I still hadn’t had the dreaded police medical examination and it was hanging over me like a dark cloud. On the day it was arranged, 6 February, Mum and Tracey both said they would come along, so that comforted me a bit but it had hurt so much the last time that I was really nervous about it.
At first the police doctor, Dr Morris, just chatted to me and asked me how I was doing. She asked if I was still sore between my legs and I said that it was much better. Then she said she had to do a blood test and I went berserk. I hate needles. Can’t bear them. It’s a full-scale phobia with me.
‘No, I won’t do it!’ I screamed and leapt out of my seat.
The doctor looked serious. ‘I know you’re frightened, Lisa, but you’ll need to be as brave as you can. There are a few reasons for this test, but one is that we need your DNA for the court case against Alan Hopkinson. Do you know what DNA is?’
I had a vague idea, but no matter what it was for, I was still determined they weren’t going to plunge a needle into my arm. Tracey and Mum were trying to calm me down and they got me to sit in the seat again. Mum had her arm around me and Tracey held my hand, but then I saw the doctor lifting the needle.
‘Get off!’ I yelled, and jerked my arm out of Mum’s grasp.
‘We also need to check you haven’t picked up any infections,’ the doctor explained. ‘We can run some tests on your blood to find out.’
I reckoned I would rather just take my chances with infections than let her stick a needle in me.
In the end I was resisting so hard that they gave up. Tracey took swabs from my mouth with cotton buds so they could test my DNA that way, and the doctor said they’d just have to keep an eye on my health for the next few months. She told Mum that it was important I was seen by my GP if there were any unusual symptoms at all.
Next, it was time for her to examine me. Charlene had told me that it was sore but bearable when she had her test done at the police station. Either she was braver than me or she hadn’t been hurt so badly because I found it horribly painful when Dr Morris started poking and prodding at me. I started crying.
Mum stroked my hair and said, ‘It’ll be alright,’ and I was thinking, It’s certainly not alright! Just leave me alone. Mum still hadn’t asked me anything about what happened in Alan’s flat. I think she couldn’t face thinking about it, and I was glad because I didn’t want to discuss it with her, but in the doctor’s surgery that day it must have been pretty obvious to her what I’d been through.
The doctor was making notes on a clipboard. ‘It’s still quite swollen but there are no tears and it’s looking a lot better than it did last time I saw you,’ she said, smiling at me. ‘You’re being very brave.’
I didn’t feel brave. I felt angry. It always annoyed me when people said I was being brave. What did they want me to do? I had no choice about the things that were happening to me. I was still a child and I had to do as I was told.
At last it was over and we could go home again, but a couple of days later it was time for me to start my counselling. Charlene had started a few days earlier and she’d told me what to expect: that they wanted you to talk about your ‘feelings’ and tell them you hated Alan and so forth. Like her, I didn’t want to do any of that. I just wanted to forget about him.
Dad drove me to the health centre and we waited until my name was called, then we both went into the room. There was a blonde woman inside, quite good-looking, with a nice smile. She stood up and shook hands with us both, saying, ‘I’m Patricia. It’s very nice to meet you.’
‘I’ll just wait outside,’ Dad told me and I felt a bit panicky.
‘Can’t you stay?’ I asked.
‘That’s not how it usually works,’ Patricia told me. ‘It’s better if I can talk to you on your own. There might be some things you wouldn’t feel comfortable talking about if your dad was here, because you didn’t want to upset him, but it’s important that you feel you can say anything to me. Why don’t we give it a try without your dad this first time and see how we get on?’
‘OK, sweetheart?’ Dad asked.
I was doubtful but I nodded slowly.
‘I’ll be right outside. Come and get me at any time if you want to.’
After he left, I sat down on a chair and looked around. There were toys in a toy box in the corner and coloured posters all over the walls.
‘Have you talked to anybody yet about what happened to you?’ Patricia asked me first.
‘I told the police all about it.’
‘Not your mum or dad?’
I shook my head.
‘I think you’ll find it will be a relief to go through it all with an adult. Maybe I can help you to understand some things that might be puzzling you about your experiences.’
‘I’m not puzzled.’
Patricia shifted in her chair, keeping up her concerned smile. ‘There are different ways we can work. I quite like playing games and painting pictures. We’ll try to make it fun when you come here. Maybe we should start by painting a picture today. Do you like painting?’
‘I prefer drawing,’ I said.
‘Oh.’ She looked around the room. ‘I don’t have any coloured pencils here, but I can get some for next time.’
