The thought of Anita finding out about Lee through a radio or TV bulletin was unbearable and, although I had no idea what I was going to say as I dialled her number, I knew I had to find the words.
‘Anita, it’s Maureen…’ I said, when she answered the phone. ‘I’m sorry to ring you at this time but Lee’s been involved in a road-rage incident.’
I could hear the panic rising in her voice as she asked me if he was all right.
‘Anita, listen to me… Lee’s been murdered.’ My voice was breaking as the words came out. ‘I’m so sorry to be telling you on the phone but I had to let you know before someone came and knocked on your door or you heard it on the news.’
I could hear her crying as she asked me what had happened.
‘We don’t know very much,’ I continued, hardly able to believe what I was saying. It was like I was talking about someone else. ‘The police have told us he’s been stabbed. Tracie’s in hospital but she’s OK.’
I knew Anita was barely able to take in what I was saying to her. Like us, the shock and disbelief had left her unable to do anything but cry.
‘I’ll have to tell Danielle later,’ she said tearfully. ‘I can’t believe this is happening.’
‘We’ve all got to be strong for her,’ I said. ‘I’ll let you know as soon as we know more.’
‘I know,’ she said. ‘I’ll come over later.’
It must have been about 7.30am when the police left. ‘We’ll be in touch,’ the policeman said. ‘I’m sure you’ll be able to go and identify Lee today.’
Identify Lee? I think it was then that the penny really dropped. I wasn’t going to see Lee. I was going to identify his body.
Once Ray, Alan, Babs and I were alone, we agreed Ray and I would get dressed while Alan began phoning the family. I still don’t know to this day how Alan managed to keep it all together. He and Babs had already been through so much after losing Spencer and yet they were fantastic.
Ray and I had been there for them then but we hadn’t ever imagined the enormity of their pain, how they’d felt, what they’d suffered. I don’t think Ray and I will ever be able to thank them for the love and support they gave us in those first devastating hours. We’d never have coped without them.
We were in such a state that I don’t think it would have occurred to us that we’d need to start letting everyone know in our family. Apart from Michelle and Steve and Alan and Babs, the only person we wanted to speak to was Tracie.
As far as we were concerned, she had all the answers.
‘Well, we just can’t sit here drinking bloody tea,’ I told Babs. ‘I’m going to try and get hold of Tracie.’
There was no answer from her flat so I phoned her mum Irene’s house. Tracie’s stepdad Alan Carter, Irene’s second husband, picked up the phone.
‘She’s too upset to speak to anyone, Maureen,’ he told me when I asked if I could talk to her. ‘And she’s tired, she’s had no sleep. The police took her from the hospital at one o’clock this morning to Redditch Police Station to make a statement. Can you ring back later?’
I could feel the anger rising. ‘Why didn’t she ring us from the hospital, Alan?’
There was a silence. ‘She couldn’t remember your number,’ he replied. ‘Ring back later.’
When I told Ray, Alan and Babs what he’d said, Ray exploded. We’d sat up all night waiting for answers and all Alan could tell us was that she was upset.
‘What does he mean, she couldn’t remember our bloody number?’ spat Ray. ‘She’s never had any trouble remembering it before.’
Ray was right. Every time Tracie and Lee had a row and split up, she’d be on the phone asking to speak to him within hours. It didn’t matter how many times we told her that Lee was out or that he didn’t want to talk to her, she’d still keep phoning, screaming down the phone that she knew he was there.
However far-fetched her excuse about not contacting us seemed, I was still determined to defend Tracie. ‘Maybe the police wanted to tell us,’ I suggested. ‘If they’ve been questioning her, she probably didn’t get the chance to phone us, Ray.’
I was too upset and exhausted to listen to him putting two and two together and getting five when none of us knew the facts. Besides which, Ray had drunk three or four large brandies by then, a drink he never normally touched, and was so distraught that I knew it was pointless to offer any rational suggestions about why she hadn’t phoned.
Staring back at my reflection in the bathroom mirror as I splashed water on my face and cleaned my teeth, things made even less sense. With so many unanswered questions whirling around in my head and the thought of how I’d break the news to Michelle, I felt completely lost and utterly confused. It seemed like a lifetime ago since Ray and I had almost fallen down the stairs to open the front door and yet, as I went into the bedroom to change out of my nightie, it seemed like it had only just happened.
I put on the jeans and top I’d been wearing the night before, raked my fingers through my hair and went downstairs. As Ray went to change, I rang the police. Whatever they were going to tell me, I’d decided I wasn’t going to take no for an answer. I didn’t care how long I had to wait around in some police station, I had to see Lee. They told me they were planning to bring Tracie back to the police station for further questioning but that we could come to the hospital and identify Lee’s body.
Only a parent who has gone through the overwhelming pain and anguish of having to look at the lifeless body of their child will understand how Ray and I felt that day. It is the most devastating and unbearable ordeal that a human being can ever face. Something that, as a mum or dad, you never imagine having to go through. Shocking, numbing, heartbreaking.
Anyone whose child has been murdered knows that a light goes out from the moment you are told, but the sickening sense of loss and overwhelming sorrow comes with the actual moment you see them. Whatever fragile hope you may have held on to, any flicker of hope that it just might not be your child disappears as you stand in the mortuary and realise that they are never coming back. That you are never again going to see their smile, hear their voice, their laughter.
The police had again told us that Lee had sustained a number of knife wounds so we had no idea what to expect. Ray was shaking so much he could hardly walk as we went into the mortuary with Alan and our police liaison officer DS Mick O’Donnell. Not knowing what to expect when we saw Lee was obviously affecting him badly, whereas I just wanted to hold our son in my arms.
Within a few minutes of getting into the room, Ray was in such a terrible state that he had to leave. I thought he was going to collapse as I watched him stroke Lee’s face. ‘I’m sorry, I can’t cope,’ he said, rushing to the door.
I was crying as I heard Ray retching and sobbing outside in the corridor. It’s a memory I will never be able to forget, like the image of pain in Alan’s face as he stood next to me and Babs gazing at Lee.
I looked at my beautiful boy as the tears rolled down my face, hardly able to comprehend how perfect he looked. Apart from three plasters on his face, on his forehead, cheek and chin, there was no sign of the brutality that had ended his life, no blood, no bruising. He looked as though he was asleep.
I kissed him gently all over his face and stroked his cheek and hair. I couldn’t believe how cold he was. Cold and still. ‘Don’t worry, Lee,’ I told