by Sue Watson
Her vulnerability was raw, no more drama, no TV catchphrases, just my mum, tear-stained, her heart swollen with love. How could I ever deny her that?
I leaned in and hugged her and we held onto each other for some time.
‘Mum, I need to think about all this and I’ll have to talk to Gina. Things have changed – but not between you and me, our lives together have always been so big and full and happy. I can’t erase that, nor would I ever want to. I don’t know what would have happened if you hadn’t chosen to be my mum, but I know I couldn’t have picked a better one.’ We sat together on the sofa talking until very late and Mum went back to bed, leaving me alone to think about everything that had been said.
After a while, I had an urge to call Gina, I had to find out what happened from her. I was crying and said I needed her to come over immediately, and she got out of bed and ordered a taxi in the middle of the night.
‘I know everything,’ I said as I opened the door. I didn’t need to say any more, she nodded and walked through.
‘In a way it’s a relief,’ Gina sighed.
She sat down and I asked her many questions and she told me the same story Mum had, but from her perspective. And when she’d finished I had one more question to ask.
‘My dad… who was he?’
‘A boy… the one I told you about, the love of my life. But we were too young and my parents too Catholic, his parents hated me, they sent him away,’ she had tears in her eyes.
‘Did he ever come back? Do you know what happened to him?’
She stared ahead for a few seconds, trying to summon up the strength to explain. ‘You’ve met him… recently I think.’
I was shocked, my stomach lurched. I’d met my own father? Wouldn’t I have known? Would I not have felt something? ‘Who?’
‘It was Peter… Peter Lombardi.’
‘Peter…? Peter from the beach with the dog, Cocoa?’ I said, trying to assimilate this information. But no sooner had I heard it than I had to discard it. ‘Gina… he died… the day before yesterday.’
She nodded. ‘It broke my heart to hear that,’ she said, big tears falling down her face.
‘Oh Gina I’m so sorry,’ I said. So that’s why she was unnerved when Peter’s nephew Marco had told us the news outside the hotel.
‘When I came back, I asked around about him, if he’d ever married. “Carried a torch for a girl who used to live here,” the guy in the pub said, and I knew that girl was me. I saw him on the beach with his dog, but it was from afar, he hadn’t seen me. I loved Peter, I don’t think I’ve ever loved anyone since – he used to write me poetry, long reams of beautiful words,’ she sighed. ‘It breaks my heart to think of the life I could have had, safe here with him… and you. When I’d seen him walking along the beach, that’s why I had to take off for a few days, I had to think about what I wanted to do. And I thought about it and decided to give it a go, to stay in Appledore, sort the café stuff out with you and find him again. I was going to wander down onto the beach one morning when the tide was out and say “Hi, remember me…?”’ Her voice cracked, she started to cry and I gave her a tissue and put my arm around her.
‘I had this stupid idea about us even getting back together, Peter and me… I knew he was single, I’d asked around. Silly isn’t it? He probably hated me for going away… but I just had this feeling about fate, you know?’
I nodded, and let her continue speaking.
‘I thought wouldn’t it be amazing if the three of us were all here, a family back where we started, where we should be… together at last.’
‘Gina, he didn’t hate you… he told me he used to write poetry for his sweetheart. He talked fondly of her and said she wasn’t here any more, and he missed her so much – I assumed she’d died. But he was talking about you.’
‘Oh Ella you’ve no idea how happy that makes me – I thought he’d never forgiven me for leaving. I wrote to you both when I left… he never responded. I sent them care of my mother because I didn’t know where he was. When he never wrote back I assumed he’d forgotten me or hated me for leaving – but I wonder if he ever received any of my letters,’ she said.
‘There were lots of letters unopened from you in a carrier bag I foundbehind the freezer on the van. I imagine there are all kinds of letters in there, possibly the ones you sent to Peter. I can understand why Sophia would keep your letters to me, but why would she keep his?’
