by Frances Vick
‘You’re here,’ she said again.
‘I remember you, you’re the teacher! That teacher who came around a bit back. What the fuck are you doing here?’ Pete was walking towards her now, angry, red-faced. ‘What are you doing? Fucking spying on us?’
‘Lorna, is your head all right?’ Claire managed to push past Pete, grabbed Lorna by the shoulders, and gently checked her head. No blood. No cut. She seemed dazed though, she must be.
‘Her head?’ Pete laughed now, shakily. ‘How about you fuck off home and mind your own business?’
‘It is my business, if a child is being hurt.’ Claire veered towards a shriek. ‘It is my business . . .’
‘Miss, don’t. Please, don’t.’ Lorna was standing close now, holding her hand, tugging it, eyes pleading.
It IS my business! Claire tried to keep the fear and hysteria inside.
Pete strode to the doorway now, shouting for Nikki, and Lorna tugged, tugged, tugged at Claire’s arm. ‘Please, really. Just go. Nothing happened, really, nothing happened. I’m all right. Honest I am, I’m OK.’ The girl was leading her back to the door now, pushing her outside. ‘I’ll call you. I’ll be OK, really.’
‘Lorna, I have to call—’ said Claire shakily, and stopped. Call who? Who could she call?
Lorna looked over her shoulder to make sure no-one could hear her: ‘You’ll make it worse. It will get worse if you do that. Tell anyone.’
Pete was back now. ‘What’re you doing, hanging about? Spying on us? Live around here, do you? You’ve got something about the kid, have you? Fucking teachers. Why’re you so into Lorna anyway? I’ll report you.’
‘Miss, go. Get in your car,’ Lorna pleaded.
‘You don’t know what she’s like!’ Pete screamed.
‘Please, Miss! Go!’
‘Lorna!’ Claire cried, as she was being shoved into her car.
‘I’ll fucking tell you what she’s like!’ Pete was framed by the door, Nikki’s face, a pale moon, bobbed behind him. Lorna dashed past them both, and Pete slammed the door so hard that the cracked glass shuddered.
Claire sat, stunned, for long minutes. There was no sound from the house. No shouting, no screaming. No signs of violence. After half an hour, she was able to start the car. The sour taste of adrenaline stayed with her all the way home.
* * *
She sat up most of the night, thinking about what she’d witnessed. It was a miracle that the girl wasn’t cut, wasn’t concussed. It really was. But had it definitely been Lorna’s head smashed against the door? Well, of course it had. Who else’s?
She wrote a list of reasons for and against calling the police. But always, always, Lorna’s fear trumped action. It will get worse if I tell. It will get worse. And Claire, imagining what could be worse, didn’t pick up the phone, didn’t tell.
There was still some whisky in the kitchen. She poured herself a large glass and stalked through the house, clenching and unclenching her hands, loitering in Mother’s room, before dragging out the big suitcase from under the bed.
It was covered in a thin patina of dust. An airport tag was still tied to the handle, with Mother’s name written on it, and inside, it smelled of Chanel No. 5 and Imperial Leather soap. Claire brought her face close to the lining and inhaled, speaking to Mother in her mind. What should I do? What should I do? Help me! But Mother’s scent grew fainter and fainter, until it was indistinguishable from Claire’s own scent of fabric conditioner and herbal toothpaste and Mother wasn’t there. Mother couldn’t help.
The next day, when she drove by, she couldn’t see a crack in the door. Maybe it had been repaired already.
16
Christmas Day, and Claire was at Derek’s. Facing the ransacked carcass of the turkey, and the gaping mouth of Pippa’s mother, she reached for another glass of Liebfraumilch, or some other sweet, sticky wine that claimed to be good for the digestion. Pippa’s silent mother had already gone through most of the bottle. Gentle snores escaped her and her chin bobbed onto her gravy-stained chest. Throughout the lunch, Claire had managed to distract herself by following the conversation intently, showing excessive interest in Pippa’s aches and Derek’s prediction of a housing crash, but now that lunch was over, and there was relative quiet, her mind began to pace feverishly around the fixed point of Lorna. What sort of a Christmas would she be having? With that family?
