‘You’re quiet,’ Dan remarks, lifting a lock of my hair out of my face and tucking it behind my ear. ‘Are you still thinking about what happened earlier, or is it something else?’
‘Just earlier,’ I lie. This subject is much easier than talking about how I haven’t yet been able to push open the door to teenage Imogen Tandy’s bedroom for fear of opening gates I can’t close again. ‘It’s still playing on my mind, if I’m honest. The way they were with that girl. I mean, did she look as though she was the type of girl to push someone into the road?’ But even as I’m saying the words, I know that no one can predict the type of person to commit violence against someone else. Least of all you, a nasty little voice reminds me. Your track record in that department is hardly gold star, is it?
‘She was pretty creepy in that chip shop,’ Dan replies. ‘I mean, how many children do you know who would threaten to cut someone’s tongue out? And how did she know that woman had been talking about her? They were nowhere near the shop when she said those things.’
I give a dismissive wave. ‘She didn’t threaten to cut her tongue out – she was just quoting something she’d heard at school or somewhere. And I got the impression that it wasn’t the first time Mrs Evans had spread her ridiculous theories. She could have been talking about another set of lies. Her foster mother was mortified, wasn’t she? I don’t know whether she was more embarrassed at Ellie’s words or you laughing when you heard them.’
‘I know. Bloody brilliant timing, don’t you think? I probably shouldn’t have laughed. Broke the tension, though.’
‘She was nowhere near that girl,’ I muse, ignoring the grin on Dan’s face. He doesn’t need any encouragement to turn every situation into a joke. ‘You saw, didn’t you? They were at least a foot apart. We would have seen it if she’d pushed her.’
‘Actually, I didn’t see,’ Dan admits, a sheepish look crossing his face. ‘I didn’t even notice them, to be honest. They were on the pavement. I clocked that they were there but not what they were doing.’
‘But you told the police officer—’
‘I know.’ Dan cringes. ‘Don’t be mad at me. I just agreed with what you said. That woman was being so horrible and I really wanted to back you up. When he took my statement, I said I’d seen the girls and I didn’t see one of them push the other. Which is true,’ he says quickly as I open my mouth to speak. ‘I didn’t see anyone push anyone. But I couldn’t swear that she didn’t push her either. I wasn’t watching.’
I think back to the seconds before the car screeched to a halt. I was so certain at the time that I’d seen them standing feet apart, but that was when Dan backed me up, when he said he’d seen the same. Can I really swear that I didn’t look away for a second? Would I testify in a court of law that Naomi had fallen? I try to replay the moment in my mind like a video, but there is no way of forcing myself to visualise what happened.
‘Im, forget it. Seriously, no one was hurt and it doesn’t look like that crazy woman is pressing charges against the kid. So let’s not let it ruin our first night.’
That is so beautifully Dan. We almost ran a child over today but we wouldn’t want that to ruin our night, would we? He’s right, he’s always right. What good will overthinking it do? No one was hurt. Both mothers took their children home today and that’s the best outcome we could have wished for. So why do I still feel so uneasy about the whole thing?
10
Whole-school assembly seems like the perfect opportunity. Once she’s made the decision to do it, once she’s squared away the notion of ‘cheating’ in her mind as simply giving Yasmin the best chance she can have of passing, it’s fairly simple. Far more so, in fact, than Florence would have you believe. The flaw in the head teacher’s anti-cheating measures is that no one ever expects someone to actually try and cheat, so there is never really a great deal of thought that goes into trying to stop them. They want you to think it’s impossible – locked drawers and sealed papers – when in actual fact there are three senior members of staff who have the key to the filing unit, and any one of them will lend you their supply-cupboard keys with that very filing-unit key on the same ring, not in a million years thinking that you might slip it off to be used later in the week. And even if they noticed it was gone, their first thought would be that it had fallen off the ring. No teachers in their school steal, or lie, or cheat. The problem with Florence is that she would much prefer to think her teachers are incompetent enough to lose a key than clever enough to steal one.
Hannah has at least twenty minutes before the children spill out of the hall and normal classes resume. That’s plenty of time to snap a quick picture of the maths resit that her niece will be taking next month. Yasmin was gutted when she failed last year and Hannah just wants to be able to make sure she revises the right things. She isn’t going to tell her the exact questions, of course, that would be wrong, but knowing what areas to practise, knowing which equations to review, that sort of thing isn’t real cheating. Yas has four weeks before the exam – plenty of time to learn what she needs to know.
Hannah glances back and forth along the corridor. It isn’t exactly deserted; every now and then a teacher who has managed to make an excuse not to be in assembly emerges from their room, or a child who desperately needs the toilet dashes out of the hall looking frantic. No matter, she isn’t breaking any rules by being in the supply cupboard, and what she needs to do will take seconds. If a child wandered in, it was unlikely they would even know she was doing anything wrong – for obvious reasons they don’t tell the students where the exam papers are kept.
