by Clare Empson
Luigi arrives with our coffees.
‘Cappuccino for the young lady. Espresso for you.’
I’ve had proper coffee before. My parents were devotees of Rombouts; they treated themselves to one of the little plastic filter cups every Sunday after lunch, although I wasn’t always offered one – it depended on my father’s mood. This is something different.
Jacob watches me while I take my first sip.
‘God. It’s delicious.’
Another sip.
‘It’s like – well, I’ve never had nectar, so …’ What would be the most accurate description of this creamy, mouth-exploding taste? ‘Hot ice cream.’
Jacob laughs.
‘That’s exactly what it’s like.’
I tell him about the Rombouts coffee. My father deciding whether or not I’d earned the right to one depending on my behaviour that week. Homework done the day it was set. Dressing properly for church. Being on time. A whole mental checklist for him to riffle through each week.
‘He sounds like a bit of a jerk.’
‘He’s a canon at our local church.’
‘There you go.’
‘I don’t like him very much. He’s not nice to my mother. He preaches about human kindness in church and then treats her like she’s a slave. He has a vicious temper and you never know when he’s going to lose it.’
‘Sounds like it was time to get away.’
‘I’d like never to go back.’
‘Well you don’t have to. You’re a free woman now. How old are you?’
‘Almost nineteen,’ I say, and Jacob laughs. I’ve let myself down with the ‘almost’.
‘How old are you?’
‘How old do you think I am?’
I am confident enough now to look at him properly, examining his features as an artist might. The grooves around his eyes are quite deep, especially when he smiles. His front teeth are a little bit crooked and slightly yellowed from nicotine. Not that any of this detracts from his beauty; more I am measuring his flaws as an indicator of age. Like looking into a horse’s mouth. Or counting the rings of an oak.
‘I think you’re thirty.’
‘Cheeky. Twenty-six.’
Seven years older, I find myself thinking. Is that an acceptable gap? And perhaps he is having the same thought, because he says, ‘Quite a lot older than you.’
‘That doesn’t matter,’ I say, and he smiles.
‘It doesn’t, does it?’
He looks at his watch. It’s ten minutes to seven.
‘If we walk slowly, the French House will be open by the time we get there. Are you up for it?’
More than I have been up for anything, ever. I wish I could communicate with Rick telepathically. If I could, I’d tell him that right now, right in this moment, I have never felt happier.
Now
Luke
Reunions between an adopted child and his birth parent are often characterised by an intense honeymoon period which can feel a bit like a love affair. The bonding process that normally takes place in the first six years of a child’s life remains dormant and is reawakened when they meet as adults.
Who Am I? The Adoptee’s Hidden Trauma by Joel Harris
Samuel lies on his little sheepskin rug in the corner of the kitchen. Hannah arranges and rearranges the flowers she bought from the florist earlier; I am stirring apple sauce, checking the slow-roasting pork, salting the potatoes, and all with an undertow of frenetic excitement. Alice is coming for lunch.
Earlier today I got out the paint pot we keep under the stairs and painted over every single fingermark and smudge of dirt I could find. Hannah polished the dark brown furniture my mother gave us, clunky mahogany antiques that feel too old-fashioned for our home. A few minutes ago she lit a Diptyque candle she’d been given for her birthday and now the kitchen smells deliciously of roasting meat mixed with fig and fern. The table is laid with linen napkins bought earlier from the gift shop. I have even polished the wine glasses. Ridiculous levels of over-preparation, but it’s the only way either of us can keep calm.
When there’s a knock at the door – one o’clock, she’s exactly on time – my stomach swoops and I am momentarily paralysed by a desire to run. Not towards the front door but away from it.
‘It will be fine,’ Hannah says, and she takes hold of my hand and pulls me out into the corridor, a gentle shove in my back until I am leading the way.
I open the door and find Alice standing there, and there’s a rush of chemicals, no other way to describe it, coursing through my veins, a surge of intensity that is like nothing so much as the feeling of being in love.
