Death Sentence (4 page)

The guy looked warily up at him and then down to the photo Matthew held out in front of him. Perusing it for a second, he dragged his hand under his nose and shook his head. Matthew had guessed he would do that, too. If he had seen her, he probably wouldn’t recall. Chances were, if she’d shared a shop doorway with him, he wouldn’t remember. The photo was of a fresh-faced, seventeen-year-old. Not Kristen. Not who she was now.

Sighing, Matthew nodded his thanks and reached into his pocket again, this time for money, though it went against the grain. Might be the guy would buy food, might be he’d spend his take for the day on booze. The dog would get fed, though. Matthew was certain of that. He bent down, patted the animal, and moved on to his next port of call. One of many he’d make, and possibly come up empty-handed. He had to try, though. Had to be sure in his mind that, in bringing Ashley into his home, he was doing the right thing. Because, once she was there, once she was settled, Matthew was damn sure he wouldn’t let her go back.

An hour later, he got lucky. Calling into a charity-run initiative helping rough sleepers, he learned that Kristen had taken advantage of their drop in service, giving her access to such basic needs as food, shelter, showers, sleeping bags. She hadn’t taken advantage of any of the alcohol recovery or mental health services, but at least she was taking care of herself in some shape or form. That was a far more preferable scenario to one of many Matthew had hardly dared envisage. Asking around, he eventually found himself on the canal towpath, checking likely places: benches located within walking distance of supermarkets, the long flight of locks leading into the city, the bridges that provided sparse protection from the elements.

Kristen was huddled under one of them, her back to the wall, her knees drawn up, a one-litre bottle of cider nestled between them. Her hair cropped short, Matthew hadn’t recognised her immediately. But for the sound of her voice, the animated hand gestures as she’d talked to the bleary-eyed guy to her side, putting the world to some sort of alcohol-obscured rights, he might have walked past her.

The guy noticed him first as he paused. ‘All right, mate?’ He nodded him a greeting, took a slug from his bottle, ran a hand over his mouth, and turned his unfocussed attention back to Kristen.

Kristen noticed him then, as Matthew loitered, wondering why he’d bothered, what he’d hoped to achieve. ‘Matt?’ she said, closing one eye and squinting at him. ‘Hey, it’s Matt.’ Establishing through her haze that it was actually him, she elbowed the man to her side, then attempted to push herself to her feet. One foot scraping the gravel and sprawling out in front of her, she failed, landing heavily back on her backside. ‘What’re you doing here?’ she drawled, her face, drawn and unhealthily pale, forming into a smile. A smile that would fade in an instant, if he went anywhere near the bottle she was now clutching proprietorially to her chest.

‘Kristen.’ Offering her a tight smile back, Matthew glanced at the guy, who’d leaned his head against the wall and appeared to be drifting off, and then back to her. ‘How’re you doing?’

‘Good,’ she said, her smile widening briefly, before she remembered she wasn’t doing so good, and that Matthew knew it.

‘I came about Ashley,’ Matthew got to the point. Further enquiries around the subject of her health and lifestyle would only lead to argument. He’d been down this road. It never led anywhere but back here.

As if on cue, Kristen took a drink, a long one, then looked away. She didn’t speak. Didn’t even ask how Ashley was.
Unbelievable.
Frustrated, Matthew ran his hand over his neck.
How had this happened?
He asked himself for the millionth time, and for the millionth time, he came to the same conclusion: there was no answer. No absolute reason why Kristen’s over-indulgence of alcohol should lead to addiction, other than a genetic propensity possibly? Their father had drunk, more when he was struggling with a case, some sick bastard not brought to justice who should have been. Kristen had overindulged as a teenager, as did most kids. She’d carried on indulging as a student. When their father had hit the bottle big time after his suspension, Kristen had seemed determined to do the same. When their father decided to quit on life, rather than quit his habit, Kristen had taken off, shacking up with some deadbeat workshy tosser. The only interest they’d had in common was smoking dope and drinking themselves into oblivion. Kristen had thwarted all attempts to make her see the guy was a loser. Thwarted all attempts at contact eventually, trailing around from bedsit to bedsit, leaving no forwarding addresses, not returning his calls.

