Chapter 10
10
The area of Little Micklethwaite around St Mede’s High School reminded me of a decaying tooth no one appeared to know how to pull. With the exceptionally pretty villages of Beddingfield and Upper Merton to its left and right, the streets I now drove through held an air of almost embarrassed shame, the area’s rich history and tradition, built on the woollen textile industry of the previous centuries, long gone. Any attempt to convert and utilise the solid Yorkshire stone-built mills, turning their vast internal space into single units advertising their new usage as body repair shops, pine stripping, welding services and the like, had in turn given up the ghost, surrendering makeshift shutters to the elements and an excess of graffiti. A long row of nineteen-seventies-built concrete shops, which had replaced the original pretty cottages, the greengrocer and bakers, which today would surely have been listed and preserved, was now made over to the ubiquitous takeaway, betting shops, a laundrette, the heavily protected post office and community centre – which didn’t appear to be used by anyone in this broken community. Even the charity shop seemed to have given up in despair. I drove on towards the vast 1950s council estate.
I’d lived in some dives in London – Hammersmith and Soho – but Soho particularly, while often dirty and unkempt, was at the same time colourful and vibrant with a rich tapestry of thriving businesses and life. These streets, which the majority of St Mede’s kids walked through to get to school, were soulless, colourless. Lacking hope. Lacking a future.
Waze on my phone directed me along a road of bungalows for the elderly where there were dire warnings of Keep off the Grass (what grass?), Keep Dogs on a Lead (apparently the pit-bull-type animal that was now peeing up against another broken-down sign hadn’t yet learned to read) and other signs with their commands long-obliterated by new commands of Fuck Off Filth. With no police presence that I could see, they appeared to have done just that. Something that looked suspiciously like the logo for the EDL was the only colour in an endless sea of brown and grey concrete amidst a profusion of stuffed-to-the-brim black binbags.
Checking in my rear-view mirror that Fabian was still behind me, I pulled up outside Blane’s block and cut the engine, locking the Honda’s door and walking back to where Fabian had now parked between a large white Transit and a rusting, abandoned caravan.
‘Stay here,’ I said.
‘I’m not letting you go in there by yourself,’ Fabian said through the open window of the Porsche.
‘Why did you want to meet me anyway?’ I asked. ‘Are you wanting to go out to eat? You’re a bit early. Mind you, I’m starving; I ended up with half a Mars bar at lunchtime.’ My stomach growled a reminder.
‘You really should start eating properly,’ Fabian began. ‘Make sure you eat the whole thing next time.’
‘Yeah, yeah. Look, I won’t be long.’
Fabian was already out of the car. ‘But what is it you’re here for? You shouldn’t have to be doing this. You’re a teacher, not a social worker. Or the police.’ He tutted. ‘I’m coming with you.’
‘Oh, don’t be daft,’ I tutted in return. ‘His mother will think you’ve come to arrest her.’ I laughed. ‘Look, if you’re coming to protect me, just pretend you’re a teacher like me.’
‘In my jeans and trainers?’
‘Oh, I don’t know, Fabian. Come on, make your mind up. Pretend you’re a social worker, then.’
Together we walked across a muddy piece of sad-looking grass littered with a couple of empty Red Bull cans, a black bin bag, its noxious contents spewing onto the adjacent broken concrete path, and what looked suspiciously like a used condom. Who on earth was having sex out here on this tiny patch of grass? I averted my eyes.
‘23B.’ I indicated a marked stairwell to the right and together we walked up the concrete steps – a fetid smell of stale urine meeting our nostrils – to the floor above, in silence. I really wished Fabian had stayed in the car; actually, wished he’d stayed back in my own pretty village of Beddingfield. I realised I was now acutely embarrassed that he was seeing me on what amounted to my home turf, vastly different from his beautiful London apartment overlooking Green Park and a different planet entirely from his parents’ pile standing proud in the rich, leafy suburbs of Marlow.
‘Right, this is it.’ I knocked on the door, tentatively at first and then, when there was no response, with a heavier hand.
‘Who is it?’ A softly spoken voice could just be heard behind the door.
‘Mrs Higson? It’s Robyn Allen from St Mede’s. I’m Blane’s form tutor. Mr Donoghue asked me to call round to see what’s happening with Blane.’
