The Babysitter

by Sheryl Browne

  ‘It’s kind of you, Jade, but…’ Still eyeing the mug, Mel hesitated, and then shook her head. ‘I don’t think I should.’

  ‘You can’t stay up here without any sustenance, Mel,’ Jade pointed out, oozing compassion. ‘You need to stay strong, for the children.’

  She nodded over her shoulder to where Poppy and Evie were tucked up on the bed, fast asleep. It really was a heart-warming scene, Poppy with her thumb plugged in her mouth, one little arm protectively around her tiny sister. Such a pity they’d have to be separated.

  Melissa turned to the bed, and stopped. ‘He’s trying to drive me away,’ she blurted out tearfully. ‘Or drive me insane. I’m not sure which. Both probably.’

  Well, she was well on the way to the latter, Jade thought, following her to put the soup down on the bedside table – and make damn sure she drank it. She looked demented. A bedraggled mess. Not quite the bright-eyed, bushy-tailed, smug cow Jade had first met.

  ‘Mark?’ Jade feigned disbelief. ‘But… he seems so nice. So normal.’ She blinked confusedly. ‘I can’t believe he’s—’

  ‘Been overmedicating me?’ Mel turned to her, her eyes full of hurt.

  Jade looked at her boggle-eyed. ‘Really?’

  ‘You don’t believe me.’ Melissa searched her face, her hope fading.

  Jade stepped towards her. ‘I didn’t say that,’ she said, placing a hand on her arm. ‘I’ve been in an abusive relationship myself, Melissa. The man was a complete control freak, a sociopath. Presented a perfectly respectable front to the outside world, but behind closed doors… Believe me, I know how deceitful and hurtful men can be.’

  Melissa studied her, her pale face flooding with obvious relief. Then, nodding, she closed her eyes and sat shakily down on the bed. ‘He’s accused me of drinking,’ she confided. ‘Excessively. But I haven’t been. He’s even planted bottles.’

  ‘Bloody hell.’ Jade widened her eyes in mock horror.

  ‘He was vile – so angry, so cold.’ Melissa tightened her hold around herself. ‘I think… he’s trying to get me certified. Trying to take the children away from me.’ Her expression was now one of fear. A bit like the fleabag cat, Jade recollected, as she’d pressed the polythene bag over its pretty, green-eyed little face.

  Melissa notched up her chin. ‘I won’t let him.’

  You won’t have much choice. Jade sat down as a cold shiver ran through Melissa’s body, which was looking a bit scrawny, Jade noticed. She really ought to drink the soup.

  ‘Thank God you alerted me to his affair with Lisa.’ Melissa looked miserable. ‘He might have got away with it if you hadn’t. Oh, God’ – she gulped back a sob – ‘what am I going to do, Jade?’

  Jade squeezed her shoulders and held her tight for a second, which was frankly a second too long for her own liking. ‘Drink your soup,’ she said. ‘Get a good night’s sleep, and then make a doctor’s appointment.’

  Melissa turned tear-filled eyes towards her.

  ‘You need to change your medication,’ Jade went on firmly. ‘Whether or not Mark is feeding you drugs, God forbid, the medication you’re on obviously isn’t helping your symptoms. You need to change it, and stay on top of it yourself. You also need to let your doctor know what’s happening, for your own sake, so he’ll have it all on record.’

  Jade prayed it sounded plausible. The ridiculous woman couldn’t just stop taking her medication. That would be a complete disaster.

  ‘You have to get yourself right, Mel. For the children.’ Jade passed her the mug, and then gave her shoulders another squeeze. ‘If you need some support, I could always come with you.’

  ‘Would you?’ Melissa’s hopeful look was back.

  ‘If you want me to, yes. Don’t worry, I’m on your side, Mel.’

  ‘Thank you.’ Melissa breathed out a heavy sigh – and took a sip of the soup. ‘I was going to go. Take the children and leave,’ she said, glancing uncertainly towards Jade. ‘But you had my car.’

  ‘Oh, Mel, I’m so sorry,’ Jade said, looking suitably distraught. ‘If I’d known about any of this, obviously I wouldn’t have taken it. I wouldn’t have gone.’

  ‘It’s all right. I shouldn’t be driving anyway, not like this, not with the children. In any case, I don’t think I should.’

  ‘Oh?’ Jade felt suddenly apprehensive as Melissa took another sip from the mug.

