suggest a comfort break. Susan. Would you like a game of Sonic the Hedgehog? WPC Davies can get up to level eight.’
Susan was led away. She was given a cup of hot chocolate. She was allowed to play Sonic the Hedgehog. Her tears dried. Her mood brightened. She had learned a valuable lesson: sex was good. It got you attention. It got you affection. It was a good way to get on in life.
And if these things came from just saying she'd done it, she couldn't wait to start doing it for real.
The two Oswalds were dropped off by a squad car at three o'clock the next morning. Caught between charging them with wasting police time and Bob's blind insistence that something had gone on between Rick Buckley and his daughter, the police decided to do nothing. No caution. No slap on the wrist. Free to go.
The same was now true of Rick Buckley. The charges against him were dropped and, as they hadn't been sent to the lab yet, the clothes he had been wearing when he'd been arrested were handed back in a clear plastic bag. In a cold room with bright white lighting, Rick hurriedly dressed in front of two male constables and a female nurse who watched his shrivelled penis bob as he stepped into light blue Y-fronts and then pulled up his trousers. Despite his total humiliation, Rick Buckley did not cry: he finished getting dressed, he put his watch on, he signed for the loose change that had been in his pockets. One of the officers marched him down a darkly lit corridor and out into early morning. It was just after 7 a.m.
No one had told Mr and Mrs Buckley their son was being released without charge. Rick stood in a dreary drizzle and, as he had hardly any money and hadn't had his mobile phone on him when he'd been arrested, started the eleven-mile walk to Hedge End. Rain saturated his wavy hair and thin summer cotton T-shirt. He walked with his arms wrapped around himself. He walked with his head down. He talked as he walked.
On each first step he said, I.
On each second step he said, feel.
On each third step he said, dirty.
He said these words over and over.
I feel dirty. I feel dirty. I feel dirty.
He said them all the way home.
It was 11 a.m. by the time he got back to Drummond Square. I don't remember seeing him hurry round the corner and disappear down the Buckleys' side alley, but I do remember Mr Buckley coming over to our house later that evening. I was pretending to be asleep in Archie's lap. He had his hands in my hair. I could hear the depth of his voice through the itch of his polyester shirt. Mr Buckley's voice was distant in contrast.
‘The police were utterly useless. They ignored what we said about Bob Oswald, then took every word he said on oath. You know, after they dragged my son down the station, they stripped him naked and took loads of swabs.’
‘They couldn't have done that without his permission.’
‘He didn't know what he was agreeing to. Since he took that beating, he doesn't seem to know if he's coming or going.’
‘You should have phoned me,’ Archie said. ‘I really wish you'd phoned me.’
‘It all happened so quickly. We didn't know what we should do.’
I looked over at Mr Buckley. I didn't really know him, but I couldn't imagine Mrs Buckley not knowing what she should do. After my father, she was the cleverest person in the square. Sometimes, when she was out in her front garden, I'd go over and ask her about multiplication or spelling and she always knew the right answers. How could she not have known to call my father? She must have known he was a solicitor. I'd told her about loads of his trials.
‘That bloody Bob Oswald,’ Mr Buckley continued. ‘He's reduced my son to a nervous wreck and got away without even a caution.’
‘You need to go back to the police, Dave.’ Archie's voice rumbled from deep inside his stomach. ‘A vicious attack on a nineteen-year-old boy…no matter what Bob Oswald thought he'd been up to … they have to do something about that.’
Mr Buckley laughed in a way I found scary. ‘What like? An ASBO? A caution?’
‘It's GBH at least,’ Archie said after a moment. ‘Bob should be facing prison.’
Mr Buckley's voice was high and shaky where my father's was soft and deep. ‘You know better than I do he'll be facing no more than community service. What'll probably happen is the police'll decide to charge me with wasting their time. It's been an eye-opener, this has. A real bloody shock.’
A long silence followed. Finally, Archie broke it.
‘How's the boy, anyway?’
Mr Buckley's voice went from shaky to jumpy. ‘Broken,’ he said. ‘Utterly broken. He reckons he's never leaving the house again.’
Another silence followed. I was very nearly asleep. It was way, way past my bedtime. Only Archie's voice kept me awake.
‘He just needs time,’ he said to Mr Buckley. ‘Don't worry. He'll be OK.’
But Archie was wrong. Mr Buckley's son was not OK. Just as he'd said to his father, he stayed inside the house. The car he had been cleaning the day Bob Oswald attacked him stood unused on the drive. The curtains to his room stayed shut.
For a time, he was a topic of fascination to me: Has he come out yet, Daddy? Never you mind. What's he doing in there, Daddy? Never you mind. Do you think we should go round and see him? Keep your bloody nose out of other people's business, for Christ's sake, I won't tell you again. Leave the poor Buckleys alone.
Jed was fascinated as well. Why would anyone want to stay in their bedroom when there were so many things to be done? He, being older, got a little more sense out of our father, who told him Mr Buckley's son had suffered a breakdown, and people who suffered breakdowns did things differently to everyone else. Jed still didn't understand though. Why had he suffered a breakdown? Archie shrugged. Some people just do.
This fuelled our fascination. A breakdown? What, like a car? Would a man from the AA come round and jump-start Mr Buckley's son, or tow him away in a tow truck? Eager to see how it ended, we sat on the kerb outside our house. Here, we watched the Buckley place for further developments. As we didn't know Mr Buckley's son's name, we started calling him Broken, as in, any sign of Broken Buckley yet? Nope. Oh. OK. After about an hour of watching, we got bored of just sitting, so we played football while we watched, then rode our scooters up and down the pavement, honking our horns at each other.
‘You kids shut that row up,’ Bob Oswald yelled as he stepped out into the sunshine. And then, seeing Mr Buckley on his knees in his garden, ‘Hey, fuckwit, how's your rapist son healing up?’ When he didn't get an answer, he spat in Mr Buckley's direction, then got in his jeep and sped off. The deep thud of bass music echoed in his wake.
Mr Buckley stood with a small trowel in his hand and stared off into the distance. He stood there for a long time, then dropped the trowel and went inside. The slam of the door seemed final, but ten or so minutes later Mrs Buckley came out and picked the trowel up. The Buckleys were tidy like that.
