Cat Step, page 7
‘Mummy, come now.’
‘I didn’t hear the number, Aidan. Wait. I’m not ready. Can you tell me again? What’s his name?’
I had to leave the bathroom to get a pen and paper. Aidan wanted to chat. Had I seen this friend of his, had I remembered him to the owners of the garage? No, I hadn’t. Through the bathroom door I heard Emily’s shouts getting angrier. I heard crashes and smashes.
When I returned to the bathroom, the floor was soaked with water and bubbles. The bath mat was in the bath with Emily. Her toys were on the floor. She threw water from the jug at me when I approached her. Then flung the jug at me too.
Knowing what I know now, I suppose I should have given her a warning. Then, it seemed essential to pick her up and haul her out of the bath. But she fought. She kicked and splashed and lashed out. I had her in my grip, but she fought so hard we both slipped. I hurt my back. She said I hurt her leg and I might have done because I fell on her by accident. ‘There’ll be no telly, no sweeties, no treats,’ I shouted at her, but she roared all the same and hit and kicked me and she hit herself too which frightened me.
‘That’s it!’ I lifted her up and yanked her to the top of the stairs.
‘Sit there and calm down. You’re in trouble. You’re in time out.’
Emily screamed that she didn’t want to be in time out. Her hair was flat against her head. I threw a towel at her and when she pushed it away I put it round her shoulders.
‘I’m cold!’
‘You stay in time out.’
Emily cried some more and then breathed hard through her nose, purposefully blowing out snot so that it dribbled into her mouth.
‘I need a tissue.’
‘You did that on purpose.’
‘I need a tissue.’
I went to the bathroom for toilet paper and when I returned Emily had gone. She was hiding on my bed so I retrieved her and set her back down into time out. The shouting started again.
‘You could have been out of time out by now.’
Emily cried and I shouted and it seemed as if the world was ruined. Everything was desperate, nuts, crazy, horrific. My daughter wouldn’t stop crying. The social worker wanted to see me again. My mum was far away and she didn’t want us anyway. My head was filled with rage and sparks from tablets I never wanted to be on in the first place.
The doorbell sounded. I couldn’t be sure because of all the noise, but when the doorbell rang again and I saw the shape of a man through the rectangle of glass I left Emily and went to open the door. Paul stood with his hands in his pockets. Emily’s cries continued.
‘Is everything okay?’ I asked.
‘Yeah.’
‘Mummy!’
‘Did you want something?’
‘No. Yes.’
Pale and naked, Emily appeared next to me, her arms by her sides, her face mangled with anger and upset.
‘Emily, get back in time out.’
‘No.’
‘This isn’t a good time is it? I came to see if—’
‘You hurt me, Mummy.’
‘No, I didn’t.’
‘You did, you hurt me.’
I turned to Emily and pointed up the stairs towards time out.
‘It doesn’t matter,’ he said. ‘Keep your heating off until the plaster’s dried.’
When I shut the door the crying stopped. Everything was quiet. I heard a car door shut and then an engine start up. I presumed it was Paul turning in the road and then driving away.
I sat with my naked girl. She had snot on her face. I wiped it on my sleeve. The ends of her hair leaked water over her neck and shoulders and down her chest. Blue veins stood out on her daddy’s white skin. Her eyes were red. I expected to be kicked or hit or for Emily to wriggle free from my arms but I put her on my lap anyway and we hugged and I felt her cold hair on my face and neck and my clothes getting wet. We were of the same, me and Emily, remorse taking us over so that we couldn’t do anything but sit with our cheeks touching, saying nothing.
‘What was all that about?’ I asked.
‘You didn’t come in the bath with me,’ Emily said.
‘You shouldn’t have thrown the jug at me.’
It seemed that was all there was to say. I dried Emily, putting cream on the backs of her legs and on her arms which helped with the eczema she’d had since a baby. She asked for a cuddle and we held each other tight, me kneeling, Emily standing in her nightdress, for so long, the longest hug, until I suggested we get a hairdryer and see what we could do with her curls.
