All That Is Lost Between Us (13 page)

This morning in assembly, Georgia had been so pale I was worried she might vomit – and now I am forced to acknowledge that she has seemed this way for a while. I have been noting it subconsciously, unable to put my finger on anything that might have helped me to confront her with my concerns.

I have so many questions for Georgia – and when she's not around I wonder why we find it so hard to talk. But whenever I'm with her there's a force-field around her, holding me at bay, stilling my tongue, making me desperate not to push her so far away that it might become impossible to reach her at all. And yet, how can I find out what's going on unless I press the issue? In theory, the accident might have helped Georgia open up to me. In reality, so far it's had the opposite effect.

I am driving myself mad with this puzzle I can't solve, this maze of deliberation that might eventually unlock a path to my daughter. I need to take a walk, and I decide to head over to the staffroom for a cup of tea while I eat my lunch. Hopefully I might find some distracting company.

I am just collecting my bag when I have a surprise visitor.

‘Danny. Come in,' I say, as I see his head appear around the door, looking uncertainly at me. ‘How are you doing today?'

He enters the room and flops down on the empty seat opposite. ‘I'm fine . . . I think,' he says. ‘Although I'm still in shock, I suppose. I don't understand how someone could do something like that and then drive away.'

‘My husband and I – our whole family – will be forever indebted to your quick thinking. Thank you for saving Georgia.'

Danny shrugs as though it is nothing and I wonder how we will ever thank him enough. ‘Have you heard any more about Sophia?' he asks.

‘She's stable in hospital – they're still waiting for her to wake up.'

‘And how's Georgia?'

Oh these delicate paths I am forced to negotiate, trying to remain ethical about discussing others' feelings. As this young boy stares at me I get an uneasy urge to unburden myself, to tell him how miserable I am that my daughter doesn't want to talk about anything with me. To ask
him
what to do! I imagine my tears falling in front of him as I beg him to tell me how to reach my child, and I see the horror on his face as he backs out the door. I come to my senses with a jump, alarmed at the intensity of the daydream.

‘She's been very subdued, and hasn't really wanted to speak about it,' I say as steadily as I can. ‘Which is understandable in the circumstances. It can take time to process something as shocking as what you both went through last night. How come you are here today? You don't have to stay at school if you don't want to, no one would blame you for going home.'

Danny shrugs. ‘Dad said it was better to carry on as normal.' He stops talking for a moment, his thoughts elsewhere, then adds, ‘I think I'm better off here.'

‘What about your mum?'

He looks surprised. ‘Mum lives overseas. She has a new husband, young kids. I stay with Dad so I can go to school here.'

I'm taken aback, and yet of course I don't know the intricacies of all the students' lives unless they are referred to me. ‘So, how do you feel about that?' I ask him, as though we are in session.

He shrugs again. ‘It is what it is. Dad and I muddle along, I get holidays in the sunshine, and my little brothers adore me. It could be a lot worse. Anyway, I didn't come here to talk about all that.' He sits up straighter in his chair. ‘Mrs Turner, I don't know how much I should be saying, or even if I'm right, but I think there's something you need to know. About last night. It's just, the accident . . . In the dark, it all happened really fast, and I feel guilty as hell about Sophia. You know, if she hadn't moved, I think the car would have missed her, but she must have been confused. She tried to follow us rather than heading to the other side of the road, and she went right into the path of the car.' He pauses. ‘But I don't think the driver was aiming at her.'

I frown. ‘What do you mean, “aiming at her”? When Georgia spoke to the police last night she also said it all happened very fast – but she didn't give the impression that the car was “aiming” at anyone. It's so dark down the lane – I know when I drive there I'm easily startled by rabbits running out on the bends, sometimes it's hard to avoid them.'

‘That's just it,' Danny says. ‘I can't be sure either. In the beginning I was so shocked about Sophia that I didn't have time to think about it. And now I feel slightly paranoid. But it's kept me awake all night, and the thought keeps coming back to me. That car was behind us so quickly, almost like it had crept up on us – it's so quiet down Vicarage Road that I'm sure we would have heard the engine if it had been going at speed.'

