by Casey Watson
It was a point I hadn’t properly considered yet, and in doing so I readily agreed. He probably had all sorts of tales he could brag about, all of which would elevate him in their eyes. Though, where that was concerned, I didn’t for a minute imagine what was coming, when there was a sharp rap on the door half an hour later.
It wasn’t one rap, either, but a series of bangs. ‘Blimey,’ I said to Riley, manoeuvring around Levi and Jackson who were playing with some building blocks on the kitchen floor. ‘Don’t mind my hinges! Who on earth could that be?’
When I opened the door, then, it was something of a shock to see Iris, the elderly lady who lived a few doors down the street, holding her cat, an equally elderly black-and-white tom. The two things didn’t stack up – why would she be banging my front door down? – till I saw how red she was in the face. She was clearly furious. And very shaken as well. ‘Can I help you, Iris?’ I asked her, confused.
In reply, she thrust the cat at me, holding it up at the end of outstretched arms, much to its irritation. It mewed pitifully. ‘What is it?’ I wanted to know, shocked.
Mike joined me in the hallway, having obviously heard the banging too, even over the din of the sports warm-up programmes that had just started on the TV. Bless him. I knew he’d been hoping for a quiet afternoon.
‘It’s that boy of yours!’ Iris barked, immediately dissolving into tears. ‘I caught him red handed, I did. He wants locking up!’
‘Spencer?’ asked Mike. ‘Iris, love, what’s he done?’
‘Caught him, I did,’ she said again. ‘Caught him red handed! Swinging Roddy around by his tail, he was. The little … oooh, he’s so cruel! How could he do a thing like that? He’s hurt, you know. Really hurt …’ She ground to a halt then, too overcome to continue.
We were both aghast. And appalled. Mike stepped out to scan the street for sight of Spencer, but, perhaps understandably, he was nowhere to be seen. Indeed, all the kids seemed to have made themselves scarce now. ‘I’m so sorry, Iris,’ he said. ‘This is dreadful, it really is. You’re sure it was Spencer?’
‘I might be getting on, but I’m not blind, Mr Watson. Oh, it was him all right. I’ve got his measure, don’t you worry. He and that other boy – the one from round the corner. Oh, if I’d caught him … but he saw me coming, and just threw my poor Roddy down … Even laughing, he was. Laughing! He’s an evil little brat.’
‘I’ll go and find him,’ Mike started.
‘No,’ I said. ‘Tell you what, I’ll go and do that. Why don’t you drive Iris round to the emergency vets – see if they can check Roddy over?’ I turned to Iris, who was still standing clutching the meowing cat. ‘Would that be okay, Iris? Just to be sure he’s all right? We’ll cover the costs, obviously. Oh, I’m really so, so sorry. This won’t be happening again, I promise.’
I felt devastated. Not to mention sick to my stomach. There were all sorts of behaviours that were troubling and distressing, but being wantonly cruel to animals was out there on its own. I recalled what had happened at the farm and felt sicker. As Mike helped Iris and the poor trembling Roddy into the car, I went back inside to fill Riley in properly.
‘God!’ she said. ‘So much for progress then, Mum. And after everything you said to him after that weekend with the Pembertons. Sounds like it’s in one ear, and –’
She stopped, stunned into silence. The side door into the kitchen opened, to reveal a grinning Spencer, accompanied by Connor, a boy I recognised from two doors down. ‘Oh, hi, Riley,’ said Spencer, immediately kneeling down to greet the little ones. ‘Hiya, Levi,’ he said cheerfully. ‘You playing building with your brother?’
I found my voice. ‘Spencer, stand up and look at me,’ I snapped. He looked shocked and alarmed. In fact, he looked the picture of complete innocence.
‘What’s up?’ he asked.
‘I think you know very well, Spencer,’ I snapped. ‘The lady from down the street has just left here, with Mike. To visit the vets.’ I paused a moment, to let this sink in. ‘Spencer, she’s told us what you did to her cat.’
Now Spencer’s expression changed. He looked outraged, and hurt. ‘She’s blamed me?’ He glanced at Connor. ‘Has she blamed me for what Adam did? Has she? I told you I’d get the blame!’ he protested, looking again at Connor. ‘I knew I’d get the blame for it, just cos I was there!’