In former days, I would have poured wine and sipped from the glass while I read Emily a story in bed. I would have refilled the glass once she was asleep and I wanted to, so desperately, so I poured the rest of a pack of Revels into my palm and pushed them into my mouth. I checked that Emily was sleeping, pulled her covers up to her chin and kissed her cheek. Then I went to the bathroom, put my foot on a towel and slid it over the wet floor, wiping up as much of the water as I could.
It was only when I sat down that I realised with the heating off, the house was freezing. I hoped Emily hadn’t got too cold sitting in time out with only her towel. I felt a bit ashamed that things had escalated so quickly when I should have been trying really hard to be a good mum.
10.
All women. At the multi-agency meeting. They were waiting for me in the parents’ room at the nursery: Sara, my social worker; the nursery head who wore green glasses and high heels; and a woman I’d never met before from the council’s family department. I think that’s what she called it.
Sara pointed to a chair next to her. I sat.
‘Where’s Emily?’ I said.
‘She’s having some lunch in the playroom. We won’t keep either of you long.’
The nursery head stood to open a window. ‘It gets quite stuffy in here,’ she said. I heard shouts from the school playground next door.
I didn’t mind that I wasn’t good enough for ballet, I didn’t mind that I got down to the last two lines but no further for Chicago, for 42nd Street, for Sunset Boulevard because all along I expected my life not to be like this. However average a dancer I was, I expected not to be sitting on the wrong side of the table in a roomful of professionals about to pick apart my parenting.
‘Now, this isn’t all doom and gloom,’ the nursery head said. She pushed her glasses further up the bridge of her nose, a purposeful push with two closed fingers.
‘Not at all. Not at all,’ Sara said.
The shame was intense. I couldn’t find my toughness. I was meek. My shoulders were hunched so I straightened them and wondered how it would feel to sit at that table when you’d never in your life been called confident, when you’d never high-kicked in front of a crowd or danced barefoot under a spotlight. I suppose those women brought sisters or mothers with them to sit by their sides. That made me think about my own mum. She wasn’t meek. I should probably call her.
‘Do you want a cup of tea, Liz?’ Sara said.
So she did drink tea. ‘No thanks,’ I said.
I waited.
The others refilled their cups. The nursery head dropped two sugar cubes into her black coffee and stirred.
Sara opened a hardback book and clicked the top of her pen onto its pages.
I took a deep breath and said, ‘You know, if you were to pull me up on my parenting, it would have been back in London, not here. You might have had a point back then, but to do this here, it’s senseless.’
I wasn’t going to tell them that I cried every day in London, that it hurt to stay alive. Emily would pass me tissues and sleep next to me while I watched television. I neglected her then, I know that. My mum took her for me whenever I wanted, which was all the time. My doctor gave me antidepressants. She told me to take lots of photos of Emily so that when I was better I’d see that I did in fact dress her nicely and look after her well. I don’t think I did either. The photos are still on my phone.
Sara said, ‘I’ve updated the room with your experience with social work thus far. We’ll not focus on the incident in the car park. That’s a police matter.’
The shame, the shame.
‘We’re here today to see how we can support you and Emily.’
As if she’d seen my shame the nursery head spoke: ‘I do want to say that you’re not the first parent who’s been referred to social services. We see all sorts in the nursery. Without breaking confidences, I just want to say that it would surprise you, some of the things we deal with. We’ll get to the bottom of this.’
‘Shall we start with you then, Moira?’ Sara said to the nursery head.
But I said, ‘This is a waste of your time. Sorry to be rude, but we’re not staying in Lennoxtown. You don’t need to do this for me.’
‘We’re doing this for Emily,’ Sara said. ‘And we will contact social work wherever you go. It doesn’t stop here.’ She could bite, Sara.
