The Woodlands Edge children’s home was boarded up and surrounded by security fencing. The site was up for sale. The grounds were overgrown and it didn’t look as if it had been occupied for several years. It reminded me of my own house: vandalised, rotting, uninhabited, slowly falling to bits. I shuddered at the thought of all the money I was about to lose and how long it would take to pay it all back.
‘How long do you reckon this place has been closed?’ Alex asked, reading my thoughts.
‘Must be at least five years. I’m trying to work through the ages. Meg must have been here in the early nineties, and it looks like it stayed open a while after that. It’s a nice enough location for a home, mind you.’
The house had extensive grounds. Overgrown, as they were now, they were a bit of a headache. If they were well kept, with the home occupied, it would have been a wonderful environment in which to grow up. The gardens were bordered by woodland. A large oak stood tall and proud by the side of a dilapidated fence, which was covered in lichen, many of its bars fallen from the rusted nails. I noticed that one of the lower branches of the old oak had been removed. It seemed strange that it should have rotted – the tree looked strong and safe.
‘Are we going in?’ Alex asked, smiling. ‘It would seem rude not to.’
There was no way we were visiting this place without a snoop around. The fencing was only the temporary type, the sort that builders use to contain hazardous areas. It didn’t take much to manoeuvre one of the posts out of its concrete stand and create a gap that was big enough to squeeze through.
‘Why didn’t Meg tell me that she’d lived in this place? Why did she keep it to herself? She can’t have been ashamed of it, surely?’
‘Who knows what happened here, or why she ended up here in the first place. You know what these bloody homes were like. In some of these places the kids would have been safer fending for themselves on the streets than being at the mercy of the bastards who were running them.’
I knew what she meant. The number of cases that I’d dealt with in my journalistic career was unbelievable. It never ceased to amaze me how these things had gone on. I wanted to find out why this home had closed, that was for sure. An earlier online search had yielded nothing interesting; it was going to be a job for the microfiche in the local library. They’d have all the old newspapers in there, and that’s where I’d find my answers, if any were to be found.
We’d reached the front door. It looked as if it had been protected by chipboard once upon a time, but that had dropped off – or been ripped away – and was now mouldering among the undergrowth in the garden. I tried the door, but it appeared to be locked. The downstairs windows were boarded and covered with different coloured spray paints. Most of them were nicknames and dates, but one caught my attention. It was in red paint. Cover-up! was all it said, scrawled all around the sides of the building. That microfiche machine was getting a visit – my journalistic antennae were tingling. Alex had clocked it too.
‘Pete! Pete! I’ve got the door open.’
Alex had gone off alone while I was studying the sides of the building.
‘How did you manage that? It was locked.’
‘It was jammed. It’s badly warped, but a good shove budged it. It was blocked off at one time; you can see the nail holes around the doorframe. Shall we go in? Although I know that you won’t want to ignore the useful health and safety warnings that have been put up.’
She smiled again. We’d been in some right shit together, but playing detectives with Alex was fun. She made it fun. She had the same instincts as me. We’d met while studying to be cub reporters, so that made sense. We were both nosey. We were paid to be that way for a living.
‘Fuck health and safety, I’m going in!’ I said, giving the door a final push so I could squeeze through.
There was a wide stone staircase winding up the three levels of the building from a massive hallway. The ceilings were high, as you’d expect in a house of that age. It must have been a wonderful building once, but now it was falling to bits. Old plaster was flaking off the walls and it smelled damp and abandoned. The ground-floor windows were boarded up. There was some light coming down the landing from the upper windows, but it felt a bit dark to be going in without a torch.
‘Have you got a light on your phone?’ I asked Alex. ‘Mine has one, but it looks a bit dark in there.’
‘Sure, yes, hang on. I’ll find it. Yes, there you are. We look like a couple of American TV cops.’
She was right about that. We entered the hallway cautiously, using the beams from our phones to check the way ahead, and then to get a closer look at the walls and decor.
‘Can you believe it. The place has been empty for ages and they’ve still got a pile of bloody junk mail!’ I laughed as I rummaged through the free newspapers, takeaway leaflets and charity bags that had been piled up to one side of the door.
‘February 2002,’ I read from the paper. ‘That’s the latest date on these papers.’
‘Hell, it’s been empty for over a decade,’ Alex replied. ‘You’d think somebody would have developed the site for housing.’
‘It’s probably council owned or something like that. If it’s tied up in any legacy, it might get even more complicated. I did a radio story once about some old people’s home that had been left in trust. It was easier to let it rot than to try and sort the trust out.’
‘Maybe,’ said Alex. ‘This place must have an amazing history.’
She moved towards the first door, which still had the word office hand-painted on it.
‘Watch out,’ I warned, uneasy about the bare, creaking floorboards. ‘Take care. If this place has been empty that long, those health and safety warnings might be making a fair point.’
Alex entered the office, stepping carefully and making sure that she scanned the path ahead.
‘Anything in there?’ I called across the hallway. I was taking a look at the lounge area. There were still some old chairs – it looked like it had been a TV room at one time.
There was no reply from Alex.
‘Anything there?’ I called again.
