All My Mothers

by Joanna Glen

  She kept saying, ‘There, yes there!’

  She was letting Mr Blume’s hairy hands actually squeeze her melony breast, and she was saying, ‘Not again.’

  I thought I was going to throw up.

  I stood very still and heard Mr Blume tell her that she was invincible.

  I tiptoed back to the bedroom.

  Bridget was fast asleep.

  I switched on my torch and I looked around wondering if there was anything I could wee in because I was never ever – in my life – going out onto the landing again.

  I opted for the pot with the droopy plant in, and I prayed Bridget wouldn’t wake up while I was weeing. She didn’t.

  The next morning, I looked up invincible in the dictionary and was relieved to discover that Bridget’s mother was too powerful to be defeated or overcome.

  I didn’t tell Bridget that her father had been squeezing her mother’s breast.

  Or that I’d wee’d in the pot plant.

  In fact, I tried really hard to erase both images from my mind.

  Chapter 29

  Bridget and I were now considered old enough and responsible enough to take our metal detectors and a picnic right over Battersea Bridge to where there was a stretch of grey beach at low tide. There, in a heady state of summer freedom, we found treasure and spotted birds (herons and greylag geese and cormorants) and ate ice creams sitting on the wall.

  It was just Bridget and me, and long languid time, fluid and never-ending.

  Until it ended, abruptly, when Bridget’s mother sat down on the kitchen armchair and pulled me onto her lap.

  ‘I’ve got some wonderful news for you,’ she said. ‘I’m going to whisper it inside your ear.’

  I knew.

  Before she’d whispered.

  ‘Your mother’s come home!’

  The tears came bursting out of my eyes and falling into my mouth.

  ‘It’ll be lovely to see your house again,’ she said, still holding me, and making my scalp tingle with her fingertips. ‘All those familiar things you haven’t thought about.’

  ‘There’s nothing familiar,’ I said. ‘It was emptied out for a re-design.’

  ‘Well, that’s exciting,’ she said.

  ‘I don’t want to leave you,’ I said.

  ‘I think it’s best for children to live with their mothers,’ she said, sounding a bit doubtful. ‘But some mothers find life easier than others.’

  ‘Do you mean that my one doesn’t find life easy?’ I said, and as I said my one, I nearly told her that my alleged mother, in fact, wasn’t my one. But I didn’t.

  She nodded, and said, ‘It’s not her fault, Eva. I know that’s hard for you to understand.’

  Then she said, ‘You can come and see us anytime.’

  Which I knew wasn’t true because children have to do what their parents tell them.

  I knew for sure that Pink Mother wouldn’t let me go over Battersea Bridge for mudlarking and picnics any more, and the thought of those days being over hurt me inside my chest.

  When I went to say goodbye to Mr Blume, he was in his study, where he kept playing the same piece of music again and again.

  ‘You must really like this music,’ I said.

  ‘It’s called Quartet for the End of Time,’ he said. ‘Messiaen composed it when he was a prisoner in a concentration camp in the Second World War. He’d found some old instruments and four people who could play them.’

  ‘Did they actually have a concert?’ I said. ‘In a concentration camp?’

  ‘Yes,’ he said. ‘The prisoners and the guards together. In the snow.’

  ‘Didn’t the music melt the guards’ hearts?’ I said.

  ‘No,’ he said. ‘Human beings aren’t as good as they imagine themselves to be.’

  ‘We’ve learnt about concentration camps at school,’ I said. ‘And I felt really sick about all the Jews who died.’

  Mr Blume nodded.

  ‘Sometimes I wonder why God doesn’t give up on humans,’ I said.

  Mr Blume stared out of the window at Bessie and Bella, who were having a space hopper race.

  The Quartet for the End of Time went on playing – it was a bit stoppy-starty for my liking.

  ‘I guess there are moments when we’d all like to climb out of time,’ said Mr Blume.

  ‘Like double maths!’ I said, to try to cheer things up a bit, but he didn’t answer.

  ‘Anyway,’ I said. ‘I wanted to say thank you very much for having me.’