The nursery head leaned forwards. ‘We’ve observed Emily in nursery. She gets awfully upset at times. She displays some behaviours that we’re a little concerned about.’
‘What behaviours?’
Sara looked down at her hardback notebook. The other woman sat back in her seat to listen to the head.
‘She gets distressed if her keyworker leaves the room. She’s hard to console when she’s upset.’
‘She’s always been like that. That’s her way, I think.’ I’m her mum, I should know. Then I said, ‘Where is her keyworker?’
‘I’m afraid we were short-staffed. I couldn’t take her out of the playroom.’
‘Do you find Emily hard to manage at home?’ Sara said to me.
As I was about to speak, a woman opened the door, poked her head into the room, saw us and said, ‘Sorry.’ She withdrew and closed the door. I wanted to say sorry and leave, like her.
‘At times, yes,’ I said.
The women nodded.
‘But I don’t abuse her. I’m not abusive.’
‘No one’s saying you are,’ said Sara.
‘But you’re saying I’m damaging Emily.’
‘We have markers,’ the nursery head said, ‘as to how a child is developing. We want her to be going along up here –’ she raised a freckled arm, ‘but she’s still here at the moment.’ She flattened her arm. ‘And we don’t want her going down here.’ She raised her elbow a little which made her fingers point down to the table. ‘It’s often the relationship with their significant carer that we check on first – it’s mostly the mother but that’s not always the case.’
‘It’s the mother in this case,’ I said.
The nursery head smiled and pushed her glasses back up her nose.
‘Can you tell us a bit about Emily’s dad?’ Sara said.
‘I’d prefer not to.’
‘Why not?’
I sighed. ‘Really, I don’t want to start on that.’
‘He’s not around?’
‘No.’
‘What about your mum? Emily mentioned she has a granny,’ the nursery head said.
‘Yes, she has a granny. My mum.’
It occurred to me then that I was self indulgent, that the escape I sought was of little use to Emily, who liked the cushions on her gran’s sofa, who liked the comfort of a familiar body. My own mother had only an address for me and hadn’t seen her granddaughter in weeks. I’d thought the hitting and tantrums and relentless bad behaviour, every hour of every day, was normal, was what being a four-year-old was like, but maybe Emily was missing home.
‘That’s a lot of pressure on your shoulders,’ Sara said.
‘What do I have to do?’
The women seemed to exhale collectively. Sara closed her notebook. ‘You could come once a week to a family support session,’ she said. ‘It’s very informal. Little tips on dealing with the difficult things. A bit of support.’
‘I don’t want you observing my parenting.’
‘Not at all,’ the family worker said. It was the first time she’d spoken. ‘It’s just reminders of things you probably do anyway, but maybe should do a little more of. Playing together. Listening to her. Time when you switch off your mobile phone.’
‘She only wants the television,’ I said.
‘We know it’s not easy. We’ve all been in situations with our own children where we’ve been tearing our hair out, beside ourselves with frustration, haven’t we?’
The women around the table nodded sympathetically and energetically.
‘You’ve got a lot going on in your life,’ the family worker said. ‘It’s understandable to want to take the easy option or to lose your patience.’
She was wrong. There wasn’t enough in my life. There was only a dead woman’s house and me and my daughter without plans or even inclinations. I should call the woman from the library who gave me her number. I should invite Paul over. I wanted to get back to the dancers in the sheltered housing.
‘Your mental well-being is a priority too,’ said Sara. ‘I don’t know if you feel you’re a bit low.’
Were they right? Were they on to me?
‘We’ve got a quick questionnaire we could do right now. You just say if you agree, strongly agree, disagree—’
‘I don’t want to do a questionnaire, thank you.’
From the playground I heard a bell ring and then shouts and running feet and the raising of a teacher’s voice. I looked towards the window but saw only the rough stone that they built the houses with in Lennoxtown.
Sara spoke again. ‘Look, we don’t believe Emily is at risk in your care. But we want to meet with you regularly in order to support you and to check that all is well. We want to set Emily up for a good and happy life. We need to get you two working as a wee team, help you get her confident and ready for school. Just stick with us for a bit, yes?’