‘I've been wondering the same thing,' I confess, relieved to have someone to discuss this with. ‘I wanted to ask Georgia for some more details this morning, but she set off for school before I could. The lack of noise has been bothering me too – and the headlights. Why did you not move faster when you first became aware of the car's lights? I know there's a corner not too far back from where Sophia was hit, but still, you were on a stretch of straight road.'

‘The police asked the same thing,' Danny replies, ‘and I just said that by the time I saw the headlights, the car was coming too fast for us to get out of the way. But, looking back, I think there was a reason I didn't see them sooner. I think the car was following us in the dark, and the driver only switched on the lights at the last second.'

Danny's words chill me as I can't help but picture the scene. The three of them on the road, with a car trailing them, hidden by the night. For what reason, though? What did all this mean?

‘Perhaps that's why you were hit,' I suggest, searching desperately for some kind of logic that would lift this crushing fear from my shoulders. ‘Perhaps the car had just set off, and the driver had forgotten to switch their lights on, so they didn't see you in time.'

But even as I say it I know it makes little sense. Set off from where? There's nothing that far down Vicarage Road, and no streetlights to fool you into complacency. Not even the laziest driver would be unaware they had forgotten to turn their lights on.

‘I don't think so,' Danny says, humouring me. ‘It's not just the lights – the engine roared, too, as though the car was charging at us. In fact, on reflection that's exactly what it felt like. It was on top of us without warning – we didn't stand a chance.'

‘You think it was intentional – that someone wanted to hurt you?'

He looks down, and then says, ‘Yes.'

We sit in a silence so portentous that the pressure of it crushes my chest. I cannot bear the thought that these children have been targeted. Can we really be right? If so, what is our next move?

Then Danny says, ‘There's something else.' He catches my eye for a moment and glances away again, over my shoulder, towards the glittering lake in the distance. ‘When I lifted Georgia up I spun a whole hundred-and-eighty degrees – and the car missed me by millimetres. In hindsight, I feel as though the car changed direction slightly, because the driver saw that I was in the way and adjusted course to try to avoid me. I just can't shake the feeling that it was aiming for one of the girls. I know that Sophia was hit, but I wonder . . . I'm sorry, Mrs Turner, but I think it might have been aiming for Georgia, and only missed her because I got in the way.'

Our eyes lock as I begin to panic. He sees my discomfort and looks away again. I root through my bag. ‘We need to call the police so you can go over your statement with them,' I tell him. ‘Are you okay with that?'

When he nods I dial the number I was given last night, and once the female constable picks up I relay our conversation. ‘Can I talk to Danny in your office at three?' she asks, and after a short conference between us all, the meeting is settled.

‘I'll leave my office unlocked,' I tell him, ‘so you can wait here.'

‘I'll come back after sport.' He stands up, swinging his bag over his shoulder. ‘I'm sorry, Mrs Turner,' he says as he leaves. ‘I hope I'm wrong.'

‘Me too, Danny,' I tell him.

Once he is gone, I wonder whether I should find Georgia right away. I check the timetable on my pin board – she's in Geography, room 406, it's not far away. I stand up and grab my bag, but as I move to the door I see the expression on her face this morning as she spoke to me. ‘
Stop interfering, Mum
.' She won't thank me for hauling her out of class in front of everybody. And for what? What will I say to her? I don't want to terrify her when this might all be speculation, and yet I need to keep a close eye on her. I check the timetable again. She will be in sport after lunch, and then she has a history class. By then the police will have talked to Danny. If they are concerned I will wait outside her classroom door, and if necessary I'll beg her to come home with me.

I go across to the window. Even though it is chilly outside I open it, needing to breathe in the fresh air. I focus on the smooth waters of the distant lake, and try to calm myself. Without meaning to, I begin to pick at the peeling white paint on the windowsill, until a tiny spike of wood pierces the sensitive skin beneath my fingernail and leaves a dull ache that won't go away.

