by Cathy Glass
Now she crossed the road and waited at the bus stop. It was only a couple of stops into town, and she could just afford the fare. She also knew from experience that she was less likely to be stopped by the police while waiting at a bus stop than she was while walking.
It was a little after 8.00 a.m. when Bonnie entered the brightly lit fast-food restaurant, with its usual breakfast clientele. She was thirsty, her arms and back ached from carrying the Moses basket and bag and she desperately needed a wee. She was also hungry; apart from the handful of biscuits she’d eaten the evening before, she’d had nothing since lunch yesterday, and that had only been a cheese-spread sandwich made from the last of the bread. Although she had enough money to buy breakfast, she had no idea how long she’d be living rough, so she wasn’t about to spend it until it became absolutely necessary. Bonnie opened the door to the corridor that led to the toilets and one of the staff came out. ‘Oh, a baby!’ she said, surprised, and then continued into the restaurant to clear tables.
Bonnie manoeuvred the Moses basket and holdall into the ladies. Fortunately it was empty, so she left the bag and Moses basket with Lucy in it outside the cubicle with the door open while she had a wee. Flushing the toilet, she came out, washed her hands and then held them under the hot-air dryer. As the dryer roared, Lucy started and cried. ‘It’s all right,’ Bonnie soothed, and quickly moved away from the dryer.
She picked up the Moses basket and bag, and as she did she caught sight of her face in the mirror on the wall. Under the bright light she looked even paler than usual and she seemed to have lost weight; her cheekbones jutted out and there were dark circles under her eyes. With a stab of horror, Bonnie thought that if she didn’t change her lifestyle soon she’d end up looking like her mother, haggard from years of drinking and smoking and being knocked around.
Returning to the restaurant, Bonnie ordered a hot chocolate for herself and a carton of milk for Lucy. ‘Eat here or takeaway?’ the assistant asked.
‘Here,’ Bonnie confirmed.
She paid and then, lodging the drinks upright at the foot of the Moses basket so she could carry everything in one go, she crossed to one of the long bench seats on the far side – away from the cashiers and the draughty door. Placing the Moses basket on the seat beside her, Bonnie quickly began drinking her hot chocolate. The warmth and sweetness was comforting and reminiscent of the hot milky drinks her gran used to make for her when she’d stayed with her as a child. Bonnie wondered what her gran was doing now. Her mother had fallen out with her and they hadn’t spoken for some years. Bonnie loved her gran, although she hadn’t seen her since she’d left home eight years previously.
She took the packet containing the last few biscuits from her bag and kept it on her lap, out of sight of the staff, as she quickly ate them. The sugar rush lifted her spirits and helped quell her appetite for the time being. Lucy was watching her, but didn’t appear to be hungry so Bonnie decided she’d keep the carton of milk she’d just bought for later and tucked it back in at the foot of the Moses basket, ready for when it was needed. She also had the yoghurts, one of which she’d give to Lucy later. She’d started giving her some soft food – yoghurt, a chip chewed by her first to soften it or a piece of bread soaked in her tea. When they were settled, she thought, and she had more money, she’d start buying the proper baby foods for weaning.
‘It won’t always be like this,’ Bonnie said out loud, turning to her daughter and gently stroking her cheek. ‘It will get better. I promise you.’ Although how and when it would get better Bonnie had no idea.
At 9.00 a.m. Bonnie hitched the bag over her shoulders, picked up the Moses basket and left the fast-food restaurant in search of a chemist. Lucy was asleep now and, although she hadn’t been sick or had a dirty nappy yet that morning, Bonnie wanted to buy the medicine so she had it ready in case it was needed. She tried to be a good mum, she told herself, but it was very difficult with no home, no regular income and having her own mother as a role model. When she’d been a child she’d assumed that the chaos and poverty she and her brothers were forced to live in was normal, that all families lived like that. But when she was old enough to play in other children’s houses she realized not only that it was not normal but that others on the estate pitied her and criticized her mother for neglecting her and her brothers. Bonnie wondered why no one had intervened; perhaps it was because of her mother’s ugly temper, which she’d been on the receiving end of many times and was always worse when she’d been drinking. This might also have been the reason why the social services hadn’t rescued her and her brothers as they had some of the other kids on the estate, she thought; that, or they weren’t worth saving – a view she still held today.
