Her Mother's Daughter

by Alice Fitzgerald

  ‘I love you, too, Mummy,’ I say.

  ‘And I love you, Mummy,’ Thomas says.

  She squeezes us tight and flattens our hair and then kisses us on the head. I smile a big smile because I’m so happy.

  ‘Come on, it’s time to get up,’ she says, and she pushes back the blankets. Me and Thomas get up and go into the bathroom to shower and get dressed. Then Mummy showers while we brush our teeth, and we go into the other room where Daddy is still in bed. We jump on top of him and he lifts us in the air like we’re aeroplanes, one at a time. His face is all puffy and his breath stinks, so we moan and fan the air in front of our noses and he laughs and calls us monsters.

  ‘Come on, let’s go and have breakfast and leave your father to get dressed,’ Mummy says. That’s another time she has called him father. I hope it’s not Sooty’s fault.

  She makes us scrambled eggs on toast, and Granddad comes in just as she’s sitting down at the table to eat.

  ‘Morning, kids,’ he says, smiling a big smile.

  ‘Morning, Granddad!’ we say together.

  Mummy doesn’t say anything. There’s just the sound of my fork and Thomas’s against our plates. I look from her to him, waiting for her to say, Good morning, but she doesn’t.

  Granddad goes over to the kitchen and sees the scrambled eggs in the frying pan. He dishes them onto a plate, but Mummy says, ‘Er, they’re for Michael.’

  Granddad laughs. ‘Are they, now?’

  I feel bad. ‘You can have my scrambled eggs, Granddad,’ I say.

  ‘And how am I going to take your scrambled eggs off you, young lady? Sure you’re a growing girl.’ He laughs. ‘I like them nice and hot anyway. I’ll make some fresh in no time.’

  We have one day left. Mummy and Daddy have to see someone about something and they say we have to stay at home. I’m glad. It means we can play with Sooty and run around and make as much noise as we want and talk to Granddad, and he can make us more bacon and sausages. Granddad is lovely. I feel bad because Mummy seems angry at him, but I don’t know why. I don’t think she should be angry at him. He’s made us lots of food and is always laughing and happy, even though Granny is ill.

  Mummy tells us they will be as quick as they can, and to be good and stay out of trouble and Granny and Granddad’s way. She says Sooty is By No Means Allowed inside the house, so we should put our coats on and stay outside and play with him. We put our coats on and I hold Sooty while we wave them away and watch the car disappear out of the drive. We go out the front to the pavestones. I find a stone and draw squares for Hopscotch and we play that for a while, but Sooty keeps trying to eat the stone. Then we go around the back and find some rope, so I do some skipping. Thomas doesn’t know how to skip, so he sits on the ground and holds Sooty, otherwise he’ll come and try and eat the rope.

  There’s a sound of knocking on a window. Me and Thomas look around, but don’t see anything. Then there’s the knocking again. I look up at all the windows and see that the one over by the corner has the curtain pulled up a bit. I walk over. Granny is holding the edge of the curtain. She’s waving her hand.

  ‘I think Granny wants us to go in,’ says Thomas, who has snuck up beside me with Sooty in his arms. Sooty is scrambling to get down.

  ‘Put him down, Thomas,’ I say, in my adult I’m-telling-youoff voice. He is always holding him, and sometimes I want to hold him, too, but Sooty needs to get to run around like a normal puppy.

  Granny waves.

  ‘Do you want us to come in, Granny?’ I say loud, calling up to the window. It’s high up, and we’re still little.

  She nods.

  ‘Can we bring Sooty?’

  She nods.

  ‘Come on, Thomas,’ I say, turning and taking Sooty. He is mine, after all. Thomas is always taking him off me. I’m grumpy. Mummy said to stay clear of Granny and Granddad, and now Granny is calling us in to her dark and smelly room with tubes and machines and things from scary films.

  We wipe our shoes on the mat at the back door like we do at home, apart from when we’re running and just can’t stop. We go into the kitchen. Granddad isn’t there. We walk through the door to the hallway; it’s quiet and spooky and I’m glad we have Sooty to protect us. We walk along the hallway, me first and then Thomas. I always have to go first because I’m the Big Sister and it’s my job to look after him because he’s still small.

  ‘I need to go to the toilet,’ Thomas says.

