by Thorne Moore
He jumped to his feet. ‘You stupid bitch! Where the fuck have you been?’
‘In hospital, Gary. Having the baby. See?’ She turned the bundle she was carrying, hoping that seeing the baby’s face would appease him.
‘Stupid fucking cow! You were supposed to have it here. Not in front of half the fucking doctors in Lyford.’
‘I couldn’t help it, Gary. I got done for shoplifting, din’ I, and it all just happened.’
‘Shoplifting? You got done? Stupid cow. Stupid fucking cow. Now what? Whole bloody world knows now, don’t they? Doctors? Police? Social Services? They’ll never let up now, got their claws into you. Be round here all the fucking time, you stupid bitch.’
‘I’m sorry, Gary. I couldn’t help it.’
He stared at the basket and its contents. ‘Where d’you get this crap? You nicked it?’
‘They gave it me, Gary. The shop where it happened. They gave it me, honest.’
‘Where it happened?’ He grabbed her arm, pulled her round. ‘You were in a fucking baby shop? You done it deliberately, din’t ya? Stupid fucking bitch, I’ll kill you!’
The first blow caught her round the ear. His fist was raised for the second, but then a hand closed round his wrist. A black hand.
‘Calm down,’ said Carver.
‘See what she fucking done?’ Gary was spluttering.
‘You want to have the police round here? Think about it.’
There was a moment’s silence, while Gary got control of his rage. Lindy wriggled free and carried her precious bundle across the room.
Carver stopped at the door, taking everything in. He glanced at Gary. ‘Think about it,’ he repeated, and was gone. Easy feet on the stairs. From the window, Lindy watched him stroll off down the road.
Leaving her with Gary. She loved him. But just now, she wasn’t sure she wanted to be alone with him.
But Carver’s words seemed to have done the trick. He was glowering, but no longer wild with rage. Just sullen. She couldn’t blame him. He’d had it all planned and she had messed it up. But maybe, now, if he saw his baby properly, he wouldn’t mind so much.
‘She’s called Kelly,’ she said.
He grunted and kicked the basket across the room. ‘Pick it up. Place is a fucking pigsty. Don’t think I’m going to fucking wait on you, just because you come home with a fucking baby.’ The rage was building up again, but he couldn’t let it burst out as usual. So he grabbed his jacket instead. ‘I’m going out. Clear the fuck up.’
Left alone, she tidied up. Set Kelly in her basket cradle, with her Baby Garden shawl and her Baby Garden quilt. Made the bed, cleared up the beer cans, the cigarette butts, the foul socks and underwear, washed the dirty crockery, stashed the baby stuff away in the cupboards. Her homecoming could have been a whole lot worse. Of course Gary was angry. Only natural. But he’d only hit her once, and he hadn’t actually thrown her out, or taken a knife to her and the child.
All down to Carver, of course. If she weren’t afraid of him, she’d have been grateful. Why had he told Gary to leave her alone? Maybe he liked her. She shuddered at that. Carver was dangerous; she’d heard things, that he had a gun, that he’d killed… He certainly had a knife. She was pretty certain he wasn’t the sort of man who secretly liked babies. But whatever his reasons, he’d done the trick.
Gary came back late. She’d given up on him. She was lying in the dark, listening for the sound of Kelly’s breathing to tell her she wasn’t alone. He slammed the door. The baby stirred. He stood in the dark staring down at it.
‘Keep it quiet,’ he ordered, then began to pull his clothes off.
She did her best. For two nights she barely slept, listening for the first hint of a whimper from the cot. Even a sigh or a gurgle and she’d be up, slithering carefully off the mattress, settling on a chair in the far corner to feed Kelly, or carrying her, tiptoeing, up to the bathroom to change her.
Then the third night she was so dog-tired she fell asleep and missed the warning signs. Gary’s foot woke her, kicking her ribs. Kelly was crying at the top of her tiny lungs.
Gary yanked her up. ‘Shut the fucking thing up, okay, or I’ll do it.’
There was a muffled yell of complaint from somewhere else in the house. Still half asleep, Lindy crawled to the basket and lifted the baby up. A wet nappy.