‘It’s OK. Thank you, he’s back. Don’t worry. The police know he’s back.’
‘Could I come in? Just for five minutes?’
Silence.
‘Just for a couple of minutes, Mrs Higson? Just to check Blane’s OK? And you are as well?’
‘You’re not a social worker,’ Fabian mouthed crossly, frowning down at me.
Ignoring him, I went on, ‘Could I just have a couple of words with Blane? A quick chat with him?’
‘He won’t want to see you. He’ll think you’re taking him off again. You know, with the police or into… you know… into care…’
‘I promise you, Mrs Higson, I’m his teacher. Two minutes, so’s I can have a word with him?’
After a long silence, the door to the flat opened a couple of centimetres and then, when the woman behind the door, after viewing my school identity lanyard, appeared satisfied that I was who I said I was, she opened the door wider, allowing us entry.
I wasn’t sure what I’d been expecting of Blane Higson’s mother – possibly a caricature of every female heroin addict I’d ever read about – but, although the woman was tiny, pale and obviously anxious, she was well dressed in clean jeans and sweater, a pair of white and gold designer trainers on her feet, her long dark hair tied back in a neat high ponytail.
‘Hi, Mrs Higson, I’m Robyn Allen, Blane’s form tutor.’
‘Actually, its Ms Scaccetti,’ the woman replied. ‘And I thought Blane’s form teacher was Ms Logan?’ She turned her head to Fabian, taking in his height, his broad shoulders in the navy jacket, his dark good looks. ‘So, who’s this with you?’ she asked, continuing to stare at Fabian.
‘Just a friend of Robyn’s,’ Fabian said cheerfully. ‘No one in authority?—’
‘I used to go to school with someone called Scaccetti,’ I interrupted, silencing Fabian with a look. ‘She was several years above me at Beddingfield High.’
‘Beddingfield Comp?’ Ms Scaccetti held my eye. ‘Loretta Scaccetti?’
‘Yes, that’s it. Do you know her?’
‘You could say that. It’s me.’
‘What is?’
‘ I’m Loretta Scaccetti.’
‘Oh, goodness, right.’ Well, that was a shock. I remembered Loretta as a slim pretty thing who all the first formers constantly looked over at in assembly. Something of a mean girl. How on earth had the charismatic Loretta ended up here in this awful tower block, a heroin addict and Blane Higson’s mother to boot? Mind you, hadn’t there been some scandal about her at school?
‘’Fraid you’re not ringing any bells with me,’ she said, peering at my face through narrowed eyes.
‘Well, I was only an insignificant Year 7 when you were in Year 11. You might remember Jessica Allen, my sister?’
‘Sorry, no.’ She shook her head, seemingly uninterested in what I was saying.
‘But you’ve older children as well as Blane…?’ I started. Blane had talked about his two big brothers who’d recently upped and left home, one, apparently, into the army, both unable to cope with their mother’s addiction, according to Blane. By my calculations, this woman in front of me could only be thirty-four at the most.
‘Pregnant at fifteen,’ (of course, that was the scandal!) ‘with Catholic parents who didn’t want to know unless I stopped seeing the boy I was with,’ Loretta said, defiantly. ‘Anyhow, you’ve not come about me.’ She stepped back into the hallway and we followed her in and then on into the sitting room. The gas fire was on full and a clothes horse of damp washing was splayed out in front of it. The steamy, humid atmosphere made me draw in a sharp intake of breath, after leaving the cold outside.
‘Blane,’ Loretta shouted. ‘Someone to see you.’
‘Tell ’em to piss off,’ a voice came loudly from the other side of a bedroom door. ‘I’ve had enough of ’em all. Tell ’em no comment .’
‘Hang on.’ I raised a questioning eye at Loretta and the woman nodded. I moved to the door. ‘Blane? Blane, it’s Ms Allen. Just come to see you’re OK, sweetheart?’
Sweetheart? Where’d that come from? Flushing slightly, I tried again. ‘Come on out, Blane, or let me come in there.’
‘You’re not coming in my bedroom,’ Blane shouted back. ‘I don’t know what your intentions might be.’
Fabian stifled a laugh, which he hurriedly turned into a cough. Intentions? Blimey, big words from the kid I’d always called Whippety Snicket on account of his stature and awful behaviour.
‘Come on, Blane, Mr Donoghue asked me to call in.’
