My Last Confession (11 page)

I wonder, looking back, if I could have walked away at that point. Not seen Amanda again. Not asked questions about her biological mother, the late Bridget McGivern. Not visited Jeremy.

Would I have walked away if Billy Mullen hadn’t turned up on my doorstep just before the trial? Billy Mullen who, I later discovered, had been Jeremy’s
cell-mate.
Billy Mullen, who had also worked with Chas in Sandhill Prison’s cook room years earlier.

Just twenty-five and a weedy wee gobshite, Billy wore bad-taste designer clothes that cemented his status as a Glasgow ned. Even more so with the scars, one on his right cheek as per the Sandhill uniform, and one on his upper right thigh, which he took every opportunity to show people, even though it involved the removal of his jeans and even though it was still infected from where the ‘cunt got me with a machete’.

Billy Mullen knocked on my door at 8 p.m. one
evening
just after I’d gotten home from a day spent visiting several new probation clients, starting several social enquiry reports, and adding information to Jeremy’s report, giving an account of his attempted suicide and noting that he still had the loving support of his wife. After looking up Jeremy’s alleged victim on the internet, I had printed and signed the pre-trial report, put it in an
envelope and laid it on my desk. Throughout the day I found myself tapping it with my fingers, knowing I should put it in the post, also knowing I was unable to.

‘Is the big fella in?’ asked Billy when I answered the door.

‘Sorry?’ I asked.

‘The big fella?’

‘Who?’

‘Are you Krissie?’

‘Why do you want to know?’ I said.

The asking suddenly switched off and the charm switched on. Glasgow banter – the ‘ochs’ and ‘you knows’ and ‘wee pals’ and ‘way backs’ and ‘them rockets from E hall’ – all rhythmic and indecipherable, like rap. I gathered, after a while, that he’d known Chas from his stint in prison.

I was just about to deny the existence of anyone called Big Fella and shut the door in his face, when Chas pushed me and my plan aside with a ‘Fuck me!’ and a bear hug. Fight Three.

And this one was not going to be easily get-over-able.

While I washed Robbie’s hands several times and then put him to bed, Chas yapped to Billy Mullen, who scared me with his bruised, cut, alien-like skull and constantly descending jeans (for the purpose of showing off infected machete scab, which he revealed on three separate
occasions
– to Chas, to me, and to Robbie, who TOUCHED IT!).

Chas turned into an alien too. After I put a resisting Robbie to bed, I listened at the door to the sitting room for a moment and noticed that Chas’s accent had even changed. A posh Edinburgh boy who’d gone to private
school and played tennis, Chas was using words like ‘reccy’ and laughing at Billy’s stories of lucky buckets and peters. Who was this man?

I went and steamed in the kitchen for an hour while they drank five bottles of beer each and laughed so
loudly
I was sure they’d wake Robbie up. I stomped past the living-room door at least twice and they didn’t flinch. Then I spent ages trying to set up the ancient video recorder because
Build a New Life in the Country
was on and I was going to miss it. They didn’t even try to help me.

‘Are you kidding me?’ I yelled at Chas when the noxious weed that was Billy Mullen finally left.

‘What?’ said Chas, mystified.

‘How can you bring him in here?’

‘He’s a fab wee fella,’ said Chas.

‘He’s a fab wee fella!’ I mimicked him, as if I was still in Primary Four.

‘You’re a snob and a pain in the arse,’ said Chas, his face furious as he reached for his coat.

This was the first time Chas had called me a pain in the anything.

‘You’re not walking out,’ I shouted as he fumbled to get his coat on, to do the ‘time out’ thing.

‘I am, actually.’

‘How can you call me a pain in the arse?’

‘Easy. You are,’ he said, unclenching my hand’s grasp.

‘Don’t walk out on me. Let’s sort this out,’ I pleaded.

‘If I have any more sorting out conversations, I’m going to explode. It’s like I’m living with a fucking therapist.’

This was a surprise. I’d thought this was the thing that differentiated us from Zara’s mum, and Marj from my
old work, both of whom never talked to their partners about anything. Zara’s mum had even weathered one argument by leaving notes on the fridge for three weeks and Marj only conversed with her revolting husband about what kind of meat he might like for dinner.

‘In the last couple of weeks I’ve done nothing but look after Robbie and get it in the neck from you when I’m not in the middle of hour-long conversations about how the fuck we can make things better.’

‘So you’ve done nothing but look after my son?’

‘I didn’t say that,’ he snapped back.