Too wrapped up in working through his own feelings around their father’s suicide, Matthew hadn’t been aware of Kristen’s downward slide into alcoholism. With Becky’s support, he’d managed to clean up his act. Kristen never had. Mathew was scared for her, furious with her for not even seeming to want to try but, aware of his own failings, he couldn’t wholly condemn her. His heart ached for her as he watched her prop the bottle back between her knees and wrap her arms about herself, probably cold through to the bone. The lined parka coat he’d given her was nowhere in evidence, he noted, no doubt that had been traded in for a fix.

Guessing there was no point enquiring as to its whereabouts, Matthew braced himself to say what he’d come to. ‘Becky and I have decided to have Ashley come and live with us, assuming you don’t have any objections, that is?’ He delivered his news and waited hopefully for a reaction.

Well, his assumptions had obviously been right. Matthew felt a wave of despair wash over him. There was no reaction. Nothing. A flicker of guilt in her eyes maybe, a shrug of indifference, and then, ‘Perfect! Rebecca to the rescue again,’ Kirsten sneered sarcastically.

Matthew held his tongue, watched as Kirsten took another mood-altering slug of booze. Even if she’d paused for thought about all that Becky had gone through, she wouldn’t feel for her. It was a fact that alcohol seemed to numb your awareness of anyone’s pain but your own. Matthew was all too aware of that.

‘I just thought you should know.’ He shrugged and waited again. Then, still getting nothing back, he reached into his jacket pocket for the cigarettes he’d bought her, walked across and bent to place them in front of her.

Kristen wouldn’t meet his eyes.

C’est la-vie.
Matthew sighed inwardly, straightened up and turned to go. He couldn’t do anything here.

‘Do you have any money?’ Kristen called after him.

Matthew stopped. Should he relent and help fuel her habit, or just keep walking?

‘I need food,’ Kristen added, the one sure-fire way to make him relent.

Matthew sighed. The liquid variety, invariably, he thought, turning back.

‘It’s all I have.’ He offered her the twenty pound note he’d had ready in his pocket. ‘Get something hot, Kristen, will you, even if it’s only a bag of chips. And go to the drop in centre tonight, yes? They’re expecting you.’

Kristen nodded, still not looking at him as she took the money and stuffed it in her own pocket.

‘I’ll catch you around.’ Matthew shrugged and turned again to walk away.

‘I couldn’t handle her!’ Kristen called, causing Matthew’s step to falter. ‘I tried! I needed help, Matthew!’

Matthew kept walking. He’d tried to help. It had made no difference.

‘You’re just like him!’ Kristen continued, shouting behind him. ‘Too concerned about everyone else, complete bloody strangers, to see when your own family is falling apart!’

Anger welling inside him, Matthew whirled around. ‘That’s crap, Kristen. I tried to help you. You know I did.’

Kristen laughed disparagingly. ‘Oh, yes, you did your duty, Matthew, just like Dad. Exactly like him. You got me dry and then hung me back out. It wasn’t enough! I needed someone to be there. I needed someone to care. I couldn’t do it on my own!’

Dangerously close to a cutting retort, Matthew stopped and searched his conscience. The truth was, while dealing with his own problems, he probably hadn’t been there emotionally. Though he’d tried to do everything he could practically. She was right about the old man. He’d also done practically everything he could bringing them up. Their father’s career, though, had become his obsession after losing their mother. Five years younger than Matthew, just eleven when she’d died, Kristen had missed her, needed her mother’s guidance during that crucial period of her life, but … couldn’t she see that that’s exactly what Ashley needed?

‘She’s your daughter, Kristen,’ he tried. He wished he could make her see. Make her find the will to fight the addiction. No one could do that for her.

‘I know that!’ Kristen glared at him. ‘I gave birth to her!’

Matthew glanced skywards, debated, and turned away. He wasn’t going this route: the blame route. When she’d fallen pregnant, he’d thought he’d done all he could in the absence of the baby’s missing father. Maybe it wasn’t enough. Maybe nothing he did would ever be enough. He couldn’t do this though. Not here. Not now.

‘She’s … different,’ Kristen said, stopping him again in his tracks.

Yet again, Matthew turned back. ‘Different how?’

‘Different,’ Kristen repeated. ‘She has needs.’

‘Special needs?’ Matthew furrowed his brow. This was the first he’d heard of it.

Kristen looked confused, uncertain. ‘Not special, no. Just … different.’

