The Island(58)
Author: C.L. Taylor

Tony doesn’t react. He continues to stare out into the street. A new bead of sweat runs down the side of his face. He doesn’t swipe it away.

‘Mum,’ I say, but I’m interrupted by the sound of her phone pinging.

‘Here we go. They’ve sent the video.’ She taps the empty seat next to her, gesturing for me to join her on the sofa. Tony doesn’t move a muscle as I cross the living room.

Mum touches the screen as I sit down next to her. An image of Mason, sitting in a beanbag chair with a PS4 controller in his hands, jumps to life. There are two boys sitting either side of my brother, both on beanbags, both holding controllers. All three boys are laughing their heads off. They look like mates, kicking back in one of their bedrooms rather than three kids who’ve been sent away to overcome their ‘behavioural problems’.

‘Can I look at that for a second?’

Mum doesn’t resist as I take the phone from her hand and click on the video details.

‘What are you doing?’ she asks.

‘Checking the date the video was taken. They might have sent you footage of when he first arrived.’

‘And?’

I stare at it in disbelief. ‘It was taken today.’

‘There you go, then.’ Tony swivels around so he’s facing us. ‘And you still claim your son wasn’t trying to manipulate you, Jane?’

Mum sighs heavily and looks at me. ‘What do you think, Drew? He looks fine, in the video, doesn’t he?’

There’s desperation in her eyes. She wants me to tell her there’s nothing to worry about.

‘No one’s being brainwashed,’ Tony says. He’s not sweating any more and his foot has stopped pounding the carpet. If anything he looks ever so slightly smug. ‘All the kids get a couple of weeks to settle in followed by an intensive course of therapeutic treatment to help them overcome their behavioural issues. If Mason passed a note to someone – and I’m of the belief it was written before he left – it was done because he’s still resistant to the idea that he needs to make some positive changes in his life.’

Waffle, waffle, waffle. Tony might be convincing Mum with his pseudo psycho-babble but I’m not so sure.

‘What kind of therapeutic treatment?’ I ask.

‘Um.’ Tony runs a hand over his thinning hair. ‘It’s … er … cognitive behavioural therapy, modelled especially for adolescence.’

He’s right. Cognitive behavioural therapy isn’t brainwashing. It helps you change the way you think and behave. But if it’s all so innocent why has he started sweating again?

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