I take big, deep lungfuls of fresh country air, but it does nothing to settle me. For a while I had imagined that the danger to Georgia had passed as that unknown car disappeared into the night. Now I am not so sure.

S
ophia's room is a forest of electronic activity, wires hanging down from beeping and hissing equipment, a few slender ones branching off to take root beneath her blanched skin.

Peering through the small window in the door, Callum hardly recognises his niece. Without make-up or styled hair, Sophia looks like the child that, technically, she still is for just a few more months. Her skull is encased in bandages, and her leg is in plaster, and raised on pillows. At least her slender face shows no trace of the grey pallor that Callum dreads seeing in the casualties on the mountains. Still, she looks so vulnerable that he finds he has to choke down the emotion that threatens to overwhelm him.

Liam is seated at the side of the bed, his hands clasped together, watching over his eldest daughter, while his youngest, Maddie, sits against the wall with her legs folded under her, playing on her phone. It is not the first time Liam and Callum have been together like this – they had spent six long weeks in a small room eerily similar to this one, just two floors away from where he stood now, praying for a miracle as their father's organs failed one by one. This scene is bringing back unbearable memories. No one has noticed him yet – Helene is dozing in an armchair in the corner – and Callum thinks about turning around. He rallies himself and pushes the door open. They all glance up, and Helene jumps awake. When she sees it's her brother-in-law the disappointment on her face makes him quick to apologise.

‘I didn't meant to disturb you, Helene.'

She waves away his concern. ‘I can't really sleep, just trying to rest so I can be strong for Sophia when she wakes up.' She gives him a defiant smile as she struggles up from her seat and comes to embrace him. ‘She's still sedated. Our sleeping beauty, hey. She's keeping us all waiting, no matter how much we shower her with kisses.' She looks across to the bed. ‘Your uncle is here, Sophia,' she calls out to the prone figure. There's no response and Helene looks back at Callum and shrugs. Then she turns to Liam.

‘Take Callum to the cafeteria and get something to eat. I'll call you if she starts to come round. You need to keep your strength up.'

Liam gets to his feet, moving across to put a hand against Helene's cheek. ‘I'll bring something back for you,' he says, and kisses her forehead as she leans against him briefly with her eyes closed, as though he is transmitting strength to her.

Callum tries to imagine his own family in the same position. He sees himself walking straight past Anya, not even stopping to kiss her. He sees his wife turning away from him without a thought and sitting down next to their daughter. When had those barriers gone up? When had they stopped considering each other's feelings?

He knows they had come perilously close to living through such a scene. By all accounts, it could so easily be Georgia lying here. Callum wants to find that boy Danny's hand and shake it till his wrist falls off.

He keeps in step with Liam as they head back along the maze of corridors, wall after wall of sickly yellow. Neither of them speaks until after they arrive at the cafeteria and pick out sandwiches and hot drinks. ‘Let's sit,' Liam says. ‘I'm not sure we're allowed food on the ward – we might have to smuggle some sandwiches in for the girls.'

A few weeks ago it had been Liam's fiftieth birthday party. Callum recalled how well and happy his brother had been that night, a beer in his hand, his arm around Helene, singing old folk songs with his friends. How quickly things change – now every crease and crevice shows up against his grey skin, and his eyes are bloodshot. Today he looks old enough for a bus pass.

‘What have the doctors said?'

‘She took a bit of a knock to the head when she fell, so they were worried about swelling on the brain. That's why they've sedated her, but all the test results today are positive, so everyone is pleased about that.' Callum nods but Liam remains serious. ‘They operated on her leg last night, so hopefully there's no lasting damage. Now we're just waiting for her to wake up.' His voice cracks on the final few words. ‘I just can't believe it, Callum. This is something that happens to other people – not us. We live in the safest place in England, don't we? I still feel like I'm waiting to emerge from a nightmare. Tell me, what's Georgia like today?'