Lost Child, page 22
The two bear puppets proceeded to work their way through almost all the puppets in the bag. Only the dragon and the ostrich were ignored, possibly because they were too big. The rest were gobbled up and the remains tossed in various directions.
‘Ahhhhh,’ Jessie said in a satisfied way and leaned the two bear puppets on their backs. ‘That was good. That was a tasty feast.’
‘Your bears were very hungry,’ I observed.
‘They were. They ate up everything.’
‘Sometimes it feels good to get rid of everything.’
She nodded contentedly and studied the bears on each hand. Then she said, ‘I wish I was a bear.’
‘You’d like to eat everyone up.’
She nodded. ‘I’d make everything go away just by eating it up.’ She grinned. ‘Chomp, chomp!’ A bit of her usual cheekiness was returning. ‘Chomp, chomp!’ she said, extending one bear to bite my arm.
‘You’d like to eat me up too.’
‘Yes! Chomp, chomp!’
A pause came then. ‘Except if I was a bear, then I’d have to have babies. Because when bears go to sleep, the babies get born without them knowing. I wouldn’t like that. Waking up, finding out I had kids.’
Jessie pulled the bear puppets back close to her and made them go mouth to mouth for a moment. Then she held one up at eye level and stared at it. ‘That’s what happened to my mum,’ she said. ‘She went to sleep and when she woke up, she had me.’
‘Your mum went to sleep, because she had an anaesthetic. The doctors needed to do a Caesarean very quickly. That’s a kind of operation. They gave her anaesthetic so she wouldn’t feel too much pain. But your mum knew she would have a baby when she woke up.’
‘She didn’t want to have a baby when she woke up,’ Jessie replied. ‘But there I was and she had to take care of me. Because my dad stuck his willy in her vagina. That’s how it happens. She wanted to go back to bed all the time, back to sleep, so that maybe I wouldn’t be there the next time she woke up. But it doesn’t work like that, does it, Eleanor?’
Jessie made the bear puppets come together, body to body. She pulled them apart and then put them back together, mouth to mouth. My sense was that she was depicting the sexual act but she gave no explanation.
‘Unless she could fly away,’ Jessie said. ‘Like a skylark. Because they fly up high. That’s when they sing. See, that’s what this fairy tale is about. Eleanor eats some fairy dust and suddenly she’s turned into a skylark.’ Jessie shot her hand up high above her head, making the bear puppet sail through the air. Rising from her seat, she held it even higher. ‘See, she’s a skylark now. You’re seeing a bear because you don’t have fairy dust on your eyes. But really she’s a skylark and she’s flying all over. She’s left all her cubs behind. She’s left the cave behind. She’s even left Magnus behind. See. He’s gone.’ Jessie flicked off the other puppet. ‘Eleanor’s a skylark now. She’s happy. The End.’
‘I’m glad Eleanor got her happy ending,’ I said.
‘That’s how it works in fairy tales.’
‘I expect that Eleanor’s cubs felt bad that she flew away and left them though, don’t you?’ I ask. ‘It wouldn’t be a happy ending for them, because they’d want their mummy. They think maybe they did something wrong and that’s why Mummy doesn’t want to be with them. They are thinking maybe it is their fault she’s gone away.’
‘No,’ Jessie said with certainty. ‘That isn’t how it works. Eleanor’s happy. The fairy dust, like, makes everything else disappear, and she doesn’t have to worry about it.’
I persisted. ‘Maybe that’s how it is for Eleanor, but I’m worried about these little cubs. If you’re born, it’s not your fault. You can’t then just disappear because someone else wants a fairy-tale ending. These little cubs need someone to take care of them. They will cry and feel lonely. The cubs aren’t to blame for being little babies who cry and need someone to take care of them.’
‘I blame them,’ Jessie said nonchalantly. ‘They shouldn’t have been born if they couldn’t take care of themselves. They shouldn’t have come out of Eleanor’s vagina when she was sleeping.’
