by Casey Watson
Keeley produced a wry and thoughtful smile. ‘Be easier this time,’ she said, dabbing at the skin under her eyes. ‘It’s not exactly hard, is it, telling the truth? Much easier than when you’re having to tell lies.’
I gave her another hug. ‘Exactly,’ I agreed. ‘And a good lesson to learn. And we’re both here to support you. So there’s nothing to be frightened of, okay?’
And, as if by design, there was a knock at the door. Policemen hardly ever seemed to ring the bell. Why was that?
‘I’ll let them in,’ Mike said, ‘then I’ll get Ty’s uniform and bag for him.’ He leaned to peck me on the cheek. ‘And I won’t hurry back, if it’s all the same to you.’
Which it was. I knew he didn’t want to have to hear it all again.
I didn’t either. But I found myself strangely energised. Not excited – you could never be excited about such a thing – but energised by the realisation that we’d reached a very important watershed. A place from which Keeley might emerge with her past partly purged, freeing her up to actually feel she had a future.
The police officers, one male and, thankfully, one female, introduced themselves to Keeley only by their first names. They were both quite young – another plus – and visibly heartened to find themselves conducting business in my living room, as if playing police officers in a Christmas movie (albeit an early one). Tired of Christmas, tired of life – the mantra came to me unbidden. I was glad to see these two officers – Dean and Laura – were not yet irreversibly hard-bitten and cynical.
They both said they’d have tea, and by the time I’d returned with a pot and some more warm mince pies Keeley was already deep into her story. She was explaining how she’d happily taken cash and gifts from Burke – not for phone sex in his case, there was no need for that now – but simply to ensure her continued silence.
‘I know that’s wrong,’ she said. ‘And I feel really ashamed of myself now. I mean, I know it was only me involved, and at first’ – she glanced up at me – ‘I didn’t see how it was anyone else’s business. It wasn’t like I was asking or anything, he was just, like, throwing it at me. But then I met this lad’ – I noticed the voice recorder now in place on the coffee table – ‘and, like, it really made me think about what I was doing with my life.’ She looked at the officers in turn. ‘You know about that, right?’ They nodded. ‘Anyway, I, like, ran away to be with him.’ She looked at me apologetically. ‘And he was so nice. So nice to me – so genuinely, properly nice, and it just made me hate myself. And made me hate that pervert even more. Because it was him who made me what I’d become.’ She paused to pick up the glass of orange juice I’d brought her. I reflected again. She was such a bright girl. Which made me even more furious, because her education had been messed up as well. All those ripples of destruction flowing out.
‘Jamie, his name was,’ Keeley went on. ‘And I told him. Not lots. Just a bit about the things Steve had had me do. Only little bits, mind, and he was, like, so disgusted, it really hit me just how fucked – sorry – messed up it all was. So I would have told anyways. I knew I would.’
I took up position in the armchair across from the tree. This part was all news to me. I’d had no idea she’d told Jamie anything about her real life. I had imagined it all to have been somewhat superficial, especially since she’d told me that she’d found herself almost inhabiting the version of herself she’d created for him. Well, well.
Despite the voice recorder, Dean was scribbling furiously in his book, while Laura continued to gently probe Keeley about some point or another. Then, finally, she addressed me. ‘I think we have all we need for now, Mrs Watson. As I’ve just explained to Keeley, Mr Burke has been arrested and will be questioned. I just need to arrange a time for the two of you to come down to the station, to sign an official statement, which will obviously be recorded. Will some time tomorrow suit you both?’ She glanced at Keeley again. ‘I know it’s a pain, sweetheart, but that will be the last time you have to make a statement about this, okay?’
Though if it went to court, not the last time she’d be asked about it, surely. And, at sixteen, she’d be expected to attend, too. But no need to worry about that now. One step at a time. And Keeley seemed calm enough about everything, at least.
‘That’s no problem,’ I said. Then I turned to Keeley myself. ‘We can go down in the morning, can’t we? Get it over with. Then we’ll see about going to college after that, shall we?’
