Chapter 30 Carla #2
‘OK, so you went with them to their house to get the bike. Is that it?’
‘I was thirsty. But they said not to tell you.’
‘Not to tell us what, Margo? Don’t worry. You’re not in any trouble. You must tell us everything you remember. What didn’t they want you to say?’
Margo’s eyelids close, as if they’re too heavy to keep open, and for a few seconds, I think she’s gone back to sleep. But then, without opening her eyes, she says, ‘It was Red Bull.’
‘They gave you Red Bull to drink?’
But this time she doesn’t answer. Is it possible she had a can of drink with Jordan and Jasper Knoll, then fell asleep in the summerhouse?
Maybe the boys left her there and Yvonne found her this morning.
It sounds like a reasonable explanation, a harmless one, but the knot in my stomach has tightened, not loosened.
There’s more to it than that, I’m sure of it.
Iris leans towards me, puts her hand on my arm and says into my ear, ‘Mum, you should get her blood tested for roofies.’
‘What?’ I glance at Daniel, but he doesn’t appear to be listening in on our whispered conversation. He has worry etched all over his face.
‘Rohypnol. It’s a drug.’
Panic wraps itself around my throat, threatening to cut off my air supply. Rohypnol. The date-rape drug. ‘I know what it is, Iris,’ I say, ‘but Margo’s only eleven.’
‘Mum, someone I know was given Rohypnol,’ she says. ‘There’s a lot of it around, even out where we live in the middle of nowhere. I just think maybe we should check.’
Iris is right. I don’t know all the symptoms or side effects, but I do know amnesia is on the list. And I’m almost certain lethargy is on there, too. And headaches. Oh, God. Do I need to ask for Margo to be examined for sexual assault, too?
I beckon to Iris to come with me to find a nurse or a doctor. I’m hoping someone will allay my fears. We find a nurse, who looks rushed off her feet. I ask if we can speak to the ward sister.
The ward sister turns out to be a young man and I realize I have no idea what the male equivalent is, to my shame. Head nurse? Nursing officer?
‘We usually do a urine test, not a blood test,’ he says. ‘Flunitrazepam is detectable for longer in the urine than in the blood.’
‘We should wake Margo up,’ Iris says, chewing her lower lip. ‘We can’t wait for her to wake up. It might be too late.’
I know what she’s thinking. The drug doesn’t stay in the system for long. The head nurse fetches me a plastic pot and asks if I need help.
‘My elder daughter will help me,’ I say and Iris nods.
‘Have you … Should we … How would we go about checking for signs of sexual assault?’ I ask him.
His eyes widen slightly. Am I overreacting? Imagining evil where there isn’t any? He disappears again and comes back this time with a hospital gown and a large transparent bag.
‘If you believe there’s a possibility that she has been sexually assaulted, we will need to call the police and get them to come to the hospital with a rape kit.’
Oh, God. I can’t put Margo through that. I can only imagine how invasive that would be. Not to mention painful and traumatic. And probably unnecessary. Iris slips her arm through mine.
The nurse must see the look on my face. ‘Why don’t you ask her a few questions when you take her to the toilet?
’ he says. ‘If you think we need to check for sexual assault, we’ll take it from there.
As a precaution, remove her clothes carefully, especially her underwear, and put them in the plastic bag.
And be careful, you know, not to destroy any potential evidence, for example, when she wipes herself after she has weed into the container. ’
I tell Daniel the nurse has asked for a urine test.
‘What? Now that she’s sleeping?’ he asks. ‘Is it urgent?’
‘Apparently,’ I say.
I look at Olly, silently willing him to help me out. As if reading my mind, he leaps to his feet and suggests to Daniel that they should go and get a cup of tea.
Iris and I have difficulty waking up Margo and I have to carry her to the toilet.
She’s a dead weight in my arms. It’s a team effort to get the urine sample.
When I ask, Margo assures me nothing hurts down there and everything feels normal.
A huge wave of relief breaks over me. Whatever has happened to Margo, she hasn’t been sexually assaulted.
I bag up her clothes anyway and Iris and I get an uncooperative, sleepy Margo into the hospital gown, then I carry her back to bed while Iris takes the urine sample to the head nurse.
Olly and Daniel come back with Ash, much to my surprise.
‘Quen … Ash was waiting in the café,’ Daniel says, hooking a thumb over his shoulder towards Ash, who is standing behind him.
I catch a smirk on Ash’s face. I can read my ex-husband like a book. His expression says, there’s a first time for everything. It almost makes me smile, despite the circumstances.
He looks from Daniel to me. ‘I thought maybe I could take Olly and Iris home,’ he says.
‘Good idea,’ I say, glancing at Margo. She’s sound asleep again.
Iris opens her mouth as if to protest, but then she closes it again. She seems to realize, as Ash does, that Daniel and I need some time alone.
Olly bends over and kisses Margo on the forehead. ‘Get well soon, Maggot,’ he whispers.
Daniel and I sit in silence, side by side, for a while after Ash, Iris and Olly have left. I’m the one who breaks it. I tell Daniel about the urine test, but I present it in such a way that it sounds as if it’s just a precaution.
‘That family has a lot to answer for.’ His voice drips with venom. ‘I’ll bloody kill those boys if they so much as laid a finger on Margo.’
‘I don’t think she’s been hurt or harmed at all,’ I say.
‘I’d like to come back home,’ he says. His head is lowered and he avoids making eye contact. ‘Margo would like that, too. She misses you all. She needs you, Carla.’
I’m not sure if he’s asking for my permission – it is, after all, my house. Well, mine and Ash’s, actually. Or is he simply telling me he’s coming home? I don’t say anything and he takes my hand, gives it a squeeze.
‘I miss you, too,’ he says, his voice scarcely audible.
It sounds like an afterthought. Can we be a team again?
Or are we only united in our growing hatred of the Knoll family?
Would Daniel come back if it wasn’t for Margo?
Now something bad might have happened to his daughter, he finally gets why I’m so protective of mine.
Is that his way of thinking? I sigh. If it wasn’t for Margo, would I take him back?
We were a team, once, Daniel and I. A reconstituted family.
It was working until Iris’s trials and tribulations.
They tested our relationship to the limit and drove a wedge between us.
Margo has lived with me as long as she lived with her real mum.
Margo’s memories of her mother are faded and fragmented.
I love Margo as if she were my own daughter and she thinks of me as her mummy.
She even calls me ‘Mummy’. But there’s a gap between Daniel and Iris.
And between Daniel and Olly. It used to be invisible, but now it’s a yawning, unfillable hole.
Perhaps it’s because my kids were older when I met Daniel.
Margo was only five. Or maybe it’s because I’m the only mum Margo has now, but Iris and Olly have Ash.
Daniel lets go of my hand and puts his arm around me. Leaning in to him, I allow myself to hope we can get through this, get back to normal. He rubs my shoulder.
‘Do you think it’s connected?’ he asks so quietly I only just catch it.
‘What?’
‘I mean, what happened to Iris and whatever happened to Margo. Both times the Knolls were involved. Could it be connected somehow?’
‘I don’t see how it can be,’ I reply.
But now Daniel has planted that seed in my head, I know it will take root and grow.