I picked up the discarded bear puppet and cradled it in my arms. ‘Poor little cub. I will hold you and cuddle you.’
Jessie regarded me, and for a moment I thought she was going to burst out laughing and tell me how silly I was being, but the pause drew out. Jessie sucked her lower lip between her teeth. Then she reached for Eleanor. Tentatively, she brought the puppet up against her body.
‘Yes, you cuddle that one and I’ll cuddle this one,’ I said. ‘And we’ll tell them how sorry we are that they were left all alone and crying. No one will hurt them. Nothing bad will happen to them.’
‘No one will stick fingers in their pussies, because that’s not cuddling, is it?’ Jessie said. ‘Because look. This could be, like, their pussy.’ She lifted open the hole where the hand went into the puppet.
‘No, that’s not cuddling. Cuddling means we just hold them tight, so that they feel warm and safe. That’s what we do with babies. That’s how babies should be treated, because that’s what babies need.’
Jessie smiled and clutched the puppet close, rocking it back and forth. ‘Yes, that’s what babies need.’
Chapter Twenty-Seven
‘I’ve got something to tell you,’ Jessie said when she came in the next Tuesday. She sat down across the table from me. ‘Melanie’s going to get adopted.’
Melanie was the now twelve-year-old who lived in the room across the hall from Jessie. The two girls had a rather fraught relationship. Melanie was a very attractive girl with long blonde hair and angelic features, and she was canny, one of those people who hides their intelligence to their advantage. This put her in a position of power in the group home, because she knew exactly how to manipulate both. She and Jessie were the only girls close in age to each other, so it was natural they hung out together, but their relationship had always seemed unequal to me. Jessie wasn’t naive, but she was younger than Melanie and not at all good at seeing when she was being set up, and Melanie took advantage of this. So I was always a little wary of her.
This news, however, came as a surprise. While I didn’t know a great deal about Melanie’s background, I did know she had a mother and a younger brother. The brother was in a foster home and apparently well settled, but that family hadn’t been able to take Melanie too. During the time I’d been working with Jessie there had been one attempt to return Melanie to her mother, who had ongoing issues with heroin addiction, but it hadn’t worked out and Melanie remained at Glan Morfa.
‘Are you sure it’s adoption?’ I asked, because I’d assumed Meleri had been planning a foster placement for her in the same way she was for Jessie.
‘Yes. Melanie said her mum got her rights taken away. Now Melanie and her brother can be adopted.’
‘What’s Melanie think of that?’
‘Well, it’s going to be fostering first, to see if they get on. But she’s going next week. And if it works out, Melanie said they might adopt her. She’ll get to take their last name, if she gets adopted. It’s McKie. That’s a Scottish name. Then Melanie will be Scottish.’
‘Her name would be Scottish. Melanie would still be Welsh because she was born here.’
‘But guess what?’ Jessie said, her tone low with titillation. ‘They’re gay! It’s two ladies! I met them. One is named Ruth and one is named Sylvia. Do you know what “gay” means? It means she’ll have two mums instead of a mum and dad.’
‘Yes, I do know what “gay” means. And isn’t that lovely for Melanie? I bet she will enjoy being in a foster home.’
‘Not fostering. She’s going to get adopted.’
‘Which is Melanie’s take on it, I expect, but it will be fostering to start.’
‘She said she’s going to call herself Melanie McKie right away. She’s going to start school like that.’
‘How do you feel about all this?’ I asked.
Jessie shrugged. ‘I don’t care really.’
‘Won’t you miss her? She’s been a good friend.’
‘She hasn’t. And besides, I don’t care. And now I think it’s time for us to do something in here. Can I draw? Where’s your case with the paper in it?’
She rose from her chair and went to my satchel. She took out the pens and three or four pieces of paper.
‘When are you taking me to see the skylarks?’ she asked, as she sat down again.
‘Perhaps next week. Instead of doing our usual session, I can take you up to the moor. How would that be?’
‘Do you think it’s okay for gay people to adopt Melanie?’ she replied.
