The Guilty Mother

It’s mid-afternoon before I can talk to Claire again. I’ve reread several articles on the Slade case, including my own. I’m still a bit hazy on some of the details, but I am clear about one thing. I’m not doing this.

It smells of cigarettes in Claire’s office. I suddenly feel like one – the itch has never completely disappeared, even after all these years as a non-smoker. I decide to scrounge a fag if she lights up, but she doesn’t appear to need one herself. She leans forward in her chair, resting her elbows on the desk and her chin on her hands.

I start by pitching Kelly’s vlog idea to Claire, aware that I’m putting off talking about Melissa Slade.

‘We’ll discuss it more fully at the next editorial meeting, but why not? She’ll be more presentable on screen than on paper,’ Claire comments dryly.

There’s a short silence, which Claire breaks. ‘Was there anything else?’

‘Er, yes. About Melissa Slade’s request for an appeal …’

‘Yes?’

‘Is there anyone else you could assign that to?’

‘Jonathan, it’s an interesting story and you’re the best I’ve got.’

‘Thank you, but can one of the others do it?’

Claire sighs. She takes a stick of chewing gum out of a packet on her desk, unwraps it and folds it into her mouth. ‘Is there some reason you can’t?’

Yes. There’s a very good reason I can’t. But there’s no way I’m going to tell Claire what it is. I don’t talk about it. Not to her. Not to anyone.

‘Well, it’s just that I’m really busy at the moment. You know?’ I can see from the expression on her face that I’m not convincing her. ‘Work-wise, I mean,’ I add. I don’t know if Claire has children, but I do know that she doesn’t tolerate anyone using their kids as an excuse for missing a deadline or as leverage for a lighter workload. ‘I’m going to the theatre tonight so I can write a review of The Cherry Orchard for The Mag, I’ve got a Sports Day to cover at the local comp tomorrow and—’

‘Jonathan, I’m giving you the opportunity to get in there ahead of the pack. This is investigative journalism.’

‘Claire. I can’t do it.’

‘Why the hell not?’

‘It’s personal.’ I have to make an effort not to raise my voice.

‘So is this.’

‘What do you mean?’

‘I mean it has to be you. It can’t be anyone else. It wasn’t my idea. It came from … Your name …’ She breaks off, as if she realises she has said too much.

‘Who asked—?’

‘Anyway, you know as well as I do, there is no one else.’

I rack my brains, trying to think of another journo who could take the job. I have to get out of this.

‘You never know, Jonathan. Maybe they got it wrong and Melissa Slade was innocent all along.’

‘Yeah, right,’ I scoff.

‘That would be a great angle,’ Claire continues, as if I hadn’t spoken. ‘She did time when she didn’t do the crime.’

An image bursts into my mind. Melissa Slade, sitting in the dock at Bristol Crown Court. Impassive and cold. I was in that courtroom nearly every day. I didn’t see her shed a single tear. Not once during the whole three weeks of her trial.

‘She was found guilty,’ I argue. ‘She did it.’

I storm out of the Aquarium, only just refraining from slamming the door behind me.

Chapter 2

Melissa

I’ve been seeing someone since I arrived here. A shrink. There’s no stigma attached to it the way there is when you’re on the outside. All the inmates I know have regular appointments with the prison psychiatrist. Anyway, he suggested it might be therapeutic if I wrote down my version of events. I don’t like that term – it sounds as if my version is just one possible account of what happened instead of the truth.

At first, I was reluctant to go through everything again, to relive something that was – and still is – so traumatic. But I’ve decided to give it a go and see if it helps. And although one day someone else may read my story – my son, Callum, perhaps – I’m really writing it for myself, so I can always skip the parts that are too painful.

So, this will be a sort of diary, I suppose, but I don’t intend to write an entry about what’s going on in here every day. Where should I begin? I should focus on the events leading up to my imprisonment. It all started when my daughters, Amber and Ellie, were newborn babies. If I could turn back time – and every single day I wish I could – that’s the moment I would go back to.

