Desperate Measures (17 page)

‘You don’t have to talk to her like she’s stupid,’ growled Jamie.

The woman with the teeth put them back in her mouth. Vicky told Jamie to shush so Jamie gave her a shove and nearly pushed her over. I looked at Mrs Frankish. She was reading through the papers in front of her. Her nails were black and shiny.

‘Jamie has a few anger management issues,’ she said without looking up.

The man with the ponytail nodded but the woman with the teeth wasn’t smiling any more.

‘This meeting is merely for myself and my colleagues to assess where you’ll be best placed in the future,’ said Mrs Frankish.

The woman with the teeth said they’d better begin as she had another very important meeting in half an hour.

The ponytail man started asking us loads of questions about where we went and what we did when we ran away. Vicky did most of the talking, except when Jamie butted in and said something rude. Then they asked me what it was like after Mum died when Dad was looking after us.

‘It was great,’ I said.

‘In what way was it great?’ asked the ponytail man, looking at me over the top of his glasses.

I thought for a bit.

‘We had jam sandwiches every night for tea. Or pot noodle. And we didn’t have to have baths or clean our teeth or brush our hair.’

Vicky started to say something but the man stopped her and said he wanted to hear from me.

‘Go on,’ he said.

‘And we stayed up really late.’

‘Did your father allow that?’

I nodded. ‘He didn’t mind.’

‘And why do you think he didn’t mind?’

‘Because he was already asleep. He’d have his bottle of drink then start snoring.’

Mrs Frankish made a clicking noise with her teeth then whispered something to the ponytail man. The other lady was busy writing things down. I started telling them about the day the men took all the furniture away and how it was fun sleeping on the carpet instead of beds, but I don’t think they were really listening because they kept whispering to each other.

Then Mrs Frankish put up her hand and said, ‘Thank you, Rhianna. You’ve been very helpful.’

She looked at the other two then said, ‘I don’t expect we’ll need long to come to our decision.’

The ponytail man nodded. The lady with the teeth smiled her big smile again. She had lots of black fillings.

‘So if you children will just go down to the waiting room for a short while . . .’

‘Because I was helpful does it mean we’re allowed to live with Dad?’ I asked Mrs Frankish. She was shuffling the papers on her desk.

‘Tell Sandy we’ll only be a few minutes,’ she said.

Jamie stood up and kicked over his chair. ‘We’re not going anywhere until you tell us we can live with our dad.’

‘Pick that up on your way out, please Jamie,’ said Mrs Frankish.

Vicky stepped forward. ‘Jamie’s right,’ she said in a wobbly voice. ‘We’re not leaving.’

‘And what’s more I’ll whack you all if you say we can’t!’

‘Yeah,’ I shouted. ‘And if you make us live somewhere else we’ll just run away again!’ I turned to Vicky. ‘We
will
run away, won’t we Vick?’

Mrs Frankish pursed her lips and narrowed her eyes. I glanced at Jamie and Re’s furious and expectant faces and slowly shook my head.

‘No. I’m not running away again.’

‘Vicky!’ Jamie and Re howled at me, their eyes wide in disbelief.

‘But we want to live with Dad!’ said Rhianna.

‘Running away again isn’t going to make that happen, Re,’ I said quietly. ‘It’s not going to solve anything.’

The toothy woman looked at her watch. ‘I’m afraid I really do have another meeting, so if you could just leave us to our discussion . . .’

‘Please . . . wait,’ I pleaded helplessly. ‘These are our lives you’re deciding on.’

She glanced at Mrs Frankish, unsure whether to
ignore me or not.

‘We will choose the option which is in all your best interests,’ said Mrs Frankish firmly. ‘Now, if you could go down to the waiting room for a few minutes, we’ll make our decision.’

The ponytail man and the toothy woman both nodded in solemn agreement.

‘You’re going to split us up, aren’t you?’ My voice sounded odd, as if it didn’t belong to me.

‘We will have to consider all the relevant factors,’ said the ponytail man.

‘But you don’t even know our dad,’ I blurted out.

‘We’ve heard what happened after your mother died.’

‘But that’s just it,’ I said, my face burning red. ‘Our mum
died
. She was very ill and she died and it was sad and horrible. But it wasn’t just awful for us – Dad was totally devastated too. He was so messed up he just couldn’t cope with looking after us at the same time.’