‘What if I don’t want to meet with you?’
They flinched at that. Sara spun her pen on top of her hardback book.
The family worker held her hands around her mug as she spoke. ‘Nobody’s forcing you to, but we’re recommending it. Go on, Liz, eh? It’ll just be me and some other mums in a room like this. It might even be this room.’ She kept her gaze on me until I nodded my head.
They brought Emily in wearing her coat and outdoor shoes, all changed and ready for me like a parcel. I sensed them watching me and it made me embarrassed to kiss her. That must be a thing, being embarrassed to kiss your own child. But Emily was as she always was. She pulled hard at my handbag, tugging at the zip, stuffing her hands inside.
‘What have you got for me?’ she asked.
‘Don’t tug.’
‘I’m hungry.’
‘Haven’t you just had lunch?’
‘I didn’t like it.’
She tugged at my bag again, pulling it off my shoulder. I looked over at the women who were watching me.
‘Don’t pull, Emily,’ I said again and then, ‘can we just leave please, and we’ll talk about this outside.’
The women stood and smiled and rearranged the chairs. Emily ignored them when they called goodbye. I was glad to hear the door close.
Life-changing. Heart-stopping. What would Robbie say? He would say, Oh Liz, what have you got yourself into? What were you doing, coming to Lennoxtown in the first place? Run, away, Lizzie, run away.
11.
One morning on our way to nursery, with the Campsie Fells cast gold by early sunlight, we saw Paul. He was leaning against the metal fence around the primary school, holding on to the railings. His body was flat against the fence and he looked like a lover. As we came closer, I saw he was talking to a child. A girl. His girl. Her hands held the railings too and she stood on her tiptoes and their faces were close. I had a sudden flash of envy even though that intimate scene was not for me, it was nothing to do with me. I’m not even sure what I was envious about other than it had something to do with love.
And then a woman stood next to Paul and passed a lunchbox through the railings to the girl. Her mother, I presumed. She put her hand to the girl’s cheek. As Paul and the woman turned around to leave, I thought, God, they’re as pretty as each other, a pair of beauties. It was hard not to stare. Then she snarled something at him and he snarled back at her and they stopped on the street and spoke words that I couldn’t hear. I was fascinated by them. Paul caught me staring and smiled. I turned my stare to a smile and held tight to Emily. I hadn’t forgotten about him coming to my door, washed and shaven in his clean clothes. I thought it was time he called again.
We began to see each other. It was never to take the place of Robbie, just a way of bringing me company. Even Robbie would have said, Take what’s there, don’t be lonely. He would also have said, Mind you’re straight up with him. I think I was.
I made a list of barre exercises I thought my students could manage. Battement tendu, battement glissé – closed beat, gliding beat – stretches of the leg to the front and the side and the back that required a hand on the barre so a ninety-six-year-old’s balance could be held. Agnes and Charlie could stay at the barre for the whole class if they wished. I thought I would try my more agile dancers – Eve, June, John – with a jump – a sauté. It would challenge their hearts and hips and knees, but they could try it, why not. When they were finished I would demonstrate an échappé sauté – an escaped jump – from fifth into second; they could progress to that, I was sure. And to give them a show I would dance a couple of sauté fouettés, whipping my leg in the air from the side to the back as I landed in arabesque. Beautiful. I would look like a ballerina doing that. Seeing Paul had emboldened me.
I went to the meeting for children and parents and carers. It took place in the parents’ room as they’d said it might, after Emily’s morning nursery session. What those women didn’t understand was that I forgot about Emily’s tantrums almost as soon as they happened. We were like that. We would wake up the next morning and cuddle and she would hold my hand and inspect it and comment on my fingernails and veins or ask to press her warm hands onto my belly fat, the belly that she grew in. I think that’s normal, isn’t it, that switch from despair to harmony? Apparently not.
