Where Has Mummy Gone?. Cathy Glass

to a small local café where I did some paperwork over a cup of tea and a teacake. I returned to collect Melody at 5.30 p.m. and went through to Yellow Room. The door was open and the three of them were putting on their coats. I said hello. Amanda looked in my direction but didn’t say anything. Melody was naturally reluctant to leave her mother and kept hugging and kissing her until the contact supervisor said, ‘Time to go.’ With a final hug and kiss for her mother, Melody came to me and we left.

      Outside the centre Melody said, ‘Mum liked your cottage pie. She ate it all.’

      ‘Good. She warmed it up in the microwave?’

      ‘Yes, the contact supervisor helped her, as children aren’t allowed in the kitchen. She was starving and said it was the first thing she’d had to eat since your rice pudding.’

      ‘But that was Wednesday,’ I said, shocked. ‘Are you sure?’

      ‘Yes. She ate the crisps and biscuits too. I keep telling you, Mum forgets to eat without me telling her to.’

      If Melody was right then it was very worrying and exceeded any adult–child dependency I’d seen before.

      ‘All right. I’ll make sure Neave knows.’ But shouldn’t her social worker have known already? I wondered. Melody and her mother had been known to the social services for some time. Unless of course Melody was exaggerating, perhaps thinking this was the way to get home.