OPERATOR "Thank you, Sophia. Now, listen there are some police officers on their way to your house now, so you just stay on the phone talking to me until they get to you, okay? Then you must let them come in. Okay, lovey? You understand that?"
SOPHIA "Yes, okay. But she"s dead. I think she must be. [Pauses.] She"s fallen down the stairs, I think, and there"s blood. She"s very cold."
The unemotional nature of the typewritten transcript made the facts seem, if anything, more chilling. I read to the end of the conversation with the operator, and tried to imagine how it must feel to take such a call.
The report then went on to describe the scene. It said that officers had found two young girls in school uniform downstairs in the property. At the foot of the stairs they found Grace Johnson lying unconscious, with a head wound. Breathing was shallow, her pulse was weak and she had suspected fractures to two limbs. Paramedics had apparently arrived at 08.30, and she had been taken to nearby St Luke"s Hospital. An empty container labelled as containing diazepam had been found on the table by Ms Johnson"s bed.
The report went on to say that both girls had been questioned about when they had last seen Ms Johnson, and Sophia had told them that she"d last seen her at 7.30 the previous evening. She"d gone in to kiss her mother good-night as she"d told Sophia she was ill and needed to go to sleep. Caitlyn had said that she hadn"t seen Ms Johnson at all, neither the previous evening nor that day. When asked if she had heard anything the noise of a fall in the night Sophia had started to cry, and apparently told the police officer, "She told me she"d do this." A family liaison officer had apparently then arrived at 08.50, and taken both the girls back to headquarters.
"G.o.d," I said to John, once I"d finished reading the report. "Set out like this ... well, it really brings it home to you, doesn"t it? What sort of a state must Sophia have been in?"
"That"s not all of it," he said. "If you turn over you"ll see that there"s more. The pills had been taken by Grace, some time before the fall, and then a few pages on it says that apparently when Sophia is told her mum is still alive she acts really strangely, just shrugging and saying, "She"ll probably die, though, right?" They question her again, following that, because they suspect she knows more than she"s letting on. At the next interview, however, she refuses to speak at all, and in the end they put it down to her being in shock about what appears to be her mother"s attempted suicide.
"This is mad," said Mike. "How come we never knew anything about this? How come social services weren"t onto this? Seems pretty clear to me that the police thought there was a question mark hanging over the whole thing!"
John gave Mike a long look. "You know what I think?" he said. "My gut instinct? My hunch is that n.o.body wanted to go there, so no one asked. Attempted suicide or accident. Case closed. It wasn"t that difficult for me to get hold of this, in the end. Two phone calls. That was all. And here it is."
"But that"s terrible," I said, once again revisiting the notion that we might have a would-be murderer in our midst.
"And what do you think, John?" Mike added pointedly. "It doesn"t seem as though much was done as far as the police were concerned. They just accepted it, did they? That Sophia"s mother did it to herself? That was that?"
"I know, Mike," John answered. "I"m with you, mate. It"s down as a probable suicide attempt, and, as I said, the case has been closed." He pushed another file across the table. "But there"s also a psychiatric evaluation in there that you both might like to read, which seems fairly unequivocal that Sophia didn"t try to kill her mother. But read it yourselves. I think you"ll reach the same conclusion as me that whatever did or didn"t happen, this child should never have been just farmed out to foster care without some sort of proper psychological support in place. It beggars belief, really, that she was just given to us to you two without everyone concerned knowing the full facts."
"You"re certainly right there," Mike agreed. He turned to me. "And it"s at least rea.s.suring to know that the consensus seems to be that she"s not about to kill us in our beds, eh, love?"
He smiled. But it was entirely without humour.
John had been right. Reading the psychiatric report had been illuminating. And once again, it seemed crazy that this child had been with us for almost four months, and we"d only just clapped eyes on this stuff.
After it was established that Sophia"s mother"s injuries meant she was unlikely to ever recover consciousness, Sophia herself had been offered counselling. By now she was living with her uncle and his wife, and it seemed all the rest of the family had been for sessions too. There had been a rift in the family from the outset, as John had already told us, the grandparents Grace"s parents having disowned her. But it seemed that this wasn"t just because they resented her existence it was because they really did believe that if it hadn"t been for Sophia, Grace would never have been driven to try and kill herself. Indeed, the grandmother, apparently, was still unconvinced that Sophia hadn"t pushed her down the stairs. The uncle, as we already knew, had strongly refuted this, causing a breakdown in relations between the various factions, the grandparents disowning their granddaughter at that point and also breaking off contact with their son.
