The Girl Who Wanted to Belong, Book 5 by Angela Hart

Author:Angela Hart
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Pan Macmillan UK

13

‘Why should you care?’

‘Mrs Hart? Can you come into the office when you collect Lucy this evening? I’m afraid we’re having a few problems.’

It was the school on the phone.

‘I’m sorry to hear that. What sort of problems?’

‘Disruptive behaviour. Name-calling. Annoying other pupils. Miss Heather has kept a log this week and would like to talk to you.’

We weren’t particularly surprised to have received a call from Lucy’s school, because ever since the disastrous Child and Family meeting her behaviour had deteriorated even further at home. Telling her about Gemma admitting to the lies was not pleasant at all. Lucy pulled her own hair and kicked the wall, then she ran around the house yelling, ‘I told you I’d never said those things! It’s the same here, nobody listens to me! I hate it here!’

I tried to be as positive as possible, telling her it was brave of Gemma to tell the truth in the end, but Lucy was having none of it. ‘She won’t get into trouble, I bet you! It’s always OK for her to tell lies, but it’s not OK for me to even tell white lies.’ I didn’t know what to say to that, because she was probably right. From what I’d heard, Wendy wasn’t going to discipline her daughter, and I couldn’t imagine Dean wading in and contradicting anything Wendy said.

Lucy had begun to make it a nightly habit to set the taps at the point where they made the pipework whistle and clank, just to annoy us. She did this all around the house and Maria reacted every time. One night they’d tussled on the landing, pulling each other’s hair and calling each other names. Jonathan had to step in and separate them.

‘Can’t you get rid of her?’ Maria complained nastily. ‘Can’t she go back to her family? Oh sorr-ee. Her family doesn’t want her.’

‘Yes they do! It’s your family who doesn’t want you. At least I visit mine. You are only allowed to visit your gran!’

‘Ha! When are you seeing your gran? I’m seeing mine tomorrow, so there!’

‘Girls! That’s quite enough,’ I said sharply. ‘Both of you – stop talking! I don’t want to hear another word.’

I had no idea what Maria knew about Lucy’s circumstances, or vice versa. I certainly never discussed any child’s personal details with anybody else, let alone another child in the house. I could only assume that, despite their differences, the girls must have spoken at some point about their families and how come they were in foster care.

We sent them to their rooms to simmer down. I thought how sad it was that the two girls had so much in common yet clashed so much. I wished they could have been a support to each other rather than falling out like this, but I knew it was probably just wishful thinking.

When children have suffered trauma and upset in their life it can take many years to repair the damage and for those children to display anything like ‘normal’ behaviour.

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