‘I didn’t hear the number, Aidan. Wait. I’m not ready. Can you tell me again? What’s his name?’
I had to leave the bathroom to get a pen and paper. Aidan wanted to chat. Had I seen this friend of his, had I remembered him to the owners of the garage? No, I hadn’t. Through the bathroom door I heard Emily’s shouts getting angrier. I heard crashes and smashes.
When I returned to the bathroom, the floor was soaked with water and bubbles. The bath mat was in the bath with Emily. Her toys were on the floor. She threw water from the jug at me when I approached her. Then flung the jug at me too.
Knowing what I know now, I suppose I should have given her a warning. Then, it seemed essential to pick her up and haul her out of the bath. But she fought. She kicked and splashed and lashed out. I had her in my grip, but she fought so hard we both slipped. I hurt my back. She said I hurt her leg and I might have done because I fell on her by accident. ‘There’ll be no telly, no sweeties, no treats,’ I shouted at her, but she roared all the same and hit and kicked me and she hit herself too which frightened me.
‘That’s it!’ I lifted her up and yanked her to the top of the stairs.
‘Sit there and calm down. You’re in trouble. You’re in time out.’
Emily screamed that she didn’t want to be in time out. Her hair was flat against her head. I threw a towel at her and when she pushed it away I put it round her shoulders.
‘I’m cold!’
‘You stay in time out.’
Emily cried some more and then breathed hard through her nose, purposefully blowing out snot so that it dribbled into her mouth.
‘I need a tissue.’
‘You did that on purpose.’
‘I need a tissue.’
I went to the bathroom for toilet paper and when I returned Emily had gone. She was hiding on my bed so I retrieved her and set her back down into time out. The shouting started again.
‘You could have been out of time out by now.’
Emily cried and I shouted and it seemed as if the world was ruined. Everything was desperate, nuts, crazy, horrific. My daughter wouldn’t stop crying. The social worker wanted to see me again. My mum was far away and she didn’t want us anyway. My head was filled with rage and sparks from tablets I never wanted to be on in the first place.
The doorbell sounded. I couldn’t be sure because of all the noise, but when the doorbell rang again and I saw the shape of a man through the rectangle of glass I left Emily and went to open the door. Paul stood with his hands in his pockets. Emily’s cries continued.
‘Is everything okay?’ I asked.
‘Yeah.’
‘Mummy!’
‘Did you want something?’
‘No. Yes.’
Pale and naked, Emily appeared next to me, her arms by her sides, her face mangled with anger and upset.
‘Emily, get back in time out.’
‘No.’
‘This isn’t a good time is it? I came to see if—’
‘You hurt me, Mummy.’
‘No, I didn’t.’
‘You did, you hurt me.’
I turned to Emily and pointed up the stairs towards time out.
‘It doesn’t matter,’ he said. ‘Keep your heating off until the plaster’s dried.’
When I shut the door the crying stopped. Everything was quiet. I heard a car door shut and then an engine start up. I presumed it was Paul turning in the road and then driving away.
I sat with my naked girl. She had snot on her face. I wiped it on my sleeve. The ends of her hair leaked water over her neck and shoulders and down her chest. Blue veins stood out on her daddy’s white skin. Her eyes were red. I expected to be kicked or hit or for Emily to wriggle free from my arms but I put her on my lap anyway and we hugged and I felt her cold hair on my face and neck and my clothes getting wet. We were of the same, me and Emily, remorse taking us over so that we couldn’t do anything but sit with our cheeks touching, saying nothing.
‘What was all that about?’ I asked.
‘You didn’t come in the bath with me,’ Emily said.
‘You shouldn’t have thrown the jug at me.’
It seemed that was all there was to say. I dried Emily, putting cream on the backs of her legs and on her arms which helped with the eczema she’d had since a baby. She asked for a cuddle and we held each other tight, me kneeling, Emily standing in her nightdress, for so long, the longest hug, until I suggested we get a hairdryer and see what we could do with her curls.
