Becky

by Darren Galsworthy

  When I witnessed him doing it one time, I was surprised to see how menacing he was towards her. Becky almost jumped out of her skin and looked terrified. I hadn’t realised how much he scared her until I saw her face that day.

  ‘Cut it out, Nathan. You’re scaring her,’ I said, but Nathan just fell about laughing.

  ‘I’m only winding her up,’ he replied.

  But something about the glint in his eye left me a little uneasy – and a glance at Becky showed that she found the situation anything but funny.

  Chapter 7

  The day that changed our lives

  I’ll never forget the last time I saw Becky alive – a few ordinary hours that now, as I look back, conjure such fierce emotions. It was Tuesday, 17 February 2015, and I came home from my job as line manager at Power Electrics, Warmley, to find Becky and Anjie in the house. Becky was mooching about, dressed in a fleecy blue onesie, because it was half-term and she didn’t have to go to school. That girl had about seven onesies, one for every day of the week. If she was leaving the house she always looked immaculate – she had a real talent for doing her make-up and hair – but when she was in the house with us she didn’t bother making much of an effort. She preferred to slob around.

  It was cold and dark by the time I trudged through the front door. I saw Becky fleetingly as she was heading upstairs to her bedroom.

  ‘Hiya, Dad,’ she said, smiling as she passed me.

  ‘Hello, my girl,’ I replied, dumping my bag on the floor and walking into the living room to check on Anjie.

  Every night, I had the same routine. I’d get home from work and cook tea for whoever was around, followed by doing the washing up – Shauna had long since stopped bothering. Then I’d sort out Anjie’s and my packed lunches for the following day, have a shower and help Anjie shower, and then finally check my emails and plan my work schedule for the next day. I’d usually finish off by having a cigarette and watching television for half an hour before heading to bed.

  Becky spent most of the time in her bedroom, like any other teenager. She had a flat-screen television in there, which she would watch while cuddling up with one of her many pets. I was always careful not to disturb her when she was in her bedroom. I knew that sixteen-year-olds needed their privacy, and Becky, more than anyone else I knew, needed her own space. She enjoyed having her own room after years of sharing with Danny, and it became her haven. It was the one place where she felt completely safe.

  At about 10 p.m. Becky came downstairs while I was in the garden room having a cigarette.

  ‘Dad, can you make me a pizza?’ she asked.

  I groaned. Becky would always leave eating until late at night, when I was ready to go to bed.

  ‘I swear, you always pick the exact time I am ready to hit the sack, Bex,’ I muttered as I walked over to the freezer. ‘What sort of a time to eat is this?’

  ‘Thanks, Dad,’ she said, grinning. ‘Can I have some garlic bread as well, please?’

  Becky knew that she would always get her way with me when it came to food. We had a freezer specially for her, full of all the stuff she liked, and because of her years of anorexia, I never refused to cook her whatever she wanted. I was just glad she was eating and hadn’t relapsed into her old ways.

  ‘You’ve got me wrapped around your little finger, haven’t you? Go on, get upstairs. I’ll bring it up to you when it’s done.’

  She smiled at me before bolting up the stairs once again.

  When her pizza was ready, I carried it up on a tray with her cutlery, and put a tea towel over my arm to make myself look like a waiter.

  ‘Your room service, ma’am,’ I said loudly outside her door.

  I could hear Becky giggling as she opened the door. ‘Thank you, kind sir,’ she said sarcastically as she took the tray from me.

  ‘I’m off to bed,’ I said. ‘Enjoy your pizza. Goodnight, Bex.’

  ‘Night, Dad.’ She smiled at me and closed the door, but not before I noticed that she was in the middle of watching Jackass. It was her all-time favourite programme, and she would watch it for hours on end, giggling uncontrollably.

  I sloped off to bed, but I didn’t sleep well that night. At around 3 a.m. I woke up to the sound of Becky’s television down the hall. She had obviously fallen asleep with it on. I crept out of bed carefully so I didn’t wake Anjie and tiptoed down to Becky’s door. She was cuddled up in bed, fast asleep. She had her onesie on and a green jumper of Anjie’s. Becky was always borrowing clothes from Anjie, and she would even nick things from my wardrobe as well. She particularly liked my baggy baseball tops, which she said were comfy to wear.

