Owning Jacob (1998)

by Simon Beckett

  'What have you done to him?'

  The social worker stepped forward. 'I think perhaps we should all just take a seat. This is going to be very difficult for everyone, and it's important to keep calm and remember that we're here to discuss what's best for Jacob.'

  'Steven,' Kale said. His head swivelled from Ben to the social worker. 'His name's Steven.'

  Carlisle faltered, then rallied. 'I'm sorry, Mr Kale, but unless you want to confuse and upset him, you'll have to start thinking of your son as Jacob now. That's the name he knows and has been brought up with, and trying to change it now could prove very difficult for him.'

  Ben saw Kale's jaw muscles bunch as he looked down again at Jacob.

  The social worker turned in silent appeal to the overweight man with a thick moustache and glasses sitting with Sandra Kale. By his dandruff-flecked suit and briefcase, Ben guessed he was their solicitor.

  The man reluctantly rose to his feet 'Why don't you sit down, Mr Kale?'

  Kale ignored him. He fished in his pocket and brought out a small parcel. 'Here.' He offered it to Jacob. Jacob just looked at it.

  Kale unwrapped it for him. Ben saw that his hands were square and broad, the fingers stubbed and callused. The object was a puzzle, a clear plastic case in which two or three tiny silver balls rolled freely. It was similar to the ones Jacob had at home. Kale gave it a little shake, rattling the balls, and offered it to him again. This time the boy accepted it. He shook it himself, copying Kale, then began trying to manoeuvre the balls into holes in the puzzle's base.

  Kale passed his hand softly over the boy's head before going back to his seat. As if that were their cue, the rest of them also went to the collection of low chairs set around a squat rectangular table. The informal setting did nothing to relieve the atmosphere in the room.

  'Before we go any further, I think one thing I have to stress is the need for us all to co-operate,' the social worker said. He was careful to address all of them, not just Kale. 'This is a very emotional time for everyone concerned, but we mustn't lose sight that our priority is Jacob's welfare, not, ah, not venting personal differences.'

  'I want my boy,' Kale said. He was hunched forward on the edge of his seat, still watching Jacob.

  In the next seat his wife was chewing on one corner of her red-painted mouth as her eyes darted from her husband to her stepson. Her eyebrows were plucked into thin dark lines. Her face was sharp-featured and the roots of her straw-coloured hair were dark brown, but there was a vulpine, shopworn attractiveness to her. An edge of white bra strap was showing on one shoulder. She looked up and caught Ben watching her. He turned away.

  Carlisle nodded placatingly. 'I know you do, Mr Kale, that's why we're here. But you must understand it isn't a simple matter of you taking Jacob home with you. There are still procedures we have to go through.'

  'Like checking up on us, you mean.' It was the first time Kale's wife had spoken. She had a cracked cigarette voice.

  'We're not "checking up" on you as such, Mrs Kale. But we can't simply turn a child over to someone without assessing what's best for him.'

  'I'm his father,' Kale said. Ben could see him rhythmically squeezing his fists, pumping the veins on his forearms until they stood out. 'He's got no right to him.' His chin jerked in Ben's direction. 'He's kept him from me all this time. He's not keeping him any more.'

  Ann Usherwood shifted forward slightly in her seat. 'Mr Murray won't contest your residence application if the local authority and social services are satisfied that it's in Jacob's best interests to live with you and your wife, Mr Kale. And for the record I must remind you that no blame for what happened is attached to my client whatsoever. The police have accepted that he believed the boy was his wife's natural son until after her death, and if not for him acting on that information none of us would be here now.'

  There was a snort from Sandra Kale. 'Give him a medal.' She had a cigarette in her hand. As she raised it to her mouth the social worker said, 'I'm sorry, it's no smoking in here.' She looked across at him, the cigarette gripped between her lips. 'You're trying to tell me that I can't have a fag?'

  Carlisle looked flustered and strained. 'No, I'm sorry.'

  'Put it away,' Kale said without looking at his wife.

  She glared at him, then angrily snatched the cigarette from her mouth. Ben noticed the red smudge of lipstick on the filter as she threw it in her handbag.