‘Spencer,’ I said, cutting through the flow of his indignation. ‘She saw you. She knows who you are and she saw you. She saw you pick that poor animal up and swing it round by its tail.’
Spencer’s eyes filled with tears. ‘Connor, tell her!’ he shouted. ‘Tell her!’ he sobbed now. ‘Tell her the truth!’
I looked at Connor, confused by Spencer’s very genuine-seeming anguish. Had Iris got it wrong? ‘Well, Connor?’ I prompted.
‘It wasn’t Spence,’ he said. ‘Honest. It was Adam what done it. We was there, but we didn’t do it. We all ran off. It was Adam.’
I looked at Riley, whose expression seemed to mirror my own. She shrugged helplessly, as unsure of things as I was. I turned back to Spencer, whose face was soaked with tears now. ‘Spencer,’ I said. ‘I can’t just let this one go. If you’re telling me the truth and it was Adam who did this, then I’m going to have to go round and see his parents right away. This is serious …’
‘So go see them. It was him, Casey, honest it was. An’ it’s about time someone else instead of me got done for everything. He’ll prob’ly lie, though. He’ll still say it was me.’
‘Well, we’ll see,’ I said. I decided I would go round there right away. So, leaving Riley in charge of Spencer and sending Connor home, I walked round the corner to Adam’s house. I needed to get to the bottom of this, however much I cringed at the thought of spelling out what I knew to Adam’s poor mum, particularly the implication that it was him who’d been responsible for the despicable deed. It left a bad taste in my mouth.
And as I’d half expected, she’d known nothing and was mortified by the time I’d finished. And when she called Adam into the hallway I caught my breath when I realised how similar, superficially, he looked to Spencer. Same toffee-coloured, curly hair, similar coloured hoodie, same black trackie bottoms … Had Spencer been telling the truth after all? Was it a case of mistaken identity? After all, this was a boy I hardly knew.
Adam, as I’d expected, denied everything. In fact, his story was identical to the one I’d already heard. It was just the names of the participants that changed. Yes, he’d been there, he admitted, but it had been Spencer who’d swung the cat round, while he and Connor had stood there and watched him.
I pointed out that Connor had corroborated Spencer’s version. ‘Course he did,’ Adam said, his voice now as indignant as Spencer’s had been earlier. ‘He’s scared of Spencer.’ He paused then. ‘We all are,’ he finished.
‘And you won’t be playing with him any more,’ his mother said firmly.
I went home feeling doubly appalled. Appalled to think that Spencer might have done such a dreadful thing, and appalled that, if he was lying, he was such a convincing liar. And was he? I couldn’t help but suspect so.
Mike called from the vets, shortly after I returned home, to tell me that though Iris’s cat was bruised and in shock there was no serious damage that he could see. By now I’d sent Spencer to his room and told him to stay there, and we agreed we’d decide how to play it when Mike got home.
‘Please don’t say anything to Kieron,’ I begged Riley, as I waved her and the kids off to go and meet her brother without me. My own plans for the afternoon were well and truly scuppered, but I didn’t want a bad situation made worse than it already was. Kieron was a real animal lover and this incident would horrify him, not to mention also derail my hopes of him warming to Spencer. Happily, Riley understood that, and agreed to keep quiet.
‘But don’t let this drop, Mum,’ she said. ‘This kid’s clearly got some serious issues going on. You need to get to the bottom of it.’
‘I know, lo
ve,’ I said. ‘I know.’ But how, I thought, as I shut the door on my pleasant family afternoon. Now he had a scapegoat to take the rap for him, I felt it highly unlikely Spencer would admit to what he’d done. And if he refused to admit it, then where did I start? How did I find a way to understand the psyche of this troubled child?
And Spencer was, so clearly, profoundly troubled. That was clear. Clear that evening when, his denial meaning nothing had been resolved, we sat down together, as per usual, to do his points.
‘Casey,’ he asked me, his big brown eyes fixed on mine. ‘I can’t get grounded for what Adam did, can I? And I’ve been thinking. You know, about the points for today and that? And I won’t lose a load, will I? I mean, I know I’ll have to lose some – for being there and all. But it won’t be too many, will it? Because that wouldn’t be fair, would it?’
