A Last Kiss for Mummy (7 page)

With Roman needing round-the-clock care and Emma being so young and vulnerable, it was perhaps no surprise that the next couple of weeks passed by in something of a baby-talc-scented blur. No surprise either that my focus was very much a tight one; the days revolving mostly around feeds, naps and washing, and the regular assessment visits made by Hannah, as well as trying to keep Emma positive and on track.

‘Have I come to the right house?!’ Riley asked when she came round for coffee the following Thursday. ‘Does a Mrs Casey Watson actually live here?’

She looked around, her expression one of shock and stupefaction. ‘Nope,’ she said, poking her head into the kitchen and through lounge in turn. ‘Nope again. No, I definitely have the wrong house.’

I shook my head while I scooped Jackson up for a cuddle. ‘I have absolutely no idea what your mother is on about,’ I told him.

‘Fairy lights!’ Riley clarified. ‘Decorations! Trees! It’s the first week in December and you don’t yet have a single thing up. This has to be a record, mum. Has to be.’

Apart from visits to the letter-box, this morning was the first time Emma had been out without me since she’d been with us; she’d gone to the mother and baby group on her own, which was an important development. As was the fact that it was also the first time I’d had the house to myself since she’d come to us, too.

‘Very funny,’ I said, following Riley into the kitchen to make the drinks. ‘Actually, your dad and I plan to go tree shopping this weekend. And the decorations are down, just not out. But they will be. You’re right, though,’ I admitted, ‘I am way behind with everything. And haven’t seen nearly enough of you, little man,’ I finished, popping Jackson up on the kitchen counter in front of me. It was an unexpected treat to see him – normally he’d be in nursery. But with two teachers away from work with a tummy bug, they had made the difficult but probably sensible decision to ask those parents in a position to, to keep their little ones off as well. I began undoing his coat buttons, marvelling as ever at how quickly he seemed to be growing. He’d be three soon and, before we knew it, off to school like Levi, something I contemplated with very mixed emotions. On the one hand, it would be nice for Riley – she could then really get her teeth into her fostering – but at the same time, how had the time gone so fast?

‘I’ll get there,’ I said. ‘Well, eventually I will, anyway. It’s incredible how quickly you forget just how time consuming a new baby is.’

‘Two babies, don’t forget,’ Riley pointed out. ‘You’re looking after both of them, Mum. Don’t forget that. How’s Emma getting on anyway? Is she coping any better now?’

‘Definitely. I have every confidence in her,’ I said, and perhaps a touch more forcefully than I intended. I wasn’t speaking to Hannah, after all, was I? Riley knew the score. I sighed then, almost automatically. It didn’t matter if Emma passed muster for Hannah and social services with flying colours. She still had the next bit to get through, didn’t she? And with little in the way of emotional support, bar a dubious-sounding boyfriend, currently in jail. That would be the difficult bit, in comparison. I gave Riley a rueful smile as I put Jackson down and popped his coat over a chair back. ‘Though when you look into their future …,’ I went on, ‘well, all I can see is hurdles. I just hope she’s going to have the wherewithal to climb over them. She’s just so young. And it’s not helped by knowing that the boyfriend’s waiting in the wings, either. I haven’t even clapped eyes on him and I worry about what’s going to happen. It’s not the greatest situation to be born into, is it? To have a convicted drug dealer as a dad.’

Riley nodded. ‘But who knows? It might become the making of him, mightn’t it? Well, once it’s out there that he is the dad, at any rate. Might persuade him to shape up and take responsibility. Do you know when he’s coming out of prison?’

‘No,’ I said. ‘Maggie doesn’t know. Just not yet.’

And, I thought, long may that state of affairs continue. I had little to go on, but my hunch was that when that day happened things might just get a whole lot more complicated.

