Scarlett's Secret (2 page)

I was gobsmacked at her hysterical tone, as she was usually so measured. She seemed livid. I could see she was close to tears as well.

Dawn brought the paper towels and Katie set about staunching the flow of blood. Who’d hit her? I didn’t know where to start, so I took the executive decision to get everyone – as far as possible – down to one level.

‘Right,’ I said again, keen to appeal to everyone’s higher sensibilities, ‘I want everyone – you included, Scarlett – to calm down and
sit
down. We need to see to Katie and, Carl – are you hurt as well?’

He seemed to be. He had one hand clamped to his reddening cheek, the other round the same upper arm. He looked distinctly sorry for himself as he nodded.

‘Is it your face?’ I asked, gesturing for him to lower his hand. And it obviously was. His left cheek was even redder than Scarlett’s face.

‘And what happened to your arm?’ I asked him, as everyone – to my relief – did as I asked them. Bar Scarlett and Jade, anyway.

‘She did it!’ he said, glaring at Scarlett. ‘Fucking slapped me
an’
fucking punched me! Fucking lunatic!’

‘Enough of that language,’ I said firmly. And was about to ask for more details when Scarlett shouted over me.

‘And you’re a fucking twat!’ she rounded on him. ‘And you deserved it!’

‘Scarlett!’ I said to her. ‘Shouting won’t help anything, will it? Will you please sit down? Come on – you and Jade. Come and sit by me, both of you –’ I pulled a couple of chairs out. ‘And let’s hear – calmly, please – what’s brought all this about, eh?’

The girls seemed undecided – they looked like they might bolt and never come back, in fact, which was the last thing I wanted – but another boy, Mattie, who’d been quiet from the outset but seemed quite together and sensible, touched Scarlett’s arm encouragingly, and this seemed to do the trick. The three of them sat down together in front of me and while the others sat around looking sheepish and, in some cases, guilty, Mattie and the girls explained what had happened.

‘It was the pairings,’ Mattie explained, looking slightly embarrassed. ‘Katie told us we must pair up with someone we felt we didn’t really know yet, and, well …’ he hesitated. ‘No one wanted to pair up with Jade.’ There was a short silence. ‘It’s because of the smell,’ he said quietly.

‘See!’ Scarlett burst out. Mattie visibly cringed. ‘See how fucking horrible they all are?’ She put her arm round her sister and crushed her towards her.

‘But it’s the truth,’ Dawn said. ‘No one wants to be mean, honest. It’s just that, well …’ she paused, too. ‘It needs to be said.’

Katie’s nose, by now, seemed to be recovering from its flood. She nodded her approval of Dawn’s honesty.

‘No, it doesn’t,’ Jade said miserably. It was the first time she’d spoken and all heads swivelled towards her. ‘You think I don’t
know
I smell? Then you’re idiots. And you know
nothing
about how shit my life is. Nothing.’ She turned to Carl then. ‘And you’re just a
dick
,’ she finished, wiping her eyes and looking like she’d quite like to slap his face, too.

I looked to Katie for more information. She obliged.

‘Caught in the crossfire,’ she told me. ‘This wasn’t intentional, was it, Scarlett?’

Scarlett shook her head. ‘No, it wasn’t – an’ I’m sorry, Katie, honest I am – it was intended for
him
!’

All eyes now turned to Carl, of course, who had so far seemed quite a nice boy. A little bit of attitude perhaps – he struck me as a teenager who had suffered from a slight lack of boundaries – borne out by the evidence on his application: he’d been in trouble with the law for petty crime and general disturbances on his estate, but so far on the course he’d done nothing to alarm us.

But now he had, and had clearly got some grief for it, too. I tried to picture Scarlett flying at him – all five foot two of her – and imagined he must have been as surprised as I was by the idea.

But she clearly had. ‘Go on,’ she prompted now. ‘Tell Casey what you said to Jade.’

Carl rubbed his arm again, is if to emphasise that he’d suffered enough. ‘I just said …’ he began haltingly.

‘He just
said
,’ Scarlett snapped, ‘that he’d rather plant his face in a pile of dog shit than pair up with Jade, because at least dog shit wouldn’t stink so bad.
That’s
what he said to her!’