From what the report said, Sophia herself seemed to get little from the counselling. Initially, it seemed she had on a couple of occasions "confessed" to an attempted murder, but the psychiatrist felt strongly that this was not the case. She had issues around the difficulties in her relationship with her mother, and he felt these "confessions" were actually more attention seeking that cry for help and fuelled by both guilt and distress. It seemed she felt totally responsible for her mother wanting to die her very existence being the cause of her mum"s unhappiness. The report concluded that this const.i.tuted an ongoing problem, as it was something that could never now be fixed.
"And we"ll never know now, will we? Not really," I said to Mike. "That"s the crux of it. We"ll never know what was going through Grace"s mind at any point. How she felt about her daughter, whether she loved her at all. Oh, the poor, poor child. It"s just so sad, Mike. And shame on those grandparents. Shame on them."
We were reading independently, Mike pa.s.sing the sheets to me as he finished them. He nudged me now. "Hey, and look at this," he said. He handed me another piece of paper. This was something that had been recorded by the police too, it looked like: a separate handwritten account, following up an abuse allegation. But it wasn"t what I expected something to do with Grace"s boyfriends. It was an allegation made against Sophia"s uncle.
Sophia had told a school friend, by all accounts, that he"d been touching her inappropriately, and the school friend had alerted their teacher. It had then been investigated, clearly, but the case had been dropped. There was no evidence, and he had apparently denied it from the outset. I looked at the date; this would have been a good while after she"d moved in with them just a couple of months before she"d gone into care. There was no mention of what Sophia might or might not have said about it. But did that even matter now? The damage had been done.
"No wonder," I said to Mike. "No wonder he didn"t keep her."
"And it makes you think, doesn"t it? About just how vulnerable we really are. What d"you think, Case?"
"I don"t know what to think now, love. And that"s the honest to G.o.d truth. On the one hand, it makes me think about all the things she told me about her mother"s boyfriends, but at the same time ... well, the way she"s been with you, and especially Kieron ..."
"Well, I know what I think. I think it"s like you said to me before. She"s in a mess. She hates herself. She"s lashing out. Asking for trouble ..."
"And clearly getting it. She might have had a chance with the uncle, mightn"t she?"
"But then again, if he did touch her ..."
"Do you believe that? I don"t." I stood up. My back was aching. "I need a coffee and a cigarette. And you don"t either, do you? Tell you what, though it makes not a jot of difference really, does it? Whether it"s true or in her head, it"s no b.l.o.o.d.y wonder she"s in a mess. And she is this isn"t the stuff of spoilt brats or badly behaved teenagers. This is actually scary, don"t you think?"
Mike stood too. "You"re telling me, love. And it"s not like we"re doctors. Should we really be continuing to be involved in all this? I mean, if it"s going to take time to place her, do we really want to keep her in the meantime? And "place her"? With who, exactly? If not us, who else? I don"t know, love. I think we might just have to pull out of this one ..."
"But we can"t, Mike. I don"t think I could have that on my conscience. What kind of damage might we do if we shipped out on her as well?"
"Love, this is way beyond our job description, it really is. Just think about it, is all I"m saying. Think about all of us in this."
And I did. I thought of all of us, and how much of a toll this was taking. I worried about Mike and I worried about Kieron, especially. Was it fair of me to put this complicated child"s needs before theirs?
I was still wrestling with my responsibilities as I went to bed that evening. Little did I know that, within less than a week, the problems we"d had so far would fade into insignificance.
Chapter 18.
"Sophia, love. Come on! It"s time to get up!"
It was Friday morning, the last day of school before Easter, and I was down in the kitchen putting eggs on for breakfast. All was suspiciously quiet upstairs. I tried again, this time heading up the stairs as I called to her. "Sophia! Come on! You"ll be late if you don"t move it!"
Once again, though, no answer was forthcoming.
Typical, I thought, as I trudged the rest of the way up to the landing. We"d already had words about school the night before, Sophia plaintively whining about having to go at all. "It"s the last day," she kept repeating. "No one bothers going in on the last day. There"s no point. We don"t actually do anything."
