I sit there looking at her, my mind whirring. She has extraordinary power for one so young; I don’t want to be a horse, kicked hard in the flank, clearing a fence neither of us should ever have attempted.
‘That’s the rule, isn’t it? If I tell you something that’s’ – she makes quote marks in the air, an affectation I hate – ‘relevant to the police investigation, you’re meant to tell him. That’s what I want to do. Simples,’ she adds in that annoying voice from that annoying advert.
‘Gemma, I’m not sure if that’s appropriate at this stage—’
‘You always say it’s my session, to use how I want. This is how I want to use it.’
Perhaps this has always been where we were heading, the natural conclusion to our work together. God knows I didn’t dodge it, nudging her to tell me about those messages, asking her all about her dad.
‘So what do you want to tell me? And, Gemma, I’m going to coach you here. Go very slowly. Stop any time. This is our last session, and I don’t want you to be left with your guts hanging out because you shared too much.’
She looks at me, vulnerable again.
‘If I don’t finish telling you, can I come back?’
Is this what this is all about? I think of Annie recalling her seduction, how powerless she was to resist. Gemma’s learnt at the feet of a master. If Patrick could see us now, he’d be punching the air.
‘No. We’ve agreed this is the last session and we’re going to stick to it.’ Would I have been so adamant if I was the only person who could extract the truth? The thing is, for her own safety, she can’t be allowed to feel like she’s omnipotent, running the show. It’s imperative I hold the boundary, at least for now. She looks at me for a long minute, her jaw rigid. ‘You don’t have to talk at all, Gemma, remember that. We could just sit here together.’
‘No! Mia . . .’ She pauses again, her chewed fingers wrapping tightly around themselves in her lap. I need to be ready to stop her if it becomes too much, whatever Patrick might want. ‘The thing about my dad is – I’m his little rock. His rock of Gibraltar.’
‘I remember you said that.’ I hated it then, and I hate it now – it’s no more than an emotional chokehold. I can’t help noticing, yet again, how young she looks in her shapeless clothes. He’s subtly telling her that if she ever grows up – kicks against his control, like any normal teenager must – he won’t survive the betrayal. It takes all my strength not to muscle in, but I stay silent. I did my best to make her question his demands – hopefully some of it lodged in her consciousness.
‘But it means I’m his Achilles heel. You know what that is, right?’
‘I do.’
She looks straight into my eyes.
‘He isn’t gone.’
‘What do you mean?’
‘He’s here, in London.’ Her gaze travels across me like a minesweeper. ‘I told him all about you.’
I take a breath. I need to make sure, for both our sakes, that it’s me holding the reins.
‘So you’ve seen him?’
‘Yeah. Stephen’s looking after him.’ ‘Looking after’ – it sounds so benign, so caring. ‘They want him to go abroad but . . .’ Her face tightens, tears springing to her eyes. ‘He can’t leave me, Mia! He can’t just up sticks and leave me.’
I think about what Judith so wisely said – this really could be no more than the fucked-up fantasy of an abandoned Daddy’s girl. Her instinct could be better than Patrick’s intelligence. But now there’s that phrase – his Achilles heel. It sounds like it’s come straight from the horse’s mouth.
‘So where do you see him, Gemma?’ She studies me, like she’s working out all over again whether I deserve her trust. ‘Remember you can stop any time.’
‘My piano lessons. He comes and meets me there. We have a McDonald’s.’
‘I didn’t know you liked McDonald’s. You’re so slim, you don’t look like a hamburger’s ever passed your lips.’
I’m pulling on the reins here, seeing what happens if I jerk us off the course she’s set.
‘I don’t,’ she says, grinning, ‘but Dad loves it! We go to the drive-in one . . .’
Is she playing a blinder here, merging fantasy and truth to create something that’s impossible to call?
‘So, Gemma, I don’t understand. Are you saying that your piano teacher smuggles your dad into her house?’ She nods solemnly. ‘And . . .’ Should I even ask this? ‘Does your mum know?’
‘Course not,’ she says, her eyes dropping, then flicking back to my face. ‘Stephen’s people can make anything happen.’
The horrible thing is – even if everything else she’s claiming is absolute rubbish – she’s right about that. I feel a strangely satisfying surge of Patrick’s righteous anger. If there’s even a small chance this is true, I need to glean everything I can. We are on the same side. The thought makes my heart contract. Does he feel it? Is he here with me, on some parallel plane?
‘So let me get this straight. You’re saying that every week you trot off to piano, and there’s your dad? And then what, he goes back to a safe house?’
‘Yeah, for now!’ she says, her voice rising, colour flushing her pale face. ‘But he can’t . . . he can’t stay much longer, Mia. It’s not safe for him.’
I bleed for the depth of pain that flashes across her face. I engage the brakes, determined not to feel pressured by the clock which ticks ever closer to the end of our session. This is Gemma, the girl I’ve grown to care about, the girl I know desperately needs the adults in her life to behave like adults. I don’t want to accidentally become as bad as Christopher, treating her like she’s some kind of human slot machine, feeding in coins and demanding she pays up.
‘I think we should stop here, Gemma. I can tell Patrick what you’ve told me, if that’s really what you want, but I want to leave us some time to properly say goodbye.’
‘I think Stephen’s gonna make him!’ says Gemma, almost as though she doesn’t hear me. ‘He can make anything happen. What if he makes him disappear?’
‘Are you worried he’s going to . . .’ I don’t want to plant that thought in her head, if she’s not there yet.
‘He could just put him on a plane, just like that,’ she says, voice rising even higher, her eyes wild. Or worse: a body bag or a police van.
‘Gemma, look at me.’ She does. ‘You shouldn’t be having to carry all this around with you, these secrets.’ If they’re real: I study her pale face, her look of desperation and fear never faltering. It’s hard to believe that’s fake. ‘It’s better the police know.’ I wish I could swear that was true. Honestly, I feel like my version of the police was roughly akin to Trumpton before Patrick told me the grim reality. He can do this, surely?
‘He said . . .’ She’s sobbing, properly sobbing now. ‘He said this could be the last week.’ A cynical part of me sits up at the phrase. This is meant to be her last week here. Coincidence or projection? She looks at me, her body opening towards me. I cross to the sofa, put my arm round those spindly shoulders, and let her cry into my chest.
‘You’ve told me now,’ I say as sobs rack her body. ‘I heard you. I know how hard it is.’ Can I really leave her, after this? I’m flattering myself. It’s not my choice, I’m suspended. I talk a little more, keeping my voice soft and calm, hoping that some of the words will filter through her distress. I tell her how much I’ve valued the sessions we’ve done together, how hard she’s worked, how much I hope she knows her own value.
And then, once Brendan’s buzzed for the second time, reminding me my next client’s been waiting fifteen long minutes, we say goodbye.