In former days, I would have poured wine and sipped from the glass while I read Emily a story in bed. I would have refilled the glass once she was asleep and I wanted to, so desperately, so I poured the rest of a pack of Revels into my palm and pushed them into my mouth. I checked that Emily was sleeping, pulled her covers up to her chin and kissed her cheek. Then I went to the bathroom, put my foot on a towel and slid it over the wet floor, wiping up as much of the water as I could.
It was only when I sat down that I realised with the heating off, the house was freezing. I hoped Emily hadn’t got too cold sitting in time out with only her towel. I felt a bit ashamed that things had escalated so quickly when I should have been trying really hard to be a good mum.
10.
All women. At the multi-agency meeting. They were waiting for me in the parents’ room at the nursery: Sara, my social worker; the nursery head who wore green glasses and high heels; and a woman I’d never met before from the council’s family department. I think that’s what she called it.
Sara pointed to a chair next to her. I sat.
‘Where’s Emily?’ I said.
‘She’s having some lunch in the playroom. We won’t keep either of you long.’
The nursery head stood to open a window. ‘It gets quite stuffy in here,’ she said. I heard shouts from the school playground next door.
I didn’t mind that I wasn’t good enough for ballet, I didn’t mind that I got down to the last two lines but no further for Chicago, for 42nd Street, for Sunset Boulevard because all along I expected my life not to be like this. However average a dancer I was, I expected not to be sitting on the wrong side of the table in a roomful of professionals about to pick apart my parenting.
‘Now, this isn’t all doom and gloom,’ the nursery head said. She pushed her glasses further up the bridge of her nose, a purposeful push with two closed fingers.
‘Not at all. Not at all,’ Sara said.
The shame was intense. I couldn’t find my toughness. I was meek. My shoulders were hunched so I straightened them and wondered how it would feel to sit at that table when you’d never in your life been called confident, when you’d never high-kicked in front of a crowd or danced barefoot under a spotlight. I suppose those women brought sisters or mothers with them to sit by their sides. That made me think about my own mum. She wasn’t meek. I should probably call her.
‘Do you want a cup of tea, Liz?’ Sara said.
So she did drink tea. ‘No thanks,’ I said.
I waited.
The others refilled their cups. The nursery head dropped two sugar cubes into her black coffee and stirred.
Sara opened a hardback book and clicked the top of her pen onto its pages.
I took a deep breath and said, ‘You know, if you were to pull me up on my parenting, it would have been back in London, not here. You might have had a point back then, but to do this here, it’s senseless.’
I wasn’t going to tell them that I cried every day in London, that it hurt to stay alive. Emily would pass me tissues and sleep next to me while I watched television. I neglected her then, I know that. My mum took her for me whenever I wanted, which was all the time. My doctor gave me antidepressants. She told me to take lots of photos of Emily so that when I was better I’d see that I did in fact dress her nicely and look after her well. I don’t think I did either. The photos are still on my phone.
Sara said, ‘I’ve updated the room with your experience with social work thus far. We’ll not focus on the incident in the car park. That’s a police matter.’
The shame, the shame.
‘We’re here today to see how we can support you and Emily.’
As if she’d seen my shame the nursery head spoke: ‘I do want to say that you’re not the first parent who’s been referred to social services. We see all sorts in the nursery. Without breaking confidences, I just want to say that it would surprise you, some of the things we deal with. We’ll get to the bottom of this.’
‘Shall we start with you then, Moira?’ Sara said to the nursery head.
But I said, ‘This is a waste of your time. Sorry to be rude, but we’re not staying in Lennoxtown. You don’t need to do this for me.’
‘We’re doing this for Emily,’ Sara said. ‘And we will contact social work wherever you go. It doesn’t stop here.’ She could bite, Sara.
The nursery head leaned forwards. ‘We’ve observed Emily in nursery. She gets awfully upset at times. She displays some behaviours that we’re a little concerned about.’
