The Forgotten Woman: A gripping, emotional rollercoaster read you’ll devour in one sitting

by Angela Marsons

  ‘Oh, you’d love it to be about money, wouldn’t you? Sorry, Fran, you miss again. The boy’s mother is a single parent. She tried to make a complaint at the police station, nothing. She wrote a letter to the Chief Constable and the Police Complaints Authority, again nothing. Not even an apology.’

  Fran smiled. ‘You realise that goes in my favour.’

  ‘And mine. David and Goliath works every time. Only this time it’s true. You know it’s real people on the jury, Fran. They’ll see this one right away.’

  ‘So what are they asking for?’

  ‘That he quits his job.’

  ‘Is that it?’

  ‘If we can settle out of court, that’s all they want. They don’t want money from him. Cynical people would be suspicious, wouldn’t you, Fran?’ he smiled.

  ‘I do find it hard to believe, yes.’

  ‘Why? Are you so jaded that you think everyone is after something? These people only want to make sure he doesn’t get the chance to do this again.’

  Fran sat up straight. ‘I have a meeting with him in the morning.’ She stood to inform him that the discussion was over. ‘I’ll give you a call tomorrow.’

  Keith stood up to leave. Fran’s mind was already elsewhere, the fury churning around her stomach. They had given her this case because they knew her first instinct would be to fight. To get up in court and play a few tricks and do what she always did: try to win. And it was her first instinct. She did want to take a man she’d never met into court just to prove she could win the case.

  ‘Fancy a coffee somewhere?’ Keith asked easily. ‘I’m not done arguing with you yet.’

  Fran opened her mouth to say no but she needed to get out of this office. It didn’t look the same to her any more. And she liked Keith, even though they didn’t agree on legal fundamentals.

  ‘I’d like that,’ she said.

  9

  Kit

  Kit’s office resembled a box. The only things that decorated the wall were a health and safety poster for the use of a visual display unit that was held to the plyboard by yellow insulation tape and a wall-planner three years out of date. The dust that rendered them a filthy grey told her that the office didn’t get cleaned too often. That and the fact that she had to wipe her hands every time she touched something.

  Her box held a desk with an ancient computer from the Jurassic period that would have given Bill Gates a coronary. It took up most of the desk space and rumbled with every new piece of information that she entered. On her first day she’d jumped up from her chair thinking she’d broken it but when no flames or smoke materialised she knew she was safe. She only wondered if the dinosaurs had had as much trouble using it.

  She’d picked it up quite easily. Exceptional keyboard skills were not necessary – the computer could only digest three words per minute anyway. Most of the input work was numerical and when narrative was required, she found two fingers served her fine.

  Her boss was a middle-aged woman named Dorothy who was seated and working before anyone else and remained seated after everyone else had left. She’d heard it said that Dorothy was a long-serving employee who had given up all rights to a personality for the good of the company. At first she’d bustled down to Kit’s office in the bowels of the building to check on her twice daily, but after being assured by her that it wasn’t rocket science the visits had stopped, leaving Kit with no disturbances other than the sound of footsteps of maintenance engineers as they passed her door to fetch stock from the stores.

  She’d met a couple of them briefly during her first day when a leery, balding plumber had suggested that he could sort out her pipes any day of the week. She had quite seriously replied, ‘My name used to be Karl, but if you’re game then so am I.’

  After watching him squirm in front of his mates for a couple of minutes, she’d put him out of his misery. They’d all had a laugh about it but they got the message.

  Later on she’d gone looking around at lunchtime for a bit of company. She’d found Dorothy alone in her office. She’d watched as the woman speared a slippery piece of pasta from her lunchbox and turned the pages of a knitting magazine. She paused at a white-cabled Aran cardigan.

  ‘The canteen is on the second floor, you can’t miss it,’ Dorothy said, wiping the inside of the lunchbox with a sterilised wipe.

  ‘You not going?’ Kit had enquired.

  Dorothy had smiled. ‘No, dear, I find that I get much more out of my girls if I let them have a good old moan about me over their crackerbread and limp lettuce. It releases the tension.’

