Funny we should reach this point now when I’ve already written so much to you, mostly about my background and how I came to . . . well, we know what I did so no need to spell it out. Not saving myself here, saving you from having to hear it again.
Anyway, I’ve already told you about my arrest, so now here’s an account of my first meeting with Dan. I know I touched on it before, but this is it in the order of things happening.
By the time he turns up at Sellybrook I’ve been on remand for a few months and my trial date’s already been put back twice, so still no real idea of when it’s going to happen. I don’t fret myself about it, nothing to be gained from that, it’s more helpful in my circumstances to focus on the day-to-day and keeping out of trouble. I don’t go looking for it, but there are times when it finds me. You’ve just got to look at someone the wrong way in here and your head’s getting stuck down a toilet, or your balls are being crushed in a meaty fist. It’s not a good idea to beat anyone at table tennis, or to support a different football team, or to ask someone’s name, or to take a shower on your own, because you’re never on your own for long.
No music in here, I miss that more than anything—not that I’m expecting you to shed any tears for me, just saying, is all.
Anyways, there I am in my cell one morning, hurting badly after a smacking from a couple of GBH-ers who’d taken against me, when I suddenly get dragged out to see a visitor and it’s not a visiting day. I automatically think it’s my jerk of a lawyer, finally turned up again, or the cops wanting another little chat about how I can help them fill in the big picture.
As I truck off with the Blimp—one of the screws—I’m hoping I might be about to hear that the charge of attempted murder has been reduced to attempted manslaughter, if there is such a thing, or even that it’s been dropped altogether. OK, I wasn’t holding my breath for it, but it was in my head.
I end up in this room I’ve never been in before that’s a bit like the ones you see in cop shows for interviews, only bigger, and I can hardly believe it when I see who’s waiting for me.
It’s only Superman.
Or the Clark Kent version of him, with reddy-brown hair and black-framed glasses, and OK he’s not as muscular as the real deal, or as tall, but he’s deffo got a look about him that says he might like putting his pants on over his trousers.
Joke. He doesn’t look like that sort of twonk at all.
He looks kind of ordinary I suppose, and friendly, because he gets up and shakes my hand, says thanks for agreeing to see him—no one asked—and would I like to sit down?
I see no reason not to, I don’t have anything else to do, and with any luck this isn’t going to be about ratting out the PC or BJ.
He tells me his name, Dan Collier, and when he says he wants to talk about you, because of the way he says it I straightaway want to run. I don’t, mainly because there’s a screw outside the door to stop me. I think he must be a cop, or . . . Actually, I don’t know what else I thought he might be . . . A vicar?
Even after he explains what he does I’m still not sure I’m fully clued in. Restorative justice has never been on my radar before, but I listen to what he has to say, and I kind of get it, but I just don’t see it working. So I tell him he’s wasting his time and probably ought to give up now and go home.
He doesn’t argue or anything, or get worked up when I start tapping my hand to let him know I’m bored (what a muppet I was then). He just keeps going, talking, talking, or he stops and looks at me like he’s expecting an answer to something he’s asked. When he doesn’t get one he starts up again. Next thing he’s answering his questions himself as if it’s me doing the talking, and I’m starting to feel a bit like one of those ventriloquists—you know, I keep my mouth shut and all the words come out of him.
It starts to get entertaining after a while, and I end up laughing at something, can’t remember what, and by the time he gets around to asking me about the attempted murder charge I don’t mind telling him what a toerag my lawyer is and that no one’s told me anything almost since I got put in here.
I’m gobsmacked when he says he’ll look into things for me, because it sounds like he means it, so I ask him if he’s a lawyer. Turns out he is, just not the sort I need, but he tells me not to worry about that, he’ll be back again soon and by then he should have my legal representation better sorted.
So, he is Superman.
I don’t see him for another week, but in that time a different brief turns up to chew things through with me, a woman this time, who puts on a good show of being interested and has some encouraging things to say, although I know what’s really going on. She’s chasing her legal aid fee, just doing it with a better attitude than the other one. I definitely qualify for legal aid, by the way, because neither me nor my ma are over the earning threshold, not even combined, which is a good thing, because I wouldn’t want to think of how many life sentences I might get if I had to stand up there and defend myself.
A few days later I get a second visit from SuperDan.
This time we talk about all kinds of different stuff, like he’s trying to get inside my head and find something buried deep that’s not there. I don’t suppose I mind, he’s not the kind of bloke you feel bothered about knowing your shit, or some of it anyway.
I’m not sure how many times he comes before he first brings up the subject of me writing to you, probably two or three, but I do know that when he said it I told him he was off his head, it was never going to happen. I mean, if I start blurting out stuff like sorry and regret, then it would be like me telling everyone I’m guilty. (OK, I am, of arson, but I think you get my drift.)
He just sits there and looks at me like he’s waiting for me to morph into the person he wants me to be, and I look at him like he’s a knob, because he is. But he’s also Dan, so I end up saying I’ll give it a go, and then he’ll see that it’s a menstrual period, which is a way of saying a waste of time.
It was that at first, a mega lost cause, mainly because I’d never written anything down before, I mean outside of lessons at school. Texts were my thing, and maybe the odd phone call or IM, not pen and paper. He tells me just to write the words the way I speak, so that’s what I do, trying not to cuss and swear too much, but he says not to worry about that. If it’s really bad he’ll get me to explain what I mean in another way, and if he thinks some of my language is obscure—his word—he’ll get me to explain that too.
It takes some getting used to, I can tell you, but once I get into it, it turns out to be something I find myself looking forward to doing. Weird, huh? It also means I get to see Dan on a fairly regular basis and if he can’t come I send in my homework, as I call it, and he brings it with him the next time he comes so we can discuss it.
During all this time he doesn’t mention much about what’s going on with you, but I know he’s building up to it and I’m bracing myself. Finally, he gets around to telling me that even though you’ve been out of hospital for a good while, you’re still not doing all that well. He says physically you’re healing the way you should, although you’ll always have scars, but upstairs you’ve still got the curtains pulled. I feel myself shrinking up inside when I hear that, like I need to get away from it, but there’s also a lot I want to say to you, I just don’t know how to find the words.
He wants me to write one more letter after this one before he starts what he calls the next stage of the process, whatever that is, but I’ve decided not to. He doesn’t understand why, so I tell him that I need to know what you think of my other letters before I start trying with all the sorry stuff. OK, I get that it doesn’t work like that, it’s not my place to call shots in this, but truth is, I’m scared. Big admission for me, that. It’s true though. I’m scared that there’s nothing I can do or say that’ll make a difference for you and that’ll be like hurting you all over again.
I know he’s going to tell me that the best way I can help you is to name the PC who ordered the hit. The trouble is, that’s like asking me to choose between you and my ma.