Never Tell A Lie

by Gail Schimmel

  As soon as I say it, I want to bite it back. It’s the sort of thing Travis might have taken offence at. I can almost hear his voice, telling me he’s not the type of guy to show off (although he was) or that Leo Goldstein mustn’t think that he, Travis, would be talking about him to anyone.

  But Joshua laughs. ‘It’s going to do my street cred so much good,’ he says.

  I breathe a sigh of relief. Joshua is not Travis, and we seem to be able to become ‘couple friends’ with April and Leo.

  If only my worries about my mother were that easy to solve.

  Chapter 18

  I have tried, since we talked about it, to ask my father more about my mother’s disappearance, but it’s hard to get much out of him.

  ‘But did you look for her?’ I ask in desperation. ‘Surely you must’ve looked for her? A depressed woman out in the world on her own?’

  ‘I had a two-year-old to raise, Mary,’ he says. ‘And I was heartbroken. After the postcard came, I wrote to a few friends of ours in England, asked them if they’d heard from her. But only one came back to me, and said not. The others didn’t answer. It wasn’t like it is now, Mary, with Facebook and what have you to track people down. If a person wanted to go, they went. That simple.’

  ‘And now,’ I ask. ‘Now that there is all that stuff?’

  ‘She knows where we are, Mary,’ he says, and I can see the shutters come down. ‘She knows where to find us if she wants us. Clearly she doesn’t.’

  When I try to ask more, he won’t answer, and soon I give up.

  But just because he didn’t want to look for her doesn’t mean that I can’t. Like I told April, I was, once upon a time, a real journalist who found out things and investigated things and got answers. When I tell Stacey about it, she agrees with me. ‘You can totally find her if you want to, babe,’ she says. ‘You’re so clever like that.’

  And so I start looking. And Facebook, like my dad said, seems the best place to start.

  I don’t know why I imagined that Lorraine Wilson would be an unusual name, but it’s not. And it doesn’t help that I literally have no idea where she might be. There are one or two that I can rule out – like if they studied at Oxford, or were born in Jamaica, or their photos are too young or too old, or just patently not my mother. But there is still a long list of Lorraines with very little public information and neutral or possible profile pictures. Only once I’ve done that will I look at the other possibilities – that she’s using her maiden name on Facebook, or that she’s remarried, or that she just isn’t there. It all seems a bit overwhelming.

  April suggested that I contact the missing people sites too. ‘Looking for Lorraine Wilson, last seen in Johannesburg on . . .’ type of thing. Apparently, there’s a TV programme about people who find each other like this, and it’s all very touching and successful. April seems absolutely sure that if I want to, I will find my mother. Stacey agrees. ‘But do you want to?’ she says.

  And that’s the question, isn’t it? Do I want to? Should I even start?

  Chapter 19

  The day after the dinner at Al Parco, I want to thank April for a great evening, but I’m not quite sure of the etiquette. It wasn’t at April’s house, and each couple paid for themselves, so I can’t really thank her. But she did issue the invitation. I have a thought that I haven’t had for years – that if I’d only had a mom, I’d know the rules for things like this. I’d have the memo; I’d find life easier. I have to figure all these things out for myself.

  Only I do have a mom, and she is out there somewhere.

  But April messages me. Thanks for a fab evening, she says.

  Loved it, I answer. Hope it was the first of many.

  Then there’s a silence, and I worry that I’ve overstepped.

  It’s the afternoon before she messages again, and Django and I are in the middle of the chaos that always engulfs us on a Sunday afternoon as we try to find all his schoolbooks and get our ducks in a row for the week ahead. But when my phone beeps, I grab it.

  Coffee tomorrow? says April.

  I don’t know what to make of that. I feel a bit anxious, like she’s got something to tell me that is too sensitive for WhatsApp. Like she’s going to break up with me. I try to tell myself that this is irrational, that I always default to thinking that people are going to let me down, and it’s only sometimes true.

  Cool, I say. After drop-off?

  This is an arrangement we often have, and April agrees.

  She’s there before me, which almost never happens, but Django had a meltdown when we got to school in the morning.