But I"d been adamant, just as I"d always been with my own two. "I don"t care what everyone else does," I told her firmly. "You are going to school and that"s that."
I"d had no hint that she"d do anything but accept that when I"d woken, my alarm going off at 7 a.m. as usual, and hers at her regular time of 7.15. That was generally my cue to get up. While she went and showered I"d go down and start breakfast, and while she dressed and got ready I"d invariably nip out into the conservatory for a quick cup of coffee and a cigarette. Today, it being so mild, I"d taken both into the garden, relishing the peace and solitude only Bob kept me company and enjoying five uninterrupted minutes to myself. It was a beautiful spring morning and the sun was already shining, sending dappled shade through the pink bower of my blossom tree.
But this morning, when I"d come back into the kitchen, she hadn"t appeared. I reached her bedroom door now. "Sophia," I said, knocking. "You awake, love?"
Not getting an answer, and feeling the first tinge of worry about her Addison"s, I turned the handle and opened the door. She was lying in bed, the duvet pulled right up under her chin, but she wasn"t asleep far from it. She looked very much awake. Awake and looking stonily right through me.
"Sophia!" I said, shocked. "What on earth are you playing at! Have you seen the time? Come on, love. Up!"
"I told you last night," she replied, her tone sullen. "I won"t be getting up, because I"m not going to school."
I almost laughed out loud at her insolence, her complete conviction in the matter. "And I told you, young lady, that you are going to school," I said. "Now stop playing silly beggars and go and jump in that shower. Come on, or you"re going to be late."
She sat up in bed then, and flicked her blonde hair behind her. Then raised her arm and jabbed a finger in my direction.
"You don"t tell me what to do," she said. "I thought I made that clear last night. Now get out of here, little woman, and next time you want to come in here, kindly wait to be invited, okay?"
I don"t know if it was that "little" or just the jaw-dropping cheek of her, but I felt as furious as I"d felt in a long time. A 13-year-old, barking orders, in my house?
I don"t think so! I thought, as I raised my own finger. All the outbursts, her instability, our fears for her sanity notwithstanding, this statement sounded like nothing more complicated than the petulant, bare-faced defiance of a spoilt adolescent. "Don"t you dare speak to me like that!" I rounded on her. "Who the h.e.l.l do you think you are? Get out of that bed, right now, before I really lose my temper. Two minutes!" I marched out and slammed the door.
I needed to calm down, I realised, as I headed back downstairs again. Slamming doors was a teenager"s department, not mine. But Jesus! This girl would try the patience of a saint!
Almost as if on cue, then, I heard the door slam again, and turned to see her coming down the stairs behind me, her face contorted, her eyes wild, her whole demeanour scary.
"You f.u.c.king b.i.t.c.h!" she screamed at me. "You ugly f.u.c.king b.i.t.c.h! I"m going to f.u.c.king kill you when I get my hands on you!"
I was shocked to the core now, but some instinct seemed to kick in and instead of continuing to the bottom I turned and, facing her now, spoke clearly and calmly. "I suggest that you stop right there, Sophia," I told her. "Think about your next move and what its consequences might be." I licked dry lips. "I think you know I"m not joking now."
I stood my ground, but I knew I was out of my depth here. I had never encountered such a venomous outburst. I"d come across violence and threats many times from kids over the years Justin, early on, had even threatened me with a kitchen knife. But there was something about Sophia that felt in a different league. I knew I had to tread carefully here, for my own protection as much as her sanity.
I was immensely relieved, then, to watch her turn and walk slowly back up the stairs. Perhaps, I thought gratefully, this would be the end of it.
It wasn"t. "I"m still not going to school," she said, back now on the landing. "You sad cow. Why don"t you just go and f.u.c.k yourself?"
Oh my G.o.d, I thought, as I mentally regrouped to respond to this. I knew I could walk away now, and that might be the best course, but I also knew that if I did, this scenario could get really ugly I felt Sophia was capable of anything right now, and I knew she was certainly not ready to concede. And if I let that happen, the monster inside her would have won. Which would simply confirm to her that she was indeed a monster. No, the hard course was the only course; I must a.s.sert my authority. Take control. She had nothing to attack me with here, after all.
