Shadow of a Doubt

by Michelle Davies

  Phone in hand, I clamber back into bed. Anne picks up on the first ring.

  ‘Oh, kiddo. We’ve been worried about you.’

  Just hearing her voice lifts my mood. ‘I’m sorry. I know I should’ve called you last night, but my head was all over the place.’

  ‘I’m not surprised. It must’ve come as a terrible shock after all this time. I can only begin to imagine how you must be feeling.’

  I picture her sitting in the hallway of their terraced house, one street back from the Morecambe seafront. She and John, my foster dad, have one of those old-fashioned telephone benches with a seat upholstered in a busy floral fabric. As a teenager, I used to be embarrassed by how naff it was and would purposely perch on the stairs to use the phone to avoid sitting on it – now I love it because it’s so them.

  ‘I’m okay. I mean, it is a shock, but it’s not like I knew her.’

  ‘That’s as may be, Cara, but losing a parent, whether you were close to them or not, is still difficult,’ says Anne. ‘We just wanted you to know we’re here for you, for whatever you need.’

  My heart expands with gratitude. Anne and her husband, John, are the only people I feel I can truly rely on and knowing I have their support now means a lot.

  I was two months past my eleventh birthday when I pitched up on their doorstep for the first time, tired and desperate for the toilet after the long train journey from London with my social worker. What’s always stuck in my mind from that day is how they let me find my own way to the bathroom, encouraging me to roam about upstairs as though the house was mine and always had been. After two years of constant supervision at the Peachick, it was like being let off a leash and as I came downstairs on that first occasion, I remember I was smiling in a way I hadn’t for many months.

  Anne and John are also the only grown-ups who ever listened to my side of the story about Matty’s death and believed I was being genuine. They also gave short shrift to anyone who questioned whether I should be allowed near their other foster children. My past, or rather what I was accused of, has never been a concern for them, and over time, I’ve come to realise what a huge act of love it was to foster me when so many others were reluctant to.

  ‘Your aunt called me again just now,’ Anne continues. ‘She was worried you hadn’t received her message yesterday and wanted to check I’d given her the right number.’

  ‘Worried?’

  I once again call to mind Karen standing on the doorstep with Mum the day I left and I find it hard to believe she is bothered about my welfare now. She certainly wasn’t the last time she saw me. It dawns on me I can no longer even bring myself to call her Auntie Karen, because that sounds like a person who is kind and loving and she was neither of those things.

  ‘Well, more like agitated,’ says Anne.

  That makes more sense.

  ‘You don’t have to talk to her if you don’t want to,’ Anne continues, ‘but the polite thing to do is to acknowledge she’s contacted you.’

  This makes me smile for the first time since yesterday evening. Growing up in Anne’s house, ‘the polite thing to do’ was the number one rule. She stayed calm when we got angry and lost our shit, which happened a lot, or when I tried to run away once, but if any of us were rude to people, her disapproval could be felt from miles away.

  ‘I’ll text her back once I’m off the phone,’ I promise. ‘Was it you who gave her my number in the first place?’

  ‘Yes. She called at about seven o’clock last night. I suggested the news might be better coming from us, but she wanted to be the one to tell you. She was concerned about how you’d take it.’

  More concern for me, yet Karen’s text was bereft of any. Funny, that.

  ‘How did she get your number?’ I ask.

  ‘Your mum had our address written down, so Karen was able to get our landline number through directory enquiries.’

  ‘Really?’

  ‘I know. I was surprised she kept it too.’

  I was told that social services had informed my parents where I’d been placed after my discharge from the Peachick and that contact would be initiated if they requested it, but they never did. So if Mum had had Anne and John’s address all this time, why did she never get in touch? Not a single word from her in all those years. Did she ever come close, I wonder – write out a birthday card, then think twice about sending it? Was she ever tempted to visit, or even just to stand outside the house to catch a glimpse of the daughter she’d disowned?

