From what we knew, and from the scrawny state of them, it was highly likely food was scarce for these children. Perhaps this was a behaviour born out of fear about where the next meal might be coming from. Or perhaps sneaking down for food in the night was the only way she could be sure to get some. Poor little mite. I crossed the room and perched on the end of the bed.
‘Olivia, sweetheart,’ I said to her gently. ‘You mustn’t do things like this, love. It’s wrong. For one thing, you should be sleeping, and for another, it’s, well, it’s taking things that don’t belong to you, isn’t it? Stealing.’ She continued to stare at me, as if in a trance. ‘Love, were you hungry?’ I persisted. ‘Was that it?’
Now she shook her head. ‘Not hungry, miss. Sorry. I swear to God almighty, I won’t do it no more, miss. I promise!’
I couldn’t help but raise my eyebrows at her strange choice of words, as I held my arms out to her, beckoning her towards me. ‘Come on love,’ I said softly, braced for the sticky paws that I knew would soon be wrapped around my neck. ‘Come here and let’s get you cleaned up, sweetheart. And get this bed straight so you can get back to sleep, eh?’
As I’d anticipated, Olivia let me scoop her into my arms, and after stripping her of her filthy nightwear and scrubbing her down with baby wipes – all of which she now seemed perfectly happy to submit to – I gathered the whole duvet and its contents into a ball, and replaced it with a spare from the airing cupboard. I could sort out the chaos in the morning.
Olivia then scooted meekly back under the clean covers. No point, I decided, in engaging her in further conversation. ‘There,’ I said simply, bending to plant a kiss on her forehead. ‘All tucked up, nice and clean. Now back to sleep, okay?’
She nodded and then obediently closed her eyes for me. But I was wide awake. I barely slept for the remainder of the night. These children were going to be some challenge.
‘So did you sleep at all, love?’ Mike asked, as I greeted the new day to see – and smell – a steaming mug of coffee being placed on my bedside table. I’d need it, I thought, as I pushed myself up to a sitting position and realised the lateness of the hour.
‘Not much.’
‘I thought not. So what happened, exactly? She wet the bed? I saw the bedding on the landing.’
I shook my head, and filled Mike in on what had actually happened. ‘Not unsurprising,’ was his considered opinion, once I’d finished. ‘They really do seem like something out of a Dickens novel, don’t they?’
I sipped my scalding but oh-so-much-needed coffee and frowned at him. ‘And it’s our job to haul them back to the 21st century.’
‘But not for long,’ Mike soothed. ‘Anyway, I’ll go down and sort the breakfast things, shall I?’
I grinned. ‘If you can find any cereal, that is!’
That was the good thing about mornings. A new day, and everything suddenly seemed more manageable. As I gathered both my wits and my dressing gown to face whatever this one held, I could hear the two of them chattering away happily in Olivia’s bedroom, and felt my normal positive, can-do mood returning. It was slightly dented, admittedly, when I went in there only to have my nose assaulted by the stench of urine, but common sense told me this was all par for the course. ‘Neglect’ was such a small word for such a big, wide-ranging, multi-faceted problem. These kids, it was clear, had never been potty trained. But that was something I could easily do for them, starting now.
The TV was blaring away to itself, and the two of them were sitting cross-legged on the floor, busy piecing together a jigsaw. ‘C’mon, kids,’ I said, stepping over them to go and open up a window. ‘Time to tidy that away now and come down for breakfast, okay?’
Olivia, seeing me, leapt up immediately, and tried to cling to me like a baby panda. It was good to see she was so affectionate, I thought, as I scooped her up onto my hip, but rather less good to see – or rather, for it to slowly, damply dawn on me – that she was also wringing wet. And so was I, now. Ashton too, I saw as he also stood up, had a suspicious wet patch all up the back of his night things.
I herded them both into the bathroom, and began stripping Olivia out of her wet things. Ashton, taking my cue, undressed likewise, ready to wash, and though I made an effort not to pay him too much attention as he did so, noticed that he was clearly embarrassed. Now that, at least, was a good thing, I thought to myself. Feeling uncomfortable about bed wetting was at least half the battle. I felt confident I could soon have him dry. In fact perhaps he was dry, and this was just a lapse, due to the trauma of the past couple of days.
Ignoring his damp things completely, I turned to Olivia. ‘Did you have an accident?’ I asked her gently as I filled the basin. The question was rhetorical – of course she’d had an accident – but her answer still flagged up the extent of the ‘neglect’.
‘Yesh!’ she told me, proudly, as she picked up her sodden pyjama bottoms, gleefully showing me what she obviously considered to be a very impressive stain.
‘It’s okay, Casey,’ Ashton added, in a reassuring tone. ‘Don’t worry. She’ll soon be all dry again.’
Bless him, I thought, as I sponged his sister down, diplomatically leaving him to sort himself out for now.
Once they were both clean and dry, I got them dressed in some of the new clothes Riley had bought for them and we eventually got downstairs for breakfast. True to his word, Mike had everything laid out ready, but it soon became evident that neither of them were interested. In fact, by now, they seemed much more interested in winding each other up; punching each other and running around madly, laughing manically for no apparent reason. It was almost as if they had morphed into different children, the shyness of yesterday having completely disappeared. Ashton, particularly, suddenly seemed a different child; one who now delighted in driving his sister mad; pulling her hair and teasing her and generally being a rather bullying big brother, something that would also need addressing.
‘Right,’ said Mike sternly, in an attempt to regain control. ‘Enough of all this. Time to sit up nicely at the table! It’s time for breakfast!’ But his words fell on completely deaf ears.
Trying to balance the two full bowls of cereal I’d poured, I approached the table and tried myself. ‘That’s enough!’ I snapped, trying to get and hold their attention. But it was hopeless – they just ignored both of us. Perhaps, I decided, I needed to change tack. Perhaps raised voices were something they had got used to simply tuning out. So instead, placing their cereal bowls on the table, I spoke more quietly. ‘Fine,’ I said. ‘This breakfast will be on the table for five minutes. If you haven’t sat down and begun eating it quietly by then, I shall assume you don’t want it and will take it away, and there’ll be nothing more to eat until lunchtime.’
This, thankfully, seemed to work. Finally, two sets of suspicious eyes were on me, and the children, my words having obviously sunk in, climbed onto their chairs, picked up their spoons and started to eat.
It was still like feeding time at the zoo, though. ‘My God, Case,’ whispered Mike as we stood by the kitchen partition and watched them. ‘If they carry on like this, this is going to be a nightmare! I hope they start calming down a bit!’
Shit! I thought suddenly, remembering. ‘Mike, their medication! It’s the bloody ADHD, all this! They must have to have their tablets first thing – of course!’ What with everything, I’d completely forgotten to ask what time of day they needed to take their pills. And
