Forbidden (27 page)

. Somehow he keeps pace with the car until we reach the end of the narrow street, until we accelerate out onto the main road. Franticaly craning my head to keep him in sight, I see him finaly stumble to a halt, his hands by his sides: defeated, crying.

You don’t let Kit lose! I want to shout at the officers. You never let any of them lose! Even when giving them a run for their money, you always, always let them catch you in the end. He stands there, staring at the car as if wiling us back, and I watch him rapidly shrink as the space between us grows. Soon my little brother is just a tiny speck in the distance – and then I can no longer see him at al.

We stop in a large car park ful of different kinds of police vehicles. Once again I am taken firmly by the arm and puled out. Pain from my bladder makes me wince as I stand, the breeze against my bare arms causing me to shiver. After crossing the tarmac, I am led through some kind of back entrance, along a short corridor and through a door labeled CHARGE ROOM. Another

uniformed officer sits behind a tal desk. The two officers at my side address him as Sergeant and inform him of my offence, but to my great relief he barely looks at me, mechanicaly tapping my details into his computer. The charge is read out to me yet again, but when I am asked if I understand it, my nod is not accepted. The question is repeated and I’m forced to use my voice.

‘Yes.’ This time I only manage a whisper. Away from the house and the danger of further upsetting Maya, I can feel myself losing strength: succumbing to the shock, the horror, the blind panic of the situation.

More questions folow. Again I am asked to repeat my name, address, date of birth. I struggle to reply, my brain seems to be slowly shutting down. When asked my occupation, I hesitate. ‘I – I don’t have one.’

‘Are you on unemployment benefit?’

‘No. I’m – I’m stil at school.’

The sergeant looks up at me then. My face burns beneath his penetrating gaze. Questions about my health folow, and my mental state is also questioned – no doubt they think only a psychopath would be capable of such a crime. I’m asked if I want a solicitor and respond immediately with a shake of the head. The last thing I need is someone else to be involved, to hear about al the terrible things I’ve done. Anyway, I am trying to prove my guilt, not my innocence. After being uncuffed, I am told to hand over my possessions. Fortunately I have none and feel relieved I didn’t take the photo from my room. Perhaps Maya wil remember it and keep it safe. But I can’t help hoping she’l cut off the two adults at either end of the bench and just keep the five children sandwiched in the middle. Because, ultimately, that was the family we became. In the end we were the ones who loved each other, who struggled and fought to stay together. And it was enough, more than enough.

They ask me to empty my pockets, remove the laces from my shoes. Again the tremor in my hands betrays me, and as I kneel between the suited legs on the dirty lino, I sense the officers’

impatience, their contempt. The shoelaces are placed in an envelope and I have to sign for them, which strikes me as absurd. A body search folows, and at the touch of the officer’s hands running over me, up and down my legs, I start to shake violently, holding onto the edge of the desk to steady myself.

In a smal anteroom, I am seated on a chair: my photo is taken, a cotton swab scraped around the inside of my mouth. As my fingers are pressed one by one against an ink pad and then down onto a marked piece of card, I am overcome by a feeling of complete detachment. I am a mere object to these people. I am barely human any more.

I am thankful when I am finaly pushed into a cel and the heavy door slams shut behind me. To my relief it is empty: smal and claustrophobic, containing nothing more than a narrow bed built into the wal. There is a barred window near the ceiling, but the light that fils the room is purely artificial, harsh and over-bright. Graffiti and what looks like faeces smear the wals. The stench is foul – far worse than the most disgusting of public urinals – and I have to breathe through my mouth to avoid gagging. It takes me for ever to relax enough to empty my bladder into the metal toilet. Now, finaly away from their watchful eyes, I cannot stop trembling. I fear that an officer wil burst in at any moment, am acutely aware of the smal window in the door, the flap just beneath it. How do I know I am not being watched right this minute? Normaly I am not this prudish, but after being puled out of bed in my underwear, frogmarched semi-naked to my bedroom by two policemen, forced to dress in front of them, I wish there was some way of covering myself up for ever. Ever since hearing the horrific charge, I have been feeling acutely ashamed of my whole body, of what it has done – of what others believe it has done.

Flushing the toilet, I return to the thick metal door and press my ear against it. Shouts echo down the corridor, drunken swearing, a wail that goes on and on, but they seem to be coming from some way away. If I keep my back to the door, then even if an officer peers at me through the window, at least he won’t be able to see my face.

