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that he loved so much in return. Those are the motives we attribute to her, the timeline we fabricate to explain things. And we continue to try to fill in more gaps. We speculate that Joanna May underestimated the tech savvy of a young boy. Why else would she have let him have access to a laptop? Was she tired of trying to entertain him down there, had she exhausted all other ideas? Did she think it was safe because it would be impossible for him to log on? How enraged was she when Ben found a WiFi signal down in that basement that didn’t need a password? Enraged enough to put his life in danger, and I think that was because it made her feel that she’d lost control, that she’d bitten off more than she could chew. Her solution? To take him back to the woods and abandon him there, then to come home and organise her exit. Is it because she really did love him that she didn’t take that final step and murder him at that point, to silence him for ever? I think so, although the thought makes me recoil. To confirm our various hypotheses, we’ve all tried to coax more information out of Ben: therapists, doctors, psychiatrists, us. But for the most part he’s chosen silence, perhaps as a way of feeling in control. And we must accept his silence. We must content ourselves with our guesswork. I wish now that I’d valued more the words that tumbled freely out of him before he was taken. I wish I’d collected them up and kept them safely in packages that I wrapped up carefully, secured with a ribbon, and stored in a safe place for the future. I wish I hadn’t been too distracted to listen to every word he said. I wish I hadn’t let him run ahead of me. There is so much that I wish, and all of it is pointless now. Beyond pointless. Ben is not the child he used to be. Trust is difficult for him, because he doesn’t understand why John and I didn’t find him earlier, or why the teacher he adored turned out to be somebody bad. He has pretty good attendance at school, considering, though it’s not uncommon for John or me to get a phone call to say that he’s unable to cope, again, that he’s gripped by a migraine so severe that he can’t open his eyes, again, and then we come to get him. Emotionally, his daily existence is volatile and unpredictable. He can be fine for days at a time, and then something sets him off balance. Then he can be desperately clingy, or angry, depending on the form his sadness takes. His emotions are powerful and visceral. Very, very occasionally he fights us, kicking and hitting. More often, he cannot last the night without waking and screaming in terror. When that happens, I run to him and lift him from his bed, and I bring him into bed with me, where we lie, eyes wide, bodies together, and I hold him to me and wait for his teeth to stop chattering, and watch carefully for the sheen of sweat on his brow that signals the fever that sometimes rises after these nightmares. I bring Skittle to sleep on the bed with us too, because the dog is the object of Ben’s most uncomplicated affections. I get pleasure from watching them play together, Ben’s gentleness with Skittle, and the dog’s adoration of him. When Ben goes to John’s house now, the dog goes with him. Her claws have made scratches all over the parquet floor, but nobody minds. And even when Ben and I lie together during those long nights, even though our hearts pump fast and in unison, I wonder if sometimes we remain a hundred miles apart, because his mind still crouches in the woods on his own, cold to the core, or perhaps in that basement, flinching as a laptop shatters against a wall, pieces falling around him, sensing the advance of a person who wants to drag him away, even though he’s covered his face with his hands, even though he cowers. These are my imaginings, for, as I said, Ben won’t speak of it. His silence torments me, because I want to make him better, but it’s her silence that I truly loathe,
for Ben can’t help it, but she is an adult and she knowingly withholds information that could help us to understand better what happened, and therefore to heal him more quickly, and that I cannot forgive her for.
- Page 278 and 279: RACHEL My cab driver on the way hom
- Page 280 and 281: tall bear of a man, with very dark
- Page 282 and 283: ‘To be honest, I assumed Nicky wo
- Page 284 and 285: He actually put his hand over his h
- Page 286 and 287: ‘Cool,’ my avatar said. ‘New
- Page 288 and 289: me wants you here to run the invest
- Page 290 and 291: I behaved in an arrogant and disgus
- Page 292 and 293: RACHEL I logged on to Furry Footbal
- Page 294 and 295: ‘I know it was him,’ I said. Th
- Page 296 and 297: Her handbag was on the seat between
- Page 298 and 299: so that my toes were already numb.
- Page 300 and 301: ‘It’s what Miss May said, about
- Page 302 and 303: He sat back down. ‘Again,’ he s
- Page 304 and 305: JIM Nicky Forbes was disturbed by m
- Page 306 and 307: RACHEL It took me twenty-five minut
- Page 308 and 309: here. And then I saw something else
- Page 310 and 311: JIM Nicky Forbes’s expression was
- Page 312 and 313: RACHEL They prised me up off the ca
- Page 314 and 315: Operator: OK. They’re a few minut
- Page 316 and 317: RECORD OF EVIDENCE: AVON AND SOMERS
- Page 318 and 319: RACHEL Bristol Children’s Hospita
- Page 320 and 321: ‘Is the child all right?’ Mrs M
- Page 322 and 323: RACHEL I approached my son’s beds
- Page 324 and 325: EPILOGUE CHRISTMAS 2013 - ONE YEAR,
- Page 326 and 327: RACHEL A few weeks ago, somebody as
- Page 330 and 331: JIM Addendum to DI James Clemo’s
- Page 332 and 333: JC: Yes. FM: Have you seen her sinc
- Page 334 and 335: RACHEL We might never have closure,
- Page 336 and 337: us that. He came to our house and w
- Page 338: BIBLIOGRAPHY The following websites
for Ben can’t help it, but she is an adult and she knowingly withholds information that could help us to<br />
understand better what happened, and therefore to heal him more quickly, and that I cannot forgive her<br />
for.
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