  ‘How on earth can you sleep with this bloody thing blaring away?’ I muttered as I gently removed the remote control from her hand and switched the television off.

  If I had known that would be the last time I would ever see my beautiful girl alive, there’s so much more I would have done. I would have stroked her hair, told her how much I loved her and how beautiful she was. I would have cuddled up beside her and stayed there all night long, watching her sleep.

  Instead, I quietly shut her bedroom door behind me before getting back into bed and falling into a deep sleep.

  The next morning, I got up at 6 so I could shower and get myself ready for work. I usually started at 7.30, so I was always out of the house before anyone else was up. That day was no exception – it was work as usual. When I got home that night, Anjie told me that Becky was sleeping over at her friend Adam’s house. We often let Becky sleep over at her mates’ houses, because she only had a few close friends and we knew them and their parents quite well. We’d often have her friends over to stay at ours too. All the mums and dads used to call it ‘kid-share’ because we took it in turns to look after them.

  Thursday, 19 February was just like any other day. It was Danny’s birthday, but we weren’t seeing him because he was going to a party. We had celebrated with him the previous weekend, when I had given him some birthday money. I went to work bright and early, and Anjie had a hospital appointment booked for late morning. She remembers Becky knocking on the door at 8.30 a.m., wanting to be let in.

  ‘Sorry, Anj,’ she explained as Anjie opened the door. ‘My key still isn’t working.’ She went straight up to her room. She had been complaining that her front-door key hadn’t been working for a few days, and I hadn’t got round to checking it.

  At around 11 a.m. Anjie’s mum collected Anjie to take her to her appointment. When Anjie returned to the house at 12.45 p.m., she noticed Nathan’s car in the driveway. He and Shauna were in the living room, watching television and playing on their phones. They had let themselves in with a key Anjie had left for them under our wheelie bin.

  As far as Anjie could tell, Becky wasn’t in the house. This wasn’t out of the ordinary. She was a typical sixteen-year-old, so if she wasn’t at home it usually meant that she was out with one of her friends. Shauna confirmed that she had heard the front door slam earlier while she was out in the garden having a cigarette.

  A few hours later, Becky’s boyfriend, Luke, came by looking for her, and Shauna answered the door. She went upstairs to check Becky’s room, and when she returned she shook her head.

  ‘Nope, she’s not in her room,’ she told him. ‘She went out earlier, I think.’

  Luke turned to Anjie. He seemed confused. ‘That’s strange. She hasn’t replied to any of my texts. That’s not like Becky. We were supposed to meet up.’

  ‘I’ll tell her to get in touch with you as soon as she comes in,’ Anjie promised.

  ‘OK, thank you, Anjie. Speak to you later, then,’ replied Luke, before walking off.

  When Becky didn’t return home that night, we all assumed that she was staying at a friend’s house, as she had done the night before, and thought nothing more of it. Becky would often sleep over at a mate’s without a moment’s hesitation. Sometimes she wouldn’t even bother to grab a change of clothes.

  Shauna and Nathan stayed at our house unt
il about 7 p.m., watching television and chatting to Anjie.

  The following day, Friday, 20 February, my alarm went off and I went to work. At about 2.30 p.m. Anjie phoned me, sounding worried.

  ‘I don’t mean to alarm you,’ she began. ‘But Becky’s friends are all here, and Luke is here, and nobody has seen her since Thursday morning. I can’t get hold of her on the phone, and nobody knows where she could be. I rang Tanya and Danny, but they don’t know either. Have you heard from her? Do you know where she is?’

  I fell silent for a moment, racking my brains about the last time I saw Becky. It was on the Tuesday night, curled up in bed in her onesie. Alarm bells started ringing in my head.

  ‘I’ve got no idea. I’ll be home as soon as I can,’ I said, before hanging up.

  I ran into my manager Lee Zanelli’s office.

  ‘I’ve just had the strangest call,’ I blurted out. ‘My daughter’s gone missing. All of her friends are sitting on my sofa and it seems none of them have seen her in days.’

