Chapter 106
Celeste
Friday
It’s four in the morning when Celeste, Warren and Nika get back from the garda station. It’s no longer Thursday night—Friday is dawning, the sky pinkening in the east as they step inside the house.
Quiet, withdrawn, defeated, Nika goes straight to her room. Celeste does not go after her.
Cody, to her surprise, is in the living room, curled on the couch, watching YouTube on the TV. He turns it off when they come into the room, and in a whisper, asks about Nika, what will happen.
“She’s been charged with a Section 3 assault,” Warren says, his voice breaking, and Celeste feels herself crumble all over again.
Her daughter, her own flesh and blood, the child she created and raised, appears to have deliberately knocked down another child.
Celeste sits beside Cody. She is broken.
Warren sits on an armchair opposite, glazed with exhaustion.
“Will she be OK?” Cody asks in a small voice. “Will she go to prison?”
“I don’t know. We’ve been told the courts will do whatever they can to keep a young person out of jail, but it’s pretty serious…
” Christ. Nika probably should go to prison.
But no matter what she’s done, Celeste doesn’t actually want that for her.
She hates Nika right now, but she loves her too.
She wants to slap her, to shake her. But she wants to hug her too.
She’s seventeen, but she’s a child. How much of who she’s turned out to be is down to Nika? And how much is her parents’ fault?
“I don’t want her to go to prison,” Cody whispers. He lays his head on his mother’s shoulder. She takes his hand. “Me neither.” She rubs his red-raw knuckles. “Cody, what really happened?”
“I told you, I punched a wall.”
“Why?”
“Because…I don’t know.”
“Please, Cody. I’m worried about you. Why did you punch a wall?”
“Because…I…because I’m dumb. I’m bad at everything. I’m always in trouble. No matter what I do, I don’t get things right. This was something I could do…and I guess it made me feel better. For a minute, anyway.”
“Oh, Cody.” Oh, Celeste. All those red flags for self-harm, and she’d been looking in the wrong direction. She’d even read about it—read that boys hurt themselves differently to girls—punching walls, taking drugs. Busy reading, but not seeing.
“And the knife?”
He pushes his head closer into her, nestling like the baby he once was.
“I thought about it, but I didn’t do anything.”
“I’m so sorry.” A sob escapes. “I’ve let you down, Cody, and I’m sorry. I’ve let both of you down.”
“It’s OK, Mum.” He hugs in closer again and a small cry shudders out.
“I’m here now,” she whispers, kissing the top of his head. “I’m here now.”