‘It was all tied up in the shame of me being an unmarried mother, she wanted better for me. I think she hoped I’d become a film star one day and we could forget all about what had happened. She wanted to be proud – I wish I could have done that for her. I was a rubbish mum and a rubbish daughter,’ she sighed.
‘Gina, I love my mum and she’ll always be my mum… but I’m sure in the right life you would have been a wonderful mother,’ I said, putting my arm around her.
‘I’d been a bit stupid in the past, tried to get you back, fight Roberta for you, but I loved you. I was bereft and I resented Roberta for being a good mother when I couldn’t, yet I knew you were safe and happy which is all that ever mattered. To hear you say I’d have been a good mother means more than you’ll ever know,’ she smiled. And she looked happier than I’d seen her since she’d arrived.
We talked for a long time, both working through what the night had brought with it. We talked of the past and the future, and over the next few hours we began to see each other differently, but the same. She wasn’t my cousin any more, nor was she my mother – but we still loved and cared about each other and this was the beginning of a new chapter.
Eventually, as the sun rose, Gina turned to me. She placed her hand on my wet cheek and smiled; ‘You have his eyes, darling,’ she said.
And I cried; for the past, for my childless mother, Sophia’s lost daughter and Gina’s lost baby. And then I cried for a man I never knew who’d died – who I’d met by chance on the beach, and who happened to be my father.
27
Rolling Back the Years
Mum came downstairs to find us both asleep on the sofa and instead of huffing and tutting and complaining about Gina’s presence, she covered us up and when we woke she made us breakfast.
I didn’t open the van that day, we had ‘a family meeting’ instead where Gina, Mum and I discussed how we would move forward. Gina was now back in our lives and we had to find a way to make it work and for them to not hurt each other any more.
Once we’d worked our way through the tears and the blame and some forgiveness, we tried to make the best of the mess we were in. I knew it would take time, they would both slip, but perhaps now the secret was out, nothing was festering, feelings could be aired and they could move forward. I also had to move forward, and try not to dwell too much on the fact that Ben was leaving for Hawaii today, but it was so difficult. Everything reminded me of him, the beautiful ice cream cone necklace he gave me, the coffee machine he’d fixed, the freezer, ice cream, the sea. For me he was blue skies, Appledore and strawberry ice cream, and I would miss him like hell.
Over the next few days, Mum and Gina and I worked through plans, discussing colour schemes, menus, ice cream flavours and staffing. Despite it being prickly in parts, I was glad of their company because mediating a potential cat fight took my mind off Ben. It was interesting to see how the dynamics shifted and changed as the three of us struggled with new roles, while falling into familiar ones from the past. At one point I suggested rude ice cream cocktails and Gina swore making Mum reprimand us both affectionately. For the first time I saw a glint of something other than hate for Gina in my mother’s eye and wondered if maybe she hadn’t lost a daughter – but found another one.
After our day of talking – both business and personal – Gina suggested we go for drinks. Mum declined, she was tired and said she’d head back, and for once seemed okay about us going out together without her. I suppose her worst fear had already happened; Gina had returned and I’d found out the truth. But Mum
had also realised that the consequences weren’t horrific, she hadn’t lost me as she feared she might. So Gina and I went to the pub, had a couple of drinks and talked, and then we laughed a lot – it felt good.
‘Don’t you two stay out so late again like you did last night,’ Mum said the following day over early breakfast on the patio. ‘I was worried to death until I heard you both stagger in at midnight.’ Gina and I giggled, we had no problem playing the roles of ‘naughty girls’, reliving our teenage years and having the security of Mum to come home to.
There was a lot of work ahead to get the café reopened by the middle of August, but I was determined and over the next couple of days threw myself into it head on. Meanwhile, Mum’s marketing expertise was in overdrive, she’d called the local papers, arranged a ‘glamour’ shoot for Delilah in the café with Designer Doggie magazine. She was Instagramming, Facebooking, Tweeting and even talking to Akahito her Japanese director friend about doing a reality show set in the café. Mum and Gina also bonded over a shared love of The Sopranos and Mob Wives – which I believe helped them to express themselves. There would for a long time be a residue of hurt and blame in their relationship, and often their bickering was real, but expressed in their own Mafia-speak it was funny and seemed harmless – I think!