‘Where’s Ms Logan?’
‘Not in school at the moment. D’you remember? I told you that the other day. If you’d been in school more regularly, you’d have known that she wasn’t back yet. Will I do instead?’
‘S’pose.’
The bedroom door opened a crack and half of Blane’s face – one eye with its accompanying brow, one nostril – could be seen. ‘Hang on, who’s that bloke? He’s not come for me, has he? Is this all a set-up?’
‘You’ve been watching too much bloody TV, Blane,’ his mother shouted. ‘Get out here and talk to this teacher of yours who’s come all the way out from school to see you.’
‘But who’s the geezer?’
‘He’s a friend of mine, Blane.’
‘Why’ve you brought him? Is he going to take me off to the police station again? Or into another effing kids’ home?’
‘No, no, not at all,’ I soothed. ‘We’re on our way out for tea and, as we were passing, I said we’d just call in to see you. Mr Donoghue – and me – well, we’ve been worried about you.’
‘McDonald’s?’
‘Sorry? Oh, yes, probably,’ I lied. I bet Fabian had never set foot in a burger place.
The door opened wider and I found myself in a tiny bedroom smaller even than Mum’s box room.
‘Where’d you go, Blane? When you didn’t come home?’
‘I had business.’
‘Oh?’
‘You know.’
‘No, I don’t.’ I smiled encouragingly. ‘Tell me.’
‘Can’t.’
‘Why not?’
‘They’d be after me.’
‘Who?’
‘I’m not telling you that. Look, miss, there’s nowt you can do. You saw what they did to Joel Sinclair.’
‘Oh, Blane, you’ve not got yourself mixed up with that lot?’
‘I’m working for them,’ he said proudly. ‘I’m a Sitter now, but soon I’ll be a Top Boy, ordering the little kids around.’
‘But the other day in school, I got the impression you were frightened, Blane.’
‘Me? Frightened? Nah, not me, miss.’
‘So where were you last night?’ When Blane said nothing, I probed further but speaking gently. ‘You didn’t come home. Your mum was worried…’
‘Only because she might not get her stuff. Only reason she was worried.’
‘I don’t think that’s true, Blane. Mr Donoghue was worried. I was worried.’
‘Well, don’t be. It’s all under control.’
‘Had you kept some of the drug money? Is that why they were after you?’
Blane’s eyes narrowed. ‘Who’s been talking?’
‘Just a guess, Blane.’
‘Yeah, well, all sorted now. I’d bought myself a scooter off another kid with the money.’ Blane pointed towards the electric scooter that had pride of place against the closed curtains. ‘But they said it’s all right. I’d been using me inish… me inishi…’
‘Your initiative?’ I finished.
‘Summat like that. I can do me work that bit faster now I’ve got me own set of wheels…’
‘And the money?’
‘Said I can add it to me debt bondage.’
‘Your debt bondage ?’ I stared. ‘What the hell’s that?’
‘Oy, don’t swear in my bedroom, miss.’ Blane actually grinned at me. ‘You know, they give you a load of dosh up front and then you pay it off every time you do a job. They let me off the scooter money because I’d used my inishi… that word you just said.’
‘And you told the police all this when they came looking for you?’
‘No, course not. I’m not a grass and they ’aven’t got nowt on me. I told ’em nothing: “No comment”.’
‘So, are you coming into school tomorrow? You’ve got to go to school, Blane.’
‘Yeah, suppose. Get off to your Big Mac now, miss.’
Realising there was little more I could report back to Mason in the morning, I said, ‘Look, Blane, I’m here if you need to talk.’
‘Nah, I’m good. ’S all good.’
* * *
‘Come on, let’s get out of here. I wouldn’t be surprised if the wheels have gone off the car. Or the car itself gone.’ Fabian almost ran out of the door of the tower block.
‘Well, if you will drive such a posh motor. Actually, Fabian, thank you.’ I reached for his arm, pulling it round my waist, loving the warmth and sense of security it offered. ‘I’m glad you were there with me. I was nervous, to be honest. Kept expecting one of these gang members to pop up. Four wheels all intact? Tyres still inflated? Green Dragon, is it?’
Fabian nodded. ‘See you in the car park.’
