Lost Girl: Julie's Story Ch. 03 Pt. 02

"Yes I do; Julie is my oldest friend; she and Mark are like my brother and sister. I'm sorry about that business back at mum's house, but I had to make sure you really were her family, and that you weren't going to hurt her. She and Mark have been through a lot, and my mum and I were protecting them. I think I'd rather wait until your aunt arrives, she's probably going to want to hear what I have to say, and I really don't want to do this twice, so if you don't mind...?"

Lena smiled that serene, placid smile of hers.

"Not at all. Emma will be here shortly, but in the meantime, would you like some tea? Or coffee?"

Everyone plumped for coffee, and Nia offered to help Lena, so the two girls disappeared into the kitchen while Jamie and I chatted about nothing much. We got to talking about children. Jamie told me they had twins, a boy and girl, two years old now, and like any proud father, he pulled out pictures of them to show me. He admired the pictures of David and Mo-Mo on the mantelpiece, and seemed particularly taken with Mo-Mo.

The girls came back in then, chatting like old friends, and just then the doorbell went again, so Lena went off to answer it while I entertained our guests. Emma came in, followed by Lena, and once again we made introductions, before getting down to why we were all here. Nia kicked off the discussion.

"I'm sorry about deceiving you when you came and saw us; we didn't know too much about you, and, given the history of Julie, Mark , and their mother, we thought it best to keep them under wraps a while longer."

Emma looked puzzled.

"I'm sorry, I don't understand, what 'history'?"

Nia looked at her levelly, chewing the inside of her lip, then exchanged glances with Jamie, who nodded, so Nia plunged on.

"Julie and Mark were abused, terrorised, and injured by their mother; she never physically mistreated them when they were young, at least, not that I know about, she just ignored them from the time they were little. Mark had to bring up Julie, but he was only a little boy himself; she left him to care for Julie because she didn't want to. Can you imagine how scared he was? How alone? He was just a small boy, and all the weight of the world was left piled on him."

She paused to dash the back of her hand across her eyes.

"It was even worse for Julie; you said you found a report at St. George's that she'd been in a sports accident. That's not true; that's what my dad told them to stop the police taking them into care and probably splitting them up forever. The truth is, Julie's mother attacked her; she punched her so hard she knocked her flying; she broke Julie's cheekbone and almost cost her an eye. My dad and I sat with her in the hospital while they treated her; they even had to give her an MRI, because they were afraid she'd sustained brain damage, because her mother had hit her so hard."

Emma was open-mouthed at this revelation, as was I. Lena took Emma's hand and squeezed it, then looked up at Nia.

"Why did she do that?" she whispered, "I remember the report; I remember Darryl telling me she was thirteen when she was injured; she was just a little girl, why did her mother do that?"

Jamie took Nia's hand as she bowed her head, but we all saw the tear roll down her cheek. When she spoke, her voice was so low we all had to strain to hear what she was saying.

"She was an alcoholic; every day, all she did was drink; that's why she left Mark to bring up Julie; he was just a small boy, and she was even younger, but she just left them to one side while she drank..."

Emma was openly crying now, and I didn't blame her; this was her deepest fear made fact, that she'd left those kids to their fate, and now this...

Lena hugged Emma as she wept, and even Nia had tears in her eyes as she watched. Emma finally got herself under control, and once more faced Nia.

"There's more, I know this isn't the whole story, please, finish it..."

Nia tried to speak, but she seemed to have trouble swallowing, so Jamie hugged her, then took up the tale.

"When they were older, their mother accused them of being...together, went into a frenzy and kicked Julie out, but what she did to Mark..."

He looked away for a moment, tugging his collar, obviously uncomfortable with what he had to say, but he ploughed on regardless.

"She told him that if he didn't leave immediately, she was going to the police to have Julie arrested and charged with...with incest, and threatened to petition to have her placed on the Sex Offenders Register, to get her sacked from her job, to ruin her and throw her to the wolves, so Mark left. But she kept him in a stranglehold; every day he had to call her from his office here in Bristol, every night she called him at his flat, seven days a week; if he missed one call, she was going to the police to have Julie arrested and charged. Mark brought Julie up, he was all she had, and he wasn't going to abandon her, so he did what she wanted."

He paused to clear his throat, an expression of distaste on his face.

