A Last Kiss for Mummy Read Free Page B

floor!’
    I was always a bit like this when an important meeting loomed. I’d done the house from top to bottom yesterday but I still felt I could do more. I’m a bit of a clean-freak and was characteristically anxious in case I’d missed some speck of dust or splash of water somewhere. Ridiculous, really, since neither John nor Maggie would be up inspecting my bathroom, but even so I just couldn’t help it.
    ‘Now, remember,’ Mike warned me, having come back down and joined me at the dining table, ‘we’re here to listen to what they have to say; to mull it all over and consider the possibilities. Not to immediately ask when the girl can move in, okay?’
    ‘Oh, be quiet, Mike,’ I chided him. ‘I’m not a child, you know. Anyway, they’re here now,’ I added, gesturing to the car that was pulling up outside. ‘Go on,’ I said. ‘Go let them in.’
    I smoothed my blouse down over my jeans and glanced again out of the window as Mike did so, childishly pleased to see that I’d been right; Maggie Cunliffe looked exactly like a Maggie. Mid-forties or thereabouts, I decided, with a lovely warm expression and curly blonde hair. She was also, I noticed appreciatively, dressed in jeans and a warm jumper. Nothing prim or proper about her. I felt immediately at ease.
    The file itself, however, looked rather more daunting. Introductions done, the coffee poured, the biscuits politely declined – so far – it appeared out of Maggie’s briefcase and landed on the table with a dull thud. Which was unusual. It was normally the case that we had almost nothing to go on, and had to find out the extent of a child’s difficulties the hard way.
    Not so here, clearly. Maggie dived straight in with a summary.
    ‘Emma’s mum was only sixteen when she had Emma,’ she began. She had a soft Scottish accent, which seemed to go just perfectly with her name. ‘There was no boyfriend – again, there’s no knowledge of who the father was – and, as you already know, Shelley – that’s her name – has battled with her demons since we’ve known her. She’s an only child herself and has long since been estranged from her own mother, and has a long history of substance abuse. Various addictions have been on file here: alcohol, prescription medicines, as well as an array of illegal drugs. During her worst periods – and there have been quite a few down the years – she’s had Emma placed into care, or had the authorities just step in and take her, but, because she never objected and so often put Emma in care voluntarily, a court order’s never been sought.
    ‘Every now and then,’ Maggie continued, ‘Shelley would sign herself up for rehab, get clean, and then come out determined to step up to the plate and take proper care of her daughter, but of course the harsh reality is that with each new episode of this kind she was just chipping away at Emma’s trust.’ Maggie sighed. ‘So, as night follows day, each time Emma went back into care – and the older she got – the more and more she felt she didn’t need her mum. It’s a really sad one, this.’ She glanced up and looked directly at me. ‘You can see how the picture’s formed here, can’t you, Casey? And it’s why we’ve ended up with the Emma we have today.’
    I nodded sadly. I could see it all too clearly. She’d be feeling lost, hurting lots and desperately needing some attachment. In my years working with teenagers I’d seen so many like her; girls who’d gone on to get pregnant at such a tragically early age simply to stop an ache that they had inside them. It was partly a need to nurture, a need to have at least something – someone – to call their own, to replace the pain of not having a mother’s love and affection.
    ‘I can indeed,’ I agreed, visualising this poor child so very well. ‘And we’re up to speed with the situation with the boyfriend, as well. John’s filled us in there.’
    ‘Yes, indeed,’ John confirmed. ‘So the