‘Yes, of course I do.’
‘You don’t think, like, anything would happen, do you?’
‘How do you mean?’
‘Well, I know what “gay” really is.’
‘And you’re worried for Melanie because they are gay?’
She shrugged. Spreading out a piece of paper Jessie began to draw, but for the first time it was not a skylark. She started sketching a figure. I was so surprised to see her drawing something different that I was momentarily silenced, watching her.
A girl took shape on the paper. Black trousers, pink blouse, blonde hair and I knew it was Melanie. This intrigued me, that Jessie would be compelled to draw Melanie. Then another figure beside her, a woman with short brown hair.
Jessie wasn’t quite as talented drawing people as she was her skylarks, and the woman came out with unequal length arms. Jessie noticed this as she added the fingers. ‘Look, I drew that wrong. It isn’t good.’ Then she paused. ‘Look how long her arm is right next to the girl. She could put her finger in the girl’s pussy.’
‘Are you worried that will happen to Melanie?’
‘No,’ she said firmly.
‘Being a gay couple means they will have a sexual relationship with each other, just as a straight couple would have a sexual relationship with each other. In both cases, the couple would care for their children like loving parents. Loving parents don’t touch their children sexually. So while Ruth and Sylvia will have a relationship with each other, they wouldn’t be sexual with Melanie. She will be safe.’
‘I know,’ Jessie said casually, and continued with her drawing.
A minute or two went by with no conversation. Now there were two women standing beside the girl and they took on more detail.
‘I wish I could draw this right. I’d like to do it better.’
‘I like it the way you’re doing it,’ I replied.
‘Can I ask you something?’
‘Yes, Jess, of course.’
But she didn’t. She became absorbed again in the drawing for several moments before finally saying, ‘Do you think a gay couple might adopt me?’
‘Are you wondering about getting adopted? Or about it being a gay couple?’
‘One of the boys was saying that you never get a mum and dad if you’re older, because mums and dads only want little kids. Babies. Big kids are too wrecked. But sometimes, like with Melanie, a gay couple wants you. Do you think a gay couple might want me?’
‘What are your thoughts?’ I asked.
‘I’d be okay with it. I think I’d like it.’
Silence then, as Jessie became absorbed filling in small details on her drawing. Then she said, ‘Mrs Thomas was talking to me last week, and she said now that they know about Gemma, maybe I can go back home soon. Because I could get supported and it would be okay.’ She paused over the drawing, but didn’t look up. ‘But . . .’
She lifted the pen. The moment drew out.
‘But what?’ I asked.
‘I mean . . . well . . . what I want to know is: how did Melanie get so that she didn’t have to go back home? How did she make it so that her family couldn’t get her back? Because I think I want to do that. I want to be somebody else’s kid.’
And then there we were, back with our old nemesis: the outing. Jessie and I had decided that I would take her up on the moor the next Tuesday afternoon, as long as the weather was good, but how were we going to get past Jessie’s sabotaging it?
‘I really, really want to do this with you,’ I said, ‘but we keep running into difficulties.’
‘We won’t this time, I promise. I promise, promise. Pinkie promise. Here, give me your pinkie so I can pinkie promise and then it will happen.’ She wiggled the little finger on her right hand at me.
‘No, I don’t doubt that you do mean it, Jess. It’s just that whenever we get close to going out together, something always happens.’
‘No, it doesn’t.’
Raising an eyebrow, I looked at her.
‘Well, it’s not my fault something always happens. That’s them. Helen and Enir. They hate me. And Lin most of all. She’s so picky. Everything I do, she comes after me. Like on Saturday night, she said I took Baban-Dai’s fifty pence piece. And I didn’t. I didn’t. But she said I did and I had to sit at the table until it was found. And that was so unfair. So super unfair.’
‘I’m not concerned about whose fault it is,’ I said. ‘I’m concerned about how we can prevent things from happening that stop us going out.’
‘People get me in trouble all the time. It’s so unfair.’
‘What can we do to make sure you stay out of trouble this week?’ I asked.