"It got so the poor guy started thinking about killing himself just to get away from under her thumb. She almost drove him mad, and yet she kept on doing it. She was going insane, you see; Alcohol Related Dementia, Korsakov's Syndrome, call it what you like; she blamed Julie for her husband leaving; she even told Julie she should have used a twisted coat-hanger when she found out she was pregnant, any way it took to get rid of her. How can you tell your own child something like that?"

Lena and Emma were immobile, open-mouthed, shock and outrage on their faces as the whole shocking, terrible story unfolded, just as I was shocked and horrified; no wonder Nia and her mother had disavowed all knowledge of Julie and Mark, given the monster their mother, my aunt, had been; for all they knew, we were just like her.

I felt I had to say something in the silence that had fallen.

"How long had all this been going on?"

Nia shook her head and flicked her hair back over her shoulders.

"For Julie? All her life, but at least she had us; any time she needed to, she could come running, and mummy, daddy, me, we were all there for her; it's Mark who was hurt the most. She never allowed him to have friends; how could he bring friends home when she was sprawled drunk on the couch? He was lonely and alone all his life, and that's how she abused him. Even when he came here, he couldn't go out, he couldn't find a girlfriend, have a life, make friends, because he had to be here to take that damned phone call every night to prove he was here and keep Julie safe! Even when he was grown the abuse didn't stop, he couldn't make it stop, not if he wanted to keep Julie safe!"

Her eyes were flashing, and I realised she was furious. Jamie pulled her closer, and she buried her face in his neck while she trembled.

"Sshhh, it's over now, they're safe, it's over babe." He whispered, but Nia pulled away to glare at him.

"No it's not, not for Mark! It'll never be over for him, not after what she did to him! Mummy told me ...!" she caught herself and buried her face in his neck once more.

I realised I was holding Lena's hand, both of us needing human contact in the midst of the emotional turmoil in the room.

Emma was twisting and coiling her handkerchief, obviously wanting to ask Nia something. Jamie noticed, and nudged Nia, who quickly wiped her eyes and composed herself.

"Do you have a picture of ...of Julie, or Mark? They were so small the last time I saw them, so young, I would so like to see what they look like now..."

Nia nodded and opened her purse, pulling out a digital camera and a photo wallet. She took out a photograph and passed it to Emma

"This is our school picture, when we were eleven, that's Julie, standing next to me."

I peered at the picture, seeing a small girl with long, platinum-blonde hair. She looked so much like how I imagined Mo-Mo was going to look, and even Lena saw it.

"This is a baby picture Mark managed to find."

Lena looked at it and gasped. Nia looked puzzled at her reaction, so Lena stood up and picked Mo-Mo's picture off the mantelpiece. When Nia saw both pictures side by side she gasped too; they could have been sisters, the same white-blonde hair, the same green eyes, the same expression as they giggled for the camera. Sure, to me, Mo-Mo looked like Lena, but the resemblance to Julie was also apparent now that I could see them both side by side.

"This is my Maureen, Mo-Mo to family and friends, her grandfather is Emma's brother, Darryl's biological father. That should prove they're family."

Nia studied the two photographs raptly.

"I'll say!" she breathed, "It's uncanny, look at them! Look at this, though."

She snapped-on the camera and flicked through the pictures until she came to the one she wanted.

"This is Mark..."

The man in the picture could almost have been the younger me, but with grey eyes; everything else was me; same hair, same expression. I stared at my double, while Lena flicked back and forth between the two of us, also unable to believe what she was seeing.

"He looks just like you, like Robert..." she breathed, and I nodded, as did Emma, smiling even as she gazed with tears in her eyes at the man she'd last seen as a small boy.

"I don't see his father at all, nothing," she marvelled, "only Robbie, and Darryl, and my dad. He has his father's eyes though. Are they happy now? That's all I ever wanted to know. I don't mind if I never meet them, just so long as I know they're both happy."

Nia nodded.

"They're happy; poor Mark's still trapped inside whatever it was his mother did to him, but Julie's helping him out of that. Their mother's dead now, she can't hurt him anymore, and they're both free of her. Julie's happy, I promise you."

I had one question I still needed an answer to.

"My friends at St. Georges unearthed a request from Croydon University Hospital Ante-Natal clinic for Julie's records; does she have a baby?"