  ‘I’ve been googling it, on my phone.’

  Googling what, for fuck’s sake? Jade was growing agitated. Immensely.

  ‘I shouldn’t leave the marital home. I would if I thought the children were in danger, but I honestly don’t think Mark would hurt them. So’ – she took a heartier drink of her soup – ‘I’ve decided. I’m going to fight back. I’m staying.’

  Shit.

  Fifty-Two

  JADE

  Thank God for that. Jade offered Melissa her new tablets with a smile. She’d eased off the drugs she was feeding her, but she couldn’t hope to up them again without drawing suspicion if Melissa wasn’t taking any medication at all. She’d been able to continue with the sleeping tablets, however. She couldn’t watch her 24/7, and Mark desperately needed some sleep. He could do with a good meal inside him, too. He’d said he would get himself something for dinner, but Jade doubted he had actually eaten anything over the last two days while she’d been babysitting his needy wife. He looked dreadful. He would make himself ill at this rate.

  ‘Why don’t you have a nice bath,’ she suggested, ‘light some candles and put loads of bubbles in. You could dye your hair back, too.’ She nodded towards the copper dye Melissa had purchased from the chemist, determined as she was to try and ‘get back to normal’, as if she ever had been normal. Listening to the nonsense the woman had spouted in the surgery this evening had been painful. The doctor had nodded in sympathy, given her various abuse helpline numbers, but he’d clearly thought she was off her trolley. Jade had made sure to back up his inclinations, looking appropriately concerned and doubtful in turns.

  Melissa, who was now sitting on the bed, feeding Evie, to Jade’s annoyance, looked up at her, smiling wanly. ‘Nice idea,’ she said, ‘but Poppy needs bathing. Then there’s her bedtime story.’

  ‘I’ll see to Poppy.’ Jade smiled warmly, though she could cheerfully strangle the woman for alienating Mark from his children in his own home. He’d have to learn to live without Poppy eventually, but she didn’t want him further upset now, on top of all of this. Jade had tried to convince her that Mark wouldn’t just snatch them, that he’d know how upsetting that would be for Poppy, but still Melissa was wary, insisting on moving the cot into the main bedroom and telling Poppy she could sleep with her because she was feeling lonely with Daddy sleeping downstairs because he wasn’t feeling well.

  ‘Or… you could let Mark help out,’ she suggested, deciding to try again. If Melissa had decided to ‘fight’, then Jade had to up her game. She had to ensure there was no doubt in Mark’s mind that this woman was a danger to Poppy and Evie. To which end, Jade needed him to be hands-on with the children.

  ‘No.’ Mel shook her head adamantly as she lifted Evie to her shoulder. ‘If he insists on staying here, he stays on my terms. He’s given up any rights to his happy family life. I still can’t believe he’s done the things he’s done. He ought to be locked up. If only I could prove it.’ Stroking Evie’s back, she pulled her possessively closer, and Jade’s heart constricted inside her.

  ‘I know,’ Jade said, turning to get her little angel’s cot ready, her face flushing with jealousy and anger as she did. ‘The thing is, though, Mel, it’s Poppy who’s suffering. She doesn’t understand. She misses him.’

  Melissa stood, turning to lower Evie into the cot. Jade couldn’t quite read her expression, but suspected she was wavering. ‘Where is he?’ she asked.

  ‘Out running.’ Trying to run his frustrations off, she knew. He couldn’t hope to, though, when the source of it was under his roof. ‘You’re not on your own with this, Mel,
’ she reminded her. ‘You can rely on me to keep an eye on things.’

  ‘I know.’ Melissa smiled sadly. ‘Okay. I’ll have a bath,’ she relented.

  Good, Jade thought. Pity she hadn’t taken her sleeping tablet. With a bit of luck, she might have drowned in it.

  ‘And make myself beautiful while I’m in there.’ Mel rolled her eyes. ‘Well, presentable, anyway,’ she said self-effacingly, causing Jade to wince. ‘Even though there doesn’t seem to be much point any more.’

  Jade moved to give her a hug as the inevitable tears welled up. God, she really was a weak specimen. ‘You’re doing it for you, Mel,’ she said forcefully. ‘For the children.’

  Mel nodded. ‘Thanks, Jade,’ she said, smiling gratefully this time. ‘I don’t know what I’d do without you.’