Keeley nodded. She looked washed out. This would start to take its toll now. It was already gone nine. Soon she’d be shattered.
She was just saying so when the male officer’s radio began crackling. Then there was a voice, but it was soon drowned out by static. He stood up. ‘Sorry,’ he said, ‘I’ll just nip outside so I can take this.’
‘It never stops,’ Laura said. ‘Non-stop, specially at this time of year.’ She stood up, too. ‘Still, I see there’s plenty of Christmas spirit here at least. Who’s the fan?’ She turned to grin at me. ‘It all looks very pretty. And no harm in getting ahead of the game, is there?’
Keeley rolled her eyes, and I was pleased to see the mood had lifted slightly. I even considered launching into my fairy-light tour, but Dean reappeared then and with him the business at hand.
He looked at us both in turn. ‘I just thought I ought to let you both know that my boss has just informed me that Mr Burke is to be detained overnight, until his solicitor can be present. And you’ll be pleased to know that Jade’s been removed to a place of safety. Just temporarily, we hope, but she’s safe, that’s the main thing, isn’t it?’
Keeley’s eyes immediately filled with tears. ‘Oh God, she’ll be so scared,’ she said. ‘Can I see her? You know, just for a bit? Just to let her know I’m there? She’ll be so upset. And I know just how that feels. Please?’
The officers exchanged a glance, which Keeley and I both saw. ‘Please? Or can I call her? Just to check she’s okay?’
‘I’m sorry, love,’ Dean said. ‘But at least you know she’s safe. And she was happy to go – my boss said. And she knows it’s just for the time being. Seems a sensible girl, if you ask me.’
I put an arm around Keeley. ‘Jade will be fine, love. She’ll have come somewhere just like this, and they’ll be taking good care of her. And I tell you what I’ll do,’ I added, even though I knew I couldn’t promise. ‘I’ll get straight on the phone to Danny once Dean and Laura have gone and try to find out if and when you can see her.’
‘You think I might be able to?’ she said, once the officers had left.
‘Truthfully?’ I answered. ‘I really don’t know. And probably won’t till we know a bit more about what’s going to happen. But I tell you what. Why don’t you go upstairs and get into your pyjamas, and while you’re doing that I will see what I can do. At the very least we should be able to get a message to her to let her know you’re keen to, and that you’re thinking of her. Which she’ll be glad to know, won’t she?’
‘And make sure they give her my love?’
‘As if I wouldn’t. Go on. Get your ’jamas on while I get on the phone to Danny.’
Though before that I had another call to make. To Mike, to let him know it was safe to come home. Which was when it struck me that the snowball was gathering momentum. For all the talk by officer Dean about Jade being ‘taken temporarily’, the truth was that I knew nothing of the situation with the Burkes. It could well be that she too now no longer had a home.
Chapter 24
We made our statements the following morning – both of them recorded and taken down in separate rooms – but when we finally emerged there was no question of Keeley going to college; the visit to the police station seemed to have really brought home to her the enormity of the chain of events she’d set in motion. It was one thing being picked up by a patrol car, driven home and ticked off – quite another to have to contemplate the reality of what she’d started – that there would be a court case prepared and, eventually, a trial,
at which she might well have to give evidence. And having been at one – Tyler’s, when he was charged with attacking his stepmother – I sympathised with her. I’d feel pretty strung out as well.
Keeley didn’t go in the next day or the following Monday either. She just withdrew into her shell, watching endless catch-up TV, with only me and the twinkling Christmas tree for company. And, once he got home from school each day, a newly minted Tyler, who now fully inhabited the role he should have taken in the first place – of benign, full-of-banter big brother. I didn’t ask, and I wouldn’t, not while Keeley was still with us, but I suspected – and happily – there might be a girl involved in this pleasing transformation.
But that could wait. In the meantime, the days were growing ever shorter, and the only glimmer of brightness on my fostering horizon was when Keeley shuffled into the kitchen one afternoon a few days later and told me she needed to make an apology – that she was very glad I’d put the Christmas tree up now.
