Thyla - Kate Gordon [7]
‘Where in the bush?’ I asked, but something inside me already knew the answer.
‘Very near to where we found you,’ you replied. ‘In the Waterworks. Just near the mountain. Just over there, actually.’
I looked up towards the mountain and felt my body go cold. That was where I was found. I wondered if it was where I’d lived. It seemed so majestic and yet so forbidding. It would have been a glorious place to live, I thought, but a harsh one.
‘I’ll never forget that moment,’ you said, your voice suddenly soft and tender. ‘When I first saw you. Have I told you about that day?’
I shook my head. I knew what happened after you found me, but not what happened before.
‘Well, we’d received an anonymous phone call, about a girl who’d been injured,’ you explained. ‘Vinnie and I went up there together and we saw you straight away. You were lying there in a pool of light; all lit up like a strange angel. In the car on the way there, I’d dared to hope it might be … but we found you instead. And I’m very glad to have found you!’
You put your hand on my shoulder as a new thought occurred to me. ‘Is that why you’ve been so nice to me? Because of where I was found? Because you think I might have seen your daughter on the mountain?’
You shook your head. ‘No. Well, maybe a bit, at first. But I’ve come to care about you a lot. Not because of Cat. Because of you. And, you know, once a mother, always a mother.’
I was not angry at you any more, Connolly. In those few seconds I stopped being angry and started feeling sad. And guilty.
‘I’m sorry,’ I began.
You clasped my arm with your freckled hand and said, ‘No, Tess. It’s okay. I know you’re feeling hurt. And lost. And abandoned. And I’m sorry that I have to leave you. I would take you home with me – I really would – but it’s against protocol. The other alternatives for you weren’t really suitable – group homes and that sort of thing. After what you’ve been through, you need an adult to look out for you. At least I know that here Cynthia can keep an eye on you. As long as you let her. Don’t fight her like Cat did, okay, Tess?’
I nodded and you went on. ‘And she’s set up the daughter of one of Vinnie’s friends to look out for you, too. She’ll be your peer mentor. Her name is Charlotte. I don’t remember Cat talking about her, but then Cat didn’t talk to me about anything much after she came here. Cynthia says she’s a good girl, though. A prefect. I hope you’ll like her.’
‘Connolly?’ I said.
‘What, Tess?’
‘If I remember anything about Cat, I’ll tell you. I promise.’
And I meant it. Suddenly, strongly, I needed to find Cat. I needed to help you, to repay you. And I needed to make Cat safe. Some fuzzy memory whispered to me that I could do this. I needed to do this. Perhaps this was my purpose.
I now had a reason to want to remember. I had a reason to use this notebook.
‘Thank you, Tessa,’ you said. ‘And I will never stop trying to find out who you are.’
Then you went and you left me by myself.
You were going to come in with me and say hello to Cynthia but as I opened the car door, a call came through on the black box you called your ‘two-way’. It was Vinnie. I recognised his voice, even with all the crackles and squeals.
‘Connolly, are you done with the kid? I need you at the station.’ It wasn’t a request. I could tell that much.
‘I’d better go,’ you said, rolling your eyes. ‘I’m sorry. Tell Cynthia we’ll catch up for coffee soon. And call me. At least once a week. You have my phone number?’
I felt at the pocket of my new school skirt, the one you bought for me. Though I did not find the skirt agreeable – I found it uncomfortable compared with trousers, and I believed its length indecently short – I was thankful to you for buying it for me. I knew the other girls would be wearing similar skirts and I wished to look as they did. Inside the pocket, a piece of paper rustled: the piece of paper on which you had written your ‘number’.
‘Yes,’ I said, and I decided I would work out later how exactly to use a ‘phone’.
‘Right, well, do. I mean it. I want to hear how you’re going.