Sadie

Miss Venables stood patiently at the gates to the school. It was ten past nine now, and the two police officers who stood outside the school every morning and afternoon to keep away undesirables had just left. It saddened her that they had to be there, but she knew it was the right thing. Prevention was better than cure, even if some of the older kids were savvy enough to arrange meets with their dealers just round the corner, where there were no uniforms. Last year a boy had been excluded for having a wrap containing three rocks of crack cocaine. Bright enough kid, decent family – you never could tell who was going to go down that line. The police had been called, a fuss had been made and the children had been told that this sort of behaviour was not to be tolerated. Stacy had argued that he should be given help, not exclusion, but hers was a lone voice, soon drowned by the head. She had received a letter from the lad’s parents just a couple of months later, saying that he had gone missing and that the police weren’t hopeful of finding him unless he wanted to come back, but thanking her for everything she had done for him.

It saddened her, too, that they had to lock the main gates to the school, not so much to keep the children in as to keep other people out. You could never be too careful these days.

She looked at her watch. Another minute for the stragglers and then she’d lock up.

Just then, around the corner, came three familiar figures.

Miss Venables had a soft spot for Sadie Burrows. It wasn’t just that she looked appealing, with her glossy long hair, olive skin and those beautiful almond-shaped eyes. Some kids just had something, a spark, call it what you will – when you’d been in the job for a while you found you could recognize it easily, and you knew how rare it was.

It didn’t make her a goody-goody. Far from it – more of a charming tearaway, and plenty of the teachers in the school had marked her out because of that. She was neither brilliant academically, nor poor – just average, although here that almost made her stand out. Sadie could be cheeky and mischievous, just like any other kid. But she was definitely the daughter of her father, a man well known all over this part of London as being able to sell umbrellas in July and sunscreen in December. Just don’t ask where it came from. Tommy Burrows had a twinkle in his eye that he had passed on to his daughter, which meant that whenever she was caught crossing the boundary, it was impossible to stay angry with her for long.

‘Come on, you three!’ she shouted at the girls as they approached. ‘You’re late. I was just about to lock up.’

‘Sorry, Miss Venables,’ Carly and Anna intoned in unison.

‘Why are you late? What have you been doing?’

‘Nothing, miss,’ the two of them told her rather guiltily.

‘Sadie?’ Miss Venables turned to the ringleader with a raised eyebrow.

Sadie looked straight at the teacher. ‘Carly had to get the little ones ready for school, miss. Me and Anna said we’d wait for her.’

Miss Venables looked at each of the girls in turn. ‘Are you sure?’

‘Oh, Miss Venables. Would I lie to you?’ Sadie looked innocently at her.

‘Probably, Miss Burrows.’ She couldn’t help smiling at Sadie’s banter, perfectly aware that she was being twisted round the finger of this little thirteen-year-old, but somehow not minding. And who was to say that they weren’t telling the truth? She knew that Carly’s mum was off the rails: a child protection officer had informed the school that she was under observation by social services. Single mum, too fond of the bottle – it was a story they heard all the time, and too often the eldest daughter ended up with the responsibility of looking after her younger siblings.

‘All right, girls. In you go, quickly. Straight to your classes.’

Carly and Anna hurried inside, but on a sudden whim Miss Venables called out, ‘Sadie!’

Sadie turned. ‘Yes, miss?’

‘Is everything all right?’

Sadie looked confused.

‘At home, I mean.’

‘Oh.’ She smiled at the teacher in appreciation. ‘Yes, miss. I think so. Thanks.’

‘Good. Well … Off you go.’

Sadie nodded and ran across the playground into the school building, while Miss Venables thoughtfully locked the main gate and wandered back inside, slowly so as to enjoy the warmth of the morning sun on her face.

After lunch she noticed Sadie again. It was Friday, so Miss Venables was on playground duty, doing her best to keep some sort of order among the couple of hundred screaming kids working off their lunch in the early-afternoon heat. Frankly, she dreaded playground duty: it was hard enough keeping a class of forty kids quiet, let alone a schoolyard full of them. And especially on a Friday, when everyone was looking forward to the weekend.