Bonnie spotted the blue-and-white cross on the chemist’s shop a little further up and went in. There were two customers already inside: a lady browsing the shelves and a man being served at the counter. Bonnie scanned the shelves looking for the medicine she needed but couldn’t find it. Once the man at the counter had finished, she went up to the pharmacist – a rather stern middle-aged Asian woman dressed in a colourful sari.
‘I think what I need is called Dioralyte,’ Bonnie said.
‘Is it for you?’ the pharmacist asked, giving Bonnie the once over.
‘No, for my baby.’
‘How old is it?’
‘Six months.’
She glanced at the Moses basket Bonnie held in front of her. ‘What are the symptoms?’
‘Sickness and diarrhoea.’
‘How long has she been ill?’
‘Two days,’ Bonnie said.
‘She needs to see a doctor if it continues,’ the pharmacist said. Reaching up to a shelf on her right, she took down a box marked Dioralyte. ‘This box contains six sachets,’ she said, leaning over the counter and tapping the box with her finger. ‘You follow the instructions. Mix one sachet with water or milk. You understand this doesn’t cure sickness and diarrhoea? It replaces the salts and glucose lost from the body. If your baby is no better in twenty-four hours, you must take her to your doctor.’
‘I will,’ Bonnie said, taking her purse from her pocket.
‘Four pounds twenty,’ the woman said.
‘That’s a lot!’ Bonnie exclaimed. ‘Can’t I just buy two sachets?’
The pharmacist paused from ringing up the item on the till and looked at Bonnie. Bonnie knew she should have kept quiet and paid. Through the dispensing hatch Bonnie could see a man, presumably the woman’s husband, stop what he was doing and look at her. Then the woman came out from behind the counter and leaned over the Moses basket for a closer look at Lucy.
‘I can smell sick,’ she said, feeling Lucy’s forehead to see if she had a temperature. Lucy stirred but didn’t wake.
‘It might be on the blanket,’ Bonnie said defensively. ‘I didn’t have time to wash that before I left. Her clothes are clean.’
‘Have you taken the baby’s temperature?’ the woman now asked.
‘Yes,’ Bonnie lied. ‘She doesn’t feel hot, does she?’
‘No, but that isn’t necessarily a good test. What was her temperature?’
‘Normal,’ Bonnie said, with no idea what that was.
The woman looked at her and then returned to behind the counter. ‘Babies can become seriously ill very quickly,’ she said. ‘You need to watch her carefully. If you go to your doctor’s, they will give you a prescription for free. Where do you live?’
‘Eighty-six Hillside Gardens,’ Bonnie said, giving the address of the launderette she’d just left. It was the only local address she knew by heart.
‘Do you want the Dioralyte?’
‘Yes,’ Bonnie said, and quickly handed her a five pound note.
‘Remember, you see your doctor if she’s no better tomorrow,’ the woman said again, and gave her the change.
‘I will,’ Bonnie said, just wanting to get out. Once she’d tucked the change into her purse, she dropped it along with the paper bag containing the Dioral
yte into the Moses basket and hurried from the shop.
However, inside the shop Mrs Patel was concerned. The young woman she had just served looked thin and gaunt and her baby was ill. She’d appeared agitated and the basket she carried her baby in was old and grubby; she hadn’t seen one like it for years. And why was the mother out on the streets with her bags packed in the middle of winter when her baby was ill? It didn’t add up; something wasn’t right. Mrs Patel was aware that in the past chemists had missed warning signs when intervention could have stopped suffering and even saved a life. Half an hour later, having voiced her concerns to her husband, he served in the shop while she went into their office at the back of the shop and phoned the social services.