  My eyes filled with tears, so I turned around and walked out.

  Pink Mother was on the doorstep. She’d had a pageboy haircut, and she was wearing a tailored cream dress with roses growing up from the hemline, with a matching cream handbag and shoes, as if she was off to a garden party at Buckingham Palace.

  ‘Come on in,’ said Bridget’s mother, attempting to embrace my not very embraceable mother.

  She pushed me forward, and I crashed into Pink Mother, who lightly grazed my shoulder blades. When she sat down on the old sofa, amongst its piles of Indian cushions, she looked like a stiff kind of doll. She kept piling cushions behind her back to help her sit up straight, whereas nobody ever sat up straight on that sofa.

  ‘Come and sit with your mother,’ said Bridget’s mother.

  I nested inside a pile of cushions at the other end of the sofa from Pink Mother, who had too much make-up on.

  ‘I can’t thank you enough,’ said Pink Mother.

  ‘It’s been a total pleasure,’ said Bridget’s mother. ‘Your daughter is an absolute gem, and we all adore her.’

  Pink Mother did a very strange smile.

  I noticed that she’d sprayed her hair totally stiff so that it moved in one piece like a helmet.

  I could hear Barnaby kicking his football against the wall at the end of the garden, and I thought, I never did call him Barny, and we never were left on our own so that he could hold me in his arms with his star hanging over me like a sign.

  ‘Do you want to say goodbye to Barny?’ said Bridget’s mother, opening the glass doors.

  I never ever want to say goodbye to Barny, I thought.

  ‘Eva’s going,’ she shouted into the garden.

  Barnaby turned around.

  ‘Bye,’ he said, just bye, and that was it, but then again, I thought, true love can make you a bit tongue-tied, especially when there are adults about.

  Pink Mother took my black case on wheels and dragged it along the hall.

  When Bridget came downstairs, she was crying, and seeing her cry made me cry too. I saw Pink Mother look up and down the whole of Bridget’s body and I knew exactly what she was thinking.

  ‘I’ll miss you,’ said Bridget.

  ‘I’ll see you at school – not tomorrow but the next day,’ I said. ‘Class 6!’

  ‘This is for you,’ said Bridget, and she handed me something wrapped in newspaper and fastened with one of her hair ties.

  Chapter 30

  Pink Mother showed me around our house as if I was a visitor.

  She felt, as I noted later in my Quest Book, like a stranger.

  ‘Where did all these things come from?’ I said in a not very kind voice. ‘Have you been travelling around the world buying weird things? I thought you were ill.’

  ‘I was ill,’ said Pink Mother. ‘As I think you know very well.’

  ‘Well, who got us all this stuff then?’

  ‘I employed a stylist called Lorraine,’ she said.

  ‘Quiche Lorraine?’ I said.

  ‘Don’t be rude,’ she said.

  ‘Quiche Lorraine likes putting things in threes,’ I said.

  ‘Doesn’t it all look lovely?’ she said.

  I took a smooth cream pebble from its arrangement of three, and I made a four on the other side of the cabinet, leaving a candlestick and a wooden horse baring its teeth, and I fixed my eyes on Pink Mother.

  She breathed in a strange way.

  ‘Don’t start,’ she said, mov
ing the pebble back to the candlestick and the angry wooden horse, and then laying her palm flat against her chest.

  We stared at each other like we were two dogs in the park.

  ‘Why don’t you have any photos of your wedding?’ I said, looking at all the empty un-Blumey windowsills. ‘Did the thieves steal those too?’

  She raised her hand to her cheek.

  She blinked.

  I’d hurt her.

  More than I’d meant to.

  I didn’t know why at the time.

  ‘Come downstairs and meet Jean,’ she said.

  Jean seemed to be our new housekeeper-nanny.

  My mother sat down and fanned her face with a magazine.

  Jean had a pale face, with beady eyes and a small nose, which she twitched like a rabbit when she felt her glasses slipping down. She was a little plump, and wore a white apron over a floral skirt.

  She said, in a very calm, quiet voice, ‘I made you your favourite: macaroni cheese.’