In the far corner, something was going on. A boy – she couldn’t quite make out who it was – was being circled by three other kids. Even at a distance, she could tell it wasn’t a friendly game. He was being pushed about from one to the other and being jeered at. It was going to escalate into something nasty. Miss Venables started to stride across the playground, blowing her whistle. But, as usual, the kids paid her no attention.

Now she could see the boy who was being bullied. Poor little Jamie Brown. He didn’t stand much chance in this place. He was so badly cared for at home that his skin was always dirty and his clothes stank of urine and filth. She suspected physical abuse, and knew that he was being closely monitored; but he would never admit to anything – he was too scared – and the mother always seemed to have a story to explain away any suspicions people had. But Jamie’s peers didn’t know about all that, or if they did they didn’t care. All they saw was a smelly little boy who cowered at every harsh word, and for whom barely a day passed without tears and fights and traumas. Even Miss Venables had to admit that standing too close to him was a bit of challenge, so the moment he had arrived at school she had known what a rough ride he was likely to get from the kids. And she knew that even if she stopped this little fracas, another one wouldn’t be far behind. That didn’t mean she shouldn’t try, though.

Suddenly she stopped.

She narrowed her eyes as she saw Sadie step confidently into the ring.

Ordinarily she would never have stood back to let other kids enter a brawl, but something encouraged her to keep her own counsel for a few moments.

Sadie was older than the boy who was being bullied, but the kids who had formed the ring were her own age and outnumbered her three to one. With casual confidence, she stood beside Jamie Brown.

The bullies sneered. ‘What are you then? His girlfriend?’

Sadie’s face didn’t flicker. ‘What do you know about girlfriends?’ she asked quietly.

A blush came to the bully’s cheek. His eyes moved from left to right as he looked to see what reaction Sadie’s comment was getting from his companions; then he made forward as if to attack Jamie Brown. Miss Venables saw the little boy flinch and, in her most authoritarian voice, started to call out the bully’s name. But as she did so, she saw the bully’s friends grab him by the arms and pull him away. They started scuffling among themselves for a moment, but then they caught sight of Miss Venables bearing down on them. Each of them threw her a scornful look, and then turned and hurried away. A final insult – ‘At least I don’t piss my pants!’ – reached her ears, but she let it pass, choosing instead to hurry up to Jamie and Sadie.

‘Are you all right, Jamie, love?’ she asked, kneeling down so that she could be more at the little boy’s level. But Jamie simply looked angry and confused; he turned and ran to the other end of the playground, where he sat with his back to the wall, alone and avoided, as he always was.

Miss Venables turned to Sadie. ‘You should leave that sort of thing to the teachers, Sadie,’ she chided.

Sadie looked calmly at her. ‘Sorry, miss,’ she said, but there was no apology in her voice. She looked over at Jamie. ‘But I don’t see why they have to be so horrible.’

‘I know, Sadie,’ Miss Venables agreed. ‘But sometimes it’s the easy targets that attract the weakest people. Jamie will be all right. I’ll keep an eye on him. Now run along.’

She watched as Sadie made her way back to Carly and Anna, who were laughing good-naturedly. They didn’t seem to have noticed what had just happened, and Sadie rejoined them quietly, only occasionally glancing across the playground to where Jamie Brown was still sitting by himself.

Chapter Two

The afternoon passed slowly. Sadie sat at the back of the class with Carly and Anna, her chin resting in the palm of her hand; she stared into space as the teacher at the front droned on and on, his monotonous lesson frequently punctuated by barks of reprimand and tellings-off. It was a typical Friday afternoon.

Carly slipped a note under the table. Her childish handwriting asked Sadie in misspelled English if she still wanted to come round to her house after school. Sadie thought about writing a reply, but instead she just whispered back.

‘Can’t,’ she told her friend. ‘Mum says I’ve got to go back home.’

Carly shot her a surprised look, and Sadie understood why. Her mum never told her when she should be back.

Even when Sadie was younger, she had been allowed to wander round the estate by herself. People came to expect it of her. She was forever knocking on doors, fixing her neighbours with her most appealing smile and flogging whatever goods or goodies her dad had a run on that particular week. She understood how difficult grown-ups found it to refuse such a chirpy young girl and she’d got a taste for it. She would always come home, of course, but she never had to be told.