Derek kept the whisky in the box room he pompously called his study. He might bring it out later; Claire hoped so. She was even willing to withstand his amused barbs. ‘Whisky? For the puritan? Better watch out, Claire, you’ll be having fun before you know it!’ If any evening needed spirits, it was this one.
‘Someone’s had her fill,’ chuckled Derek, nodding at his mother-in-law. ‘Pippa? Eh? Someone’s had her fill! Claire, top-up? Why not. Christmas. Give me your glass.’ Derek was slightly drunk. His shirt cuff trailed in gravy as he passed Claire her brimming glass. ‘Any more thoughts about work, Claire?’
‘I’m back in January.’
‘They’ll be desperate for you back, I’d say.’
‘I don’t know about that.’
‘Desperate, I’d say. You have a way with the horrors. Sometimes, when Pippa feels a bit low about our decision, I tell her, think of the mess, think of the expense. No free time. If you want kids, do a stint teaching, that’s what I say. That should change your mind!’
‘Oh, it’s a lovely job, Derek.’
‘I’m sure it is. Sure it is. But you get paid for it. That’s what I’ve said to Pippa. Claire gets paid for it. No money in motherhood, is there?’
‘Maybe there should be.’ Claire smiled. ‘If there was money in it, perhaps people would be better at it.’
‘Or have even more kids on the public teat. Kids, big screen TVs, fags, holidays. No. We should pay people not to have kids, that’s what I think. Send the sterilising wagons down the estates, a quick tube tie, and buy them off with an Xbox. That’s what I’d do!’
‘Oh Derek—’
‘Well, it’s a solution, isn’t it?’
‘A solution to what?’
‘A solution to the godawful mess this country’s got itself into. Oh, I know you think I’m some kind of – I don’t know – reactionary or something. But I’m a do-er, not a thinker. And that’s what we need more of, do-ers.’
‘I think you’re trying to get a rise out of me, Derek,’ smiled Claire.
‘Well, Claire, I am and I’m not. Come on now. You’ve worked with these kids year after year. You’ve seen what bad parenting has done to them. You know that they’ll end up making exactly the same mistakes. And on and on it goes. See that little smile? You know I’m right. You do, don’t you?’
‘I think that some families need more support—’
‘Support! They want locking up. That little lass the other day, killed by the family dog. Why on God’s green earth would a baby need a pit bull for a pet? And that little girl, the one in your school – Jane?’
‘Jade Wood.’
‘Jade, yes, that was it. Half-starved, and by her own parents!’ He shook his head.
Claire thought of Lorna. Lorna in her house full of dogs, and men, and the smell of chips and damp and dirt. There was no way of knowing how she was, if she was safe. The last two nights Claire had had terrible dreams: the dull, terrible thump of the child's head against the door, the eventual creaking shatter of the glass, and Lorna’s muted, painful grunt as her head appeared, eyes staring, from between the trembling shards. Her staying there, trapped, while Pete ranted, his red face just visible through the frame, and Claire, frozen, staring at the child’s blank eyes, unable to move, unable even to comprehend what she’d seen. That it hadn’t actually happened like that was pure luck; she’d intervened before Pete had managed to put Lorna’s head all the way through the glass. But what if she’d been too late? What if she hadn’t been there at all?
‘There, look, I’ve depressed you now. Sorry, Claire. Silly topic of conversation. At the end
of the day, people like you make all the difference. Caring. And I know you’re not a person of faith, but it’s God’s love you’re spreading.’
‘How much have you had to drink?’ Claire smiled.
‘Hand on heart, Claire, I’m a bit pissed. But I mean what I say. You’re a good woman. And here’s to you.’ He extended his glass unsteadily, wine slopping on his mother-in-law’s plate. ‘Any more booze in the fridge, Pip?’
Claire drank the rest of her wine in three gulps. ‘It is a hard job, Derek, though. Teaching. You can get very close to some of the kiddies, they can be so sweet and so trusting. There’s this one girl—’
‘Oh they’re sweet enough when they’re small, I’ll give you that. But before you know it you’ve got a great hulking adolescent mucking up the bathroom—’
‘—She’s ten now. And she’s taken a bit of a shine to me. And, yes she is one of those children from a bad family. You know, what you were saying, with the dogs and everything. And she tells me, not really tells me, but hints, you know, that things aren’t good at home. Not safe. And, and, well I’ve seen things myself. And the problem is Derek, that, well, I feel like I’m in over my head a little—’
‘Pippa? Any more wine in there?’