  ‘No problem. That’s what friends are for,’ Jade assured her, squeezing her hand and turning for the door. ‘Indulge and enjoy. I’ll go and extract Poppy from in front of the TV before she gets square eyes.’

  Fifty-Three

  MARK

  ‘How are things?’ Lisa asked, when Mark picked up her call.

  ‘On a scale of one to ten, eleven.’ Coming through the front door, Mark sighed and wiped an arm across his forehead. He’d run until he thought his lungs would give out. He’d thought it would help channel some of his anger and sheer bloody frustration. It hadn’t.

  ‘That bad, hey?’

  ‘And some,’ Mark answered honestly. ‘How’re things with you?’

  ‘Wonderful. I love being in an office with Cummings strutting about like a dog with two dicks. Seems there’s a new lust in his life, poor cow. She’s obviously short-sighted or in serious need of counselling.’

  Mark laughed, and then wondered when he’d last done that. ‘Any developments on the Daisy case?’ he asked her seriously. Even with the madness his life had become, he hadn’t been able to stop thinking about the little girl, to shake the nagging feeling that somehow, somewhere, she was alive.

  ‘Nothing. It’s gone cold. Looks like the powers that be will be scaling the investigation down. Sorry, Mark,’ Lisa said, dashing his hopes that someone might come forward with fresh information, that one of the team might come up with something in his absence.

  Mark’s stomach knotted inside him. He’d let the girl down. He should have been on top of it, he thought, his frustration growing. He should have been on top of what was happening here, too, right under his nose, before it spiralled out of control. Before he lost the woman he’d loved with all of himself. Still loved.

  ‘Look, Mark, I’ve been meaning to ring you about something else. It might be nothing, but…’

  ‘Clearly you think it’s something,’ Mark prompted her, tugging his damp T-shirt over his head as he headed for the kitchen for a cold drink.

  ‘I’ve been doing some digging and—’

  But Mark cut her off mid-sentence. ‘I have to go. I’ll call you back,’ he said quickly, abruptly ending the call.

  ‘Lisa?’ Mel asked him, from where she was standing by the fridge.

  Mark cursed inwardly. ‘A work call,’ he said, feeling guilty, with no clue why.

  ‘Of course it was.’ Mel’s tone was flat. She didn’t look at him so much as through him. ‘Just orange,’ she said, indicating her glass pointedly, and then walked past him to the hall.

  ‘Shit…’ Mark muttered, fetching himself a coke from the fridge, and finding himself wishing he could have a whisky – or several. Consume so much alcohol he’d be comatose and oblivious to any of this. ‘Sod it,’ he said, parking himself heavily at the kitchen island. What happened? What in God’s name went so wrong? How? He stared upwards, as if there were a God up there who might answer him.

  He wasn’t aware of Jade coming into the kitchen behind him.

  ‘Oh dear, I take it things are getting to you?’ she asked him sympathetically.

  ‘Just a bit.’ Mark smiled disconsolately.

  Jade pressed an arm around his shoulders. Being half-naked, Mark felt somewhat awkward, but wasn’t sure how to extricate himself without offending her.

  Jade saved him from any potential awkwardness. ‘Poppy’s ready for her bath,’ she said, giving his shoulders a reassuring squeeze and then moving towards the cooker. ‘She wants The Wheels on the Bus for her bedtime story.’

  Mark looked at her with surprise.

  ‘She said to tell you to hurry up.’ Jade smiled and nodded him towards the stairs.

  He was being allowed contact with his own kids? That was something, Mark supposed.

  Fifty-Four

  JADE

  ‘And then we had gymnastics…’ Jade could hear Poppy chatting to Mark about her school day as she crept along the landing. ‘But I don’t like it.’ Jade peeked around the bathroom door to see Poppy wearing her petulant, annoying little frown.

  ‘Oh, why’s that then?’ Mark asked.

  ‘Because I like swimming better,’ Poppy said, her little face pointing upwards as Mark carefully rinsed the soap from her hair. ‘Miss Winters calls me her little mermaid,’ she informed him importantly. ‘Cos I can hold my breath for seven whole… Ouch! Daddeee…’

  ‘Oops, sorry, Poppet. Hold on a sec.’ Mark got hastily to his feet as Poppy clamped her hands to her soap-stung eyes. ‘Damn,’ he muttered, turning for the towel to find it wasn’t there.

  The missing towel in hand, Jade took a step back down the stairs as he emerged from the bathroom to head for the airing cupboard, Poppy whingeing behind him. ‘Daddy, it’s stinging.’