After the funeral, though, things started to become a bit different. Mum would still never tell her when to be home, and at first that was just because it was the way things had always been. But the loss of her man hit Jackie Burrows hard. Sadie would never forget the first time she got back after school to find her drunk. The bottle of cheap vodka on the smoked-glass coffee table wasn’t quite empty, but it wasn’t far off. An ashtray was full of stubs, and the television was on. Sadie’s mum was comatose on the sofa and, try though she might, the little girl couldn’t rouse her. She shook her, tears streaming down her face and crying at her to wake up; but when she did open her eyes, they just rolled unconsciously to the top of her head before closing again. Sadie had been on the point of calling an ambulance when her mother rolled off the sofa and started vomiting on the carpet.

It had taken her two days to get back on her feet again. Sadie stayed away from school to nurse her, bringing her glasses of water and painkillers. Jackie had begged her daughter not to be angry with her, but Sadie was not angry. In her childlike way she understood. At times mother and daughter held each other and cried and cried, but they never spoke of their sadness. How would they have known what to say?

Since then Jackie had never been that bad. But for several months not a day went by when Sadie didn’t come home to find the ever-open bottle of vodka depleted and the ashtray brimming over. And more than once, when the booze had run out and Jackie was in no state to leave the house, she handed Sadie one of the precious ten-pound notes that arrived in her purse courtesy of the benefits office, and begged, ‘Get us a bottle of voddy, love.’

The first time it happened, Sadie was reluctant. ‘I can’t, Mum. I’m not old enough.’

But Mum looked imploringly at her, a horrible, pitiful desperation in her eyes, and Sadie agreed because she didn’t know what else to do. She took the money down to the off-licence with the grey metal grilles on the front where on a number of occasions she had gone with her dad to sell cheap cases of spirits. The first time she tried to buy vodka the owner had been nervous; but she told him it was for her mum, and she soon ceased to have any problem.

Jackie’s habit grew from bad to worse, and soon she was able to drink the same quantities she had that first time without the devastating effect.

And then, a few months ago, it simply stopped. Sadie returned home one day to discover that for the first time in ages her mum had dealt with the washing – a job Sadie had taken over in some unspoken agreement, knowing that if she didn’t she’d just have to wear dirty clothes. Jackie had folded the clothes and placed them on the kitchen table, and as Sadie walked in, her satchel slung over her shoulder, Mum was standing proudly by her handiwork, dressed and sober. She almost managed to look proud of what she had achieved. No matter that the dirty dishes were piled in the sink; no matter that the house stank of cigarettes. Sadie could tell it was a turning point.

That night Jackie even went out. Sadie lay alone in the darkness of her bedroom, wondering where she was and waiting for her to come back, but towards midnight sleep overtook her; she awoke the next morning to find her mum still asleep. She left for school quietly, without waking her up.

At first Jackie’s evening outings were few and far between. But as the weeks passed, Sadie found herself alone in the house of an evening increasingly frequently. Now and then she would ask her mum where she had been, but Jackie would reply evasively. She was lonely in the house by herself at night, and the creaks and cracks that always sounded ten times louder when the lights were off were frightening. But she never said anything to Mum: she was just glad she had stopped drinking. And when they did spend time together, there would be kisses and cuddles and affection; sometimes they even managed to talk about Dad without crying.

Life was getting better. They were going to be OK. Just the two of them.

The bell rang for the end of school, and there was a sudden cacophony of chair-scraping. Sadie closed the book that she had not glanced at since the start of the lesson and tossed it into her satchel. Most of her share of the chocolate bars she had pinched that morning were still in there, she noticed, as she heard Carly speak.

‘So, why does your mum want you home?’

‘Dunno,’ Sadie shrugged, affecting less interest than she felt.

They wandered out into the corridor and walked towards the exit.

By the time they got there, most of the other kids had left. As they walked through the school gates, Sadie saw little Jamie Brown, the boy she had helped in the playground. He seemed to be in a world of his own, scuffing his shoes as he shuffled along and humming dreamily to himself in that tuneless way that always attracted so much derision from the other kids.

‘You all right, Jamie?’ she asked as they passed.