  ‘I’m not getting out,’ he said. ‘I’m not doing school today.’

  ‘Django,’ I said, in my most reasonable tone. ‘We have talked about this. Firstly, school is mostly not optional. But secondly, you can’t announce that you’re not going as we arrive at school. It messes with my day.’

  ‘You can just take me home,’ he said. ‘Nelly is working today.’

  Nelly works twice a week, and I fantasise about her being able to work all week. All my winning-the-lottery fantasies start with ‘And Nelly would work full-time.’ But the downside is that on Mondays and Thursdays, Nelly’s days, Django is just ever so slightly more likely to play up.

  ‘I have a meeting in ten minutes,’ I said. ‘I don’t have time to take you home.’

  I didn’t want to tell Django that my meeting was actually a coffee with April, and that in all seriousness I probably could just call her and tell her I’d be late. She didn’t exactly have anywhere she needed to be. But I didn’t want to; I wanted to get to coffee and I wanted Django to go to school.

  ‘I can come to your meeting and wait in the car,’ he said. ‘And then you can take me home.’

  I tried to summon my strictest voice. ‘Django,’ I said. ‘Get out the car. You are going to school today. That’s that.’

  ‘No.’

  We were at an impasse, and I didn’t know what to do. Then I saw the headmaster walk out and survey the parking area. He does this most mornings – depending on my mood, I feel like he looks like a benevolent emperor or a vulture. Today, however, he looked like an angel sent to save me.

  ‘If you don’t get out,’ I hissed at Django, ‘I will call Mr Richardson right now. And he can deal with you.’

  ‘You wouldn’t.’

  ‘Watch,’ I said. I opened the window. ‘Last chance,’ I told Django.

  He looked from me to Bob Richardson and back.

  ‘Fine,’ he said. ‘You win. But for the record, I hate you.’

  He grabbed his bags and slammed the car door hard as he got out.

  I sighed and put my head down on the steering wheel for a moment. I was getting parenting so wrong, but I didn’t know how else to do it.

  I couldn’t spend long feeling sorry for myself – I was late for April. And, as I said, she is waiting for me when I get there. She’s looking a bit flustered and explains that she left her phone at home, because she took the wrong bag. I smile – a typical April mini-drama.

  We order lattes.

  ‘So,’ she says, as I make myself comfortable. ‘Did you enjoy Saturday?’

  ‘Very much,’ I say. ‘So did Joshua. And you?’

  ‘Absolutely,’ says April. ‘And Leo loved you guys. He never loves anyone.’

  ‘Really?’ I say, sipping my latte. ‘He seems the type of guy that anyone would get on with.’

  ‘Yes,’ says April. ‘He’s very charming. And people always like him. But he doesn’t usually like them back.’

  I laugh. ‘Sure am glad I didn’t know that before we met him.’

  April looks at her coffee. ‘Not really the sort of thing I can tell people.’ Then she laughs too. ‘That is, before they’ve met him.’

  ‘So, what do you do when that happens?’ I ask.

  ‘Oh God,’ she says. ‘It’s awful. I have to makes excuses and lie and dodge until they give up asking us.’

  ‘It was like that with my
late husband,’ I say. ‘But he wasn’t anything like Leo. Nobody liked him either, so the dodging was easier.’ I laugh.

  ‘You don’t talk about him much,’ says April.

  I don’t speak about Travis much. I didn’t while he was alive, and I don’t now. I don’t want my friends to know the Mary who was married to Travis; that weak, pathetic creature. Suddenly though, sitting with April, I desperately want to. I can feel the whole story pushing at my lips, dancing on my tongue, wanting to come out. But if I start talking, where will I stop? And I can’t tell anyone – no matter how good a friend, no matter how close to me – the whole story.

  ‘Travis wasn’t a nice man,’ I say slowly. ‘I should never have married him, and having married him, I should never have stayed. But I did.’

  ‘You have Django though?’ says April. ‘You wouldn’t give that up?’

  I smile. ‘Obviously not,’ I say. ‘But equally, if I’d never had him, or had other children with a nicer man, I’d be none the wiser about Django, would I?’