‘—And because she’s told me things in confidence, you know, I don’t know how I can go about telling the police or anyone without her losing confidence in me—’
‘Lots of girls have confidence issues. Until they turn into teenagers, and then it’s all miniskirts and sex.’
‘Not that kind of confidence, Derek. I mean trust. In me.’
Derek turned his clouded eyes to her. ‘But I do trust you, Claire. What a thing to say! Pip! Wine?’
* * *
After a disappointingly small whisky and a confusing game of Pictionary, Claire snuck upstairs to use the phone on the landing. She really ought to have a mobile. Lorna had told her to get one just a few weeks ago and she should have listened to her, then she could have gone outside and had a private chat without worrying about Derek blundering in and overhearing. The passive-aggressive sound of Christmas carols filtered out of the kitchen, as Pippa banged pans into the dishwasher and grumbled at the mess. Claire sat down on the floor and took a few deep breaths before she dialled Lorna’s number on Derek and Pip’s old rotary phone. Her nails dug into the deep pile of the carpet; adrenaline flooded her chest and stomach. An answer. Carl. Claire pictured his empty, pugnacious face, wondered if he’d think it odd that an unknown adult was calling his ten-year-old sister on Christmas Day, decided it was unlikely.
‘Is Lorna there?’ Claire spoke with a local accent.
‘Who?’
‘Is Lorna there?’ There was a silence. One of her nails snagged painfully in the carpet, broke, and she breathed quickly, shallowly, like a cornered animal, waiting for questions.
But Carl asked no questions. He’d dropped the phone on the floor. A curious dog, sniffing at the receiver, gave one, piercing, bark. And then, Lorna was there.
Relief made Claire’s head swim. It didn’t matter that she’d run a risk calling. It didn’t matter that Lorna sounded cold, hurt and distant. All that mattered was that she was there, at the other end of the line. She was there.
‘Happy Christmas, Lorna!’
‘Miss! Happy Christmas!’
‘Is everything all right?’
The girl made an evasive noise. Claire’s hand tightened on the receiver.
‘I’ve been reading,’ Lorna whispered. ‘Some of those books you gave me – Famous Five? I’ve been reading about the sea.’
There was a long silence. ‘We’ll go one day,’ Claire found herself saying.
‘We will? Mean it?’ The trembling eagerness in the girl’s voice was so welcome. ‘We’ll go? And swim in the sea? And have a picnic in a cave carpeted with pure white sand?’ She was back to her old self; whimsical, confiding. ‘And hire a sailboat. And ride bikes and have picnic lunches?’
‘Yes,’ Claire said again, the words out of her mouth before she could check them. ‘Yes. And, and – ice creams?’
‘Oooooh! Ice creams!’ Lorna giggled. ‘And ginger beer?’
‘Yes!’
‘What actually is ginger beer?’
‘It’s not like real beer. It’s pop, fizzy pop.’
‘Good. I don’t like real beer.’
There was another silence.
‘Lorna? Are you OK? What I said before, about the police—’
‘I can’t go to them. They’ll tell them I’m lying. Mum, and Pete, they always tell people I’m lying. And Pete’s in trouble with someone. With his ex-girlfriend. He says she wants to stop him seeing his kids. And if I tell anyone about what’s happening here, he’ll lose the court case and then he’ll kill me, I’m sure.’ All this was said in a breathless little rush.
‘What is happening there?’ Silence. ‘Lorna?’
‘He has pills,’ the girl whispered. ‘He puts them in Mum’s tea, and Carl’s sometimes, and they go to sleep. And then he can get to me. Are you OK, Miss?’
Claire closed her eyes and thought feverishly. This, THIS was concrete. This was something she could take to the police! And then she thought of PC Jones, friends – probably best friends – with Mervyn Pryce. Her report would mysteriously disappear, and Lorna would be made to suffer even more. She felt sick. ‘Yes, I mean no. But, I’m just so . . .’
