The Wild Child Read online

  Along the way, however, I’d read up a lot on the subject and my hunch was that Connor might just be the real deal. His notes certainly seemed to point to it and his behaviour before going into care seemed to as well. It’s accepted in many quarters now that there are features of brain chemistry linked to sociopathy and psychopathy; that it’s a combination of this, coupled with terrible circumstances as a trigger, that brings about the lack of empathy that characterises such people. Sadly, though, once it’s part of someone’s personality it’s extremely hard to treat.

  Which made several things clear. That a weekend with us would probably make no difference to what became of him, and that he needed help that the likes of us weren’t qualified to provide. So, despite it going against everything I believed in, I knew then that this mini-placement was to be purely about containment. There was simply no other way to approach it.

  With that in mind, I knew I should stop floundering about, trying to think of ways in which I could try to help him. I just needed to put lots of things in place to keep him out of trouble and occupied. A sad thought to accept, but obviously necessary.

  I wondered if he could read minds as well as he knew his way around an Xbox. Because by the time he’d climbed into the car he had completely lost his attitude. Indeed, as I got into the front seat I felt a hand on my shoulder. It was Connor, with the angelic smile once again in place. ‘Sorry about swearing, Mrs Watson,’ he said meekly.

  ‘You know, Connor,’ I said, swivelling to face him, ‘it’s fine to call me Casey.’

  ‘Casey, then,’ he said, as if finding the familiarity uncomfortable on his tongue. ‘I was only having a bit of fun with Tyler, honest.’ He glanced at Tyler, who was looking at him as if he really wasn’t sure what to make of him. ‘We should never have been looking at boobs,’ he went on. And I was about to agree that he certainly shouldn’t have been, when he finished off with ‘not with a woman around the house’.

  I swivelled back and switched the ignition on, speechless. I caught Tyler’s gaze in the mirror, but decided we’d best ignore what Connor had just said. ‘Right, fasten up then, boys. Let’s go and let off some steam, shall we?’

  Though, in Connor’s case – Connor who was only eight years old – a cold shower might have been a better choice.

  Chapter 5

  While I drove, the boys chatted away about more appropriate subjects, Tyler explaining to Connor about what he could expect to find at Jungle Pit, which were the best and worst slides, and the scariest rope swings. I started to relax a little. Perhaps I’d over-reacted earlier. The poor kid was a product of his early environment, after all. Maybe he’d just been testing the water – kids who were shunted around often pushed and strained at the boundaries. Perhaps he was just keen to see how far he could go.

  The café area of the Jungle Pit was actually in the same cavernous space that held the play area itself, cordoned off to one side by a low yellow plastic wall. Here it was traditional for all the mums, dads and all the other kinds of child-minders to install themselves at one of the various tables, while the kids scampered off to throw themselves about.

  Being a Saturday, it was heaving, despite the glorious weather. It was a big draw in all weathers simply because it was so contained. You could sit and read a book or catch up with the papers while your kids ran amok in a corralled and controlled environment, with the safety-conscious staff always looking on.

  Once installed, I sent the boys off and told them I’d call them back once I’d got some drinks and then later, if they were hungry, some food. They duly deposited their shoes and ran off towards the big colourful cubes in which the various spills and thrills could be had. Some of the cubes were suspended from beams by thick chains and ropes. These were for older children only, or, rather, children over a certain height, as they purposely swayed to make the activities in them that bit more exciting. Connor was only just big enough, but as Tyler headed off to the area with all the footballs it was to these that he immediately made a beeline, and once he was out of sight I strolled off to get myself a coffee.

  It’s easy to lose yourself in places like the Jungle Pit. Whether it’s because they are so well managed, bristling with young energetic staff, or perhaps just because zoning out is one of those essential parenting skills, I was miles away, reading one of the free newspapers and sipping on a latte, when the commotion by the hanging cubes started up.

  I certainly knew it had been going on a while, because it was the activity at the tables around me that first grabbed my attention: the adults who were scraping back their chairs, the various oohs and ahhs, the fact that the area was fast emptying of people. I was sitting in the middle of a sea of abandoned tables by the time I became aware – aware that everyone had gone to look at whatever was happening elsewhere.