Jamie looked up as though noticing the girls for the first time – which he probably was. The pungent odour of stale urine hit Sadie’s nose, and she did her best to stop her distaste from showing in her face; but next to her she heard Carly’s voice, half-choking, half-sniggering. She glanced at her in momentary annoyance and then turned her attention back to Jamie. As soon as he had heard Carly, he had hung his head straight back down and started to walk away, his cheek twitching nervously. Sadie strode after him. As she did so, and on a whim, she thrust her hand into her satchel and brought out a bar of chocolate. She shoved it into Jamie’s hand. ‘Here you go,’ she told him. ‘You can have this.’

Jamie stopped once more and stared in astonishment at the foil wrapper in his hand. He looked to Sadie as though he had never seen a bar of chocolate in his life.

‘Go on,’ Sadie said to him, half laughing. ‘It’s not poison.’

A look of indecision crossed the little boy’s face, but eventually he shook his head and handed it back to Sadie. ‘No thanks,’ he said in a small voice. ‘I can’t.’

Sadie and Carly shared a surprised glance.

‘What do you mean, you can’t?’ Carly asked. ‘She just gave it to you, didn’t she?’

‘I’m not allowed,’ Jamie said firmly, handing the chocolate bar back.

‘Who says?’ Sadie asked him gently.

‘My mum.’

Sadie looked at him in confusion. ‘But it’s only a bit of chocolate.’

‘Yeah, but I’m still not allowed.’

‘But she won’t know.’

Jamie looked away, embarrassment shadowing his face. ‘Yeah, she will. She always knows. She gets … angry.’ As he said the word ‘angry’, his voice went hoarse.

Sadie and Carly stood awkwardly, unable to think what to say.

‘Anyway,’ Jamie mumbled, his voice a little aggressive now, ‘it’s nothing to do with you.’ And he strode off, walking with more purpose than before and resolutely not looking back.

‘Weirdo,’ Carly observed, but without much conviction. Sadie said nothing.

It was a ten-minute walk back to the estate, and the two girls remained quiet all the way home. Sadie couldn’t speak for Carly, but she had been shocked by the look on Jamie’s face when he spoke of his mother. It was a look of sadness, certainly, but also of confusion and fear. She couldn’t imagine what it must be like to feel those emotions when you were going home.

That thought brought her mother’s farewell words this morning back to her: ‘I’ve got a surprise for you,’ An involuntary smile flickered across Sadie’s face – like all children, she liked surprises. She liked the anticipation. And most of all, she liked the idea that her mum had thought about doing something for her. It was like the old times, when her dad would arrange little treats for her if he’d made a bit of money.

As they arrived on the outskirts of the estate, Sadie and Carly said goodbye and went their separate ways. In the bright afternoon sunshine, the faceless grey tower blocks almost managed to look cheery, and Sadie continued to daydream as she wandered home, her mind full of what-ifs. What if she were to get back to find the flat as it used to be: full of boxes and the life that her dad breathed into the place? What if they were going out, to the cinema, or McDonald’s? Maybe her mum had rented a video from the shop, and bought them Coca-Cola and crisps.

She wandered up the pathway, put her key in the door and walked inside.

Jackie stood in the kitchen. It was a large room, big enough for a dining table, which they never used. As Sadie stood in the door, her always-present satchel hanging around her neck, she blinked in astonishment. When she had left this morning, the sink had been brimming with dirty plates and pans, and Sadie fully expected to find it so when she returned. Jackie might have kicked the booze, but she was still a long way from being the perfect mum, and it was just a matter of course now for her to have to wash up whatever she needed when she made her sandwich for tea. But this afternoon, the kitchen was pristine. Even the large ashtray had been emptied, although Jackie still had a long, slim cigarette burning between her fingers.

‘Are they new trousers, Mum?’ Sadie asked, a bit disconsolately, as she had been telling her that she needed new school shoes for ages now.

‘Oxfam.’ Jackie smiled a little nervously, stubbed out the half-smoked ciggie and walked forward to embrace her daughter. She planted a kiss on Sadie’s cheek, and the girl turned to look at her mum in suspicious amusement. Mum never kissed her when she got home from school – it just wasn’t something she did.

‘What’s going on, Mum?’ she asked, removing the satchel from round her neck and plonking it in the middle of the floor.