  Kit had laughed and gone in search. It hadn’t been hard to find. The cackle had guided her. She glanced in and half expected them to be leaning over a cauldron citing ‘legs of toads, hair of spiders’. The reality had not been much different. No one was unpleasant, but she didn’t stay. There was something about groups of women that she didn’t like. She could imagine that behind your back they were quietly stabbing you in it. She couldn’t be bothered.

  She had wandered back down to what she now called her playpen and found a group of engineers eating their lunch. She took her cheese sandwich and joined them. At first they seemed a little uncomfortable but after three of her best dirty jokes they were at ease and treated her like one of the lads. This had become her routine now and it was her favourite part of the day. In spite of her past she enjoyed the company of men. It suited her; she could be her normal sarcastic self. Most women would take offence at her humour but the men enjoyed it so she spent more time with them.

  On the first day of her second week Kit was startled from her work by shouting in the stores. As there were no windows she sat back and tried to listen. By the sound of it they were right outside her office. She recognised the gruff tone of Trevor, the stores manager. His low, smoke-aggravated voice suited his bearded appearance. She craned her head but she couldn’t place the second, well-spoken voice, which remained controlled, even in anger.

  The door to her office opened and a man, as surprised to see her as she was to see him, stopped in his tracks. ‘Oh, I’m sorry. I didn’t realise this office…’ He looked around and she could see that he questioned the term ‘office’. Trevor was right behind him and she realised they were coming in to finish their discussion. Kit stood. ‘Should I leave?’

  ‘No, no! Never mind.’ She could see that the pause in the argument was giving them both some time to cool off. The man in the suit turned to Trevor. ‘I want a stock list on my desk Monday morning.’

  ‘But that means Saturday…’

  The suit raised his eyebrows. ‘The stock is going somewhere so they can all help with the stock check. And it won’t be at overtime rate.’

  Trevor paused as though he wished to continue the debate but saw from the unyielding expression that faced him there was little point. He shook his head and left the office.

  ‘Tyler Morrison, assistant manager,’ the suit stated, thrusting his hand forward.

  ‘Kit Mason, resident inmate,’ she said, indicating the cell-like enclosure.

  He smiled. ‘Sorry about that out there. I don’t normally use that type of language, especially when ladies are present.’

  It took Kit a moment to realise that he meant her and that he was being serious. She didn’t know what to say. ‘Is there a problem?’ she asked.

  ‘The stock doesn’t add up, again. We have a constant problem with missing items. I don’t suppose you’ve noticed anything suspicious?’

  Kit looked at the plywood surroundings and looked back at him.

  ‘Yes, I see what you mean,’ he agreed with a smile.

  He wiped a small section of the desk with a white cotton handkerchief and perched his backside on the edge. Seeing the colour of the fabric, he rolled it into a ball and threw it in the bin. ‘How do you like it?’

  ‘That’s a little personal. We’ve only just met.’ The words were out before Kit could stop them. ‘I’m sorry, I…’ she stuttered. She’d observed other demeanours at work and
realised that she would have to hold her tongue, although in her case it was like trying to hold an over-zealous eel.

  He laughed and Kit noticed what great teeth he had, emphasised by a fading but visible tan. His navy blue suit looked pricey, she thought, but if he was one of the bigwigs it would be.

  She guessed him to be in his early thirties, with lines around his eyes that looked as though he had laughed too much. His dark, almost black hair, worn a little long, emphasised the darkness of his eyes.

  ‘Are they keeping you busy?’

  ‘Yes, thank you,’ she said primly.

  ‘Please, don’t close up on me. I have enough trouble sitting down upstairs.’

  ‘Uhh?’

  ‘Well, I have to remove at least three people from my backside first,’ he declared with amusement and a little arrogance.

  Kit laughed.

  ‘That’s better. Sometimes it’s good to be around real people. Upstairs they have to share a personality. No one has the courage to have one of their own.’

  ‘Charitable sort of bloke, aren’t you?’

  ‘Bored of idiots would be more accurate,’ he said.

  A sudden thought occurred to Kit. ‘May I make a suggestion?’