The supply cupboard is dimly lit and a total pigsty. Hannah herself has never even attempted a clear-up, but she knows several other teachers who have spent days in the holiday trying to organise it, to no avail. You won’t catch her giving up her holiday to sort out other people’s mess. Some of the staff are worse than the bloody kids. The filing unit that holds the exam papers is at the back and is low enough that Hannah has to hunch over it. She wrestles with the flimsy key, and after what feels like an eternity slides it open.
The papers are kept shrink-wrapped in alphabetical order, so finding the stack of maths GCSE resits takes a matter of seconds. The shrink-wrap is another simple obstacle to be overcome. Hannah pulls out a Stanley knife from the resistant-materials department that she hid behind a stack of pencil sharpeners yesterday and slices a thin line into the creases of the wrapping. Despite her earlier pep talk to herself that nothing will go wrong, that this is a simple two-minute job, her heart is thumping dangerously. Bloody hell, Hannah, calm down, she chides. It would hardly do to give yourself a heart attack and be discovered in here clutching a stack of exam papers, would it? She allows herself a small smile as she slides out one of the papers and clicks off a couple of photos on her phone. Jesus, these look harder than the original exam – thank goodness she had a look. Yas would never have revised half of this stuff.
Slipping the paper back in through the top, she slides the pile back into the filing cabinet. She isn’t concerned about the split in the wrap – she made it in between the folds of the shrink wrap and no one is likely to notice it when they slice into it. Just to be on the safe side, she’ll volunteer to be on the set-up team for the resit and open that one herself.
Locking up the cabinet, she congratulates herself silently on a job well done. She doesn’t feel guilty; if they really expected no one to take a peek, they would make it harder. Probably half of those piles have slits in from other teachers having a nose. She slips the Stanley knife into one of the boxes of art supplies that litter the floor and turns to make her way back to her classroom. Her heart plummets. Standing silently in the doorway is Ellie Atkinson.
‘Ellie.’ Hannah plasters on her young-children smile. This child is more than slightly creepy. Hannah has heard all sorts about how her parents were killed in a house fire, Ellie the only survivor. She’d been moved on from two foster families before the Jeffersons took her in, and the woman fr
om Place2Be who had been tasked with helping her settle in mysteriously quit just three weeks after meeting her. Hannah squares her shoulders. She’s just a kid, she tells herself. What can she possibly do to me? ‘What are you doing out of assembly?’
Ellie says nothing, just watches Hannah in that clinical way she has, as though she is appraising her and finding her disappointingly lacking.
‘You should be in assembly,’ Hannah repeats, but her voice sounds less certain to her own ears now. She isn’t sure, but she thinks she hears Ellie mutter something.
‘What was that? What did you say?’
Silence. Ellie has deep chocolate-brown eyes and they are fixed on Hannah, who feels frozen to the spot.
The hallway bursts into a cacophony of sound as the assembly spills out, breaking whatever spell Hannah’s feet are under. She gives a disgusted little snort and grabs a pack of rulers from the shelf, waves them at Ellie muttering, ‘Just getting these,’ and pushes past her out of the cupboard. Ellie turns and slides into the crowd of children, leaving Hannah to lock the door with trembling fingers.
11
Imogen
‘You look amazing.’ Dan lets out a low whistle and gives my backside a squeeze. For months after I was fired, all my husband saw me in was my pyjamas or workout leggings – not that I did any working out. I barely moved from the sofa for days at a time, only shifting position to receive the meals he brought me. It’s nice to be feeling more like a human being again. ‘Are you nervous?’
‘A little,’ I admit. ‘It’s just strange being back here after so long, and now starting a new job. I’m not going to mess it up this time, though. You don’t have to worry about what happened at Morgan and Astley happening again.’
‘I’m not worried about that,’ Dan says, but I see the momentary flicker of relief on his face. ‘I’m worried about what being back here is doing to you. You’ve been pretty quiet since we arrived. Last night you stayed up until stupid o’clock to avoid going to bed in your mum’s room. You know we could have sold this place, stayed where we were.’
‘And how long would that have taken? We couldn’t have afforded the rent on that place much longer, Dan, not with me not working. We were haemorrhaging money. Knowing that I was the reason our meagre savings were dwindling was difficult. Nana left this house to Mum mortgage-free; now it’s ours. Plus I applied for about forty jobs in London and was turned down for every one. This was our only option and you know it.’
‘We had other options,’ he says gently. I know what our other options were.
‘I wasn’t about to take your parents’ money.’ My voice comes out harsher than I intended, but Dan just shrugs.
‘They wouldn’t have minded.’
‘I would have minded.’ I struggle to keep the edge out of my voice. I know his mum and dad wouldn’t have minded. Dan is their only son and they – well, his mother to be exact – have always been desperate to keep me on side, lest I pack up and take my ovaries with me. His mum brings flowers and wine every time they visit – last time she turned up with a crocheted pen holder, a peach woollen tube that looked so obscene that when Dan had caught my eye I had to excuse myself to the kitchen and laugh until I sobbed into the fridge.