  The social worker looked at her, then away. 'As Ms Usherwood said, Mr Kale, there's no question of anyone contesting your application for a residence order. But these things do take time, and meanwhile, although you'll all be owed frequent contact, it's best if Jacob remains with Mr Murray—'

  'No.'

  'I appreciate how you must feel, but—' He broke off as Kale abruptly rose to his feet. Ben stiffened as he came around the table.

  'Ah, Mr Kale…?' Kale ignored the social worker as he went over to where Jacob was standing. He crouched down in front of him as he had earlier. 'Steven?'

  'Mr Kale, I really must ask you not to—'

  'Look at me, Steven.'

  Jacob continued playing with the puzzle as though he were unaware of Kale's presence. Kale reached out and slowly pushed it down. Jacob gave a little grunt of annoyance and jerked away.

  'You'll upset him,' Ben said. Kale took no notice.

  'Steven.' He took hold of Jacob's chin and gently lifted it. 'Don't,' Ben began, but stopped when he saw that Jacob was paying attention.

  'I'm your dad. Tell them you want to come home with me. Tell them.'

  No one moved. Father and son regarded each other, and for an incredulous second Ben thought that Jacob was going to respond. Then the boy turned back to the puzzle.

  The tinny rattle of the silver balls had broken the quiet.

  'He can't help it,' Ben had said, feeling obscurely sorry for Kale. Yet at the same time he couldn't deny he was pleased.

  Both emotions had chilled as the man turned to him with his wide-eyed stare. It was unsettling in its blankness. You can't tell what he's thinking, what he's going to do. He's like a fucking Rottweiler.

  Kale went back to his seat and didn't speak again for the rest of the meeting.

  After that the days had sunk into a montage of dour offices and stern, official faces. The police interviewed Ben several times and took the newspaper cuttings. He didn't care if he never saw them again. Besides, if it was newsprint he wanted, there was plenty of fresh material. The media had latched on to the story of 'Baby Steven's Return' with glee.

  Seeing the number of 'exclusive' interviews that Quilley gave, Ben guessed that the detective had finally found a market for his information.

  He hoped he choked on it.

  He had called Sarah's parents before the news broke, wanting to spare them hearing about it first on the TV or radio. He spoke to her father, the words tripping him up so that he had to backtrack constantly to untangle himself.

  'I don't understand,' Geoffrey said when he'd finished. His voice was an old man's.

  'I didn't want to tell you like this, but the press have found out. It's…well, it's going to get pretty bad.'

  'Oh no. Oh no.'

  'I'm sorry.'

  But his father-in-law wasn't listening. 'What am I going to tell Alice?' he asked.

  Ben was trying to think of something to say when the receiver was fumbled down at the other end.

  His mother-in-law called him that same night, after it had been on the evening news. 'Are you satisfied now?' she hissed. 'You couldn't leave well alone, could you? Isn't it enough that Sarah's dead? Did you have to destroy what we've got left?'

  'Alice—'

  'He's our grandson! He doesn't belong to you! He's all we've got left, and you're giving him away! God, I despise you! I despise you!'

  Ben couldn't blame her. He didn't feel too good about himself.

  The garden was completely in shade now. The swing creaked, almost at a standstill. Ben gave it a final push with his foot and
stood up. His flesh under the dun white shirt felt brittle with goose-pimples.

  He went inside. The front of the house was west-facing, and the lounge was still bright. A rhomboid of yellow light was shafting obliquely on to the carpet through the window. Ben sat in it, closing his eyes and turning his face up to the day's last dregs of sun.

  His vision became a red field. Red on red, backed by red, lit by a red glow. He gave himself up to it. It was a Friday night. He didn't want to have to think about what he was going to do with himself for the rest of the weekend. Or the ones after that. Weekends spent with Sarah and Jacob had developed a rose-tinted distortion in his memory that he knew wasn't real but didn't question. He didn't want to think about that either. It was easier to tilt his head to the dying sun and think of nothing.

  The red universe darkened to black. He opened his eyes.