She stands on our doorstep dressed in a blue denim shirt and white jeans, a paper wrap of sweet peas held against her chest.
‘These are for you.’ She thrusts them at Hannah as she walks through the door and Hannah presses them to her face and inhales.
‘My absolute favourites. Oh Alice,’ she says, looking up at my birth mother. ‘You look exactly like Luke. And Samuel looks just like you too.’
Her voice wavers dangerously and Alice reaches forward to pull her into a brief, spontaneous hug.
‘Believe me,’ Alice says, ‘I’ve done nothing but cry for the past few days.’
She releases Hannah and looks at me – a fractional pause; you’d need to be deeply attuned to notice it – and then we embrace too. How can I explain what it’s like, this shyness, this shall-we, shan’t-we first-date-ness between mother and son? It’s easier for Hannah and Alice, that’s all.
In the sharp bright light of our kitchen, Alice spots Samuel on his rug and gives a little cry of anguish that seems familiar to me, perhaps from a lifetime ago, perhaps recorded somewhere in my cellular memory, who knows?
‘Just look at your little boy,’ she says. ‘He’s you exactly, isn’t he? Those eyes, my God.’
But then she moves away to look out at our little garden with its tiny bed in full bloom: irises, freesias, delphiniums (my other mother’s handiwork; she’s a fanatical gardener).
‘What a place you have here,’ she says, and does Hannah notice the way Alice’s voice shakes, her fight for composure? Her examination of the garden, I understand, is simply a decoy while she gets herself back together.
And yet with the presence of Hannah and Samuel, the relaxed setting of our own home, this lunch is the antithesis of our first one.
The food is perfect. Roasts are my speciality and I’ve really put my back into this one. The pork is scented with fennel seeds and cloves, the potatoes are hot, exploding little mouthfuls of crunchy sweetness.
And within minutes it seems Alice and Hannah are like old friends. They have art in common and a shared passion for Rodin. Alice tells us she still goes to the V&A at least once a month to sketch a Rodin nude.
They talk of the Young British Artists, Hirst, Emin, the Chapman brothers, and Charles Saatchi’s Sensation show a few years back, which Hannah loved and Alice hated.
‘I can’t stand this trend for fleeting, button-pushing art. The portrait of Myra Hindley was shocking. And? What are you left with? So Marc Quinn filled a head with blood. Cheap, disposable emotion, nothing particularly thought-provoking or enduring, to my mind.’
When Alice tells us about her and Richard’s time at the Slade, I find myself mesmerised.
‘There was a restaurant everyone went to at the time – everyone famous, that is, not poor students like us. San Lorenzo, you might have heard of it? Well, they bought one of Rick’s self-portraits and hung it in the restaurant, and after that, collectors and galleries were sniffing around him, even in our first year. That doesn’t happen very often. Rick was the real deal right from day one.’
Hannah says, ‘We literally couldn’t believe it when we found out he was Luke’s father. He’s a god as far as I’m concerned.’
‘You must meet him. He’s keen to get to know Luke, but we thought it was a good idea for us to meet first.’
‘What happened with you and Rick? Do you mind me asking?’ Hannah says.
‘You probably know he’s gay?’
‘So how …?’
‘It was much harder to be gay back then. There was a lot of homophobia around. And Rick was always hoping he’d become straight, that was the goal.’
She breaks off to sigh.
‘Poor Rick. You can’t change who you are. The thing you need to know is that both of us wanted to keep you, and we tried so hard to make it happen. But my father was very insistent on your being adopted.’
‘If you and Rick wanted to keep me, surely it was none of his business?’
‘You’d have to meet my father to understand, and that’s never going to happen. I haven’t seen him since you were born.’
‘How awful,’ Hannah says.
‘My father went behind my back to bring in the adoption agency. I’ll never forgive him for that. He refused to give me any financial support and the only way for us to survive was for Rick to drop out of college and get a job. And in the end I couldn’t let him make that sacrifice. He had to finish at the Slade. He needed to become Richard Fields. And we’d have been so poor, you and I, living in council housing and relying on social security handouts. I didn’t want that for you, Luke. I’m sorry.’
