While I drove, the boys chatted away about more appropriate subjects, Tyler explaining to Connor about what he could expect to find at Jungle Pit, which were the best and worst slides, and the scariest rope swings. I started to relax a little. Perhaps I’d over-reacted earlier. The poor kid was a product of his early environment, after all. Maybe he’d just been testing the water – kids who were shunted around often pushed and strained at the boundaries. Perhaps he was just keen to see how far he could go.
The café area of the Jungle Pit was actually in the same cavernous space that held the play area itself, cordoned off to one side by a low yellow plastic wall. Here it was traditional for all the mums, dads and all the other kinds of child-minders to install themselves at one of the various tables, while the kids scampered off to throw themselves about.
Being a Saturday, it was heaving, despite the glorious weather. It was a big draw in all weathers simply because it was so contained. You could sit and read a book or catch up with the papers while your kids ran amok in a corralled and controlled environment, with the safety-conscious staff always looking on.
Once installed, I sent the boys off and told them I’d call them back once I’d got some drinks and then later, if they were hungry, some food. They duly deposited their shoes and ran off towards the big colourful cubes in which the various spills and thrills could be had. Some of the cubes were suspended from beams by thick chains and ropes. These were for older children only, or, rather, children over a certain height, as they purposely swayed to make the activities in them that bit more exciting. Connor was only just big enough, but as Tyler headed off to the area with all the footballs it was to these that he immediately made a beeline, and once he was out of sight I strolled off to get myself a coffee.
It’s easy to lose yourself in places like the Jungle Pit. Whether it’s because they are so well managed, bristling with young energetic staff, or perhaps just because zoning out is one of those essential parenting skills, I was miles away, reading one of the free newspapers and sipping on a latte, when the commotion by the hanging cubes started up.
I certainly knew it had been going on a while, because it was the activity at the tables around me that first grabbed my attention: the adults who were scraping back their chairs, the various oohs and ahhs, the fact that the area was fast emptying of people. I was sitting in the middle of a sea of abandoned tables by the time I became aware – aware that everyone had gone to look at whatever was happening elsewhere.
I put my coffee down and stood up, too, conscious that all eyes seemed drawn upwards, glancing around as I did so to see if I could see the boys. I tilted my own head – whatever was going on was happening high up in the rafters – or whatever the steel things were that constituted rafters in such a place. Which was when I saw Connor, who was a good twenty or twenty-five feet above us, perching precariously on a dangerously narrow beam; one of several that spanned the building and from which hung the giant cubes on chains.
‘What on earth …?’ I said in a panic as I rushed across to the play area. Tyler ran across to me then, looking bewildered. ‘What the hell’s he doing, Casey?’ he asked, not taking his eyes off Connor. ‘That’s well high, that is,’ he said, with a note of admiration. Then he turned to me. ‘I don’t think he’s allowed up there, do you?’
‘He most certainly isn’t,’ I said, wondering what was going to be done about it. And if so, by whom. I called up to him, all too aware of the heads swivelling towards me. ‘Connor! Get down from there right now! And be careful about it. Very careful. Come on!’
Having presumably identified me as the responsible adult, a young girl in a Jungle Pit T-shirt also ran across to me. ‘We can’t be responsible if he falls from there,’ she pointed out. ‘It’s clearly marked that they shouldn’t climb on top of the cubes.’
I didn’t doubt it was clearly marked. They’d be extremely keen not to be slapped with a writ, wouldn’t they? And I’d seen the sign myself. Despite the high levels of staff, you couldn’t move for firmly fixed notices reminding you that whatever happened it was unquestionably neither their fault nor their responsibility.
‘I’m sure he knows that,’ I told her. Then I turned my gaze upwards again. ‘Connor!’ I barked at him. ‘You come down from there this instant! You know full well that you’re not allowed to be up there!’
‘Piss off, you old fart!’ came the immediate response. I cringed. I could also feel my cheeks burning as the previous looks – which had mostly been of the sympathetic variety – now changed to ones of disapproval. The young girl who had spoken to me started to edge away now, too, walking backwards so that she didn’t miss anything.
‘I think I’ll go and get the manager,’ she said. ‘He’ll know what to do.’
As she scurried away I looked back up to check that Connor wasn’t in any imminent danger. Yes, the place was full of soft structures and crash mats but he was much higher up than he was supposed to be and – to my extreme annoyance – he was beginning to put himself in further danger by acting up for his now captive audience. I had no idea what had inspired him to climb up there in the first place, but there was no doubt that he was enjoying being in the spotlight, walking the beam like a tight-rope act, holding his arms out to the side and whistling a tune as he pretended to trip, eliciting a mass gasp from the increasingly nervous crowd.
‘Get down here, Connor!’ I tried again. ‘Get back down here this minute, before we’re asked to leave!’
‘Ooh! Asked to leave!’ he mimicked. ‘Ooh, I’m so scared! Piss off, old lady. I can stay here all night if I want to.’
Tyler’s face had blanched now, and I misread it. ‘It’s okay, Ty,’ I said quietly. ‘He’ll come down soon enough. He’s got to come down eventually, after all.’
‘No he bloody won’t,’ Tyler replied angrily. ‘He’s coming down right now. He’s not speaking to you like that and getting away with it.’
He hared off to the nearest cube, from which he could begin making an assault. ‘Ty, don’t go up there,’ I called to him. But he ignored me. ‘Get down, you little idiot!’ he yelled. ‘Get down here now. If I have to come up for you, you’re getting a slap, you hear me?’