There was another heavy silence. ‘Didn’t he, Mattie?’ Scarlett demanded. ‘Thought he was
so
fucking funny. He just didn’t realise that
I
heard it, too!’

She stood up then, and yanked her sister up onto her feet with her. ‘C’mon, Jade,’ she said. ‘We’re going. And we don’t have to come back, either. We don’t need any of this shit.’ They started heading for the door.

I was just rising from my own seat to try to diffuse this unfortunate situation when Jade pulled away from Scarlett slightly and turned around. ‘Oh, I’m coming back,’ she said, surprising her sister, I think, as much as the rest of us. ‘Take a lot more than that
dickhead
to scare me off!’

At which point they did leave, and the rest of us breathed out. Not that the day was quite done. Apart from the incident reports we’d have to file and the words we’d need to have with Carl privately, it was an important function of the course to deal with issues, rather than bury them, so I took the opportunity, once Katie had reassured me she wasn’t actually wounded, to discuss with the team how –
as
a team – we could best make the situation right.

Dawn was positive, thinking that now the problem was out in the open Jade’s personal hygiene might improve. And a couple of the others admitted that they felt really bad, and would make a special effort to include, rather than avoid, her. In the end, given that Carl had already received such an embarrassing physical pasting from Scarlett, I decided to leave him till an opportune moment once the residential trip was under way. But, though I was pleased overall that we’d straightened things out as best we could for the moment, it still felt like the tip of that proverbial iceberg.

And it was. The next morning, I was at the centre at 8 a.m., bright and early, to prepare for the team’s arrival at nine. And as I rounded the corner I was surprised to see Scarlett sitting on the wall outside.

‘Hi, Scarlett,’ I said. There was no sign of Jade. ‘What brings you here so early?’

She stood up and brushed the seat of her jeans off. ‘I needed to speak to you,’ she said, as I unlocked the door, ‘before Jade gets here.’

‘That’s fine,’ I said, ushering her over the threshold. I remembered they lived separately, so perhaps they weren’t inseparable, after all. ‘What about?’ I said, hoping it might be Jade’s problems. That would definitely be progress. I headed straight for the kitchen and she followed.

‘Casey,’ she said, ‘can I tell you a secret?’

I turned to face her as I turned on the tap to fill the kettle. ‘’Course you can,’ I said, keeping my voice casual.

She chewed on her lip. ‘I can’t really talk about it – not just yet, but, well, me an’ Jade have had some bad stuff happen to us – you know we had to go into care, don’t you?’ I nodded. ‘Well, it involves my dad and mum –’ she paused. ‘And, like I say, I can’t really talk about it, but, well, I’m
fine
. I’m over it. But …’ she hesitated, as if unsure whether to continue. ‘Well, it’s just that it’s different with Jade,’ she continued finally. ‘She deals with it differently, you know? That’s the thing.’

Not knowing what the ‘it’ was that Scarlett felt she couldn’t tell me made it difficult to know what to say. So I said nothing. Just nodded, and let her carry on. Which she did.

‘She got involved with a druggie, that’s what happened. An’ he was on the sex offenders’ register and she had her kids took off her.’

‘Her kids?’ I was trying to catch up, but there were too many questions blocking the route. ‘Kids plural?’

Scarlett nodded. Yeah, she had two with him. I
told
her, I
did
…’

She tailed off. I could see she was worried that she’d said too much already. I put a hand out and squeezed her arm. ‘You want a coffee?’ I said. ‘I’m having one. Can’t function without my coffee. And, look, you don’t have to tell me any more if you don’t want to. Not if it’s upsetting you.’

Scarlett opened the cupboard and got down two mugs. ‘No, I need to. I mean, I just need you to know. That’s what it’s about. I mean, she hasn’t said so, but, well, I think she makes herself smell on purpose. I’ve been thinking about it lots. She hardly ever has a wash or changes her clothes – and she doesn’t wash them either – and her flat’s just as bad. It’s covered in dog shit, and hairs, and she never cleans up, and she says it’s just since the babies went and that, but it isn’t. It’s always been that way, ever since she moved in.’

‘You didn’t move in together, then? You know – when you had to leave home?’

She shook her head. ‘No, that was never happening – she was already seeing that knobhead.’

‘So it might have been partly down to him, then?’