  I put my coffee down and stood up, too, conscious that all eyes seemed drawn upwards, glancing around as I did so to see if I could see the boys. I tilted my own head – whatever was going on was happening high up in the rafters – or whatever the steel things were that constituted rafters in such a place. Which was when I saw Connor, who was a good twenty or twenty-five feet above us, perching precariously on a dangerously narrow beam; one of several that spanned the building and from which hung the giant cubes on chains.

  ‘What on earth …?’ I said in a panic as I rushed across to the play area. Tyler ran across to me then, looking bewildered. ‘What the hell’s he doing, Casey?’ he asked, not taking his eyes off Connor. ‘That’s well high, that is,’ he said, with a note of admiration. Then he turned to me. ‘I don’t think he’s allowed up there, do you?’

  ‘He most certainly isn’t,’ I said, wondering what was going to be done about it. And if so, by whom. I called up to him, all too aware of the heads swivelling towards me. ‘Connor! Get down from there right now! And be careful about it. Very careful. Come on!’

  Having presumably identified me as the responsible adult, a young girl in a Jungle Pit T-shirt also ran across to me. ‘We can’t be responsible if he falls from there,’ she pointed out. ‘It’s clearly marked that they shouldn’t climb on top of the cubes.’

  I didn’t doubt it was clearly marked. They’d be extremely keen not to be slapped with a writ, wouldn’t they? And I’d seen the sign myself. Despite the high levels of staff, you couldn’t move for firmly fixed notices reminding you that whatever happened it was unquestionably neither their fault nor their responsibility.

  ‘I’m sure he knows that,’ I told her. Then I turned my gaze upwards again. ‘Connor!’ I barked at him. ‘You come down from there this instant! You know full well that you’re not allowed to be up there!’

  ‘Piss off, you old fart!’ came the immediate response. I cringed. I could also feel my cheeks burning as the previous looks – which had mostly been of the sympathetic variety – now changed to ones of disapproval. The young girl who had spoken to me started to edge away now, too, walking backwards so that she didn’t miss anything.

  ‘I think I’ll go and get the manager,’ she said. ‘He’ll know what to do.’

  As she scurried away I looked back up to check that Connor wasn’t in any imminent danger. Yes, the place was full of soft structures and crash mats but he was much higher up than he was supposed to be and – to my extreme annoyance – he was beginning to put himself in further danger by acting up for his now captive audience. I had no idea what had inspired him to climb up there in the first place, but there was no doubt that he was enjoying being in the spotlight, walking the beam like a tight-rope act, holding his arms out to the side and whistling a tune as he pretended to trip, eliciting a mass gasp from the increasingly nervous crowd.

  ‘Get down here, Connor!’ I tried again. ‘Get back down here this minute, before we’re asked to leave!’

  ‘Ooh! Asked to leave!’ he mimicked. ‘Ooh, I’m so scared! Piss off, old lady. I can stay here all night if I want to.’

  Tyler’s face had blanched now, and I misread it. ‘It’s okay, Ty,’
I said quietly. ‘He’ll come down soon enough. He’s got to come down eventually, after all.’

  ‘No he bloody won’t,’ Tyler replied angrily. ‘He’s coming down right now. He’s not speaking to you like that and getting away with it.’

  He hared off to the nearest cube, from which he could begin making an assault. ‘Ty, don’t go up there,’ I called to him. But he ignored me. ‘Get down, you little idiot!’ he yelled. ‘Get down here now. If I have to come up for you, you’re getting a slap, you hear me?’

  I headed after him, keen to dissuade him, dodging past the other parents, and, as I did so, Connor sat back down on the beam.

  Good, I thought. Perhaps he was going to shimmy down and put an end to it. But I was wrong. He was merely relocating further along, the better to call down and argue his case. ‘Well, I’m definitely not coming down now then, you fucking idiot. An’ if you try to come and get me, I’ll kick you in the bollocks and then I’ll feed you to the porn queen of Brixton!’ he shouted. ‘Just you see if I don’t!’

