The Child Who

by Simon Lelic

  ‘I want it to be over.’

  Leo looked up. There were no tears now in his daughter’s eyes, though the burn on her cheeks endured.

  ‘The case. You and Mum. Sophie ignoring me, people hating me. That man taking pictures of me at the beach. I just want it all to be over.’

  ‘It’s not that simple, Ellie.’

  ‘You asked me. You said, what else could you do? I’m telling you.’

  ‘Yes. I know. But…’ The plea. The trial. Leo had avoided telling his family about Daniel’s decision but it was getting to the point where he would have to.

  ‘So? When will it be over?’

  ‘It depends.’

  ‘On whether there’s a trial.’

  ‘Right. Exactly. On whether there’s a trial.’

  ‘Do you think there will be?’

  ‘That’s not up to me. That’s up to Dan…’ Leo, for some reason, stopped himself saying Daniel’s name. ‘That’s up to my client. As a solicitor, I can only do as I’m instructed. It would be unprofessional of me to try to influence his decision either way.’ Which seemed an odd thing for him to say – now, here, in the circumstances. But at least it was out there. He would not, he hoped, have to say it again.

  ‘But you must know. You must have an idea.’

  ‘Ellie. Really. It’s not my—’

  She stopped him with a look.

  ‘Probably,’ he said, exhaling. ‘At the moment, the way things are looking, it seems likely that there will be a trial.’ He flinched at the sight of Ellie’s despair. ‘But until the plea is entered… I mean, technically, at this point in time, at least until the arraignment…’

  ‘But… How long? How long will a trial take?’

  ‘I… It’s difficult to say.’

  ‘What does that mean? Days? Weeks, even?’

  Leo hesitated. Weeks, certainly. Months – years, probably – counting the appeals. ‘It might take a while, yes. But really, Ellie, there’s no need for you to worry.’

  ‘That’s what you said before. At the start. That’s exactly what you told me then!’

  Which was not fair. He had warned her. That day in the car. He had said, things might get uncomfortable. He had used those very words. He would not remind her of that now, of course, because heaven knew how she would respond.

  ‘Now you’re angry.’

  ‘What?’ Leo said. ‘No I’m not.’

  ‘You are. I can tell.’

  ‘Ellie. Don’t. Don’t cry, please.’

  ‘I’m not crying,’ she said with a sniff. ‘I’m just…’

  ‘What? Ellie, tell me.’

  ‘I’m scared, Dad.’ The tears ran now and she did not try to stop them.

  ‘It’s all right. Ellie, darling. There’s nothing to be scared of.’ He attempted a reassuring laugh but heard, from somewhere, a voice.

  How would you like it? How would your daughter?

  Leo held out an arm and Ellie allowed herself to be enfolded. Through the heavy cotton of the dressing gown, her body seemed barely to have substance at all.

  19

  A knock. Two beats of a knuckle. As though knocking, in this house, were the way things had always been done.

  Leo waited for the door to open. It did not, right away, so he ventured a come in – just as his wife slid her face into the room.

  ‘This was on the mat with the junk mail,’ she said, waving an envelope and then depositing it on the nearest surface. ‘And I’m ready when you are.’

  Leo rolled his chair back from his desk. ‘Oh. Right.’ He checked his wrist.

  ‘Whenever you are,’ Megan said again. ‘There’s no great rush. School’s not out for another half an hour.’ She pressed her lips together – as close to a smile, in the past few days, as she had managed. She turned to leave.

  ‘Meg. Wait.’ Leo used his heels to drag himself closer to the door.

  Megan stopped, turned. The smile, her expression said, had been a blip.

  ‘How… um. How much are you taking? I mean, my golf clubs. Should I take them out of the boot?’ Were they even in the boot?

  ‘There’s a case each. And Ellie will have her school things when we pick her up.’

  A case. A case was a holiday, a week away.

  Megan seemed to sense his optimism. ‘Mum has spares if we run out of anything. And I’ll be able to borrow her car when I work out what else we need.’

  Leo’s focus fell to the floor.

  ‘Are you sure?’ he said. ‘That it’s necessary, I mean?’

