Another Forgotten Child Read Online Free

more of her things when Mum has calmed down, but I’m not sure how much use they’ll be.’ I nodded again, as I understood what she meant. If the clothes Aimee wore now were representative of the rest of her clothes, the others were likely to be suitable for the ragbag. The jacket she’d refused to take off was far too small, dirty and badly worn; the faded black jogging bottoms were too short and badly stained; and her plastic trainers had split at both toes, so that her socks poked through. I couldn’t remember the last time I’d seen a child so poorly dressed.
    ‘Is she in her school uniform?’ I asked, mindful that Aimee had come to me straight from school.
    ‘What there is of it,’ Kristen said. ‘You’ll need to buy her a whole new uniform. I’ll arrange for you to have the initial clothing allowance.’ This allowance – approximately £80 – is a payment made to foster carers when a child arrives with nothing and needs a whole new wardrobe. It is often weeks before the money is paid and it only goes some way towards the clothes a child needs, but at least it is something.
    ‘Thank you,’ I said.
    ‘Is there somewhere private where we can go to talk?’ Kristen said to me. ‘Laura could stay here with Aimee.’
    ‘Of course,’ I said, standing. ‘We can go in the front room. There are some games over there,’ I said to Aimee and Laura, pointing to the boxes of games I’d brought in.
    Laura stood and went over to select a game while Aimee remained on the sofa, studying its fabric as though she’d never seen anything like it before. Then she began struggling out of her jacket. ‘It’s bleeding hot in ’ere,’ she said. ‘I’m gonna take me coat off.’
    ‘Good choice,’ I said, throwing her a smile.
    Kristen took some papers from her briefcase and as we left the room we heard Laura suggest to Aimee they do a jigsaw together and Aimee ask what a jigsaw was.
    ‘Aimee is eight,’ I said quietly to Kristen in the hall. ‘And she doesn’t know what a jigsaw is?’
    ‘It doesn’t surprise me,’ Kristen said. ‘She’s been so neglected. There were never any toys at her mother’s flat, so Aimee watched television all day and night. Susan said the toys were at Aimee’s father’s flat but he wouldn’t let me in, so I could never substantiate that. I doubt there were toys there, though. All their money went on drugs.’
    Once we were in the front room with the door closed Kristen confided that Aimee’s was one of the worse cases of neglect she’d ever come across, and repeated that she couldn’t understand why she hadn’t been removed from home sooner. Then she said again that Aimee had very bad head lice, so my family and I should be careful not to catch them.
    ‘I’ll treat her hair tonight,’ I said. ‘I have a bottle of lotion.’
    ‘Good,’ Kristen said. ‘She needs a bath as well. She smells something awful.’
    I nodded, for I had noticed as she’d walked in. ‘I’ll do that as well before she goes to bed.’
    ‘You know Aimee used to kick and bite her mother when she tried to wash her?’ Kristen reminded me.
    ‘Yes, I know. I read it in the referral.’
    ‘There’s a high level of contact with her mother,’ Kristen said, moving on. ‘Face-to-face contact will be supervised at the family centre and it will take place after school on Monday, Wednesday and Friday. There will be telephone contact every night they don’t see each other, including weekends. Can you monitor the phone contact, please, on speakerphone?’
    ‘Yes,’ I said. This was something I was often asked to do. ‘So is the care plan eventually to return Aimee home?’ I asked. That was the most likely explanation for the very high level of contact – so that the bond between Aimee and her mother would be maintained for when Aimee was eventually rehabilitated at home.
    ‘Good grief! No!’ Kristen exclaimed, shocked. ‘There’s no chance of Aimee being returned home. Her mother has been