Please come. Or write. The other kids here call me all sorts but they’re no better themselves. I’ve found out there’s one who attacked her baby brother. I think that’s worse because he can’t have been upsetting her that much. I like Kam. He’s funny and he doesn’t pick on me. He’s teaching me to play table tennis.
Will you phone me? I know they gave you the number but I’ve written it at the top just in case you lost it. I thought you wanted to help me.
Love from Katya.
‘Who is Emily, Katya?’
She looked up at the psychiatrist and frowned. It sounded like a trick question. He held out a scrap of paper. On it were words in Katya’s handwriting. She had written Emily over and over again and doodled babyish flowers and hearts around it. She flushed and pushed it away.
‘Is she a friend?’
She shrugged. ‘Not really.’
‘So where did you meet her? Did she go to your school? Is she a neighbour or a family friend? Surely it won’t hurt to tell me something about her.’
‘Why don’t you ask Maggie?’
‘Why would I do that?’
‘Because Emily is Maggie’s daughter, of course,’ she said with studied patience.
The wait felt very long before Adam eventually spoke. ‘Maggie’s daughter is called Victoria. There is no Emily.’
It was the final betrayal. Emily must have been in on the deception; Maggie must have explained: ‘Don’t tell her your name because she wants to be your friend and she isn’t good enough for you. She’ll pollute you.’
She heard her mum talking to a friend once. She must’ve been about six years old. Her friend asked why she’d kept her. ‘Why didn’t you have an abortion, Linda?’ And her mum said it was because she wanted to make someone who would love her whatever. Katya did love her but it made her cross to think she’d been made on purpose for that.
She asked Maggie that question after Maggie told her that she had her baby when she was seventeen years old. Maggie said it was because she wanted someone that she could love. Katya tried and tried to work out which was better: to make a baby to love or to make a baby to do the loving, but it was really hard. It made her feel that she had the bigger responsibility though. She had to love her mother even though when she got home from school sometimes she would have to wait to go in. It wasn’t fair.
‘You’ve got a visitor, Katya,’ Yvonne, her supervisor, said. ‘Up you get.’
It had to be Maggie. She had come for her. It was all going to be OK. She would go to Maggie’s house and Maggie would change her mind and tell her that she loved her and would be her mum. She would have a sister. She might have to share a bedroom, because that flat was tiny, but she didn’t care because it would be her home.
She followed Yvonne down the corridor and through the doors into the room with the friendly sofas and bright murals. It was supposed to make the kids feel happy. The sun was shining through the windows, straight into her face, and she stopped short.
‘Here’s Sally come to see you. Would you like some orange squash and a biscuit? Come on, love, don’t be rude. Say hello.’
Katya stood with her hands down by her sides, her fists clenched, a cry growing like a tumour in her abdomen, pushing up her throat until she almost gagged on it.
She pressed it down hard as she was firmly propelled to a chair. Sally was sitting opposite. Her eyes were red and her skin was blotchy and she looked older. Katya wondered if the sister had died or if she’d had to leave her on her deathbed when she heard her husband was killed. The tumour was sucking all the space out of her insides till she felt like she was going to throw up her breakfast.
Sally pressed her forehead against her clasped hands and took a deep breath.
‘I forgive you, Katya,’ she said.
Katya heard herself scream like it was another person. It went on and on and on and people were rushing into the room and her arms were being held and she was being dragged out and taken back to her room through all these kids who stared at her. Some of them laughed. One lad shouted, ‘Katya! Katya!’ repeating her name even as she threw herself down on the bed.
‘Tell me about Sally Bryant.’
‘Why? Sally isn’t important.’
‘Isn’t she? Well, Katya, why don’t you tell me about her anyway and let me decide what’s important or not?’
She sighed heavily and picked at her nails. The only thing good about these sessions was that they broke up the day, so she wasn’t eager for them to stop. It was why she was talking now, telling her story. He recorded it all and wrote notes, but she didn’t think it would make a difference. She was still stuck here.
‘She was all right,’ she said. ‘She was out at work a lot.’
‘A nurse, right?’
Katya nodded.
‘How did she treat you?’
Katya shrugged.
‘Did she get cross or irritated?’
‘No. She was all right. I told you before.’
He clasped his hands and looked at her like he was reading the spines of books on library shelves. ‘Why were you so upset when she forgave you?’
‘Because I didn’t need her to.’ She scratched at her scabs. He was as thick as everyone else.
‘Why not?’
‘Because he deserved what he got, didn’t he? He was a pervert.’
He gazed at her steadily, swivelling his thumbs slowly round and round each other. ‘Were you jealous of Sally’s relationship with your foster father?’
She laughed out loud but inside she felt uncertain. ‘What?’
‘Jealous. It would have been natural. He was a father figure and vulnerable children attach themselves to father figures. Sally told me about an incident when he kissed her in front of you.’
‘What about it?’
‘She says you had a face like thunder.’
She glared at him. ‘Well, I didn’t and you can’t say I did because you weren’t there.’
‘Katya, the police looked into this. There is no evidence to support your accusations, no witnesses, no other victims, no prior convictions. You were found guilty in a court of law.’
‘But he started it. He took my book and wouldn’t give it back.’
‘The Blue Fairy Book?’
‘Yes. It was my mum’s. Then he tried to do it to me.’
‘I’m sure you think that something like that happened. You were wound up and he took the teasing too far.’ He glanced at his notes. ‘At the police station you told the child psychiatrist that you had imagined killing him before that.’
He waited for her to contest this and sighed. ‘Katya, you’re only eleven years old and you have your whole life ahead of you. We are going to help you move on, but first you have to come to terms with what you did. Do you understand that?’
She didn’t answer.
He clicked his biro and slipped it into his shirt pocket. ‘Let’s try again tomorrow.’ His face softened as he stood up and moved towards the door. ‘You matter, Katya. Don’t ever let anyone tell you you don’t.’
45
Tuesday, 4 May 2010