She also wrote to Jade twice. Two very long letters. Whether Jade would be allowed to receive and read them was quite another thing, but I didn’t tell Keeley that. I didn’t tell her anything, in fact, of the little I did know, because I’d been told I mustn’t – as a potential witness she must be starved of information in order that her testimony couldn’t be challenged in court.
One thing I did know was that, from the outset, Steve Burke had denied all the charges. ‘Entirely as we expected,’ the family liaison officer told me, when he called on the Tuesday. ‘He’s a rabbit in the headlights, so it’s pretty standard at this point,’ he went on, ‘so don’t read anything into it. But it does mean you’re perfectly entitled to hire your own solicitor if you want to. That said, though,’ he finished, ‘Jade Burke is co-operating fully with the investigation, so I doubt you’d actually need one, truth be known.’
I wasn’t sure what to make of all that, but at least his tone was reassuring. And I was happier still when the news came the next morning that John and Danny were going to come round with a fuller update. ‘That’s good,’ I said. ‘We’re in need of some positive news. We’re all feeling very much in limbo.’
‘Well, you’re bound to be,’ John consoled me, ‘but this could all go on for months, as you know. I’d say best to keep busy and distracted.’
I’ve known John a long time and picked up on it straight away. He’d put the emphasis on the word ‘distracted’ and a new hope bubbled up. Had something changed? Did he have some news about Keeley being able to see Jade? Oh God, I hoped so. It would really give her a boost, I knew.
‘I’m all distracted-out,’ I said. ‘And I have no more fairy lights left to deploy. Do you have a suggestion about where we should find that distraction? Come on, I know you’re keeping something from me. Will you please spit it out?’
John laughed. ‘Tomorrow. And that’s all I can say. I’m still waiting for another phone call before I can be absolutely sure. I’ll get back to you as soon as I can.’
It hit me like a thunderbolt. Could it be? So soon?
‘You mean –’
‘Tomorrow,’ he said firmly. ‘Now put your jaw back in place. Poker face, remember. Not a word to Keeley.’
‘Phone me, yes?’ I made him promise.
He promised.
‘Do you think they’re coming to tell us that the pervert has confessed?’ Keeley mused as I stood looking out of the window the following morning, ants very much in my pants. It had snowed overnight and was still coming down now. Big lazy flakes that I’d doubted would lie, but were looking increasingly like they were intent on proving me wrong.
Under normal circumstances I would have been over the moon to see my front garden all deep and crisp and even like this, even if Christmas was still some way away. Precisely because Christmas was some way away, more accurately, invoking visions of the whole of Britain becoming one big snowdrift and of the scenes on the Christmas cards I’d already begun writing being a real actual thing rather than just whimsy.
Today, however, the snow just added to the chill of impending doom I was feeling. It had been unlike John to leave me hanging when he had something important to impart, and I was beginning to think that whatever the phone call was he’d been waiting for might have come back as bad news. They were due any minute, after all, and still he hadn’t called.
‘Casey?’ Keeley prompted, nudging me out of my reverie. ‘What d’you think? Do you think it could be that? God, I so hope so. I can’t believe he really thinks he can get away with it.’
I turned towards her and gave her a tight smile. ‘Who knows? But he’ll have to admit it eventually, I just know it. With Jade’s evidence as well as yours, it won’t really matter so much if he does keep denying it anyway. In fact, once they do find some decent evidence, he’ll have only made it worse for himself. The police and the courts aren’t stupid. They’ll see through him. And don’t forget, they’ll be amassing evidence as we speak, won’t they? Going through his phone records and bank records and credit card statements and so on. There’ll be some trail which will corroborate what you told them. There always is.’
I didn’t know that for sure, of course, and if he had been very clever, and the evidence was scant, both girls might be required to give their evidence again. I knew it would be awful if it came to that.
‘Anyway,’ I said, spying a car finally approaching. ‘We’re about to find out, kiddo. John and Danny are here.’
It was John’s car that pulled up, Danny unbending himself from the passenger seat and bobbing up from the far side of the car, and both yanking their collars up as they started down our path, disturbing the lovely snow with their soggy, grey footprints. ‘Pop the kettle on, Keeley,’ I called as I hurried to the door. ‘And pop those mince pies in the oven. They look like they need them.’