‘She shrugged. ‘I guess. But I don’t know … It’s just that I wanted you to know. It’s not that she means to make everyone hate her. It’s just like, well, I think she does do it on purpose – you know, wearing her stinking old clothes and everything – so that everyone will hate her. Well, not hate her exactly, but, you know, back off. Leave her alone.’

I considered her words. And given the background – I was still in a state of shock about those two babies – it made sense, and I was impressed that Scarlett had thought it through and been so perceptive. What to do about it, however, was another matter entirely.

‘I think you might be right,’ I said, ‘given what you’ve told me, Scarlett. And thank you for doing so. Yesterday must have been an unpleasant experience for both of you, and your coming here helps me understand better why things kicked off the way they did.’

‘And I’m going to say sorry properly to Katie,’ she said. ‘I
am
sorry, really. It’s just when people like him … well, like I say, I’m really sorry.’

‘I know you are,’ I said. ‘I can see that. The question now, however, is how best we can help you both. Is there anything I can do?’

‘Well, I suppose you could try,’ she said, looking hopefully at me. ‘It’s just that she’s gotta keep herself clean and fresh and stuff or it’s just going to be awful when we go away, but if I say anything she’ll kick off again. I know she will. I daren’t even say
anything
to her. It just makes her worse.’

‘Don’t you worry,’ I said, ‘you can leave it with me.’ Because, actually, in comparison to what I’d just heard, that part was easily addressed.

‘So,’ I announced, ‘on this eve of our adventure, I can reveal that I have gifts for you all!’

There was a small cheer as I delved into my bag. It was the end of the day, and we were just finishing off our last-minute tick lists. We’d sorted shopping lists and menus and rotas and teams and I was tickled to see how much these kids seemed to be looking forward to what a lot of people my age would consider a chore – cooking meals for each other all week. But then, for some, these simple things were new experiences. Tomorrow morning would see us heading off to the wilds of the countryside and we were, by now, as ready as we’d ever be. The teenagers were palpably excited. There’d been no recurrence of the unpleasantness of before, and though Jade was still wary, she’d been true to her word about not leaving; she seemed determined to see things through and that in itself gave me hope that whatever the appalling circumstances of her recent past, she could find a way out and go on to something better.

My gifts, which had been bought out of the residential budget, were a toilet bag for each of them, complete with all the usual toiletries: soap and shower gel, shampoo and conditioner, toothbrush and toothpaste, deodorant, and as I handed them out I made a reference to being a mother with a teenage son, and how I knew all about boys and their smelly habits if left unchecked.

Everyone knew the truth, of course – after the incident earlier in the week, how could they not? – but it was at least a way to emphasise hygiene without singling Jade out, and I could see Scarlett was grateful.

And happily, for the most part it worked. For all my worries about how things would pan out in the close-knit environment of a full-on residential week of new experiences and challenging activities, Jade’s personal hygiene seemed no longer to be a problem. No, she wouldn’t be winning awards for Miss Squeaky Clean any time soon, but she definitely smelt less offensive than previously and she did, if not that willingly, shower.

‘Group dynamics,’ Katie observed sagely, as we beavered away together trying to load the minibus so that we’d get everything in – no mean feat – on the final morning. ‘I remember learning all about it in college. It’s all down to peer pressure, what we’ve witnessed this week, wouldn’t you say? It’s one thing turning up at the centre every day, in clothes
you
chose, washed or unwashed – unwashed, in this case – ready to take on anyone who crosses you, but quite another when you’re living cheek by jowl with other people, isn’t it? Makes it so much harder not to conform. Everyone else goes to the shower block, then you go to the shower block. Not showering, instead of being something you just didn’t get round to, becomes an act of defiance. Different thing.’

‘Different thing entirely,’ I said, grunting as I tried to shoehorn in a plastic box of bats and balls. And she was also spot on, I decided.

But my pleasure in seeing how well the week had gone – and it had; it had been a blur of activity from the moment we set off – was still tempered by the knowledge I now had of these poor girls. I didn’t know what had happened to them to make social services take such drastic action (unusual in girls of their age), but what had happened with Jade subsequently made me think the worst. She must have been in a very unhappy place, whatever happened – which would have made her vulnerable to a predatory male.

I also knew now that it weighed heavily on her sister, and though Scarlett hadn’t sought me out to talk further while we’d been away, I had a feeling she might once we returned.