I was speechless. He had clearly gone through all this in his mind, and was now, very coolly, trying to negotiate a deal. I paused, studying the sheet while giving myself time to answer. This child had not only accepted the points system – he positively embraced it. It seemed the accrual of points was his number one concern. But thoughts of the cat? I doubted Roddy had even once crossed his mind. He seemed to be aware of my discomfort as well, leaning across me, as I pondered, to point something out.
‘Here,’ he said. ‘Look. You could take those points off, couldn’t you? The ones about behaving sensibly during peer time.’
This was a new category that had been added now that he’d moved to the second level, and, thinking fast, I agreed that those points would indeed have to go. ‘But you’ll also lose these,’ I added, pointing to the ones for respecting adults. ‘Because Iris was obviously very distressed about what happened, and though you didn’t do it you were there. And you didn’t try to stop it.’
I watched the smile ebb and then disappear from his face, as it sunk in that he now had insufficient points left to be allowed any peer time the following day.
He said nothing, however. He just drank the remainder of his milk and finished his biscuits in complete silence, and said nothing – not a word to us – as he headed off to bed.
‘Not a happy bunny, then?’ observed Mike, as we heard his bedroom door closing.
I shook my head. He’d been outmanoeuvred on the points chart and he knew it. Forget the cat, forget remorse, forget his horrible act of cruelty. He’d been scuppered, and was very cross. The thought chilled me.
Chapter 11
Sunday morning saw Spencer once again in a cheerful mood, as if the events of yesterday hadn’t even happened. He sat happily down to breakfast, full of chatter about this and that, and tucking into the bacon and eggs I gave him with gusto.
‘Hmm,’ said Mike, raising a surreptitious eyebrow in my direction. ‘You obviously got a good night’s sleep, Spencer.’
Spencer nodded. ‘I did,’ he agreed. ‘And now I’m all ready to do whatever you like. I know I’m stopping in today but if you want me to do anything – you know, garden or wash the car or owt – I will do.’
Mike grinned at him. Hard not to – he was such a little charmer. ‘Thanks, mate,’ he said. ‘I’m sure we’ll think of something to keep you occupied.’
In the end we spent most of the day baking. It seemed that, like Justin, our first foster child, Spencer was a bit of a dab hand in the kitchen and really enjoyed creating things from scratch. We made a batch of cookies, some butterfly buns and scones and, once they were cooling, even made a casserole together, to have for Sunday dinner, for a change.
There was something about doing things like this together, side by side, which worked its magic on developing a closeness with children, I’d discovered – it seemed to help them open up more than they would if you were talking face to face; something I’d found to be true way back when I’d worked in schools. The horrors of yesterday’s cruelty seemed to melt into the distance as Spencer told me a little more about the family he’d come from, how he loved that our house was so warm all the time, compared to his home, which was always so freezing. ‘My mum doesn’t have the heating on in the daytime,’ he told me. ‘She says it costs too much, what with seven of us. We always wear a lot of jumpers in the winter.’
He was such a sage little thing in some ways, often sounding older than his years. A real conundrum of a child. But why was that?
‘Do you help your mum with the cooking, Spencer?’ I asked, having shown him how to use the scraper, and watching how deftly he worked his way through all the vegetables.
He shook his head. ‘She doesn’t do much cooking. Not this kind,’ he answered. He stopped then, and finished stripping a carrot of its skin. ‘But I’ll be able to show her now, won’t I? Look, I’m good, me.’
Though I didn’t glean much more about what made Spencer tick, it was a good day, a happy day, a day we could build on, and when the kids arrived – Riley and David, Kieron and Lauren – for Sunday dinner, I could see how much it meant to Spencer to have contributed. ‘You are so clever!’ gasped Riley, through a mouthful of casserole. ‘Are you renting him out, Mum? I could so do with a chef like Spencer in my house.’
Kieron too seemed warmer towards him, commenting on how tasty his buns were, and I was glad I’d decided not to tell him about the neighbour’s cat. However horrible what Spencer had done had been, he was still only eight. Still time for whatever demons caused such dreadful behaviour to be tracked down and pulled out and dealt with. And if there was one thing I was set on, it was doing that.
