Kim comes to the door holding a mascara tube in one hand and the wand in the other. Behind her, Sophie can hear Kim’s grandson shouting about something. Kim closes her eyes, turns her head and sighs before opening them again and staring straight at Sophie. ‘Oh,’ she says. ‘Sorry. I thought it was going to be an Amazon delivery.’
‘Sorry to disturb you so early, Kim. I can see you’re busy, but I just wanted to show you something, quickly. If you’ve got a minute?’
‘Yeah, sure. Come in. Sorry, it’s all a bit chaotic; you know, mornings. Do you have kids?’
‘No,’ Sophie replies. ‘No. Well, step-kids. Sort of. Not technically but just about. They’re coming to stay this weekend so I guess I’ll be the one in chaos then.’
Kim’s house is lovely, painted in soft shades of grey and teal and oyster-shell pink with splashes of mad wallpaper with birds of paradise printed on them and copper-shaded lights. But it’s a mess. The floor is littered with shoes and toys and empty cardboard boxes. The TV blares from the living room and the boy isshouting ever louder. In the kitchen he sits on an aqua-blue chair at a white Formica-topped table eating cereal with a plastic spoon.
‘Come on, Noah, you need to finish up now. We have to leave in ten minutes.’
‘No,’ he shouts. ‘No nursery.’ He throws his plastic spoon down on to the table where it splatters milk everywhere. Kim grabs a damp cloth from the sink and wipes up the spills, before removing the boy’s cereal bowl and carrying it towards the dishwasher.
‘No!’ the boy yells. ‘No. Give it back!’
‘OK,’ says Kim. ‘But you have to promise to eat it up nice and fast. OK?’
He nods solemnly and she replaces the bowl in front of him, whereupon he slides it slowly and deliberately across the table until it is nearly hanging off the edge. Kim grabs it just before it falls, whisks it away from him and says, ‘Sorry. That’s your last chance. Now you need to finish your juice and we need to get ready to go.’
‘No,’ he shouts. ‘Not going.’
‘I can come back later, if you’d rather,’ says Sophie.
Kim sighs. ‘Can you just tell me what it is?’
‘I was just looking through the social media,’ Sophie begins hesitantly. ‘For all the kids who were at Dark Place that night. And I found a YouTube channel, for a girl. She’s called Amelia, but she shortens it to Mimi. And I wondered if maybe it was her?’
‘Mimi? Mimi Rhodes?’
‘Yes. And this girl, she just posted something yesterday, something strange. I wanted you to see it so you could tell me if it’s her or not? If it’s Mimi?’
‘Tell you what,’ says Kim. ‘Let me just corral this one and I’ll meet you on the street. We can walk to the nursery together. If you have time?’
‘Yes. Yes. I have time. I have loads of time. I’ll see you in a minute.’
She leaves the house, the sound of Kim’s grandson’s furious tantrum still ringing in her ears. She waits by the edge of the common for a few minutes and then finally Kim appears, her hair in a haphazard bun on top of her head, black-framed glasses on and no make-up, pushing the crying boy in his buggy.
He’s quietening down now, and Sophie glances at him and then at Kim and says, ‘Everything OK?’
Kim nods. ‘Yes. We got there in the end. We have a reward chart. Don’t we, Noah? And what do we get if we get up to the top level of the rainbow?’
‘Legoland!’
‘Yes. We get to go to Legoland. And how far up the ladder are we?’
‘Half.’
‘Yes. We’re halfway. So we just need to keep trying to be good, particularly in the mornings, so we’re not late for nursery. Yes?’
‘Yes.’ He nods. ‘Yes. And then … Legoland!’
They’re halfway across the common, about to circle the duck pond. Sophie turns on her phone and sets the video to full screen, turns it on its side and they watch it as they walk. ‘Is that her? Is that Mimi Rhodes?’
‘God. I’m not a hundred per cent sure. I only saw her a couple of times, at the police station. And she had red hair then, I think, not blonde. But yes, it does sort of look like her.’
‘Me see?’ asks Noah.
She sighs and says to Sophie, ‘Do you mind? He always has to see everything. Everything.’