Alice seems exhausted after this admission, exhausted and a little broken. Hannah, who has been feeding Samuel on her lap, instinctively hands him to her. I see Alice’s reluctance as the baby is settled in her lap; fractional, just the slightest hesitation, but I catch it. And I also register the seconds of pain that flash through her eyes.
‘Goodness,’ she says. ‘The weight of him. The feel of him.’ She sniffs his head. ‘That wonderful baby smell. What is it, milk, soap? There’s a sweetness, isn’t there? I’d quite forgotten.’
She is wearing a long necklace of black beads, and Samuel, nestled against her chest, grabs hold of it in his fist and pulls.
‘Oh you cheeky thing,’ Alice says, pulling a puppet show of facial expressions, eyes wide, mouth in a round, exaggerated ‘O’. And Samuel laughs, for the first time in his life, a deep-bellied chuckle that neither of us has ever heard before.
‘Oh Alice,’ Hannah cries, ‘you made him laugh.’
And Alice does it again, no trace of self-consciousness as she performs for our son, eyes open, eyes shut; a simplistic version of peekaboo that triggers another outburst of giggles.
‘You are such a sweet boy.’ She presses her lips against Samuel’s scalp.
There is this great big dent in my heart, no other way to say it. Once upon a time, Alice would have pulled faces for me too.
Perhaps in the silence that follows we are all thinking the same thing.
Hannah leans forward and says, voice low, ‘Oh Alice. Poor you.’
Alice closes her eyes for a second; she nods.
‘I tried, Luke, I really did. But in the end I couldn’t keep you. And after you’d gone, well, to say that I regretted it …’
Hannah says, ‘I’m sorry,’ and I know from the break in her voice that she is fighting tears. I hear the words she leaves unsaid. Sorry for asking about it. Sorry for what happened, for losing your son.
‘You did the right thing for me,’ I say, even though I believe the opposite is true. Take a child from its natural mother? How could that possibly be the right thing? But instinctively I understand that this woman, this real live mother of mine, cannot cope with the truth. ‘It was brave of you. You gave me a life with the security of two parents, even though it was the last thing you wanted.’
Alice reaches out to cover my hand with her own, and it’s the first relaxed physical contact between us.
‘Luke,’ she says. ‘You have grown into the nicest human being.’
Then
Alice
Here at the French House (actual name the York Minster, though no one calls it that), Jacob is famous. Everyone knows him: young, old, the red-faced, bad-tempered barman, who redeems himself when he shouts, ‘What’s your girl drinking, Jake? Gin or beer?’
It’s halves of beer and pressing ourselves into a tightly packed corner, no tables or chairs or anywhere even to put down my sketchbook. I keep it wedged beneath one arm until Jacob notices, takes it from me and stashes it behind the bar.
The white noise of a hundred or so people talking and laughing, the air putrid with smoke and spilt alcohol, our bodies unnervingly close. We try to talk a few times but it’s like puppet theatre. I’m mouthing words, like I’m underwater; he’s shaking his head.
‘Nope,’ he shouts. ‘Still can’t get it.’
And then he looks at me in a way that makes me aware of my heart thudding, pulsing, and my breath, which I let go in one long rush. He doesn’t drop his eyes and I don’t drop mine and the look, the half-smile, lets me know that he feels as I do. There is a conclusion to this, an obvious one, and I understand it here in this densely packed bar where the noise is like a cocoon, just me and Jacob at its very centre, no room for anyone else.
I’ve made a decision and the decision is this. If there’s a chance to sleep with Jacob tonight, I’m taking it. The desire to touch him, with my hands, my mouth, to press my cheek against his, it’s exactly the same pull I felt when I watched him on stage at the Marquee.
‘What are you thinking about, Alice?’ he shouts. He pulls his face into a comical frown.
