D. E. White - The Forgotten Child

‘Your brother knew you were friends with Cathryn Davies, so perhaps he thought you might be angry he had left her, and his other children, for Larissa,’ DC Marriot suggested. In her mind’s eye Holly could see the boy, Jayden’s boy, lying helpless and unconscious under his white shroud of hospital sheets. Another child.

‘Yeah, maybe. Roman and Alexi were high, weren’t they, when they went to collect Jay’s debt? Mason was always bigging up his sons, even Niko, the baby of the family, saying they were going to inherit the business, going to be millionaires … But they were always losers, and violent with it. They didn’t have to kill Larissa, or her baby.’ Holly felt empty now, hollow and sick. She still had nightmares about the baby, even though she hadn’t discovered the tiny body.

‘Supposing the boy in hospital is Jayden’s … He would have been around a year old when his mother was murdered, so perhaps your brother took him to safety? We aren’t saying your brother is definitely alive, but I would say it’s a possibility. The other possibility, of course, is that Jayden did escape that night, with his other child, but was later murdered, and the child has been raised by someone else.’

‘If he is alive … Fuck, I can’t even think …’ Holly shook her head, scraping back her hair with all ten fingertips. ‘I just can’t imagine it, but my dad is going to go mental when you tell him it’s a possibility .’

The two women stood up to go, and DC Marriot turned back at the front door. ‘Holly, be careful, won’t you? This isn’t just about the boy, and his possible identity. We also have to consider who left him in your car.’

Holly sighed. ‘I’m hardly going to forget, am I? But yeah, thanks, I’ll take care.’

***

Holly watched the two policewomen get into their car and head off to her dad’s flat. He still lived next to the betting shop, but one of her cousins ran the bookies business now. Most of the time her dad was too pissed to remember his own name, so good luck them getting anything coherent out of him. They’d probably get the wheels nicked off their car too, just for going onto the Seaview.

What a mess. Her head was buzzing, and she wandered around the house picking things up and putting them down. Jayden’s son? If he was alive why had he never been in touch? Larissa had had another child – given the timeframe, it fitted. Either that or they were wrong about the age of the boy in hospital and Jayden had survived, and got over Larissa pretty quick. Perhaps they were right with the second theory. Maybe her brother had given his baby son to someone he trusted to look after him, but then got himself in trouble with the wrong people. Again.

Holly reached for her phone. ‘Cathryn?’

Her best friend answered on the second ring, her voice quick and sharp. ‘Where the hell have you been, girly? I’ve left four messages on your voicemail since you came out of hospital, and I’ve only had one text and one phone call. What’s going on, Holly? I’ve been so bloody worried about you.’

‘Sorry. It’s been weird. Look, can I come over?’

‘Of course. I’m just putting Angel down for a nap. I’ll open a bottle.’

‘It’s twelve o’clock,’ Holly said, her heart lightening, despite herself.

Cath was always there for her, always ready to help despite being a single mum with five kids. She was the type of girl who only ever wanted to have fun, and had slowly morphed into the type of woman who inspires awe in her friends by juggling kids and work on her own, whilst being blatantly honest about how tough it could be. Her huge clan of aunts, uncles and cousins all helped out with the childcare, but the kids’ dads had all buggered off. The fact that two of the dads were Niko and Jayden hadn’t altered the friendship. Holly’s best friend, Lydia often said with a smile, was a force of nature.

‘Whatever, I’ve had a bitch of a week, babes. We’ll walk to school to get the brats later, then I can take the twins in the buggy and they won’t screech so much.’

Holly grabbed her coat, pulling the fake fur hood snugly around her face, and set off for the Seaview. Her road of respectable Victorian semis ran down to the railway bridge. After that the houses became blocks of flats, with smaller buildings squeezed together, dwarfed by the grim tower blocks.

The light drizzle was whipped across Holly’s face by an icy lash of wind. She crossed the road, head down, and took the footpath that led to Cathryn’s house. High wooden fences either side killed the wind, but the path was dank, and gloomy, the mud strewn with cigarette butts, rubbish and empty bottles.

Stepping over an odd assortment of rotting furniture, which included a sofa and the remains of a double bed, Holly allowed her mind to drift again. Every step was familiar from here onwards. She and Jayden had played football in that road, had smoked in that playground, spinning slowly on the creaking swings, feet scuffing the gravel. Niko had tried his luck with Cathryn behind those green-encrusted concrete garages. Roman, Alexi and Devril had played basketball next to that tower block, and Cath’s mum owned the chippie in the next road. She would give the kids greasy paper bags of salty chips drenched in vinegar and only charge them half the usual price. The usual mix of emotions when she came back to the Seaview made her stomach roll uneasily. There was sadness, nostalgia, a touch of fear that she didn’t quite belong anywhere now.

A car screeched past, jammed with teenagers, the radio blaring, and there was a gang of five kids playing football on the scrubby grass that bordered the Seaview, on the edge of Beach Road. Their yells echoed across the wasteland, bouncing off the concrete walls of the tower blocks.

Cathryn’s house, part of a block of grimy terrace houses, was strewn with the chaos of five children, and Holly, as usual, felt instantly at home. The rooms smelt of polish, perfume and babies, and there were piles of clean washing on the table, contrasting with the piles of dirty washing on the kitchen floor. Make-up covered the tiny worktop, and Cathryn’s uniform was hung up to dry over the sink.

Relaxing, she sank down with a sandwich and a glass on the crumb-encrusted sofa, narrowly avoiding a dozen plastic Lego bricks.

‘Right, babes, what the fuck is going on?’ Cathryn sat opposite her, baby monitor wedged between two cushions, wine bottle on the table between them. Her long platinum-blonde hair was tied up in a knot, her pretty face was bare of make-up, and she wore her usual ripped skinny jeans and cropped pink velour hoodie top, which showed off her flat, improbably tanned stomach.

Holly took a deep breath. ‘The police came over to mine after I dropped Milo at school this morning. They said they got the DNA results back from the lab, and the boy in hospital is related to me. Cath, they reckon he’s Jayden’s kid.’

Cath stared with her mouth open, baby blue eyes wide and shocked. ‘But Jay’s dead, so how …’ She stopped talking, leant over, and sloshed white wine into both their glasses. ‘The fucking bastard. Do you really think he’s just been living somewhere else all this time?’

‘I don’t know. They don’t know either. Going by the age of the boy they reckon he’s Larissa’s kid, unless Jayden had someone else on the go. Suppose Jayden is alive, I don’t understand why that dealer would have lied and said he helped get rid of the body?’

‘Dunno, but if I find out he’s still alive …’ Cath took a long, shuddering breath, ‘Why would he not contact us? Me and the kids, Lydia, your dad and you? Even just to say he was on the run or whatever? I’ve had to tell Sean and Ronnie that their dad’s dead and now what do I do?’