by Harriet Tyce
“Who do you think is going to tell me to stop?” Barbara says with a throaty laugh.
“No good my saying it’s not good for you, I suppose,” I say.
“Darling, I’m sixty-five. It hasn’t killed me yet,” she says, holding the pack out to me.
It’s tempting. Almost. The rasp of the match, the flare of the flame as it catches, the sweet smell of the first fumes before they turn heavy and stale. But I can’t. “No, no thanks. I don’t. I gave up when I was pregnant. Never started again. I don’t dare. I can’t do it by halves.”
“Ah yes, of course. You had a baby. Your career was about to take off, and you got pregnant and disappeared off to America. Don’t you think it was rather a waste?”
I blink, surprised at the directness of the question. She couldn’t be more different from the mothers I’ve left up in St. John’s Wood, all done up tight in their sports gear.
“Come on,” Barbara says. “Sit down and tell me all about it. I’ve never understood it in any of you girls. There you were, one of our brightest young tenants, crown court trials rolling in, and you chuck it all in for a baby. All seems rather a shame, if you ask me.”
I clear papers from the second chair in the room, put them on the floor. I sit down, taking my time before I say anything. Though it’s been well over ten years, Barbara’s drawl is still so familiar. It’s surreal being back in chambers. Even the smell of Barbara’s cigarettes is the same, fighting for supremacy against the perfume with which the barrister has always doused herself; a powerful scent exactly the same as those years before.
I open my mouth to speak, the years falling away.
“Yes. It was a shame. I’m not sure I’d make the same decision now.”
“There’s always something, every year,” Barbara says. “One of the pupils cracks. Usually it’s getting slaughtered and falling over in a chambers’ party. Or telling the wrong person to fuck off. You were one of the sensible ones, though. I thought you’d be here for the duration.”
My guard shoots back up. The waves of memory have receded. I remind myself of the cloud of malice that has always lurked not far behind Barbara’s head.
“It’s not the easiest, having a baby and having to travel so much to court. Besides, my partner got an offer too good to refuse in the States. That’s why we moved.”
Barbara’s mouth twitches with disdain. “You were doing so well. I can’t imagine what offer might be too good to refuse that required you giving up all those years of hard work. It’s a shame his career had to take precedence over your vocation,” she says with a snort. “At least you’re back now. I assume he’s going to take over the childcare?”
“He’s still in the U.S.,” I say. “We’ve separated.”
Another snort. “I’m not surprised. You should have dumped him years ago—you’ve wasted the last decade of your life. At least you haven’t left it too late to get back to work. Honestly, these women with so much promise, degrees from the best universities, brilliant practices, and they give it all up to go off and have children. We never see them again. Ridiculous.”
I blink. I can see her point. I’ve raged about it silently over these years. But surely Barbara can’t be so blind to the realities of the situation, the difficulties faced by parents in such an inflexible working environment, the demands of court and the cab-rank rule taking precedence over all other considerations.
“It’s complicated,” I say in the end. “I don’t regret having my daughter in any way, but I’m glad to be back. And very grateful to have the opportunity to work on this case with you. Can you tell me anything about it?” It’s time to move the conversation on.
Barbara snorts again, perhaps unsure as to whether she has finished her cross-examination of me, but I smile brightly, hoping that it might discourage her from going on any more. After a moment, she lights another cigarette and shuffles through some papers.
“I’ll give you a brief chronology of the case. For what it’s worth. I’ve never seen such nonsense in all my life,” she says, settling back in her chair.
13
I pull a file at random out of one of the boxes that Barbara’s given me to go through—screenshots from a Facebook page, a series of photographs of the complainant in the case. She’s young, laughing, arm around a friend in one, posing in a fedora in another. I look more closely at the dates of the post. The girl would have been in her early teens. Just a child. In the third photo she’s pouting, a feather boa draped seductively around her neck. But still just a child, playing dress-up.
I lean back in my chair, shut my eyes. As soon as Barbara finished her narrative, she headed out for lunch, so I have the room to myself. I need to piece together what I’ve been told, block out the feeling of compassion for the complainant that’s crept up on me. I have to concentrate on finding the best way to serve our client’s interests.
He’s a lovely man, Kirsten said.
I feel very strongly about this case, Barbara said. There’s a significant danger of grave injustice here. We will have to fight very hard on this.
I rehearse the facts as I’ve been given them in the papers and Barbara’s brief account: Freya MacKinley, now seventeen, has had a troubled life, despite its brevity. She has been problematic for some time, both at school and at home: inattentive, undisciplined and very resistant to all authority. Her years at primary school passed without undue issue, and at one stage, she showed great academic promise. But she failed to gain a place at any of her preferred secondary schools, according to a report provided by her former headteacher, and she ended up at a private secondary school renowned more for its socializing than its academic standards. From Year 7 onward, her attitude at school deteriorated, and when her parents divorced when she was thirteen, the problems increased. She was the first in her year to experiment with cigarettes and alcohol, then cannabis, and harder drug use was suspected, though never established.
