by Gwyneth Rees
Sadie made a funny choking sound and I realised she had started to cry.
‘Oh, Sadie, I’m sorry,’ Mum murmured. She was probably hugging Sadie, though I couldn’t see.
Silently I tiptoed back to the front door. I didn’t want them to know I’d overheard their conversation. I was going to have to pretend I’d just this second arrived home.
I gave them a few more minutes, then I opened the front door and slammed it shut this time. I called out ‘HI!’ before treading loudly across the hall.
I took as long as possible hanging up my jacket, and by the time I reached the kitchen they had closed the photo album. Sadie was rubbing her eyes and Mum was on her feet filling the kettle.
‘Hi,’ all three of us blurted out awkwardly at more or less the same time.
‘How was dinner?’ Mum asked me.
‘Fine,’ I answered quickly. ‘We went to that really nice Italian restaurant … I had ravioli and a cream horn.’ I paused. ‘How about you? How was your meeting with Lenny?’
‘Fine.’ Mum was reaching into the cupboard for the teabags. ‘They’re coming back next week to speak to you as well. I’ve tried to tell them you need more time to adjust but they’re getting very anxious to know how you feel about Sadie staying with us more permanently.’
I saw that Sadie was looking at me intently. She must think she still had the same hold over me as before.
‘OK,’ I said. ‘Next time they come I’ll tell them.’ And I turned round and went upstairs, feeling Mum and Sadie both staring after me.
*
That weekend passed quickly, even though nothing much happened. When Sadie cornered me to ask exactly what I intended to tell our social workers, I let her think I was still buying into her kidnapping story and that I would therefore say whatever she wanted. It was tempting to tell her the truth, but the last thing I wanted was Sadie inventing some new threat to try and keep me quiet.
I couldn’t deny that I found Sadie a lot less terrifying now that I’d got to know her better, but the main thing that still worried me was how readily (and convincingly) she was prepared to lie to get what she wanted. And Mum just couldn’t seem to see that. In fact, my mother still seemed totally sucked in by Sadie’s whole prodigal daughter routine – or prodigal niece, if there was such a thing.
I woke up feeling tired and grumpy on Monday morning. I wished I could skip school and stay in bed. Instead I staggered into the bathroom and I was just splashing cold water on my face to wake myself up when I heard a beep and looked up to see Sadie’s phone lying on the bathroom shelf. A new text had just come in. It was from Alison:
Be careful on Saturday. Don’t get caught. Overnight coach booked for Sunday night. Be at bus station 10pm.
‘Let me in! I need to get something!’ Sadie was thumping impatiently on the door.
‘Hold your horses! I’ll be out in a minute!’ I shouted back. I decided it was probably best to pretend I hadn’t seen her text, though I badly wanted to know what was going on. What was happening on Saturday? And why was Alison texting her about an overnight coach?
Maybe I should tell Mum. But then again there was a part of me that thought that whatever Sadie was planning, I should just wait and see how it all played out.
I got dressed and ate my breakfast as quickly as I could, and I managed to leave the house ahead of Sadie. I wanted to tell Josh about that text and see what he thought about it. Josh is always really sensible about this kind of thing.
‘Poppy, wait!’ I had nearly reached school when I heard Sadie behind me, running to catch up.
‘POPPY!’ Josh was calling to me from up ahead, his schoolbag swinging beside him. I ignored Sadie and kept walking towards Josh. ‘Sean and I went bowling with Leo at the weekend,’ he said as I reached him. ‘It was great! You have to come with us this Saturday, OK?’
‘I’m seeing Amy this Saturday.’
‘Oh yeah, I forgot. A week on Saturday, then?’
‘Can Sean make that one?’
He grinned. ‘Oh, don’t you worry – we’ll check he can make it before we book anything!’
‘I wasn’t worrying, I was just asking,’ I said stroppily. ‘Listen, I’ve been thinking … maybe we should ask Anne-Marie if she wants to come.’
‘Why?’ He didn’t sound keen.
‘Well, it’s a bit mean to leave her out and I don’t think she does much on a Saturday.’