  This is something I have thought of a lot, alone in the small hours when I can’t sleep. The common wisdom is that we must forgive the bad marriage that brought us a beloved child. But that is crap. A good marriage would have brought us other beloved children. Yes, we must make the best of it; celebrate the good things that happened. But don’t tell me that marrying Travis was worth getting Django, because it wasn’t. Because I would never have known that I missed him.

  I try to explain this to April. She nods. ‘I think I know what you’re saying,’ she says. ‘It’s kind of like a philosophical knot, isn’t it? Like getting your head around death, or non-existence, or . . . or . . . that bloody cat in a box?’

  ‘Exactly.’ I laugh. ‘It’s exactly like that bloody cat in a box.’

  ‘And Joshua?’ says April. ‘How’re things going?’

  ‘It’s kind of amazing,’ I say. ‘I feel like I’ve always known him. Like we’re two halves of something.’ I pause. ‘Oh God, that sounds so pathetic and naive. Of course we’re not two halves of anything.’

  ‘It sounds wonderful,’ says April.

  ‘But I kind of keep expecting it to go bad, if you know what I mean?’ I tell her. ‘Like this weekend? I was convinced that he’d go all psycho on me like Travis used to do, and take against you and Leo, and spoil things. I kept waiting for it to happen.’

  ‘But it didn’t, did it?’

  I smile. ‘No, it didn’t.’

  ‘You’re lucky.’ April is quiet. She’s chewing at the skin on the side of her thumb, a habit I have noticed once or twice in the past when she’s been anxious or thinking.

  ‘So it’s great all round,’ I say, giving her a small shove. ‘Leo likes us, we like you guys, nobody has to avoid anybody.’

  She stops chewing her thumb. ‘You’re right,’ she says. ‘Thank God. I would have been broken-hearted if Leo made me give you up.’

  ‘Oh, me too!’ I say, feeling a bit like a teenager declaring Best Friend-ness; but it’s a good feeling.

  ‘So,’ says April. ‘How are you feeling about your mom? Have you decided what to do?’

  The truth is, I’ve been doing a lot of thinking, and I tell April about the plan to look for my mother that I’ve slowly been hatching.

  It’s later that night, lying in bed, that I start playing over what April said. Was she trying to tell me something? I wonder. Then I give myself a mental shake, and I turn over to try to sleep in a different position. I must stop looking through the world with Travis-coloured glasses. Travis is dead. And April and Leo are lovely people. The end.

  Chapter 20

  I’m not sure how the next ‘foursome’ dinner date would have happened – would we have been invited to their house at that point? – but it is pre-empted by Linda Henderson. Linda has been sending little jokes and memes and links on the WhatsApp group she created for our table ever since the reunion. Joshua and I, and April and I, have laughed amongst ourselves a bit. But we’ve also answered her, and so have the others, and there is a soft banter that happens every now and then over the months that have passed.

  But it seems that Linda needs more. Soon after the successful dinner date, we all get a message on the group from Linda.

  Braai at my place. Bring your famdamilies. Let’s get the group together again! My kids can’t wait!

  The date is two weeks away.

  Almost immediately, I get exactly the same message from both April and Joshua:

  Famdamilies???

  Okay, it’s all a bit over-the-top enthusiasm; and one gets the feeling she might back it up with a Bible quote, or a kitten meme. But she means well.

  She means well.

  I send this to both April and Joshua. It’s weird that I’m having the same conversation with both of them. Joshua comes back:

  It’ll be a jol.

  I guess that means we’re going. Which is good to know, because April phones about a minute later.

  ‘D’you think you’ll go?’ she says.

  ‘Looks like it,’ I say.

  ‘And Joshua?’

  ‘Yes.’ It’s funny how I didn’t even question that she was asking about us as a couple.

  ‘Cool, then I might be able to persuade Leo.’

  ‘They’re a good group of people,’ I remind her.

  ‘It was fun at the reunion.’

  ‘Exactly. And Leo’s not as bad as you make out. He’ll love it.’

  April is quiet.

  ‘Sorry,’ I say. ‘Obviously you know Leo better than I do. But I’m sure he’ll enjoy it. They’re interesting people.’ I pause. ‘Only, maybe don’t show him that part about famdamilies.’