‘Sorry for me? I know. That’s why I’ve always trusted you. That’s why I know you’ll look after me. I feel it. I speak to you in my head, like you’re meant to do with God. But I do it with you.’
‘Lorna—’
But the phone went suddenly dead. Claire frantically dialled again, but the line was engaged.
Cousin Derek took her pallor and long absence from the front room as proof of too much Christmas spirit. ‘Praying to the porcelain God, eh? Ask Pippa for some of her herbal tea. Camomile? Worked wonders for her when she had stomach flu. While you’re in there, can you have a scout about for the TV guide?’
* * *
Claire let herself back in the dark house, shivering with cold. She’d left the car at Derek’s – too much Liebfraumilch to drive – and had walked home, despite Derek’s admonishments – ‘Go back in the morning! We have the study – won’t take long to get the camp bed in there!’ – and despite Pippa’s raised eyebrows and pursed lips.
Riven with tension, she sat down at the kitchen table with a cup of tea, and tried to put her mind into some sort of order. She daren’t call again. Oh God, why had she left the car? It wasn’t as if she was really drunk. She could have driven past Lorna’s house, looking for signs of life . . . slept in the car if necessary . . . She put on her coat to walk back to Derek’s to collect it. But then realised they’d see her. Derek and Pippa were curtain-twitchers at the best of times; someone starting a car in their quiet cul-de-sac on Christmas night would be sure to arouse their interest. And once they realised it was Claire, she’d never hear the end of it – ‘You storm off and then don’t have the decency to pop back and say goodbye properly? After all Pippa’s hard work?’ She shuddered. And then, what if, while she was out, Lorna did call? Or even came over, cold, frightened, injured maybe, and found no-one home, no-one to take care of her? No, no. Best just to sit tight here. Sit tight and wait.
17
Lorna did arrive, shivering, that evening. She still wore her school shoes with no socks, but now had a hoodie over her pyjamas. She said she’d walked the whole way. That was all she said.
Claire put some more wood on the fire, brought down a quilt, and wrapped it around the child, who stared quietly at the TV, ignoring Claire’s timid questions. After a while, she stopped shaking, and allowed Claire to take off her shoes, run her a bath. While she soaked, Claire pressed her lips together into a hard white line, and cried, silently, behind the door so that Lorna wouldn’t see her.
After half an hour, Lorna got out of the bath like a somnambulist, wide-eyed and slow, accepted the too-big robe, an
d sat in front of the fire, letting Claire brush her hair. The robe slipped down, and Claire could see more bruises – older, and faded to yellow – on the nape of her neck and shoulders. When Lorna silently allowed herself to be dressed in one of Claire’s shirts, what could be a half-healed bite revealed itself on one buttock. Claire, blushing, holding back tears, gave her some leggings to put on, the waistband cinched in with a safety pin. She sang half-remembered lullabies to her, brushed her hair until it dried, and kept on brushing it until it crackled with electricity. They sat together, staring at the flames. Time ticked.
‘It’s not fair,’ whispered the girl. ‘It’s not fair.’
‘No, it isn’t.’
‘When I was little. Smaller. When I was little, I had a made-up friend. When I closed my eyes, she would come and wrap her arms around me and take me away.’
‘Where did you go?’
‘We went to the clouds. We went where there wasn’t anybody. Just me and her.’ Claire tightened her hold around Lorna’s waist. ‘And when we were together, I was happy. But it only worked sometimes. Did you have a friend? Someone made up like that? Or real?’
‘I had Mother, I suppose. She was my best friend,’ Claire murmured.
‘That’s what a mum should be.’
‘Yes.’
‘Did she take you places?’ Lorna asked.
‘We went to the seaside.’ Claire’s voice was dreamy, sleepy. ‘We went to Cornwall.’
‘And were there lots of people there?’
‘No. Not many. Not where we went.’
‘Were you safe there? And happy?’ Lorna whispered.
‘I was. We were.’
‘Will—’ and then Lorna stopped.
‘Will?’
‘Will you always be my friend?’
‘Yes,’ said Claire, slowly, dreamily. ‘I will always be your friend.’
‘Will you – not – ask me questions. Too many? And no more police. You can’t tell them. Ever.’