  I took Tyler’s wrist and squeezed it. ‘Don’t go up there, love,’ I said quietly. ‘That’s exactly what he’s hoping. And I’m rather keen to keep you in one piece.’

  ‘I’m keen to keep everyone in one piece,’ came a voice from behind me. A male voice. ‘That your boy up there?’ he asked me.

  I turned and nodded. ‘Kind of. He’s my responsibility, anyway. He’s in care,’ I explained. ‘Between placements. We’ve just got him for the weekend. His name’s Connor.’

  This was clearly the manager because he had a whistle on a string round his neck. Perhaps he’d have better luck coaxing Connor down. He blew it, though to what end I didn’t know. He already had Connor’s full attention. ‘Come on down, Connor, lad,’ he coaxed. ‘It’s not safe up there. Get down now and that’s the end of it. You’ll not be in any trouble.’

  As if he’d care, I thought. He’d probably be hundreds of miles away in just over a day. But the manager couldn’t know that and I wasn’t about to tell him. Though, on the plus side, his intervention had at least signalled a kind of end to things, because the crowd that had assembled began drifting away.

  All but a committed core of anxious parents, at any rate. Which was still audience enough to keep Connor astride his rafter, despite further barked commands from the manager. Why wouldn’t he stay up there? What exactly could they do? And while he still had their attention he was still having fun. Which gave me an idea. ‘I tell you what,’ I said, keeping my voice down. ‘Can you go with me on something? Let me try another tack?’

  ‘What sort of tack?’ the manager asked, looking anxious.

  ‘The leaving tack,’ I told him quietly. ‘As in Tyler and I leave – well, pretend to, at any rate. We’ll only be outside, but I’ve a hunch it’ll do the trick.’

  The man, whose name badge read ‘Declan Patterson, Centre Manager’, was around Kieron’s age, I reckoned, and seemed happy to go with whatever tack I came up with, even winking at me surreptitiously as I sent Tyler off to get his coat with a loud, ‘That’s it, I’ve had enough of this! We’re leaving!’

  I then flapped an arm upwards, before talking as if to a full house in the theatre. ‘I’m sorry, but we have to go. Can I leave my phone number at the entrance? Would that be okay? Then if he decides to come down – or if he falls or anything – just give me a ring, will you? Though there’s a thought,’ I added, turning back just as I was about to sweep Tyler out of the place, ‘can you make sure it’s not between six and seven? Only that’s when I watch Emmerdale on catch-up.’

  I doubted Connor could have seen Mr Patterson’s uncomfortable expression or, indeed, Tyler’s monumental struggle not to laugh. But he could certainly hear me, and must have had the proverbial bird’s-eye view of our departure through the security barrier and then out of sight.

  ‘We’re not really going anywhere, are we?’ Tyler wanted to know, once we were back out in the building’s entrance.

  ‘Don’t be daft,’ I said, pulling him against the wall by the double doors, the better to keep an eye on developments. ‘Just using toddler-taming tactics, that’s all. Give it five minutes – ten, absolute tops – and my hunch is he’ll be shimmying down and following us through those doors; behaving like a clown’s only fun when you have an audience.’

  Though I wasn’t as confident as I sounded (Connor was an unknown quantity, after all) it wasn’t even five minutes before he burst through the door and headed back out into the car park – or, rather, would have done if he hadn’t caught sight of the pair of us out of the corner of his eye.

  He stopped dead in his tracks and did a Tom and Jerry-style slow-motion double-take, before thrusting his hands in his jeans pockets and trying to inject some swagger back into his stance. ‘Ha! Had you then!’ he crowed. ‘Done you both up like kippers! Oh, Connor! Don’t fall, Connor! Oh, Connor, come down!’ He laughed and puffed out his bony little chest. ‘You don’t know me,’ he added. ‘I’m like a pro at doing high wire. I done circus skills, I have. Sammy the Dwarf an’ the Porn Queen of Sarf Landen taught me everyfing they know.’

  It was something of a job not to laugh. Not to mention something of a job not to form the bizarre mental picture of Tyler being devoured by the Porn Queen of Sarf Landen while Connor was being coached by Sammy the Dwarf. But this was no time for laughing. The smile I was trying not to crack was born of relief more than anything.