  Jade sighed and, covered by the outwardly opening airing cupboard door, stepped quickly back up towards the bathroom. She didn’t have to dunk her, thankfully. Poppy had already taken it upon herself to look like a drowning mermaid.

  Disappearing in the nick of time, as Mark reappeared, Jade waited at the top of the stairs. And sure enough… ‘Poppy!’ Mark shouted urgently. ‘Poppy!’

  ‘What the hell were you doing?’ he snapped angrily, plucking her from the water and swinging Poppy towards him, who clearly wasn’t drowned. More was the pity. Peering back around the door, Jade watched jealously on.

  Startled by his tone, and the shocked look on his face, Poppy squirmed in his arms, attempting to wriggle away from him.

  ‘Poppy, stop.’ In danger of dropping her, Mark tried to hang onto her. ‘Poppy!’

  ‘I was holding my breath!’ Poppy cried, and promptly burst into tears.

  ‘Christ…’ Mark hugged her close. ‘I’m sorry, Poppy,’ he murmured throatily into her wet hair. ‘I thought…’

  * * *

  She was rewarded, of course. Melissa fussed and fawned all over the little brat, while Mark, who’d almost suffered a heart attack, lingered awkwardly in the background, looking shocked – and guilty. As if it was his fault. Honestly, did the woman who’d promised to love and cherish him really have to work so hard at compounding his guilt? Obviously, if the child had drowned, it would have been an accident. Yet, Melissa, who’d previously thought Mark was her knight in shining armour, was looking at him as if he were a complete monster, nothing but contempt in her eyes, which was all to the good, Jade supposed.

  Poppy, oblivious to the trouble she’d caused, was now busy licking her bowl free of vanilla ice cream. Little pig. They ought to have christened her Pinky.

  ‘Come on, sweetie, let’s get you tucked up in bed.’ Melissa, who still had a towel wrapped around her hair, shot Mark another venomous look as she plucked Poppy from the stool at the island, as if the child had lost the use of her legs.

  Mark said nothing, just kneaded his forehead in that frustrated way he did. Jade knew why. He was trying to avoid arguing in front of his children. Did the woman not have eyes? A brain in her rusty-haired head? Could she not see how much he cared for his children?

  Jade pulled in a breath, blowing it angrily out through her nostrils, as she headed for the kettle. ‘I’ll make some hot chocolate,’ she said, working to keep her tone in check. ‘Would you like
one, Mark?’

  But he just stood there, looking for all the world like a lost soul. A lost, lonely soul.

  ‘It wasn’t your fault,’ Jade said, walking across to him and pressing a hand softly to his chest. ‘She didn’t come to any harm.’

  Mark glanced down. He didn’t seem to mind her hand there. ‘She could have done,’ he said, his tone hoarse, as if he were holding back tears. ‘I shouldn’t have left her.’

  The kettle boiled behind them. Jade smiled again affectionately and turned to it. She had no idea what to say to him. Words couldn’t make his pain go away. He needed comfort, holding. He needed to be loved. To be needed. She was treacherously close to telling him the truth; that bitch had never wanted him for more than his seed, his money, his status. That she’d used him, mercilessly. Never loved him. Not like Jade loved him.

  ‘Chocolate?’ she said instead, the kettle poised over a mug.

  ‘What?’ Mark looked up distractedly. ‘Oh. No, thanks.’ Smiling sadly, he turned to the lounge.

  For something stronger, Jade suspected, and she didn’t blame him. How she wished she could sit next to him, lie next to him, press her ear to his chest and listen to his poor heart beating. Sighing, she popped two pills into Melissa’s hot chocolate, stirred longingly, and then froze. The hot chocolate wasn’t dairy-free, was it?

  Fifty-Five

  MELISSA

  ‘Poppy, shuffle over, sweetie.’ Mel came out of the bathroom, where she’d finally managed to rinse the colour from her hair, to find Poppy lying sideways across the bed.

  ‘Poppy?’ Glancing at her through the mirror as she gave her new copper locks a last rub with the towel, Mel guessed she must have fallen asleep – not surprisingly, after the evening’s events. She knew, in her heart, that Mark would never hurt their daughter. And she’d done it herself, dashed out of the bathroom for a towel or a toy, she thought guiltily. She hadn’t admitted that to Mark, of course. She didn’t want to give him any more ammunition to use against her.