‘I’m street, so look both ways before you cross me,’ Mum would say to bat Gina down and Gina would rise with a sassy shot across her bows like: ‘Don’t come for me bitch!’ Which was hilarious, and they’d found a way to dance around each other and rub along in those sometimes painful, early days.
During this time I kept in touch with Ben, telling him the story as it unfolded, he said it was like a soap opera and couldn’t believe all that had happened.
‘I worry about you, I can come back,’ he offered, ‘just say the word and I’ll be there.’ But I wouldn’t let him, this wasn’t our time, I had too many complex relationships to work out before I was ready to add a man to the mix. I missed him, but the café reopening kept me busy and distracted along with all the ongoing ‘relationship management’ of Mum and Gina aka ‘Mob Wives’.
During this time, Mum manned the van while Gina and I breathed life into the café, painting the walls peppermint, buying new, candy pink tables and rolling back the years. I had my hair cut and wore rings on my fingers and toes, and I was happiest walking around barefoot these days. My bohemian self was finally emerging, and after everything that had happened it seemed like nothing scared me any more. When you find out your mother isn’t your mother, nothing surprises you ever again.
Of course in the middle of all this was Peter’s funeral, which was incredibly tough. Gina and I went together, we stayed apart from the family who had no idea of our connection and probably just assumed we were paying our respects as local residents. It bonded us even more to share our grief for him, and for a life that might have been, if things had been different all those years ago. I found it hard to believe the lovely, gentle man I used to talk to on the beach was actually my biological father, some of the mourners my blood relatives, but in a small way it helped me to say goodbye.
Once work started on the café I threw myself into it and barely had a chance to catch up with my feelings, I was so consumed with the reopening. I was also keen to make up for lost time with Gina, aware that she might not stick around – and I could handle that, because I knew my mum would be there for me. It was a fine balance – I felt like I was managing international negotiations and at times ‘the talks’ almost collapsed. But we were all on a learning curve and Gina was trying to see things from Mum’s perspective and Mum was being more sensitive to Gina’s difficult and shifting role. Meanwhile I just woke every morning in shock, unable to get used to the strangeness and trying to come to terms with who I was.
‘You’ve dealt with this so well,’ Mum said to me one afternoon as we worked together in the van. It was a Saturday and busy on the beach so as Gina took deliveries for the café opening I spent a couple of hours helping Mum.
‘I had no choice,’ I said. ‘I had to deal with it – though it still doesn’t feel real. At the moment I’m just enjoying the fact that Gina’s come back into our lives and we’re a family again, I try not to think about the other thing… because the idea you’re not my biological mum doesn’t work for me.’
‘Nor me,’ she sighed. ‘I used to watch all those programmes on TV about long-lost children turning up in their mother’s lives and I used to think about Gina turning up in ours. It scared me to death, but instead of facing it, telling you – I put all that fear onto Gina and blamed her and Sophia. But you were Gina’s baby and Sophia’s granddaughter… they loved you too, and in my fear I was the one who took you away.’
I should have been told – one of them should have realised the impact this would have on me. But I couldn’t spend the rest of my life blaming other people, there had been too much of that and now we were a family again I didn’t want to lose anyone.
‘You did what you thought was right,’ I said. ‘And by the way, I still have the best mum,’ I smiled putting my arm around her.
We suddenly had a little rush at the van and though Mum could be eccentric and erratic, she worked well under pressure. She was able to focus and get on with things and just be there, which was as well because later that day Lucie called. She was devastated, her boyfriend had not only dumped her, but had stolen what little money she had along with her return ticket. Apparently she’d been calling all afternoon, but I’d been so busy I’d turned my phone off.
‘Mum,’ she was sobbing, ‘I want to come home.’