No sooner have I ascertained that I finaly have some degree of privacy than the safety valve in my mind that had kept me functioning until now opens, as if by force, and the images and memories flood in. I make a sudden dash for the bed, but my knees give way before I reach it. I sink down on the concrete floor and dig my nails into the thick plastic sheet sewn onto the mattress. I pul at it so violently, I’m scared it might rip. Doubling over, I press my face hard against the stinking bed, muffling my nose and mouth as much as I can. The gut-wrenching sobs tear at my whole body, threatening to split me apart with their force. The whole mattress shakes, my ribcage shuddering against the hard bed-frame, and I am choking, suffocating, depriving myself of oxygen but unable to raise my head to draw breath for fear of making a sound. Crying has never hurt so much. I want to crawl under the bed in case someone looks in and sees me like this, but the space is far too smal. I cannot even remove the bed-sheet in order to cover myself – there is simply nowhere to hide. I hear Kit’s anguished cries, see his fists pound against the window, his skinny frame racing to keep up with the car, his whole body crumpling as he realizes he is powerless to rescue me. I think of Tiffin and Wila playing at Freddie’s, running round the house with their friends in excitement, oblivious of what awaits them on their return. Wil they be told what I have done? Wil they be questioned about me too – asked about al the cuddles, the bath-times, the bedtimes, being tickled, the rough-andtumble games we used to play? Wil they be brainwashed into thinking I abused them? And in years to come, if we ever get the chance to meet again as adults, wil they even want to see me? Tiffin wil have vague memories of me, but Wila wil have known me for only the first five years of her life – what, if any, memories, wil she retain?

Finaly, too weak to keep her from my thoughts any longer, I think of Maya. Maya, Maya, Maya. I choke her name into my hands, hoping that the sound of her name wil bring me some comfort. I never, ever should have taken such a terrible risk with her happiness. For her sake, for the children’s sakes, I should never have alowed our relationship to develop. I cannot regret it for myself – there is nothing I wouldn’t have endured just for the few months we had together. But I never thought about the danger to her, the horror she would be forced to undergo.

I am terrified of what they might be doing to her right now – bombarding her with questions she wil struggle to answer, torn between protecting me by teling the truth and accusing me of rape to enable her to protect the children. How could I have put her in such a position? How could I have asked her to make such a choice?

The clash and crash of keys and metal locks jolts through my body, startling me into confused, panicked consciousness. An officer orders me to get up, informs me I’m being taken to the interview room. Before I can get my body to respond I am seized by the arm and jolted to my feet. I pul away for a moment, desperate to get my thoughts in order – al I need is a moment to clear my head, remember what it is I have to say. This could be my only chance and I have to get it right, al of it, make sure there isn’t the slightest discrepancy between Maya’s story and my own. I am cuffed once again and led down several long, brightly lit corridors. I have no idea how long it’s been since I was shoved into the cel – time has ceased to exist: there are no windows and I cannot tel what time of day or night it is. I feel dizzy with pain and fear: one wrong word, one wrong move and I could mess it al up, let something slip that would somehow implicate Maya in this too. Much like my cel, the interview room is harshly lit: bright, fluorescent light turning the whole room an eerie yelow. It isn’t much bigger than the cel, but now the stench of urine is replaced by sweat and stale air, the wals are bare and the floor carpeted. The only furniture is a narrow table and three chairs. Two officers are seated on the far side: a man and a woman. The man looks to be in his early forties, with a narrow face and close-cropped hair. The hardness behind the eyes, the grave expression, the set of the jaw al suggest that he has seen this many times before, has been breaking criminals down for years – he looks sharp and shrewd, and there is something tough and intimidating about him. The woman, on the other hand, looks older and more ordinary, with scraped-back hair and a world-weary expression, but her eyes also have that sharp gaze. Both officers look as if they have been wel-trained in the art of manipulating, threatening, cajoling or even lying to get what they want from their suspects. Even in my confused, hazy state, I immediately sense that they are good at what they do.