January – February 2012

It wasn’t the same when I brought Callum home. Back then, I was on cloud nine. It really was the happiest time of my life, just as everyone tells you it will be. He was a calm baby and this gave me the impression I was getting everything right. To my delight, the pregnancy weight fell off my body in next to no time with a little exercise and no dieting whatsoever. Simon and I continued to see our friends, many of whom had children themselves. My best friend, Jenny, was expecting her first baby, too. Once she was on maternity leave, she popped round nearly every day to see Callum and me and, as she put it, “learn the ropes”.

I would spend several minutes a day just watching Callum sleep, marvelling at how perfect he was, this tiny human being that I’d created. I’d devoured at least half a dozen maternity books during my pregnancy, but nothing had prepared me for the tsunami of feelings that hit me with motherhood. Unconditional love like nothing I’d ever known before, but also such intense fear. I was terrified I wouldn’t be able to protect him. He was my responsibility, a huge responsibility. From the instant I brought him into this world, he became my world and I became his. My beautiful baby boy, my life.

With Ellie and Amber, however, it was very different and I didn’t know why. Perhaps it was because Michael wasn’t as supportive and helpful as Simon had been. Or maybe it was due to my age. I was thirteen years older, about to fall into my forties. It might have been because there were two of them. I don’t know.

I remember vividly the first time I realised something was wrong with me. It when I caught sight of my reflection in the mirror above the sofa one afternoon. The woman looking back was unrecognisable. My hair was greasy and lank, my face blotchy and my eyes were bloodshot from lack of sleep. It struck me that I’d been wearing my pyjamas for at least three days and nights. The top had baby sick down the front. I couldn’t recall when I’d last taken a shower. I looked awful; I felt awful.

Amber – or maybe it was Ellie – started to scream. It was time for a feed. Instead of going to her, I headed for the bathroom.

‘Your mummy is smelly,’ I threw over my shoulder in a voice that didn’t sound like mine. ‘She needs a shower.’

I took my time, spending several minutes under the hot jet. Afterwards, I sprayed on some deodorant, put on a bit of make-up and dried my hair. Then I got dressed – into a maternity outfit – I couldn’t fit into my normal clothes yet, but at least I felt cleansed.

That feeling didn’t last long. It was quickly replaced by a crushing guilt as I came back into the living room and realised both girls were wailing now. Their racket would have been audible in the bathroom – except for when I was in the shower or when my hairdryer was on – and deafening from the bedroom, directly above, but I must have blocked out their cries.

I went through the motions on automatic pilot, laying them on nursing pillows so I could feed them each with a bottle at the same time, and then changing their nappies one after the other. When they’d calmed down and were strapped into their baby bouncers, I went into the kitchen and made myself breakfast. It was three in the afternoon.

Sitting at the wooden table, I remember glancing up at the clock and noticing it was now half past three. My porridge was still in the bowl, in front of me, untouched. I’d been staring at it. I had no appetite. What had been going through my head for the last half an hour? I had no idea.

It didn’t even occur to me to clean up the mess I’d made in the kitchen. I walked back into the living room, my legs heavy and unwilling, as if they’d been chained together. I looked at the twins. My baby girls. They were perfect. Amber had dark hair, like Michael and his daughter, Bella, and Ellie was fair like Callum and me.

I remembered waking up in a pool of sweat the previous night after a particularly vivid nightmare. In my dream, I’d fallen asleep, a baby in each of my arms, and they were about to fall to the floor. It wasn’t the first time I’d dreamt that. Far from it. It had become a recurring nightmare.

When I thought about the dream, two things occurred to me. Firstly, it reflected my fear that I was a bad mother. But I thought it also proved I cared about my girls. I didn’t want them to come to any harm. I found that reassuring because it meant there couldn’t be anything chemically wrong with me. Could there?

Looking at them jiggling on their rocker chairs, I could see how adorable they were. I just didn’t feel any bond. There was no emotion in me at all. I couldn’t connect. No matter how cute they were, or how much they smiled, the bottom line was I didn’t love my baby girls. Apart from a sort of detached numbness, I didn’t really feel anything.

I tried to discuss this with my husband. ‘Do you think I resent them?’

‘Possibly,’ he said. ‘I do too sometimes if I’m honest. After all, we didn’t exactly plan this pregnancy.’