  The sun had shifted so that a horizontal shadow of window frame fell across his face. The patch of sunlight had shrunk to a stripe, too narrow to sit in. Ben put his hand down to push himself up and felt something hard. A single piece of jigsaw puzzle was lying face down on the carpet, concealed by the tassels of a rug. He picked it up. The shiny side was bright blue. A thick orange line cut across it. Ben couldn't imagine what it could be a part of, or which of Jacob's jigsaws it was from. He turned the irregular piece of cardboard in his hand, then looked at his watch.

  It was time for the news.

  It was one of the last items, a feel-good wind-down to the programme. The newsreader had a smile as she announced that Steven Kale was now back with his real father. It's Jacob. Not Steven. There was no mention that he'd been seeing the Kales more and more frequently as part of a supervised 'rehabilitation' process. The coverage showed John and Sandra Kale outside the social services building that afternoon, with Jacob between them. Journalists and photographers scurried alongside and in front. Kale acted as if they didn't exist, but his wife was loving every second of it. She played up to the attention, cheaply sexual as she posed and postured, the only one of the reunited family who was smiling. She beamed at the cameras, holding on to Jacob's hand, and Ben could see that her knuckles were white with the effort of keeping it there. Jacob's head was down, refuting the activity around him. Ben felt his own chest tighten.

  He almost didn't recognise the brief shot of himself, hurrying away like a criminal.

  Kale's residence application had been approved, and that afternoon Ben had taken Jacob for the final handover to his new parents. He'd told himself all the way through that it was the best thing to do. Best for Jacob. To have contested Kale's right to his son would have been selfish. No matter what he felt personally, no matter what Sarah's parents thought, John Kale was Jacob's father. All the other arguments failed in the face of that. If the social services had found anything, any reason why Jacob shouldn't be returned to his natural father, then that would have been different. But they hadn't, and Ben had agreed to abide by their decision. And he had. Right up till the end.

  I'm sorry, Sarah.

  He remembered how Jessica had accused him of not wanting the responsibility of looking after Jacob, and wondered if his motives for giving him up without a fight had been completely pure after all. His reasoning now seemed blurred and muddied.

  He watched as the television report cut to an elderly couple in a tiny flocked-wallpaper living room. Jeanette Kale's parents.

  The woman was in a wheelchair, obviously uncomfortable in front of the TV cameras. Her husband sat holding her hand, a composed-looking man being slowly dragged down by age.

  Yes, they were very happy, they said. Yes, they wished their daughter were alive to see her son's return. When they were asked if they had seen their grandson yet, Ben saw the woman glance at her husband. He hesitated. 'No, not yet.' When would they be seeing him? the interviewer pressed.

  Again there was an awkwardness.

  'Soon, we hope,' the man answered. He didn't look at the interviewer as he said it.

  The item ended with a shot of the Kales taking Jacob into their house. The cameras had obviously stayed at the top of the path and were filming over the gate. The overgrown garden with its piles of junk wasn't shown. Its squalor would presumably have struck the wrong chord for the 'up' tone of the rest of the piece. Ben watched as Jacob was absorbed into the black rectangle of the hallway and a smiling Sandra Kale reluctantly closed the door.

  He turned the set off. He went into the kitchen, got himself another beer from the fridge and sat down at the table to roll himself a joint. He was smoking too many and drinking too much lately. Fuck it. He drew down a lungful of the bitter-sweet smoke, held it, then blew it out and took a gulp of beer to cool his mouth.

  Once a month.

  That was his reward for doing the right thing. That was how often he'd been granted access to Jacob. Not that it was called 'access' any more. The new word was contact, as if the name made any difference. It still meant he would only be all owed to see him one day out of every twenty-eight.

  Once a fucking month.

  Even Ann Usherwood had been confident that it would be weekly, or fortnightly at the worst but, although the police had absolved Ben of any guilt, any complicity in what had happened, the social services had still decided that it wouldn't be in Jacob's 'best interests' to see him too often. They appeared as taken with the romantic story of 'little boy lost, little boy found' as the lowest of the tabloids. Not that they admitted it. It was all couched in the most respectable, reasonable terms. Jacob was already settling into his new home surprisingly well, Carlisle, the social worker, had told Ben. In view of the circumstances, and his condition, far from helping that process, frequent contact with his former stepfather might actually disrupt it. He said they were sorry.