‘Only some papers, nothing private, but interesting. Social services handbooks, crap like that. How about you?’
‘Just a lounge area. It opens onto what looks like a dining room; it’s got some of those old school trestle tables in there still. Looks very Oliver Twist to me. Must have been horrible for those poor kids.’
There was a sudden rustle from one of the old hessian chairs, and then a scratching sound on the floorboards. I shone my torch to see a large rat scuttling across the room.
‘Oh shit, rats!’ I called to Alex. ‘It’s coming your way, look out!’
I heard a short cry of alarm from across the hallway, and then a loud crack from inside the office.
I ran in the direction of the rat, but I couldn’t hear it anymore, it had taken shelter.
‘Alex? Alex? Are you okay? It’s gone now.’
I walked into the office area, shining my torch. There was no Alex.
‘Alex? Where are you?’
I looked around for another door, but there was only one entrance. I shone the light from my phone across the floor and around the room. I found the papers that Alex had been talking about. I moved towards the table, and then I saw what had happened. She’d fallen through the floorboards. There was a dark hole in the area where she must have been standing. I couldn’t see a light from her torch – neither could I hear her making any sound.
‘Alex? Are you alright?’ I called, shining my torch down into the hole created by the shattered floorboards and terrified of what I was going to find on the floor below.
Chapter Four
1992 There were not many members of staff that the youngsters bonded with at Woodlands Edge Children’s Home. Bob Taylor was one of them. He was a favourite of most of the children whose misfortune it was to end up there.
Most of the staff were indifferent. They were professional, kin
d enough, but always businesslike. The children in the home craved a close connection with an adult, and Bob Taylor was someone they could trust. His eyes were kind and he was always happy to listen. He’d frequently stay after his shift was over to work through some problem related to school or members of the opposite sex. He was like a real dad, and he genuinely enjoyed the company of the young people in his care.
Then there was Tom, one of the caretakers at the home. He worked alternate early and late shifts. The second caretaker was grumpy and impatient; he had no interest in the kids, but Tom made time for them, he’d be happy to chat as he was going about his work. There was a reason for that. Tom was unable to have children with his wife, Mavis. They’d met and married in Blackpool and always hoped to start a family there, but after several years of trying, they had not been given the child that they craved.
Tom knew how sad it made Mavis, and it goaded him constantly that he couldn’t give her that one thing. They had fostered, to bring the presence of children into their lives, but it broke their hearts when their young visitors had to move on. They wanted their own children. They were trying to adopt. It was a long and tortuous process, but they lived in hope that they would be able to have a child in their lives before they were too old.
There was no way a baby or toddler would be placed with them now, but a teenager was possible. It was a daily torture to Tom to work in that place. All those kids desperately craving the love of a stable home and he and Mavis who would adopt any one of them at the drop of a hat.
Tom was always happy to pass the time of day talking the boys through practical tasks like bleeding radiators and fixing door handles. He figured that they’d need skills like that when they were older, and without a parent to teach them, who else would?
Tom was popular with the girls too; he was unusual in that he didn’t differentiate between them and the boys. He was equally at ease teaching Hannah and Meg how to use a hammer as he was showing Jacob or David the best way to replace a washer.
He was a quiet man, intimidated by the social workers and professional staff, and much more at ease with the children. Although he felt the sadness in many of the children, he’d always assumed that was because they were so desperate to find families to live with. He’d never got a sense that anything else was going on. The older youngsters were able to separate the horrors of the night-time from the safety of daytime – they suppressed it and never discussed it among themselves or the adults.
He got on well with Meg and Hannah. They were a right couple of characters. They’d chat and laugh and loved helping him as he went about his chores. They were a double act, joined at the hip, and always enjoying each other’s company.
He sensed trouble coming with David and Jacob. They were nice lads, but all those hormones were exploding in one building. He would never dare to mention it to any of the staff, it wasn’t his place, but he could see that David had eyes for Meg. And she was certainly no reluctant party. He hoped that the social workers were keeping an eye on them all. It wasn’t his business, they must be used to dealing with teenagers who were becoming sexually aware.
Life went on at Woodlands Edge. Tom grew closer to Meg and Hannah. He’d discuss the girls with Mavis and they dreamt about how, one day, they might be able to care for them in their own home – if there was ever any movement on their adoption paperwork.
It all changed the day that Jacob died. It shook Tom to the core. He’d liked Jacob. He was cheeky – what young lad isn’t? But Tom hadn’t put him down as being that unhappy. It was one of the lowest points of his life. It wouldn’t be the last.
He was on the early shift that day and he’d stopped to brew up. At first he thought it was the radio, but the shouting was persistent and urgent. It was coming from outside. Tom rushed to the front entrance, from where he could see Bob struggling with something over by the big oak tree.
He knew before he even got there that it was a body. Bob was frantically trying to support it, hoping that he wasn’t dead. It was too late, of course. Jacob had been dead for a couple of hours.
The boy’s face haunted Tom for several months afterwards – you should never have to see a child like that. The police came and the body was removed; the news was broken to the youngsters inside the home and a terrible darkness descended over them.
