The Day I lost You

by Fionnuala Kearney

  Leah kisses my cheek and grabs my bag in one movement.

  ‘Rose,’ I call her again, as I pick up Pug’s travel basket and hand it out to Leah. The poor dog, she doesn’t know whether she’s coming or going ever since I got her.

  Rose appears at the top of the stairs. ‘I can’t choose. I’ve packed a few things in a very small bag, Nanny.’

  I look at Leah, whose eyes are also fixed on the child. Standing there at the top of the stairs, the slivers of light from the landing window on her face and hair, she looks just like Anna. It makes me gasp.

  ‘It’s fine, love,’ Leah answers for me. ‘That small bag is fine.’ She reaches a hand up to take it from her.

  ‘And I packed my new jeans, Nanny. You forgot them.’

  Leah bursts out laughing, ruffles Rose’s plaited hair.

  Even I can’t help smiling. ‘Have you had a wee?’ I ask. ‘It’s a long journey.’

  ‘I know how long it is, Nanny. That’s why I packed so much. And yes. I ’ready had a wee.’

  ‘I have the DVD player in my car too, so take some along?’ Leah says, grabbing my car keys from the side table and disappearing outside. Rose runs back up the stairs, only to appear a minute later with a handful of DVDs, no cases on them.

  I grab them from her. ‘I’m always telling you to put these back in their covers, aren’t I?’

  She stops on the stairs and I realize my tone was curt. Her lower lip starts to tremble. ‘I was trying to be fast,’ she says.

  I climb up, take hold of her and carry her to the car. ‘Sorry, darling. I didn’t sleep well last night and I’m a bit tired.’ I place her on the booster seat that Leah has just removed from my car and strap her in. ‘I love you, gorgeous girl.’ I tickle her nose with mine.

  ‘I love you, gorgeous Nanny.’ She grins.

  ‘Right, let’s get on the road,’ Leah says. ‘We’ll stop somewhere for brunch on the way.’ Before we leave my driveway, she fishes in the end of her bag and pulls out Anna’s phone. ‘Right, you have it now. I’ve been petrified I’d lose it or my bag would be nicked. Imagine if I told you I’d lost it?’ She lets out a low whistle.

  It almost burns a hole in my palm and I let it sit on my lap, resting between my legs.

  ‘0712,’ Leah says. ‘I’m sorry.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘0712. It’s the code. He asked me for a number that was specific to Anna that we’d remember but not a birthdate. It was the first thing that came into my head.’

  ‘Oh …’ 0712. The date of the accident. The date she died.

  ‘Obviously, you can change it. But you need it to get in the first time.’

  I nod, glad, for once, that I can’t read or use a phone while I’m in a car without feeling nauseous. It has waited long enough – it can wait another few hours.

  Thankfully, Rose is already occupied. The zip has been opened on her bag and she has released a menagerie of soft toys on the back seat, chatting to each of them in her furry line-up.

  For a while, we’re silent, Leah and I. Rose is doing enough talking for three. She’s talking about Anna, wondering what star she will be tonight, telling us that she can always see the stars more clearly at Gramps’s house. Granma and Gramps have a better sky. But what if she wants to look at her during the day? Where is she then?

  My phone buzzes in the central console and the screen shows me it’s Theo. I turn the sound off.

  ‘Don’t blame him.’ Leah stares ahead at the road. Rose is talking to Mr Giraffe about her mummy. She is offering to be Mr Giraffe’s mummy.

  ‘Who shall I blame, then?’ I can hear nothing but a black mood in my voice today.

  ‘Anna was his patient.’

  ‘I know that. I’m meant to be his friend.’

  ‘And he knows that. He was in an impossible situation.’

  ‘My only daughter has just died.’ I whisper the words. ‘Don’t tell me about impossible situations.’

  I don’t tell Leah that I almost called him last night after getting his messages. He’s right. We need each other; but I also need more time to lick my wounds.

  Rose is now counting Eddie Stobart trucks, looking out of the window at their names on their front grilles. If she can, she knows from previous games that she has to try and spell out the letters. ‘Look, Nanny!’ she cries. ‘It says, A, N, A! Like Mummy.’

  I strain my body around to look out of the back window and yes, there it is behind us. A N A. I don’t bother explaining it’s missing an ‘N’. I just nod.

  ‘Mummy’s not a truck in the daytime, is she?’ Her tiny face scowls.

  ‘No, darling, she’s not a truck.’ I shake my head, reach back and take her hand.