  Pink Mother sat down at our new shiny table with a glass of water, and took small sips while I ate the macaroni cheese. I swallowed it in big creamy lumps looking at Jean’s brown-and-grey hair, which was drawn into a low ponytail, reaching all the way to her bottom.

  ‘It was a good thing for me that Beatrice Blume got ill,’ said Pink Mother.

  ‘What kind of ill?’ I said, holding my breath, dreading the answer.

  ‘Oh, I didn’t know you didn’t know,’ said Pink Mother, blushing.

  I could feel the macaroni sliding down my throat like snails as I thought of Mr Blume holding her breast in his hand.

  ‘What I meant was that hearing she was ill gave me the impetus I needed to get better. So I could come and look after you.’

  ‘Did Mr Blume ring you up then?’ I said.

  She nodded.

  ‘Pineapple upside-down cake!’ said Jean quietly.

  ‘Is she going to die?’ I said.

  ‘She has breast cancer,’ said Pink Mother.

  I froze.

  The great cancerous bird of prey had swooped down and chosen the person I loved most in the world. She was hanging like a blue ragdoll in the bird’s beak.

  I could see her with the wind in her hair at the edge of the sea, and I could feel her lavender arms around us as we looked out to the feather-yachts, and she would always and forever be beautiful Blue Mother, come to life and stepping out of the pages of The Rainbow Rained Us.

  ‘Did you just say it was a good thing Bridget’s mother got ill?’ I said.

  Pink Mother was blushing.

  ‘Well, I didn’t mean—’

  I didn’t wait to hear what she didn’t mean.

  I ran upstairs to my bedroom.

  I got under my new cold shiny sheets and went down to the very end of the bed.

  I started shaking all over my body.

  It got darker and darker.

  Pink Mother came up the stairs, and into my bedroom.

  ‘Please will you come out of those sheets and say good night nicely?’ I heard her say.

  I didn’t move.

  She sat down on the bed.

  I felt trapped and breathless under the tucked-in sheet.

  ‘I told myself I was getting better for you,’ she said. ‘I tried so hard for you, Eva.’

  I felt bad.

  I still didn’t move.

  The door slammed.

  When I was sure she’d gone, I slid up the bed.

  I grabbed Bridget’s present.

  She’d written I LOVE YOU in different coloured pen all over the newspaper wrapping. I took off the hair elastic and, underneath the newspaper, there was a layer of tissue. I ripped apart the tissue and there was the gold crucifix she’d found on the beach.

  There was also a card which Bridget had stuck stars onto.

  Inside, she’d written: It will be so empty in my bedroom tonight. You are the best friend I will ever have. I love you as big as the sea. (?/10)

  Although it was grammatically incorrect, I still decided to give her 9.5 for her simile because of the lovely warming effect it had on me.

  I found a tiny piece of card also wrapped in tissue.

  It said: Follicle.

  Bridget had hairs!

  I immediately pulled down my pants.

  Nothing there.

  I got up and looked at my armpits in the mirror.

  Nothing there.

  I put the gold crucifix on my new shiny bedside table, and I briefly prayed for the miraculous onset of puberty. Then I decided God probably didn’t want to be bothered with that, so I kneeled down and put my hands together and said, ‘If Blue Mother dies from this illness, you must make her come back to life like you did! Do you hear me, Jesus? Three days – like you – is the absolute maximum for her to be dead.’

  How did God hear so many different voices all at once, I wondered.

  He must have amazing ears, I thought.

  And be very good at languages.

  And also feel like he’s losing his mind.

  Chapter 31

  When I saw Bridget at school, it felt weird.

  ‘Hello,’ I said, in my bright new uniform.

  ‘Hello,’ she said, in her second-hand uniform, with the button missing on the dress.

  When I thought about the note saying follicle, I couldn’t think how to bring it up.

  In fact, I couldn’t think of anything at all to say to her.

  Her mother had cancer – and she didn’t know, and I did.

  No words came out of my mouth.

  ‘Did you get my card?’ said Bridget.

  I blushed.