‘What behaviours?’
Sara looked down at her hardback notebook. The other woman sat back in her seat to listen to the head.
‘She gets distressed if her keyworker leaves the room. She’s hard to console when she’s upset.’
‘She’s always been like that. That’s her way, I think.’ I’m her mum, I should know. Then I said, ‘Where is her keyworker?’
‘I’m afraid we were short-staffed. I couldn’t take her out of the playroom.’
‘Do you find Emily hard to manage at home?’ Sara said to me.
As I was about to speak, a woman opened the door, poked her head into the room, saw us and said, ‘Sorry.’ She withdrew and closed the door. I wanted to say sorry and leave, like her.
‘At times, yes,’ I said.
The women nodded.
‘But I don’t abuse her. I’m not abusive.’
‘No one’s saying you are,’ said Sara.
‘But you’re saying I’m damaging Emily.’
‘We have markers,’ the nursery head said, ‘as to how a child is developing. We want her to be going along up here –’ she raised a freckled arm, ‘but she’s still here at the moment.’ She flattened her arm. ‘And we don’t want her going down here.’ She raised her elbow a little which made her fingers point down to the table. ‘It’s often the relationship with their significant carer that we check on first – it’s mostly the mother but that’s not always the case.’
‘It’s the mother in this case,’ I said.
The nursery head smiled and pushed her glasses back up her nose.
‘Can you tell us a bit about Emily’s dad?’ Sara said.
‘I’d prefer not to.’
‘Why not?’
I sighed. ‘Really, I don’t want to start on that.’
‘He’s not around?’
‘No.’
‘What about your mum? Emily mentioned she has a granny,’ the nursery head said.
‘Yes, she has a granny. My mum.’
It occurred to me then that I was self indulgent, that the escape I sought was of little use to Emily, who liked the cushions on her gran’s sofa, who liked the comfort of a familiar body. My own mother had only an address for me and hadn’t seen her granddaughter in weeks. I’d thought the hitting and tantrums and relentless bad behaviour, every hour of every day, was normal, was what being a four-year-old was like, but maybe Emily was missing home.
‘That’s a lot of pressure on your shoulders,’ Sara said.
‘What do I have to do?’
The women seemed to exhale collectively. Sara closed her notebook. ‘You could come once a week to a family support session,’ she said. ‘It’s very informal. Little tips on dealing with the difficult things. A bit of support.’
‘I don’t want you observing my parenting.’
‘Not at all,’ the family worker said. It was the first time she’d spoken. ‘It’s just reminders of things you probably do anyway, but maybe should do a little more of. Playing together. Listening to her. Time when you switch off your mobile phone.’
‘She only wants the television,’ I said.
‘We know it’s not easy. We’ve all been in situations with our own children where we’ve been tearing our hair out, beside ourselves with frustration, haven’t we?’
The women around the table nodded sympathetically and energetically.
‘You’ve got a lot going on in your life,’ the family worker said. ‘It’s understandable to want to take the easy option or to lose your patience.’
She was wrong. There wasn’t enough in my life. There was only a dead woman’s house and me and my daughter without plans or even inclinations. I should call the woman from the library who gave me her number. I should invite Paul over. I wanted to get back to the dancers in the sheltered housing.
‘Your mental well-being is a priority too,’ said Sara. ‘I don’t know if you feel you’re a bit low.’
Were they right? Were they on to me?
‘We’ve got a quick questionnaire we could do right now. You just say if you agree, strongly agree, disagree—’
‘I don’t want to do a questionnaire, thank you.’
From the playground I heard a bell ring and then shouts and running feet and the raising of a teacher’s voice. I looked towards the window but saw only the rough stone that they built the houses with in Lennoxtown.
Sara spoke again. ‘Look, we don’t believe Emily is at risk in your care. But we want to meet with you regularly in order to support you and to check that all is well. We want to set Emily up for a good and happy life. We need to get you two working as a wee team, help you get her confident and ready for school. Just stick with us for a bit, yes?’