That was true. It came about after I’d had a tummy bug. I must have thrown up my contraceptive pill. Of course, I only realised this about two months later – when it was too late – as I started throwing up again, this time with morning sickness.

‘Our sex life is pretty much non-existent at the moment,’ Michael added, looking at me in a way that implied he blamed me, more than the twins, for that.

‘It will get better.’

‘And we don’t see much of our friends anymore.’

‘I’m sorry, Michael. I can’t help it. I’m simply not up to socialising – I feel exhausted all the time.’

It wasn’t just that. I no longer seemed to have anything in common with my friends. Their kids were around the same age as my son, Callum, and my stepdaughter, Bella, and they were into terrible teens and GCSEs or A levels with their offspring, as we were, but unlike us, they were done with nappies and night feeds and baby paraphernalia.

‘At least you get to go to work,’ I said with a sigh.

Perhaps this was my main regret. I’d had a high-flying career in the police force. I’d made chief inspector at the age of thirty-six and I was heading my second major murder investigation three years later when I found out I was pregnant. In the end, I’d had to hand over the command for that particular case to take my maternity leave. Any aspirations of one day climbing another rung on the ladder had been put on hold. I hoped this was temporary, although in the weeks after the twins were born, I couldn’t imagine ever having the energy to go back to work.

‘Someone has to earn the bread,’ Michael said.

‘I know. I just feel a bit … housebound.’

‘Why don’t you go for a run? The exercise would do you good.’

I’d been completely addicted to sport before I found out I was pregnant. I ran two or three marathons a year, and did ultra trails. When I had the twins, Michael bought me a special buggy so I could go for a jog with them. But the winter was dragging on, Amber seemed to have a constantly runny nose and sniffles, and I was constantly tired. I hadn’t used the sports stroller once. I hadn’t done any sport whatsoever for ages. Michael’s suggestion was a good one, but I didn’t feel like it.

I wasn’t sure how to pull myself out of the dark abyss I’d fallen into. But then one afternoon, Jenny came for a visit. I thought she’d been avoiding me, but perhaps it was just her busy life that had got in the way and kept us apart, even though she only lived up the road, or maybe I was the one avoiding her.

Jenny hadn’t given me much notice and as she stepped into the house, I saw it through her eyes. The place was a pigsty. She made us a mug of tea and rang her cleaner. Ten minutes later, a young woman arrived on my doorstep and introduced herself in a strong Eastern European accent as “Irena the cleaner”. In other circumstances, her greeting might have sparked some amusement, but sleep deprivation had robbed me of my sense of humour.

‘Let’s get the girls ready,’ Jenny said. ‘We’ll go out for some fresh air.’

So while Irena cleaned my house, Jenny and I took Amber and Ellie to the park. It must have been just after school finished for the day because there were lots of children. As we walked along the path, Jenny pushing the buggy, I saw a woman sitting on a bench. She looked how I felt, drained and dazed. She was unwrapping a chocolate bar for her little girl, who was jumping up and down impatiently.

But in the other direction a couple of women walked by, one with a pushchair and one holding a toddler by the hand. They were talking and laughing together, their animated made-up faces glowing with youthful energy. They made it all look so easy; they made me feel like a failure, as if I was inferior to these yummy mummies and would never be up to scratch. I burst into tears.

Using one hand to push the stroller, Jenny took my elbow with her other hand, and led me to a free bench a few feet away. She held me and rubbed my back while violent sobs racked my whole body. I’m not sure how long I cried. I was aware of passers-by staring at us, and I was embarrassed, but Jenny didn’t seem to be.

‘You need help,’ she said, when I’d finished, without asking me what was wrong. ‘You can’t possibly cope with two teenagers and twin babies by yourself.’ She fished a packet of tissues out of her handbag and handed me one.

‘Bella helps me out when she’s home,’ I said. ‘And Michael …’

What did Michael do exactly? An image came to me, then, unbidden – Michael raising his eyebrows disapprovingly. I couldn’t pinpoint an actual event to go with the image; he seemed to be giving me that look a lot lately. When he came home at a reasonable time and dinner wasn’t ready. Or when he came home late and the house was still untidy.

