by Ali Mercer
It was obvious from the way Elspeth told me this that Roger found Ingrid a complete pain to deal with, and that was what encouraged me to come out with the whole story. I’d told Elspeth that Ingrid had been one of the first people to spot that Daisy had problems, and had reacted as if it was a terrible tragedy, which was what Mark seemed to think too. And then she had always taken Mark’s side, no matter how appallingly he’d behaved, even when he’d washed his hands of us.
Finally, I’d told Elspeth how Mark had gone back to the woman who had been waiting in the wings all along, and who’d already, unknown to me, already had a child by him… and was now married to him and having another baby, as Ingrid had so helpfully told me.
Elspeth had reacted to all of this with a mixture of shock and indignation and concern, and it was a comfort to feel that someone was on my side, for once.
But this was different. She looked serious and apprehensive, and I wasn’t at all sure I was ready to hear what she was about to tell me.
She said, ‘I’m sorry, Paula. It’s sad news. The baby passed away. It was a boy, and he only lived for a few days. He had a birth defect, and he had to have an operation and didn’t make it through. Roger heard about it because of Ingrid. Apparently afterwards she smashed up some stuff in her flat, and he had to repair the plaster.’
‘Oh, no.’
What else was there to say? How was I supposed to react? All the blood seemed to have drained out of me. Was it really possible for me to feel sorry for Mark, after everything that had happened? And what about this other woman – this Jenny – who’d slept with him when he was still my husband and had his child, and then had gone off and married someone else?
But I did. I felt dreadful for both of them. And for the girls, too. Jenny’s daughters, the one who was Mark’s and the one who wasn’t.
‘I’m sorry,’ Elspeth said again. ‘I thought you ought to know.’
‘I’m glad you told me. Thank you.’ My mouth had gone dry.
‘Call me, if you ever want to talk about it. Or anything,’ Elspeth said, and reached out to squeeze my arm.
Suddenly Daisy cried out, and I said, ‘I have to check on her.’
‘I’ll let myself out,’ Elspeth said.
‘OK. Thanks. I’ll be in touch.’
I hurried into the living room and realised at once what was bothering Daisy: the washing-machine video had stopped because the iPad had run out of charge. I got the extension cord and plugged it in, and it came back to life. Daisy calmed down and the house was quiet, apart from the sound of somebody’s unbalanced load in their washing machine, and it was such a profound relief to have been able to soothe her that I could have cried.
She was in her favourite place, her sweet spot, kneeling on the sofa with the iPad in front of her, propped up against one of the arms. I leaned against her and put my arms around her. She didn’t resist or protest: she seemed quite happy to be embraced. I’d read that some autistic children couldn’t stand this kind of contact, but as long as Daisy wasn’t feeling agitated or upset, she seemed quite willing to accept it. She was tolerating me, maybe even indulging me, although she had no intention of being distracted from the washing machines on the screen in front of her.
I breathed in her smell. Melon-scented shampoo, strawberry soap. Her skin was so soft, so perfect. It was so good to see her content like this after the outburst in front of the supermarket… which must have had a cause, one that was terrible to her, but not one that she could communicate to me.
Not yet. But one day she might be able to.
She’d learned so much already, in her short life. Maybe not as much as others, or maybe not the same kinds of things as others, who hadn’t learned the same kinds of things as her – who else could twiddle a teaspoon as efficiently and regularly as Daisy? But the more she could explain to me, the more sense we would be able to make of each other.
How frustrating must it be, to not be able to say what was wrong or what would be right, to be dependent on the guesswork of a mostly clueless adult?
But there was always hope. I would learn, and she would learn, too. Yes, I was afraid of what might happen when she was bigger and stronger. But who knew what the future might hold? Maybe she would learn to control herself, not to go on the attack when things took a turn she didn’t like.
The brain was plastic – that was one thing I had learned: that was the word that neuroscientists used. Which conjured up images of carrier bags and dolls’ heads, but didn’t mean that at all. It meant it could change: rewire itself, make new connections. Not just in childhood, but at any age.
‘We should do something,’ I said. ‘To say how sorry we are. We could send them a sympathy card, at least. From you and me. I could hold you up and you could put it in the postbox for me.’
Daisy didn’t respond. She didn’t seem to be listening. But she didn’t pull away, either.
And suddenly I thought that if I could have this – this closeness, this comfort – this was more than enough. It was everything.
‘I love you,’ I murmured. ‘I’ll always love you, Daisy. I’m lucky to have you. And I’ll always take care of you.’
And then, to my complete astonishment, she swivelled round, and in one swift movement, clasped both of her hands around my neck and hugged me back.
Twenty-Two
Ellie
Ten years later
* * *
In the months before Ava’s wedding I’d been trying to straighten myself out. No more drinking. No more smoking weed. No more hooking up with boys on the night bus. I was renting a spare room off Peter Carman, our old neighbour, and that made it easier. Peter liked an orderly life, and had made it quite clear he wasn’t about to tolerate a wayward lodger throwing up in his flowerbed, however willing he was to give me a chance to get back on my feet.
