A tear made its way down Kate’s face and dropped from the end of her chin. She wiped it away with the back of her hand. ‘I can understand that you…’
Shannon took a deep breath and sat up straight. ‘I made that choice, Kate. Me. No one else. No one made me. Adam and Jessie offered to send me updates. Photographs. They are good people. But I told them not to. Every time I move, I send Adam my new address and contact numbers in case of, y’know, if she needs a kidney or something, and I always write: “All okay?” And he replies: “All okay.” That’s our deal.’
This was the first time Shannon had told anyone this. Had she expected to feel a sense of unburdening? Because she didn’t. If anything, she felt worse. Saying the words aloud, especially to Kate, a mother, made the whole thing feel more real than it had ever been.
‘So when I say that I can’t love a baby, that’s what I mean. I am cold in a way that women should not be cold. How else can you explain what I did? And, even if, by some miracle, I could love a baby, I don’t deserve to, Kate. I don’t deserve it. Because loving another child would make what I did eighteen years ago so much, much worse than it is already.’
For a few moments, the two of them sat in silence. People chatted all around them. Happy people with straightforward, uncomplicated lives. What was Kate thinking of her right now? Whatever it was, she deserved it. Kate opened her mouth to speak and then her phone beeped.
She fumbled in her bag for her mobile. ‘I’m so sorry. I just need to check this. I haven’t been able to get through to L…’
As she swiped the screen and read the message, Kate’s face turned pale.
Shannon frowned. ‘Is everything okay?’ It looked like bad news. Was it the children? Please God, no.
Kate stuffed the mobile back in her bag. Her eyes artificially bright. ‘All fine, no problem.’
‘Are you sure? Because it doesn’t look like you’re okay.’
Kate waved away the question, then leaned forwards and put her hand over Shannon’s. ‘You are a good person, Shannon. A kind, loving, generous person. You made the only decision you could at the time. And you were only just twenty when you had her! Almost still a child. You can’t punish yourself for the rest of your life.’
Was that what Shannon was doing by not seeing Faye? Punishing herself? Or was she just a coward? ‘She’s here.’
Kate started and looked around her. ‘What? Who?’
‘Faye. My… the baby. The girl. She’s in Paris. She’s trying to find me.’ Shannon tried to take a sip from her water but her glass was empty. When she looked up at Kate, her vision blurred. ‘What the hell am I going to do?’
Kate took her hand again. ‘It might be out of turn for me to say this, Shannon. But it’s not too late.’
‘To have a baby? Clearly not.’ Shannon gestured to her midriff.
But Kate was shaking her head. ‘To get to know your daughter.’
And then the tears really came.
Chapter Thirty-Three
Laura
Once, when Laura was at school, she had been called to the head’s office. In the end, it hadn’t been for anything serious at all, but those ten minutes, sitting on a hard plastic chair, waiting to be called in, had been agony.
This was a thousand times worse.
She got to the conference room at least twenty minutes before her allotted time and no one else was around. According to the schedule, Paolo would be inside right now and it took every ounce of self-control Laura had not to listen at the door.
But she’d only been there for five minutes when Robert strode out. He seemed surprised to see her and looked at his watch. ‘You are not due for another fifteen minutes.’
‘I like to be early and prepared.’ Where was Paolo?
‘Yes. Very good. I need a short break. I’ll be back for your appointed time.’
He strode away with his mobile pressed to his ear. From the look on his face, she wouldn’t want to be the person receiving that call. But where was Paolo?
‘Buongiorno.’ She turned and saw him walking across the lobby. She looked from him to the room he should have been in and back again.
He smiled. ‘It didn’t take very long. I am gone.’ He mimed a plane taking off with his right hand.
Laura wanted to be sick and it wasn’t just the hangover. ‘What?’
Paolo nodded. ‘Yes. Gone. I could have argued for my job but, I just didn’t really want to.’ He looked at her intently. ‘It is time.’
