. Grace, I’m sure there will be lots of other trees to climb. We can go and try that one the boys were on. I don’t want you to hurt yourself, or you won’t be able to do any more climbing, will you? Can you hear me?’

  Grace was now about six to eight foot in the air. She was facing away from us and, for once, she was standing incredibly still, rooted on a wide, sturdy branch. With one hand she was holding onto a bunch of several thin branches above her head.

  Jonathan looked down at me. ‘What shall we do?’ he hissed.

  ‘Let me try to talk to her.’

  I remembered what I’d been telling myself, about keeping things simple and not bombarding Grace with questions or instructions.

  ‘Grace, it’s Angela.’

  I waited.

  ‘Can you hear me?’

  No reply. No movement. Nothing at all.

  ‘Grace, it’s Angela.’

  I waited again.

  ‘Can you hear me?’

  Finally, she started to slowly move herself around. I breathed out, not realising until that point that I’d been holding my breath.

  ‘Are you OK?’

  She nodded ever so slightly. She was still clutching the bunch of branches above her head as she carefully twirled her body around. It turned with her, snapping, stretching and straining as the thin branches formed one scraggy rope. It looked like it might give way at any minute.

  ‘Can you hold on to that thick branch next to your left arm?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Grace, you need to hold on to a thick branch.’

  No reply.

  ‘You are a good climber. Please take hold of that thick branch, so you are safer.’

  I detected a slight nod of the head.

  ‘Can you hear me? You can do this, Grace.’

  She didn’t look at me, but ever so slowly she started scanning the branches on all sides. Fraction by fraction, she clicked her head around in an almost mechanical, doll-like way. Then she suddenly let go of the thin bunch of branches above her head.

  I gasped and instinctively threw my hands over my mouth. Her body dipped and her arms fell forwards as she crouched down and gripped the large branch she also had her feet on. Her bottom was in the air now and she held that position, panting and looking as agile as a jungle cat. This was not what I’d expected her to do, but at least she was stable. I was confident that from this position she could carefully climb back down.

  ‘Well done. I think you can come down the way you went up now.’

  She nodded and I felt a flood of relief, but then Grace went sideways instead of down the way I’d expected her to. She looked to be in a world of her own, and then she turned away from us and began to climb higher and higher, at quite a pace. I heard Jonathan audibly gasp.

  ‘I’m going up,’ he said assuredly.

  I agreed. I knew he would climb slowly and quietly, without making a fuss. Grace might not even notice him until he was upon her; she was facing away from us and now seemed to be chuntering to herself as she concentrated on picking her way up and up. The tree was very old and I told myself hundreds and hundreds of people had climbed it before Grace. As long as nobody panicked, everything would be fine.

  Grace’s head shot around as soon as she heard Jonathan behind her.

  ‘This is FUN!’ she exclaimed, smiling. Her cheeky little face was scarlet and her hair looked wilder than ever, her curls
glistening like so many shiny corkscrews in the sun. ‘I’m reaching for the stars! Angela told me to! Angela said, “Reach for the stars, Grace!”’

  Grace was now just about as high as she could go. I’d say she was at least ten feet in the air. The branches above her started to thin out and point skywards at this point; even someone as slight and lithe as Grace would not be able to climb them. She looked at Jonathan and laughed as she spoke to him again. I couldn’t make out what she said, but Jonathan told me later she started to repeat, ‘What goes up must come down! What goes up must come down. What goes up must come down.’

  Grace continued chanting as she studiously, and expertly, started to pick her way back down the tree. It felt like I stood there with bated breath for an hour, though it could only have been minutes. My palms were sweaty and my heart felt so tight I had a pain in my chest. Jonathan had inflated the tyres on my bike that morning and a horrible image wouldn’t leave my head of my heart being blown up not with air, but with shot after shot of adrenalin. It honestly felt fit to burst with stress.