‘I can use a normal lead pencil,’ I volunteered, wondering what she wanted me to draw.
‘No, the colours you choose are very important. Could you maybe try to use the paints this time? I’ll get pencils for next week.’
‘OK,’ I agreed. ‘What do you want me to paint?’
She was putting a big sheet of paper on the table, and setting out the paints. It was a kids’ painting set, where you had to dip your brush in water and rub the paint to get colour. ‘I want you to paint a picture that shows me how you are feeling. Just paint whatever comes into your head.’
That sounded like a stupid idea. How could you paint feelings? I was feeling absolutely fine – just frustrated with all the people who kept harping on about things.
Patricia was waiting for me to start. I picked up the brush and began painting a girl sitting in a room but I soon realised it wasn’t working out. The perspective was all wrong. It looked like a kid’s painting. I didn’t want her to think that’s all I was capable of because I was quite proud of my art skills so I loaded the brush with black paint and scrubbed it all out with great sweeping strokes.
‘It wasn’t working,’ I explained, and was irritated to realise that tears were filling my eyes.
‘You must feel quite angry just now,’ Patricia said in a gentle voice. ‘A very bad thing has happened to you through no fault of your own.’
I started crying, and at the same time I was annoyed with myself for crying.
‘It’s OK,’ she said. ‘It’s going to be alright.’ She passed me a box of tissues and I took one and blew my nose loudly.
She continued. ‘We’re going to draw some pictures and chat about things and help you to feel less angry and less sad.’
‘Next time,’ I asked, ‘can my dad stay in the room? I’d rather he was here.’
Something changed in her face. She was disappointed in me. ‘I don’t think that’s such a good idea.’
‘I’d really like him to be here,’ I pleaded.
She was reluctant but finally said, ‘If you’re sure that’s how you want it, we’ll give it a try.’
I nodded, and wiped my eyes with a tissue. I didn’t want Dad to see that I’d been crying because I was worried about upsetting him. He didn’t say much but when we were at home he always wanted to be in the same room as me, and his eyes followed me with a kind of haunted expression. That’s how I could tell that my abduction had almost been harder for him than it had been for me. He looked shattered, as though he’d been in a car accident or something. I knew that Charlene’s dad Keith had taken leave of absence from his job because he couldn’t handle going back just yet. I think my dad would have liked to do the same but the council wouldn’t let him. They had both aged a lot in the three days we were missing. There seemed to be a lot more lines on Dad’s forehead and around his eyes.
When my session with Patricia was finished I went out and told Dad that I had decided I wanted him to sit in with me in future and I think he was pleased. ‘Whatever you want,’ he said. ‘We’ll do it your way.’
When I saw Charlene later and told her that Dad was going to be at my counselling sessions, she was amazed. ‘But you won’t be able to talk about things like sex with him there. It’d be embarrassing.’
‘I don’t want to talk about sex,’ I said.
‘Counsellors like all that stuff,’ she told me. ‘Sex and dreams. They always want to know your dreams.’
I was still having nightmares almost every night in which I was back in the flat again. Alan was either a menacing presence in the next room, or his weight was pressing down on top of me. I’d wake up with my heart pounding and it took me a while to get back to sleep again.
‘I’m not telling her my dreams,’ I said. ‘That’s personal. I’m getting fed up to the back teeth with people asking me about it.’
The first day Charlene and I were back at school, everyone had crowded round us but no one dared to ask anything because they’d been warned not to. But by the second day, people were dropping things into conversation – ‘Oh, I heard he had a gun’; ‘I heard you were chained up in a cellar’. Stupid things like that. We usually just snapped at them to shut up and stop being idiots. Stevie, my boyfriend, had seen the TV coverage of the photo-call on the beach and he was very embarrassed that I had mentioned his name. He would hardly even come near me that week in case anyone teased him about it.
Gradually, as the days passed, things got back more or less to normal, except that everyone wanted to be our friend. ‘Can I sit beside you in music?’ one would say, and another would go, ‘Will you be my partner at gym today?’ or ‘Do you want one of my sweets?’ If I liked them, I just agreed. I’d always had two or three close friends in the past but suddenly I seemed to have about twenty! I knew it wasn’t all real friendship and that they just wanted to be associated with me because of what I’d been through, but I was happy to go along with it if I liked them. Charlene had the same thing going on. My only regret was that I missed it just being the two of us, the way it had been before. I missed walking to school with her and stopping to buy sweets, and gossiping on our own in the corner of the playground.