  For a moment Lee looked at me, stunned, before speaking.

  ‘Do you want to try looking at her Facebook, see if you can find anything?’ he suggested.

  I logged into my Facebook account to check her page but saw nothing that indicated where she might be. I also tried to call Becky’s mobile phone, but it was turned off, so I left her a message.

  ‘Becky, can you call me back and let me know where you are? Thanks, love.’

  I turned to Lee. ‘I’m sorry, mate, but I’ve got to go,’ I said. I could feel my blood pressure rising, my heart thudding in my chest.

  ‘No problem, Dar – just get out of here,’ Lee urged. ‘Don’t worry about things here. Go and sort it out. I’ll let everyone know. Just go and find your daughter.’

  I raced home, driving as fast as I could, and within thirty minutes I was pulling up outside the house.

  When I walked into the living room, it was full of people: Anjie, Nathan and Shauna, and Becky’s friends Adam, Courtney and Teela – a new friend from school – as well as her boyfriend, Luke. All their faces had the same expression – anxious and confused.

  Luke explained that he had grown more and more concerned that Becky hadn’t been in touch all day Thursday, so he’d decided to phone Anjie the next morning. Her friends also had no idea where she was, and everyone had come round to the house to see if she was here.

  I didn’t know what to think as I looked at each of them in turn. Becky always chose to spend her time with the same people – and all those people were sitting in my house.

  ‘Right, let’s get our heads together,’ I said. ‘When did we all last see her?’

  ‘I saw her on Thursday morning when she left my house,’ Adam volunteered, and Luke said that he had been in touch with her by text later that morning, adding, ‘She was supposed to meet up with me yesterday afternoon, but then I didn’t hear from her again.’

  ‘I saw her before I went to the hospital, but she was gone by the time I got home,’ Anjie said.

  Shauna piped up. ‘She left the house while you were at the hospital. I heard the door slam on her way out.’

  We established between us that Becky had left the house at around 11.15 a.m, before Anjie returned from her appointment at 12.45 p.m.

  As I called her phone again, I noticed that my hand was shaking.

  ‘Becky, it’s your dad,’ I said. ‘We are getting worried about you now. All your friends are here. Can you please call or text one of us to let us know you’re safe?’

  I hung up the phone then turned to Courtney. ‘Can you come up to her bedroom with me?’ I asked. ‘Let me know if there are any clothes missing?’

  She nodded and jumped to her feet. I knew Courtney and Becky were so close that she would instantly be able to tell if Becky had taken anything of significance with her. Courtney checked through her wardrobe and I glanced around the rest of her bedroom. It all looked pretty normal to me. Courtney noticed that Becky’s blue puffer jacket was missing. She also noticed that Becky had left her make-up behind.

  ‘She never goes anywhere without her make-up, Dar,’ she said, looking worried. ‘All her bags are here too, and she always has a bag with her.’

  The onesie she had been wearing a few nights earlier was missing, as well as Anjie’s green jumper. We also realised that her phone and laptop were missing, but Becky never took her laptop out of the house. Nothing made sense.

  I walked back into the living room, sat down and took a deep breath. It was 4 p.m. and she’d not been seen for well over twenty-four hours.

  ‘I think it’s time to call the police,’ I said. I grabbed my mobile and dialled 999.

  ‘Hi, my name is Darren Galsworthy and I need to report a missing person,’ I said as soon as I got through. It felt so unnatural for those words to be coming out of my mouth.

  ‘It’s my daughter. Her name is Rebecca Watts, and she’s sixteen. She was last seen yesterday morning. She’s 5 foot 1 inch tall, with long brown-red hair. She’s particularly vulnerable as she finds it hard to read people. She never goes anywhere on her own. She’s painfully shy – she won’t even get on a bus alone.’

  ‘Could she be at a friend’s house?’ the police officer asked.

  ‘She doesn’t have many friends and the ones she has are all sitting on my sofa right now,’ I told her. ‘She’s always with her friends, at school, or at home with us. She doesn’t ever go anywhere else. Nobody knows where she is. This is incredibly unlike her. Please help us.’