I walked back up the stairs again, never taking my eyes from her. And it was then that it occurred to me that my position was quite precarious. Three steps lower than her, Sophia literally towered over me. "Sophia, love," I said quietly. "Let"s just calm down and stop this silliness, shall we? You know full well it"s wrong to speak to adults like that, don"t you? Come on, love. What"s brought this on?"
She looked down at me and laughed. It went through me. "Do you know what a silly little woman you are?" she spat at me. "You don"t get it, do you? If I don"t want to do something, what the h.e.l.l do you think you can do about it?"
I felt the anger surge again in me and fought to press it down. "Look," I said. "I"ve had just about enough of this now. You"re the child, I"m the grown-up." I paused so she could digest this. "Now b.l.o.o.d.y well get dressed before I dress you myself. Do not underestimate me, Sophia!"
What happened next was all a blur but will remain with me for ever. Because, sudden though it was, it all seemed to happen in slow motion. One minute I was preparing to take a step and march her back to her bedroom, and the next I saw her grin and it was a grin of pure malevolence as she raised her hand and shoved me in the chest.
I was falling now, and instinctively tried to grab something. Flailing wildly, I was able to wrap my hand around the banister, but such was the force of her hand slamming into me that in doing so I was violently twisted around, which arrested my fall to the bottom of the staircase, but wrenched my arm and slammed me hard against the wall.
From there I could only look on in shocked horror as her hand flew to her mouth and she let out a shriek. "Oh my G.o.d!" she started screaming at me. "Oh, my G.o.d, Casey, I"m so sorry! I"m so sorry! What have I done? Oh my G.o.d!"
She ran back into her room then, still shouting apologies, and I could hear her huge convulsive sobs even as I stumbled back downstairs.
Right away, listening to her, I was in my own turmoil. What had I done wrong? What could I have done differently to defuse things? What other course of action should I have considered in all this that might have had a less d.a.m.ning outcome? I was all too aware of what could have happened. Had my fingers not managed to get a grip on that banister, I could be lying on the hall floor right now, badly hurt.
Or worse ... I thought of Grace and swallowed. I realised I was shaking, so I reached for my cigarettes and cold coffee, and, almost on autopilot, went back into the garden. I wasn"t sure what to do next. Didn"t have a clue, in fact. My head was empty. All I could think of was my own uselessness, my own complete lack of foresight in going back up those stairs, my lack of memory about the demons that must haunt Sophia about what happened to her own mother, how her losing control and its subsequent consequences would surely colour everything now. G.o.d, I thought. This was terrible. Why was I failing so badly with this girl?
I started crying then, crying at the contrast of my warm sunny garden with what had happened, in my own home, just minutes before. I pinched my cheeks in an effort to stop myself weeping, trying to re-channel my emotions down a less self-pitying route. But I felt wretched. What kind of a foster carer was I if I couldn"t control a girl who"d just turned 13?
I didn"t hear Sophia when she came through the conservatory, but as I rubbed at my cheeks angrily and puffed furiously on my cigarette, there she was, suddenly, all dressed for school.
"Right, I"m off now," she said, her expression still hard-faced and angry. I wasn"t sure if she was spoiling for further conflict. I wasn"t.
"Good," I said. "Go. We will speak about this later."
She turned on her heel then and stalked back inside, slamming each door she went through, one by one. First the gla.s.s conservatory door, which rattled in its frame alarmingly, then the kitchen door bang then the front door, a loud thud. It was only when I heard that, that I left my safe haven. I needed more coffee a very big mug of coffee. I felt like I"d gone five rounds with Mike Tyson.
It was still early much too early to hope to get hold of John Fulshaw but I needed to speak to someone, two someones, in fact. I first called Riley, who I knew would be up and about with Levi, and then Mike, who"d had an early start, and might by now be on a break at work. Both were understandably concerned and also furious, and both wanted to come straight home and check I was okay.
I held them off, though, grateful as I was for my family. There was no point in either of them rushing home to me. The storm had pa.s.sed now. Its perpetrator had gone to school, and the house was now empty. I"d just needed to vent my feelings, that was all.
It was John I needed really, so I could log this latest incident, and once it was past nine I dialled his number. I must be his favourite caller, I mused ironically, as I listened to the ring tone. Always calling him with bad news, these days. Never good. Even so, I couldn"t help feeling a surge of irritation at getting his answerphone. Had he known it was me? I also hated talking to the wretched things at the best of times, and this was definitely not the best of times. I left what probably sounded like a very garbled message, finishing with a heartfelt request that he ring me back.