Laura’s head felt like the inside of a beehive. What should she say? She motioned towards the room of doom. ‘It’s me next.’
‘I know.’
‘And I don’t have very good news for him.’
‘You said.’
‘What should I do?’
Gently, Paolo took her hand. ‘What you should do is up to you. What I want you to do is say goodbye to Robert in there and goodbye to James over there,’ he motioned in what she assumed was the direction of England, ‘and then come travelling with me, anywhere you want to go.’
Laura felt as if her legs might give way under her. What was he suggesting? ‘You want me to come with you?’
Paolo smiled his beautiful smile. ‘Si. You and me. Travelling the world together. What could be better?’
It sounded beyond amazing, but she needed to be sensible. ‘But I want to buy a house. I want a family.’
‘I want that too. Very much. And if we spend a year together, we will know.’
The beehive in her brain was in a frenzy. ‘Know what?’
Paolo laughed. ‘We will know whether we are a good fit.’ He interlocked his fingers like a child playing a miming game. ‘And then we can argue about whether to live in beautiful, sunny Italy or grey, rainy England and get married and have babies together.’
He made it sound so simple. How could it be so simple? Was he mocking her?
‘Paolo. I am serious. I want to settle down, make plans.’
He drew in close to her. ‘Laura, I am completely serious. I like you. I like you very much. We have… chemistry. But we don’t know if this will work for ever. So we need to spend time together. That is what I am proposing. A year together. And then we make a plan.’
The beehive started to calm down. She looked at him. Deeply into his eyes. He was serious. What had Shannon said about him? He’s a family man. Could he be her family man? Was this completely ridiculous? Or was it more ridiculous to wait around for an Englishman who, after twelve years together, still spoke in maybe and could and perhaps. And who never, ever used the word plan.
‘Paolo, I…’
‘Oh, you’re still here, Paolo.’ Robert strode back into the room and straight past them. ‘Please will you follow me, Laura?’
She took a deep breath. And followed Robert.
* * *
After she had given Robert the explanation that Shannon had suggested, she watched him sit back and chew on his pen. He clearly wasn’t happy. ‘And why do they want to return so many units?’
‘Because of their warehouse issues. Their software program showed no stock, so their customers bought elsewhere and they’ve been left sitting on a load of units.’
Robert shrugged. ‘Not our problem.’
She had been waiting for this. ‘I know. But they are one of the biggest distributors in the UK. If we want to maintain our relationship with—’
Robert interrupted. ‘Relationship? If you had done your job and maintained a relationship, we wouldn’t be looking at a huge stock return at the end of the quarter.’
Laura swallowed. Relationships seemed to be the key word in her life right now. Managing them. Maintaining them. Starting them? Where had Paolo gone? Was he packing right now? Would he wait to speak to her? And if he left, would they ever speak again? She needed to get her head back in the room. Robert was staring at her. Waiting for a response. ‘I… er… I know what you’re saying, Robert, but…’
Robert sighed. A big, deep sigh. ‘I’m not happy, Laura, not
happy at all. But I am also not prepared to lose another member of the sales team this week.’ Laura wondered if that were true, or if Shannon had been fighting her case for her.
‘Okay. So what happens now?’
‘I want to closely monitor the UK for the next quarter. You need to schedule meetings with all your big customers in the next few weeks, which I will attend. Try to get them close together so that I am not going backwards and forwards to London too often. I will make sure these relationships are on track and then we can see how you manage them.’
Laura could feel a deep flush starting in her neck. This was humiliating. She would have to take Robert to all her meetings, like he was her dad coming to school to make sure the other children were playing nicely with her. ‘I’m not sure that it’s necessary…’
Robert coughed to interrupt her. ‘It is necessary if you want to keep your job. With the quarter losses you’ve just shown me, I would be perfectly entitled to terminate your contract.’