  ‘So where is she?’ she persists.

  ‘Your mummy is everywhere,’ Leah interrupts. ‘In everything pretty that you can see during the day. Like a rainbow, or a butterfly or a bird, or a—’

  ‘A bunny rabbit,’ Rose says.

  ‘Yes,’ Leah agrees.

  ‘Or a doggie.’

  I watch Rose look at Pug’s travel basket in a new light. She slides her small fingers through the grille, touches Pug’s face and smiles. Pug licks her hand and Rose turns her head to one side like she always does when she’s about to take a nap.

  ‘Or even a doggie,’ I smile.

  Leah sighs and I can tell, like me, she’s unsure if the idea of Rose believing Pug might be her mother is a good one.

  ‘Mum will be all right with us just arriving, won’t she?’ I change the subject.

  ‘She’s Mum. Of course. It is interesting, though, that we’re both headed there when things are shit.’

  Something in her voice, in what she’s just said, makes me ask, ‘You, are you all right? I know why my life’s in the shitter. Please tell me you’re coming home just to be with me and your life’s not in the shitter too?’

  She laughs. ‘I’m going home just to be with you.’

  ‘What’s wrong?’

  ‘Nothing.’

  ‘Don’t. I’m fragile but I’m not an idiot.’

  ‘It’s nothing. Jen, Gus’s daughter. She’s asked to come and live with us.’

  I literally suck air through my teeth, knowing it’s the last thing that Leah would want. Jen can be hard work, sometimes seems to resent Leah, even though she and Gus only met long after he had parted from her mother. Leah loves her, but it’s not always easy.

  ‘What’ll you do?’

  ‘Grin and bear it. What choice do I have?’

  ‘You could run away to Mum and Dad’s with me.’

  She smiles.

  ‘We could hide out together in Windermere, have Mum cook for us while we let “the help” we’re arranging look after Dad.’

  Her smile widens. ‘Put that way, it’s tempting to stay forever … But I have to be back on Saturday. Jen moves in on Sunday. It’d look awful if I wasn’t there.’

  I hear a soft snore coming from the back and, when I look behind, see it’s Rose and not Pug.

  ‘Why is she moving out of her mother’s?’

  ‘I don’t know. I don’t think Gus knows either – he’d tell me. It just seems to be they’ve had a falling-out and her answer is to come and live with Dad.’

  ‘Dad and Leah,’ I correct her.

  ‘Yeah, that.’ She sighs a long, deep sigh. ‘Hopefully, she’ll realize I’m really an evil stepmother and run home to Mummy.’

  ‘Maleficent … Ma-leah-cent.’ I laugh, knowing the truth will be Leah tripping over herself to make Jen feel at home.

  ‘Go on, laugh. You won’t be laughing when I’m around in yours hiding on a more local level.’

  ‘Anytime.’ I shake my head. ‘Anytime. Ma-leah-cent. I think that’s my new nickname for you.’

  ‘Hah-bloody-hah.’ She clicks the indicators on and pulls towards the left. ‘There’s a McDonald’s a few miles up ahead. I need comfort food.’

  ‘Mmm.’ I need comfort food too. I need comfort, full stop.

  My phone
pings a text and this time I try and read it, instantly feeling sick. Theo again.

  ‘You should call him,’ Leah states.

  ‘I’m not calling him. Not yet.’

  ‘What is going on, Jess? There’s more to this than meets the eye,’ Leah says, her brow all creased.

  ‘You’ll ruin your Botox.’ I wag a finger at her.

  ‘Answer me,’ she demands.

  I shrug, am about to defend my stance.

  ‘Jesus, Jess. You only have a few friends in life and Theo’s a good one. Is this still about him and Anna?’ She’s shaking her head and I tell her to watch the road.

  ‘It’s not just that,’ I say, peering over my shoulder to check Rose is asleep.

  ‘What then?’

  ‘We kissed.’ I can’t even tell her what my head is really afraid of, what scenarios I have come up with since discovering a handkerchief.

  Her head shoots out from her neck like one of those old-fashioned toys that bends into a cup and sips from it. ‘You did what?’

  ‘You heard me. It was the night he told me about the letter and Anna, and afterwards … Well, it happened, and since then I’ve just been mad as hell at him. He so should have told me before any bloody letter allowed him to. I don’t care what you think.’ I take a breath. ‘I honestly think he’d have let Sean just take Rose away and said nothing to me, even though he knew Sean wasn’t her father. Bloody ethics. Like I care about his fucking ethics.’ I am surprised at my own tone of voice.