Mrs Frankish frowned. ‘We know that Vicky, but —’

‘But that’s the whole point,’ I interrupted. ‘You only know about Dad
after
Mum died but you don’t know anything about him before she died. You don’t know what sort of dad he really is at all.’

There was a silence. As I searched their faces for some kind of positive reaction, I could feel my heart thumping against my ribs as if it might explode at any moment.

‘Tell us then,’ said Mrs Frankish gently, after a moment or two. ‘Tell us what your dad was like before your mum died.’

Suddenly all those special memories that I had deliberately suppressed over the last couple of years came flashing back, jostling and crowding into my brain like shapes in a kaleidoscope.

I could picture us all about four years ago in the garden of some posh stately home we visited and hear our excited squealing laughter as we followed Dad, stretched out and rolling over and over down a grassy slope to Mum, who was giggling like a schoolgirl at the bottom.

Back home in our little kitchen, I could smell the rich tomatoey sauce bubbling on the cooker while we watched Dad’s concentrated expression as he forked out a long skein of spaghetti from another pan and then deliberately wobbled it about pretending it was alive so he couldn’t nibble the end to check it was done.

Out in our street I could see myself, much younger still, on my little pink bike – I could feel the wind on my face and the exhilaration sparking through me as Dad let go of my saddle and chased alongside me on the pavement shouting, ‘Keep going, Vicky! Keep going!’ knowing all the while he was still close by in case I fell.

And then one of my earliest memories . . . I was on our stairs in the dark, I could smell the pine scent from the Christmas tree as I wandered down crying from a bad dream and found Dad and Mum laughing together as they wrapped up presents in the sitting room. I could feel my cheek against the soft bumpy wool of his blue jumper as he carried me back up to bed whispering softly that everything was all right.

I felt a surge of happiness. But where should I begin? How could I explain our wonderful, funny, kind dad in just a few sentences? I glanced round at Re and Jamie – their expressions intense and serious. The toothy woman glanced sideways at her watch and fidgeted and immediately I knew exactly how to start.

‘The most important thing to know about our dad is that he always made time for us. He used to work really hard, but when he got home it didn’t matter if he was tired or busy or had tons of other things to do, he’d always find the time to listen to us, or talk about stuff or just play.’

‘It’s true,’ interrupted Jamie. ‘Every Saturday he’d take us to the park and play football or whatever we wanted.’

‘And at bedtime he’d read us each a story,’ Re added. ‘I always wanted the same one. It’s called
We’re Going on a Bear Hunt
. It’s really good. It’s all about catching a bear.’

Another memory bounced into my head.

‘Hey, remember when Jamie left the door to his hamster cage wide open?’ I asked Jamie and Re who immediately grinned and nodded.

‘Jamie came downstairs yelling that Mr Spud had escaped,’ I continued. ‘He was so upset. We looked everywhere, turned the house upside-down . . . Then Mum thought she heard a scratching noise in the bathroom. Dad checked and saw a little hole in the skirting in the corner so he peeled back the lino and spent the whole evening taking up all the floorboards. “Don’t worry, Jamie,” he kept saying as he got hotter and dustier, “I’ll find Mr Spud. You’ll see.” And then finally he said he thought he could see something
right in the corner by the pipes, so Jamie got the cage ready to put Mr Spud back in and Dad stretched his arm down and under and felt around and brought out one of Re’s old socks! Then the nesting stuff in the cage wobbled and Mr Spud popped his head out and looked at us all as if to say “Keep the noise down, will you?” He’d been there all the time, fast asleep. And Dad looked at Mum and all the floorboards and all the mess and we thought he was going to explode but he didn’t . . . He just said, “Well that’s sorted then. Sorry to disturb you, Mr Spud,” and laughed. He was so patient . . . Even when we were naughty.’

‘When I was little I took all the eggs out of the fridge and dropped them in his wellies,’ said Re.

‘I made an insect zoo in his lunch box once,’ giggled Jamie. ‘Dad said he jumped a mile when he opened it because a load of beetles flew out in his face. But when he got home he didn’t shout at me or anything.’