  I let out a long sigh. Second-guessing the whys and wherefores of a woman who became a stranger to me isn’t something I’m capable of this morning. I feel out of kilter and so do my surroundings, which bothers me immensely, because for so long my flat has been my haven, the one place where I can be myself and forget about who I was. It’s as though real life is seeping through its protective walls and the safe space I’ve spent all these years carefully constructing is being eroded brick by brick. I think this is upsetting me as much as her dying.

  I live on a peninsula of the Essex coast that’s cut off from the mainland twice a day by the tide. It’s a twenty-minute drive from my workplace in Colchester and I chose to settle here when I was eighteen because it’s one of those blissfully subdued places that old people like to retire to and was the environment I needed after two years in hospital and another seven in foster care. Less touristy than Morecambe, it is calm and quiet and I can breathe here. I go for daily walks along the coastal path and spend my weekends treading a familiar route through the nearby nature reserve. Mustard, who is now sprawled on my bedroom floor watching me, loves the walks as much as I do, but loves diving into the estuary more.

  It’s also only an hour’s drive from where I grew up. An unquenchable need to be close to Heldean was another reason I didn’t stay in Morecambe, much as Anne and John hoped I would. They even offered to apply for a ‘staying put’ order on my behalf so I could remain in their foster care until the age of twenty-one, but I said no. I wanted to come back down south as soon as I was free to and so my social worker arranged for me to be set up in independent accommodation with the support of a carer for the first year, until I felt confident enough to go it alone. Anne and John understood why I wanted to move down south, I think, after I made it clear they were my family now and I would never lose touch with them. True to my word, I still visit once every other month and spend every Christmas and Easter with them.

  ‘Do you think I should go to the funeral?’ I ask.

  ‘Do you want to?’ Anne parries back.

  ‘I don’t know. I think so, but I don’t want to go anywhere near that house.’

  Even the mere thought of returning to 16 Parsons Close inspires a terror that makes me shudder violently. I will never understand what possessed my parents to continue living there after what happened. Even after Dad died – which I was only informed about by my social worker – Mum still refused to relinquish the house and its hideous memories. I know that because I regularly check online to see if it’s been listed for sale, but it never has.

  ‘You wouldn’t have to. You could go to the funeral, pay your respects, then leave. You won’t be alone either – I’m coming with you,’ says Anne decisively.

  Relief floods through me. I had a feeling she might offer, but I didn’t want to ask. She doesn’t drive, so John would need to stay with their current charges, and it’s a long way on the train from Morecambe to Heldean, with at least two changes and a crossover on the Tube between mainline stations in London. But Anne knows what returning to Heldean will mean for me, which is why she wants to come.

  ‘I would love you to, thank you.’

  ‘Once your aunt lets you know when the funeral is, I’ll sort out my ticket.’

  ‘I’ll pay for it,’ I say hastily.

  ‘I can pay my way, kiddo.’

  The nickname ‘kiddo’ is not exclusive to me; it’s the default title Anne gives all the children in her care. Dozens of youngsters have crossed her and John�
�s threshold over the years and it stops her inadvertently forgetting anyone’s name and inflicting the kind of hurt that is magnified a million times when you’re new to foster care and already feel displaced and forgotten. She and John are both edging towards seventy but refuse to retire, saying that while there are children who need a place where they can feel safe, and for as long as the local authority will allow it, they’ll carry on fostering. At the moment, they have two girls staying, one of ten and another of thirteen. Both a handful, they have yet to realise how lucky they are to have landed on Anne and John’s doorstep. But they will, eventually, just as I did.

  I can easily cover Anne’s ticket. I will happily pay out hundreds if it means she will come with me to Heldean.

  ‘Let’s see how much it costs first, then we can argue about who pays,’ says Anne. ‘But I can come down sooner, if you want some company?’

  ‘There’s no need. I mean – there’s nothing to talk about really, is there? She was my mum, but I didn’t know her.’

  We both know my feelings towards Anita Belling are far more complicated than my casual tone suggests, and that our relationship cannot be so easily downplayed, but Anne knows me well enough to let it drop.