‘Fucking stinks,’ snarled Gary. ‘Get it out.’
She staggered upstairs with a new nappy, dropped the old one in the plastic bag she’d left under the bath, washed and redressed Kelly, cooing incoherently over her. She didn’t mind changing her, or feeding her, or doing anything the baby needed, but just now all she wanted was to get back to sleep. Back down to their room, pull off the wet bedding in the basket, put an old towel in instead; that would do for now. The baby went down without trouble. Lindy groped her way back to the mattress.
Gary had sprawled across it, arms and legs flung wide, snoring. She tried to edge in, to find enough space to lie down, but he woke and kicked her. ‘Fuck off.’
‘Gary, I need to sleep.’
He swore again, pulled one of the pillows free and threw it at her. So she took it, and her heavy shoplifting coat, and curled up under the table.
He was irritable next day, flying into a rage every time the baby made the slightest noise. He hit Lindy. She knew what he was like in these moods. Sometimes it was drugs, and sometimes it was nerves, but when he was like this he took it out on her.
He went for her again and tripped over the basket. She was sure he was going to turn on Kelly, shake her, slap her, hurl her round the room. Lindy crouched over the basket, taking his blows on her back and her shoulders, while he swore and snarled.
He got his foot under her, pushed her off, and stood with clenched fists over the cradle, his breathing halfway to a sob.
‘Don’t touch her,’ Lindy pleaded.
He reached down, grabbed the baby’s ankles.
Lindy sprang forward. ‘You touch her, I’ll tell Carver. I will!’
It worked. Gary stepped back as if the baby had given him an electric shock.
He soon got over it. Even managed a laugh. ‘You think that’s the magic word, do you?’ He put on a silly whine. ‘I’ll go tell Carver.’ He helped himself to a can of beer, leaning nonchalantly on the sink like he was the hard man of the street and no one dared mess with Gary Bagley. ‘What you think, then? That Carver’s got a soft spot for you? That thing’s fairy godfather? Looking out for it? Stupid cow. He needs it quiet, that’s all. Just for a few days. Got something big going down. I’m doing a job for him.’ He said it proudly, like he’d been appointed Prime Minister or something, but he was scared too. Lindy could tell. That was why he was so on edge. He was in on something out of his league and he knew it.
‘Don’t,’ she said. She didn’t want her Gary in on it. A job for Carver was bad news.
‘You what?’ His lip curled.
‘I’m scared, Gary. You do a job for Carver, what if it gets really bad?’
‘Shut up! What do you know about it? I’m the man he wants, okay? You know what it’s worth? You ain’t got no idea.’
‘All right, Gary.’
‘Keep the fucking baby quiet too. Shit. If you’d kept your nose down and had it here, we could have got rid of it.’
Lindy cradled the baby. Imagined being here when the pain had started, imagined giving birth on this mattress, curtains drawn, Gary telling her to shut it. At least he’d have been there with her. Maybe he’d have held her hand like he did sometimes.
She held onto that comforting image, blocking out the darker ones she couldn’t bear. They’d lurked at the back of her mind since Gary had come home. Get rid of the baby, he’d told her. Like leaving her on the hospital steps or something. That was what happened to a baby a year or so back. That was what Gary meant. She wouldn’t let the other image in, the old newspaper and a brick and the stinking gully behind the garages in Heighton Street.
Gary slammed out. He came in
late again, quieter. Let her share the bed this time, though he didn’t touch her. She could sense his nerves, stretching him like a string.
The baby woke her, a fretful murmur, not yet a full-blown cry. She opened her eyes.
Gary was already out of bed. He stood, silent over Kelly in her basket, looking down on her, head on one side, like he was studying something fascinating. Not hostile, not angry, she could see that in the light of the street lamp.
He was holding his pillow, clutching it with both hands.
She switched the light on and he looked round at her. A stupid laugh. He’d taken something, that was why he was laughing.
‘I’ll take her,’ she said, kneeling to pick up Kelly.
‘I could make her go to sleep,’ he crooned, gripping the pillow tighter.
‘It’s all right, she won’t make a noise,’ Lindy promised.