‘I can only remember one time when I saw him really angry. And it wasn’t with us,’ I said. ‘Re and I had just started junior school and they wouldn’t let her join in the swimming lessons. Health and Safety or some stupid excuse. Dad was furious and he went up to school to see the head teacher. When he came back he didn’t say much, but that evening he picked up Re’s swimming costume and towel and told her they were going down to the swimming pool. He took her every Monday and Thursday evening for a year and taught her to swim himself. When they had a gala at school in the summer he made sure she was entered for it —’

‘And I won three races!’

There was a loud knock on the door. It swung open and the man in the grey suit popped his head round.

‘Mrs Trevellian – they’re all waiting for you.’

The toothy woman darted him a vague look. ‘I’ll be with you in a moment,’ she said.

The man nodded and went.

Mrs Frankish looked at her watch, then turned to us.

‘I think you three had better go and find Sandy,’ she said, indicating the door.

‘But we haven’t finished yet,’ I said. ‘There’s lots more we need to tell you.’

Mrs Frankish ignored my plea.

‘She’ll be in the waiting room,’ she said. ‘I’ll be down shortly.’

There was nothing more we could do. We trooped back to the waiting room and watched the smile drop from Sandy’s face as she saw our gloomy expressions.

Rhianna started to cry and Jamie made a good effort pretending he wasn’t about to.

But I just felt numb inside. Too numb to cry.

Sandy put her arms round me and hugged me tight.

‘What happened?’ she asked, looking at Vicky.

Vicky didn’t answer. She just shook her head and went and sat down in the corner. She pulled her knees up to her chest and hugged them.

‘They told us we had to wait here,’ I said.

‘They don’t want us to live with Dad,’ Jamie said then he burst into tears.

‘I’m so sorry. Really I am,’ said Sandy.

‘Are they going to send me away to that school now?’ I asked her.

‘I don’t know Rhianna.’ She bit her bottom lip.

‘They can’t make me go, can they? Not if I don’t want to?’ I looked at Vicky again. ‘Vicky tell me they can’t.’

But Vicky didn’t say anything. No one said anything.
We just sat. And sat. After ages and ages the door opened. Jamie rubbed his face with the back of his hand. Vicky looked up. Her face was white and her eyes were staring. Mrs Frankish walked in.

I tried to search her face for clues to our fate but she was avoiding our eyes, looking down at the papers she held in her hand.

‘My colleagues and I have discussed things in the light of everything you’ve told us. And we’ve looked carefully at this prison report on your dad.’ She looked up. Her expression was serious, severe even. I dug my fingertips into my palms and braced myself for the worst. ‘Apart from absconding, it seems he’s been a model prisoner.’ She paused for a moment. ‘We’ve decided to give him a second chance,’ she said quietly. ‘We’re going to recommend that you return to his care.’

Shocked, it took a second for me to take this in.

‘But,’ she continued, ‘this will only be for a trial period and under very strict supervision . . .’

Rhianna looked at me for an explanation. Jumping up I
yelled, ‘We’re going to live with Dad!’

There was a huge explosion from Jamie. ‘Yessssss!’

Re squealed with delight. Jamie was leaping around the room, shouting and cheering and bouncing off the walls. Sandy laughed and hugged Re.

Mrs Frankish watched with a small, bemused smile on her face.

‘Thank you so much, Mrs Frankish,’ I said happily.

She turned to me. ‘Don’t mess up this trial with your dad, Vicky.’

‘We won’t.’

She patted my arm with her long bony hand, then without another word hurried out of the waiting room.

We had to wait for days and days but then the letter came. It said we were definitely allowed to live with Dad. Sandy read it and told me. I wanted to go and pack my stuff straight away but Sandy said it was too early because we weren’t going for another two weeks so we had to go to school as usual.

At school I told everyone in the Unit that we were going to live with Dad. Mrs Edwards said it was wonderful news and she was really pleased for me. She said I could draw a picture of Dad, Vicky, Jamie and me in our new house so I drew us standing outside a little white cottage with lovely red roses all round the door. Then I drew the garden with lots of trees and veggies growing in it and six chickens pecking on the ground and two pet rabbits in a big run on the grass. On the other side of our house I drew a big blue
lake with a little island in the middle. Last of all I drew Mum and Peter’s spirits on the island using Mrs Edward’s special silver and gold pens and stuck sparkly glitter all round them both. I drew one of Mum’s arms up in the air because she was waving to us. It took me until break-time to finish it. Mrs Edwards said it was the best picture I’d ever done and pinned it up on the wall.