  We talk for a bit longer, then I say I need to take Mustard out for a walk and we hang up. He starts circling by my bedroom door in anticipation.

  ‘You need to wait a minute, mate. I have to send this message first.’

  I draft and send the text quickly, because if I give myself any more time to think about it, I’ll chicken out.

  HI KAREN. THANK YOU FOR THE TEXT. THE NEWS HAS COME AS A GREAT SHOCK. I WOULD LIKE TO ATTEND THE FUNERAL – PLEASE CAN YOU LET ME KNOW DATE/TIME/CHURCH. CARA.

  The reply is instantaneous, as though Karen’s been waiting all night and all morning for me to message her back.

  THE FAMILY FEELS IT WOULD BE INAPPROPRIATE FOR YOU TO BE THERE.

  Instantly I’m annoyed. Why bother to tell me my mum is dead if it changes nothing?

  I furiously tap out a response, but before I can send it, another message comes in.

  PLEASE UNDERSTAND THIS IS A VERY DIFFICULT TIME FOR US AND YOUR COMING WILL ONLY CAUSE MORE DISTRESS.

  I draft a curt response but promptly delete it. Karen has no right to ban me from attending and I really should fight my corner, but what’s the point? I don’t need the added stress.

  OK.

  I’m not expecting any response to that, but my phone pings again and this time her reply floors me.

  WILL READING IS TUES 5TH AT FAIRLOP’S, HIGH ST. 11.30 A.M. YOUR MUM LEFT INSTRUCTIONS SAYING YOU MUST ATTEND.

  I sit bolt upright on the bed. Why do I need to be there? My frown deepens as I read the text again: attending a meeting slap bang in the middle of Heldean High Street is not the same as slipping unobtrusively into the back of a church to attend a funeral. I don’t know if I want to be that exposed. Heldean is a small town where things don’t go unnoticed, and my turning up at Fairlop’s to hear my mum’s will being read would be big news for locals. Someone might even tip off the media, a thought that floods me with anxiety. I have read every awful, nasty word that has been written about me over the years and I dread to think how much worse it could be in this age of trial by social media. As my possible exposure looms large, I struggle to catch my breath, the palisades of my haven crumbling faster around me.

  After a few moments, Mustard whines louder to remind me he’s still waiting and I clamber off the bed to reassure him, grateful for the distraction. Crossing the room, my gaze strays to the photograph in a tiny blue frame on the chest of drawers beside the door. Barely bigger than a passport headshot, it’s the only picture I have of my brother Matty and its inferior quality compared to the photograph alongside it, of Anne and John, reflects the fact it was cut from a newspaper. Matty is smiling impishly in the picture and as I draw nearer, it hits me that it’s not for Mum that I must swallow my fears and return to Heldean – it’s for him.

  Chapter Six

  The Heldean Advertiser

  ONLINE EXCLUSIVE

  1 HR AGO

  The Heldean Haunting: mother dies 25 years after infamous hoax

  By Beth Jenkins, Senior Reporter

  @Beth_ HelAdv

  The mother at the centre of the Heldean Haunting has died after losing her battle with cancer, her family has confirmed.

  Anita Belling, 61, passed away on Friday at St Bernadette’s Hospice, ten months after she was diagnosed with cancer of the liver.

  It was in 1994 that Mrs Belling’s family made headline news when her son, Matty, six, was smothered to death by his nine-year-old sister, Cara, at their home in Parsons Close. The inquest into Matty’s death revealed he suffocated when Cara wrapped him in a full-length curtain in the front room of their home and he was unable to escape.

  Afterwards, Cara famously tried to blame his death on a ghost called Limey Stan, who she claimed was haunting the family’s three-bedroom property for months preceding the killing.

  The case came to be known as the Heldean Haunting and has been the subject of various books over the years, including one by Heldean resident and self-proclaimed paranormal expert, Timothy Pitt. He remains the only person to ever support Cara’s claim that Limey Stan existed.