  Jonathan stayed as close as he could to Grace and had his eyes trained on her the whole time. At last, she was just a few feet from the ground. She jumped from the lowest branch dramatically, and Jonathan was just a step behind.

  ‘Easy!’ she said proudly. As he took his last step down, Jonathan caught his toe on a protruding lump of bark and landed clumsily on the grass beside Grace. I could tell he was really cross, but he kept his counsel, stood up straight and dusted himself down. The last thing we needed was to give Grace any excuse to take off again.

  ‘I’m glad you’re both back on safe ground. Both OK? Let’s go and get the bikes.’

  I wanted to get Grace away from the tree as quickly as possible; we’d talk to her about this properly later, probably in the car, when we’d be more likely to have her attention. She seemed oblivious to the fright she’d given us; it was as if she’d shut out the world for a few minutes and all her focus was on climbing the tree. There wasn’t a flicker of acknowledgement that Jonathan had had to go after her, or that she’d ignored our pleas not to climb so high.

  ‘Bikes? Oh yeah. Where are we going now? What are we doing, Angela?’

  She was skipping towards her bike, looking like she didn’t have a care in the world.

  Jonathan widened his eyes at me behind Grace’s back. Written all over his face were the words, ‘What a nightmare!’

  We set off on the bikes again.

  ‘Please stay close,’ I said, adding that if she didn’t do as we asked we would have to go home. My nerves felt shot to ribbons.

  Grace didn’t argue, and thankfully she threw herself into the ride with gusto. Part of the track sloped downwards, and she held her legs out like oars and let herself freewheel. ‘Yee-hah!’ she called.

  I knew the park well and I took the lead, taking us on a picturesque trail that eventually brought us to the top of the car park. Jonathan cycled behind Grace the whole way; neither of us wanted to take any chances.

  There was a bin in the car park. Chip wrappers were scattered on the ground near it. I commented to a member of the park staff that I couldn’t understand why people didn’t put their rubbish in the bin, to which he replied, ‘Those chip wrappers have been put in the bin a few times but that black bird keeps coming down and picking them out.’ He pointed to a tree that overhung the car park.

  I opened up the panniers on my bike, took out the rubbish from our picnic and stuffed it into the bin. I had a spare plastic bag, one I’d used to wrap our fruit and water bottles in, and I decided to use it to scoop up the greasy chip wrappers and put them in the bin too. Meanwhile, Jonathan said he’d start fixing the bikes onto the cycle rack on the car.

  ‘You’re a good citizen,’ Grace said, when I explained what I was doing with the plastic bag. ‘I learned about that in the Green Club at school. Good citizens don’t litter. Good citizens look after our planet.’

  ‘I like the sound of the Green Club! I hate litter.’

  ‘Can I still go to Green Club?’ Grace asked. She looked very thoughtful and worried.

  I’d already talked to Grace about which clubs she might want to join when the new school term started up, and she had told me she wanted to do singing and disco dancing. I’d told her I’d do my best to get her signed up either at school or in a local club, but this was the first I’d heard about Green Club.

  Encouraging kids to join clubs is a high priority and we always let them pick what they want to do. Children benefit enormously from being able to have a go at what interests them. As well as trying new things and learning different skills, it’s important for kids to socialise with other children, follow rules outside the home and school and simply have a change of scene or a fresh challenge. We’ve met plenty of kids who have never done any extra-curricular activities before they were taken into care. Some had never even been swimming or been taught to play a simple game of catch, and we’ve met several who have never even heard of board games most of us grew up with, like Cluedo or Operation.

  ‘Green Club? It may not be called that in your new school, but we’ll see what’s on offer. And, do you remember, we talked about you doing singing and disco dancing clubs? All the clubs start up in September.’

  She didn’t reply and I wondered if she’d forgotten our earlier conversation.

  ‘When you start school we can see what’s available. If there’s nothing at the school, we’ll see what’s on in the town.’

