Cat Step, page 12
‘How long will it take?’
‘I don’t know.’ He had a kind voice but he knew when to stop talking and looked down at his shoes.
The courtroom was smaller than I’d imagined. No jury. A judge, some lawyers. I didn’t know who was who. I had to swear that I would tell the truth and felt utterly alone when I did so. My voice reminded me of the way I’d sounded in the meeting with the social worker and the nursery people, only quieter. There wasn’t a soul I recognised. A woman and a teenage girl sat at the back with empty seats around them. That’s where my mum would have sat, where Robbie would have sat, where June could have sat if she wasn’t taking care of Emily. The man, the accused, caught my eye and looked away. He wore a T-shirt and jeans.
‘Where do you reside, Miss Morley?’ The procurator fiscal spoke.
I told her Audrey’s address.
‘Do you own a Ford car?’ She gave the registration number in a pleasant, formal voice.
‘Yes. It’s my mum’s.’
‘Did you park the car in the Co-op car park on Main Street, Lennoxtown?’
‘Yes.’
‘Did you lock the car?’
‘Yes.’
‘What state was the car in when you left it?’
‘What do you mean?’
‘Was there any damage to the car?’
‘No. No damage. No broken window.’ This was simple enough. I felt my shoulders relax.
‘Was there a child in the car?’ Her voice was breezy, light, casual.
‘Yes,’ I said, trying to keep my voice as light as hers. The policeman had told me there might be mention of Emily, but I didn’t expect it from her.
‘Where did you go?’
‘Into the Co-op.’
‘How long were you gone for?’
‘Only five minutes. If that. I just went in for milk and fish fingers and a few other things.’
‘Thank you. Did you leave your child alone in the car?’
She nodded for me to answer. The judge looked at me. The defendant’s lawyer looked at me too.
‘Yes,’ I said.
‘Why?’ Why? Why was this woman asking me? She was the prosecutor.
‘Because she was sleeping. She had tonsillitis. She was sick.’
‘She was asleep when you left her?’
‘Yes.’
‘And what state was your child in when you returned to the car?’
‘She was asleep.’
‘And what state was your car in when you returned?’
‘The window was smashed. Cracked.’
‘Cracked or smashed?’
‘Cracked.’
‘Which window?’
‘The one on the passenger’s side. The front passenger window.’
‘Was anything stolen?’
‘No. I think he was disturbed before he could take my phone.’ I looked at the accused man and he caught my eye again. His face looked pale.
The procurator fiscal nodded at me. ‘Thank you. That’s all.’ She sat down.
I took what felt like my first breath in minutes. The lights were yellow in the courtroom, the wood gleamed. A clerk shuffled in her seat. Somebody sneezed. The defence lawyer stood up.
‘Just a few questions please.’ He cleared his throat. His black gown swished. ‘Why did you park your car in the Co-op car park?’
‘I needed to get some shopping.’
‘What age is your child?’
‘Four.’
‘And you left her alone in the car?’
‘Yes.’
‘Why?’
How many teams can you name in the Scottish leagues beginning with A?
My fucking mind. I stayed silent. I stared at the lawyer.
‘Why did you leave her alone in your car?’
‘Because she was sleeping.’
‘Just to clarify, you left a child of four alone in a car?’
I looked at the prosecutor fiscal. ‘Yes.’
‘Had you checked the status of the queues at the checkout before you left her alone in the car?’
‘I’m sorry?’
‘Had you checked the status of the queues at the checkout before you left her alone in the car?’
‘No.’
Ayr United! Robbie’s voice was in my head again, his fist was punching the waiting room air. I must have smiled.
‘You seem to think that’s amusing.’
‘No.’
‘No.’
The thief and I glanced at each other. I saw him look at his lawyer with interest.
‘How far from the entrance did you park?’
‘I couldn’t get a space close to the entrance.’
‘So you were far from the entrance?’
‘Not too far.’
‘But you weren’t close to the entrance?’
‘No.’
‘Can you be sure you were only away for five minutes?’
‘Pretty sure.’
‘Did you have some means of telling the time?’
Ayr United, Aberdeen, Albion Rovers. Auchinleck Talbot. Annan. Alloa Athletic. Go away Robbie.
‘I’m sorry?’
‘Did you have a watch, a phone, some means of telling the time?’
‘No. I left my phone in the car, which is why it got broken into.’
‘My client disagrees with your interpretation. I’ll come to that. But please clarify; you could have been longer than five minutes in the Co-op? You had no accurate way of knowing?’
‘Possibly. But probably not.’
‘Possibly, probably. We know for sure that you left a sick child alone in a car as far away from the entrance to the store as you possibly could have. Can you tell me what state your child was in when you returned to her?’
‘She was asleep.’
‘Are you sure?’
‘Yes.’
‘My client tells me she was extremely distressed.’
I shot a look at the man, the client, and he met my eyes. Bold. I heard nothing but the buzz of a ceiling light.
‘I don’t understand,’ I said.
