Dead of Night

by Deborah Lucy

  Since they’d brought her home when she was just days old, she had been the answer to their prayers – and so that’s what they’d called her. Five desperate rounds of non-productive IVF had left the two high achievers shattered. They had everything except their own child. When they finally accepted defeat and considered adoption, they knew they had to have a newborn. It would feel as if the baby were almost their own flesh and blood that way.

  And she had been an absolute joy to them ever since. Seemingly wiser than her years, the Taylors told anyone who would listen of her academic achievements at her expensive private school. With top grades in her year, she was fluent in French and Mandarin. Not only that, but she was very socially rounded and could talk to anyone with confidence and empathy, thanks to drama and debating classes.

  She was very smart and savvy, already taking an interest in politics and the wider world. She was developing a social conscience and was keen to help those less fortunate than herself. She wanted to become a lawyer and she had set her sights on a law degree at university.

  She was a credit to her successful architect parents, who were extremely proud of her. From their home in affluent Little Aston, Sutton Coldfield, they had nurtured Prayer and watched with wonder as they saw their pretty teenage girl take confident strides towards adulthood. She was full of the promise of a successful life and future.

  Prayer conceded that it must have been very difficult for them when she asked to find her birth mother, but they couldn’t have been nicer about it, or more supportive. They were the best parents to have been adopted by.

  When she had explained that she’d prefer to meet her biological mother without them, they were understandably apprehensive. This was something she wanted to do on her own, she said. She wanted to keep them both separate – her parents and her biological mother. When she explained that she would be staying under the guidance of the Salvation Army and that there would be a member of the Salvation Army with her at all times, they were much happier about her request and understood completely. They would be supporting her, she told them, acting as an intermediary. She’d never lied to them before, but she’d lied then.

  She also told them her biological mother was a nurse who lived on her own. Another lie. Prayer had no idea what she did for a living, but she knew that saying she was a nurse would have a positive influence on her parents. All Prayer knew was that she wanted to meet her biological mother and question her.

  The burning question she wanted to ask, of course, was why? Why had she been given away? She needed to know. Typical in the circumstances, she also wanted to know who her father was. What had happened to cause her own mother to give her baby away to two strangers? What sort of person was she to do that?

  She talked it through with her parents and she reassured them that once she knew about her biological parents, she could put it behind her. It was merely a case of putting a missing piece of a puzzle into place and then closing that part of her life forever.

  The Taylors understood; they would give her space and time and wait for her to call them, such was their trust in their amazing daughter and the bond they had with her. She had never given them any concern, or a moment’s worry. She was so very sensible.

  Prayer knew this. She knew how they viewed her and like most teenagers her age, she was beginning not to share quite so much, to keep things to herself; starting the process of breaking away, of independence from her parents. She was a product of their successful nurture, but Prayer was already making plans for a life at a university as far away from the family home as she could get. Unknown to them, she was starting to make her own decisions, hungry for life on her own terms. She loved them dearly but needed to be her own person.

  Such was their trust in her and her ability to handle the situation, they were prepared to step back and in a week’s time, welcome her home and listen to her news. As much as it hurt them to do so, as much as they wanted to continue to protect her from the wider world, they knew they had to start treating her like an adult – the last thing they wanted was to lose her now.

  This, they decided, would best be done in the half-term break. Prayer’s private school broke up earlier and for longer than state schools. This would allow her to spend the time away from them in Swindon that she wanted, and also leave them able to make the best of the second week.

  She’d chosen to go by train, as she could travel on her own and it would give her time to gather her thoughts and imagine what was to come. She kept her parents informed of her two changes at Birmingham and Gloucester. They promised that after they knew she had arrived safely, they wouldn’t bother her with their calls or texts.

  The Great Western train was approaching Swindon and she was full of excitement and trepidation. She texted them: ‘I’m here! Love you. Big hugs xxx ’. She was wearing an expensive leather biker jacket over a roll-neck jumper and jeans. As Prayer looked at herself in a small mirror she kept in her smart handbag, she took a lipstick and applied it, pouting as she did so. She’d wanted to look good, make the best impression. What would her birth mother look like, she wondered? Would they have similarities? In a few minutes she would know; she would be meeting her for the first time.

  The train came to a halt at Swindon station, where they had arranged to meet. The other passengers stirred and stood up to retrieve their bags from the overhead luggage space. There was a sense of anticipation as they all reached their destination. Suddenly, Prayer was nervous. Her usual unwavering confidence uncharacteristically deserted her.

  She deliberately didn’t look out of the window as she retrieved her pink case from overhead. It was becoming all too real. There would be no going back from this point. She would always know where she came from. Who she came from. She had a thousand questions, but right there and then, wondered if she was doing the right thing after all. She counselled herself. She was here now. How bad could it be, the truth? She had to know it.