Freya narrowly avoided expulsion on a number of occasions, leniency only being shown in consideration of her parents’ very hostile divorce. It’s clear, though, that even by the school’s lax standards, she was heading for academic disaster, when she was taken under the wing of Barbara’s client, one Jeremy Taylor, a French and English teacher in his mid-twenties. He also taught drama, and through Freya’s reluctant participation in a production of The Taming of the Shrew, he managed to create a good enough connection with her that she agreed to extra tuition from him. Through this, she managed to pull herself together enough to be heading toward a very creditable set of results in her GCSEs.
Up to this point, both prosecution and defense largely agree on the facts. But from here, the stories begin to diverge. According to the prosecution case, Taylor had been tutoring Freya in more than irregular verbs. They say that from the beginning, he had been grooming her for a sexual relationship, which came to fruition after her sixteenth birthday, and continued until he tried to end that relationship, whereupon she went straight to the police with her account, which forms the basis of the charges now laid against him.
On the other hand, the defense version of events is that Jeremy felt sorry for the girl and did his best to help her. She was persistent in making small advances toward him, but he was reluctant to give up on her as he felt that she had some potential, and was sorry for her. He ensured on all occasions that the tutor sessions were held in public places, and that her mother was copied in on all correspondence. Despite his best intentions to help her, however, the matter reached a head when during a tutorial session taking place in her house, she stripped off her clothes in an attempt to seduce him. At this point he terminated the arrangement, and in rage and hurt at the rejection, Freya went to the police with her allegations. He denies entirely any sexual or romantic relationship between them.
I rub my eyes. It’s a simple story, a simple defense. It’ll all come down to who is the most credible on the stand. I leaf through the photograph printouts until I find a more recent shot of Freya, from earlier this ye
ar. She’s older, expression more wary, her eyes not quite looking into the camera. Still a child, though, still an air of inexperience, of innocence about her. I read again the description that Jeremy has given of her—it doesn’t chime with the photograph. Perhaps the case won’t be as simple after all…
Are there any photos of the defendant? I start to look through but give up, defeated by the paperwork. He inspires warmth, though, that much is clear from both Kirsten and Barbara’s reactions to him. And I’ll be able to judge for myself soon enough, when he next attends chambers for a conference with Barbara.
In the meantime, my job is clear. I have to go through the reams of messages from Freya’s phone and computer, looking for any evidence to support the girl’s contention that she and the defendant were in a relationship. Or rather, looking for the absence of evidence. Freya might claim that she was being discreet in how she and Jeremy were in touch, but there’s no way that their relationship could exist as she says and there be no trace of it on any of her social media. Jeremy has said that there was never any external communication between the two of them. I need to make sure there’s nothing to contradict that.
Three hours later and I’ve barely scratched the surface. It looks, at this stage at least, as if Freya joined Facebook first, when she was eleven years old. So close to Robin’s age. I repress a shudder. I’ve managed to keep Robin off social media so far, instant messaging the only permitted stream of communication, but I know it’ll only be a matter of time. As with Freya. By the time she was thirteen, Instagram and Twitter had followed, though Twitter doesn’t seem to have been a site that held much interest for the child—the printout of Freya’s profile page shows her following only a handful of people, two pop stars, a couple of teen magazines and the BBC news service. Then Snapchat, though I know that’s unlikely to lead to any useful information, the automatic self-deletion of photographs its main appeal. I start noting down dates and times until it’s time to leave and collect Robin. I take the first folder out of the box and put it in my bag, ready to work on later that evening.
I wait at the school gate with my head down, shoulders hunched against the chill of the autumn evening and the sneers of the mothers. I’m thinking about the case, wondering what sort of relationship Freya had with her mother that she was signing on to social media at such a young age. Then I chide myself. I shouldn’t judge. For all I know, Robin is on half of them already, too. It’s months since I checked her phone.
I’m still deep in thought when I feel a tap on my shoulder. I look up with a smile, assuming it’s Robin. But it isn’t. It’s one of the mums. My face stiffens the moment I see her, but once I clock the smile on the woman’s face, my jaw muscles unclench a tiny amount.
“I thought you were Robin,” I say.
“Sorry to disturb you. You looked miles away, but I wanted to introduce myself. I saw you at the coffee morning earlier, but we didn’t get the chance to speak.”
I look at her more closely, now recognizing her—it’s the dark-haired woman who was eating a croissant. The most normal-looking of the lot, fairly short, not that skinny, her hair showing the odd trace of gray. I feel my face relax a tiny bit more, but I’m still on high alert, nerves tingling.
“I had to get to work,” I say. “It went on longer than I thought.”
“It always does,” the woman says, and laughs. I’m so taken aback that I laugh too, before sucking the sound back in.
This woman might seem pleasant, but any minute now she’s going to show her teeth.
“Anyway, it looks like the girls are coming now,” I say.
“I think they’ll be a couple of minutes yet,” the woman says, glancing through the gates. “Let me introduce myself. I’m Nicole. I don’t bite.”
I feel my cheeks grow hot, the woman echoing my thoughts only too closely. “I’m Sadie,” I say.
“Good to meet you properly, at last,” Nicole says. “I’m Pippa’s mum. I think she’s in the same class as your daughter.”
“Robin hasn’t said.”
