Sing me to Sleep

by Helen Moorhouse

  It was Bee who spoke first.

  “Anyway,” she said flatly, “in case you think that I’m going to sponge any more money off my dad to bring up Adam Wilson’s kid, then you can forget about it. I won’t interfere with your plans any more than I have to.”

  Rowan frowned. “What do you mean, Bee?” she asked.

  Bee rolled her eyes. “I’m going to get rid of it. Have an abortion. Today, in fact. Although with any luck I mightn’t have to after yesterday.”

  “Don’t!”

  Bee jumped at the ferocity of Rowan’s tone. She stared at her for a moment, part of her wondering had she actually just heard her stepmother bark at her like that? Was Rowan actually capable of speaking in that tone of voice or was it her subconscious instead?

  Rowan’s face, however, was proof enough that it was she who had spoken. She was suddenly pale, her face as white as Bee’s. Her chest rose and fell rapidly, although her breathing was silent. Bee flinched again as Rowan stood abruptly and went to stand at the window, her back to the table where they had been sitting. Bee couldn’t have been positive – it was difficult to see against the glare of the morning sunshine that flooded in through the window – but she thought that her stepmother was trembling.

  Rowan’s voice came more quietly now. “Please, Bee . . .” she managed before her voice trailed off.

  Anger suddenly flooded back through Bee. “I’m so sorry, Rowan, if this offends your pro-life sensibilities –,” she began.

  “That’s not it.”

  “But seriously, what do you expect me to do? Have a baby? On my own? Because it’s not like Adam’s going to have a change of heart any time soon and come skipping home to me to change nappies. Are you out of your mind, Rowan? All these years I’ve studied – surely you of all people want me to finally start making my own money so you can get me off your back? And I’ve got a little bit of planning to do on that front seeing as how I was made to chuck in the course I was doing in order to free myself up to do something that I got – that I got duped into doing. I didn’t make any of this bloody mess but I’m damn sure not going to get out of it if I’m saddled with a kid.”

  Rowan’s voice came in a low growl. “Bee, are you ever going to grow up?”

  Bee was stunned into silence again. Her headache and nausea – she blamed the hangover but she had a sneaking suspicion that morning sickness had begun to set in also – were forgotten as she stared at the silhouette of the older woman as she turned to face her.

  “I’m perfectly grown up, thank you very much,” she retorted bitterly.

  It was an attitude that Rowan was familiar with from so many years before. “You’re grown up, are you?” she replied, still in the same low, quiet tone. “Grown up because you don’t live with me and your dad any more? Grown up because you’re in college and you can just about manage to get yourself in on time in the morning? Grown up because you had a boyfriend? Because you can drive a car? Because you’re twenty-five years old? Is that why you think you’re so grown up, Bee?”

  Rowan paused for a response which didn’t come.

  “How about you try the real stuff though? What about – oh, I don’t know – taking responsibility for your actions for a change? Is it only Adam’s fault that you chucked in your course and believed that you’d get into Darvill’s? Is it only his fault that you got pregnant? Only up to you to keep it if it’s convenient for you? Does the fact he doesn’t want to be involved somehow absolve you from everything, conveniently enough? Don’t you have anything to do with all of this?”

  Bee stared at her stepmother, open-mouthed with outrage.

  “How dare you?” she spat. “How . . . dare you! None of this is your business, you interfering old cow! I’m sick of you sticking your nose into my life when you’re nothing to me, do you hear? Nothing! Except a control-freak gold-digger who’s had her claws in my dad from day one. Who wasn’t happy until she got everything to go her own way – until she imprisoned him in the countryside to keep a good hold on him. Who took him away from his family and friends so that she had the upper hand at all times –”

  “Who took you away from those scumbags that you hung about with, more like,” retorted Rowan. “You’ve always resented me, Bee. But you cannot for a second say that I am nothing to you. All your life I’ve looked out for you as best I could, no matter how difficult you’ve made it for me, but if you think that you’d be where you are today without the decision that your father and I made to take you out of London then you’re very, very wrong.”

  “Where I am today?” squeaked Bee, her eyes wide with anger and disbelief. “What, like out of a college place with no idea what to do next with my life because someone lied to me? Sharing a house with my cousins and their overbearing family? Pregnant and alone?”

  “I mean alive,” snapped Rowan in return. “With no prison record, or addiction problems. The crowds you were running around with – they had knives and drugs and they knew what to do with them and a spoiled little brat like you wouldn’t have lasted two minutes if things got serious. We took you out of London for your own good – your father was worried sick about you. At least he’s had some peace since we moved to Somerset.”

  “So much peace that he’s half dead with boredom,” countered Bee.

  Rowan raised her palms to heaven in exasperation. What planet did Bee actually live on?

  “Wandering around the farm all day with that bloody pig for company. Hardly able to sustain a conversation.”

  “Not with you anyway on account of how it’s impossible to get a word in edgeways about anything that isn’t you, or Adam the last time you came to stay. Your father’s happy, Bee. He’s content – just ask him. Why wouldn’t he be? He’s got a great show on TV, he loves the farm and he bloody loves you too but you wouldn’t know that because you never bother to talk to him, just at him. And listening – well, we can see now that that’s an alien concept to you. How many ways does a parent have to tell a child to be careful, to look after herself?”