Nia and Jamie exchanged glances, then nodded.

"She has two, Nia...and Markie. Markie's two and a bit, the same age as mine, and Nia's just over a year old now..."

"Is she married now?" asked Lena, and Nia shook her head.

"No, but she and Ma...her partner are happy, and very much in love."

Lena looked at me; she'd caught the correction as well; Nia had almost said 'Mark'; something else was going on here. Jamie jumped in while Nia covered her confusion.

"Darryl, you say Julie's uncle Robert is your father, and he was a Fraser; if I'm not prying too deeply, why is your name 'Morgan'?"

I spent the next couple of minutes explaining to him the circumstances of my birth and upbringing, and why I carried my maternal grandfather's name, not my father's.

"That's quite a story," he commented, "he died in the Falklands? I was there my last year of uni, working with a geophysical team, prospecting for oil. It's odd how our two families keep intersecting and going off again. Mark kept getting mistaken for you, and it freaked him out!"

My ears pricked up, and my interest must have shown, so he elaborated.

"Mark's brokerage firm has an office in Clifton, well, Redland, actually, and he comes down once a month; he'd go for lunch in one of the pubs behind the Royal Infirmary, and someone would come up to him and call him 'Darryl'; poor guy was getting freaked about it. I guess people were mistaking him for you, so do you work in Clifton?"

Lena grinned.

"Dar works at the Bristol Royal Infirmary; it was probably only going to be a matter of time before he and Mark walked smack into each other in a pub around there!"

Both Jamie and Nia looked interested, so I elaborated.

"I'm the Junior Surgical Consultant on the Cardiology team. I trained at St. Georges, and lived in a flat on one of the streets off Tooting Broadway. I used to go for a drink on my evenings off at 'The Windmill' on Clapham Common, because the pubs at Amen Corner and Tooting Broadway were just too rough, and I usually parked my car on the street where you live; again we go back to what you were saying just now, about our lives constantly intersecting then going off again at tangents; I may even have seen Julie a dozen times when I was a med student and never knew who she was; she would have just been a little girl then, so I probably wouldn't even have noticed her."

While I'd been talking, Lena and Nia kept exchanging glances; there was some kind of communication going on there, and when I cocked an eyebrow at her, she nodded, that expression she get's when she knows she's right settling on her. She leaned forward, her hand finding mine again as she spoke.

"Nia, Jamie, about Julie and Mark; they're together, aren't they? Don't worry, I'm not condemning, neither is Darryl, heaven knows we should be the last ones to point and accuse, but they're together, and that's why they're happy, isn't that right?"

Nia and Jamie exchanged looks, then Jamie answered.

"Yes, they are; they love each other, they have two lovely kids, they have us; their mother tried her damnedest to destroy them, and now she's dead and they're happy; maybe there is such a thing as natural justice."

Emma looked sadly at them.

"Sandra did terrible things; she made her children hate and fear her, but she was still my little sister, and I loved her. Tell me, please; how did she die, and when?"

Jamie looked uncomfortable, but plunged on.

"She was sectioned under the Mental Health Act, and they confined her in a secure nursing home in Richmond. Her dementia had progressed to the point where she'd lost all touch with reality. She was there for about a year, and she died just two days after her granddaughter was born, in 2012; she's buried in Mortlake Crematorium, and no, Mark and Julie have never been to see her; they have no reason to. I'm sorry, but after what she did to them, the mess she made of their lives, the evil things she did to torture and torment them, Julie and Mark want nothing more to do with her. I'm so sorry, I wish I could have spared you that..."

Emma nodded, ashen-faced, all through this, tears running down her cheeks, and Jamie, to his credit, looked ashamed that he'd been the one to tell her. Nia suddenly leaned forward and took Emma's hand between hers, sympathy for her evident in her look.

"I'm sorry you had to learn this; it's not something anyone would want to hear, and we took no pleasure telling you, believe me, but it's gone now, that was the past; Mark and Julie survived, they have loved ones now, and people who love them. You've probably guessed by now that we came down to check you out. Julie and Mark are part of my family; my mum has taken them as her own kids now. Now Mark's my brother, and Julie's my sister, and we look after our own, so we came here to meet you and find out for ourselves what kind of people you are. What we found is a concerned, caring, loving family, and we'll be telling Julie that; perhaps it's time her family was put back together."