Well, given her upbringing she was bound to be that, wasn’t she? Different to all the other kids around her, her peers. Matthew had been there, bullied relentlessly, his family circumstances and his asthma making him ‘different’. Glancing again at Kristen, whose attention was back on her bottle, Matthew shook his head and turned to go. She was making no sense, nor would she, no surprise there. No doubt he would find out what Ashley’s needs were from the care home. He’d cross that bridge then.

‘She’s better off without me!’ Kristen shouted after him. ‘You know she is, Matthew.’

Chapter Three

Ashley was listening to music on her phone when they came. Sitting cross-legged on the lawn, well-away from the noisy brats in the play area, she could sense them watching her through the patio doors, her uncle and aunt, supposed to be.
Long lost uncle and aunt
, Ashley thought cynically. She didn’t even remember them.

They won’t take us
. Emily was right beside her, as always. Ashley tried to ignore her, plucking a daisy instead and splicing the stem with her thumbnail.

The mom might. She’s smiling
. Emily continued to relay events, even though Ashley feigned disinterest.
The dad’s frowning, though. No, they won’t take us.

Ashley shrugged and selected another daisy. Closing one eye, she threaded one stem through the other, like soft green cotton through the eye of a needle. ‘You don’t know. You can’t read minds,’ she said and reached to pick another daisy.

I can read faishes,
Emily lisped huffily.
And his is not a happy face
.

Ashley didn’t care. Even if they did take her and she got to move in with them, they wouldn’t keep her for long. She’d rather not go than have them end up looking at her the way the other couple had, like she was a weirdo. Ashley had tried to tell people about Emily, but no one believed her. After a while, she’d stopped trying, because of the looks. Those and the endless questions the doctor kept asking her: Was she lonely? Did she feel shy, fearful, upset or angry? Did she ever hear voices? People talking to her who weren’t there?
Well, that’s just plain stupid,
Ashley had once pointed out. How could people talk to her if they weren’t even there? That hadn’t gone down too well.

She hadn’t admitted it, but she did get angry when the other kids picked on her. She hadn’t meant for Kaitlyn to fall off the top of the slide that time, but Kaitlyn kept banging on, calling her a
derbrain
, like it was really original, saying she’d blab on her for talking to herself. On and on she’d gone. Ashley had only meant to shut her up. It worked, she supposed. She hadn’t done it since.

Reaching for another daisy, Ashley glanced towards a group of kids whooping and screaming as they played tag. She was lonely sometimes, too, something else she didn’t admit. She liked playing with the little ones, though. Miss Cummings, the care home manager, seemed pleased that the younger kids liked her, and the doctor didn’t seem to worry about her so much since Ashley had told him she didn’t hear voices and absolutely never saw things that weren’t there.

Would they take her, she wondered idly. Probably not. Ashley didn’t want to go anywhere anyway just to come back again. How was that supposed to
not
make her feel upset?

I bet they don’t even come out and shee us.
Emily sighed dramatically.

Ashley shrugged again. ‘Not bothered.’

Ooh, you are, too!
Emily’s eyes swivelled towards her.
You want a proper mum and dad, just like I do.

‘No I don’t.’ Ashley spliced another stem.

Emily, though, wouldn’t leave it.
Liar,
she said, folding her arms in that know-it-all way she had.

‘Am not,’ Ashley countered. ‘It’s OK here.’

Liar, liar, pants on fire.
Emily persisted, annoyingly.

‘I am
not
.’ Ashley glanced at her through her curtain of hair. ‘It’s not that bad. We get to use the computers, watch TV and …’ Ashley stopped and shrank back as one of the kids shot past, snatching at her daisy chain, as he went.

Get tormented by boys. Nasty horrible ones
. Emily picked up, her eyes sweeping contemptuously over the boy, as he skidded into a turn to face them.

‘Loopy Ashley did a poo,’ Jack, an idiot fat-cheeked bully, sang, hilariously, smirking as he jogged backwards. ‘How many dollops did she do-oo?’

‘Piss off,’ Ashley mumbled, her cheeks heating up.

‘If you go down to the woods today you’re in for a big surprise,’ the boy sang crassly on. ‘If you go down to the woods today, you’d better hide your eyes. Coz Ashley Adams is going there too. She’ll be pushing a pram and shaggin’ a man …’