‘Well, if you don’t like it, Chas …’

‘All I did tonight was have a drink with an old friend who happens to come from a different socio-economic background. And you can’t handle it.’

‘He’s an offender, and I’m a probation officer. Robbie’s sleeping and you’re swearing in there and drinking beer!’

‘Oh my God!’ said Chas. Then, instead of taking me in his arms and promising to change his character and
personality
forever because I was right and he was wrong, he added, ‘You’re a snob and a hypocrite.’

‘A snob?
Me?’

‘And you’re fucking naïve, Krissie. You

take things at face value, believe shit just ’cause of how it looks. You’re gullible, Krissie. You’re a naïve, gullible snob.’

‘I’m
gullible! I know these guys, I
work
with these guys. They’re dangerous. And you’ve just finished parole, Chas! Not to mention having him here is unprofessional!’

‘He was by far the funniest guy I met in prison. If you can’t tolerate the company of a boy from across the river in our house then you’re in the wrong job
and
the wrong relationship.’

Before I could say anything in response, he was out the door.

And so was I, following him down the stairs and
making
a racket, not caring what the musicians downstairs heard, or what the old lady across the landing thought.

‘Come back here, Charles!’ Charles was a bad sign. I never called him Charles.

‘Get back here now or –’

He stopped at the second landing and looked up at me.

‘Or what,
Kristina?’

‘Or I’ll … just get back here.’

But he just turned and walked away, and a few moments later I heard the door slam.

The next day I scrawled an angry, ridiculous letter of
resignation
. Robert and Penny were away facilitating a domestic violence workshop, so I was alone in the office with Danny.

‘How does this sound?’ I said, reading the letter to him.

Before Danny could respond, I put the letter down and got on my high horse.

It had to be more than a coincidence, I told him, that my life had fallen apart as soon as I started work as a criminal justice social worker. There was the stress of working with admin staff who were mean witches from hell, refusing to help you no matter how difficult not helping might be in comparison. There was also the stress of having a boss who was never there, who left notes and reports and case files in pigeonholes in the early hours of the morning and then disappeared to fucking
absentee-management
training of all things. And the stress of clients who were drunk or rude, and who refused to leave the interview room until you’d given them money or a cigarette. And the stress of abandoning my child to
various
places and carers all over the city. Plus the fucking stress of being the breadwinner … Of my boyfriend being away all day, all night, doing God knows what – maybe even fucking someone else. Of smoking again and having a terrible headache and only a day to complete a
report on a man who bit another man’s ear off and a never-ending pile of frigging whites …

‘Stop!’ shouted Danny.

What a relief, to be told to stop. My face had gone red with lack of breath and I was incapable of stopping alone.

‘Breathe,’ said Danny. ‘Your life is not in ruins. You are tired and you had a fight with your boyfriend. Give me the report. I’ll do it. And go home,’ he added, before
ripping
up my attention-seeking letter of resignation.

That night Chas and I didn’t sort things out, didn’t have the chat that differentiated us from other couples. Instead we withheld affection and sex and I realised we were exactly the same as every other couple; that my gloating feeling of superiority was ill-founded.

Our chemicals had obviously done their stuff – two years was the limit, apparently – and we no longer tingled at the thought of each other or found each other’s little habits cute.

I found the way Chas sometimes picked at his toes not cute at all. Ditto the way he worked all night in his studio and refused to show me any of his paintings. Double ditto the way he used my Mach Three razor and not one of the three I had bought especially for him. Not to mention the way he cooked nothing but pizza and that an overflowing washing basket was invisible to him. Or how he made me feel stupid because he was always so
reasonable
and invariably right.

They say the thing that attracts you to someone is the thing that will tear you apart. I’d fallen in love with Chas because he was down-to-earth and kind, because he didn’t care what others thought of him, and because he treated
people well, regardless of their looks or background. And indeed it appeared that this might be the problem, because I did not want him associating with Billy Mullen. It made me uneasy. I had a distinctly bad feeling about it.

We made sure Robbie had no idea of how estranged we were. I did the bath, Chas did the story, and we both lay on either side of him for a few minutes at bedtime before retreating and resuming our silent argument.

I ate my lonely Sainsbury’s microwaved Thai curry in the kitchen, did the dishes, swept and mopped the floor, tidied the bathroom, put a load of washing on the pulley and another one in the machine, arranged the clothes for the morning, put videos in their cases, and did a list in my head of all of the above and a list of all the things Chas had done (i.e. nothing). Then he came in and declared: ‘Let’s have a party.’

‘Sorry?’

‘Let’s have a party on Friday. Your folks are happy to baby-sit.’

