had a memory lapse, four weeks after Noah was born, Maddie had been so frightened she’d had to tell someone. Jayne might only be a little older than Maddie, but she made her feel mothered in a way Sarah never had. It was Jayne who’d finally talked her into going back to Dr Calkins, even offering to come with her. With Jayne beside her, she’d told the doctor everything and had been surprised, and immensely reassured, when he’d explained it was nothing more than a side effect of the antidepressants she’d been on since Jacob’s birth. Once Noah was a little older, he said, they’d scale back her meds and everything would be fine.
She hoped he was right, but last night had shocked her to the core. She’d never knowingly put the children at risk before. It was only luck Noah had just ended up with a few red marks. What if she didn’t simply lose her memory next time? What if she had a proper blackout, when she was driving or carrying the baby? Or what if she did something she couldn’t remember, like leaving the gas on or the bathwater running? She could burn the house down, and never even know it.
‘Well?’ Jayne teased, flicking the kettle back on. ‘Or have you already forgotten the question?’
Maddie was about to tell Jayne what had happened. But then Emily came running back into the kitchen, asking for something to drink, and Jayne noticed some of her chickenpox blisters were weeping and went off to get some calamine lotion, and so in the end, Maddie said nothing at all.
She wriggles uncomfortably in the dark. She badly needs to pee, but if she comes out of the cupboard, Mae will be very angry. Mae told her to stay in there till the lady has gone or she’ll be sorry. She knows better than to disobey Mae. Last time, Mae beat her so hard, she knocked out two of her teeth and she couldn’t move her arm properly for ages. Let that be a lesson to you. Sometimes her shoulder still hurts.
Mae says she’s a wicked little cow who’ll get what’s coming to her. She says one of these days she’ll end up hanging from a hook in the shed, like the rabbits, with her gizzard slit. She doesn’t know what a gizzard is, but she doesn’t want hers slit. It sounds like it would hurt.
She really really needs to pee. She squeezes her legs together tight. It’s so hot in the cupboard and she’s thirsty, too. She doesn’t know why she has to hide, but she thinks it’s probably because she was so naughty yesterday. Mae had to punish her and now she has big red and purple bruises all over her legs. She didn’t mean to be a greedy little brat, but she was so hungry. Sometimes Mae forgets to feed her, and so after Mae has gone to bed, she sneaks back downstairs and eats whatever she can find in the kitchen, like she was last night when Mae caught her.
She wishes Davy was still here. Her brother was nearly as big as Mae and Mae didn’t get as cross with her when he was around. But Davy left. He told her he’d come back for her, but he hasn’t yet. Good riddance, Mae says.
She doesn’t think it’s good riddance, though. She misses Davy.
She can’t hold the pee in any longer and it starts to trickle down her leg. Mae will be angry that she wet herself, but it’s better than coming out of the cupboard and having the lady see her. Last time a lady came to the house, Davy had to leave. It was her fault, because the special sweets made her sick. They were blue and came in a little bottle. They didn’t taste very nice, but Mae told her to eat them all, a special treat, so she did. They made her feel funny. She got all sleepy and Mae let her curl up on the sofa, which is something she never usually does. But then Davy came home early from school and found her and he gave her a glass of warm water with salt in it, which tasted disgusting and made her sick. She doesn’t know why that made Davy so happy, but he hugged her and kissed her and made her promise never to eat Mae’s sweets again.
The next day, the lady came and asked her lots of questions about Mae (the lady called her ‘your mummy’ and Mae didn’t say, Don’t you bloody call me that, you little bastard, if I’d had my way I’d have got rid of you, you can blame your father, fucking bastard I should have known he wouldn’t stick around). Mae sat on the sofa next to her with her arm round her and pinched her hard when the lady wasn’t looking, to remind her to keep smiling and be a good girl. Mae didn’t get cross with Davy in front of the lady, she laughed and said Davy had got the wrong end of the stick, it was a silly accident, she was very careful about where she kept her pills, especially when there were kiddies about, but you know what they’re like, you have to have eyes in the back of your head. She didn’t understand what Mae meant about the stick, but she hoped it wasn’t a big one.
The lady wrote all this down and then she went and Mae stopped smiling and dragged Davy upstairs and she heard Mae shouting and Davy shouted back, and there was lots of banging and yelling and screaming. She didn’t see Davy for a few days after that and then one night he sneaked into her bedroom and crouched down by her mattress on the floor to shake her awake. His face was all purple and bruised and one eye was swollen shut. He told her he was going to track down his own dad and he’d get him to speak to the lady and make her listen this time. You poor bloody cow, he said. If you was a dog, they’d take you off her, they wouldn’t let her treat you like this.
But Davy never came back. Mae said good riddance, just like your father, they’re all the same. Mae said it’s your fault he left, you wicked evil little bastard. Mae must be right, or else why hadn’t he come back for her like he promised?
She hears the door slam now and Mae stomping up the stairs. She scrambles back away from the cupboard door, trying to make herself small in the corner. Even though she didn’t come out of the cupboard, she knows she’s going to be in trouble anyway because of the pee and because she’s a bad lot who’s got it coming to her.
The door flies open and she blinks in the sudden light. Mae reaches in and grabs her arm and yanks her out, and she tumbles onto the bare boards, scraping her knee. Mae doesn’t give her time to stand up. Her arm feels like it’s being pulled out of its socket as she’s hauled along the hallway, and she has to bite her lip hard to stop from crying.
Mae stops suddenly and flings her into a heap against the wall. You dirty little bastard! she screams. Four years old and you’re still wetting yourself! You little cunt!
She curls into a ball as Mae aims a kick at her, trying to protect herself. She didn’t know she was four years old. There are so many things she doesn’t know, including her own name. Davy called her peanut and Mae calls her little bastard and dirty bitch and fucking slag, but she doesn’t think any of those are her name.
Mae grabs her arm again. She just has time to scramble to her feet as Mae drags her down the stairs. She is shocked when Mae hauls the front door open and yanks her outside. She’s hardly ever allowed outside.
There are so many things she wants to look at as Mae pulls her down the street, but she’s too busy trying to keep up with her. Then they get on a bus and she bounces up and down in her seat, so excited she forgets to be scared. A bus! Davy used to get a bus to school every day, sometimes she watched him from the window, but she’s never been on a bus! She wonders where they are going. Maybe Mae has found Davy at last. Maybe she’s not angry with him anymore and they are going to get him and bring him home.
She is sad when they get off the bus, but Mae grips her hand and marches her down a big street, much bigger than the one where they live. It is filled with shops with big glass windows with plastic people standing in them, wearing the cleanest clothes she has ever seen.
Suddenly Mae halts by a black door with gold writing on it and pushes her through it. There are no plastic people in this shop, just a pretty lady with long