Several young people knew why Jacob had done what he’d done, so why did none of them speak? Gary had gathered them in the lounge to break the news. He’d actually managed to shed a tear for the benefit of the other staff. David wanted to kill him.
There were questions, a full investigation, caring social workers, counsellors, the lot, but not one of them walked away with the information that could have explained and rectified it all: Gary Maxwell was a bullying and manipulative monster and he was making their lives a living hell. The younger children liked Gary, but he was grooming them for later, making sure they were ready. He only began to intimidate them when they moved on to secondary school. That’s when things changed. They didn’t know. How could they? Every word that came out of his mouth helped to weave a web of control around them.
Tom saw snatches of this. He was not party to confidential chats, but he could observe from afar. He knew that David was taking antidepressants. A kid of his age, on antidepressants. He’d lost his best friend, of course he was bereft, but drugs? Who was looking out for these kids?
Tom had watched as Meg and David grew closer. It didn’t exclude Hannah, but there was something else there. A craving in David for love, that’s what he put it down to. What must it be like for those kids to have nobody to hug them? He tried to guide David to talk to Bob, but he couldn’t intervene, he was only a caretaker. He knew the staff, but he was deferential to them; he would never dare to speak his mind. He was there to change light bulbs and fix plugs. It was not his place to advise on the children.
The first thing Tom knew about Bob’s departure was movement in the entrance hall. People were looking out of windows, checking to confirm that Bob had actually done what they’d thought – he had left after a blazing row with Gary. There were hushed conversations among staff and children; nobody knew exactly what had happened. Everybody kept out of Gary’s way. He was furious. Tom averted his eyes and didn’t get involved. It was not his place to speculate about what had gone on.
Then it happened again. It was Tom who found the body this time. It was hanging from the same branch that Jacob had chosen. David had taken the same terrible way out as his young friend, copying his method exactly. Tom wept as he took the body down and checked for signs of life. Like Jacob, David was cold and dead and had been for hours. He’d planned it that way, using the cover of darkness to conceal his actions.
What could be making these wonderful young men so desperately unhappy? Why had these two boys taken their lives so violently? Tom wanted to scream these questions at Gary, but the adoption paperwork was progressing well, and he had high hopes that he and Mavis would be able to care for their own child before the year was out. Now was not the time to rock the boat.
Meg and Hannah were distraught at the loss of their friend. Tom didn’t see them for some time after David’s death, and it was only after everybody returned from his funeral that they came up to chat to him again.
‘Did David look at peace when you cut him down?’ Hannah asked. ‘Please tell me he looked like he’d found some peace.’
Tom lied. There was no way he was going to tell them what David’s body had looked like. Not their friend. They didn’t need to hear that.
‘He looked like he’d found the escape he was looking for,’ Tom replied quietly. He didn’t mention the bulging eyes and blue face.
Meg couldn’t speak to him, she was so upset. She’d always seemed a tough cookie to him, and he’d never seen her so distressed and vulnerable before. It was a few weeks later that he’d find out why, along with the rest of the staff, to their horror.
Before David killed himself he’d had enough time to make Meg pregnant. At the a
ge of only fourteen, Meg Stewart was pregnant with a dead boy’s child.
‘Shit, it’s time I lost some weight!’ came a voice from the darkness below.
‘Are you hurt?’
I was frantic. I could barely see a thing – it had to have been quite a fall if Alex had gone through the floorboards.
‘Only my dignity,’ she replied. ‘And I thought it couldn’t get any worse than when I appeared on CeleBritish Holidays. Turns out I was wrong!’
At least she was joking. I cautiously moved as close as I dared to the broken floorboards and peered down. I could see her lying on the floor, cushioned by boxes of old newspapers.
‘These broke my fall,’ Alex said, blinking in the glare of my flashlight. ‘It’s a bloody good job. It’s a stone floor down here.’
‘You sure you’re okay?’ I asked again. I couldn’t believe that she hadn’t broken anything. She tried to move.
‘Oh shit. I’ve hurt my ankle. Sprained I think, not broken. God, that hurts!’
‘I’m going to work out how to get to you. Do you need an ambulance or anything? How bad is it?’
‘Just a shoulder to lean on – please don’t call an ambulance. If the local press get a whiff of TV presenter Alex Kennedy falling on her arse in an abandoned building, we’ll never get them off our tail. Come down here to give me some support, if you can. I’ll be okay.’
‘Find your phone, I’m coming down.’
It was too dark in the cellar to leave Alex without any light, but once she’d found her phone I could use my own flashlight to illuminate my path.
I trod warily on the floorboards. Alex’s accident had made me doubt the safety of the building. Perhaps we’d been a bit gung ho sneaking in – there were plenty of warnings, after all.
I moved along the corridor, looking into the rooms as I passed them, and eventually reached the door leading down to the cellar. It took some opening – all of the woodwork was swollen with damp. Behind the door was a steep wooden staircase. No wonder they’d closed the building down. No health and safety legislation would let kids anywhere near stairs like that. I gingerly placed my weight on the first step. The woodwork creaked, but seemed to be sturdy. I heard a rustle below.
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