  She waited patiently for an old couple barring her way as they gathered their things from their seats. They stood in the aisle hurriedly putting on their coats. Still she didn’t look out of the windows. She wanted to get off the train first. The old couple muttered their apologies and chided one another for their slowness. At last they were ready and started to move down the aisle.

  This was it, thought Prayer, the point of no return. Nervously, she stepped out onto the platform, paying attention to her case, and at last looked up. There was no one there. She walked forward and looked around at the people that had just come off the train. They were all busy helloing and waving to people. Then suddenly she saw her. Standing alone with her hand up, a slight figure in the distance. Prayer walked towards her.

  Chapter 3

  ‘MEGON – PLEASE COME HOME’ the bold print pleaded. A photograph of Megon Wallace in a school uniform accompanied the piece, along with a picture of family members, concern etched in their faces. The text included the words, ‘We all love you. You’re not in trouble, just get in touch with us, please.’

  The Evening Standard had run the report on the seventh page; the thirteen-year-old girl had left home in Hackney one late September morning to go to school and hadn’t come home since. It was a depressingly familiar ‘runaway’ story that readers would have read time and again. The only reason it had managed to get into the Standard three weeks ago was due to the fact that one of the paper’s reporters lived in the same block as Megon’s parents.

  The piece went on to explain that Dad, Paul Wallace, had just been made redundant, and Mum, Leonie, was recovering from chemotherapy. Megon’s two younger sisters and Nigella, the pregnant family Rottweiler, all missed her. The reporter had tried hard for the sympathy angle.

  Wallace held a cutting of the report in his hands; he’d carried it with him for three weeks, folded in his wallet. He read it again and again. It was a nightmare he couldn’t quite believe they were all in. The flimsy paper was already becoming worn, but there it was. In black and white. His daughter had left home an
d not returned. He was gutted, literally. When he could get it, sleep was the only respite he had from a raw fear that had lodged firmly in his stomach ever since she’d gone. He was literally sick with worry. She was the only thing he could think of.

  The police had taken the missing report and had said all the right things. But Megon had been one of twenty-six reports of missing people across the capital they had received that day. The day before there had been twenty-nine and the day after, another thirty-two, many young truants amongst them. While most returned home within twenty-four hours, some remained missing.

  They signposted the family to Missing People, the charity set up in memory of Suzy Lamplugh, the estate agent who’d walked out of her office one day in July 1986 and had not been seen since. It had been Missing People who had immediately printed posters of Megon and provided ongoing support to their family. They assigned them a caseworker, who told them they could ring her whenever they needed to – and they did. True to her word, the caseworker was there for them. Especially when Paul Wallace was sleepless at stupid o’clock in the morning.

  Megon then joined the hundreds of other people who featured on the charity’s website. And as Wallace scoured through the endless stream of faces of other missing people – missing since last week, last month, last year; five, ten years ago, longer; twenty years, thirty years – he began to wonder if their quest was already futile.

  Where did all these people go? Where were they all? There were hundreds of them, thousands. Some were old, some middle-aged, some in their teens, twenties, thirties – all ages. Some were infants, and there were even babies. How could they all be missing? How can a baby be missing? How could so many people be displaced? How come he hadn’t known about all this until now? He was shocked by the sheer scale of it all.

  A huge wave of despair washed over him as he looked at the faces on his laptop screen. There were teenagers like Megon who’d left home one day and never returned. How come this wasn’t in the news? Why hadn’t he known about this? Where were the police investigations? How could teenagers simply go missing?

  They couldn’t all still be missing, he thought; not after ten, twenty or thirty years. They had to be dead – taken, killed, murdered – but what was being done about it? Because if they weren’t dead, where were they? How could kids vanish and there not be a public outcry?

  Paul Wallace was determined Megon would not be one of the faces that would look out at people in a year’s time. He began to think that it was just as well he had lost his job. He could put all his efforts into finding Megon. She had been missing for four weeks and already it felt like four months.

  The police didn’t seem overly concerned – they could see that her life wasn’t ideal. Friends had reported they’d seen her; she was alive and apparently well. But not at home. She’d regularly stayed out late and they suggested that going missing was another step further, probably another symptom of her unhappiness and general teenage hormones. A cry for attention.

  Paul was the first to admit that their domestic set-up wasn’t conducive to happy families. The five of them and the dog were all cooped up in a small flat, and the last six months had seen enough frustration and tension to test even the most contented. Having to support his wife through her cancer diagnosis and then the treatment had seen him take his eye off the ball at work. There had been little in the way of sympathy there – there was no room in small companies to carry people like him.

  He’d had to look after the girls, take on the household chores as well. He’d put his family first and it had resulted in his redundancy. He’d worked at the company for fifteen years, always on time, the last to leave and at the first sign that he needed some support, he was gone.

  With a couple of thousand pounds in redundancy money, Paul was at least able to concentrate on looking after Leonie. He’d thought he was going to lose her and that terrified him. With her cancer now in remission, it felt like they’d turned a corner. As they were about to count their blessings, without being able to draw breath, they’d gone from one nightmare to another. He’d lost Megon. They’d fought the cancer so now he was determined they’d fight for Megon. He had to find her and bring her back.