The next couple of days, too, went remarkably productively. But I wasn’t stupid. Spencer was with us for a reason, and a part of me was probably just waiting for that reason to make its presence felt again.
And it did, as expected, the following Wednesday. Not that there was any warning; the day had gone well, Spencer cracking jokes about the shepherd’s pie I’d made for dinner, wondering if I’d minced up a bunch of real shepherds and was secretly trying to turn him into a cannibal. And after he’d wolfed it down, I agreed he could have his usual hour of playing out, as he’d earned sufficient points again by now.
‘But don’t be late, mind,’ I warned him as I passed him his watch. ‘You don’t want to be losing minutes off your tomorrow time, do you?’
Spencer’s expression was one of amused resignation. ‘I know, Casey,’ he said, as if he was 28, rather than eight. ‘You tell me every day, and every day I come in on time, don’t I?’
‘Hey, cheeky face,’ I interrupted, ‘off you scoot, before I change my mind.’
He grinned impishly as he ran past me to grab his coat.
I smiled to myself as I began clearing the table and preparing a plate of food for Mike, to keep warm in the oven. He’d be home soon, and much preferred that to it being microwaved. That done I made a coffee and grabbed a couple of magazines, keen to catch up with what was happening in the soaps. Ironic, I mused, that since Spencer came I’d fallen behind with most of them. Unlike most of my other kids, he was too young to follow soap operas – no, I thought, he was just like a character from one, instead.
And just as I was thinking it, it seems the fates were keen to prove it, as the silence was broken by a sudden, loud and extremely piercing scream. And not a playful one, either. It was a child’s, but it was blood-curdling. I threw down the magazine and rushed to the front door.
My instinct, on opening it, proved to be spot on. Just outside, in full view, and clearly not caring a jot about it, Spencer was beating the living daylights out of a young boy. The child was screaming at him, pleading with him to stop and let him go, but his attempts to crawl away were obviously proving fruitless, Spencer being very much the bigger, stronger one.
And he wasn’t letting up. He was kicking and punching the child mercilessly. I flew down the path, horrified, to where they were. ‘Spencer,’ I yelled, ‘what the hell are you doing?’ I managed to grab his arm just as he was about to land another vicious punch. ‘Spencer! STOP IT! Do you hear me?’
Clearly he didn’t
. He seemed oblivious. And even as I continued to hold him he continued to kick out. But it was the expression on his face that really chilled me to the bone, it was so strange. His eyes, though on his victim, didn’t seem to be ‘switched on’, somehow, and his mouth was set in a thin rigid line, almost a rictus, which put me in mind again of Justin, who used to have similar sorts of ‘turns’ when it seemed he’d been consumed by the intensity of his anger.
Thankfully Spencer was a good couple of years younger, so, physically at least, he was no match for me. Though it took almost all my strength, I managed to heave him off the poor lad, who scrambled, terrified, to his feet, and ran away.
I physically carried Spencer back into the house, and, floppy now, he let me. I then deposited him on the sofa in the living room.
Breathless from my exertion I then sat down beside him. ‘Right, young man,’ I told him. ‘You had better start talking. Don’t even think of trying the silent treatment with me this time, okay?’
Spencer had now folded his arms across his chest – oozing defiance and defensiveness – and, breathing heavily too, he fixed his eyes on the mirror on the opposite wall. He was flushed and his mouth still had that same linear affect. It was clear he was still struggling to control his anger. Eventually he spoke, the words coming out in staccato bursts. ‘He wanted a fight, so I gave him one. I won,’ was all he said.
‘That’s not good enough, Spencer,’ I said. ‘You were really hurting him. That went way beyond winning. You had completely overpowered him. He was begging you to stop. Who was he, anyway?’
‘Aaron,’ he said. ‘An’ I won him fair and square.’
‘No, Spencer,’ I said. ‘There was nothing fair about that fight. Nothing. I won’t have it, you hear me? I saw what you were doing. That wasn’t a fight. That was a beating. And he was much smaller than you. I can’t believe you’re sitting here thinking it was okay to do that. What on earth did he do to deserve treatment like that?’