  ‘Can’t you wait?’ I say, because that’s what Mummy always says when we say we need to go to the toilet.

  ‘No!’ he says.

  I turn left at the bathroom door and lock it after Thomas is inside. I put Sooty in the bath and he’s so funny because he tries to climb up the side, but it’s too slippery for him, so he keeps sliding up and down, up and down. Me and Thomas giggle while we watch him. Thomas does his wee and I decide I might as well do a wee, too, now that we’re here, so I do one and then flush the toilet. After I flush it I jump away quickly because I hate getting wee-spray on my legs. Thomas always forgets and then complains when he gets splashed, and I laugh while he wipes it away with toilet roll.

  We wash our hands with soap and water and then dry them with the towel on the back of the door. I pick Sooty up from the bath and he licks me all over my face because he’s so happy to be out. He doesn’t like baths, like me and Thomas do.

  I carry on along the hallway and, when I get to Granny’s room, I knock on the door.

  ‘Yes, yes, yes, come in,’ she says, and when I push open the door she is coughing into her hands. I want to put my hand over my face, but I know that would be rude. I turn and look at Thomas and he is scrunching up his nose, so I give him an elbow in his side to tell him to stop-that-right-now.

  Granny puts a clear plastic mask over her face, which makes me take a big breath of air. She pats the bed next to her, which means we have to go and sit down. I sit first and Thomas sits next to me. I keep a tight grip on Sooty because if Mummy knew he was in here she would kill me, so I better not let his lovely hairs go all over the place.

  We sit and wait while she gets her breath through the mask and then takes a sip of water from the glass on the bedside table. She sits up and wipes her mouth with a hankie. I hate hankies. Mummy makes us keep one up our sleeve when we have a cold, so when you blow your nose, you have to put it back up your sleeve right after and you get all wet. Granny does exactly that. I suddenly think how funny it is that Mummy makes us do that and Granny does the same. I decide to ask her what Mummy was like when she was little, like me and Thomas.

  She shakes her head from side to side like she’s thinking. ‘Ah, sure, you know, a little girl like any other.’

  ‘But what was she like?’ I ask again, the way I do when Mummy doesn’t answer a question properly and I have to ask it over and over again.

  ‘She looked like you,’ she says, pointing to me.

  I smile, happy with myself. That means I’m going to be beautiful when I grow up.

  ‘What about me?’ Thomas says in a high-pitched voice.

  ‘You look like your father,’ Granny says.

  He pouts and folds his arms. He always wants to be the same as me.

  ‘Don’t be stupid,’ Granny says to him, and the seriousness in her voice makes Thomas look down, his chin on his chest. ‘There are a lot more important things in life than looking like your mother.’

  I wonder what she means but I don’t dare ask.

  ‘Her looks are what started it all.’

  I stroke Sooty on his chin and he holds my hand with one paw and licks my fingers to say he loves me. I give him to Thomas, because I think he needs a cuddle. I need a cuddle, too. ‘Do you need anything, Granny?’ I ask.

  She closes her eyes to small slits and looks at me through them. ‘Make me a ham-and-cheese toasted sandwich,’ she says. ‘I’m famished all of a sudden.’

  ‘Okay,’ I say, climbing off the bed. ‘Come on, Thomas.’ I have never made a ham-and-cheese toas
ted sandwich, but I’ve seen Mummy make them a trillion times, so I’m sure I’ll be fine.

  We go into the kitchen and get the ham and cheese out and find the bread. I put the bread into the toaster and get out a plate, a knife and the butter. When the bread pops, I try to take it out but it’s too hot. We wait. Thomas pulls over a chair and climbs up onto the worktop so he can watch.

  ‘Where’s Granddad?’ he asks. He’s still sulking after Granny telling him off.

  ‘I don’t know,’ I say.

  ‘Maybe he wants a sandwich.’

  ‘Okay,’ I say, ‘I’ll make him one, too.’ I get more bread out and wait for the toasted slices to cool. Then I take them out and put the other ones in. I butter the bread and then put a slice of ham on one piece of toast. The cheese is a big block, so I have to cut it. I cut bits off the corners, because I can’t cut a whole slice like Mummy does. I put the other piece of toast on top and cut it in half. When the other pieces are cold, I take them out, put some butter on them and do the same with the ham and cheese. I cut it in half, but one side comes out much bigger.