And it was a chance. I knew that. It was a place to live in London that I couldn’t possibly have afforded otherwise. I had a part-time job in a vegan café, I’d enrolled on a couple of A levels at the local community college and I had the illusion of independence. I was a twenty-one-year-old school dropout, trying to give myself and adult life another chance. Mum was relieved and I was hopeful, and probably Mark didn’t really care what I was doing as long as Mum wasn’t upset about it. I knew I wasn’t really standing on my own two feet, but at least I wasn’t lying in the gutter.
But then it started coming back.
I’d managed to get myself hooked on smoking and had quit, after a couple of failed attempts, soon after I moved in with Peter. And then my sense of smell had come back and I’d realised that it had gone without me even realising I’d lost it: I could smell burning, or bacon frying, or lavender, like memories come back to life.
In a way this was the same. There were signs that I was able to notice, that would have been there whether I was receptive to them or not.
At first it was just little things, and they could have been coincidences. Before the café owner rang to offer me a job, I could feel the good fortune in the air, like snow poised to fall on Christmas Eve. And when I smoked my last cigarette I knew it really was the last. The next day I got through a whole dinner with Dad without taking one of his, which proved it.
There were no words, and there were no sightings of anything or anyone. It was like the ghost of what it had been, an old habit vaguely remembered. And that was fine by me.
And then it was better than fine, because during Ava’s wedding ceremony something glorious happened.
After Felix died, when I’d closed my mind to the things I sometimes glimpsed or sensed, it had been like shutting up a room in a house and leaving it in darkness. Except it had been me who had found myself in the dark. The knowledge I’d been given had been partial and unclear, like a light flicking on and off, and I had decided I would be better off without it: that I’d be spared the guilt that went with knowing only a little, and not being able to change anything. But then I had realised that giving up on the confusion me
ant giving up on the light as well. I couldn’t summon up the golden warmth that reminded me of my grandmother any more. It had gone along with everything else.
At Ava’s wedding that changed.
I was sitting in the pew reserved for family at the front of the church, between Mum’s rather grumpy sister, my aunt Amanda, and Dad, who looked really nervous and uncomfortable and was furiously tapping his foot. Desperate for a drink, basically. You might have thought he’d take this in his stride – that after all these years, it wouldn’t be such a big deal to see Mark walk Ava down the aisle, instead of him, and give her away. But that obviously wasn’t the case.
We all managed to exchange a few pleasantries about the journeys we’d had to get there and how beautiful the church was and what a lovely day it was for a wedding, and then fell into a slightly dazed silence which could have been prompted by awe or awkwardness, or a combination of the two.
Would Grandma have forgiven Mum for letting Ava grow up thinking my dad was her father? I could see now why Mum had done it. Mark had been married to someone else. And Dad had really loved Mum, in his way. And us. Still did. It was just that he had a problem that made it difficult, almost impossible, for him to love us in a way that allowed us to trust him, and he’d never been able to fix it.
You might say he hadn’t loved us enough to fix it. But you could also say that we’d never loved him enough to try to help him.
Should we have tried to help him?
Might it still be possible?
It was never too late. While there was life, there was always still hope. The capacity to change. Right up to the very end.
And maybe even after.
At least Dad seemed to have calmed down a little. He’d stopped tapping his foot, and was looking around at the church like a very reluctant tourist who’d resigned himself to being shut in here for the duration.
His expression suggested he would rather have been anywhere but here. But then, he’d made it. That was something. He was only staying for the ceremony; he had given some complicated excuse as to why he couldn’t hang round for the reception afterwards, involving a flight that could on no account be changed. We’d all secretly been a little bit relieved. Ava had said that she’d already witnessed one punch-up between Mark and Dad and could do without another, especially on her wedding day, and Mum had protested that neither of them would dream of doing such a thing and none of us had really believed her.
Anyway, soon enough Dad would be off on his latest urgent escape mission from his broken-down family.
Broken down, but still motoring. Yes, there was plenty of mileage in us yet.
And I was going to enjoy this. Ava’s big day.
Any wedding is always a triumph of love over the odds. Who’d have thought that Ava, my ambitious, beautiful sister, with her fancy London flat and her nice car and her job in banking, would have ended up getting hitched to… Toby Andrews, the one-time spotty no-hoper who’d had a thing about her at school? Not that Toby had spots any more, and he seemed very nice and obviously Ava liked him. And he wasn’t like either Mark or Dad… which was probably just as well. He was a chef, which was also good because Ava was a rubbish cook, so at least they’d have something decent to eat once in a while. Plus he was devoted to her, and that was the main thing.
The organ was grinding away, not solemn but definitely serious. There was plenty to look at, from the congregation – who’d have thought that Ava, never the chummiest of people, would have had upwards of a hundred guests at her wedding? – to the fine vaulted architecture and the bunches of white roses decorating the pews and the altar.
