Free Breaking the Silence by Casey Watson

got there.
    Jenson’s estate was a big sprawling one, built in the fifties or sixties; certainly at a time before everyone had cars. Every road I drove down had a ribbon of them on either side, all of them listing a little, looking like rows of sleeping animals, half up on the pavement, half in the kerb, leaving just a sliver of road to squeeze my car through. I had to park way past the house, which was showing no signs of life – but which perhaps wouldn’t, given this was a sunny early summer afternoon. I hurried back and headed up the front path – there was a gate, but it too was listing – but my knocks on the blue-painted front door produced nothing but an empty echo, which reverberated down the equally empty hallway I could see through the heavily frosted glass.
    Not that this meant anything. He wasn’t going to answer the door, was he? If he was smart, which I thought he was, he would have been keeping an eye out. He would want to see who was out there before risking revealing himself. And if he didn’t like what he saw then he would simply lay low – with or without his older sister.
    There was little I could do except wait for Marie to arrive. And then, presumably, for Karen to show up. I stepped back from the door and scanned the street. Jenson could be anywhere. He’d probably have dozens of friends he could go to. It was a huge estate, and one I knew well from my days as a school behaviour manager. I used to visit families here regularly, as part of my job involved visiting troubled kids in their home settings and talking to their families about how they could help their kids better. I’d sit and discuss strategies, talk about boundaries and discipline, then I’d help them create reward charts – I’d always come armed with stars and stickers – to help them try and curb their teenagers’ less delightful behaviours.
    It seemed a long time ago, now, and in some ways it was. I’d been fostering for almost half a decade now; some
very
intense years.
    I was just reflecting on how much my life had changed since I answered that fostering agency ad when I became aware of a ‘psst!’ sound close to me. I turned to see a woman on the doorstep of the neighbouring semi, silently beckoning that I should step a little closer.
    She wore one of those old-fashioned wrap-around aprons that look like dresses, and drew a finger to her lip as I approached. ‘Are you one of the social workers?’ she wanted to know.
    I shook my head, and keeping my voice low to match hers I explained that, no, I was Jenson’s foster carer.
    ‘My name’s Casey,’ I added. ‘Do you know something about his whereabouts?’
    She cocked her head back. ‘The lad’s in my garden,’ she told me, ‘waiting for his mum to get home. Playing with my dog. He loves my Sabre, he does. I expect he’s missed him.’
    She looked to be in her sixties, and had that bustling, sleeves-up, no-nonsense air of a woman used to looking after herself. I imagined Sabre as a hulking great Alsatian, and her motto to be ‘I speak as I find’.
    ‘Come in to the front room,’ she commanded, gesturing with her hand as she led the way into her hall. The house smelt of lavender polish, with an undercurrent of onions. She’d obviously been cooking. Something wholesome, I didn’t doubt. ‘So’s he won’t see you,’ she elaborated. ‘Though what you’re going to do with him, I don’t know. He’s bound to kick off once he knows you’ve tracked him down.’
    ‘Do you know what’s happening?’ I asked, still keeping my voice low. ‘Have you seen his mother?’
    ‘Oh yes,’ she said. ‘Not half an hour ago. She’s been back and gone straight out again. And she’s fuming. They’ve apparently told her she’s got to have some report or something done on her. Anyway, she’s gone off to fetch her Carley from her mate’s house, or so she tells me. She might just have gone off on the piss. That wouldn’t surprise me. And then me laddo here