Elisabeth Carpenter - Only a Mother

‘I’m not obsessed. It’s giving me a focus. Last month you said I’d lost my drive, now you’re complaining because I found it.’

‘Hopefully that girl will come home safe and everything can get back to normal.’

‘Her name’s Leanne.’

‘Bye, love,’ she whispers loudly from the top of the stairs.

He rushes to the landing.

‘I was in the middle of talking to you!’

She stops halfway down the steps, turning around slowly.

‘You will wake the kids,’ she hisses.

‘So? What do you care?’ He shouts, knowing that the volume will piss her off even more. ‘You’re hardly ever here – and when you are, you take no notice of me.’

‘Have you heard yourself?’ She’s leaning towards him, her eyes narrow. ‘I hardly ever go out for actual fun. In case you hadn’t realised, when I am out all hours, I’m bloody working!’ She turns and stomps down the rest of the stairs. She stops as she reaches for the door handle, looking up at Luke. ‘We can talk about this tomorrow.’

The door slams shut. She didn’t bloody care about waking the children then, did she? Luke is shaking. What’s wrong with her? Can’t she see how much it hurts him to be dismissed all the time?

Luke hadn’t heard a cab waiting for her outside. Did she actually mention where she was going? Fuck it. Helen’s a grown woman – she can look after herself.

He briefly checks on the girls before returning to his office, slumping onto his chair. After a few deep breaths, he turns to face his computer.

Luke clicks on Olivia Threlfall’s email and scrolls through the pictures she sent him. He stops when he comes to one that’s obviously been scanned – the photo is slightly bent in the top right corner. It’s one of Jenna that Luke hasn’t seen before. In it, Olivia is sitting on her older sister’s knee. Jenna has her arms wrapped around her sister; their heads are level, with Olivia’s long brown hair resting on Jenna’s shoulders.

Luke can’t stop thinking about what happened today. He thought that Craig was alone in the car, but who knew. Maybe Alan Lucas – who might not even be his father – is an accomplice and was with the girl that morning.

And what about Jason? Have the police asked him questions in connection with Leanne Livesey? Rebecca Savage said she saw Craig Wright with Jenna, but he also remembers her parting words to him: We’ve had this hanging over our head for years. I want it to go away. It would’ve been better to have said ‘I just wanted the truth out there’ or something. Maybe it’s not Erica who’s lying after all.

But Luke can’t speculate in his articles about Leanne Livesey and Jenna Threlfall. If he’s honest, he’s a bit fed up of thinking about Craig Wright. He must research the facts.

He left me on my own. He said it would be fun.

But it’s not.

I really trusted him. I’d written all those letters, told him everything about me, and for what? Nothing.

This room is rank. It’s like one of those places you see on those reality crime shows where someone’s been murdered, but all that’s left are the stains. Franny McPhee loved those types of programmes. When I couldn’t sleep sometimes, I’d go downstairs. She said I shouldn’t watch them, but I told her I’d only watch them on my iPad anyway.

She forgot that I didn’t have an iPad.

People don’t remember the little things about you when they don’t really care. They never do. Mum remembered, before. When she cared. She used to record Made in Chelsea for me when I wasn’t in – without me even asking. When I was feeling down about something, she’d make me cheese on toast with pepperoni on it.

I just want someone to know that I only drink a milky coffee when there’s half a sugar in it, or that sometimes, in the morning, it takes me five minutes to come round and to actually speak. I want someone to know that, when I care about them, then I’ll always have their back.

But what if it ends here, in this shitty, stinking room?

I’ve never felt so alone. And that’s making me think too much, you see.

I thought he cared about me. But everyone’s the same, aren’t they? They all want something. They probably think I’m stupid.

Now, I’m sitting on a sofa that’s probably been here for years, covered in stains from people that might be dead.

I’m so cold, and it’s so dark in here. The electricity’s not working and there are no candles.

I pull my knees towards my chest and wrap my arms around them, as though I were hugging someone else.

I’d only intended to have a short rest on the settee, but I slept all night. I kept the twenty-four-hour news station on and briefly woke at midnight and again at three in the morning, but there was nothing about Leanne.

I’m so exhausted. I can’t tell if it’s from the pain or the worry. It’s February – surely it can’t be this hot outside; I’m drenched in sweat.

I hadn’t expected Craig home – he hasn’t stayed here in days. I pray to God that he’s not done something stupid. Perhaps he’s taken her somewhere nice – she probably hasn’t had a holiday in a few years.

Why am I thinking this? Of course he won’t have whisked her away on some jaunt. I’m doing it again. My head’s in the clouds, not wanting to see what’s right in front of me: the truth about my son.

I can’t move from the settee. Perhaps if I take two or more of these pills, then I can close my eyes and never wake up. I’ve never been that brave, though. Never had the courage to end it all. I feel too ashamed about what I’ve done. And I’ve done it for nothing. Everyone else was right and I was wrong.

I wish I could go back to the day everything changed – the day my mother died. If she were here, then everything wouldn’t have turned out like this. She would’ve been there for me, helped me bring up Craig so I wouldn’t have made the same mistakes.

It was a few days before she died that she noticed there was something not right.

‘You’ve not used your monthly supplies in the bathroom,’ she said. ‘I bought you some more and the others are still there.’

I used to like that I never had to worry about things like that – perhaps that was my laziness, but right then I hated that she knew things that were so personal to me when I wanted to hide everything.

I was sitting against my bedroom door, wrapped in my quilt and reading a book to take my mind off a problem I didn’t know how to fix.

‘I bought my own, Mum,’ I said.

‘You did what? You didn’t buy those tampon things, did you? You’re not married yet, you shouldn’t be using objects like that.’

I pulled my quilt closer around me. Who called tampons ‘objects’? She had silly euphemisms for everything.

‘You’ve not been out gallivanting, have you?’ she said. ‘Pamela Valentine said she saw you and Denise’s Jim driving past her on the high street. I don’t want you to get a name for yourself. You’re a good girl, Erica.’

‘Pamela Valentine’s a nosy old cow,’ I said, the strongest words my mother would allow.

‘She’s younger than I am, Erica,’ said Mother. I heard a noise behind the door, like she was sitting down against it. ‘I know you think you know everything, that I’ve never been young, and I’ve always been this old, but I’m only looking out for you. I wouldn’t want you making the same mistakes I did.’

So this was where we were going to have this conversation, I thought. Divided by a door, like a priest and a sinner in a confessional box.

‘He’s been giving me a lift when I finish at five,’ I said. ‘Denise gave him earache about leaving me at the bus stop.’