Whatever cajoling Shannon had done on her behalf clearly hadn’t stretched that far. Laura was failing and would need to accept the consequences. But she didn’t want to. In fact, she had never really wanted this job at all. She clearly wasn’t any good at it and, right now, she didn’t give a fat flying fudge cake about having her contract terminated. What had Paolo said? It is time.
She sat up straight and looked Robert in the eye. ‘It won’t be necessary because I’m handing in my notice.’
He smiled and leaned back in his chair, legs stretched out in front of him. ‘Really? There seems to be an epidemic of that today. Are you sure that is wise?’
She didn’t care if it was wise or sensible or downright stupid, the thought of never having to talk about printers again was almost joyous. ‘Thank you for the opportunity you gave me, Robert. But I’m not really cut out for a career in sales. I think it is best for both the company and me if I hand in my notice. I have loads of accrued holiday, so I think I can say that will be effective pretty much today.’
Robert’s face changed. She knew that his American bosses would not be happy to find out that he had lost two of his sales team in one day. However, he soon regained his composure. ‘I accept your resignation.’ To his credit, he stood up and shook her hand.
As she left the room, she felt lighter than she had in a long time. Now she just needed to find Paolo.
Chapter Thirty-Four
Shannon
Whatever she’d said to Kate earlier, giving up Faye was the hardest thing Shannon had ever had to do in her life. As soon as she could, she’d applied for her Irish passport and moved to Europe. Keeping several thousand miles between her and the memory of Jessie in the park that day had helped her to deal with it. That, and the knowledge that Faye was better off without her.
But her telephone conversation with Adam the night before had turned everything on its head.
‘What’s going on, Adam? Faye is in Paris? And you’ve given her my address? What were you thinking?’
‘What did you expect me to do, Shannon? She’s eighteen. She has a right to know who her mother is. I wasn’t going to lie to her.’
Surely they hadn’t kept it at secret from her all these years? Weren’t you supposed to tell children if they’d been adopted? Be clear and honest about it from when they were small? Not spring it on them when they were older. Did Shannon have any right to have an opinion on that? ‘You didn’t tell her before now?’
Adam sighed. ‘She knew that Jess wasn’t her biological mother. We’ve always been honest with her. Answered any questions. Up until now she hasn’t had a lot of questions. She’s always been a happy, easy-going kid and she just accepted what we told her. But this last year, especially when she was approaching her eighteenth birthday, she’s been asking a lot of questions. Questions about you.’
Shannon’s heart thumped. ‘What kind of questions?’
‘What you looked like. Whether she looked the same as you. What your job was. Were you artistic like her?’ He paused and Shannon fought the urge to ask him whether they did look alike. He lowered his voice. ‘And, when Jessie wasn’t around, she asked me if I’d been in love with you.’
Poor Jessie. She didn’t deserve any of this. Shannon thought of the huge smile she’d worn in the park that day: the woman was born to be a mother. ‘I hope you told her the truth.’ The last thing the girl needed was some fairy tale about Adam and Shannon having been in love. At thirty-eight, Shannon could recognise the difference between love, infatuation and lust.
She heard Adam scratch his head again. ‘Yes, I told her the truth. I said that we’d… cared about each other. But it wasn’t love. It was her mum I loved. I love Jessie.’
Several thousand miles, and nineteen years away and that still hurt a little. ‘And what does Jessie think about all this?’
‘You can ask her, if you like.’
She didn’t have time to say no before Adam had passed the phone over to his wife. Clearly he couldn’t wait to be rid of Shannon. Again.
‘Hi, Shannon.’ Jessie’s voice touched some long-forgotten place in Shannon. The place where she’d stored distant memories. The accusations. The hysterics. Then, later, the apologies and the sympathy. Jessie had cared for Shannon in her pregnancy. After the baby was born, she had held Shannon tight and whispered in her ear: Thank you.
Shannon swallowed and let her professional side take the lead. Smile when you speak on the telephone and your customer will hear it. ‘Hi, Jessie. This is tricky, isn’t it?’
