CHAPTER 12
When I returned to the living room, she was still there, wrapped up tightly in the sleeping bag, a light sheen of sweat on her face. I handed her the hot chocolate I had prepared, along with the first of the antibiotics, and watched her face light up at the aroma rising from the mug.

Her voice was clear, as Sparky had observed, but still weak.

“Why are you doing this?”

“Later, girl”

Another twitch at that word. I pressed on.

“Go through that bit later, love. Sparky called you Kim?”

Her head went down, hair falling across her face so that I could only see the slight gleam of her eyes.

“Kimberley…”

“Nice name. I’m Debbie. I drive wagons for a local firm, big ones. Not exactly your typical woman, me”

She took the bait, as I had hoped.

“Neither am I…”

Unfortunately, she lost it just then, tears pouring down her face to soak the pyjama top, and without conscious thought I found myself on the settee beside her, wrapping her in my arms just as Mam had done so often with me. I waited until she was cried out, then simply whispered “Safe here, girl”, before moving back to my armchair and my own cooling chocolate. She calmed her breathing, which was still shallow and weaker than I liked, and then started again.

“You say a safe place, Debbie?”

“Yup. I said it to Sparky as well. I don’t know who you are, and I don’t need to know anything you don’t want to tell me, but I couldn’t be sure there wasn’t somebody after you. If you have somebody you’d like to call, I have a phone. Your choice, your call, if you pardon the pun”

“Why?”

“Like I said, if you remember. Been there, seen that, got the T-shirt and the scars”

Her head lifted again as she stared at me, obviously looking for the scars in question, and I smiled back at her.

“Not when I’m dressed, love. And some scars aren’t physical, are they?”

“I’ve got scars. Dad’s belt, mostly”

Another razor cut from my early life.

“I know that scene too well, Kim, I met some people who were much worse, though. I’m still here only because I met some others who were much nicer”

She shivered.

“Not that kid’s home in the North?”

I shook my head, and found myself staring into my mug as unwanted memories filled my mind.

“No, not any of those. Mine was in England. The people I met went on to somewhere even worse, though, in Carlisle”

“Fucking hell…”

“It was exactly that, or so I’m told. Cards on the table time, then. I got out, I ended up eating from rubbish bins for a while, scraping ciggy ash off leftovers. It wasn’t nice; enough said. I was bloody lucky, amazingly so, and met two people who adopted me. There were others who were looking for me, that I really didn’t want to find me, so if it’s the same set-up for you, don’t fret. The only people who know you are here are Sparky and those who brought your medicine, and that’s all. I’m not going to tell anybody unless you ask me to”

“Why me?”

“Because you needed me, girl. That’s all. Call it paying my Mam and Dad back”

“Where are they living?”

That was one question too many, and my own control went. Kimberley just lay on the settee till I had finished my own crying, and then changed the subject.

“My cards on the table, then. My turn. You’ve seen me undressed”

“Yes”

“You know I’m a pervert, then”

“Pervert? I think you might be a transsexual girl. That’s not a pervert, not in my book”

“Not a pervert, when I’m pretending to be a girl?”

“I don’t think you’re pretending. Are you actually pretending?”

Once more, her head dropped.

“No. People tell me I am, though, and Mam and Dad, and my brother, they say I am, and when they caught me in Mam’s dress…”

“Where are you from, Kim? Remember: only tell me what you feel you can. This isn’t the Spanish Inquisition”

She almost laughed then, starting the usual phrase about ‘nobody expecting’, then caught herself.

“I’m from Ponty. Not many places to hide round there, so I came down here. About a month ago. Wasn’t quite as wet”

Suddenly, her reticence broke.

“I know you won’t understand, Debbie, but I am a girl, just all wrong where it matters. Still a girl, though, in my head. There was a girl on the telly, kid’s comedy show with a couple of black boys, and she was called Kimberly, without an ‘e’, but I thought that looked silly, though I liked how the name sounded, and…”

A short pause for breath, her lungs clearly still struggling.

“I don’t know if Mam and Dad called out the police. I can’t go back. Like I said, you won’t get it, but if they make me live as a boy, well, I just can’t”

I thought for a few seconds, then let out my breath in a long sigh.

“Trust me, Kim: I understand exactly what you mean”

“How could you, unless… Oh fuck”

“Used to be called Billy, didn’t I? Long time ago, different place, different world. I understand exactly. Leave it there. Now, it is getting late, and I have work tomorrow. Here’s the deal, OK? There’s a spare bed you can have, I’ll show you which one, and there is no lock on the door. I won’t lock the back door, as I said earlier. I’m going to take a risk here, and the rest is up to you. Get a night’s sleep in the warm and dry, and then clear off, or stay here until I get back from work. There’s food in the fridge and the freezer, tea, cocoa, all that stuff. I get back about half past five, cause I’m on local jobs this week. If you decide to skip out, your clothes are hanging on a rack in the kitchen. Just wash any dishes, OK? The pills are on the table over there, with a note on how many to take and when”

I drew another long breath.