  There was barely concealed condescension in his eyes. ‘Go ahead.’

  ‘It’s about the stock. I mean, I know I don’t know anything, and I have no idea how the place runs, but Trevor works a day shift, doesn’t he?’

  ‘Yes, that’s right. That’s to cover as many engineers collecting parts as we can. I’m not accusing anyone of theft, it’s purely that if Trevor isn’t available they go into the stores, take what they need and don’t bother to log it on the form. Ultimately it’s stock we can’t account for.’

  ‘But wouldn’t it make more sense to have Trevor on early shift when the stock is going out?’

  Tyler said nothing and continued to stare over her head.

  Kit felt herself blush self-consciously. ‘I’m sorry,’ she apologised, realising that, as usual, her mouth was ten minutes in front of her brain. ‘And this is how you suck eggs.’

  Tyler laughed out loud. ‘Please, go on,’ he invited.

  ‘That’s it really. I don’t hear too many footsteps past my door after two thirty yet Trevor’s still here.’

  Tyler stared up at the stained ceiling. Kit couldn’t believe he was giving it thought. She’d expected him to laugh in her face.

  ‘Firstly I’m not sure Trevor would welcome permanent earlies…’

  ‘I’ve heard him say he’s an early riser…’

  ‘And secondly, we’d still have a problem after he’s gone.’

  ‘I’m still here, couldn’t I do it?’

  His forefinger stoked his chin. ‘And how do I know I can trust you with the keys to the stores?’

  ‘Because I don’t know the difference between an air-conditioning unit and a toilet plunger,’ she replied honestly.

  He looked straight ahead and said nothing.

  She turned away from him. ‘I’m sorry, it was a stupid idea. I’ll just get back to my inputting.’

  ‘The next time you have a stupid idea, Kit Mason…’ she cringed as he stood to leave ‘…you give me a call,’ he said pleasantly before closing the door behind him.

  Maybe I’ll just do that, Kit smiled to herself as the clock struggled towards five.

  The short walk back to the end of the street was punctuated by a few nods to a couple of the regular girls touting for business outside a rundown cinema. She wasn’t sure how that had started. Maybe there was an antenna that gave out a signal that could never be turned off, even when you thought you’d left it behind.

  Without warning a shiver of fear pricked at the back of her neck. A sense of something dangerous stole around her shoulders. She turned her head quickly, her eyes alert, ready to spot anything different. Her gaze caught sight of a large figure dressed in black, ducking into a pastry shop some fifty feet away. Her heart rose into her mouth and choked her. In that split second she had recognised the tailored black jacket and the bald black head that dominated her nightmares. She could swear that the arms of the jacket strained against muscles that she knew so well. Feeling trapped and alone she walked on a couple of paces. He had found her. After all this time Banda had tracked her down. She stopped walking and turned around. She had to go back; she had to know.

  She instructed her trembling legs to move forward towards the frontage of the pastry shop. She stood to the side and glanced in as though undertaking a covert police surveillance. Her heart raced and beat loudly against her chest. She could hear the blood pumping around her body. Stealing a look over the counter she inched forward, her view slightly obscured by rows of cakes and buns. She appraised each person in the queue and found nothing more than two pensioners and a teenage boy. She exhaled deeply and allowed the tension to leave her body. She’d been seeing things that weren’t there. There was nothing frightening in the shop. Her mind had played tricks on her. She stood for a moment taking deep breaths, eager to get oxygen into her body before retracing her steps.

  At the end of the road her mind thought ‘left’ but her feet had other ideas, taking her in the opposite direction to her new flat.

  Each time she placed the key in the Yale lock a surge of pride shot through her. It was her flat, her home. She had her own door, her own postcode, even her own neighbours. Noisy sometimes but she found that more of a reassurance than a nuisance.

  She loved her new home but missed Mark more than she’d thought possible. At one time she’d wondered idly if there could be something between them once she moved out. She now had to accept that it didn’t matter: she was no longer his charge and yet he had not approached her. Contrary to her own feelings she had been part of his job. And yet try as she might to console herself with the thought she had to move on, she longed to see him again, not as a carer but as a man – a man who might be interested in getting to know the real person inside, without the cracks. Ha, who’d be that brave? she thought wryly.