I am directed to the grey plastic chair placed opposite them, less than half a metre away from the edge of the table and backed up against the wal behind me. We may as wel al be in a cage together: the table is not very wide and it al feels far too close for comfort. I am acutely aware of my clammy face, the hair sticking to my forehead, the thin fabric of my T-shirt clinging to my skin, the sweat patches visible on the material. I feel dirty and disgusting, the taste of bile in my throat, sour blood in my mouth, and despite the officers’ impassive expressions, their revulsion is almost tangible in this smal, enclosed space.

The man hasn’t looked up since I was brought in, but keeps scribbling away in a file. When he does raise his eyes, I feel myself flinch and automaticaly try to scrape my chair back, but it does not budge.

‘This interview is going to be recorded and videoed.’ Eyes like smal grey pebbles bear into mine.

‘Do you have a problem with that?’

As if I have a choice. ‘No.’ I notice a discreet camera in the corner of the room, trained on my face. Fresh sweat breaks out across my forehead.

The man flicks the switch of some kind of recording device and reads out a case number, folowed by the date and time. He goes on to state, ‘Present is myself, Detective Inspector Sutton. To my right, Detective Inspector Kaye. Opposite us, the suspect. Would you identify yourself, please?’

Who exactly is he speaking to? Other police officers, truth-analysts, the judge and jury? Wil this interview be played in court? Wil my own descriptions of my heinous crime be played back to my family? Wil Maya be forced to listen to me stutter and stumble my way through this interrogation and then be asked to confirm whether I’ve been teling the truth?

Don’t think about that now, for chrissakes. Stop thinking about that now – the only two things you should be focusing on right now are your demeanour and your words. Everything that comes out of your mouth must be completely and utterly convincing.

‘Lochan Whi—’ I clear my throat; my voice is weak and uneven. ‘Lochan Whitely.’

The next few questions are the usual: date of birth? Nationality? Address? Detective Sutton barely looks up, either jotting things down in his file or fast-forwarding through my notes, his eyes flicking rapidly from side to side.

‘Do you know why you’re here?’ His eyes meet mine very suddenly, making me start. I nod. Then I swalow. ‘Yes.’

Pen poised, he continues to look at me, as if waiting for me to continue. ‘For – for sexualy abusing my sister,’ I say, my voice strained but steady.

The words hang in the air like smal red puncture wounds. I feel the atmosphere thicken, tighten. Even though the interrogating officers have it al written down in front of them, my actualy saying the words aloud, in the presence of both a video camera and a voice recorder, makes it al suddenly unalterable. I barely feel as if I’m lying any more. Perhaps there is no one universal truth. Consensual incest to me, sexual abuse of a child family member to them. Perhaps both labels are correct. And then the questions begin.

At first it’s al background stuff. The tedious, endless minutiae: where I was born, the members of my family, everyone’s dates of birth, the details surrounding our father, my relationship with him, with my siblings, with my mother. I stick to the truth as much as possible, even teling them about our mother’s late shifts at the restaurant, her relationship with Dave. I am careful to omit the parts that I hope Mum and Kit wil have the sense to gloss over too: her drinking problem, the fights over money, the move to Dave’s house, and finaly the almost total abandonment of her family. Instead, I tel them that she has only recently started working late shifts and that I babysit in the evenings, but only once the children are in bed. So far, so good. Not an ideal family set-up, but one that just about fits within the bounds of normality. And then, after they have been given every little detail, from the number of rooms in our house to our respective schools, our grades and extra-curricular activities, the question is finaly asked:

‘When was the first time you had any kind of sexual contact with Maya?’ The officer’s gaze is direct and his voice as expressionless as before, but he suddenly seems to be watching me carefuly, waiting for the slightest shift in my expression.

Silence thickens the air, draining it of oxygen, and I am aware of the sound of my own rapid breathing, my lungs automaticaly crying out for more air. I’m aware too of the sweat running down the sides of my face and certain he can see the fear in my eyes. I am exhausted and in pain and desperate for the toilet again, but clearly the interview has a long time yet to run.

‘When – when you say sexual contact, do you mean like – like feelings, or when we first – I mean, I first t-touched her, or—?’

‘The first time you had any inappropriate exposure or contact.’ His voice has hardened, his jaw tightened and the words shoot out of his mouth like smal bulets.

Fighting my way through the fog and panic, I try to come up with the correct answer. It is vital I get al this right so it wil match up exactly with Maya’s account. Sexual contact – but what exactly does that mean? That first kiss the night of her date? Or before that, when we were dancing?