Faye's Diary

Chapter 19: No-one Knows I've Gone

“Did you sleep well?” Dan asked me in the morning.

“Very well thanks,” I said. That wasn’t strictly true; I had woken up several times in the night after having dreams about Lee. “Thank you for letting me stay here by the way.”

“That’s ok; it’s the least we could do. We can’t foster you, but we can let you stay over for a while.”

“There is something that I would like to give you. It’s my bag with the missing gap to Charlotte’s block of diaries. I thought that you should be the ones to give it to her. And also, I don’t really want to travel with it in case something happens. I know it won’t but y’know. It’s very precious and I don’t want to lose it; it’s safer here,” I said.

Dan took the diary from my outstretched hand. “Charlotte has wanted to come and collect this for years but she was never brave enough, that’s why she left a gap for it. She’ll be so pleased to see it.”

“Charlotte is moving to a university near here soon to finish off her studies and will be moving back in with us for a while, you’re welcome to come over sometime,” Lilly said, her blue eyes shining vibrantly.

“Thank you; I’d love to. Hopefully I’ll find her today.”

*** 

“Well, goodbye Faye, and I hope that when you come back, you’ll have our Charlotte with you,” Lilly called as I set off back down their garden path. I thought of home and wondered how this place could be so close to it and yet so different.

“I hope so too. Goodbye!” I called and I began to run. I was running to the train station to find my sister and to bring her back, but I was also running away from Mum and everything that she had lied about. I finally felt free.

I was glad that I had ran away from home, because I could do what I wanted without anyone looking down their nose at me or telling me to stop. People always say that running away from home is scary, but I wasn’t scared. I felt invincible. It was like I was on top of the world and it really was my oyster. I could do anything or go anywhere; but I knew where I wanted to go, where I had to go. I had to find my sister.

I thought of Mum in our house sitting there, alone. She always said it was too big for just us, so I wonder how big it felt with just her. I wonder how alone Charlotte felt when Lee left her room that night? Or how alone she felt when she was first sent to the care home? If Mum was sat there alone, then it was her own fault, for lying to me for eleven years.

I thought I heard someone calling my name, but when I listened again, all I heard was the wind. I walked onwards but I was sure I heard someone calling my name again. They sounded pretty desperate to see me, they were almost screaming. Panic rose inside me, in case it was Mum coming for me and I ran down the nearest alleyway. When I could no longer hear the voice I shook my head and leaned against a wall on the other side of the alley.

But then another thought popped into my head; Jamaal’s face. It was then that I realised, it was Friday morning. Everyone else was in school right now. I thought about Eliza and wondered if she was worried about me. I thought about everyone gossiping about me, whispering in corners and thinking of my body lying in a ditch somewhere. The thought made me shudder. But then I imagined Jade going on a patrol, fighting anyone who dared to utter my name. It made me laugh, any excuse for a fight and Jade was the first in the que.

I thought about Jamaal and wondered whether he was missing me. Probably not, I concluded; he’s probably got another girlfriend by now. By the time I get back, he might not even remember my name. It seemed a shame, I really liked him, but I liked the idea of finding my sister more. I almost laughed at how strange that was. I’d been on a date with Jamaal two days ago and I hadn’t seen Charlotte in eleven years, and yet I preferred her to him.

I sighed sadly but then a memory popped into my head. It was of my cousin Amy singing, ‘Don’t worry, be happy!’ She’s quite a good little singer actually, but the memory made me sad because the thought of her and Aunty Alice worrying over me was awful.

I thought about Granny too. This made me feel the worst, because even though she had lied to me, the same as Mum I didn’t feel like she was so directly involved. Although this didn’t make sense, I just knew that I wanted to make sure she was ok, so I decided to ring her on my mobile.

I turned it on and found three texts. Two were from Eliza; one was asking me where I was, and the other was telling me about something funny that happened in class. The other one was from Jade, also asking where I was. No-one seemed too concerned and I felt hurt.

 “Hello, Granny?” I asked when she picked up the phone.

“Faye? Oh good, I was just about to ring the house to speak to you. I’m in the market and there is a great bargain on t-shirts. Now, do you want a pink one with a tiger on it, or the blue one with two wine glasses on it?”

“Granny are you ok, you aren’t too worried are you?” I asked, confused.

  “Worried? No dear, they’re just t-shirts. You can have both of them if you want,” she said chuckling.

Then it hit me. Mum hadn’t told anyone that I had gone. She obviously didn’t miss me at all and didn’t care that I was gone, so hadn’t bothered to tell anyone. “I’ll just have the pink one please Granny,” I said.

“Ok love.” And then she said, “Aren’t you meant to be at school?”

“I am, it’s break-time,” I said thinking fast. We said our goodbyes and put the phone down. I immediately called Mum.

“Hello, Faye? Is that you? Oh darling, thank goodness you’ve called, I was so worried,” Mum said.

“Oh shut up, if you were that worried, you would have called me,” I snapped at her.

“I did call you, thousands of times, but your phone has been off. Come home Faye, where are you?”

“You’re just saying that! Do you know where Granny is at the moment? She’s at the market choosing a t-shirt for me. She’s going to bring it over later. I called her in ‘break-time’ to see how she was, you see,” I snarled. “Well, that’s what she thinks anyway. I really felt guilty about making my poor Granny worry to death about me so I thought I’d call her to see if she was ok. It turned out though, that she wasn’t worried at all, because she didn’t even know I was gone! That how much you missed me, Mother dearest, that you didn’t bother to tell anyone that I’d even gone!”

“I can explain! I didn’t want anyone to know because I knew that they would persuade me to go to the police and if I did that then they would take you away from me and I’d never get you back!”

“Who would take me away from you?”

“Social Services, they’d think that I wasn’t a fit mother.”

“And why would they do that? It’s not like they have ever heard from you before is it?” I said. Of course they had, but I just wanted her to tell me so. I wanted her to break down and admit everything so that I could rush home and hug her and we could set about finding Charlotte together. I didn’t want to do it on my own really. I crossed my fingers and hoped for her to say it.

“Well, no. Why do you ask? Look, Faye I just want you to come home. Please?” My heart almost shattered and the pain hit me so hard, it hurt. Suddenly, I just wanted to kill her. Why wouldn’t she just tell me?

I ignored her question and said, “So is there anyone who knows? About me being missing?”

“Your Aunty Alice knows, but only because she worked it out of me. Little Amy is worried sick,” Mum said. Usually that kind of emotional blackmail would work on me, but I was so angry with her, I hardly heard what she said.

“Bye Mum,” I put the phone down.

I shoved my phone angrily in my pocket and stormed off. But when I had calmed down, Mum’s words came back to me and I wondered if Amy really was worried.

I looked down the street that I was currently on and turned around and ran in the other direction. It only took me a few minutes to get there. I walked up to the front door and knocked. A woman in her thirties with blond hair just like mine and a small girl of about seven opened the door. Both were pale faced but when they saw me, they both started crying.

“Faye!” The woman said.

“Aunty Alice!”