A Stolen Childhood (25 page)

‘I know,’ I said. ‘I just hate feeling like this. It’s like this big cloud is sitting over my head and won’t go away. I need a holiday, Mike. Somewhere, hot and dry and warm and entirely cloud-free.’

He rubbed his hand vigorously across the top of my head. ‘There,’ he said. ‘Gone. So now you can snap out of it and stop wallowing in self-pity.’

He nearly got a dig in the ribs for that, but I resisted. Instead I sighed. ‘Mike, I’m not
wallowing
, I’m just upset! How can anyone do this job and
not
get upset? I’m serious, I don’t know if this job’s really for me. This thing with Kiara’s really brought it home to me. It’s just so emotionally draining.’

Mike snorted in derision. ‘Casey, you’ve been moving towards a job like this for as long as I’ve known you. Of
course
it’s for you. You’re good at it and, trust me, you
will
get over it. Bloody hell, love, have you forgotten all the trials of the other kids you’ve had? Each and every one of them had some horrible past or present.’

‘I know,’ I said, ‘but this is
different
. Almost all the others, so far, are still
in
our school. I get to know the ending. And most of them are relatively happy endings, too. This just feels so unfinished, and it makes me feel … oh, I don’t know how to describe it … Yes I do, actually. Bloody empty.’

I hauled myself up to a sitting position, tipping him off the sofa in the process. ‘Look,’ I know you’re right,’ I said, as I helped him back up. ‘I know I have to buck up and shut up. I’m just tired, that’s all. Tired and emotional. Perhaps I just need an early night, that’s all. And a holiday,’ I added, just to press my point home.

He headed off to the kitchen then, and returned clutching half a bottle of red wine we’d had left over from the previous weekend, and two glasses. ‘Here we are,’ he said, placing the glasses on the coffee table and uncorking the bottle. ‘I had a thought. Perhaps that’s it. Perhaps you’re not quite tired and emotional
enough
.’ He handed a glass to me. ‘Here, this’ll sort you out.’

Though it never seemed like a bright idea to deal with stress at work by necking wine of an evening, one glass does not an alcoholic make, obviously, and I slept like a baby that night. And though it was something of a struggle having to explain Kiara’s disappearance to the remaining three members of my current ‘team’, by the end of the day I was feeling much brighter.

Chloe was, as could have been predicted, inconsolable, but, like me, as the day wore on (and helped enormously by Kelly ‘needing’ her to help her with the big display board we were making for the end-of-year assembly) even she had managed to dry her copious tears. Life moved on and, somehow, we all had to adjust to it, safe in the knowledge that Kiara was now in the best place.

And now it was Monday, the first day of our week in school, and there was much to be grateful for.

‘Miss, miss, we’re back home!’ was Tommy’s excited greeting as I walked up to the school entrance that morning. He’d obviously come to school early and had been waiting outside for me. He looked happier than he had in a long time. ‘And guess what,’ he continued as he fell into step beside me, doing the hop-skip-and-jump I invariably had to do with Gary. ‘Mr Clark has only gone and given me mum a big bag of brand new school uniform for me for next term. I’m gonna look well dapper, aren’t I, miss?!’

Ha!
I thought. Gary Clark, the old softie. It was usually me that scavenged through all the best second-hand uniform for my Unit kids, and Gary Clark telling me off for being over-generous.

‘Did he indeed?’ I replied, filing that nugget away for future reference, ‘and yes, Tommy, I bet you will look dapper as well. Oh, I’m so happy for you and your mum and sisters, I really am. So you’re back in the same house as you were before?’

It seemed the answer was yes, which restored my faith in the powers that be, for it also seemed as if the restraining order that had been slapped on his step-father was working, in that if he so much as went within ‘like, a
mile
of us!’, as Tommy put it, he would find himself hot-footing it to jail. And it seemed he had heeded the warning. He’d apparently gone back down south and left the family in peace.

Of course you could never say never, and I didn’t doubt Tommy’s mum still felt scared. But she obviously felt secure enough to stay put, rather than flee again, and that was the best news I could have heard.

And not just for Tommy – for me as well.