‘It’s like you said, a fresh start. We’ve gone from renting a place we could no longer afford and me being unemployed to owning our own home and me having a new job. This is important to us.’
‘It’s important to you,’ Dan replies, kissing my hair. ‘You are important to me. And I know you don’t want to talk about your mum,’ he holds up his hands in surrender at my look, ‘and that’s fine. You know me, Im, I’d never push you. But one day I hope you can get past whatever happened. For the sake of our family.’
My mouth suddenly feels as though it is filled with sand. I nod once, then look away.
‘I’d better get going,’ I say. ‘Don’t want to be late on my first day.’
12
The classroom is silent, all the children going about their work, and Hannah pulls out her iPad ready for at least half an hour on Facebook. Maybe she’ll buy some new shoes, something for the weekend.
They’re only five minutes into the task she has set them when Ellie raises her hand. Hannah resists the urge to sigh. ‘Yes, Ellie?’
‘Miss, I wanted to ask you a question about morals.’
Hannah feels the dread rise in her chest. This instantly feels like a trap.
‘Go on.’
Ellie smiles, a small movement that makes the hairs on Hannah’s arms tingle. ‘I just wanted to know what you think someone should do if they thought they’d seen someone else cheating.’
Fuck. She knew Ellie had seen her in the cupboard. But how had she known what she was doing? Unless she knows where the tests were kept – and it’s unlikely the Year 7s would know, let alone care – it would have just looked as though Hannah was getting supplies.
‘I think you’d have to be very sure of what you saw, Ellie.’
‘But would you say they should tell someone?’ Ellie pushes. ‘Like the head teacher?’
Hannah winces. ‘Without any proof I’d certainly be wary. It might look like you were trying to cause trouble for the person. You’re welcome to talk to me after class if you’d like?’
Ellie smiles that smile again. ‘I don’t think that’s necessary, miss, thanks.’
13
Imogen
My new office is so far removed from my old one that it may as well be on a different planet. Completely open-plan, with pinboards between desks that barely rise above the occupants’ foreheads and don’t quite manage to pull off the illusion of privacy. There are twelve people in this office when it is up to capacity, or so I was told this morning, but most of them work from other offices half of the week and it is rarely full. Still, it is such a far cry from my private office with its tasteful decor and above all its silence that I already feel as though I might struggle to breathe in here. There are seven people in today and that is enough to maintain a steady buzz of conversation, like an air-con unit in need of a service.
‘It’s great to have you here finally.’ Lucy has been given the unenviable task of showing me around, giving introductions and generally initiating me in the ways of the public sector. So far this morning she has covered tea funds, cakes on birthdays and communal lockers. She smiles at the emphasis on ‘finally’ to show me it’s not me she’s getting at. ‘You’ll soon find out what this place is like. Why do something in a week when you can stretch it out to three months? Not that we got any notice of the vacancy, but still, it took them over a month to put the post out. That’s the reason for the backlog.
‘Anyway,’ she takes a breath when she registers the look on my face, ‘I’m scaring you. It’s not that bad really, just public sector for you. Your last place was private, wasn’t it? Can’t imagine why you wanted to leave that for government work. I’d give my eye teeth for a job in the private sector, me.’ She gives a self-conscious giggle and I try to fix my grimace into a smile. Is everyone here like this? I’m really not used to such a them-and-us approach; neither am I used to colleagues who tell you their life story before you even sit down at your desk. I was at Morgan and Astley for six years and I barely knew anything about my colleagues’ personal lives.
I dig my fingernails into the flesh between my thumb and forefinger to quell the rising nausea. What have I done? Have I really thrown away my career and ended up here? The whole idea seems ridiculous now, as though I was really drunk and can’t remember anything I did, or my reasons for doing it. You’re lucky to have a job, I tell myself, especially one as good as this. Place2Be is a fantastic organisation, providing mental health support in schools all around the country. We actually help children who need it, not just rich kids who have gone off the rails. Kids like . . . no, don’t think about him now.
‘The stationery cupboard is just down the hall, next to admin. Joy keeps the key but it’s only so people don’t dump all their crap in there. I’ll
take you down there in a bit to kit your desk out. Looks like it’s been raided since Em left.’ She casts an apologetic glance at the bare desk; it’s made of oak veneer, a giant chip in one corner and a cup-sized hole rimmed in plastic towards the back. My old one was . . . Never mind. It’s someone else’s now. Probably Fat Matt – he’d had his eyes on my office for years. I scowl at the thought of him rubbing his blubbery rolls all over my leather chair and replacing the light smell of incense with his rancid body odour. ‘IT will come and set up your computer at some point today.’
Nothing like leaving it till the last minute, I think, but say nothing. They’ve known I was starting today for weeks now. But I’m not about to start complaining on my first day.
Joy is an aptly named smiling woman, one of those people who instantly make you feel better in their presence.
‘Morning, love,’ she says when Lucy herds me into the office. It’s so strange, being presented around like a new kid at school. ‘Nice to have you on board. Has Lucy been treating you well?’
The Foster Child Page 4