  Leonie wasn’t strong enough to join him in the search and the girls had to go to school, so he continued to go out alone every day. He went back in the evening, made sure they were all right, fed them, fed the dog, and then at about 10 p.m., went out again until 2 a.m. He was back out again at 6 a.m.; his body wouldn’t let him rest any longer than three hours. Very quickly this became his routine. His job.

  He’d put up the posters of her all around the locality and in the Tube stations. Her young, pretty face looked out, her dark hair falling on her shoulders. She looked older than thirteen – he saw that now and it frightened him. It annoyed him if a poster was taken down, so he’d put another in its place. He made sure all the neighbours knew about Megon’s disappearance.

  This had paid off when he discovered one of them was a freelance journalist for the Evening Standard. She said she’d help Paul with publicity, get Megon’s picture out to thousands throughout London and beyond. He was pleased with the piece, which had given the number of the charity and asked people to ring if they’d seen Megon.

  From day one he had taken to the streets himself, walking around, convinced that he’d see her and be able to take her back. He’d walked so many miles. His feet ached at first and then they just seemed to become part of his shoes, as he barely took them off.

  He had to go to every place he thought she might be or anywhere her friends had told him she might go. She’d had a mobile that the police had rung the day after they reported her missing. She answered once, but the line immediately went dead. He tried but with the same result.

  His regular visits to the Missing People website made him wonder how on earth people continued to function when their loved ones remained missing. As the weeks went by, he knew the answer to this. As much as he tried to remain cheerful indoors with his family, he knew he was only just hanging on.

  At the same time as his heart was heavy and felt like it was breaking, his head was awash with dark thoughts. Paul’s mind was his biggest enemy; he knew if he listened to the voices in his head, played out the worst nightmares of what might be happening to Megon, he would quickly go mad. These were the things that deprived him of sleep. He felt that he was on a knife edge. He daren’t speak to Leonie about it; he didn’t want to hear her nightmares too. Besides, they hadn’t spoken much since Megon had gone. The pain was etched raw on Leonie’s face; there was no need for words. The girls cried. He knew what he had to do. Find her. For all their sakes.

  He had to carry on searching because if he gave in, if he gave up, not only Megon would be lost; they’d all be lost. Every time he went out to look for her, Paul had every hope that that day, that night, he would find her and take her home. He knew he hadn’t seen his little girl for the last time. He knew that it was up to him to find her.

  Every day, her friends, neighbours, even strangers who were shown her picture said they saw her here and there. This sent Paul all across London. As a result of the newspaper appeal, the police told him she had been seen as far afield as the Midlands, Cornwall and Brighton. He soon realised she couldn’t be in all these places at the same time and so he chose to stay local for the sake of Leonie and the girls, refusing to believe that Megon would leave them to go miles away.

  As the weeks went by, he spoke to people, people he wouldn’t otherwise have passed the time of day with. In his bid to reach anyone who might have seen Megon, his quest saw him speaking to the homeless, those who sat out all night, wrapped up in rags and cardboard, using anything they could find to fight against the cold. He came to respect them, if nothing else but for their sheer tenacity for continuing to live a life of hardship with little or no apparent comfort.

  He became good at people watching, spent hours at it until those he watched became familiar. He watched and observed so many kids pouring
onto the streets and at railway stations such as King’s Cross and Euston, and saw how they were approached by those who hung around those places, watching, like him. Once, he spoke to a young lad, Mitch, at King’s Cross, who’d come down from the north a year ago.

  Paul told him he worked for a charity, and for a Big Mac and Coke, Mitch told him the names of a few of the people that Paul had seen, and what they were doing. Mitch said there was a trade in the young and vulnerable who were literally bought and sold. The boy spoke matter-of-factly about it.

  ‘I see these kids about a few times and then I don’t see them no more. They disappear. Because they’ve been taken. Taken and sold on to someone for money, so another person can use them to make money.’

  ‘But how can they disappear? What about their families? Why doesn’t anyone want to find them?’ Paul struggled to understand.

  ‘They’ve run away, like me. We’re trouble at home, we don’t want to be at school, so we come here. When trouble goes away, no one goes out and looks for it to bring it back, do they? But when they come here, the kids, they don’t know about these people. They make promises and kids get sucked in. They’re good at it; they make it sound good and the kids go with them. I wanted to make my own way, live my own life, that’s why I came here. But I watch this other shit going on all the time.’

  Paul was incredulous. ‘But how do you live? How do you survive?’

  ‘They approached me to do the toilets, going up to men. I told them to fuck off. So I steal. I take mobiles, laptops and iPads, wallets and handbags. People are careless. I do good trade at train stations.’

  Mitch explained he didn’t lose any sleep over what he did, just hoped that in time he would somehow no longer need to do it. It was still better than what ‘they’ would have him do.