  ‘Car!’ I barked. ‘Right now. I’m not very happy with you, Connor. You’ve spoiled the day now – not just for you, but for me and Tyler, too. I’m going to have to think seriously about what to do with you after that little episode. About whether I can trust you enough to even take you out of the house. Is that what you want?’ I asked as I frogmarched him across the car park. ‘To spend the whole time you’re with us locked indoors?’

  Connor only shrugged as I unlocked the car and briskly clipped him into his seatbelt. ‘Don’t care what you do,’ he said. ‘You can do what you like. Lock me in, leave me out. Makes no difference to me. I’m off to live with me dad soon, anyways.’

  ‘Yeah, right,’ Tyler said.

  ‘Yeah, fucking right!’ Connor growled, swivelling to face him. ‘You got a problem with that?’

  ‘And what if I have?’ Tyler said. ‘What you going to do? Set Sammy the Dwarf on me?’

  And it wasn’t even Saturday teatime.

  Chapter 6

  ‘Sammy the Dwarf?’ Mike said as I slid a couple of frozen pizzas into the oven. ‘Seriously?’

  I’d regaled him with the key points of our all too brief outing, and, like me, he was inclined to see the funny side. And, to be fair, by the time we were home the mood had lightened considerably, Connor getting over his strop – and the telling off he got for it – by responding to Tyler’s comment not by maintaining his aggression but by seeming keen to appease him. Indeed, he’d become very chatty, regaling us with a potted history of his diminutive circus mentors, who it turned out had been quite key figures in his young life.

  ‘A drinking friend of his dad’s,’ I explained to Mike now. ‘Him and someone called Lydia, aka the ‘Porn Queen of South London’ by all accounts. Seems they used to look after him a fair bit when Connor’s dad was out “working”.’

  ‘By which you presumably mean “robbing”,’ Mike observed drily. ‘And by the sound of it, he’s spent a fair bit of time with that father of his down the years, hasn’t he?’ He shook his head. ‘No wonder he’s such a delicate soul, eh? You couldn’t make it up, could you?’

  But though the situation had been defused and Connor was once again contrite, I still felt a seed of anxiety growing within me about what was going to happen to him long term. What would happen if they didn’t find a place for him on Monday? Did I ask them to collect him anyway? In reality, were we acting like we were playing pass the parcel? Having torn off a sheet of him, were we simply pushing him on to the next foster carer?

  In truth, I hoped they’d have a place for Connor, and
coming face to face with that fact really upset me. I’d never thought like that before about any child we’d cared for, not even a scrawny eight-year-old with so little going for him. And it wasn’t as if I was inexperienced with kids who were angry, disobedient and out of control. They were my stock-in-trade, even when they were trying their hardest to be unlovable. No, there was something else about Connor; something in the core of his being. Something I’d yet to put my finger on.

  But if I thought I’d have a minute’s peace to mull over my concerns I was wrong.

  Once we’d all been fed, I decided I needed to burn off some excess energy as well, and in the time-honoured fashion. So, Mike having elected to slope off and build some flat-pack furniture with Kieron, I told the boys they could have the living room to themselves for a couple of hours.

  Satisfied that I’d made myself clear, I then left them to it while I tackled the dinner plates and then pulled my cleaning stuff out of the kitchen cupboard. I smiled as I donned my Marigolds. I was quite looking forward to a spot of ‘me’ time, even if the ‘me’ in question was donning rubber gloves and squirting various cleaning sprays.

  But I should have remembered that the phrase ‘five minutes’ peace’ hadn’t been turned into the title of a book for no reason. Yes, it was probably longer than that, but it certainly didn’t feel a lot longer before I heard thumps and bangs and shouts coming from the living room. I yanked off the Marigolds and went to investigate.

  We usually kept the big double doors opened fully back so that the living and dining areas merged into one much bigger space, but to create some privacy for all – particularly given this particular fraught weekend – I had closed them earlier, giving us two separate rooms. I opened both. ‘What’s going on in here?’ I wanted to know. ‘What’s all the noise for?’ I had to shout to be heard above the noise of the blaring television.