Where the Memories Lie

 

I wanted to mention that the state she was in was entirely her own doing, but I pushed the thought away. No one would ever persuade Rose she was in the wrong. That she was the selfish one.

 

The despicable parent who didn’t even deserve to have a child. Not when there were so many people out there who desperately wanted them and couldn’t.

 

‘Right. So, you’ve never heard from her at all, then, in the last twenty-five years?’ I asked, wanting to make quite sure so I could leave.

 

‘No. And I’m bloody glad. Useless cow.’ Her eyes glinted with steel and something else. Hatred, it almost looked like.

 

I took a step backwards towards the corridor. ‘Do you remember the letter she wrote you when she left?’

 

‘What about it?’

 

‘Do you remember what it said?’

 

95

 

Sibel Hodge

 

She shrugged. ‘No. I ripped it up.’

 

‘But it was definitely Katie’s handwriting, though?’

 

She snorted. ‘Of course it was. Whose handwriting did you think it would be? The Queen’s?’

 

I was halfway through my morning patients when a thought struck me. Maybe I’d been surrounded by a clue to Katie’s whereabouts all this time and I’d never even realised.

 

What do you do when you leave a doctor’s surgery and move to another location? Katie would’ve had to register with a new practice at some point in the last twenty-five years. Even if she was perfectly healthy and never had a reason to see a doctor, she would surely have been having regular smear tests.

 

I typed in Katie’s name and date of birth. Before I started at the surgery all the old paper records had been transferred onto computer so it only took a few seconds for her name to ping up in front of my eyes.

 

It took another few seconds to realise that the last entry in the records was from when she was seventeen for a repeat prescription of the contraceptive pill, and no doctor or hospital had ever requested a copy of her records.

 

I sat back in the chair. No. That couldn’t be right, although there could be a good explanation. Maybe they’d been requested but someone had forgotten to add an entry. Or maybe the request had been written in the paper records but accidentally omitted when the information was added to the computer all those years ago.

 

My eyes scanned the screen, wondering if maybe a request had been filed at the beginning of her notes, rather than the end.

 

I scrolled back through the most recent entries and turned the pages, going back in time. And that’s when I saw something disturbing.

 

96

 

Where the Memories Lie

 

From the age of eight, Katie had been treated for repeated bouts of cystitis and vaginal thrush and inflammation. Eight?

 

Sexual abuse was the first thought that popped into my head.

 

I remembered Jack’s predatory looks. Katie’s promiscuity. She’d started having sex with boys at fourteen. I thought it was her way of trying to find love and attention when she couldn’t get any at home, but could it have been more than that? Was it learned behaviour?

 

Had Jack been abusing her from an early age?

 

Then again it might mean nothing. Although vulvovaginitis, thrush and chronic urinary tract infections can be signs of sexual abuse, they can also be caused by other circumstances, such as lack of hygiene; using soap, shower gel, or bubble bath; diet; and taking antibiotics.

 

I bit my lip and stared at the screen. She’d been prescribed antibiotics for a couple of bouts of tonsillitis, and I knew her diet was pretty poor at home.

 

Was I looking for something that wasn’t there because I didn’t want to believe that Tom had killed and buried her like he’d told me?