Danny grinned as he stamped snow off his shoes. ‘Go north, young man, they said. It’ll be lovely, they said. D’you know, I think I’ve seen more snow in the past year than I’ve seen in my entire life down south. I mean, it’s not even Christmas yet, for goodness sake!’
‘Smells like it, though,’ John said, sniffing the air as he came in. ‘Casey here is the queen of the mini mince pie. From November onwards, as you’ll already have noticed.’
I studied the pair of them so closely that John even noticed. ‘Told you,’ John said. ‘I said she would burn us with her eyes, didn’t I?’
I felt the heaviness in my stomach grow lighter. Then mild annoyance. Had he been keeping his good news from me on purpose?
Apparently so. We were all seated round the table before he finally confirmed it. ‘Sorry, Casey,’ he told me. ‘I would have called, but I couldn’t steal Danny’s thunder.’
‘What thunder?’ Keeley asked. ‘What exactly is going on here?’
‘Lots, Keels,’ Danny told her. ‘We have some news for you.’
‘About Jade?’ Her eyes were bright now. ‘Am I going to be allowed to see her?’
‘Not yet,’ Danny told her. ‘But there’s good news on that front as well. Stephen Burke has decided to change his plea.’
‘Which means what?’ she asked.
‘That there’ll be a great deal less paperwork. Which means a great deal less manpower, and a great deal less time. And, as a consequence, also a great deal less time till you can see her. So that’s good, isn’t it?’
‘Oh, that’s is good,’ I enthused. I was warming to this now.
‘You said “front”,’ Keeley came back immediately, sharp as ever. ‘I mean it’s brilliant, but you said “on that front”. So what’s the other front?’
Danny sat forward in his seat and cleared his throat, as if preparing to deliver a long speech. ‘First of all, Keels, an apology. I know you’ve been through hell this last year or so, and nobody picked up on it. Not me, nor anybody else, so for that I want to say I’m truly sorry –’
‘You don’t have to apologise,’ she said. ‘I didn’t tell anyone, did I? In fact, I told a bunch of lies in
stead. Seriously, we’re cool.’
‘Even so,’ he went on, ‘I should have picked up on something. And you’re still going through it now, having to give statement after statement after flipping statement, and I know you’re probably sick to the back teeth of it. And later on, later on today, perhaps, even, I think you and I need to sit down, or stand up, or go for a walk in the snow even, and have a bit of a chat about how we move forwards from here. And if you’re not ready yet, that’s fine, we can do it another day, another week, whatever. But just know, I’m here for you now, okay?’
Keeley looked stunned. ‘It’s fine, honest. I’m cool, Danny. It’s fine.’
‘Actually, it’s not fine,’ Danny said. ‘You’ve been failed at every juncture.’ And he said it with such passion that Keeley even looked at me with a ‘whatttt?’ kind of expression.
But I thought I got it. It was important that we all recalibrate our minds and memories. Memories of what we’d assumed, what we’d learned, what we’d thought we all knew. Plus I had an inkling he was enjoying himself, too.
Keeley grinned at him. ‘Whatever you say,’ she said. ‘Cool. We can go for a walk after this if you really want to. But what’s all this got to do with this “front” thing?’
And I was glad she’d asked, because faced with two men with twinkles in their eyes to match the tree I was fast running out of patience.
‘Oh that’ll be nice,’ I said. ‘Perfect afternoon for it, too. But, yes, go on, Danny, let’s get to the juicy bits.’
I tried to ignore John’s snort as I watched Danny grab a file from his backpack. ‘Okay,’ he said, opening it up on the dining table. ‘The juicy bit it is, then.’ Then he grew serious. ‘Now, this might be a little difficult for you to understand, Keeley, but bear with me, okay?’ He cleared his throat. ‘And forgive me if this sounds blunt, but I think you’re old enough for me to speak plainly. It’s about when you were first taken into care and denied contact with your brothers and sisters.’