‘This may be nothing,’ she began, as many callers to the duty social worker do. ‘My name is Mrs Patel, I’m the chemist at 137 High Street. I’ve just served a young woman with a sick baby and I’m concerned. Is it possible for someone to check on her? I have an address.’
And that was the first time Lucy came to the notice of the social services – as a six-month-old baby with an address but no name.
Chapter Four
Too Late to Help
Three days later, in the early afternoon, Miranda parked her car in the first available space on the road, a little way past the launderette, and got out, extending her umbrella as she went. She was a first-year social worker, having qualified the year before, and had been assigned this relatively straightforward case. The duty social worker at the Local Authority had noted Mrs Patel’s concerns and passed the referral to Miranda’s team manager, who’d allotted the case to her. Miranda had duly contacted the health visitor whose patch included 86 Hillside Gardens, but having checked their records she had come back to her and said they had no record of a young mother and baby registered at that address. Now Miranda was visiting the address to investigate Mrs Patel’s concerns.
It was only as Miranda stood in the street that she realized the address she’d been given wasn’t a house but a launderette – the last shop in a parade of four. With the rain bouncing off her umbrella, she checked the street sign to make sure she was in the correct road, and then looked round the end of the building to the side of the launderette to see if there was a door to Number 86. There wasn’t, so she returned to the front of the launderette, collapsed her umbrella and went in. Thick, dank and unhealthily humid air hit her. Although most of the machines were working, there were only two people in the shop: an elderly man sitting on the bench in front of the machines, presumably waiting for his washing to finish, and a rather large woman in her late thirties ironing at the far end of the shop. The woman looked over as Miranda entered and, seeing her hesitate, asked in a strong Eastern European accent: ‘Can I help you?’
Miranda walked over to the woman before she spoke. ‘Is this Number 86 Hillside Gardens?’ she asked.
‘Yes,’ the woman confirmed, pausing from her ironing.
‘Are you the owner?’
‘No. I work here. Why?’
‘I’m trying to find a young woman with a baby who may live here,’ Miranda said.
The woman looked at her suspiciously, and Miranda thought that perhaps she hadn’t fully understood her, so she rephrased: ‘I would like to see the woman living here who has a baby.’
‘No. I live here. Me – Alicja, with my husband,’ she said, pointing to the ceiling and flat above.
‘Do you have a baby?’ Miranda asked. Although Alicja didn’t match the description Mrs Patel had given, she was possibly a relative.
‘No baby. My boy eight. He in Poland,’ Alicja said.
‘Does anyone else live here with you?’
‘Are you the police?’ Alicja asked, her eyes narrowing. ‘We have right to be here. My husband has visa.’
‘No, I’m not the police,’ Miranda said with a smile, trying to reassure the woman. ‘I am a social worker.’
Alicja frowned, puzzled.
‘Social worker,’ Miranda repeated, wishing that like some of her colleagues she’d mastered the basics of Polish. ‘Me good lady,’ she said, pointing to herself. ‘I help people. I want to help the woman with the baby.’
‘Not police?’ Alicja asked again, seeking confirmation.
‘No. Social worker. Do you have a mother and baby living with you?’
‘No. No baby. Only me and husband,’ Alicja confirmed.
‘Do you know a woman in her early twenties with a six-month-old baby?’ Miranda now asked, for it was possible that the mother she was looking for had stayed with Alicja or just visited.
‘No. I show you our room?’ Alicja said again, pointing to the flat above.
Miranda hadn’t intended to ask to see the living accommodation; she really didn’t have a right, but as Alicja had offered it made sense for her to see the flat so she could rule out the baby being there.
‘Yes, please,’ she said. ‘That is kind of you.’
Alicja gave a small nod and, unplugging the iron, led the way to the door in the far corner of the shop. Opening it, she tapped the light switch and Miranda followed her up the dingy, damp-smelling staircase.
‘Ivan very angry with the girl with baby,’ Alicja said. ‘Ivan own shop and she steal his money and go.’