‘Your opening is next week, Chas.’

‘I need to chill out. I want to have a drink and a chat and I want to flirt with you at a party and feel young again.’

‘I don’t feel like having a party.’

He knew I hated parties. I got stressed just thinking about organising them, which was one of the reasons I hadn’t wanted to get married until an accidental
wedding-dress
purchase had fucked with my head.

‘That’s a shame. I’ve already invited some folk over.’

And off he went to fritter about in that fucking studio which could have been full of bare-breasted ladies for all I knew.

I didn’t sleep at all as I tossed and turned and
wondered
what he was doing, and how we would ever get through this. When he came in and saw I was still awake, he said, ‘You’re stressed. You’re not coping. We need to make some big changes.’

I lay there silently wondering how to bring up the list I’d made earlier of all the things I’d done in the house and all the things he’d not done, and how to say that a party was not a good idea and … I was the one with the
problems
. ME!

He sighed at the silence and left to sleep on the sofa.

Fuck.

This was not us. We were not this couple.

Fuck.

Leaving a maternity ward empty-handed is an
unimaginable
experience. Ask anyone whose baby has been placed in a tubed plastic container to grow some more, or been removed for detox and foster care. Ask anyone who’s had a stillborn baby or a baby that died soon after birth. Ask anyone who’s given up their baby for adoption. Not pleasant, walking with the limping gait of a torn new mother, alongside women with stomachs or little car seats filled with baby, smiles that are filled with baby, baby, baby.

Bridget Garden, just seventeen years old, walked out of the maternity ward empty-handed, her breasts hard and lumpy, wet patches on her T-shirt. She was still bleeding into the extra-strength super-size pads provided by the hospital – and continued to do so for as many days as the milk persevered. Her body cried a grief-soup of milk, blood and tears that would discolour her heart until she died.

When she got home to the house at Ballon she went to bed. She just lay there, body oozing.

Bridget’s mother became increasingly worried about her daughter’s mental health as the days passed.

‘Let’s go for a walk,’ she would suggest, opening the curtains each morning. ‘Or would you like to go to the movies? Bridge, please. Look at me. Talk to me. I’m sorry you’re hurting, my little girl. I’m so sorry.’

For weeks, months maybe, Bridget lay in her bedroom with the lights off and the door shut, hoping for the
healing
that her mother insisted time would bring. But time did not heal. Instead the emptiness of a seven pound eight ounce child who had nuzzled into her ribcage grew – as if she were really there; it grew larger and heavier until it weighed on her so painfully that Bridget’s mother realised she’d made a big mistake.

But it was too late. Something had been signed and someone had double-checked while Bridget had lain waiting for time to heal, and it was too late. The baby was someone else’s, the life of motherhood, of watching and knowing and loving, was someone else’s. A winning ticket thrown away.

Bridget put her name on a list and started her time. Eighteen years minimum, it would be. It was up to the little one she’d named Jenny. A sing-song simple name. Jenny.

As time wore on, there were many things that
cushioned
the sadness of losing her child. Bridget buried
herself
in her degree, and excelled. She chose a specialism that excited her, and loved her job. She chose to work and live near her family and friends, which meant she had the support of people who understood her loss.

And she had Hamish.

Bridget refused to see him for many months. But he persevered, ringing her daily, and knocking on the family door at least once a week.

‘I’m sorry,’ he said when she finally let him in. ‘I’m so sorry. I love you.’

He was a kind and honest young man. They could never just be childhood sweethearts. In Hamish’s arms,
the burden of Bridget’s grief seemed to halve. She loved him and she needed to be with him for the rest of her life.

It took years before they could contemplate having another baby, and they never discussed it. But one day Hamish didn’t put a condom on and Bridget didn’t
complain
. Afterwards, Bridget cried.

‘I can’t. I shouldn’t. It’s wrong to want this,’ she said.

As usual, he told her what she needed to hear. They were so young when it happened. It was a terrible
mistake
, but they had to move on. Little Jenny was with a good family. They must try and be happy.

As Bridget’s period arrived each month for the next year, her guilt and self-loathing turned to desperation and excitement. She wanted and needed to get pregnant. And eventually, she did.

Rachel. A blessing from God. A different girl. A fresh start.

But sometimes the pain returned and Bridget felt as if she was just going through the motions of life, getting into the routine of it, taking turns with the rubbish,
ferrying
Rachel to athletics, shopping in B & Q on the
weekends,
and all within the Ochil Hills that would be her cell walls for at least eighteen years.