I headed after him, keen to dissuade him, dodging past the other parents, and, as I did so, Connor sat back down on the beam.
Good, I thought. Perhaps he was going to shimmy down and put an end to it. But I was wrong. He was merely relocating further along, the better to call down and argue his case. ‘Well, I’m definitely not coming down now then, you fucking idiot. An’ if you try to come and get me, I’ll kick you in the bollocks and then I’ll feed you to the porn queen of Brixton!’ he shouted. ‘Just you see if I don’t!’
I took Tyler’s wrist and squeezed it. ‘Don’t go up there, love,’ I said quietly. ‘That’s exactly what he’s hoping. And I’m rather keen to keep you in one piece.’
‘I’m keen to keep everyone in one piece,’ came a voice from behind me. A male voice. ‘That your boy up there?’ he asked me.
I turned and nodded. ‘Kind of. He’s my responsibility, anyway. He’s in care,’ I explained. ‘Between placements. We’ve just got him for the weekend. His name’s Connor.’
This was clearly the manager because he had a whistle on a string round his neck. Perhaps he’d have better luck coaxing Connor down. He blew it, though to what end I didn’t know. He already had Connor’s full attention. ‘Come on down, Connor, lad,’ he coaxed. ‘It’s not safe up there. Get down now and that’s the end of it. You’ll not be in any trouble.’
As if he’d care, I thought. He’d probably be hundreds of miles away in just over a day. But the manager couldn’t know that and I wasn’t about to tell him. Though, on the plus side, his intervention had at least signalled a kind of end to things, because the crowd that had assembled began drifting away.
All but a committed core of anxious parents, at any rate. Which was still audience enough to keep Connor astride his rafter, despite further barked commands from the manager. Why wouldn’t he stay up there? What exactly could they do? And while he still had their attention he was still having fun. Which gave me an idea. ‘I tell you what,’ I said, keeping my voice down. ‘Can you go with me on something? Let me try another tack?’
‘What sort of tack?’ the manager asked, looking anxious.
‘The leaving tack,’ I told him quietly. ‘As in Tyler and I leave – well, pretend to, at any rate. We’ll only be outside, but I’ve a hunch it’ll do the trick.’
The man, whose name badge read ‘Declan Patterson, Centre Manager’, was around Kieron’s age, I reckoned, and seemed happy to go with whatever tack I came up with, even winking at me surreptitiously as I sent Tyler off to get his coat with a loud, ‘That’s it, I’ve had enough of this! We’re leaving!’
I then flapped an arm upwards, before talking as if to a full house in the theatre. ‘I’m sorry, but we have to go. Can I leave my phone number at the entrance? Would that be okay? Then if he decides to come down – or if he falls or anything – just give me a ring, will you? Though there’s a thought,’ I added, turning back just as I was about to sweep Tyler out of the place, ‘can you make sure it’s not between six and seven? Only that’s when I watch Emmerdale on catch-up.’
I doubted Connor could have seen Mr Patterson’s uncomfortable expression or, indeed, Tyler’s monumental struggle not to laugh. But he could certainly hear me, and must have had the proverbial bird’s-eye view of our departure through the security barrier and then out of sight.
‘We’re not really going anywhere, are we?’ Tyler wanted to know, once we were back out in the building’s entrance.
‘Don’t be daft,’ I said, pulling him against the wall by the double doors, the better to keep an eye on developments. ‘Just using toddler-taming tactics, that’s all. Give it five minutes – ten, absolute tops – and my hunch is he’ll be shimmying down and following us through those doors; behaving like a clown’s only fun when you have an audience.’
Though I wasn’t as confident as I sounded (Connor was an unknown quantity, after all) it wasn’t even five minutes before he burst through the door and headed back out into the car park – or, rather, would have done if he hadn’t caught sight of the pair of us out of the corner of his eye.
He stopped dead in his tracks and did a Tom and Jerry-style slow-motion double-take, before thrusting his hands in his jeans pockets and trying to inject some swagger back into his stance. ‘Ha! Had you then!’ he crowed. ‘Done you both up like kippers! Oh, Connor! Don’t fall, Connor! Oh, Connor, come down!’ He laughed and puffed out his bony little chest. ‘You don’t know me,’ he added. ‘I’m like a pro at doing high wire. I done circus skills, I have. Sammy the Dwarf an’ the Porn Queen of Sarf Landen taught me everyfing they know.’
It was something of a job not to laugh. Not to mention something of a job not to form the bizarre mental picture of Tyler being devoured by the Porn Queen of Sarf Landen while Connor was being coached by Sammy the Dwarf. But this was no time for laughing. The smile I was trying not to crack was born of relief more than anything.
‘Car!’ I barked. ‘Right now. I’m not very happy with you, Connor. You’ve spoiled the day now – not just for you, but for me and Tyler, too. I’m going to have to think seriously about what to do with you after that little episode. About whether I can trust you enough to even take you out of the house. Is that what you want?’ I asked as I frogmarched him across the car park. ‘To spend the whole time you’re with us locked indoors?’
Connor only shrugged as I unlocked the car and briskly clipped him into his seatbelt. ‘Don’t care what you do,’ he said. ‘You can do what you like. Lock me in, leave me out. Makes no difference to me. I’m off to live with me dad soon, anyways.’
‘Yeah, right,’ Tyler said.
‘Yeah, fucking right!’ Connor growled, swivelling to face him. ‘You got a problem with that?’
‘And what if I have?’ Tyler said. ‘What you going to do? Set Sammy the Dwarf on me?’
And it wasn’t even Saturday teatime.