He was staring at them both as if he couldn’t quite grasp what they were or why they were there. She rocked the baby, moving step by step away from him. At last, he staggered back to the bed and flopped down again.
Lindy switched the light off again, sat down on the chair by the door, and settled Kelly with a bottle. Kelly was a good baby, when she was fed and changed. It was easy to keep her happy. Easy because Kelly had everything she needed. Milk, warmth, love. How different was it going to be when she started needing proper food, and the nappies ran out, and she needed more clothes?
For a brief bleak moment, Lindy allowed herself to look into the future. What about when Kelly went to school? She wouldn’t be such a good mum then, would she? Couldn’t hardly read or write herself. Living here, with Gary, in this one room? Gary and his drugs, his rages, his pillow. What about when he’d done this job for Carver, and Carver didn’t care about keeping things quiet any more? Lindy couldn’t be awake all the time.
There was this heaviness in her gut. In her heart. Sadness that was never going to go away. Lindy was never going to be a good mum. She had nothing to give her baby. Kelly wouldn’t make it, not here.
‘We can discuss things,’ the social worker had said, at the hospital. Like whether Lindy would prefer to put Kelly up for adoption. Lindy hadn’t listened. She knew better than to listen to social workers. But she should have. She didn’t want to have her baby taken away, but maybe that was what Kelly needed.
Except Lindy knew all about being taken away. The rush and noise and terror and big people treating her like she was nothing, and her sisters screaming, and Jimmy crying, and strangers all around her. So alone and helpless. She didn’t want that for Kelly.
But if she kept Kelly here, it would happen. They’d watch over her, with their sharp eyes, for a year or two, noting bruises, stripping her, weighing her, bringing in doctors to poke her, and then they’d come for her, battering down the door. Snatching her away, no matter how Lindy screamed.
Better for her to go now, while she was a tiny baby, because people liked babies. Someone would want to adopt her, proper like, not just a foster home. A real family. Let them take her now. Lindy could do like that woman had done. Leave her somewhere safe, so that she’d be found quickly.
The bedsit was silent. Gary was asleep. Kelly was asleep in her arms. Lindy wanted this moment to never end. But they had to go.
She laid Kelly in her cot and got dressed. No noise. What time was it? Nearly four. Chilly out. Kelly would need to be wrapped up warm. Lindy picked the shawl up, the webbed design a grey veil in the darkness. This was no good. The baby that had been left at the hospital; they’d traced the mother because of something it wore. People might remember how she was given all this Baby Garden stuff.
What else did she have? No baby clothes of her own. Lindy stripped Kelly down to her nappy and wrapped her in a cheap vest top she’d nicked a year ago and never worn. Then in a towel. Their good towel, warm and thick. That had been nicked too.
Quietly, barely breathing, Lindy cradled the bundled baby to her, eased open the door, stepped out onto the dark stairs. Went down to the hall, opened the front door, drank in the clear cold air.
She was conscious of her footsteps ringing out on the empty pavement. No one was around to see or care. A couple of stray dogs running around, that was all.
She thought of returning to the hospital, but that was a really long walk, three or four miles. And the hospital wouldn’t be quiet and dark like this. There were always people on duty, coming and going.
The police station? Same with that. It never went to sleep. And if Lindy didn’t want anything to do with social workers, police were worse.
She reached the town centre before she knew what she was going to do. Then it came to her, because she had been here so many times before. Cleaners came in at night, through the little back doors under the car park, the doors that shoppers never saw. Came in, did their work, went out again.
She settled into a corner in Albert Street, near the door. They wouldn’t look her way, a cul-de-sac for unloading trucks. They’d be heading the other way. Not so very long ago, she’d been one of them, earning her pay packet with a mop. She knew their shifts. Here and then on to the Town Hall, and the office block in William Street. Any moment now they’d be coming out.
Kelly was stirring. Lindy had changed her but she hadn’t brought any spare. If the baby started bawling now, she’d be in trouble. She rocked the child, singing softly, and Kelly breathed a little sigh and settled down again.