But with the twin preoccupations of Tarim and Christmas, I’d perhaps taken my eye off the ball where Emma’s emotional state was concerned. Up to this point, there was one subject that Emma and I hadn’t discussed: her mother, and the role she’d played in her life. Which was fine – if a child didn’t want to talk about their family background, then so be it. Though we always made it clear we were happy to listen, we were not there to interrogate them or, for that matter, formally counsel them. Our job was to take care of them, full stop. Though, obviously, sometimes prompted by a family photo, or a recollection, a conversation would be sparked and a child would want to talk to us – and in that case, our care of them would naturally include listening to their problems and helping them process how they might deal with them. It also meant being honest about hearing things that were potentially actionable. If a child confided they had been abused, for example, I had to make it clear to them I would need to share what they had told me with people who might be able to help. This didn’t always go down as well as might be imagined. If a child had been sworn to secrecy, for example, by the adult or adults in question, the feeling that they’d told on them could be every bit as distressing for a child as the abuse itself.

I didn’t think this applied to Emma, but I obviously did know she was estranged from her mother, and as there’s nothing like the approach of Christmas to concentrate the mind when it came to family, Emma’s mum and what might happen was definitely on my mind. Given our line of work, Mike and I had now spent several Christmases that included children who’d barely known the joy of spending one with a family of their own or, if they had, one blighted by abuse or neglect. We still did – the first child we ever fostered, Justin, now a strapping lad of seventeen, still spent Christmas Day with us every year. Usually this happened at Riley’s since she was now the one with the little ones, but this year, because of our current situation, we had decided that the annual family feast would be at our house. I couldn’t wait. There was nothing like having a baby around at Christmas.

But not everyone felt the same as I did, clearly, and it was on a chilly morning about half-way through December when both Emma and I were about to find that out. It was feeling slightly more Christmassy now. There was no sign of actual snow yet, though the air was certainly cold enough and when I’d put my head outside the door to grab the milk I thought it might have snowed, the garden was so completely frosted with silvery-white. The post was slightly later, landing with a pleasingly hefty thump just as I was clearing away the breakfast things and Emma had gone into the living room to change Roman’s nappy. This was a regular event since the tree had gone up as he loved staring up at it – me being me I had the fairy lights going all day.

I went out into the hall wondering how many Christmas cards had landed. I’d spent an enjoyable evening a few nights back doing mine, and was looking forward to catching up now with old friends. I’d had a varied life, job wise, and it was nice to stay in touch with all the people I’d worked with along the way.

The scattered pile was made up of the usual collection of envelopes; the obvious Christmas cards, the obvious bills, the obvious junk mail and flyers, but as I riffled through, pulling the cards to the top so I could open those first, I noticed one in the pile addressed to Emma. Not that there was anything unusual in Emma getting letters; she had been receiving them almost every other day since she’d arrived with us – something Maggie didn’t have a problem with – but this one was different: it didn’t have the HMP prison stamp on it. So not from Tarim, this one. I wondered who might have sent it. As in the case of all children in care, it was important to monitor who they had contact with. I looked again at the envelope. The handwriting was tiny and spidery, meandering in a gentle downward slope across the front; the hand was distinctive, too, and right away something told me it was an older, rather than a younger hand.

‘There’s a letter for you, love,’ I said, taking my small haul into the living room.

Emma was kneeling by the changing mat, just doing the poppers up on Roman’s vest. She was becoming practised now, handling him so much more confidently and easily.

‘Really?’ she said, turning to smile, her ponytail flicking round as she did. Her hair was looking better as well, I thought, now she was over that debilitating early period. As was her skin, which was getting some colour back at last.

I handed the letter to her. It wasn’t thick – at most a couple of pages, probably only one. And not a card. It wasn’t stiff enough for that.

Nevertheless, she seemed to think it might be.

‘Oh my God,’ she said, as she studied it. ‘Oh my God, it’s from my mum, Casey! Shit, it’s been months …’ She peeled the corner of the flap. ‘Like, months and months. I bet it’s for Christmas. I bet it’s a Christmas card or some money or something!’ She finished ripping the flap open and began tugging out the contents.

‘That’s nice,’ I said, kneeling down alongside her and tickling Roman’s tummy.

‘She always does this,’ Emma qualified. ‘When she’s been through one of her episodes and that. Says sorry and stuff …’

She tailed off then and unfolded the sheet of paper inside.