  Megan swallowed. ‘There’s a casserole in the freezer.’ She faced the kitchen and spoke as though Leo was looking where she was. ‘I’ve split it in two. Give it half an hour in the oven once it’s defrosted, or blast it for a few minutes in the microwave. If you stick it in the oven, don’t forget to put it in an oven-proof dish.’

  ‘Meg.’

  ‘Also, there’s a frozen pizza. Ham and pineapple. And there’s a pork chop in the fridge. You need to eat it by—’

  ‘Meg. Please.’

  Megan raised a hand to her brow. ‘We’ve been over this, Leo.’

  ‘We have.’ They had. ‘But…’ But what?

  ‘I need a break. From the house as much as anything. And it’s clear you need to focus. If you really feel you need to do this, it would be better, for your sake, if you did it without any more… distractions.’

  Leo nodded – not conceding the point, just bobbing past it. ‘The thing is,’ he said, ‘I was looking at some recent cases. At the coverage in the press once things actually got under way. And what happens is, when a trial begins, there’s actually less attention in a way because of all the restric…’

  Leo stopped himself. From the look on Megan’s face, the coverage was not the point.

  ‘I’ll be in the kitchen,’ she said. ‘Let me know when you’re ready.’

  ‘Meg. Megan!’

  He checked the kitchen. She was not in the kitchen. He checked the living room.

  ‘Megan!’

  Jesus Christ. Jesus H Christ.

  ‘Megan! Meg! M—’

  ‘Leo.’ Megan emerged from the kitchen. ‘What’s wrong? I was just in the…’ She hitched a thumb towards her shoulder but Leo crossed the hall and grabbed her arm.

  ‘Leo!’

  ‘Where are the car keys? Have you got the car keys?’

  ‘For heaven’s sake, Leo, what’s got—’

  ‘The car keys! Where are they!’

  ‘On the hook! The same place they always are!’

  Leo dragged his wife towards the rack by the door. Halfway there he checked himself, pulled up short.

  ‘We should ring. Have you got the number?’ He released his wife and reached the telephone table in three long strides. He picked up the receiver. ‘The number. For the school. What’s the number?’

  ‘The school?’ Megan’s eyes broadened. ‘Why? What’s happened? Did they call? I didn’t hear the—’

  ‘They haven’t called! We need to call them! What’s the number!’

  Again Megan pointed towards the kitchen. ‘It’s in my address book. In my bag. Shall I—’

  ‘Never mind.’ Leo made to replace the receiver but missed the cradle. He let it lie. ‘We’ll just go. Let’s just go.’

  ‘Leo! Will you please tell me what’s going on!’

  Leo had hold of Megan’s wrist again but this time she planted her feet.

  ‘What are you doing! Let’s go!’ He pulled but Megan sidled.

  ‘Not until you tell me what’s going on!’

  ‘I will.’ Leo dragged a finger along the key rack and plucked the fob with the Volkswagen logo. ‘In the car. I promise. I’ll explain when we get into the car.’

  ‘What about my suitcase? And Ellie’s? I need shoes at least, Leo!’

  ‘Here!’ Leo grabbed a pair from the jumble on the mat. ‘Now come on!’

  Megan was in the passenger seat beside him, her finger at her heel and her cheek pressed against the dashboard.
She was cringing, muttering, struggling to squeeze her feet into her daughter’s trainers.

  ‘Well?’ she said. ‘Are you going to explain?’

  But Leo was focused on the traffic. Even on a weekday, in the middle of the afternoon, the dual carriageway was a procession.

  ‘Leo!’

  He thrust at the brakes and Megan caught her weight on her outstretched hands.

  ‘Slow down, will you!’

  Leo cursed. He flashed his lights. The driver of the bus in front responded with a gesture from his side window and seemed, deliberately, to slow. Once again Leo swore. He craned to see. There was nothing up ahead, no reason for the bus to be plodding at… Jesus Christ. Twenty miles an hour, when the speed limit here was, what? Sixty? They passed a sign. Forty, then. Leo made to undertake but there was a camper van mirror to mirror, with a kid driving who must have been drunk or stoned or something because he was beating the steering wheel as though it were a kettledrum.

  ‘Leo! Please! Whatever you’re rushing for, this isn’t going to get us there any quicker!’