  I was bending down and scooping up the chip papers as I said this. Again Grace didn’t reply, so I turned my head to look up at her. I was startled by what I saw. Grace’s eyes were on stalks, she was ghostly white and looked scared stiff.

  ‘Grace? What is it, sweetheart?’

  She was staring beyond me, at the ground beneath the bin. There was an empty whisky bottle lying there, which must have been hidden by the greasy papers. Instinctively, I scooped the bottle up and threw it straight in the bin, so Grace didn’t have to look at it any longer. I’m a stickler for glass recycling normally, but Grace was my priority here and my gut told me I had to get that bottle out of sight as quickly as possible.

  ‘Grace, sweetheart, it’s OK. Don’t worry. Everything’s in the bin now.’

  She was rooted to the spot, completely motionless, and the colour had drained from her usually rosy-red lips. She reminded me of Vicky, one of the girls we fostered when we started out back in the eighties, and who I wrote about in my first book, Terrified. Vicky used to freeze in terror when she was reminded of frightening and traumatic things that had happened in her childhood.

  I figured it didn’t take a genius to work out why Grace was so spooked by the whisky bottle. We knew her dad had been an alcoholic, and by her reaction it appeared whisky had been his poison.

  ‘Grace? Can you hear me?’

  She jolted her head from side to side, as if looking for the answer somewhere in the car park.

  ‘What?’

  ‘It’s OK, Grace. Come on, let’s help Jonathan.’

  She continued to stare at me, and then she suddenly bolted. It took me completely by surprise; it was like she went from zero to a hundred miles an hour in the blink of an eye.

  ‘What the . . .’ I heard Jonathan shout as she charged past him. She headed to the fir tree she’d talked about climbing, the one the group of boys were playing on when we arrived. After what had happened, we’d avoided it and hoped Grace wouldn’t remember that she wanted to climb on it. Jonathan was hot on her heels, but she was incredibly fast and nimble and had started scaling the tree before he could stop her.

  ‘Don’t go up high!’ he called forcefully.

  Even if he’d caught up with her on the ground, it wasn’t guaranteed that Jonathan could have stopped Grace. Foster carers can’t grab hold of a child in the way a parent might, to stop their own child running off, for example. This is drummed into us at training: the rule is that you can’t restrain or even ‘safe hold’ a child in any way w
ithout permission, or without it being written into their care plan, even in an emergency situation. The only thing that is allowed is to hold a child’s arm in a soft grip, but even then we have to err on the side of caution. Shockingly, one carer we knew grabbed tight hold of a child because he was going to fall in a stream and she tried to stop him. He was left with bruises, his parents reported the foster carer and, even though she was eventually cleared of any wrongdoing, she gave up fostering because of the stress and injustice of it all.

  ‘Grace! Can you hear me?’

  All we could do was reason; words were all we had.

  ‘Can you hear me Grace?’ Jonathan was calling up to her, who was a few feet up by now and resolutely ignoring him.

  ‘Please don’t go past the next branch. It’s not safe. Stay on the lower branches.’

  She scampered up several branches very adeptly, swinging herself up to a resting place, several more feet above the ground. There she sat panting and puffing for quite some time. She looked back but still didn’t answer us.

  I was at Jonathan’s side now and we both stayed calm.

  ‘What are we going to do now?’ he said.

  ‘She’ll come down. Don’t panic. She’s actually a good little climber.’

  ‘I heard that!’ she called cheekily.

  She started laughing, and to my surprise I laughed too. I think it was with relief. Thank God she was talking to us, I thought, and sounding more like her usual self.

  It took a few more tense minutes before she decided to slowly make her way down.

  ‘You don’t need to worry about me,’ she sang. ‘I’m a good climber. Jonathan, do you think I’m a good climber? I was the best in my old school on the monkey bars, you know. Are you a good climber, Angela? Have you ever been proper climbing? Like rock climbing? Angela? Are you? Can you climb? Can you do monkey bars?’