Jessie sniffed. ‘Yes, it’s hard, but I think we all knew it would come someday. Faye’s a very strong-minded young woman.’
‘So Adam tells me.’ Shannon had a weird feeling in her chest. Was that pride? That definitely had no right to be there. ‘Jessie, you need to speak to her. Tell her to go home. I don’t know what Adam was thinking, telling her where I live. We had an agreement.’
Jessie sighed at the other end. ‘It’s not as easy as that. She’s there on an Art History trip. She knows that’s where you live and she asked Adam for your contact details.’
It was such an insane thing to do. Shannon tried not to raise her voice, but it was a struggle. ‘And he just gave them to her? How is that fair to me? Without warning?’
Jessie’s voice was calm and soothing. ‘To be fair to him, he has been trying to contact you for the last two weeks, Shannon. You haven’t replied.’
That was true, but it was still a massive step to take. ‘Surely you don’t think this is a good idea? It’s all so sudden. It needs to be thought out properly.’
There was short silence on the other end before Jessie replied. Calm and considered. ‘I’d be lying if I said I was happy about it. But I knew it would come. She knows that I love her and…’ Jessie’s voice started to wobble at the other end. ‘Be nice to her, Shannon. She’s a really great kid. She’s got a lot of you in her.’
Shannon’s stomach flipped over. This was too much. She needed more time to think about this. ‘Jessie, please. Talk to her. Maybe we can… I don’t know… write first? Speak on the phone? Meeting face to face – it’s just too fast.’
‘It doesn’t seem too fast to her. You remember what it was like to be young and impatient, Shannon.’
How was Jessie taking this so well? The woman was an absolute saint. Shannon’s throat was tight. ‘I’m not like you, Jessie. You’re kind and patient and… you love her. I’m just not… I’m not like that.’
‘You don’t have to be her mom, Shannon. I’ve got that covered. You just need to meet her and answer her questions.’ Jessie paused. ‘She’s going to think you’re really cool.’
Shannon’s throat was in danger of closing up altogether. ‘How are you not angry, Jessie? If I were you, I would hate me right now.’
Jessie’s voice was soft and broken. ‘How could I hate you? You gave me the best gift any woman can give another woman. You gave me my child, Shannon.’
Shannon started to cry again. Once these waterworks
got turned on, there seemed to be no stopping them. ‘I can’t do this, Jessie. I’m not like that. I just gave her away. What kind of woman does that make me?’
Jessie was crying openly now, too. ‘It’s going to be okay, Shannon. It’s all going to be okay.’
When they’d finished speaking, Adam hadn’t come back onto the phone. He’d seemed content to let the women deal with this. Once she’d hung up, Shannon had gone to wash her face in the bathroom.
And now here she was in the same bathroom, washing off the tears from her conversation with Kate. Yesterday, she had wished Kate had picked a different weekend to come. Now she was unbelievably grateful that she was here. Who else could she have talked to about all this? Certainly not Robert.
But what happened now? Should she just go home and wait for Faye to show up? Jessie had given her Faye’s cell phone number: should she try to call her? What would she even say? Hi. It’s your birth mother calling. What’s up? Everyone – even Kate – seemed to think it was a good idea for Shannon to meet up with Faye, but what if it all went badly? What if Shannon upset her? What if Faye was angry? Or disappointed?
Whatever she did, she needed to reapply her make-up first. Shannon hadn’t faced the world with less than foundation and mascara since she’d turned twenty-one. How did you dress to meet the daughter you hadn’t seen in eighteen years? Her stomach flipped again. Was she really doing this?
Somewhere, in the midst of her fear, was a prickle of excitement. What would Faye look like? How would she sound? Would she be serious, or quick to smile? For the last eighteen years, Shannon had always pictured her as a baby, but she was a grown woman now. What was she going to say to her? How was she going to feel? Terrified? Desperate? Would she feel… love?
There was a knock on the door. Shannon froze. Was it Robert? Kate?
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