  ‘Ready!’ I say, happy with the sandwiches.

  Thomas climbs down and I give him one sandwich to carry. Sooty follows us along the hallway, each of us carrying a plate. We go right to the end to Granny’s room and knock on the door. I open the door and Thomas goes in and gives her the sandwich, then turns to leave.

  ‘Where are ye off to?’ she says.

  ‘To give Granddad his,’ I say, pointing at the plate I’m holding.

  Granny taps the bed and points at Thomas. ‘You stay here and keep me company while your sister gives it to him.’

  Thomas sits down and Sooty runs over and licks his shoes.

  ‘I’ll be really quick,’ I tell him.

  I go to find Granddad, even though I’m breaking all of Mummy’s rules. I go back along the hallway to the kitchen to see if he’s there. Nope. I go into the fancy room – nothing. I look out the window. Not outside. That means I have to go upstairs. I go up and call out but there’s no answer, so I go along the hall to the end where I’ve never been. I knock on the door.

  There’s a cough and then, ‘Come in.’ It’s Granddad.

  My heart is beating like a drum. If Mummy caught me, she would kill me. I’m scared. I open the door and go in and there is Granddad, lying on the bed with his shirt open so I can see the vest underneath, and his trousers on.

  ‘I was just having a rest,’ he says, sitting up.

  ‘I brought you a sandwich,’ I say, feeling stupid, because this was a stupid idea.

  ‘Isn’t that lovely?’ He laughs, and when I don’t move he says, ‘Well, come in and give it to me then.’

  I go over to him and give him the plate.

  ‘So, sit down and talk to me for a minute.’

  I sit on the edge of the bed and watch him eat his sandwich. My tummy is tight and I’m hot and my heart is still going full drum. I keep turning to the door to see if Sooty or Thomas come in.

  ‘What do you like to do?’ Granddad asks, taking the last bite of the first half.

  ‘Erm.’ I try to think but can’t come up with anything. ‘We like to… play in the garden, and the park,’ I say. I turn back to the door, but there’s no sign of Thomas or Sooty. I want to go but I can’t leave.

  ‘What else?’

  ‘Hopscotch, and drawing.’

  When he has finished, he asks me to put the plate on the table.

  I get up and go to get the plate from him, and when I reach to take it, he jumps forward and shouts, Boo! really loud. I jump and drop the plate and crumbs go all over the bed. He laughs and I smile, but really I want to cry.

  I’m picking up the plate when Sooty comes running in. He squeals and tries to eat my laces. Then Thomas comes in.

  ‘Thomas!’ I run and hug him.

  ‘Hello, Thomas,’ says Granddad. ‘Let’s have a cuddle with this puppy, then,’ he says, so I pick Sooty up and put him on the bed. After they’ve been playing for a minute, I think we really should go. ‘Mummy said Sooty has to be outside, so we better go.’

  ‘Well, do as your mummy says.’ He smiles.

  I take the plate and close the door after us. There is something scary about Granny and Granddad.

  When Mummy and Daddy get back, we have to pack and get ready because we’re leaving tomorrow. Mummy is in our room with us, folding our tops and my skirts into halves and putting them into the suitcase.

  ‘How was it when we were away?’ she asks.

  ‘Fine,’ I say. ‘We made Granny a ham-and-cheese sandwich.’

  ‘Really? How did you manage that?’

  ‘It was easy,’ I say. I don’t tell her we made one for Granddad as well.

  ‘Granny said I don’t look like you, and Clare does,’ says Thomas.

  ‘Did she now?’ Mummy laughs.

  ‘Yeah, she was mean to me. She said it’s better not to look like you anyway, because that’s what started everything.’

  ‘Shut up, Thomas,’ I say and I throw a teddy at his face.

  Mummy stands still. Her face turns white and she grabs my arms, her fingernails digging into my skin. ‘What?’ she says.

  I cry out. ‘Mummy, it hurts!’ I yell. I wriggle and try to get out of her grasp, but she holds me so tight I can’t get away.

  ‘Tell me what she said, right now.’

  I keep wriggling.

  ‘Right now!’ she screams.

  Tears roll down my cheeks. ‘She said there are bigger things in life than looking like you. And then she said your looks started everything.’ The tears run down my cheeks.

