CHAPTER 21
Work was a bit of a shock after the weekend. We had a couple of domestics that turned nasty, and that really brought a few things home to me. We had a remarkably strong family, all things considered, and clearly Tony’s much smaller one was just as strong. Enid in particular was someone I decided never to get on the wrong side of, which raised another thought: I was making so many assumptions about her son and my sister, particularly about the permanence of their new arrangement.

It was just that it seemed so absolutely right. I had watched her around Jim, for example, and there were so many things going on behind her mask of maturity and confidence I couldn’t be sure what the mix was. One thing I did know, of course, was that Sarah was a true Powell. When she took to someone, it was with a deep and fierce loyalty. She had rung me at home a couple of days after we got back.

“Elaine, you free to talk?”

“Just the wife about, you know that. Ah. Do I hear someone who wants to talk but can’t decide where to start?”

There was silence at the other end of the phone for a few seconds, before she spoke again in a very soft voice.

“Lainey, I think…”

“Yes? Fallen hard, is it?”

She was crying. I could hear the odd sniffle as well as the rustle of a tissue near the telephone.

“Talk to me, Sar”

“We went out together on Sunday. He had a match. Duw, you should have seen him! Like a bloody tank, he was!”

“That’s not it, is it? So you fancy big men; we know that”

“We had Jim with us…”

Another penny dropping. Just like Siân, like Vicky, she was feeling one of the deepest of needs. Steer away, Lainey.

“So it’s ‘us’ and ‘we’ now, girl?”

Another pause. Another softening of her voice.

“I really think so, Lainey. I mean… look, it was his mother, aye? She said I should take him a cuppa, and, well”

“Sorry, chwaer fychan, but what has tea got to do with this?”

“I gave them Sunday dinner after the match, so, well, I let him use the bath, and then Enid just says he likes a cuppa while he soaks, and…”

“Hang fire, Sar: his mother told you to go up while he was in the bath? Duw!”

She was silent again for nearly thirty seconds, but I could hear some gentle sobs. When she spoke again, there was real pain in her voice.

“It was so different, Lainey! I mean, Joe, he was exciting, aye? But this, Tony….”

She drew a long and rattling breath, words and thoughts catching unsaid in her throat.

“Lainey, is it possible to fall in love in two days? It wasn’t sex, not in any way, it was making love, and I’ve never….”

She broke off. I waited, but it went on too long.

“Sar?”

“Yes…”

“You’ve never loved, have you?”

“I love Mam and Dad, and you two”

“Not the same, girl, not at all. You’re frightened of it?”

“Bloody terrified! What do I know about doing it right? Look what happened when I tried before!”

I found my arms tensing, the tendons standing out as my wife entered the room. She put her hand to my arm, easing the rigidity a little but not entirely. Sodding rape victims, always the same: what did I do wrong, how did I cause this? Wind it back in yet again, woman.

“Listen to me, chwaer fychan. I have told you this enough times for it to have sunk in, but clearly you need another lesson: you were the victim of a manipulative, exploitative, cynical bastard, from a family of bastards. You were raped, in effect. There is only one person responsible for a rape and that is the rapist, got that?”

Siân took my hand as I dragged my voice back to the gentleness my sister needed.

“Tony is a good man. He has a strong mother. He has a lovely little boy. What isn’t there to love? So, yes, to answer your question, I think it is possible. But then you’ve actually had years, haven’t you?”

“Sort of…”

“Look, girl: Arris is as fine a judge of character as I’ve ever met. She clearly adores him, aye?”

“Yes, but—“

I interrupted her. “No but: she also adores you, if you can understand what I am getting at here. You are a fine woman”

“I’m not though, am I?”

Always the same from her, the lack of reality. We both knew what she was. Our parents knew what she was, Arris knew, and I was certain Tony knew, but Sarah still spoke against it. Not real.

“Not going there, Sar. Beat yourself up all you like, but you are the only one doing it”

Shit. Foot firmly in mouth. Funnily enough, she actually laughed at that one.

“Sar, sorry. You know what I really meant, don’t you?”