  “I’m hardly a child, Rowan.”

  Rowan shook her head. “Well, then why couldn’t you manage simple contraception then? Why are you now going to wreck your life having an abortion?”

  Silence fell for a moment as Bee sneered at her stepmother. “Like having a baby wouldn’t wreck my life?”

  “It might bloody teach you to grow up a bit,” Rowan jabbed back.

  Bee set her lips in a thin line before speaking again. “Look, Rowan, I think you’re crossing a line here. What I choose to do with my body is absolutely none of your business. I cannot have this baby, do you hear me? I don’t want it and you can’t tell me what to do. I don’t fall under your spell like my dad does. You can’t control me any more the way that you’ve controlled where we’ve lived, and what jobs my dad did and everything that we ate and wore and where I went to school. It’s nothing to do with you, Rowan. You’re not my mum!”

  Rowan stared at Bee, her mouth twisting for a moment into an incredulous smile that fell away as quickly as it had formed. She shook her head again in disbelief.

  “Bee, I have no clue where you get your ideas, do you know that? I’m not a control freak, nor do I have any sort of master plan like you seem to think. I’m no gold-digger – in fact, if you want proof, in the early days of Lila and Vulpo it was me who supported us, who paid all the bills. Not that it’s your business, but I have never asked your father for a red cent in all the time we’ve been together and I have no plans to start doing that now – and I’m damn sure I’m not eating into anything that you have a right to. Don’t you even know your dad? I couldn’t manipulate him if I tried – and I haven’t, before you accuse me of that. But do you know something? You’re right. I’m not your mum. Very far from it, in fact. For example, I’ve been faithful to your father for twenty years. I adore him and he adores me. And I have always, always done my best by you, even when you made it nigh on impossible. And something else, Bee – I’m here. Here for you in this big mes
s. And I’m not planning on going anywhere.”

  “Holding back my hair while I throw up doesn’t make you a parent,” spat Bee, her face red with fury. “How dare you get all sanctimonious and superior about my mother when you know nothing about her!”

  “You’re the one who was calling her a liar not ten minutes ago! It strikes me that you don’t know very much about your mum either, except some idea of a saint that you’ve formed in your head.”

  Bee responded by throwing her hands in the air and suddenly standing, making as if to walk away but at the last second changing her mind and turning back to Rowan.

  “This conversation ends here, Rowan,” she said flatly. “I don’t know why you’re here in the first place and I don’t care. All I know is that I don’t need you, do you hear me? I don’t need you interfering with my life and my decisions. I don’t need you to preach at me to keep this baby because it’s not something that I’m going to consider. And I don’t want you ever to mention my mother to me again. Is that clear?”

  Rowan stared back at her for a moment. Tried to think of a response. Tried to think what she could say to change Bee’s mind. Thoughts flooded through her mind, too fast to rein in and make coherent sense of. Her body tingled as she longed to grab the younger woman and shake the nonsense she was spouting out of her. Instead, she remained silent. Her body deflated suddenly. What was the point?

  “Is that clear?” snapped Bee again.

  “Yes,”replied Rowan sharply. “Have it your way, Bee. Think your crazy thoughts. Live your stupid, irresponsible life. You don’t need help after all, do you?” She shook her head again and on impulse stood, reached out and grabbed her keys which lay on the kitchen countertop, beside Guillaume’s letter. “Good luck with it all then, Bee. And go ahead and have your abortion. You’re right – it’s none of my business. But for what it’s worth, I have a bloody strong feeling that it’s going to create more problems for you than it solves.”

  She brushed sharply past Bee as she made her way out of the room.

  Bee stepped aside and watched her go, her face still sullen and resentful, her expression hard. It softened a little as she heard the front door slam behind her stepmother and she was left again entirely alone.

  Chapter 54

  September 2020

  Jenny

  She’s right.

  That bloody woman is absolutely right.

  I watch as my daughter falls apart yet that woman I have despised for so long tries to put her back together.

  I watch as my daughter spouts nonsense, blames the world and lives in denial when she is old enough to start to think for herself, to take responsibility, and that woman tries her best to set her straight.

  I watch as my baby cries because she is going to have a baby herself.

  And I don’t know what to say or do.

  But that woman does.

  She doesn’t know that she is doing everything right but she is taking over my job. Acting like a real mother.

  And I realise that even if I were there to do that job myself, I am not entirely sure if I would know what to do.

  More than anything, I realise that Bee is moving away from me. That not only is her mental image of me shattered, but that I am of no use to her now in the slightest.

  She needs a real mother. Someone of flesh and bone and wisdom and it seems that this woman is all of those things.

  I am losing my daughter to someone else.

  But of that I am suddenly and strangely glad. Because she needs to be nurtured, to be protected – all of those things that I once thought were my responsibility.

  It turns out that they’re not any more. The time has come for someone else to be a mother to my child.