  Cara was below the age of criminality at the time of the killing and therefore too young to be tried. Instead, she was admitted to the Peachick Children and Young Person’s Psychiatric Hospital in London, where, according to an interview her parents gave to the BBC at the time, she was diagnosed with delusional disorder. On her discharge two years later, she was taken into foster care somewhere in the north of England.

  Mrs Belling’s husband, Paul, died in a road traffic accident on the M11 in 2001. She never remarried. Her sister, Karen Johnson, issued an appeal for privacy via The Heldean Advertiser on behalf of their family.

  ‘Whilst we understand there is still considerable interest locally in what happened twenty-five years ago, I ask that we be left alone to mourn in peace,’ she said. ‘We shall be making no further statement beyond this.’

  Details for the funeral are not yet known, but Mrs Johnson, of Dargets Road, confirmed it would be a private service for close family and friends only. Cara Belling will not be among the attendees.

  RELATED STORIES

  The Heldean Haunting: the fatal hoax that shocked a nation

  Debunking the myth of Limey Stan – local paranormal expert claims ghost DID exist

  Whatever happened to Cara Belling?

  Chapter Seven

  Cara

  They blamed two specific events for planting the seed of what happened – ‘they’ being the doctors and psychiatrists who examined me in the immediate aftermath of my brother’s death and put me under continuous observation at the Peachick for the next two years. So determined were they to make sense of what had happened, they searched long and hard to identify the so-called triggers that, in their opinion, had precipitated me developing a form of psychosis known as delusional disorder.

  But they all got it so, so wrong.

  The first supposed trigger they identified I have a vague recollection of, although not in the way they recorded it in my medical notes, which I requested access to a few years ago when I was still trying to unpick what I had experienced and why. At some point in April 1994, my parents had bought some new furniture for the front room and Mum insisted she no longer wanted copious rows of video tapes on display, so she asked Dad to sort through his collection and throw out the ones he was no longer interested in keeping. According to my notes from the Peachick, I sat with Dad as he went about his task and we spent an enjoyable hour or so discussing what films he liked and why.

  Among the cassettes were blank tapes on which he’d recorded programmes previously aired on TV – and among them was Ghostwatch, a 1992 spoof ‘mockumentary’ that involved three famous TV presenters of the day investigating a haunted house and somehow managing to trick 11 million viewers into thinking it was gen
uine. Dad loved anything scary and apparently told me – I have no recollection of this, I am going by what is in my notes – that it was one of the scariest things he’d ever watched. He wasn’t alone, either. The BBC was flooded with complaints from thousands of people utterly traumatised by the broadcast that was billed as a drama: I’ve since read up on the programme and it ended with the so-called poltergeist seizing control of the TV cameras and one of the presenters disappearing into a ‘void’.

  Dad had written ‘Ghostwatch – not for children!’ on the spine of the tape and at the Peachick they determined it was that which piqued my own obsession with ghosts and our house being haunted. In my notes, it says that ‘learning about Ghostwatch had an adverse effect on Cara’s mental reasoning that eventually manifested as delusional disorder’, which I swear is rubbish, because after helping Dad sort out his tapes, I never gave the programme a second thought until they started asking me about it a few weeks after I was admitted to the Peachick. Or badgered me about it, more like.

  Although my notes paint a picture otherwise, it felt as though the hospital’s agenda was already set. The police saw me as guilty of killing Matty and so my doctor’s job was to get me to admit I was lying about Limey Stan and it felt as though little thought was given to how traumatised I was at being separated from my family. Until I was hospitalised, I’d never spent more than three nights away from home and that was to stay with my grandparents, only an hour’s drive away. I had been due, however, to go on a school residential trip in the October of that year, to an Outward Bound centre close to where I now live on the coast. But when the time of the trip came round and my classmates were squabbling over bunk beds and learning how to build a campfire and keep a canoe upright, I was trying to convince a bunch of strangers I hadn’t lost my mind.