“It must be a lot for her to take in,” Nicole says, “with all these new people. Pippa says she seems quiet.”
I sigh. “It’s always hard to begin with. She’s still finding her feet.”
“I’m sure she’ll be on top of it all really soon,” Nicole says. “Kids are so resilient. So adaptable. Not like us. How are you finding it all? I felt for you when you choked on that canapé at the drinks.”
She has a gentle note in her voice, a genuine sound of empathy, and it’s been so long that anyone has spoken like that to me that tears prick my eyes. I swallow, hard.
“Sorry,” I manage to get the word out past the lump in my throat. “Sorry. Was it you? Who helped me that evening? I never saw anyone to thank.”
“Please don’t apologize. And don’t think you have to thank me—I was in the right place at the right time, that’s all,” Nicole says. She puts out a hand and places it on my arm, squeezing gently. “It’s always difficult to adjust to a new place. Especially somewhere that seems as unfriendly as here. It isn’t as bad as it looks, though. I promise.”
I feel strangely reluctant to tell her I know exactly what it’s like—that I came here myself. I try to muster a laugh, but it falls hollow. I’m feeling hot, my collar too tight, the backs of my hands starting to itch.
Nicole continues. “I feel like an outsider sometimes too, you know. This school is a real stretch for me, especially as I’m a single mum. But it’s worth it. The girls are so happy. And they do so well.”
“You really think the girls are happy?”
“Yes, definitely. It can take a bit of getting used to, but you’ll get there. Robin too. This is just teething troubles. Give it a few weeks, and it’ll be as if she’s always been here.” Nicole pats me on the arm again.
“Thank you. I really appreciate that.”
“We’ll have Robin round to spend some time with Pippa, if you like. I can catch you up with some of the gossip.”
“That would be brilliant,” I say, finally managing a smile.
SUNDAY, 11:05 A.M.
I pace up and down, up and down. Waiting. The house feels colder, more empty by the minute. Ten o’clock passes. Eleven. I make a phone call.
“I’m sure there’s a good explanation,” she says. “We need to stay calm.”
“I’m doing my best to stay calm,” I say. “But where the hell are they?”
“I don’t know right now,” she says, “but I’m sure they’re on the way.”
“I’m calling the police.”
“Don’t do that,” she says. “Not yet. There’s bound to be a good reason why they’re not back yet. Maybe they’ve stopped for breakfast somewhere. Or there’s been a breakdown. You can’t go leaping to the worst conclusion. Just sit tight—
they’ll be bound to turn up soon enough.”
“I can’t just sit here and do nothing,” I say.
“You need to stay at home,” she says. “They might nearly be in London. You need to be there in case she comes home.”
“I can’t… I don’t know what to do,” I say. My head is spinning and I’m fighting a wave of nausea, panic and acid, sharp at the back of my throat.
“Sit tight,” she says. “I’ll call you back very soon. Just stay put. I promise you it’ll be all right.”
I’m trying to stay calm, go through all the rational explanations that I can muster, but pressure’s building up in my head, higher and higher, louder and louder, scratching feet of insects marching around and around, scrabbling away in fear and self-recrimination. I start screaming, words at first, WHERE ARE YOU? but the sound breaks into incoherence, a mess of shouted noise, until I slump down at the kitchen table, head in hands.
Finally I can take in a breath. Fuck it, I’m calling the police. I punch 999 into my phone, wait in desperation for the operator to reply.
14
“What’s Pippa like?” I ask Robin when we get home that afternoon.
&
nbsp; “Pippa? She always seems a bit nervous. But she’s OK. Why?”
“I was talking to her mum, that’s all. She seems friendly, too. She chatted to me at the school gate. She said something about a playdate—would you be interested?”
“That would be really fun,” Robin says.
“Great.”
When Robin goes up to bed, I clear up the kitchen and pull out the file I took from chambers, ready to keep going with my search. I’m swiftly engrossed, surprised to find it’s after ten when my phone pings with a message. It won’t be Andrew—I know that without even looking. It might be Zora to check how the day has gone, though I know she’s busy. But it isn’t. It’s a number I don’t recognize.
Nicole here—how are you doing? Are you free next Friday for Robin to come over? Also ICYMI, costume needed for the girls’ assembly tomorrow. Favorite character from Greek myth.
Ah, that’s nice, is my first response. Maybe the situation is picking up. We’ll have friends by the time it’s half… Sorry, what? My brain does a sharp one-eighty. Costume? Favorite character from Greek myth? I rush upstairs to Robin’s room, shake her awake.
“I told you,” Robin says.
“You didn’t. I would have remembered.”
“It doesn’t matter. I can just wear uniform.”
“It does matter. I don’t want it to look like we don’t care. Who’s your favorite character from Greek myth?”
“I don’t know any Greek myths,” Robin says. “I’m going back to sleep.” She rolls over, back into oblivion.
My temper rising, I check my emails. In the midst of the multitude of start-of-term information I’ve received I find a calendar marked up with all the term’s events and, sure enough, in very small text, it says Year 6, assembly on Greek myths, costumes to be provided by parents. How was I supposed to notice that? If only I’d started talking to Nicole a few days sooner…