  ‘Really really?’ I said.

  ‘Really really,’ she said. ‘I showed my mum.’

  ‘That’s good,’ I said.

  ‘Was it nice to be back with your mum?’ she said. ‘Despite …’

  ‘No, not really,’ I said.

  ‘Do you still think she isn’t your mother?’ she said. ‘I never found the right moment to ask you.’

  I was about to answer when the bell went.

  Bridget and I didn’t see each other much that afternoon because we were in different art and drama groups.

  That evening, I remember taking my clothes off and examining my armpits and inside my pants right up close to the mirror. I didn’t want Bridget to go racing ahead of me, when we’d agreed to do everything together at the same time in the same way forever. There were no hairs.

  I sat at my desk staring at my homework list.

  First, a presentation called ‘A Memorable Moment from the Summer’.

  I decided to phone Bridget to ask her whether we should discuss what we were planning to say, in case we both picked the same memorable moment. Really, I wanted to go back to the conversation about Pink Mother not being my mother, which we still hadn’t had.

  ‘What are you going to do for your memorable moment?’ I said.

  ‘Not last night but the night before,’ Bridget answered.

  I froze.

  It was one of only two nights I hadn’t been with her.

  ‘Why? What happened?’ I said. ‘What was so good about it?’

  ‘D made a campfire in the garden,’ said Bridget. ‘And we all went round and said the thing we loved most about M. And there was a shooting star. An actual shooting star. And D said don’t forget this moment. Then he put up our big tent and we all slept in it together, like a family of mice.’

  Before I could stop myself, I said, ‘Did you have the campfire to celebrate that you’d got rid of me?’

  ‘What do you mean?’ said Bridget.

  I turned flaming hot because, in a flash, I realised why D had made a campfire, why he’d made them say how wonderful their mother was, why they’d slept together in the tent.

  ‘I’m sorry, Bridge,’ I said.

  ‘It was just the first thing I thought of when Mrs Williams said a memorable moment. Because D said don’t forget this,’ said Bridget.

  ‘I’m really sorr
y,’ I said. ‘Forget I ever said it …’

  Then there was a silence that went on a bit too long.

  ‘What are you going to write about?’ said Bridget.

  ‘I’m not sure,’ I said, stuttering.

  The memory I wanted to choose was when Bridget and I were sitting on top of the hill and her mother put her arms around our shoulders. But I felt that wouldn’t be right because, however much I wished she was, she wasn’t my mother, and Bridget might find it odd that it had meant so much to me. Also, I couldn’t bear to think about her right now.

  ‘I could do something about metal-detecting,’ I said, trying to sound casual.

  ‘The others will think that’s weird,’ said Bridget.

  ‘Or fossil-hunting,’ I said.

  ‘They’ll think that’s weird too.’

  ‘So are you saying I mustn’t mention either of them?’

  ‘Sorry, Eva,’ she said. ‘M’s calling me for supper.’

  I wanted to rewind and start again.

  I shoved my feelings deep inside me as usual, and I prepared a pathetic presentation about going on a picnic up a hill with some family friends.

  When I finished, Mrs Williams said, ‘Is that the end?’

  Chapter 32

  One day Bridget wasn’t at school, and when she came back, something had changed in her face.

  I knew she knew, and I knew I mustn’t let on that I knew too.

  ‘Hello,’ I said, wondering if we normally said hello in the morning or usually went straight into a conversation.

  ‘Hello,’ she said back.

  ‘Are you OK?’ I said.

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Good.’

  ‘Were you ill?’ I said.

  She didn’t answer.

  ‘We had a family emergency,’ she said, like she’d been rehearsing.

  I am part of your family, I thought, and I want to be part of any emergency you will ever have in the whole of your life.

  ‘I can’t talk about it,’ she said in a very cold voice.

  ‘OK,’ I said, feeling like I might start crying.

  ‘My mum’s started painting again,’ said Bridget.

  ‘Why did she stop?’ I said.

  ‘She got too busy being a mother.’

  ‘Isn’t she still busy being a mother?’ I said.