  Chapter 55

  September 2020

  Bee and Rowan

  Twice Bee thought seriously of asking the cab driver to stop and let her out so that she could be sick. Twice she managed to keep it under control. It was the timing that was crucial, she knew. She had to be at the Mayberry by two, a little earlier even. Her appointment wasn’t until three, but that wasn’t the time that she had given Adam.

  If she just had him for an hour to herself, she knew that she could talk him round. It had come as a shock to him, she knew that. And on top of her letting him down so badly at the Darvill’s interview. But they’d had a few days apart to cool down and she knew that deep down he still loved her. All those times they’d spent together – they couldn’t stand for nothing, could they? All the times they’d talked about the future, being together – she consoled herself with memories like this. They made her feel safe. Made her sure that he’d come back to her and they’d carry on being as happy as they had been. Made her sure that he’d turn up today.

  As the cab pulled up, she looked toward the dated façade of the building. She had been born here, she knew. It had been a state-of-the-art maternity clinic then, her dad had told her once as they passed it. It was shabby now. And more multifunctional, of course. The entrance that she sought wasn’t at the front but in a more discreet location around the side. In an effort to keep the heavily pregnant mothers separate from the others. From people like her, who came to end life rather than start it.

  Bee gagged again at the thought and she immediately squeezed her eyes shut to block it. She couldn’t for a second think about the abortion. She wasn’t going to have to go through with it anyway, she was sure of that. Adam would turn up. It was going to be fine. The next time she came here it would be through the front door, she knew it.

  She managed to collect her thoughts and accepted her change from the taxi driver in silence before stepping down from the cab onto the pavement, glancing around her to see if perhaps he was there, waiting already.

  He would approach her straight away – arms outstretched, begging her not to go through with it and they’d collapse, happy, into each other’s arms, aware of all that they might have lost, before turning their thoughts to the bright future they were going to have together.

  Her cousins would have to move out of Pilton Gardens, of course. And then it would be perfect. Then they would plan the nursery and redecorate – put the baby in her old room. Just like her mum and dad had. Bee blocked that thought from her mind as soon as it arrived, too. She couldn’t think any more about her mother now. That was another day’s work.

  With a sigh, Bee stuffed her hands in her pockets and sat on the edge of one of the raised flower beds to wait – her dad had said that they were fountains once, but nowhere in England had fountains these days unless under very special dispensation from the government. Even the king had had to apply, just like everyone else. Odd really, when flooding was so severe, that they couldn’t somehow just fathom a way to channel it into fountains, to make something beautiful out of disaster. Like she was going to do. She knew it.

  She tried to keep an eye on everyone who passed at first, turning this way and that to catch better sight of a familiar navy-blue blazer or the tip of a blond head. She grew tired of this after a while, however. Decided in herself that no good would come of looking too eager when Adam did, eventually, get there. Anything could have delayed him, she thought, glancing at her watch which read two fifteen. She had no doubt in her mind that he was currently on his way, making a dash across the city to get to her before it was too late. And then all of this anxiety would stop. This awful feeling of being unsure. She knew it was going to be fine, of course. She just needed to hear him say it.

  When she saw the glint of sunlight reflect off the black cab as it pulled up, she thought that she might actually faint with the wave of relief that flooded over her. He’s here, she thought, her heart pounding so quickly that she feared it might seize up. Finally. He’s here. She watched the door open slowly, gripping the insides of her jacket pockets to still her trembling fingers, positive to her core that it was a matter of moments only before she would see his face, and then everything would be fine.

  But it wasn’t fine. It was far from fine, in fact. Yes, th
e face that emerged from the cab and looked wide-eyed around the piazza outside the clinic was a familiar one. But it wasn’t Adam’s. It was, in fact, the last face that she wanted to see. Hadn’t she told her stepmother as much only a couple of hours before?

  Bee contemplated hiding. She glanced around her hurriedly to see if there was a bush or a tree perhaps, or something she could position herself behind until Rowan went away. What the hell was she doing here? How had she found out? Or was this some horrendous coincidence? Bee’s heart pounded faster as she observed that there was nowhere to hide. She glanced at the door of the clinic through which she would have to enter in a little over a half an hour and a wave of dread hit her. She brushed it aside, contemplated making a run for it in through the door before realising that it was too late. Rowan had seen her and was approaching fast, half walking, half running, her face filled with unwanted sympathy.

  Bee took a deep breath, tried to quell the growing sense of panic that was mixing with the anxiety and terror that she already felt.

  “Go away, Rowan,” she warned, when the older woman was still a good few yards away. It didn’t stop her approach.

  “Bee . . .” Rowan began, coming to a halt before her, slightly out of breath.

  “Rowan, seriously – this is none of your business and I do not want to see you.”

  “Bee, please, let me talk to you for five minutes.”

  “No.” Bee glanced around her frantically. Adam would be here any minute and she couldn’t risk him seeing her horrendous stepmother and then disappearing again before she’d had a chance to talk to him. What was Rowan playing at? She could ruin everything.

  “How did you know I was even here?”

  “I guessed, Bee . . . geography and that . . .” She glanced up at the building with trepidation. “It’s closest to home. I’ve been here before.”