I’d also been thinking that if we didn’t ask her, and Sadie and I went with the boys, then it might seem a bit like a double date, which would be embarrassing.
‘Anne-Marie is going to be at her aunt and uncle’s all day this Saturday,’ Sadie said, having caught us up and overheard the last part of our conversation.
‘Poppy can’t make this –’ Josh began, but I cut him off.
‘How do you know that?’ I demanded sharply.
Sadie shrugged. ‘I asked her what she was doing at the weekend and she told me.’
‘So are you free this Saturday?’ I asked her. ‘Or do you have something on too?’
She gave me a guarded look. ‘Like what?’
I shrugged. ‘I don’t know. Anything. You tell me.’
‘Look – there’s Sean,’ Josh exclaimed, pointing at a very small figure in the distance. ‘He’d better hurry or he’s going to be late again and then he’s really gonna be in trouble! Leo’s threatened to make him ride to school with him if he’s late for registration one more time.’
We could hear the school bell ringing and in the distance we saw Sean break into a run, but he was too far away for us to wait for him. The three of us carried on into school, and after Josh had gone off with some other Year Nines, Sadie and I headed for our registration room.
Anne-Marie joined us just as we were having a discussion about Sean.
‘He’s a total wuss if you ask me,’ Sadie was saying dismissively. ‘Letting himself be bossed around all the time by someone who isn’t even his proper dad!’
‘He’s not a wuss,’ I protested hotly. ‘He just doesn’t want to get on Mr Anderson’s bad side. Plus if he gets grounded then he won’t be able to come bowling with us, will he?’
‘He could if he had any guts. He doesn’t have to do what his bossy stepdad says. I think it’s pathetic the way he acts around him – like he really looks up to him and wants to please him all the time or something.’
‘Even if he does, what’s it to you?’ I said. ‘Anyway, it’s probably really nice for Sean to finally have a dad after so long.’
‘Poppy’s right,’ Anne-Marie agreed. ‘You know his dad died when he and his sister were little, don’t you? I just think that’s so sad.’
Sadie’s eyes narrowed as she gave Anne-Marie a cold look. ‘It’s not that sad.’
Anne-Marie opened her mouth to speak, then shut it again.
‘What?’ Sadie demanded defiantly as she saw the looks we were both giving her. ‘People die all the time. It’s not that big a deal.’
‘That’s really mean, Sadie,’ I said with feeling.
‘Oh, stop being so pathetic!’ she snapped before storming off.
‘I can’t believe she said that!’ Anne-Marie said as we watched her go. ‘I mean, what was all that about?’
I shrugged like I didn’t know, but in actual fact I had a pretty good idea. And I vowed to steer well clear of the subject of fathers with Sadie from now on.
Chapter Twenty
‘So what do you think I should do?’ I asked Josh at lunchtime as the two of us headed for the far side of the playground to sit on the wall. I had told him about the text I’d accidently seen and we were speculating about what it meant.
‘If you weren’t going to see Amy, you could follow her on Saturday and see where she goes,’ he said.
‘See where who goes?’ Sean asked as he joined us.
Before I could stop him Josh had told Sean about the text.
‘Sounds like she’s planning to do something dodgy on Saturday and then leave town
on Sunday!’ Sean joked. ‘Why don’t you just ask her? She left her phone in the bathroom and you saw her text. What’s the big deal?’
‘Uh-oh, here she comes,’ Josh said as he spotted Sadie walking across the playground.
‘Just leave this to me,’ Sean said. ‘I’ll soon get the information out of her.’
‘Sean, just leave it –’ I began but he ignored me and greeted Sadie the second she was in earshot.
‘Hi, Sadie! We were just talking about you!’
‘Really?’ She didn’t look impressed.
‘Yeah, we were talking about bowling this Saturday. I know Poppy can’t come, but what about you?’
She looked a bit surprised. ‘I guess I could come in the morning.’
‘Oh yeah? So what have you got planned in the afternoon, then?’
She scowled. ‘None of your business.’
‘Come on, Sadie. It can’t be that big a secret. Not unless you’re going to rob a bank or … I don’t know … spring your dad from prison or something.’