‘I’m so glad,’ I told him as I unlocked my classroom door. ‘So even when you move to mainstream classes full time again, I’ll still be able to get my Tommy fix here and there.’

He grinned. ‘I’m like your coffee, ain’t I, miss? Like your caffeine fix!’

‘You could be right,’ I agreed, sweeping his fringe back from his eyes. I’d changed my mind. It would be a shame to cut that hair.

It would be a shame to say goodbye to him as well – to all of them, in fact. Which meant ends of terms were often particularly emotional times for me, as they often formed natural points on the calendar where a child would move on from the Unit. So despite my resolve to toughen up I knew it would end in tears. Not tears born out of major trauma, God willing, but tears even so.

And they began good and early, first thing on the Wednesday morning, when Jonathan’s foster parents came into school with him, to see me – apropos, apparently, of nothing.

‘We hoped you wouldn’t mind,’ Jenny, his foster mum, told me once I’d ushered them into Gary’s office. ‘Only we just wanted to put a face to a name, really. Jonathan’s told us so much about you, and how he’s loved his time with you, and we’re so pleased to meet you at last, we really are.’

‘It’s been so helpful for us at home,’ Richard, his foster dad, added. ‘His behaviour is so much better since he’s been in your Unit, and he’s really come out of his shell these past few weeks.’ He smiled a smile that spoke volumes – of relief, was my hunch. ‘We’re starting to see the real Jonathan now,’ he added, taking his hand and squeezing it. ‘And it’s lovely.’

Seeing Jonathan hold that hand said it all, really. I thanked them both but pointed out that it wasn’t really my doing. ‘I really can’t take the credit for any of that,’ I said, looking at Jonathan, and knowing the hard work would begin in September when he was back in the fray. ‘It’s this young man here who’s done all the hard work. He’s made some firm friends and he’s been a real pleasure to have. He’s a credit to the both of you, he really is.’

I watched them both swelling with pride and I wondered about them. Wondered quite how it must feel to accept a child into your life and bring them up. What must that
feel
like? It must be difficult, I decided – a job not for the faint-hearted – as there would be no physical or emotional bond in place, no foundations to build on either, no instinctive imperative to love and to cherish; how did it feel when they lashed out, pushed you away, defied you, withdrew from you? How did you go from the one place – having a hurting, angry child plopped down in your midst – to the obvious warmth, love and affection I saw before me now? I thought of the Beatles song. Was love really all you needed?

I didn’t know, but as I waved them off, Jonathan’s hand now in mine, I felt a great rush of respect for them, and also quite tearful. I needed to get a grip on myself, clearly.

There was little or no hope for me come Thursday, however, so I just surrendered myself; I had two six-packs of tissues and what would be would be. The Thursday was the day of our whole school end-of-year assembly – the assembly that everybody loved over all other kinds of assembly. The one where the oldest children, the ones who were leaving us, were very much the stars of the show. This was all about their achievements, the giving out of awards, the teachers standing up to say their various bits and pieces (through veils of tears, obviously) and, usually at this point, they would endear themselves to their pupils even more, by larking about, being generally silly and un-teacherish. Mike Moore would then ramp up the emotional temperature by making one of his fabled ‘farewell and good luck’ speeches and, though I’d only been at the school for a short while, comparatively, I could tell from watching those who had been there for years and years that it never got any easier to sit through without weeping.

But for all the crying, it was also the happiest of assemblies, with no boring rules being read out, no pupils being singled out for detentions and no talk of lessons and homework. Instead each year group always put on a bit of a performance; usually a song, poem, dance or drama presentation, which soon had everyone’s hands red raw from all the clapping.

I was at just such a point, an hour into the assembly, when I was astonished to see Kelly Vickers – who’d inexplicably disappeared from beside me a few minutes back – mounting the stage, followed by Chloe, Tommy and Jonathan. What the hell?

I was bemused not least because we hadn’t actually prepared anything. What with everything that had been going on during the last weeks of term, it had kind of disappeared into the ‘maybe next time’ pit.

But apparently not. ‘The children from Mrs Watson’s Unit have been working really hard this term,’ Kelly was saying, ‘and we’d all like to celebrate the end of year by reciting a poem that the kids have worked really hard on. I also need to tell you that this is a surprise for Mrs Watson.’ She grinned over at me here. ‘We all kept it a
big
secret, so without further ado, I give you … Chloe, Jonathan and Tommy!’

