Page 1 of Darling Girls

THE OFFICE OF DR WARREN, PSYCHIATRIST

Dr Warren sits in a grey folding chair, one ankle resting on the opposite knee. His suit is brown; his tie, red. His thin-rimmed glasses lie against his chest, on a chain. When I knock on the open door, he points to the vacant chair facing him, his gaze fixed on an old-school manila folder in his lap. His bald, liver-spotted head is as waxed and shiny as a freshly buffed sports car.

‘Hello,’ I say tentatively.

No response. After a brief hesitation, I squeak across the floor in my sneakers and sit.

Dr Warren remains bent over his file.

The room is bare apart from the chairs, a pot plant and a battered wooden coffee table. While I wait for him to acknowledge me, I observe a couple of sparrows pecking at the peeling paint on the windowsill outside.

‘Excuse me,’ I say after several minutes, when Dr Warren still hasn’t greeted me. The clock on the wall says five past the hour.

He looks up, faintly irritated. ‘Yes?’

‘Are we’ – I feel silly – ‘going to start?’

He looks at the clock, then back at his paperwork. Sighs. ‘Whenever you like.’

I haven’t seen a therapist before, but this feels a little unorthodox. Perhaps he is one of those therapists who uses unconventional means to bring about a particular result – like failing to provide a chair because studies have shown that people get to the heart of things faster when they are uncomfortable?

Or maybe Dr Warren is an arsehole.

‘So I just . . . talk?’

‘Yes.’

‘About what?’

He sighs again. ‘It’s up to you. But I’d suggest that you might want to talk about what happened at Wild Meadows.’

It shouldn’t be jarring, hearing the name of my childhood home spoken in such a familiar way. These days everyone is familiar with Wild Meadows. The media love the juxtaposition of the whimsical country estate and the atrocities that happened therein. They also love anything to do with foster children. The headlines practically wrote themselves.

WILD MEADOWS OR HOUSE OF HORRORS?

SECRETS BURIED BENEATH THE WILD MEADOWS

WHAT’S LURKING IN THE WILD MEADOWS

These headlines have put Wild Meadows on the map. These days, apparently, people even drive up there to see it . . . or what’s left of it. But while it’s a headline or novelty to most, to me it’s my life. The place where I learned about loss, and shame . . . and hate.

‘I can’t talk about Wild Meadows,’ I say. ‘Not yet.’

Not ever.

Dr Warren leans back in his chair, clearly disappointed. I don’t like to disappoint people. And yet, if I just come out with it, he won’t understand. No one understands what it was like for me, growing up at Wild Meadows. The suffering that woman caused me, day after day. The only ones who understand are those who lived it.

‘Well, we can just sit here if you’d prefer.’

Then Dr Warren looks back at his file, which I now realise is folded to conceal a newspaper. It confirms something I’d suspected for most of my life: that no one cares.

1

JESSICA

‘Jessssica!’

Jessica had nearly escaped through the magnificent double front doors of Debbie Montgomery-Squires’ home when she heard her name.