Emma smiled sadly.

"Mark and Julie are happy, really? You promise? From what you say, all my worst fears for them came true, but now they're happy together, yes?"

Nia nodded, her own smile gentle and understanding.

"They're very happy, I promise you."

At that moment, Mo-Mo made her presence felt, grizzling as she woke from her nap in the other room. David was with mum, and not due back from Play-Centre until after lunch, so we just had the one to deal with. Lena went to get her, and when she brought her back into the room, Nia was immediately all over her.

"Jamie, look, she looks like Nia!" was her comment, and when Lena offered to let her carry Mo-Mo, Nia jumped at the chance, rocking her as she baby-talked to her, with Jamie grinning as he watched.

I also grinned as I watched Nia rocking my daughter.

"Careful, she's teething, so her tummy's a little delicate right now; carrying her's a bit like juggling eggs; one wrong move and it's everywhere!"

Nia grinned back at me.

"Don't worry, I have twins, they did this together; three months of no sleep, ice cubes, nuclear-waste Pampers, and drooling, been there, done that!"

While Lena, Emma, and Nia fussed over Mo-Mo, Jamie and I chatted about Julie and Mark. I was curious about my cousins, about what they were like, especially Julie.

"What's she like, Jamie, really?" I asked.

Jamie leaned back and smiled gently.

"She's tiny, only about yea high, but she's tough; I suppose she had to be, but she's a lovely girl, pretty as they come, and Mum adores her. Mark calls her 'Tinkerbell', and that's what she's been all her life to him. She and Nia have been friends since they were little girls. They went through school together, and to be honest, the only real mum she ever had was Nia's mother. Nia's parents are Julie's parents now, her kids climb all over my da...I mean Nia's dad like he's their own personal playground, and she and Mark are in and out all the time; they have real family now."

He sighed and took a sip from his coffee.

"Mark brought her up all by himself; he was just a little boy himself, only three years older than her, but he had to do everything for her, from the time she was a toddler, and that left no time for him to be what he should have been. Mum's heartbroken that the one thing she can't do is help him; only Julie can do that; all we can do is sit on the sidelines and be there when they need us."

A thought suddenly struck me, dredged-up by that slip he'd made when talking about Nia's parents.

"When you say 'Mum', you mean Nia's mother yes?"

He darted a look at me and looked away again just as quickly.

"Yes, of course, Nia's mother..."

I smiled to myself and decided to try one last question.

"It's just that I couldn't help noticing you both have exactly the same eyes..?" I prodded gently, and once again Jamie darted that quick glance at me, then smiled.

"Yeah, funny that!" he grinned, confirming my suspicions; he and Nia were related too, just how closely was of no interest to me; it was Julie and Mark who concerned me, but I found myself feeling grateful that, given the awful life they'd had, and the neglect and cruelty they'd suffered, there were at least two good people who obviously cared deeply about them.

Jamie and Nia finally left after promising they'd do all they could to persuade Julie to meet with us. She borrowed a picture of Mo-Mo to show her, and took a picture of Emma, and some of Lena and me, and she seemed confident that Julie would agree.

"Julie's a nice girl; even with all that happened to her, she's not bitter or twisted inside. Her mother terrified and ostracized her, but it never left her all bent and twisted inside, just wary of any kind of family entanglements, but now I think she's ready to start finding her family again. Don't worry, when she sees these pictures, I think you'll be hearing from her again."

We left Emma in the study for the rest of the afternoon, flicking again and again through the pictures of Julie, Mark, and their children that Nia had downloaded to my laptop, tears in her eyes but a smile playing on her lips as she finally saw them again after so long.

JULIE:

Nia called Saturday lunchtime to say it went well, and she wanted to talk on Tuesday when she and Jamie got back from Bristol, which didn't help; three days of second-guessing her and wondering how it went was going to drive me up the wall, and take Mark with me, but there was nothing I could do about it, so I decided to be strong, just wait it out, and not let it get to me.

That lasted two hours, then I bundled Nia into her pushchair with Markie to keep her company, and beat it for Mummy's place. I think she knew I was coming; the table was set for three, and she had that look that told me she knew exactly what was going through my mind.