There was a huge cheer, and heads all around the hall swivelled to smile at me. I reached for my tissues, realising how wily my assistant was – all that sending me away and telling me not to hurry back. It all made perfect sense now. I pulled a second tissue from the pack. I was going to need another of them and fast. How on earth had they managed this, I wondered, catching their eyes, taking in their beams of pure enjoyment. Taking in Jonathan’s slight nervousness, Tommy’s proud, puffed-out chest, Chloe’s air of slight bewilderment at quite what she was doing up there, in front of so many people all at once. And then they began, crystal clear and in perfect unison.

It’s not that we are naughty kids, it’s not like that at all,

The Unit is our place to learn, a place we can walk tall.

We don’t get bullied and we don’t feel sad, we work there and we play,

We learn to cope with everything and we’d just like to say …

We’re ready now to go to class, and we know that we’ve improved,

But sorry, miss, we’re staying with you and we shall not be moved!

The cheer that went up then was uproarious. But it seemed they weren’t quite done.

Of course we
know
we have to move, it’s time for us to go,

We just want to say thank you, miss, and that we’ll miss you so.

Needless to say, the next bit was a blur. Literally. I was dripping with tears; an emotional wreck. All I remember with any clarity – well, in visual terms, anyway – was Kelly returning to her seat moments later and that, unable to speak due to the lump in my throat, I just did the most unladylike thing I could do. I punched her in the thigh.

And I knew I’d be okay.

Epilogue

I did talk Mike into booking that holiday and, as fate would have it, our fortnight in Menorca marked a watershed for us, being the last family holiday for just the four of us. Boyfriends, girlfriends and other exciting developments put paid to that, but, as any parent will probably attest, in a good way.

As for the children from school, well of course I went back after the holidays ready to face my new challenges, and happily I got to see Chloe, Jonathan and Tommy almost every day. They were back in mainstream classes and each of them went on to do really well. Chloe and her mum got the support they so badly needed, and they thrived on it. So much so that it was decided to hold off looking for a new specialist school for Chloe, particularly when Mrs Jones started to attend AA meetings and, finally, to everyone’s delight, stopped drinking. She said that she felt like she’d been woken from a very long sleep. Fingers crossed she doesn’t drift away again.

Jonathan continued to live with the Halls, and although he watched other foster children come and go, I found out recently that he remained with them until he was 18, and when he was old enough, he even got sponsored to go to work at Camp America for a full summer, where he assisted in outdoor activities for young people.

Tommy never changed, and I’m glad of it. He did go back to his lessons and he has definitely smartened up some, but his personality dictated that he would for ever be ‘class clown’; perhaps the legacy of so many moves and so many new kids to ‘get in’ with and impress, he just couldn’t help himself. Fortunately, however, all the teachers loved him and, bar our delightful Mr Hunt (more of whom later), went out of their way to keep him on the straight and narrow.

I never did hear anything more from Morgan. Her family moved on from that particular travellers’ site at the end of that summer, and could have ended up anywhere. And though she was only with us for a short time, I like to think she followed her dreams – and having met Granny Giles, I have no doubt whatsoever that her dad wouldn’t have been allowed to stand in her way.

As for Kiara, ah, how much she remained in my heart and on my mind. So much so that when a card was forwarded to me, just before the end of the summer holidays, I burst into tears all over again. I don’t know if she was prompted to write it – I liked to think not – but it was just to thank me and say she missed us and wish her friends in the Unit well, and it really meant the world to me.

And, despite her living in a different area and attending a new school, we did receive updates on Kiara’s progress fairly regularly, thanks mainly to Gary Clark and his ever-growing list of ‘contacts’. He was like a dog with a bone when it came to seeking answers and would pick up that phone every month or so to ask about her progress, just because, like me, what had happened to Kiara had shocked him to the core, despite having already worked for several years in child protection. To have one parent systematically abuse you was trauma enough, but to have two … well, I don’t think I’ll ever look at the phrase ‘out of the frying pan and into the fire’ in quite the same way.