Jenny didn’t push it. ‘Wasn’t your mum helping you out?’ she asked instead.

‘She was, but we had a row.’ I didn’t go into details. It was a petty argument, caused partly by my inability to take advice and partly by my mother giving criticism and instructions rather than suggestions and assistance. I needed to pick up the phone and call her, but I wished just for once that she would make the first move.

‘I’ll have a word with Irena when we get back to your place,’ Jenny said. ‘We’ll set up something permanent with her. Then we’ll make a doctor’s appointment for you. And from now on, you must have some time out for yourself. Some “me time”, as they say. Every day. To do some exercise, to have a haircut and a facial, or just to relax and breathe.’

I stared at Jenny blankly. I could hardly find the energy to get out of bed, or the time to do basic household chores. On an exceptionally good day, I managed to get dressed and clean my teeth before Michael came home in the evening. How on earth was I going to get out and do some sport or get a makeover?

Jenny answered my unspoken question. ‘You need a nanny. We’ll find you a nanny,’ she said.

I wasn’t sure if this was a good idea or how Michael would feel about it. We could easily afford it, although Mike was tight with money – well, he called it “frugal” – but I had my maternity pay.

‘Thanks,’ I said. ‘You’re a brick.’ I welled up again, thinking I didn’t deserve her.

‘Of course you do,’ she said firmly, and I realised I’d voiced that thought. ‘You have to stop thinking like that. You’re not yourself at the moment, that’s all.’

‘How did you know?’

‘Well, you might have sailed through motherhood last time with Callum, but I found it a bit of a struggle with Sophia.’

I knew that must be an understatement. Jenny wasn’t the sort of person to seek attention for herself and she wouldn’t have wanted me to feel sorry for her. I hugged her.

In the end, Jenny didn’t find a nanny; she found an au pair. With hindsight, of course, it was a mistake letting Clémentine into our home. But we couldn’t have foreseen how she would change our lives. Especially mine.

Chapter 3

Jonathan

April 2018

Just as I’m undocking my laptop to leave the office for the day, my phone beeps with a text. It’s from Nina, my childminder. I read it, swearing under my breath.

‘What’s up?’ Kelly says, turning to face me.

‘I was supposed to go to see The Cherry Orchard this evening,’ I say absent-mindedly, my finger typing out a short reply on the keyboard of my phone, ‘but Nina has let me down.’

I hit the arrow to send the text and look up to see the blank expression on Kelly’s face as she ponders this.

‘It’s a play,’ I add, ‘by Chekhov.’

‘I know,’ Kelly says. She doesn’t sound at all indignant, but I feel slightly guilty for underestimating her. ‘I haven’t seen that one,’ she continues, ‘but I’ve seen The Seagull and read Three Sisters. More of an Ibsen fan myself.’

There’s an awkward pause and I don’t know how to fill it. I can’t stand Ibsen or Chekhov, personally. I’m not a keen theatregoer at all, except for the Christmas pantomime, but that doesn’t seem like the right thing to say.

In the end, Kelly puts a stop to the pause, but adds to the awkwardness. ‘Is it for a review for The Mag?’ She doesn’t pause for me to answer. ‘I’ll go with you if you don’t want to go by yourself.’

‘What? Oh, no. Nina was supposed to look after my kids. She’s not my date.’

Holly, my girlfriend, is my date. Holly is pretty and intelligent – she’s a pathologist – and I’ve been seeing her for about eighteen months now. My heart sinks at having to cancel my plans with her this evening, although part of me is thrilled at not having to sit through the play. But I still need to fake a review somehow.

‘Oh.’ Kelly actually sounds disappointed and I realise the play is probably more her bag than mine. ‘Well, I can babysit if you like,’ she says, ‘to thank you for your help earlier.’

‘That’s very kind of you, Kelly, but it’s part of my job description to oversee your work, and I couldn’t possibly accept your kind offer. I’ve got two tickets, though. It’s on at Bristol Old Vic. Is there someone you could go with?’ Her angelic face brightens up and she nods.

‘Yeah. My mum’s quite arty. I’m sure she’d love to go with me!’