Jackie took her daughter by the hand. ‘Come with me, love,’ she said, unable to hide the quiver in her voice. ‘I want you to meet someone.’

She led Sadie through the kitchen and into the sitting room. As she did so, Sadie felt a lurch in her stomach. Her childish instinct told her what was coming.

The man standing in their sitting room had very closely cropped hair. His face was slightly round and clean-shaven, and his sideburns were sharp and angular. There was a scar, about an inch long, above his right eye, and his lips were pale and pursed. He wore brown trousers, pleated below the waist in such a way that they gave the impression of hiding a bit of tummy, and a pale blue shirt that complimented his piercing eyes. It was his eyes that struck Sadie most of all. They were surrounded by black bags and stared straight at her with a flatness that seemed to contradict the thin smile that spread across his face.

And within seconds of seeing him, she realized that she had met him before. That very morning. He was the man who had sent the shopkeeper packing. The man who had stopped her copping it.

She stared at him awkwardly, her dark eyes narrowing a little and the inside of her mouth suddenly becoming dry. Then she heard her mum speaking.

‘Sadie,’ she said in an emphatically friendly voice, like a hostess introducing two people at a party, ‘I want you to meet Allen.’

She waited for Sadie to say something, but Sadie didn’t.

‘Say hello, Sadie, love. And remember your manners. Allen’s going to be your new dad.’

Chapter Three

‘What do you mean?’

Sadie looked round at her mother incredulously. What was she saying? They were in this together, weren’t they? They were mourning her dad together.

Jackie seemed surprised by Sadie’s reaction. ‘Don’t be like that, love.’

Silence.

Allen spoke for the first time. His voice was deep, quiet and not unfriendly; Sadie could not place his faintly Mancunian accent, but to her it sounded almost musical. ‘Why don’t we have a nice brew, eh, Jackie?’ he suggested to Sadie’s mum.

Jackie responded a bit too quickly. ‘Cuppa, Sadie?’ she asked, even though she knew perfectly well that Sadie had never drunk tea in her life. When Sadie didn’t reply and just remained staring at Allen, she turned. ‘I’ll put the kettle on,’ she said, almost to herself, as she walked back into the kitchen. But instead of making for the kettle she first picked up a packet of cigarettes on the side, took one out and lit it with a deep drag.

Sadie’s emotions were running riot, and a feeling of physical sickness arose in her gut. She spun round and walked back into the kitchen, wanting to ask her mum a million questions but somehow unable to find the words for even one. Allen followed her and stood in the doorway. The silence was filled by the clattering of her mum getting the tea things together.

When Sadie could bear it no longer she finally spoke. ‘I wasn’t doing anything,’ she whispered.

‘What’s that, Sadie?’ Allen replied, his voice loud enough to be heard by Jackie.

Sadie shot him a spiteful look as her mum turned round to listen. ‘We just met before, that’s all,’ she mumbled.

Allen raised an eyebrow and smiled. ‘No, pet,’ he said. ‘I don’t think so.’

‘Yes, we have,’ she insisted.

‘Sadie,’ her mum reprimanded. ‘Don’t answer back to Allen.’ She turned to her new man. ‘I’m sorry,’ she told him.

‘It’s all right. She’s just getting confused, aren’t you, pet?’

‘I’m not getting confused, I …’ Her voice trailed away as she realized that Jackie was now suddenly too busy making the tea to listen.

Allen approached her, and Sadie became aware of his strong-smelling aftershave. He put his hand into his pocket pulled out a cuddly toy, pink and floppy-eared, and pressed it into Sadie’s unwilling hand. She looked at it briefly. It was not new – she could tell that instantly – and it was the sort of thing that might have been of interest to a child half her age.

‘Squeeze it,’ Allen said.

She did so, and the cuddly toy started to laugh. The laugh lasted for about thirty seconds, during which time the three of them were silent. When it stopped, Sadie looked from the toy back to Allen. He was obviously expecting a ‘thank you’, but she didn’t have the voice to give it to him, and his eyes tightened in momentary annoyance. He looked over her shoulder, across the kitchen and into the hallway. ‘Don’t you think you should pick up your school satchel, Sadie?’ he asked.