‘My client tells me your daughter was extremely distressed and he smashed the window in order to free her.’
‘She wasn’t distressed. She was asleep.’
‘Are you sure she wasn’t crying?’
‘Yes, I’m sure she wasn’t crying.’ I think I shouted.
‘She was screaming according to my client.’
‘No.’
‘Could you have heard her crying from inside the Co-op?’
‘I’m not answering that.’
‘You have to answer. You’re on oath.’
‘Probably not.’
‘You probably could not have heard her crying?’
‘No, I probably could not.’
‘So she could well have been crying. Or screaming. You have no way of knowing how long she was crying for because you wouldn’t have heard her in the shop.’
‘She wasn’t crying, she was asleep.’
‘You were gone for at least five minutes. In that time she could have been crying, couldn’t she, and you’d never have known?’
I shook my head.
‘Can you answer the question? She could have been crying and you wouldn’t have heard her from the shop?’
‘Yes, but—’
‘My client asserts that he attempted to free a distressed and hysterical child, one whose mother admits was suffering from tonsillitis, from a locked car. It was his intention to free the distressed child and alert the appropriate authorities. Is that not why he attempted to break into the car?’
‘No.’ I shook my head.
‘You chose a spot as far away from the entrance to the shop as was possible, you were away for five minutes, most likely more, and your child was suffering inside a locked car. My client did what he felt to be morally correct. He smashed the window of your car in order to free a distressed child.’
The lawyer let the slight echo do its work. The judge looked at me. The accused man looked at me. The lawyer looked at the judge.
‘I have no further questions.’
I waited until I was dismissed then stepped down from the witness box, picked up my coat and bag and let the court official escort me out.
‘He lied,’ I said to the official who looked at his shoes.
I took the lift to the foyer where guards and staff stood at ease. There was no wall to lean against or pillar to hide behind. The floor was shiny and I wondered how many times a person had come fresh from court and puked on its glistening tiles.
Outside, I saw them before they saw me. June stood on the concrete steps while Emily played. She ran along the length of them, going as far from June as the steps would allow then returning to her. When I called her name Emily charged up the steps towards me and June looked at me with sympathy. I heaved up tears and had to stay bent doubled for a time with Emily’s hand pat-patting my back.
He got a fine and community service. The judge didn’t believe him and none of the other witnesses’ accounts corroborated his story. The young policeman gave me another courtesy call to tell me the verdict and said the man narrowly avoided jail. For the thief, it had been worth the lie. For me, the lie had sliced me open. I was glad no one had been there to see it. The policeman told me there were no plans to charge me with Abandonment. The social worker telephoned too. When she said, ‘You and Emily are making good progress. Keep up whatever you’re doing,’ I considered it a good day. I’ve had worse.
2.
The estate agent returned to value the flat on a day that was fine, at last. The sun was on the hills, exposing every crevice and crease. We’d been surprised by the crocuses in the narrow beds alongside the path and although the grass needed cutting the front garden looked pretty. Perky and full of promise, the estate agent praised it, as well as the plastering and the paintwork Paul had done and the vases of tulips I’d put around the house. He made me feel good which is how he sold houses, I suppose.
‘What will you do when you sell?’ he asked, and his phone buzzed in his jacket pocket.
‘We’ll find somewhere else to live,’ I said, as if that would be easy.
‘I’ll sell your flat for you, no bother. So you’d better work out what you’re doing.’ He almost reminded me of Robbie, I almost liked his manner.
Later, we saw a man in a van park outside the flat. I helped Emily carry a chair to the window and we watched him pull a For Sale sign from the back of the van and clip it to the gatepost.
‘There you are, Emily,’ I said. ‘Our work here is done.’
‘Can we get a cat?’ She had a way of surprising me.
‘We could get a cat. Yes. Not yet. But soon.’
I wondered where we would go once the flat was sold. We would need somewhere with a cat flap. We would need somewhere a cat could come home to, somewhere permanent. The idea felt nice.
The man waved at us watching him through the window and we waved back. Maybe the sunlight made people more friendly. Even in the Co-op the cashiers passed the time of day with me now. They spoke to Emily first and because she was too shy to reply I replied for her, with one hand on her head, patting it for my own reassurance. ‘Still cold, but,’ they would say, and I would agree, but it almost wasn’t cold today.
The man drove away in his van and the street settled. A blackbird made a nest in the hedge and we watched it dart in and out of the leaves.
‘You are the best mummy in the world,’ Emily said.
Surprised again. I suppose you open a box for those moments and put them in, like the blackbird, adding as they come.
‘And you are the best daughter,’ I said and I put my arm around her narrow shoulders.
‘I love you too much,’ she said.
That was almost too much.
‘You can’t love somebody too much, can you?’
I kissed her forehead, put my cheek against hers and felt the enormous responsibility I had for her. It was good, sometimes, to be reminded of your great responsibilities, but most of the time it was easier, less daunting, to let it happen, to let the profoundness be. When Robbie died, I lost the ability to feel and the truth is I envied her all that love. Mine was hard to grab: a blackbird’s wing on a quick turn.
