Damaged, A Baby’s Cry and The Night the Angels Came 3-in-1 Collection. Cathy Glass
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as I counted up the weeks I realized we were only six away from Christmas Eve. I picked up a basket, and we made our way round the department store.
Jodie was as ever an enthusiastic if not discerning shopper, and she happily grabbed any gaily packaged parcel that came within reach. While we shopped, I talked to her about Christmas and told her about the little traditions that she could expect with us, like decorating the house and the tree, the family service at our church on Christmas Eve, and the pillowcases we all hang on our doors before going to bed. I told her about the glass of sherry and the mince pie that we leave out for Santa, along with carrots for the reindeer. Jodie listened with mild interest but contributed nothing of her own experiences. She didn’t even mention her last Christmas with her parents, which is usually very poignant for children in care. Instead she grasped the material aspect of the festival and started telling me a long list of all the presents she wanted this year, which was, in a nutshell, anything brightly coloured – preferably pink and sparkly.
‘What did you get last Christmas?’ I asked, interrupting her.
‘Shoes,’ she said. ‘Black ones for school. But they wasn’t wrapped.’
‘And what did you do on Christmas Day? Did you play games?’
She nodded. ‘We went up the pub and played darts. Mum had lots of beer and fell over so we had to go home. They went to sleep, so I put a pizza in the oven and after that they felt better.’
I sighed. What a miserable Christmas – and to think that Jodie had assumed responsibility for her parents like that, particularly with her problems! I’d quickly guessed that she had taken a big portion of running the home on to her seven-year-old shoulders. For all her malcoordination and poor motor skills, she’d told me once how to mix a baby’s bottle and she knew how to cook fish fingers in the oven. But if her Christmas was joyless, it was no worse than others I’d heard of from my foster children who’d never known the excitement and pleasure of waking up on Christmas morning to bursting pillowcases and presents under the tree. ‘Well, Christmas will be very different this year, Jodie, and I know you’re going to enjoy it.’
‘Will I, Cathy?’ she said, and her face lit up.
‘Yes. I promise.’ As we carried on shopping, I resolved that she would have the best Christmas I could possibly give her – it would be one way that I could try and restore a piece of her childhood to her. I couldn’t wait to see her pleasure on the day itself, even if it was over a month away.
I found presents for my nieces and nephews, then spotted a pair of Winnie the Pooh slippers which would go into Paula’s sack. Not wishing to have the surprise ruined, I discreetly placed them at the bottom of the basket, and distracted Jodie while I paid. I did the same with the other stocking fillers, including a Tweenies jigsaw for Jodie, and some fancy hair conditioner that Lucy had mentioned. I would be doing all my shopping with Jodie this year, so it would have to be furtive and piecemeal, but it would be worth it.
When we arrived home, Lucy and Paula had just beaten us in. They were in the hallway, removing their coats and unloading their schoolbags.
‘We’ve been to Christmas,’ Jodie shouted excitedly.
‘Shopping,’ I added. ‘I’ve made a start.’
‘Yes, shopping,’ Jodie repeated. ‘And my daddy was naughty, he took his clothes off and weed on me.’
The girls laughed uncomfortably. Neither of them knew what to say.
‘Jodie,’ I said, ‘we went shopping this afternoon. What your daddy did happened more than a year ago. Don’t link the two. It’s confusing.’
But she often did this, running past and present together in a continuum of now. Right from the start she had had no conception of time, but her inability to distinguish between past, present and future seemed to be getting worse.
‘Do you want to play a game?’ asked Paula.
Jodie stared blankly back.
Paula persisted. ‘Let’s all do a jigsaw together!’
‘What about Barbie?’ asked Lucy. ‘I’d love to play with your Barbie dolls.’
‘No!’ snapped Jodie. ‘My dolls! Cathy, can I watch a video?’
‘Wouldn’t you rather play with the girls, Jodie?’ I asked. ‘I’m sure that would be much more fun, and I know the girls would like to hear all about your day at the shops.’
Jodie sighed, exhausted by my unreasonable demands. ‘Please, Cathy,’ she pleaded. ‘I been good?’
I reluctantly agreed, and let her take one of her Early Years videos upstairs. The girls went up to their rooms, and I could see they were a little hurt. Of course, they had no particular desire to play Barbie dolls with Jodie, but no one likes being rejected. Paula and Lucy had been trying to spend more time with Jodie, and to become her friends, but she was impossible to break through to. Most children, no matter how bad their behaviour, do essentially want to be liked, and to feel the approval of those around them. Jodie, on the other hand, simply couldn’t have cared less. When the girls wanted to play with her, she wasn’t pleased or flattered, and it didn’t even occur to her that she might hurt their feelings. She was completely oblivious.
Her relationship with Adrian was even more distant. Because of the nature of the abuse she had suffered, Jodie regarded all males in sexual terms, and would try to flirt with them, or rub provocatively up against them. There was nothing deliberate about this, it was simply the kind of behaviour which had characterized her relationships with men in the past, and it was going to take an awfully long time to reverse this pattern. As a result, Adrian found her very difficult, and tended to just stay out of her way.
As I began peeling the potatoes for dinner, I heard loud thumps coming from upstairs. I was about to climb the stairs, ready to go up and deal with yet another scene, when I realized what the noise was. Jodie’s video contained song and dance routines for the children to join in with. Jodie was simply dancing along to her video.
As I returned to the kitchen, I felt immensely sad. Given the choice between playing with my daughters or watching a video on her own, Jodie had had no hesitation in choosing the video. It wasn’t even that she didn’t like the girls; if she had the option of being alone or of spending time with anyone, Jodie would always choose to be alone. Her history had taught her that the company of others could only bring pain and rejection, and this lesson had isolated her from the world.
My fear was the effect that this awful legacy was likely to have on the rest of her life. Jodie’s hostility, defensiveness and delayed development meant that she really had nothing going for her. She wasn’t pretty, bright or talented. She wasn’t kind, warm or vulnerable. She was still overweight, despite my efforts, although her weight had stabilized. She was rude, unpleasant, aggressive, violent, and she had absolutely no desire to be liked by anyone. It was a mixture that was bound to alienate her and she had no tools to win other people over, nothing at her disposal to make others wish to be around her, or to win her affection.
As far as I could tell, not one person had ever taken an interest in Jodie in her entire life, except those that had wanted to hurt her. Not one person had ever loved her. But as I listened to her clumsy, arrhythmic stomping coming from upstairs, I felt more drawn to her than ever. Surely it wasn’t too late for her? She was only eight years old, for goodness’ sake. Could her entire life really be mapped out?
I hoped fervently that there was time to heal her broken personality, and I longed to put her back together again so that she could have another chance at the childhood that had been so cruelly taken from her. I was determined to try my very best for this child and if love, attention, kindness and hard work could do anything, I would not stop until she was better.
Chapter Sixteen The Spider’s Web
It was a beautiful, crisp winter morning in early December; the sun was a soft golden