‘I see,’ Miranda said. ‘So there was a girl with a baby living here before you, and she left?’ Then she gave a little cry and stopped dead as the lights went out.
‘No worry. I press,’ Alicja said, going up the last few steps and pressing the switch at the top to restore the lights.
Miranda joined her on the small landing.
‘Yes. She go,’ Alicja said, opening the door to the flat. ‘Me and husband come last night. No unpacking yet.’
Miranda followed Alicja into the flat, which, like the staircase, smelled damp and musty. A drizzle of winter light filtered through the grimy windows, but even in the half-light Miranda could see the flat was unfit for human habitation.
‘We unpack later,’ Alicja said, almost apologetically, waving a hand at the bags, cardboard boxes and carrier bags that littered the floor. ‘No time yet.’
Miranda gave a weak smile and nodded; her gaze had gone to the nylon sleeping bags open on the grimy, worn sofa and armchair.
‘No beds,’ Alicja said, following Miranda’s gaze. ‘Ivan say no bed. He lock door to bedrooms. He have key. Me and husband sleep here.’
Not for the first time since Miranda had begun her career in social work, she was appalled at the conditions some people were forced to live in. And while it was true that this wasn’t the worse she’d seen – not by a long way – it was bad, and she felt Alicja’s humiliation that she and her husband – two hard-working adults – had been reduced to living like this. She also felt anger towards the landlords who exploited immigrant labour.
‘And there was a baby living here?’ Miranda asked, now concerned that a baby could have been living in such conditions.
‘Yes,’ Alicja said. ‘Mother leave dirty nappy and clothes, baby clothes. I show you.’
Miranda followed Alicja round the boxes and bags into what passed for a kitchen. Freezing cold, with crumbling plaster and filthy like the rest of the flat, Miranda noted it didn’t even have the basics of storage cupboards or a fridge. Alicja went to a row of knotted bin bags propped against the old cooker, which had its oven door hanging off. Untying the top of one of the bags, Alicja tilted it towards her so she could see in. Miranda saw the soiled nappy and baby clothes among the other garbage and took a step back, away from the smell coming from the bag.
‘I put these out later, and clean when I finish work,’ Alicja said quickly, retying the bag.
Miranda was tempted to ask how much she and her husband were paying Ivan for this dump, but it was none of her business. She’d learnt early on in her career that social workers couldn’t save every adult living in poverty; the social services budget didn’t stretch that far. As there was no child or vulnerable adult living here, her involvement was effectively finished.
There was nothing she could do.
‘I show you bathroom?’ Alicja offered. ‘Then I work. Ivan angry if I not work.’
‘Thank you,’ Miranda said. She followed Alicja out of the kitchen, around the bags and boxes in the living room to the bathroom. It was pretty much as Miranda had expected: basic, with mould growing on the walls and around the window, an old cracked bath and sink, ripped lino, a leaking toilet and no heating. That a baby had been living here was appalling.
‘Do you know where the woman and baby went?’ Miranda asked, as they returned to the top of the stairs and Alicja pressed the light switch.
‘No. Good that Ivan not know,’ Alicja said. ‘He very angry. She take his money, but he bad man. He frighten me, but not frighten my husband.’
Alicja went ahead to the bottom of the stairs and kept the light switch pressed so Miranda could complete her decent without suddenly being plunged into darkness.
‘Now I work,’ Alicja said, as they returned to the launderette.
‘Thank you very much for your time,’ Miranda said. ‘You’ve been very helpful.’ She took a social services compliment slip, which she used as a business card, from her bag and handed it to Alicja. ‘That is the telephone number of where I work,’ she said. ‘If the girl and her baby come back, will you call me please?’
Alicja nodded and tucked the slip of paper into the pocket of her jeans and picked up the iron. ‘She not come back here. She keep away from Ivan. Maybe you talk to the man in the shop next door? He come here this morning. Ask about baby. He worried – his wife hear baby crying.’