  I felt my voice crack, and Anjie reached out to squeeze my hand tightly.

  ‘OK, Mr Galsworthy, thank you for the information. We’ll send someone round to your address as soon as we can,’ he said, before ending the call.

  I felt helpless. The only thing I could try was to phone Becky’s mobile again.

  ‘Please, Becky,’ I begged, ‘I’m so worried about you. Please come home. Please call me.’

  As I hung up, everybody looked at each other anxiously. There was nothing to say. All any of us could do was wait. Anjie started crying quietly.

  ‘You guys should probably get home,’ I said, turning to Becky’s friends. ‘I don’t want your parents worrying too. Thank you for coming over, and let us know if you hear anything at all. Becky is so lucky to have you lot as her friends.’

  They nodded solemnly and filed out. I found myself pacing up and down the room, a bag of nervous energy. I couldn’t relax. I needed to feel I was doing something, being useful, so I put my shoes on and went out to knock on every door in our street, asking if any of the neighbours had seen Becky, or if she had walked past the day before. But none of them had. When I returned, Shauna was in the garden room, smoking a cigarette and playing on her phone, and Nathan was crouched on the floor, watching as my grandchild charged around the living room.

  I turned to him. ‘Nathan, I want to put something up on Facebook about Becky.’ He looked up at me as I added, ‘Can you help?’

  I was useless with Facebook and social media in general. I didn’t have to use them for work and hardly any people my age used them to keep in touch, so I didn’t really understand how it all worked. Whenever I did have to go on Facebook for something, I always asked Nathan and Shauna to help me.

  Nathan slowly got to his feet. ‘No problem,’ he said, sitting down at the computer. ‘We’ll need to find a picture of her to put up and then we can post an appeal.’

  Huddled together, we looked through Facebook and our phones to find a good photo of Becky to use.

  ‘How about this one?’ Nathan suggested, showing me a selfie-style shot of Becky taken from her Facebook page. ‘It should be clear enough.’

  ‘Yeah, good idea. Do that,’ I said. Out of the corner of my eye I saw Shauna come into the room and sit down on the sofa. She was still playing around with her phone. I wondered if maybe she was looking for a good picture to use as well, but she didn’t say anything.

  ‘Right, that’s uploaded,’ Nathan said. ‘Now we have a p
icture of her, we just need to write something above it, Dar. What do you want to write?’

  I leaned over and told him what to say as he typed: ‘PLEASE SHARE. Missing sixteen-year-old girl. Please private message if you have seen her or know anything.’

  ‘That should do it,’ Nathan said as he posted the message. ‘People should be able to share it round for you now.’

  ‘Thank you, Nath,’ I said.

  ‘No problem,’ he replied, going over to sit down by Shauna.

  Two police officers arrived to talk to us at about 6.30 p.m. We told them everything we knew: that Anjie had seen Becky before she left for the hospital, and that Shauna and Nathan had heard Becky’s music on in her room when they’d arrived at the house.

  ‘I heard the music being turned off and the front door slamming shut,’ Shauna added. ‘But I didn’t actually see her leave.’

  ‘Did you have a fight or argument with Becky in the hours leading up to her disappearance?’ one of the officers asked me, and I shook my head.

  ‘Not at all,’ I replied. ‘The last time I saw her was Tuesday night. I came home from work, she watched television, and I made her a pizza. I left for work the next day and she slept over at a friend’s house the following night. Everything was calm and completely normal.’

  They turned their attention to Anjie. ‘What frame of mind was Becky in when she returned home after sleeping at her friend’s house?’ they asked.

  ‘She seemed fine,’ Anjie said. ‘She was a bit grumpy because her front-door key didn’t work, but that was it. She came home and went straight to her room. That wasn’t unusual for her, to be honest.’

  I wanted the police to organise search parties and get the whole force out looking for her, but they seemed to think that she had probably gone off with some new friend we didn’t know about and would be back before long. That’s the impression I got, anyway. I suppose that might be the case with most missing teenagers, but I knew my daughter, and I knew for sure that wasn’t what had happened.