  The bus, finally, gathered speed. The needle on Leo’s dial nudged forty, forty-five. They were making ground now but less quickly than they needed to. An ambulance passed the opposite way – on a clear carriageway, naturally – and Leo thought of sirens, of the police, of how maybe he should have called the police. But the police would have asked him whether he had spoken to the school, told him to ring the school and then ring back, and by the time he did, by the time he explained – to the police, to the school, to the police again – they could have driven to the school themselves. If it weren’t for the traffic, that is.

  ‘Leo. Please. You’re scaring me.’

  A Range Rover drew alongside and Leo twitched the steering wheel as though to veer into it. The 4x4 fell back. Leo swerved into the gap and accelerated towards the roundabout.

  ‘Where are we meeting her?’

  ‘What? Leo!’ Megan clutched at her seat.

  ‘Ellie! Where are we meeting her!’

  ‘At the gates! Just… The usual place.’

  Leo slowed, slightly, yet took the roundabout in third. There were speed bumps blistering the side street and Leo surged over them, scraping the Passat along the tarmac on each downward lunge. The sound was like the world tearing and Megan, each time, gave another yell. She pressed one palm to the ceiling and clung with the other to the handle on the door. She was crying, Leo realised.

  There were cars corked up ahead and children breaking from the school gates. Leo wrenched the handbrake. He opened the door and lunged with a foot but his seat belt was attached and it hauled him back. He fumbled, found the catch, and lurched once more into the street.

  ‘Ellie!’

  Leo heard his name in the wake of his daughter’s, his wife’s voice echoing his. Whatever she said afterwards, though, was muffled by the shrillness of the schoolyard.

  ‘Ellie!’ he called again.

  There was a hatchback moving off the way Leo had arrived and he caught its bonnet with his open hands just as it slammed to a stop. Someone shouted, swore, but Leo spun away and on, through the gaps between the double-parked cars. He collided with a coat, rebounded into an open door, and somehow found himself on the pavement.

  ‘Ellie!’ He paused, raised himself on tiptoes. People were stopping now, turning to look, but when they angled their bodies towards him they only made it harder for him to see. He shoved his way through a chorus of protests and emerged into a vacuum beside the gates.

  ‘Where is she?’ He whirled, spotted Megan approaching, but not close enough yet to answer his question. He grabbed the shoulder of someone passing. ‘Have you seen Ellie? Ellie Curtice?’ The boy made a face and shrugged Leo off.

  ‘Excuse me. Hey.’ Leo seized someone else, a girl this time, Ellie’s age, but the girl seemed unable, in her fright, to respond at all.

  ‘Leo! What are you doing!’

  ‘Meg. Where is she? You said here, didn’t you? You said to meet here?’

  ‘Yes but…’ Megan checked her watch. She frowned, as though it was later than she had realised. ‘Maybe she…’ She cast about, letting the sentence dwindle. ‘Ellie?’ she said. ‘Ellie!’

  The crowd around them was drifting to a halt. It was thinning anyway beneath the reddening sky but the pupils and parents who were yet to leave had ceased chattering and were turning to stare. Leo spotted a teacher inside the gates, watching Leo with a look of alarm. He saw her collar a pupil, then propel the girl towards the main building. Leo searched the faces searching his. He yelled his daughter’s name.

  ‘Mr Curtice?’

  A girl’s voice; one Leo recognised. He checked about him for its source. ‘Sophie!’ Leo stooped and clasped his daughter’s friend by the shoulders. ‘Have you seen Ellie? She should be here. Have you seen her?’

  Sophie was already shaking her head. ‘No, she—’

  ‘Sophie!’ Megan, crouching beside him. ‘Have you seen Ellie?’

  ‘No. I was just saying. I saw her in lessons this morning but after lunch she was gone.’

  No. Please God no.

  ‘Gone?’ Megan said. ‘Gone where?’

  ‘I dunno. She—’ Sophie grimaced. ‘Ow. Mr Curtice, you’re hurting me.’

  ‘Let go of her, Leo, for pity’s sake!’ Megan tugged Leo’s arm and shoved at his shoulder. He released his hold at the same time and stumbled backwards, colliding with the gate behind him. He slid until he found himself sitting.