‘I just won’t get in trouble. I promise. And you need to make Lin be fair to me. Then I won’t get wound up. Because that’s what she does. Wind me up. If you do that, then I’ll be able to go.’
‘I’m not sure this is my responsibility. It seems to me,’ I said, ‘that when we make plans to go out and the time gets close, you find it harder to behave. This is something that has happened to other kids I’ve known too. They really, really want to go out with me, but they aren’t sure what is going to happen and how they will feel, and so they start to feel anxious. Quite often, when we’re feeling scared, we misbehave. Not on purpose. It just happens.’
‘I’m not scared. I’m not scared of anything,’ Jessie asserted.
‘Well, maybe not, but what I’m thinking is that it might be helpful if we practised going out together. I’ll arrange the chairs, and we’ll take a pretend journey together.’
‘That’s daft. I’m not a baby. I don’t play pretend.’
‘“Pretend” was maybe the wrong word. “Role play”. Let’s role play going out together, because it’s a good way to practise new things.’
‘You’re weird,’ Jessie said dismissively.
‘Maybe so, but we’re still going to do it.’ Standing up, I moved two of the chairs side by side. The room was so small that doing this meant one chair was against the table, the other against the sofa. Jessie was still in her chair on the other side of the table, and she watched me sceptically.
‘Okay, this is my car. I’m the driver, sitting here. Come around and get in. Let’s go to the moors to see the skylarks.’
Jessie remained where she was.
‘Come on,’ I said. ‘Come get in the car.’
She stood up and came around the table, but there wasn’t room to get into the chair beside me without climbing onto the sofa first, so Jessie hesitated.
‘Okay, so there’s the first situation. What would happen if you came out to my car but you weren’t sure how to open the door to get in.’
‘I’d say, “You need to move your sofa out of the way of your car.”’
I laughed. She was determined to be obstructive, but it was too funny not to laugh. This made Jessie giggle too.
‘It’s a pretty crap car,’ she said.
‘Yes, you’re right. But get in anyway.’
Jessie climbed over the sofa and sat down on the chair next to me.
‘So what would you say, if you came out to my real car but couldn’t get in?’
‘“Could you help me, please?”’
‘Good, that would work, wouldn’t it? So, now, here we are driving. What might be the next worry? What kind of problems might we encounter?’
‘I don’t know.’
‘Some children get travel sick. They aren’t used to riding on country roads. Does that ever happen to you?’
‘No.’
‘That’s good. But what if it did? What if you started feeling sick while I was driving? What could you do?’
‘Say, “I’m going to go blaaaaaaa!”’ and she did a fake vomit.
‘Say that we didn’t want you to go blaaa inside the car? How could we handle that situation?’
‘I don’t get car sick.’
‘Okay, but what if you ate too much ice cream on the way and got a bad tummy and it made you feel sick. How could we handle that situation?’
‘I could catch it in my frock, like this! Blaaaaa!’ She lifted up the edges of her dress to demonstrate.
Clearly Jessie was finding this scenario entertaining, which I didn’t mind, as it gave us some much-needed comic relief. I hoped it was also making the outing sound fun and doable instead of scary. We role played several other versions of dealing with a vomitous child to much laughter and gross sound effects.
‘Okay, so now we’re driving up onto the moor. What could happen next?’ I asked.
‘I don’t know. I’ve never been to the moors,’ she replied.
‘You don’t know what to expect. It’s pretty normal to feel anxious about something that is new. It helps to explore it in the context of things we do know. Are you worried about the sharks?’
Jessie hooted with laughter. ‘You’re being so ridiculous! There’s not going to be any sharks there. It’s land.’
‘See, you do know something about where we’re going.’
‘Maybe I’m worried about the skylarks,’ Jessie said mischievously. ‘Maybe I think they are going to eat me all up!’ Putting her arms together, she made jawlike movements. ‘Like this!’ She made her hands bite up and down my arm.
‘I think we’ve got a silly game going on here,’ I said.