  At this, April laughs. ‘You’re right,’ she says. ‘He will enjoy them. I worry too much. Plus, I presume we can bring the kids, given the whole famdamily vibe. So that’s kind of cool. No babysitters, at least. And Zach and Django can play. Will Joshua bring his daughter?’

  Joshua’s daughter.

  This is a sensitive issue.

  Joshua met Django fairly early in our relationship. It was inevitable – I’m a single mom; you see me, you see my kid. And even though we’ve managed to go out a lot, I’ve got one dad and a few friends, not a whole team of back-up grandparents. Travis’s father died when he was twelve, and his mother is still alive. But she’s in a frail-care facility and is completely demented. For ages after Travis died, I tried to take Django to see his grandmother, but she had no idea who either of us were, and it was frankly frightening even for me, let alone a small boy. The final straw, however, was when I did my usual, ‘Hello, Melody, it’s me, Mary’, and she said, with a sweet smile on her face, ‘Oh, my son’s married to a woman called Mary, but she’s a cheap-ass whore.’

  That was that – all sense of obligation disappeared in a puff of nastiness. My father found it hilarious.

  So Joshua has got to know Django. But I’ve never met his daughter.

  I know that she’s eighteen and studying law like her father. I know that her name is Willow – ‘Because that’s the sort of rubbish you name your child when you have them at twenty,’ says Joshua. And I know that she looks like her name: tall, long blonde hair . . . willowy. ‘She takes after her mom in the looks department,’ says Joshua, and I try not to feel a pang of jealousy, because I know that he barely even had a relationship with Willow’s mom. But they both seem to be extraordinarily attractive women.

  Anyway, Willow goes to university in Cape Town, and lives in a flatlet in her mom’s garden when she is home, so I suppose it’s not that surprising that we haven’t met.

  But in the four months that we’ve been together, Willow has been up for at least two weekends, and both times, Joshua has taken her out to dinner and not invited me. The first time, it didn’t bother me – it was early days and I could see why he wouldn’t. But the last time was more recently, and I kind of feel like with the relationship he is building with my son, it might be nice for me to meet his daughter. But I haven’t said an
ything.

  ‘I doubt Joshua will bring Willow,’ I tell April. ‘I’m pretty sure she’s in Cape Town that weekend.’

  ‘Of course, silly me,’ says April. ‘Leo’s always telling me I’m useless at retaining information. He’s right.’

  ‘That’s really not something I’ve noticed about you,’ I say. ‘And Willow’s whereabouts are hardly the sort of information that you need to retain.’

  ‘True.’ She laughs. ‘Leo probably means it more about important things. Like the pin code to my bank card.’

  ‘You’ve forgotten that?’ I laugh.

  ‘It was a brand-new one, and I hadn’t changed it to my usual one yet.’

  ‘God, I hate that,’ I say. ‘Why can’t they just leave it the same?’

  The plans for Linda’s braai seem to get more complicated as we get nearer. She doesn’t seem to be able to just give us the information all at once. So first it’s the time and date. And then the next day, someone asks for the address and she says, ‘Oh yes, of course’, and shares that. She’s in Fourways. It’s a mission to get there from my place. But still, it will be fun.

  Then, with a week to go, she sends this:

  BYOB please guys. And something for the kids to drink.

  Okay, not a problem. Most of my friends are single moms – we always bring our own drinks to each other’s houses. It’s not even something you have to say in that group.

  Then the next day:

  And guys, obvs because we’re braaiing, please bring your meat.

  April calls me. ‘Exactly what will she be providing?’ she says. ‘Leo hates these bring-your-own jols. Always says he’d rather go to a nice restaurant.’

  Frankly, I agree with Leo. But I’m trying to be relaxed and to just go with it. ‘At least we don’t have to bring salads and what-not,’ I say.

  But I speak too soon, because the next day we get a list of things that Linda would like us to bring in addition to the booze and meat. I’m bringing dessert. For about fourteen people.

  ‘Leo says the four of us should just cancel and go for dinner,’ April says on our next call. ‘He thinks it would be cheaper.’