Sadie went pale at the mention of her dad.
I immediately looked sharply at Josh. He’d promised not to tell anyone about Sadie’s dad being in prison.
‘Hey, I never mentioned it,’ Josh hissed, frowning at my accusing look.
Sadie looked fit to explode. ‘How do you know about my dad?’ she asked Sean furiously.
‘Oh, well …’ He looked wide-eyed. ‘I only know cos I overheard Leo, but –’
‘WHAT?’ Sadie didn’t let him finish before she jumped up. ‘Mr Jamieson said the teachers would keep it confidential. And now your stepdad is spreading it round the school?’
‘No, of course not! No one else knows except me!’
‘He wasn’t meant to tell anyone! That’s it! I’M GOING TO REPORT HIM RIGHT NOW!’ She turned to leave.
‘What? No! It wasn’t like that, Sadie –’ Sean reached out to stop her going, and the second his hand made contact with her shoulder she whirled round and whacked him hard in the face.
‘SADIE!’ I screamed as she ran off towards the school building.
Sean fell backwards against the railings, blood spurting from his nose. Josh and I rushed over to him.
Sean’s hands were covering his face but the blood was trickling through his fingers. ‘We have to stop her telling,’ he cried out in a bunged-up voice.
‘Sean, your nose is bleeding! Sit down and tip your head forward,’ I told him, pulling tissues out of my bag at a rate of knots. Thankfully I knew what to do because Amy used to get nosebleeds sometimes.
‘I have to go after her,’ Sean repeated desperately.
‘Josh, you go!’ I told him. ‘Sean, just stay here and squeeze the top of your nose.’
Josh rushed off and Sean stopped trying to stay on his feet and sat down on the wall instead. Fortunately nobody else seemed to have noticed what had happened. The last thing Sean needed right now was an audience.
Thankfully his nosebleed didn’t take long to stop. ‘I don’t think it’s broken … it’s not bent or anything,’ I told him as I peered closely at his nose.
‘It hurts,’ he grunted. ‘And I need to change this shirt before anyone sees.’ His shirt was splattered with blood. ‘Oh God, if Leo hears about this he’s going to be really mad!’
‘Let’s just wait here for a minute. Maybe Josh managed to stop Sadie telling.’
We sat together on the wall in silence for a couple of minutes.
‘So when did Leo … Mr Anderson … tell you about Sadie’s dad?’ I asked him awkwardly.
He looked uncomfortable. ‘He didn’t tell me! It’s just … I overheard him talking to Mum about it one night. It was really late and I’d gone downstairs for some water. I know I shouldn’t have been listening in. I never even told them I’d overheard.’ He sighed. ‘Now I’ve gone and landed Leo in it!’ His voice had actually risen up a pitch at the thought of Leo getting into trouble because of what he’d done.
‘You never know – Josh might have stopped her telling by now,’ I said. ‘Come on. Let’s go and find out.’
He reached up to touch his nose self-consciously as we walked across the playground. ‘Does it look really bad?’
‘It’s pretty red. You’re probably going to get a big bruise.’
‘Good,’ he said matter-of-factly. ‘The bigger the better. I need it to look as bad as possible so Leo and Mum feel sorry for me. Otherwise they’re going to kill me.’
‘Oh, Sean.’ I couldn’t help grinning despite the situation. ‘Look, there’s Josh,’ I said as we stepped inside the school building. Our head teacher’s room is on the ground floor and Josh was walking away from it, towards us. He was alone and he looked worried.
‘Where’s Sadie?’ I asked at once.
‘I couldn’t stop her,’ he said gloomily. ‘She told Mr Jamieson’s secretary she needed to speak to him urgently. She’s in his office right now, reporting Mr Anderson for breach of confidentiality.’
*
Once Mr Jamieson got involved everything happened really fast.
Josh and Sean and I all got interviewed very briefly in his office. Mr Jamieson said he wanted ‘corroboration of the facts’ before he took any further action. We told him how Sadie had punched Sean and given him a nosebleed. I felt no loyalty towards my cousin now that she had just made a heap of trouble for everyone.