‘What if I don’t want to meet with you?’
They flinched at that. Sara spun her pen on top of her hardback book.
The family worker held her hands around her mug as she spoke. ‘Nobody’s forcing you to, but we’re recommending it. Go on, Liz, eh? It’ll just be me and some other mums in a room like this. It might even be this room.’ She kept her gaze on me until I nodded my head.
They brought Emily in wearing her coat and outdoor shoes, all changed and ready for me like a parcel. I sensed them watching me and it made me embarrassed to kiss her. That must be a thing, being embarrassed to kiss your own child. But Emily was as she always was. She pulled hard at my handbag, tugging at the zip, stuffing her hands inside.
‘What have you got for me?’ she asked.
‘Don’t tug.’
‘I’m hungry.’
‘Haven’t you just had lunch?’
‘I didn’t like it.’
She tugged at my bag again, pulling it off my shoulder. I looked over at the women who were watching me.
‘Don’t pull, Emily,’ I said again and then, ‘can we just leave please, and we’ll talk about this outside.’
The women stood and smiled and rearranged the chairs. Emily ignored them when they called goodbye. I was glad to hear the door close.
Life-changing. Heart-stopping. What would Robbie say? He would say, Oh Liz, what have you got yourself into? What were you doing, coming to Lennoxtown in the first place? Run, away, Lizzie, run away.
11.
One morning on our way to nursery, with the Campsie Fells cast gold by early sunlight, we saw Paul. He was leaning against the metal fence around the primary school, holding on to the railings. His body was flat against the fence and he looked like a lover. As we came closer, I saw he was talking to a child. A girl. His girl. Her hands held the railings too and she stood on her tiptoes and their faces were close. I had a sudden flash of envy even though that intimate scene was not for me, it was nothing to do with me. I’m not even sure what I was envious about other than it had something to do with love.
And then a woman stood next to Paul and passed a lunchbox through the railings to the girl. Her mother, I presumed. She put her hand to the girl’s cheek. As Paul and the woman turned around to leave, I thought, God, they’re as pretty as each other, a pair of beauties. It was hard not to stare. Then she snarled something at him and he snarled back at her and they stopped on the street and spoke words that I couldn’t hear. I was fascinated by them. Paul caught me staring and smiled. I turned my stare to a smile and held tight to Emily. I hadn’t forgotten about him coming to my door, washed and shaven in his clean clothes. I thought it was time he called again.
We began to see each other. It was never to take the place of Robbie, just a way of bringing me company. Even Robbie would have said, Take what’s there, don’t be lonely. He would also have said, Mind you’re straight up with him. I think I was.
I made a list of barre exercises I thought my students could manage. Battement tendu, battement glissé – closed beat, gliding beat – stretches of the leg to the front and the side and the back that required a hand on the barre so a ninety-six-year-old’s balance could be held. Agnes and Charlie could stay at the barre for the whole class if they wished. I thought I would try my more agile dancers – Eve, June, John – with a jump – a sauté. It would challenge their hearts and hips and knees, but they could try it, why not. When they were finished I would demonstrate an échappé sauté – an escaped jump – from fifth into second; they could progress to that, I was sure. And to give them a show I would dance a couple of sauté fouettés, whipping my leg in the air from the side to the back as I landed in arabesque. Beautiful. I would look like a ballerina doing that. Seeing Paul had emboldened me.
I went to the meeting for children and parents and carers. It took place in the parents’ room as they’d said it might, after Emily’s morning nursery session. What those women didn’t understand was that I forgot about Emily’s tantrums almost as soon as they happened. We were like that. We would wake up the next morning and cuddle and she would hold my hand and inspect it and comment on my fingernails and veins or ask to press her warm hands onto my belly fat, the belly that she grew in. I think that’s normal, isn’t it, that switch from despair to harmony? Apparently not.