I’m thinking that I would really, really like to kiss him, though I can’t say that.
‘Shall we find somewhere quieter after this?’ I shout back, and he smiles again.
‘Come on.’ He takes hold of my hand, and just that first contact is an electrical charge that judders through my bones.
Outside, it’s a crowded Friday night in Soho. There are people everywhere, the streets now vivid with neon signs for strip joints and peep shows and girlie bars. When I first arrived in London, a few weeks ago, I was shocked by the blatant, frenzied sexualness of Soho. Not like my father, who decries it as a snake pit of immorality (he’s always been unoriginal in thought); more the fact that these bodily desires I’d always considered secret, and possibly shaming, were to be honoured and celebrated instead. I took the trouble to lose my virginity in my last year at school; nothing special, a few pleasant-enough skirmishes with a boy from school I liked but didn’t love. One thing I knew was that I wasn’t going to arrive in London with the tag of virginity tied around my neck.
Drinkers pool on the pavement outside every pub we pass, and quite often we walk in the middle of the street just to get around them, still hand in hand, Jacob now with the sketchbook beneath his arm.
‘Are you hungry?’ he asks, and I tell him yes, wanting to stretch the evening out for as long as I can.
‘Chinatown then.’
Our ‘business deal’, such as it is, is struck in a red and gold restaurant over bowls of chicken in black bean sauce and egg-fried rice.
‘What we have in mind is a charcoal drawing of the three of us on stage, something very posed and stylised, almost like a classical painting, but it’s a sketch.’
He flips through the final pages of my sketchbook and comes to the last drawing of Josef.
‘This is incredible, Alice. You have so much talent.’
I can’t hide the glow of pleasure at his words.
‘There are some classic poses that life models always adopt. Maybe we could incorporate some of those?’
‘Are you suggesting we do this in the buff?’
I start to laugh, but it dies halfway through because now all I can see is him naked.
‘We’ll get you some money from the record label, of course. How much do you want? Fifty pounds? A hundred? Let’s call it a hundred.’
‘A hundred pounds is far
too much.’
‘Most people would actually be quite pleased. Most people would ask for more. Stick it in the bank or something, you might need it someday.’
In my head I’m storing up these extraordinary moments to recount to Rick, but they are coming at me too fast. Me earning a hundred pounds in the course of one brief conversation? Rick sold his painting to San Lorenzo for thirty, and at the time that seemed unthinkable to us.
‘What shall we do now? We could go to a club, but there’s nothing open for an hour or so. But maybe you want to go home?’
‘I don’t want to go home.’
‘So …’ A slight hesitation. ‘I live in Soho. You could come to my flat for a bit, if you wanted? But is that what you want?’
I nod, because it’s impossible to speak.
The way we grin at each other then, a mutual smile that tips into almost-laughter, is an agreement signed.
In darkness now, we pass doorways with red lights above them, others where girls stand outside, bare legs with fur coats, the standard uniform. Sometimes Jacob says hello.
‘Hi, darling,’ he calls, and the girls always know his name.
‘Hi, Jake.’
‘Should I call you Jake?’ I ask, and he laughs.
‘I should think so. My grandparents were the only people who called me Jacob, and you wouldn’t want me to associate you with them.’
His flat is at the far end of Dean Street, three floors up, he tells me, though the moment he has opened up the front door of the thin, tall house and pulled me inside, he kisses me, both hands clasping my face, the sketchbook thudding to the floor.
‘Next time,’ he says, stooping to pick it up, ‘let’s leave the etchings behind.’
The front door of his flat opens into a large sitting room, painted wine red with purple and gold strips of fabric hanging from the ceiling like rows of hammocks. There are candles everywhere, dark red ones, stuffed into empty wine bottles with swollen bases. Beneath the window there’s a low-slung sofa made of brown corduroy, almost hidden beneath a covering of cushions, twenty or thirty of them, in orange, red and purple, each one embroidered in gold and glinting with tiny mirrors.