I open my desk drawer and pull out the envelope containing the tickets. ‘I’ll need some feedback I can use for my write-up,’ I say. Kelly nods again. ‘I’ll give you a hand with your feature on the homeless if you like.’

On my way home, I call Holly to cancel.

‘Oh, never mind. That’s OK,’ she says, although I can tell from the sound of her voice that it’s not. ‘If you like, I could …’

She doesn’t finish her sentence, but I can guess what she was about to say. Even though we’ve been dating for a year and a half, I still haven’t told anyone about her, least of all my boys. Holly is desperate to come round and meet them. It’s a topic she has been bringing up a lot lately and that I’ve been circumventing. I’m sure Holly thinks I’m commitment-phobic, but it’s not that. I think I’m doing a good job of moving on, and it’s what Mel would have wanted; it’s just that at the moment I’m happy with the way things are.

‘I’ll make it up to you, I promise.’

As I make pizza and watch Paddington 2 with my sons that evening, I’ve all but forgotten about Melissa Slade. I can feel her crouching at the back of my mind, ready to jump out at me, but I’m doing a good job of shutting her out for the moment.

But once I’ve turned off the TV and put the boys to bed, there’s no distraction and no buffer against my thoughts, and I can’t seem to get Melissa Slade out of my head.

I can’t be bothered to boot up my laptop this evening, but on my phone I skim through some more of the online articles from the trial and her first appeal.

Mel was obsessed with the case. She dreamt of having a baby girl – we were trying for another baby at the time – and she didn’t believe that this woman could have killed hers. But that was Mel. She was a good person and she only ever saw the good in other people. ‘Innocent until proven guilty, Jon,’ I remember her saying when we discussed Melissa Slade’s trial in the evenings when I got home from the courtroom.

We didn’t discuss the appeal that followed in November 2014. Mel had died two months earlier.

I feel a tear snake its way down my cheek. I wish Mel were here now. I’d like to ask her for advice. I don’t know what to do. What would you do, Mel? But as soon as the question enters my head, the answer comes to me.

You can do this, Jon. The voice in my head is Mel’s. The voice of reason. It has nothing to do with us. Nothing to do with what happened to our family.

‘Innocent until proven guilty, huh?’ I say aloud. ‘But she was found guilty as charged.’

Leaning back on the sofa, I doze off for a while, but it’s a fitful sleep. I wake up with a start and a crick in my neck. I get up and check on Noah and Alfie before making my way to bed.

The following day, after covering Sports Day at the local school, I write a review from Kelly’s enthusiastic comments about the play and the programme, which she has brought with her to show me. She has also taken a few photos with her smartphone and I choose one of the better ones. I add Kelly’s name to mine at the top of the article.

At lunchtime, I honour my promise to Kelly. At first she’s confused when I buy three sandwiches, but she gives her trademark grin when she gets it. There seem to be roadworks all over the city at the moment, so instead of taking my car, we walk to Temple Way and then get on the bus for Cabot Circus. With my mouth full of BLT sub, I brief Kelly before we get off at the shopping centre.

‘You need originality. You wrote that the number of Bristol’s homeless is twice the national average, which is shocking, and you mention that a local charity has made shipping containers into homes to get people off the streets, which is fantastic, but this is old news. We need the faces behind the facts and figures. You have to add something new.’

Kelly bobs her head vigorously then bites into her sandwich. When she’s not grinning, she’s nodding, I think unfairly.

As we wander up and down the pedestrianised streets around the shopping centre, I start to think we should have come after work, in the evening. But then we see a woman sitting in the doorway of a shop, hugging her knees to her chest, her sleeping bag rolled up beside her. The shop has “clearance sale” stickers across its windows and has evidently now closed down.

‘There’s your angle,’ I say to Kelly, pointing.

‘What? Oh, I see. The irony. Someone sleeping rough in front of an empty building when the council promised to open up empty buildings to house them.’

‘No. That’s not what I meant. Although, that could work, too. I was thinking more—’

‘Bristol’s Homeless Women,’ Kelly finishes my sentence.

‘Exactly,’ I say. Handing Kelly a bacon sub and a ten-pound note, I tell her I’ll be waiting for her in Costa Coffee a few doors up the road. ‘Don’t forget to take her photo,’ I remind her.