A Family Torn Apart by Cathy Glass

Author:Cathy Glass
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: HarperCollins Publishers
Published: 2022-05-11T21:53:45+00:00

The following day I took the girls shopping for the last of their school clothes. Selina had bought their uniforms, but I needed to buy school shoes and PE kits. I also bought them more casual clothes, nightwear and underwear. Selina hadn’t sent any more of their personal possessions since they’d arrived, always assuming they would be going home soon. Paula came too and bought herself some jeans. We had lunch in a café in the shopping centre, which Angie and Polly enjoyed.

That afternoon when we phoned Selina she asked Angie and Polly what they’d been doing, and Angie told her we’d been shopping and bought school shoes and PE kits. Selina went very quiet and from then on seemed to struggle to make conversation. At the end she asked if she could speak to me alone, so I took my phone out of the room.

‘Don’t tell any of the other parents at school that Angie and Polly are in care,’ she said. I assumed this was the reason she’d gone quiet.

‘I won’t.’

‘What will you tell them?’

‘If anyone asks, I’ll say the girls are staying with me for a while. That’s all.’

‘They’re sure to find out,’ she said anxiously. ‘The school knows, so it will get out somehow.’ Some parents worry about this and find having children in care embarrassing, others don’t. ‘It’s best if you have nothing to do with the other parents while you wait in the playground before and after school,’ Selina continued. ‘Especially those parents whose children are friends with mine. They’re the ones who are likely to ask you. One has been texting me to see if we can meet up before school starts next week. I’ve said I’m too busy.’

‘Selina, from what I’ve read on the school’s website there won’t be much opportunity to socialize in the playground because of the pandemic restrictions. School start and end times are being staggered so only one class arrives and leaves at a time. Parents have to wait two metres apart to collect their children and then leave straight away.’

‘Oh, yes. I read that too,’ she said, brightening a little. ‘And parents have to wear a face mask while they wait.’

‘That’s right. Try not to worry. Even if another parent does approach me, I am very good at deflecting prying questions.’

‘When all this started I never in my wildest imagination thought Angie and Polly would still be in care now. I thought what Ashleigh said would have been cleared up long ago. But my nightmare goes on and on with no end in sight.’

‘I know these investigations can take time,’ I said.

‘Do you know how long?’

‘Months, not weeks.’

‘I’m losing my children, Cathy. I can feel it. They’re slipping away. Time is passing. I’m not there for them. We’re drifting apart. I’m no longer surprised I can’t hear them in the house or that their beds are empty. I’m adjusting to my children not being with me and it’s destroying me.’

I felt so sorry for her, but she was right.

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