“If you stay, a pot of tea would be nice to come home to. I keep saying this, but everything is your choice. You leave only when you want to. Now, bedtime for me. If you don’t mind, I’ll help you up the stairs to your room, and show you how the shower works. I can’t offer you a spare toothbrush, but there are clean towels in the airing cupboard”

In the end, I slept fitfully, terrified I had made a huge mistake, but as I crept past her room on my way down to a quick breakfast, I heard her wheezy breathing coming from the spare bedroom, the rhythm one of deep slumber. Tea, toast and work, running loads to local supermarkets while wondering how much my generosity might cost me, how many of my possessions might already have walked out of my back door with Kimberley. I had to wind my neck in several times as I rode home, worried as I was. Bike parked, chain around saddle and rear wheel, D-lock through the forks, and my gloves stuffed into my lid as I opened the back door, to encounter the smell of chocolate and a very, very nervous new girl,

“Debbie…”

“That choccy for me?”

“I broke a mug…”

“Not important, girl. Answer the question! Bloody cold out there!”

She pushed the mug of delights over to me, nodding, and I sipped it slowly, blowing over the top to cool each mouthful.

“How’d you break the mug, Kim? Dizziness?”

She nodded, and I took her arm to lead her to the settee, where I saw the sleeping bag was still in place.

“Sit down. No messing around till you’re feeling better, OK? What did you do with the day?”

She looked embarrassed.

“Got a bit nosy, Deb. Slept till twelve, then stood in the shower. Made some cheese on toast and then, well”

She indicated my stereo, our old and faithful family system, with the newer attachment of a CD player.

“You’ve got a real mix of stuff there, so I put the headphones on, and it was hours ago, and… Sorry if I was wrong, but I had a look at the photo albums. Some places I recognised. Sorry if it was private stuff”

This was the child I had spent all day feeling terrified would strip my house bare?

“Kim?”

“Yeah?”

“I’m off work tomorrow. Fancy a slobby evening tonight? Put some sounds on, and I’ll talk you through the photos. Some good memories there. Do you eat Chinese food?”

“Never had it. Mam and Dad don’t like foreign muck, they say”

“Then we finish our cocoa and I take a walk up the road. My treat”

Her face crumpled once more, and I immediately understood.

“Kim, girl, not a problem. Some day, you will be in my position. You pass it on, OK?”

There was a hammering at the back door, and the terror on her face was heartbreaking. I held a finger to my lips and left her under the sleeping bag, closing the living room door as I went into the kitchen. I moved a cook’s knife from the wooden block that held my little collection, and put it down on the shelf to the left of my back door. Chain on, door cracked, hand ready to seize the blade.

“Hiya, Rosie! You OK?”

I quickly unfastened the door, and as she stamped in, wearing full winter riding gear, I took the knife back to its normal home. My friend nodded approvingly.

“Sensible woman, but I knew that already. How’s the house guest? Still here?”

I nodded.

“Give me a minute, and I’ll warn her. What are you up to?”

“No plans, woman. Carl’s away on business”

“Fancy a Chinese? We were just going to slob around tonight, play some music and have a look through my photos”

“This girl sound?”

“I think so. She’s doing her best not to piss me off, but she’s still taking risks. I’ll introduce you in a few”

Rosie grinned happily.

“Then I shall enjoy taking the piss out of your photos!”

I slipped back through the door to the living room, where Kim was looking terrified. I held up both hands, smiling at her in as reassuring a way as I could manage.

“Nothing to worry about. My oldest friend, one of the family that sorted your medicine for me. She wants to see the pics as well, so she can embarrass me. You up to that?”

She gave a hesitant nod, and I called Rosie in before pulling out the menu for my trusty local takeaway. We made a selection, adding a number of side dishes as well as some chips to the order, just in case the cuisine didn’t suit Kim, and Rosie stood up.

“I’ll be back in a bit, then, and you, Debbie Wells, you put that purse away and don’t be so fucking silly. My treat!”

As soon as the back door slammed, Kim turned to me.

“She scares the shit out of me!”

I nodded, smiling happily.

“Oh yes! My sister is very good at that. Just ignore it, and I’ll set up the autochanger for the CDs. Any requests?”

There was enough room on the settee for all three of us, trays on laps with a collection of foil boxes on the coffee table, as Echoes followed Below the Salt, to be followed in turn by Led Zep Four, which I had picked so that I could follow it with a Sandy Denny collection, all on the basis that we weren’t out to dance ourselves silly but rather to appreciate words and music together. Once the bulk of the food was gone, I found some wet wipes for our fingers and pulled out the two oldest photo albums.

“Right, Kim. This is somewhere called the Farmyard Fumble, and those two little girls are sitting either side of you, just not so little now…”