“Yes, Lainey. Thank you for having the grace to realise when you say what might be the wrong thing. Look… look, I want to try with him, really think I should try. It’s just, well, if I’ve got it wrong, what do I do?”

“Sar, do you really think you have it wrong? Really?”

A shorter silence this time, but without the sobs.

“No, I don’t”

"You have a chance at a life, chwaer fychan. Go out and grab it with both hands”

She actually giggled at that. “I, er, I only used the one, Lainey”

I had to explain my laughter to my wife, before the three of us settled down to a more normal chat about work and Vicky, Mam and Uncle Arwel. Sorted, for now, but that crisis of confidence was only the tip of something that ran far deeper in Sarah. I would have to watch her carefully, I realised.

A few days after that, my boss called me into his office.

“Afternoon, Sergeant Powell. Take a seat, Elaine. Tea?”

“Please, sir. What do you want to see me about?”

“Iwan in here, Elaine. I have a job for you. Wyn speaks highly of you, you know. Says you have potential for the next rung, and what I thought was to give you something to set in your CV, if you are willing”

“What sort of job, sir? Er, Iwan?”

“Big thing these days, Elaine. The Equality and Diversity Action Plan”

“Ah. This would involve me doing the action?”

“Sort of. You are as diverse as we can get, what with your own…arrangements, as well as your sister”

I prickled a bit at that, but I realised he meant no harm as he continued.

“Bit of a foot-soldier role, actually. There’s been a lot of reaction over the years to the Lawrence case, the allegations of us all being racists and so on. That’s driven a lot of work for some of us, but it’s been very defined in its area of concern. LGBT stuff, as they call it; that’s been left behind a bit. Ah, our tea. Shall I be mother?”

He poured. “There have been some gay-bashings in Swansea and Bridgend we suspect might be related, and the local lads have been just a bit slow in their priorities”

I felt a little bile rise. “My sister has never been gay, Iwan”

He gave me a very flat stare. “I know all about your sister. I am aware of subsequent events, one in particular. A line has been drawn there, Elaine. I can understand your concern, but this is not about her. Three men have been beaten rather badly, and the third one was also raped. We, that is South Wales and DP, have decided that we will tackle this jointly and in a two-pronged way. We have put together a task force to concentrate on the offences, of course, but we will also be looking at our own people. Those above me are concerned that the culture that led to the departure of two unwanted excuses for police officers still has roots in the rest of us, and a campaign of brainwashing has been ordered”

“You mean education and enlightenment, surely?”

“No, Elaine. This attitude is filth, dirt, a stain on their thinking. I want it washed out”

I laughed. “Sit them down and lecture them, then? They’ll be just the same after as before, except more resentful after being patronised”

He grinned. “Nope, not at all. I said a task force earlier, and that is what I want for this side of it. Discussion groups with ‘out’ LGBT people, not lectures. Let them meet the very individuals they despise. I have some civilians lined up, and I’d like you to take on some of the management. Booking venues, arranging dates”

“This because I’m a dyke, Iwan?”

“I’d be a liar if I said it wasn’t, and if I also said it wasn’t because of your sister, but the main reason is a lot simpler and more complicated at the same time. You have potential. Wyn saw it, I can see it. I want you to move onward and upward, and this is prime CV material. That main reason, though, is that you have some of the best communication and people skills I have seen in years. If anyone here can do hearts and minds, you can. I’ll e-mail you the details later. And thanks in advance”

“You that sure I will do this?”

He grinned again. “Absolutely!”

So it was that three weeks later I was sitting with eleven others around a table in Abertawe’s main nick. Ten of the others were coppers from Heddlu De Cymru, the other being the Spectrum representative from the massive Driving Licence centre up the road. One of the coppers looked familiar; slight, dark-haired and very pale-skinned. I made the introductions.

“Hi, I am Sergeant Elaine Powell of Dyfed-Powys. This is Chris O’Connor of the LGBT group Spectrum, from over at the DVLC. Can we have some introductions?”

I looked directly at the familiar face, and suddenly it clicked. Crying by the side of the road.

“Sergeant Adam Price, South Wales”