* * *
‘Where are you going? Entrance is this way!’ I turned in surprise as Fabian caught up with me in the car park, taking my hand and veering off to the left. ‘Oh, you fancy a swim, do you?’ He was heading across the road towards the village duck pond where rustling, a series of secretive scurrying and flitting noises made us slow down on the path surrounding the water.
‘How do the ducks escape the fox?’ Fabian was asking as he continued to lead me around the long edge of the pond.
‘Used to outwitting it, I guess – they’re more than happy roosting on the water at night. Look, there’s a couple over there.’ I pointed to a symmetrical pair of dark shapes on the small island in the middle of the pond.
‘Aren’t they waste bins? They must get off to bed early.’ He smiled.
‘It’s actually beginning to freeze at the edge of the pond,’ I said, dipping my toe and immediately breaking the thin ice as I’d so often done as a child. ‘Fabian, where are we going?’ I demanded once more, following Fabian, who appeared determined to get where he was going. ‘Careful, there’s always goose poo on these paths. Slippy.’
‘There can’t be many villages left with an actual duck pond,’ Fabian called over his shoulder. ‘That’s why I fell in love with it.’
‘With what?’ Panting slightly behind him, I knew I needed to get my fitness back after doing little exercise over the Christmas period.
‘ Now where are we going?’ I complained as Fabian took a turning through the churchyard and out towards the cricket pitch on the other side. ‘I really could do with getting home to see what’s up with Sorrel.’
‘There,’ he said, five minutes later. ‘There!’
‘What? What am I looking at?’ Sweating now in my big coat after the walk, I stood, turning a complete three hundred and sixty degrees as I tried to work out just what was exciting Fabian so much. He’d brought me halfway across the village, rather than settling down in The Green Dragon with the warming hot toddy for which the village pub had become famous. And which, after the day I’d had, I was desperate for.
‘Oh, for heaven’s sake, woman.’ Fabian took my hand once more, pulling me towards the row of exquisite early-nineteenth-century cottages overlooking both the village green on one side and the cricket pitch on the other. ‘To let.’
‘To let what?’
‘Jesus, you’re thick when you want to be, Robyn. The fourth cottage from the left? It has a To Let sign outside.’
‘Right?’
‘And, I would very much like to extend my time away from London by renting said cottage.’
‘Oh?’ I felt my pulse quicken.
‘And, I would very much like it if you’d rent it with me.’
‘Gosh. Are you asking me to live with you?’
‘Yes, that’s the general idea.’ He laughed, but I knew he was nervous waiting for me to say something.
‘And you don’t want to go back to London?’ I asked.
‘No. Not at the moment anyway. Not without you, Robyn. I don’t want to spend another day without you in my bed.’
‘But have you seen it inside? It might be dark and poky. It might be noisy, cold and damp. It might be old-fashioned with no shower and nowhere for you to cook properly…’
‘I went round it this afternoon. It’s light, airy and, best of all, has a fabulous modern kitchen just waiting for me to get stuck in. It’s been totally renovated since the old woman who lived here died and the cottage sold on.’
‘So who owns it now? Where are they?’
‘Some young bloke who has suddenly upped and gone abroad apparently. The estate agent was happy to show me round, but said I’d need to make a decision pdq as there were a load of other people interested.’
‘So, you said you’d have it?’ I stared. ‘Really? Goodness. But what will you do all day? You know, stuck in the middle of a village where you don’t know anyone? While I’m at school? And your family won’t be pleased. They’ll blame me for keeping you up here.’
‘Well, yes, very likely, but, to be honest, I don’t really care. We can take each day as it comes. I can be a house husband and have “your tea” ready for you every day. And Boris can come over from Harrogate with me. You’d be OK with that? Mind you, I never mentioned the dog to the agent.’ Fabian pulled a face.
‘I love Boris… but, Fabian, what will you do all day?’ I realised I was sticking my fingernails into the palms of my hands, praying this was real. That Fabian wasn’t having me on.
‘Take on some legal work, probably. I can work as an agent for the CPS: they’re always looking for people.’
‘But you’re a defence barrister, not a prosecuting solicitor.’ I wasn’t sure that that was the best way forward for him.
‘Or…’ And here Fabian took my hand, pulling me inside his unbuttoned warm coat. ‘Or Jess and I can look into doing what we really want.’ Fabian was animated.
‘Your restaurant?’
‘ Our restaurant.’ He smiled, kissing the top of my head.