That was when I sensed it. Her. The old magic that had made me feel so cherished when I was small, and that came and went like unseasonal warm weather, or like sunshine between passing clouds.
It was as comforting as a hug: it was that real. Like having a pair of arms wrapped round me to reassure me that all would be well, and that I was loved.
That time I heard her, too.
Tell your mother not to worry. She just has to do the right thing for now.
And then it faded, leaving me comforted and unsettled at the same time.
Hearing things? My long-dead grandmother, speaking to me, right here in church on my sister’s wedding day?
I couldn’t tell anybody about this, especially not Mum. She’d think I was completely out of my mind.
* * *
When the ceremony was over I said goodbye to Dad and made my way with the other guests to the medieval hall where the reception was being held, and found my place next to Mark at the top table.
I would have rather sat next to Peter, to be honest; it would have helped me fend off the temptation to start drinking, and make sure I behaved myself. But this was how Ava had chosen to do things, and it was her big day.
There was no point remembering that I’d always been the one who was desperate to get married, while Ava had poured scorn on the idea. That was life, I had begun to realise: life was what happened in the space between what you wanted and what you got.
And then Mark stood up to give his speech and tapped the glass, and they appeared at the back of the hall.
I didn’t recognise them, but knew I ought to. There was a tired-looking woman in jeans with a teenage girl who was dressed head to toe in varying shades of pink. They were holding hands. The teenage girl looked as if she had absolutely no idea what she was doing there but was willing to go with the flow for now. And the woman was as cold and calm and unwavering as an assassin.
Mark looked as if he’d seen a ghost. A real ghost.
The glass he was holding slipped from his fingers and smashed. He pressed his hand to his heart, then to his head. And then he collapsed onto the floor like a puppet whose strings have just been dropped, and the whole hall went silent.
Twenty-Three
Ava
‘Dad!’
I’d never called him that before. And there he was, down on the ground at my wedding reception, groaning and clutching his head in agony.
Everyone and everything else faded into the background: the blue-tinged sunlight drifting through the big old windows, the scent of the roses, my white silk dress. The hum of conversation in the room gave way to a hush that was broken by urgent voices, but I didn’t hear what they were saying. I was down on my knees beside him, pleading.
He looked as if he was dying. As if here and now was the setting Fate had chosen for his time to be up, on the worn wooden floorboards where monks had walked long ago.
Mum was down beside him, supporting him, loosening his tie. I managed to say, ‘We need an ambulance.’
She said, ‘Toby’s calling for one. Mark… Can you hear me?’
Dad looked up at her. He was focusing. That was good, surely?
‘Head hurts,’ he mumbled.
His gaze drifted away from her towards Toby, who was still talking to the ambulance despatcher, and Ellie, who was standing by and looking down at us in horror. Then he turned towards the intruders, the woman and the girl who had come in just before he collapsed, and who were now standing by Toby and Ellie, close enough to touch.
What the hell were they doing here?
The woman had marched in so decisively, as if she was in exactly the right place; the girl less so. She looked as if she didn’t have a clue what she was doing there. And why had the woman been holding her by the hand as they walked along?
It was Paula. Paula and Daisy. It had to be. They even looked familiar. I’d only ever seen them the once that I could remember, in the newspaper photograph that Ingrid had shown us years ago. But that was enough.
The other mother and the other daughter. The phantom family, the one that all of us preferred not to think about. The one that had been living quietly in this town all this time. From our point of view, as good as dead.
Dad managed an approximation of a smile.
When he spoke, his voice was strong and clear and there was no missing what he said.
&nbs
p; ‘Here you all are. Is it judgement day?’
Twenty-Four
Jenny
The ambulance picked up speed as it made its way through Kettlebridge. How long would it take us? Twenty minutes? Half an hour? At least they’d let me come with him. I was sitting close enough to reach out and touch him; he was upright on the folding stretcher, belted into place, his face contorted with pain.
‘Your turn,’ he managed to say.
My turn. Of course, he’d seen me screaming my head off when I gave birth to Felix all those years ago – I’d never been one for delivering babies in dignified silence.
‘Maybe you shouldn’t try to talk,’ I said, looking up for guidance from the paramedic who was standing over us.
‘Talking’s fine,’ he said. ‘If he gets to the hospital conscious and able to speak for himself, that’ll be a good sign.’
Mark said, ‘Jenny… I have to tell you something. Something I did wrong.’
This was going to be about Paula. I was sure of it. I was here with him, and for all either of us knew he was dying… and he was going to waste his last breath on her? On the woman who’d cheated on him and made his life a misery, taken a house from him, refused to let him see their child… assuming it was his child? I knew he believed it was. But surely, given her track record, there was room for doubt?
I’d recognised her, but only just. She’d looked very different to the sleek, expensively dressed, professional woman I’d seen with Mark at the hospital that time. She’d had her hair hacked short, and she obviously didn’t bother with colouring it – there had been plenty of silver on show. In her faded T-shirt and jeans, she’d looked like someone who had just wandered in off the street – which was pretty much what she was.