  ‘What did she mean?’ She squeezes my arms tighter and I know I’m going to have big bruises when she lets go.

  ‘I don’t know! Mummy, I don’t know!’ I cry.

  ‘Mummy, let go of her!’ shouts Thomas.

  Mummy waves her other arm, and the back of her hand lands slap against Thomas’s face. Thomas yelps and falls back on the bed. Sooty whines.

  ‘That FUCKING CUNT!’ Mummy screams. ‘I knew it, I knew it.’ She says it over and over again, shaking her head. Her face has gone yellow, like the ends of the cigarettes she leaves in the ashtray on the nights she smokes, and her eyes are wide open with the white bits glistening. She lets go of me and runs her hands through her hair. Then she runs out of the room. I climb onto the bed next to Thomas and put my arms around him. I know now what that word means. It means someone is so horrible that you really, really hate them.

  Mummy screams so fast I can’t understand. She’s screaming and sobbing at the same time, and I hear her say all the bad words I have ever heard and she says, ‘I knew it, I knew it.’ Then a door slams and there’s a huge crash that shakes the bed, and the sound of glass shattering into a thousand tiny pieces. I remember the wooden unit in Granny’s room with mirrors in the doors. Me and Thomas stay still, hugging each other. We get under the covers and let Sooty under, too. There’s more screaming and shouting and then there’s Daddy’s voice. Then, after lots of hushing and muttering, everything goes dead.

  Just when I’m falling off to sleep there’s another loud bang, this time from the other side of the house; maybe the front room. Everything is shattering to smithereens. Daddy comes running into the room. His cheeks are wet and his hair is mad and messy, the way Mummy hates.

  ‘Daddy, what’s happening?’ I whisper.

  ‘Don’t ask questions,’ he shouts. He goes over to the suitcase and heaps the last things on the bed inside, in one big pile, and zips it closed. ‘Get your rucksacks together as quick as you can,’ he says. ‘Now!’

  I start crying. Daddy never shouts. I get out of bed and get my rucksack and Thomas’s and put our teddies and books and crayons in. I zip them up. I wipe my face. Stupid Thomas. If only he hadn’t said anything. He’s such a stupid big-mouth that now he has caused the whole house to shatter, and driven Mummy mad.

  ‘Come on,’ Daddy says. He picks up the suitcase and wraps Thomas in his arms and
tells me to stay there. He carries Thomas out and closes the door behind him, so I’m left on my own with Sooty. I wait. There is no sound. I need my pump. I go into my pink rucksack and get it out and take a puff and hold – one, two, three – and then I do the same again. I put on my pink rucksack and hold Thomas’s in my arms.

  Daddy comes back. He picks Sooty up by the back of the neck and Sooty squeals.

  I cry harder.

  He hands Sooty to me, takes Thomas’s rucksack and picks me up. He opens the door and carries me into the hallway and out the front door. On the way past the lovely front room I can see that none of the framed photographs are on the wall. Now they are all over the carpet, shining like the sea under the sun, winking a thousand times. The nice red sofa that we played Noughts and Crosses on with our fingers is sliced into bits, and I can see the yellow stuffing poking up, like when I have a scab and it gets infected and yellow pus explodes out of it.

  Daddy puts me and Sooty in the car and closes the door and goes back inside. Thomas is crying. I try to quieten him, but give up and cry, too.

  Daddy comes out with his arm round Mummy. She is screaming. Her hair is wild and her make-up is all over her face. Spots of blood are all over her arms and her hands. Daddy brings her to the car and opens the door and helps her in. She puts her face in her hands and rocks back and forth, making these horrible whining noises that make me and Thomas cry even more.

  JOSEPHINE

  29TH JULY 1997

  I have to see Siobhan.

  ‘No,’ says Michael, ‘let’s get far away from here and never come back.’

  But I mean it. I have to see her. I can’t leave it like this. He says it’s a mistake. A big mistake. You’re not in the right state. Why don’t you wait until we’re home and you can ring her.

  No. No. No. Take me to her, Michael. Please.

  I direct him to her house and get out of the car before he has the handbrake on. I walk straight in the front door and call out Siobhan’s name.

  She’s in the kitchen with her son. She takes one look at me and tells him, ‘Go to your room and play for a while, I’ll be in in a minute.’