Dead To Me

16

JANET WAS SHATTERED at the start of the day. She’d arrived home the night before to find Elise and Taisie going at it like something off Jerry Springer. Ade out at a leaving do for someone at school. As Janet came through the door, she could hear thumping from upstairs and Taisie screaming, ‘Give it me back, you slag. You bitch. Give it me now.’

‘Oy!’ Janet called out. ‘What’s going on?’

‘Give it me!’

Janet got halfway upstairs in time to see Taisie land a kick on Elise’s bedroom door. Taisie was incandescent, her face red with exertion, eyes wild.

‘What’s going on?’ Janet said again.

Taisie, only now aware of her there, rounded on her mother, as though Janet was also to blame: ‘She’s got my phone and she won’t give it back!’

‘Elise?’ Janet called. ‘Open the door.’

‘She tried to hit me,’ Elise said, slightly muffled. ‘Tell her off.’

‘Why did you hit her?’ Janet asked Taisie, who was unable to stand still, seething with outrage.

‘I didn’t, I missed,’ snapped Taisie. ‘And she took my phone, I told you, dumbo.’

‘Hey!’ Janet glared at Taisie. ‘Open the door, Elise,’ she said again.

She heard Elise fumbling with the lock. She had seen it so many times before. Taisie wronged by her bigger brighter sister, going off like a warehouse full of firecrackers while Elise, sensible and clever and sometimes a little holier than thou, took the moral high ground.

Elise opened the door and Taisie lunged, but Janet caught her arm. ‘Cool it, lady,’ she said. Then turned to Elise, ‘Give her the phone.’

Elise was flushed, a righteous look on her face. ‘But she-’

‘Give it,’ Janet said firmly, ‘and then you can explain.’

‘I haven’t done anything wrong,’ Elise protested, all wounded innocence. ‘Anyway, she’s-’

‘Elise,’ Janet cautioned.

Elise thrust out the phone, which Taisie snatched, snarling, ‘Loser.’

‘Taisie.’

‘Well, she is,’ Taisie retorted. ‘She’s no life of her own, so she’s spying on me.’

Janet looked to Elise for an explanation.

‘Why don’t you ask her what she’s got on her phone?’ Elise said. ‘You’ve heard of cyber bullying?’

Janet turned to Taisie.

‘It’s not, it’s just a joke,’ the younger girl said.

‘Unless you’re on the receiving end,’ Elise said sharply.

Janet held out her hand for the phone. Taisie coloured and Janet could see her gauging whether to refuse. ‘Give it.’

‘I hate you, you sad cow,’ Taisie yelled at Elise, as she plonked the phone in Janet’s outstretched hand.

‘Hate you more,’ Elise said.

Janet wasn’t sure what she was looking for on the phone but needed to appear in control. ‘I’ll keep this for now,’ she stalled. ‘You both must have some homework to do.’

‘It’s in the picture files,’ Elise said smugly.

Taisie stamped off to her room, banging the door hard.

Don’t slam it, Janet thought, but let it go.

She ate the warmed-up remains of beef curry as she navigated the phone. Found the picture directory, spotted the file name: Mr Fairy. It was Taisie’s form tutor, doctored to show the man with breasts and a tutu. It was crudely done, but effective if you wanted to lampoon the bloke. Janet could take him or leave him but had gathered he was unpopular with the kids. All the same, there was something cruel and distasteful in what they were doing. Eleven-year-olds!

Leaving Taisie to stew, Janet ran a bath. She thought about Lisa Finn’s missing phone. What might be on there, what it might tell them? Someone had taken it, concealed it. Because of what it might reveal? Or something more basic? Phone equals dosh. Sean would have reason to take it if he needed money for drugs. Or the killer might have stolen it, knowing it betrayed clues as to his identity. Was Sean the killer? She couldn’t tell. And that was OK; early days. You couldn’t rush an investigation, you’d be likely to muck it up if you did.

After her bath, Janet went to Taisie, the phone in hand. Taisie was sitting on her bed, school books spread out around her, but Janet had no idea whether she had done any work or simply arranged them for effect. Parents’ evenings, the ones she made it to, and the ones Ade had reported back on, brought less-than-glowing reports on Taisie’s work. She was slapdash and careless. Her reading and numeracy levels were almost a year short of the average for her age, though the school couldn’t find any specific problem to account for it, no dyslexia or other learning difficulty. Her attitude was found wanting too. They had hoped that the move to High School would be a fresh start, a turning point, but this didn’t bode well.