Emily licked a finger. I watched her squeak a smile onto the smeary window and realised I’d forgotten to clean it, and that was a thing all the house-selling websites advised: clean windows. So Emily stood on the chair and cleaned the bottom half of the windows while I cleaned the top. There was pink plaster dust along with the dirt. We showed each other our grubby pieces of kitchen roll and Emily screwed her face into a snarl as she cleaned as hard as she could. A teenager on a bike rode by and stared up at us. We waved.
‘Some more spray?’ I said and let Emily squeeze the Windolene against the glass.
‘Bam,’ she said as she sprayed.
‘Bam, bam,’ I said.
‘Bam. My daddy was a bam.’
‘Pardon?’ I stopped wiping but Emily wiped on, her elbow a point at my body. ‘Emily what did you say about your daddy?’ She rarely spoke about her dad. I was the one who talked of him.
‘He was a bam.’
‘No he wasn’t.’
‘Yes he was. Lilly said he was.’
‘Who’s Lilly? I took her kitchen roll from her and she tried to grab the Windolene but I held that away from her too. ‘He was a what, Emily? What did Lilly say he was? Who is this Lilly?’
‘She goes to my nursery.’
‘And what did she call him?’
‘A bam.’
‘What’s a bam?’ I knew what a bam was. Robbie used to call me a bam when I tap danced on the bedcovers and tangled my feet in the duvet, but he called the boys at the end of our street who asked us to buy alcohol bams too, boys at the violent edge of adolescence.
‘Why did she say he was a bam?’
‘I don’t know.’
‘I’ll do the rest of the windows,’ I said and I asked her to go and play somewhere else. She didn’t want to. ‘Put the telly on then.’
Sara would have said my parenting was wrong, that I punished Emily for telling me what she did, but honestly, it was all I could do to stay standing on my chair with my face pressed against the glass watching my breath cloud the pane, while my head buzzed, and not smash the glass right there and then. People here talked of Robbie? The teenager on his bike passed by our house again and I think I frightened him. He looked back at me several times before leaning forwards and pedalling hard. Control yourself, I told myself, got off the chair, put the kitchen roll in the bin, then went to find Emily.
That night I phoned Aidan. I told him the For Sale sign was up and pictures of the house were on the internet. I listened for sounds of Australia. He was driving with his phone on speaker, and there was a muffled rush of engine and passing traffic.
‘What are you going to do?’ he asked.
‘Can we stay in the house until you sell it? I’m not quite sure where we’ll go next.’
‘Are you not going back to London?’
‘I don’t know. Did Robbie live anywhere else? Maybe we could follow his life.’
Aidan didn’t laugh. ‘Stay until it sells. It might take a while. Isn’t your mum missing you?’
I said nothing and listened again for Australia.
‘I’m nearly at my work now,’ Aidan said.
I couldn’t help myself.
‘Why didn’t Robbie like Lennoxtown?’
A pause. ‘No one likes where they were brought up.’
‘Why not?’
‘Did you ever ask him?’
‘I’m asking you, Aidan.’
He coughed. He started to speak a couple of times but he didn’t finish any sentences. It was hard to hear.
‘Someone called him a bam,’ I said.
He laughed now and said, ‘We all know what he was like.’
‘But it was one of Emily’s friends at nursery. A child. Why would she say that? Her parents must think he was a bam. Does everyone think that?’
‘You’re reading too much into it.’ His voice became clear and the background noise disappeared. ‘I’m not sure Lennoxtown is the place for you, Liz. You should move on, pal.’
‘Maybe bam means nothing at all.’
‘Exactly. I’m at work now. I have to go.’
He was no help to me. The only thing he said when I asked him to tell me one thing – one thing – about their childhood in Lennoxtown was that Robbie was gullible, despite his tendency to show off. Gullible. We’re all gullible, even me. Well, I must be.
I tried to forget it. I had many people to let through the door. The flat attracted interest and there were regular viewings. It was hard to keep it clean and tidy, especially when Paul came to see me in the evenings and instead of tidying, we slept together or talked or watched TV. I began to look forward to his visits. I got used to them. I got used to the jaunty patter of the estate agent too and got panicked when he said someone had made an offer. He told me he would introduce a closing date, on which day people would put in a bid, and I would take the highest offer. Or Aidan would. We’ll get you a good price, he told me. Too soon, I told him. You’d better make your plans, he told me.
3.
When I arrived for our next class, my dancers were polite and pleased to see me but again not inclined to dance, preferring instead to talk about another woman who’d had a fall and was found, by Ruth, in her bathroom, conscious but with a fractured ankle. They sighed and shook their heads. Charlie wore his dressing gown, Senga and Agnes sipped milk from teacups, Alice sat, as she always did, poised and interested, and John folded his newspaper into a square but didn’t bend his head to do the crossword. ‘Her trampolining days are well and truly over,’ he said.
‘Did she used to be a trampolinist?’