I told myself it would all calm down soon and things would get back to normal – but I couldn’t have been more wrong.
On the Friday of my first week back at school, a special needs teacher called Mrs Bourne came to our classroom. ‘Lisa Hoodless?’ she said. ‘Your mum is here to see you. Can you come with me?’
I wondered what Mum wanted, then I guessed that maybe she had come to pick me up early because I had some appointment or other.
Mrs Bourne went to Christine’s classroom next and we fetched her as well, then she led us both to the tiny special needs classroom. Mum was standing by the window and she turned to look at us with a very funny expression on her face. She seemed very tense and jumpy.
‘Sit down, girls,’ Mrs Bourne said. ‘Your mum has something to tell you.’
There was one big table in the middle of the room with chairs arranged all the way round it. Christine and I sat next to each other at a corner and Mum came and crouched beside us on the floor. She looked terrible. I hadn’t a clue what was going on.
It was ages before she even said anything. She just looked from one to the other of us as if she was trying to pluck up the courage.
‘You know I love you both very much, don’t you?’ she began.
We nodded.
‘The problem is that I haven’t been getting on very well with your father. You’ve probably noticed that we’ve been arguing a lot.’
I hadn’t noticed anything more than usual. She and Dad had always argued as far back as I could remember.
‘The thing is…’ She bit her lip, then the words came out in a rush. ‘I’ve met someone else. His name is Tom. I’m going to go and live with him and your dad will bring you up now. I’ll see you every weekend, though.’ Her voice trailed off as she saw the horrified expressions on our faces.
‘But, Mum, you can’t!’ I exclaimed.
‘The decision is made, Lisa. It won’t be so bad, though. You’ll see.’
‘Is it because of me?’ Christine asked in a little voice. ‘Is it because I was naughty?’
‘No, of course not, silly!’ Mum gave a fake kind of a laugh.
‘Is it because I was kidnapped?’ I asked. I started crying and Christine joined in.
Mum put her arms around us both and gave us a big hug. ‘It’s not your fault. It’s just Dad and I can’t get on with each other.’
Suddenly I remembered a dream I’d had earlier in the week. I’d dreamt that Mum and Dad had a big argument and Dad took us away to live in a new house. It was like a mansion with a black-and-white checked floor in the hall and a big spiral staircase. The following morning I had told Mum about my dream and she gave me a really funny look as though she was going to cry.
‘What’s the matter? What have I said?’ I asked.
‘Oh, nothing, nothing,’ she replied.
But it seemed as though my dream had all been true.
‘When are you going?’ I asked. Christine was sobbing so much that she couldn’t even speak so I had to be the one asking the questions.
‘Today. I’ll be gone by the time you get home from school. That’s why I thought I’d better come here to explain. Your dad will make your tea for you tonight, but I’ll see you at the weekend sometime. Don’t worry. It will all be fine.’
‘Please don’t go!’ I cried. ‘You can still change your mind. Just don’t do it.’
She was stroking my hair. ‘You’ll understand when you’re older, Lisa, that sometimes grown-ups have to do these things. I’m sorry. I’ve got to go now.’
‘What about Georgie?’ I asked suddenly. ‘Are you taking Georgie?’
There was a pause. ‘No, your dad will look after her.’
That was really serious if she wasn’t taking Georgie. How would Dad manage to look after a baby when he had a job?
She gave us one last hug then stood up and hurried out of the room without looking back. Christine and I clung to each other, sobbing our hearts out, while Mrs Bourne tried to think of comforting things to say.
‘You’ll see your mum really soon,’ she said. ‘You’ll probably have a bedroom at her new place and you can choose things for it. That’ll be fun, won’t it?’
Poor woman! She didn’t know what to do with us. There was nothing she could have said to make things remotely better. As soon as the first fits of sobbing subsided, she walked us back to our classrooms.
I went in and everyone looked up. It must have been obvious that I’d been crying. I think Mr Okrainetz knew something about it because he was really nice to me. I sat down at my desk, still crying quietly. The girls who sat closest to me leant in and I whispered to them what had happened. Charlene stood up and came over to give me a hug. No one seemed to know what to say. None of their mothers had left them and gone off to live with another man, someone they’d never met.
It was the worst thing that had ever happened to me in my life. The experiences in the flat with Alan were nothing compared with this. My own mother was leaving me. I didn’t know how I was going to carry on without her. It all seemed totally unreal.