  Which made everything all right, of course.

  Ben drained the bottle of beer and went upstairs to Jacob's room. What used to be Jacob's room, he corrected himself, drawing on the joint. He looked at the toys and clothes that Kale hadn't wanted, the Rebus symbols and brightly coloured posters on the wall. He didn't know which was worst, seeing what was left behind or noticing what was missing. He'd taken the previous day off work so they could spend it together. They'd gone to the zoo. He'd carried the boy on his shoulders around the caged and penned animals, trying to make him laugh, wanting it to be a day they'd both remember. Jacob seemed to have had a good time but it had been too emotionally loaded for Ben to enjoy it. A part of him was forever standing back, self-consciously observing everything they did in the awareness that it was their last day. Telling himself that he'd be able to see Jacob again in a month's time didn't help. He knew it would be different then. His mood had continued even when they were back home. That morning he'd helped Jacob dress, made his breakfast, all with the knowledge that he wouldn't be doing any of it again.

  It was harder than ever to convince himself that he had made the right decision.

  He closed the door on the room that Jacob wouldn't be spending any more nights in and went back downstairs. He killed the joint and took another beer from the fridge. A photograph of Sarah stared down at him from the kitchen wall. He had always liked it because she seemed to be smiling even though, taking each of her features in isolation, she wasn't. It had only been recently that he could bring himself to put it up. Sarah thought it was vain to have photographs of herself on display unless either Ben or Jacob were in them too, and after she had died he'd found it too painful to see it every day. He looked at it now, but even after several joints and beers he couldn't fancy that he saw any reproach or criticism in it. It hadn't changed.

  It was just a photograph.

  The doorbell rang. Ben stayed where he was. He didn't want to see anyone. He had switched off his mobile, and as soon as he had arrived home he had taken the phone off the hook to preempt the sympathy calls he knew would be coming. He felt a little guilty for avoiding Colin, but he could always phone him later. It was even possible that his father might feel obliged to ring again, and Ben felt bad enough a
lready without having to go through that. There had been a call when the story first broke, a short conversation that left Ben more depressed than ever. Most of the conversation had been taken up with his excuses for staying away, an apologetic ramble that boiled down to his wife feeling under the weather. Ben had noticed that she always came down with something whenever anyone put any demands on her husband's attentions. 'You know how it is,' his father had finished, and Ben had agreed that yes, he knew how it was.

  Thanks, Dad.

  The doorbell shrilled again. Ben resolutely sat at the table, but this time it didn't stop. He pushed back the chair and went to see who it was.

  Zoe was leaning with her thumb on the bell. She jerked it away when he opened the door. A taxi was double-parked on the road behind her, its engine still running. She gave a grin that didn't manage to conceal her nervousness. 'Hi. I tried to ring, but the phone's been engaged.'

  Ben was still trying to adjust to seeing her. 'I took it off the hook.'

  'Oh.' She put her hands in the back pockets of her tight black jeans. They rode low on her hips. The movement hunched up her shoulders. 'I heard about what had happened on the news. I thought I'd see if you were okay.'

  'Yeah, I'm fine.' He remembered his manners. 'Are you coming in?'

  'No, it's all right. The taxi's waiting.' Zoe watched herself stub her toe up and down on the step. Her hair was red this week. 'So what are you doing now?'

  Ben recalled the solicitor's talk of an appeal over his contact with Jacob, but it had been half-hearted. And just then it seemed too abstract, too effortful for him to concentrate on now. 'I don't know.'

  She looked down the street as if something there had caught her attention. 'There's a party in a new club in Soho. I've got an invite. Fancy going?'

  It occurred to him that perhaps she hadn't been asking about his long-term plans after all. He took in the lipstick and make-up. The orange top she had on was even briefer than the ones she wore to work, little more than a bra that clung to her small breasts. 'No, I don't think so. Thanks for asking, though.'