Janet sometimes thought it was as if Taisie, realizing Elise was a high achiever, motivated and hard-working, the swot of the family, had decided to carve out a different niche for herself in reaction. Wayward, bolshie, bold. At the end of the day, Janet wanted both her girls to be happy. Unlike Ade, she didn’t care overmuch if Taisie shunned the academic route, but she passionately wanted her to do well in some field, to know the sense of achievement, the boost to self-esteem, the sheer engagement that came from a job well done, from having skills and being a success. Whenever Taisie showed any glimmer of interest in something: street dance, ice-skating, guitar, woodwork, Janet was 100 per cent behind her: encouraging, interested, shelling out for all the gear. And all too often Taisie’s interest faded as quickly as it had blossomed. The roof space was half-full of discarded tennis racquets and jewellery-making kits, magic sets and martial arts outfits.

‘How do you think he feels?’ Janet held up the phone.

‘It’s only a joke,’ Taisie said.

‘I’m not laughing. Would you like it if it was you? Would it make you laugh?’

‘I wouldn’t care,’ Taisie said dismissively, with a toss of her head.

‘You think?’ Janet said. ‘And if it was me or your dad?’

She didn’t say anything.

‘This is a form of bullying.’ Janet sat on the edge of the bed. ‘I don’t want you to be a bully. You’re better than that.’

‘It’s not,’ Taisie began, though Janet could see the alteration in her expression, a hint of embarrassment.

‘It is,’ Janet said, ‘and it can start with a picture like this, and then another, and then something worse, something online. And everyone’s having a laugh, but it gets nastier and people say awful things, mean and hurtful things.’

‘We didn’t mean anything bad,’ Taisie said, her voice small, mouth turned down.

‘The police get involved sometimes, you know. Intentional harassment – it’s taken seriously.’

Taisie stared at her, her face a mix of anxiety and bravado.

‘Exactly this sort of thing,’ Janet went on. ‘Bullying.’

‘He’s a teacher,’ Taisie said.

‘Doesn’t matter. He’s a person, he’s a human being. You don’t have to like him, but you treat him the same as you’d want for yourself.’ Taisie had gone quiet. Janet knew she was getting through to her. ‘So how are you going to make this right?’

Taisie shrugged, a jerk of the shoulders up and back, one fingernail scraping at the nail polish she’d tried last week.

At ten? Ade had said, tarting herself up, rampant sexualization.

It’s hardly nipple tassels and a thong, Janet had replied. You make a fuss and she’ll push it further, you know what she’s like.

‘Absolutely no idea?’ Janet prompted Taisie.

‘Delete it.’

‘Be a start. And you could tell your friends to do the same, and tell them your mum’s talking about opening an investigation if there’s any more of it.’

‘Mum!’

‘It’s not a joke,’ Janet said. ‘So you do that and then give me your phone.’

‘What?’ Taisie glared at her.

‘No phone for a week. No MSN – the lot.’

‘That is so not fair. That is tight!’

‘Yep,’ Janet said. ‘So maybe you’ll think twice next time.’ She got up to leave. ‘And tell whoever did the photoshop that the tutu was too small,’ she added on her way out.

‘It was the only one-’ Taisie stopped abruptly, but not soon enough.

Gotcha! Janet paused at the door. Taisie had the grace to blush. Perhaps art was the way to go? Or IT? Collage or photomontage her thing. Get her a camera for Christmas, given her recent surge of interest in photography. How much was a decent camera these days? Too much? Ade could do some research.

Elise was on the landing, pretending to come out of the bathroom. ‘Heard enough?’ Janet asked her.

‘Is she grounded?’ Elise said. ‘Have you taken her phone?’

‘No phone for a week. But you could have waited till I got back, let me deal with it.’

‘She’d have wiped it by then,’ Elise protested.

By the time Janet got downstairs Ade had arrived and she had to fill him in on it all, and when she finally did get to bed she remembered she still had to sort out her mum’s birthday present. And she worried about Taisie. She did her best, but what if it wasn’t enough? What then?

I did my best, Denise Finn had said. We all do. Until it goes wrong and all you can hear is that mocking voice inside, nagging away: Could I have done more, done it differently?

Ade snored all night. She kicked him every so often and he made huffing sounds and turned over and after a few minutes he was off snoring again. By the time she sat down to plan an interview strategy for Sean Broughton the next morning she felt dog rough. Damned if she’d let it show though.