I don’t know if I believe in a sixth sense – not really – but as she began reading I had this sudden jolt of anxiety about what the contents might say. I had no reason to – even with the history between them; this was Christmas, after all. And at Christmas people sometimes become better people, at least temporarily – or at least feel guilty about not having been. And given that history, perhaps Emma’s mother was having one of her ‘good’ periods, and, damaging though they undoubtedly had been and would be, children always kept the faith. They almost never gave up on hope.

But I had been here before, with other kids, and perhaps that was what had prompted it; that kind of heart in mouth sensation I knew so well.

And as soon as I saw Emma’s expression change from one of delight to one of despair, I knew the feeling had been right, however much I wished it hadn’t been.

‘What is it, love?’ I asked gently, but she was too absorbed in whatever she was reading to hear me. I watched her face crumple and saw tears begin welling. ‘Sweetheart …’ I prompted. Emma turned to me then and, hand trembling, she passed the letter.

‘Here,’ she said brokenly, ‘read it yourself. The bitch! The fucking bitch!’ She stood up, leaving Roman gurgling on the carpet, and walked over to the window, furiously wiping at her tears. ‘Why, Casey? Why does she hate me?’

I had already read the first line – ‘I suppose you think you’re so clever, don’t you?’ – and, tearing my eyes from Emma, braced myself for the rest. And perhaps Emma was right – what I saw written there could only be described as hate mail, and it broke my heart that a mother could speak to her child like this.

Dear Emma

I suppose you think you’re so clever, don’t you? Leaving me when I needed you the most and choosing that evil bastard and his spawn over me. You think you can just desert me and then send the social round, begging me to take you back? Well, no. Not this time, girl, you’ve really messed up. I’ve finished with you now, and to think that you are actually a mother, what a laugh! You aren’t fit to wipe that baby’s arse!

Don’t worry though, Emma, you won’t have him for long. The social will have him off you in a breath when they see how completely useless you are. If I’ve got anything to do with it, he’ll be put into care and you’ll never see him again. That way you can get on with it, play at being a grown up with that junkie dealer. The next letter you get will probably be addressed to the next prison cell to his. Won’t that be a laugh? Anyway, fuck you and your kid. You’ve been a weight around my neck since the day you were born.

Mum

I had to take a gulp of air as I folded the letter up and looked at Emma, and I realised I’d been holding my breath. She was watching me now, waiting for a reaction, I suspected, and I gave her one. I smiled at her, weakly.

‘Do you want to talk about it, love?’ I asked her.

‘What’s to talk about?’ she fired back at me. ‘I think she made herself pretty clear. That, Casey, is my mother for you.’

I picked Roman up from where he was kicking about and placed him in his Moses basket with his bunny-rabbit rattle.

‘Come on,’ I said to Emma as I sat on the sofa and patted the space next to me. ‘Sit down for a minute and let’s just think about it. It sounds to me like your mum is very angry at someone or something, but I can’t believe that she won’t regret writing all this.’

Emma, sobbing freely now, sat down heavily beside me. And as she crossed her legs under her and lowered her head into her hands, it really struck me just how young she was. ‘She won’t regret it, Casey,’ she said, lifting her head again. ‘She never does. She might forget it, and never mention it again, but regret? No, that’s not her style. She’s never happy unless she’s upsetting somebody.’

‘She’s said things like this before, then?’ I asked. I’d seen all sorts in my time but some things never changed – like just how appalled I felt that a mother could hurt her daughter like this.

Emma sniffed and then gave a harsh laugh. ‘That’s tame compared to some of her motherly rants, trust me! I don’t know what they’ve already told you, but she’s sick in the head.’

‘You mean mentally ill?’ I asked.

Her voice was full of bitterness. ‘And the rest! She calls it depression and has tablets for it and everything, but soon as she starts to feel better she quits them and says she doesn’t need them any more. Even accuses the doctor of trying to poison her and stuff. That’s when she turns into a complete
Loony Tunes
.’ She nodded towards the letter I was still holding. ‘She’s probably off the pills now. I’m sick of it, Casey. She’s been like this ever since I was a kid.’

I wasn’t surprised she was sick of it. It was clear that she’d become no more used to her mother’s breathtaking cruelty than I had. She wiped the back of a hand across her eyes.