  Kit didn’t even try and feign surprise when she realised where her feet had guided her, towards the safety of Mark. She was disappointed to see that the exterior of the old house had remained unchanged after her week-long absence. Why did the building bear no further scars to mark her departure? Why was it only clear to her that she no longer lived there?

  Instinctively she reached for the key to the inner door before realising that she no longer had one. She knocked on the middle panel, feeling uncomfortably like a visiting stranger, and found herself hoping that Mark would answer the door and upon seeing her, his face would soften. Would he understand that of all the journeys she had made, this had been one of the most difficult? Would he fathom that this simple act could cost her so much?

  The door flew open and Kit found herself looking into the expression of a stranger. The face was drawn and tight. Sallow skin hung from prominent cheekbones. Black, greasy hair straggled towards collarbones that almost protruded from the skin. Only the eyes were familiar; they were suspicious, wary and guarded and had once been her own.

  ‘Is Mark here?’

  The girl looked her up and down derisively before half closing the door and calling Mark’s name. Kit felt the heat flood her cheeks. She was tempted to follow the girl and knock her to the ground. But she didn’t. She had no right to simply walk into this house uninvited any more. It was no longer her home.

  ‘Kit, hi, how are you?’

  Again, it was not the face she had been expecting. Karen, who resided in the room next to the one Kit had previously occupied, beamed at her from the doorway. She opened the door wide. ‘Come on in. Mark’s busy in the kitchen.’

  Kit stepped over the threshold and found herself wishing she’d gone straight home. The whole aura of the house screamed Stranger at her. She felt out of sync with time, as though she was walking back into the distant past and not the place she had been living a week earlier.

  ‘How’s the job? How’s the flat?’ Kar
en asked, excitedly. She had arrived at the shelter two weeks after Kit.

  ‘Oh, fine, you know,’ she answered vaguely. Her earlier excitement about the ideas at work had dissipated somewhere between the knock to the front door and the reality of Karen guiding her to the kitchen, as though she’d forgotten where it was.

  ‘Hello, stranger,’ Mark said, in a voice that she recognised, with a smile that she’d seen a hundred times before. It was the Mark that he used for everyone.

  She struggled to find a Kit to match, a façade that would fit this occasion, but it was alien. She had not been backed into this corner; she had crawled there of her own accord, and now she felt trapped and vulnerable, like a rat scouring the rubbish bins.

  ‘Just thought I’d pop by to tell you that I’m not missing you and I’ve forgotten you all already.’

  ‘I’m sorry, and you are…?’

  ‘Ha, bloody ha!’ she said, standing awkwardly in the doorway.

  ‘Are you staying for dinner, Kit?’ Karen asked. ‘Mark’s making Spagretchy Bollocknoise.’

  Kit smiled at the old joke the two of them had shared about Mark’s speciality dish.

  ‘Of course she’s not,’ Mark responded, as he stirred the mince. ‘She’s far too busy to hang out with a bunch of old memories.’

  Kit closed her mouth, stung. The acceptance had been on the tip of her tongue.

  An uncomfortable silence crowded the room. Karen hopped from one foot to the other. ‘Erm… I’ll just go and wash my hands before dinner.’

  ‘Actually, Kaz, I could do with an extra pair of hands to help me serve this up,’ Mark said, without turning.

  Kit heard the message and understood it fully. He had no wish to be alone with her. The words were emblazoned on a neon sign hanging around his neck. ‘YOU’RE NO LONGER WELCOME’.

  She stood in the doorway observing the activity of Mark and Karen as they dished up dinner with the trained co-ordination of a dancing couple. Karen held out a spoon for Mark to taste. He took the offering and smiled appreciatively. Kit realised that Karen had taken her place. There was no distinction between the way Mark looked at Karen and the way he had previously looked at her. She had moved out and someone else had taken her place. Any misconceived notions she’d had about occupying a special place in Mark’s thoughts crashed to the ground.