Will You Love Me?: The story of my adopted daughter Lucy: Part 3 of 3
Will You Love Me can either be read as a full-length eBook or in 3 serialised eBook-only parts.This is PART 3 of 3 (Chapters 17-27 of 27).You can read Part 3 on release of the full-length eBook and paperback.The eleventh memoir and latest title from the internationally bestselling author and foster carer Cathy Glass. This book tells the true story of Cathy’s adopted daughter Lucy.Lucy was born to a single mother who had been abused and neglected for most of her own childhood. Right from the beginning Lucy’s mother couldn’t cope, but it wasn’t until Lucy reached eight years old that she was finally taken into permanent foster care.By the time Lucy is brought to live with Cathy she is eleven years old and severely distressed after being moved from one foster home to another. Withdrawn, refusing to eat and three years behind in her schooling, it is thought that the damage Lucy has suffered is irreversible.But Cathy and her two children bond with Lucy quickly, and break through to Lucy in a way no-one else has been able to, finally showing her the loving home she never believed existed. Cathy and Lucy believe they were always destined to be mother and daughter – it just took them a little while to find each other.
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Also by Cathy Glass
Damaged
Hidden
Cut
The Saddest Girl in the World
Happy Kids
The Girl in the Mirror
I Miss Mummy
Mummy Told Me Not to Tell
My Dad’s a Policeman (a Quick Reads novel)
Run, Mummy, Run
The Night the Angels Came
Happy Adults
A Baby’s Cry
Happy Mealtimes For Kids
Another Forgotten Child
Please Don’t Take My Baby
A big thank-you to my editor, Holly; my literary agent Andrew; and Carole, Vicky, Laura and all the team at HarperCollins.
Chapter Seventeen
‘I wouldn’t ask but we’re desperate,’ Jill said. ‘I know we agreed you’d wait until Lucy had been with you for longer and had calmed down before you fostered another child, but Lucy’s taking her time to calm down, and none of our other carers are free. It would only be for two weeks’ respite and David’s very sweet. It’s just while his mother is in hospital.’
‘I really don’t know, Jill,’ I said again, wishing she hadn’t asked. Although I had the space in my house to foster another child, I had my hands full with Lucy, and David was sure to be upset at being separated from his mother. ‘Will I have to take him to visit his mother in hospital as well?’ I asked, feeling this would be impossible with everything else that was going on.
‘No, his aunt will take him,’ Jill said. ‘She can’t look after him during the day because she works full time, but she can take him to the hospital in the evenings and at the weekend. David won’t give you any trouble,’ Jill added. ‘And we’d be very grateful.’
‘When do you need to know by?’ I asked.
‘Now, please. His mother would need to bring him to you tomorrow morning, before she goes into hospital.’
‘And there really is no one else?’
‘No.’
‘All right, I’ll do it,’ I said. ‘Although I have big reservations.’
‘You’ll be fine,’ Jill said, with a confidence I didn’t feel. ‘And you never know, it might do Lucy some good. Give her someone else to focus on for a change, rather than herself.’ Although Jill was highly sympathetic to Lucy, as I was, I think she was starting to lose patience and felt that maybe Lucy was revelling in all the attention her outbursts evoked. ‘Thanks, Cathy.’
We said goodbye and I went straight upstairs to the spare bedroom and made up the bed with a fresh duvet cover and pillowcase. That evening over dinner, I explained to Adrian, Paula and Lucy that David would be coming the following day to stay for two weeks while his mother was in hospital. Adrian and Paula were very enthusiastic, probably because a well-behaved three-year-old would be light relief after Lucy’s recent tantrums. Lucy looked at me, amazed by the news, shocked even, and then became confrontational.
‘You’re fostering another child as well as me?’ she asked disparagingly.
‘That’s right, love. Just for two weeks.’
‘Are you allowed to?’
‘Yes, of course. I’m approved to foster two children or a sibling group of up to three. Don’t worry. It won’t affect my care of you.’
Lucy scowled, while Paula and Adrian wanted to know more about David. ‘Why’s his mother having to stay in hospital?’ Paula asked, concerned.
‘She’s got to have an operation, and she’ll need time to recover afterwards,’ I said. Jill had told me that Beth, David’s mother, was having a hysterectomy, but Paula didn’t need to know that.
‘Hasn’t David got a gran and grandpa to look after him?’ Adrian asked, which is what would have happened to Adrian and Paula had I had to stay in hospital.
‘Unfortunately not,’ I said. ‘David’s grandparents are dead.’
‘That’s sad,’ Paula said.
Then Lucy asked, or rather demanded, ‘What about his dad? Hasn’t he got a dad who can look after him?’
‘No, he died last year,’ I said. ‘He wasn’t very old.’
And just for a moment I saw on Lucy’s face the briefest acknowledgement that there could be at least one other child in the world who’d had a sad and difficult life just as she had, albeit in a different way. Paula looked close to tears, so I changed the subject and talked about the games we could play with a three-year-old.
That evening, when I went to say goodnight to Lucy, it was obvious she’d been thinking about David, for she had some questions about him. ‘Does David still miss his daddy?’ she said quietly.
‘I’m sure he does,’ I said.
‘Will he miss his mummy and cry at night?’
‘Very likely, but I’ll look after him. Then, when you come home from school, you can help me if you like.’
But Lucy had lowered her guard enough for one evening and retorted with a sharp, ‘No. That’s your job.’
Ignoring her ill humour, I said goodnight, kissed her forehead and came out.
Beth arrived with David at 9.30 the following morning, just after I’d returned from taking Paula to school. Beth was a lovely lady in her thirties, although she was anxious at the thought of the operation she was about to have, and also about leaving David, whom she’d never left with anyone before. She brought with her a suitcase containing David’s clothes, a toy box of his favourite toys and books and a cuddly toy, which she told me he took to bed with him at night – all of which would help him settle with me. Although Beth was worried about leaving David, as we talked, David – not fully appreciating what was about to happen – was happy to chase Toscha and then play with the toys I’d put out in the living room. Beth had written down David’s routine, which would be useful for me to follow, and had also included his likes and dislikes in food, which again would be very helpful.
