Silent Child(13)

DCI Stevenson moved towards the desk and hovered there. Jake sat on a chair to my left, his fingers drumming against the grey wool of his trousers. I felt small beside them all, despite my distended stomach. Here I was, one pregnant woman amidst a cluster of men. A shock of femininity thrown into a testosterone-filled room. Despite the situation, I found myself straining to stay composed, self-conscious of breaking down in front of them. I was almost positive that there would be no judgement on their part even if I did, but it would only waste more time. I needed to know everything they knew about my son.

Dr Schaffer pushed a file across his desk and then pulled it back before clearing his throat. His head was bent down, looking at the file rather than at me. He seemed tall even sat there in the desk chair. With his head bent like that I could see the way his hair was thinning. I saw the pink of his scalp, slightly shining, beneath the soft greying hairs.

“This is a very difficult case,” Dr Schaffer said. “Without Aiden talking to us it’s difficult to make an assessment.”

“Just tell me everything you know, and what you think it means,” I said. I turned to DCI Stevenson. “And I mean everything.”

Finally, the doctor lifted his head and I saw that he had composed himself as a professional. He rested his hands on top of the file and linked his fingers together. “Aiden is small for his age, which leads us to think that he has been malnourished. When he was found on the road, he was walking very slowly, with a limp, and was short of breath. His posture is a little crouched when he walks, perhaps to overcompensate for the limp. During our examination we found that he has underdeveloped calf and thigh muscles, and there is an indication of ankle injuries in the past, though we will need to perform more tests to discover the extent of those injuries. They are healed now.

“Aiden’s teeth are quite crooked and though I’m no expert in that area, I believe that they have not been cared for particularly well, though he may have had a toothbrush. His skin is very pale, and his eyes were particularly sensitive to bright light.”

It was at this point that the rushing of my blood, and the thudding of my heart, became far louder than the doctor, and I was afraid that I was about to swoon forward in the chair. I took a deep breath, stroked my stomach, and willed myself to stay conscious. The problem was, I’d already guessed what he was about to say and I didn’t want to hear it. I wanted to stand up on my shaky feet and my swollen ankles, and run as fast as I could while eight months pregnant. I wanted to get out of that place—to even get away from Aiden, as sick as that sounds—and never think of any of this again. But I couldn’t. Aiden had been born. He had existed. He was still here. And he had a story deep down inside that deserved to be heard and processed by his mother.

“Emma,” Jake said quietly. He squeezed my hand. “Are you all right, love?”

“Do you need a break?” DCI Stevenson asked.

I shook my head. “Go on. I’m fine. Tell me everything you know.”

Dr Schaffer smiled then, and it reminded me of the smile proud parents give their nervous children at sports events. But then he glanced down at his file and let out a long, deep sigh. The worst was to come. “There is evidence of damage to Aiden’s gums, and there are lacerations on his body that are consistent with sexual abuse.”

I leaned forward and vomited a small amount of clear liquid onto the floor of the doctor’s office. Jake stroked my hair away from my forehead and helped me straighten up in the chair. DCI Stevenson quickly mopped up the sick with his handkerchief and dropped it into the waste paper bin.

“Not to worry,” Dr Schaffer said. “I needed a new bin anyway.” He forced a smile.

“I’m so sorry,” I said.

“It’s quite all right.”

“I’ll take this to one of the nurses,” said DCI Stevenson. “And I’m getting us all some water. I think we need it.”

I smiled thinly, grateful to him for pretending that we all needed water. Pretending that I wasn’t the only one in the room who had lost control of her bodily functions.

I’d known it was coming. Of course I had. Little boys aren’t taken away for no reason. Not long after the flood, after search and rescue had failed to find Aiden’s body, I’d gone through every possible reason for a child’s disappearance, from getting lost down a well to being sold into the sex trade. I went over it all. I saw men with moustaches holding my little boy’s hand and leading him into murky rooms. I saw money changing hands and lascivious smiles on the faces of obese predatory men. I pictured the worst, the very worst, and I felt grimy and disgusting for even thinking it. No shower could take those images away.