Mum was called and asked to come up to the school immediately. I was told to take Sean to the medical room to get checked over by our school nurse. Sadie was taken off by the school counsellor Mrs Thomson to talk to her until Mum got here, and Josh was sent back to class.
Up in the medical room, as soon as the nurse had finished checking Sean and writing her report, she left us alone. Sean immediately started panicking that Leo might lose his job or face some kind of disciplinary hearing or something.
‘Oh, Sean, I’m sure it won’t come to that,’ I tried to reassure him.
‘Why couldn’t I just keep my big mouth shut?’ he mumbled, holding his head in his hands. ‘Ouch!’ Clearly he’d forgotten about his nose.
‘Anyway, Sadie’s got to be in more trouble than you,’ I said, trying to make him feel better. ‘She actually punched you. She’ll probably get suspended.’
Just then the door of the medical room opened and Mr Anderson came in. He looked worried and he frowned even more when he saw Sean. I can’t say I blamed him. The bruising was coming out pretty badly around Sean’s nose now.
‘I heard what happened. Are you OK?’ Mr Anderson squatted down in front of him, peering closely at his face and ignoring his protests as he lightly felt the bridge of his nose. ‘Looks like she packed quite a punch. I don’t think you’ll be living this one down in a hurry, mate.’ He turned to me. ‘Poppy, your mother’s just arrived. Mr Jamieson wants you to wait outside his office in case he needs to speak to you again.’
‘You heard why she punched me, right?’ Sean whispered, sounding nervous.
‘Oh yes, I heard, all right,’ Mr Anderson replied. ‘Mr Jamieson just hauled me into his office to inform me.’
Sean gulped. ‘Leo, I’m really sorry.’
‘Yes, well, we need to talk. But first we need to get your face checked out. Come on. I’m dropping you off at home. Your mother’s phoning the doctor to see if you can get an appointment this afternoon.’
‘What about you, Leo?’ Sean asked anxiously. ‘Did I get you in a lot of trouble?’
‘We’ll talk about it at home.’
And not for the first time I felt a rush of warmth towards Sean, because it was so obvious how much he cared. Unlike Sadie. I sighed. Why did she have to be such a troublemaker? And why did she have to be my cousin?
After ten minutes of sitting outside Mr Jamieson’s office on my own I was called in. Either Mum or Mr Jamieson or both seemed to be under the mistaken impression that when it came to getting Sadie’s cooperation I might have more influence over her than Mum.
Mum wanted Sadie to drop her complain
t against Mr Anderson and they were engaged in a tetchy to and fro about it. Mum said Mr Anderson clearly hadn’t deliberately shared the confidential information with Sean. Sadie said he shouldn’t have shared it with his wife either. Mum said that husbands and wives couldn’t be expected not to talk to each other about their jobs. Sadie told her that was rubbish because lots of people with stressful jobs didn’t have a husband or wife to offload on to and they seemed to manage.
Mr Jamieson told Sadie that he accepted there was a confidentiality issue to be looked at, but that her assault on Sean was a far more serious offence and one that he intended to address as a priority. And that he was going to suspend her.
As soon as he said that Sadie pushed back her chair and jumped from her seat, shouting that we were all in this together and that she was done listening to any of us.
‘You’re all pathetic!’ she snapped. Then she told Mr Jamieson she was going to make an official complaint about the school to social services. ‘And you’re going to face disciplinary action for the way you run it,’ she added angrily.
Mum and I nearly fell off our chairs. Even Mr Jamieson, who never usually gets ruffled, looked slightly taken aback.
‘Sadie, that’s enough!’ Mum snapped, standing up along with her. It was the sternest I’d ever heard her when she was addressing my cousin.
‘You’re not my mum!’ Sadie yelled. ‘YOU can’t tell me what to do!’
Mum just sighed. I have to say that she’s always been good at ignoring any you’re-not-my-mum missiles that get hurled at her when she’s fostering.
‘Sadie, everyone here is trying to help you. Please stop fighting us,’ she persisted.
‘You don’t want to help me!’ Sadie screamed. ‘You just want to get rid of me!’ And before anyone could stop her she was out through the door.