Right, I thought, that done, now you have to cheer up, Case. So I flicked the switch on the kettle at times like this, you couldn"t ever have too much coffee and ramped the volume on the radio up to max. Then I turned it down just a little, so I could still hear the phone, and forced myself to sing along to the Three Degrees.
And after around fifteen minutes the phone did indeed ring. a.s.suming it would be John, I ran to get it.
But it wasn"t john. It was Edith Thomas, the school nurse.
"Mrs Watson?" she said. "I"m so sorry to bother you, but we need you to come to school as soon as you can."
I listened, dumbstruck. What now? Silly question. "We"ve called an ambulance," she was saying. "But if you could come as soon as possible, we"d appreciate it. We think Sophia has had some sort of collapse. She"s unconscious ..."
"Oh, Christ," I said. "I"ll be there as soon as I can. You do have the emergency kit in school, though, so ..."
"Yes, we know," she said patiently. "But there"s no one here who can administer it. It must be either you or a paramedic."
Why? I thought. Why? Suppose I"d been unavailable? Would they have just sat there and done nothing? G.o.d! Where were the protocols for this? Surely they could give it! I mentally re-focused. This wasn"t the time to row with her. Hopefully the ambulance would beat me anyway. "Okay," I said. "Ten minutes, okay?"
As I raced upstairs to dress I was still in my pyjamas I couldn"t shift the nagging doubt that had lodged in my mind. She"d caved in so easily, in the end, after all. Still angry, yes, but at least she"d gone to school. Was this development just a tactic, of the kind Kieron had mentioned, to draw attention from what she"d already done?
I was dreading the thought of injecting her. I"d got away with it the last time, but would I strike lucky again? I just had this sense that my luck had run out. I wasn"t a nurse or a doctor, and I was terrible with needles, but I just knew I would have to do it, that the buck stopped right here. With all this in my mind I was beginning to feel completely frazzled. And even more so when I pulled into the school car park to find no rea.s.suring ambulance was already parked. Please just get here, I thought, as I ran down the school corridor to the medical room and Sophia. Please, please just get here.
Chapter 19.
Sophia was lying face down on the medical bench, her face turned to one side and her cheek pressed against the mattress. There was a teacher sitting beside her, one I didn"t recognise, who was rhythmically stroking her hair back from her brow. Her eyes were closed. She did indeed look as if she might be unconscious, but, equally, she could have just been asleep.
Nearby, Edith, the school nurse, was standing with a clipboard, writing notes. She looked up as I entered. "Ah, Casey," she said smiling a weak, troubled smile. "Sorry to have to ruin your morning like this, but it looks as though we are going to need you to inject Sophia with her medicine. She"s been like this for a good ten minutes now."
The ten minutes it had taken me to get there, in fact. I looked closely at Sophia. I felt sure I could see her mouth twitch. The trace of a smile, perhaps? I just couldn"t seem to shift the idea that this was all part of an elaborate grand plan. I felt like a puppet having my strings jerked.
"Oh, dear," I said, frowning at Edith. "I"d hoped the paramedics would have been here by now. You know I"ve never done anything like this before, don"t you?"
"You"ll be fine," she soothed. "There"s nothing to it, really there isn"t."
Then why couldn"t she do it, then? I thought crossly, even though I already knew the answer. I fumbled in the emergency bag, my fingers beginning to quiver, and prepared the syringe as I"d been shown to. I then took one last hopeful glance through the still open medical room door, willing the paramedics to come belting down the corridor and save me. But there was nothing. Nope! I thought, trying to still the shakes. You"re on your own.
I took a deep breath, to steady myself. This really wasn"t complicated. All that was required was for me to jab the needle into her leg and to push the plunger till the contents had gone in. Simple, at least in theory. But, in practice, still quite difficult. It was all I could do not to close my eyes as I jabbed the needle into her just the idea of wilfully sticking a needle into another person felt wrong, even though I well knew how silly I was being.
I winced as I pushed on the plunger to deliver the vital hydrocortisone, and then sighed as I heard the sound of boots in the corridor. Typical, I thought. The paramedics had arrived now. I pulled the needle out of Sophia"s thigh just as they entered the room.