  ‘Gone where, Sophie? Where did Ellie go?’ Megan was gripping the girl’s shoulders herself now, locking Sophie’s eyes with her own.

  ‘I dunno. She wasn’t at the shop at lunchtime so I figured she’d gone to the park. I mean, just lately we… we haven’t been…’ The girl looked towards the ground. ‘When I didn’t see her this afternoon, I just assumed she must’ve gone home. That maybe someone had said something or something. To upset her, I mean.’

  Leo could only watch. He could only listen. He wanted to lift a hand from the floor but sensed, if he let go, that he would not be able to stop himself falling.

  Megan, in front of him, was standing, scanning the street. Coatless, she shivered, but made no move to wrap herself in her arms. She started to speak, to nod, and Leo was aware, vaguely, of a voice drawing closer from across the playground. Ms Bridgwater. The head teacher. Stamping her authority on a situation that was already beyond her control. And Megan again, raising her voice now, hurling gestures towards the school, along the street, back to the school and then —

  And then she stopped. She fell silent. She looked at Leo and angled her head. She said something, a question, and Leo looked up at his wife but could not answer. Because he was right. Now that he had let go it seemed like he was tumbling, like the world all of a sudden had given way. In its place there was just a void, an encroaching blackness, and the words on the page he had drawn from his pocket and was somehow holding out towards his wife –

  YOU SHOULD HAVE LISTENED

  YOU DONT DESERVE A DAUGHTER

  – scrawled in blood and underlined with Ellie’s hair.

  -

  She is early herself but he is already seated. It is not like him, she thinks. But then who is she, these days, to be able to judge?

  She slides from her coat but no one offers to take it from her. When no one comes to direct her to the table either, she drapes the coat over her arm and makes her own way across the restaurant floor. It is busy for brunch-time and she has to weave and hoist her coat and apologise, more than once, for knocking other patrons’ chairs. Feeling hot, and damp from the rain, and conscious that her hair, probably, is a frizzy mess, she arrives. Leo stands to greet her.

  This, ridiculously, given what she has come here to say, is the moment she has been dreading. Not the act of coming face to face after such a long time but the decision, once they are within range, about how she should greet her husband. A kiss, she thought, on the cheek but Leo is caught between the table and the le
ather bench and Megan, to reach him, would have to lunge. An embrace – a hand on the shoulder, a brief coming together – is her backup but this, in the circumstances, would prove awkward too. A handshake is out of the question so in the end Megan flounders. She says hi, then hi again, then smiles, sort of, and just sits.

  He is staring. Megan does her best, with a surreptitious palm, to smooth her hair.

  But, ‘You look well,’ Leo says. ‘You really do.’

  In spite of her relief, she could take offence – what did he expect? – but his manner is earnest and his expression uncertain and she thinks that today she should endeavour to be kind. Compliments, she knows, are not her husband’s vernacular. He utters them, when he utters them, with the same failed fluidity that defines his French.

  ‘You look well yourself,’ she says. And this is indeed being kind because Leo looks anything but. He has shaved and is neatly turned out – a shirt collar beneath a V-neck jumper and the colours even vaguely coincide – but there is no dressing up a dishevelment that runs deeper. His skin is wan, sunless. He has lost weight. He had some to spare but it has slipped most noticeably from his cheeks. As for his hair: when she last saw him it was already deserting him and he has pre-empted the sedition of the rest by clipping it tight. The result, a stranger might say, was making the best of a bad lot – better than a combover, certainly. But it is not Leo.

  She decides. If she was not sure before, she is sure now.

  ‘Would you like a drink?’ Leo already has a coffee but is directing a finger at a passing waiter. The waiter – a boy, practically, and east European, Megan predicts – has stopped mid stride. He does not have long, the bustle and his bearing convey. Quickly now, please: what will it be?

  ‘A cappuccino?’ says Leo. ‘Right?’

  The waiter nods and is about to dart on but Megan reaches. ‘A Bloody Mary,’ she says. ‘Lots of spice.’ Again the waiter nods. Megan fails to look at Leo as she turns. She needs the drink. She is under no obligation to explain why. And now, she realises, she might un-decide. Such is her see-saw antagonism, her decision might tip on the weight of what Leo says next.