I immediately dropped everything. We closed the van, I called the airport and Mum called the British Embassy – I didn’t ask why, I don’t think she knew herself she just panicked. She was screaming down the phone about her granddaughter being destitute and sold as a Thai bride, finishing with, ‘If someone in that goddam office doesn’t move their ass right now, I’m gonna pop a cap in it!’ Her American TV speak had been made worse by the presence of Gina, for whom everyone was an ‘ass’, a ‘doll’ or ‘trailer trash’.
So as mother threatened the nice man at the British Embassy with all kinds of physical abuse involving fire arms and baseball bats, I calmly booked an immediate return for my baby.
When we’d both got off the phone, we opened up the van to see Gina storming across the beach.
‘Girls, what the hell? Why have you closed? Do you realise the queue’s all gone to the deli for trashy ice cream instead of ours?’
‘Sorry, Gina,’ I said, ‘but Lucie called, she needed to come home from Thailand, her boyfriend’s dumped her and stolen all her money…’
Gina looked relieved. ‘Shit is that all? I thought one of you had died in there,’ she said, turning around and wandering back up the beach to the café.
I can’t deny I felt a tinge of disappointment, hurt even, that Gina hadn’t asked whether Lucie was okay.
I glanced at Mum, who knew me better than I knew myself.
‘Don’t feel bad, Gina doesn’t really know what it’s like to be a mum… or a nana… she’ll get there, love.’
She smiled and served the next customers and I thought about how my mum had always been there, not just for the first days at school, the Nativity plays, the wedding – but for the stuff life is made of. Between the red-letter days and watersheds, she’d been there dealing with the fabric of life, cooking meals, cleaning floors, potty-training and soothing teething babies – first me then my kids. She’d laughed and cried with us, been covered in vomit and tears, watched endless hours of kids’ TV and ached as much as we did every time we hurt our knees or our hearts. It didn’t matter how her motherhood had happened – she was my mum, the kids’ nan, and she’d earned it.
Lucie was due to fly in the following day, and knowing neither of us would be able to sleep, I suggested Mum and I go through the rest of the Italian carrier bag that evening.
‘God knows what we’ll find in here,’ I said, elbow-deep in notebook
s, though I was hopeful we might find Sophia’s ice cream recipes. But sadly, after several hours, I had to concede what Mum had been saying all along – that Sophia kept all her recipes in her head.
The following day, after just a few hours’ sleep, I met Lucie at the airport. She burst into tears and so did I as she hurled herself across Arrivals and we wrapped our arms around each other oblivious to everyone else.
I smelled musky perfume and sun oil in her hair and felt like a cat whose kitten had been returned smelling different and couldn’t rest until it was washed off. I wanted to wipe away the hurt, the miles and all the missing, and gently pulled away slightly so I could check her for bruises or cuts.
‘You haven’t been hurt have you – he didn’t attack you or anything?’
‘No Mum, I told you, I’m fine physically… wow Mum you’ve changed. Your hair’s amazing and you look – different, like a slightly cool version of yourself.’
I laughed, with relief that she was okay and with deep joy that in my daughter’s eyes I was finally ‘slightly cool’.
We walked together to the car, arm in arm, my baby was back. It made me think again about Mum and Gina and all the pain of losing your child, or never feeling you really had them.
‘So what happened, Lucie?’ I asked as we reached the car.
‘This guy I was seeing, he just took my wallet while I was sleeping.’
‘Was it that Pang guy you’re always photographed with?’
‘No, Pang’s lovely – he’s such a sweetie, he was there when I needed him.’
‘Oh I’m glad you had someone with you, darling.’
‘Yes he’s growing breasts and working as a pole dancer now, he wants to come to the UK and work. I said we’d help him… can we, Mum?’
I was a little taken aback, so Mum’s gaydar was almost right, but perhaps her transsexual one needed updating? And how like Lucie to think of others when she was going through her own trauma. ‘I would love to help Pang,’ I said, ‘but let’s just put him and his pole on a back-burner until I get you safely home and settled. I have a café to open. While I drive, call your nan, she won’t rest until she knows you landed safely. Oh and there’s someone I want you to meet – a lot happened while you were away.’