With a blaze of light the door swung open, two women emerging, chattering loudly. Usually about eight of them, and then Stan. Always slow on his feet, Stan. Pausing behind them for a few swigs from the half bottle of whisky he kept in his pocket. By the time they left their last port of call, the minibus would be swerving all over the empty streets.
Four more women. A pause. Then a couple more, the door beginning to swing shut behind them. That was it. Now, before Stan followed them. Lindy slipped forward, caught the door. She knew her way. A sloping corridor, with a cupboard off it. She tried the handle, to be sure it was open if she needed to duck out of the way. Unlocked and empty except for a few cardboard boxes and crates. One of them was as good as a cradle really. She pulled it loose and crept on up the corridor into the empty, echoing, dimly lit expanse of the shopping centre. She could hear Stan singing. He liked the sound of his voice booming down the empty spaces. On his way, but still some way off.
She turned in the other direction. WHSmith’s, she wanted really, because it opened early, but it was too far away. Debenham’s was closer. There would be people around soon to find Kelly. She dropped the cardboard box in the doorway, then looked one last time at her daughter in her arms.
Lindy wanted to hug her and kiss her so much it hurt. But that would wake her. Carefully, gently, she laid her down in the box, swallowing the tears that were pouring down her cheeks. She mustn’t sob, mustn’t make any noise.
Forcing air into her lungs, she returned to the sloping corridor, as quietly as she could. Stan ambled into view as she slid out of sight. Had he seen her? He said nothing. His toneless singing didn’t falter. She ran down the corridor, yanked up the bar of the door, fell out into Albert Street, ducked into the darkness of the cul-de-sac. Waited, heart beating.
The door eased open again. Stan came out. Door closed. He was locking it, walking away. Lindy couldn’t get back in now. It was done, there was no going back.
And now she could cry in earnest, because the only thing she wanted in the world was to go back and undo it all.
‘You stupid fucking bitch!’ It was like being beaten round the head. When was the last time Gary had called her anything else? He used to be nice to her once. It did her head in. All of her hurt. Her stomach ached, her tits ached. She wanted to die.
‘I told you we don’t want no trouble just now, and what do you do? Dump the fucking baby in the shopping centre!’
‘I thought it was what you wanted,’ she pleaded. ‘You said we should get rid of it.’
‘Not this way! Stupid fucking bitch! What d’y
ou think will fucking happen? Jesus fucking Christ!’ He had his head in his hands. ‘What if they come looking? You thought about that?’
‘I didn’t leave nothing on her to say where she’d come from, Gary.’
‘Lindy, you stupid bitch, you was in the fucking hospital with her! You think they won’t send someone round to check? Ask questions? Jesus! He’ll kill us.’ He turned on her, his fear crystallising into anger. ‘I’m warning you, stupid cow! If anyone comes sniffing round here, if there’s the slightest hint of trouble, I’ll cut your fucking throat. Get that?’
She nodded. He wouldn’t. He would hit her, because she was easy to hit, but he wouldn’t do worse than that, because he wouldn’t dare. But Carver – Carver would kill her, easy as blinking. The thing was, she didn’t care any more.
ii
Gillian
Baby Found In Mall
Staff arriving this morning at WHSmiths in the Queen Elizabeth Shopping Centre were astonished to hear a baby crying, and traced it to a cardboard box in the doorway of Debenham’s.
‘We thought at first it was a cat,’ said mum, Kathleen Morris, 38. ‘We couldn’t believe our eyes when we saw what it was.’
The baby, a girl thought to be less than a month old, was wrapped in a towel. There was no note, and police have as yet found no clue as to the identity of the mother.
‘We need to find this lady, who may be in need of medical attention,’ said police sergeant Brian Hewitt. ‘I urge her strongly to come forward.’
Staff at the Lyford and Stapledon Hospital have named the little girl Debbie, since she was found by Debenham’s. She is thought to be in good health, though doctors are running tests.
Police and the management of the Queen Elizabeth Shopping Centre are at a loss to understand how the child came to be in the Centre, which is securely locked at night. Cleaning staff have been interviewed and have declared that no baby was on the premises when they were at work.
‘If there had been a baby there, I’d have seen it,’ said Stanley Turner, 63. ‘It’s my job to keep a sharp eye on things.’