Mistaken Identity Ch. 03

Janice's bubble burst on finding she wasn't being driven home after all. Not hers, it was Ruby's home they were driving to. In the schoolgirl sports kit, it would be impossible to be taken seriously when she tried to explain she was a married woman. Who would believe her? She looked like a schoolgirl, and had been taken out of school, so she was now a schoolgirl.

The girl's parents would tell the social worker she wasn't Ruby, and that would be her queue to reveal the truth. She would tell the social worker, Margaret bullied her into playing the part, and anyone would believe that.

Yet again, she gave in to the inevitable, and bowed to other peoples plans. The social worker would give her a lift home, and the nightmare would end. She was sure of it.

After knocking vigorously, they walked through an unlocked door, into an unkempt house. They found the mother was drunk and probably on drugs as well. The woman wouldn't be able to identify herself in a mirror, let alone her daughter.

Janice is dismayed over the appalling conditions Ruby had lived in. Desperate for the mother to say she isn't Ruby, she decides to make the woman a black coffee in an attempt to sober her up.

'Here, drink this,' Janice said, offering the woman a mug.

'What are you doing? Trying to drug me again, bitch! Get out of the way. You'll not get my stash, bitch! Ruby?' the mother asked, squinting in the gloom at Janice.

They didn't look alike but the woman was too out of it to know much, or see much of anything. The woman raised a claw like hand, with chipped bright red nail polish. There was surprising strength in her hands and arms. She dragged Janice over her knees. Janice dropped the coffee, and gagged on the smell of a dirty woman.

'Ouch! Stop that!' Janice cried out.

'Oww! Noo, please!'

Several swipes of the woman's hand on her bare bottom, had Janice crying. Crying out for help, and crying tears of self-pity.

'What in hell! That's no way to treat anyone, especially not your daughter,' the social worker chastised the woman.

Miss Fernley grabbed Janice from the woman, pulling her onto the floor. She helped Janice up, to stand on the threadbare carpet.

'She's not my daughter!' the woman complained, then broke into a hacking cough.

'That's right, I'm not Ruby, I'm Janice. It's all been a big mistake. You can let me go home, I'll be fine,' Janice tried to tell the woman.

'Come on, we're going,' the social worker said, grabbing hold of Janice's hand. 'You can't stay here.'

'I could go home. A friend's house, a hotel?' Janice pleaded.

Not sure if she should reveal her identity yet, she tried to lie. Not very good at it, the woman ignored her.

***

Miss Fernley drove Ruby away from the awful house, not to the safety of Janice's home, but to a sheltered environment, an assessment centre. Janice was in a daze, from being assaulted by Ruby's mother, and as usual she accepted being led around.

In the assessment centre big burly men and woman, told her to keep quiet, shut up, and worse. She did as she was told. Before she could bring her wits together, she was booked in, and entrenched in the system. Janice was scared from the sound of heavy doors being locked behind her. The place was secured to prevent girls absconding.

Having to behave like a kid among adults around her age, was dreadful. Janice dare not tell them she was an adult, and a married woman, as they would think she was mad, and send her to a psychiatric unit. The girls were tough and violent, so she had to be careful with them too.

'You can make one phone call. A friend or family, it's up to you,' the woman told her.

Janice sat on a cheap institutional, plastic chair, with a phone cradled to her ear, wondering what to do. The only number she knew off by heart was her husbands, as everyone else was listed in her phone at home.

Friends were in a another city, and she hadn't been in contact with them for a long time. There were no other family besides her husband, and he would probably just laugh at her.

Knowing his number, she phoned her husband, hoping he was in, and would listen to her.

'No! I didn't do anything, it has all been a bad mistake. No, it's not a prison for women, it's an assessment centre for girls, not adults. It's a long story. Can you please come to visit? Please! I'd be ever so grateful,' she pleaded, trying to be pleasant.

'I can get there on Saturday, not before. Just don't do anything stupid, and I'll see you then. No promises about getting you out, we'll have see what can be done,' he told her.

'Oh! Thank you, I'll be a good little, err, I mean, I'll be so grateful, honestly I will,' she truthfully simpered.

Two days to wait! She could do that, she really could. This place couldn't be any worse than that dreadful school. There were girls hear, no boys, with everyone and everywhere closely monitored. They promised to replace the revealing gym slip with a smock, whatever that was.

He would need convincing, but her husband would get her out of this place. At the very least he could tell them her age, and that she was an adult. It might cause more trouble, so she would have to tell him to pretend she was a kid for a while longer. Just so long as she could get out of here, and go home.

If she made any more decisions for herself, she might end up in prison. Maybe she could meet a nice man willing to look after her? A knight in shining armour her husband wasn't, but he would have to do until one came along.