Living in a Squat

Unfortunately, the police did find her. After Juliet was reported as a missing child on the television news, and some photos of her appeared in the press, there were a number of calls to the police from people claiming they'd seen her. A lot of the sightings turned out to be nothing more than wild goose chases, but before I had chance to celebrate, the police phoned us to announce that she'd been found in London, in Balham, in a squat. She spent three weeks living with a bunch of drug addicts and prostitutes. Val was beside herself with worry when she heard this. She was convinced that Juliet had started using drugs, that she must be shooting up Heroin, and that she probably had been been pimped out. Val's mind was working overtime. She was worrying that Juliet might be pregnant or that she must have caught syphilis or the clap. I told her to shut up about it; she should just be thankful that they'd found her bloody kid. Juliet came home. She came home all quiet as a mouse, and she insisted that she hadn't done anything worse than smoke some grass. I just hoped that Juliet would piss off again soon, and not be found next time. I really hated her for all the trouble she had caused. I despised Val too. Val was fussing over Juliet more than even before. It made me sick.