  ‘He wouldn’t have.’ Leah is almost spitting. ‘And you’re bloody unbelievable. You’re saying you’re mad at him about one thing and really you’re mad at him because a line got crossed.’

  ‘I’m not.’ I fold my arms. ‘You don’t understand. I can’t trust him.’

  She looks at me as though I’ve finally lost my mind. ‘McDonald’s up ahead. You’d better wake Rose. Mind you, you’re enough to make me seriously lose my appetite.’

  My face turns to look out through my window. When I find my voice, it’s cracked. ‘Don’t tell me off. Help me,’ I whisper to her, swallowing a lump in my throat. ‘I’m lost.’

  She sighs, close to tears herself, and reaches for my hand. ‘We’ll work it out, Jess. We’ll work it out, but for Christ’s sake stop seeing friends as foes and stop thinking the worst of Anna. There, I’ve said it. She made mistakes. Who doesn’t make mistakes?’ She glances back at Rose in the rear-view mirror. ‘Not everyone’s mistakes result in such joy.’

  She pulls into the slip road for the services and I’m silent, remembering Anna’s first tattoo: Felix culpa. As we search for a parking space, cars, trucks, and hordes of people flash by my window, all of them certain of their destination. Whereas, I am well and truly lost.

  30. Jess

  It’s obvious as soon as we land on our parents that Dad’s not well. Mum seems very bothered that we’ve come, and suddenly the idea of surprising her so that she doesn’t fuss seems like a very bad one. By the time we get there, having stopped to eat, it’s almost one thirty. Mum is still in her dressing gown: it’s wide open, her nightie underneath. Her hair hasn’t been brushed. There are signs of Monday’s makeup still around the edges of her eyes.

  I let Rose and Pug into the back garden, warning her to stay near the house where I can see her. With one eye on my dishevelled mother and one eye on my wild granddaughter, running around like a dervish with the dog, I learn that Dad has been in bed since they got back. My mother doesn’t want to use the words that it was all too much for him, but it obviously was.

  Ever-practical Leah has been through the fridge and is making notes on her phone.

  ‘Right,’ she says, ‘you need food in. I’m going up to see Dad before I pop out to get stuff and then, Mum …’ She fixes her eyes firmly on my mother’s. ‘Then, when I get back, you are going to listen to some sense. You need help here. No more, “I can manage” shit.’

  Mum’s face flinches and I walk across to the back of the room and pull the sliding door open. ‘Rose!’ I shout. ‘Up near the house, please. Stay back from the water.’

  Leah has left the room by the time I watch Rose return and I hear her car start up and rev out of the driveway.

  ‘Well …’ Mum says.

  ‘She’s right. And you know it. Time to stop fighting. Let some people help you. It’s the same advice you’ve been giving me, Mum, and it’s time you listened.’

  She slumps into a nearby chair. ‘I feel like I’m letting him down.

  ‘I’m going to make you a cup of tea. Have you had anything to eat?’

  ‘I ate the remains of your dad’s breakfast. He’s only eaten half a slice of toast today.’

  ‘And what?’ I take the chance to look out of the window as I put the kettle onto boil. Rose is just outside on the patio, playing with Pug and a tennis ball. ‘You had the other half?’

  She nods. ‘Maybe it’s good you’re here. Maybe things happen for a reason and maybe I do need to get some help.’

  I frown, don’t let her see, but I hate that expression so much. Things happen for a reason. Do they? So, why is my daughter dead at twenty-four? Tell me, whoever is sorting out all the reasons up there? I look heaven-bound as I dangle a teabag over some boiling water and hand it, weak and black, to Mum.

  ‘I’m going to pop in and see Dad. Keep an eye on Rose.’

  She nods. ‘Make sure he’s warm. He keeps tossing the duvet off himself.’

  In their bedroom, Dad has indeed thrown the duvet off the good side of his body. He’s propped up on pillows and attempts a smile when he sees me.

  ‘Dar-l—ing,’ he whispers.

  I kiss his cheek. He’s hot, not temperature hot but hot. It has warmed up outside, so I open a window a bit.

  ‘Mum’s worried about you.’

  He makes an attempt to roll his eyes.

  ‘She loves you … Says you haven’t really eaten the last couple of days.’

  He shakes his head.

  ‘Sleeping okay?’

  ‘Lo-ts.’

  ‘Rose and I have come to see you. In fact, Rose, Leah and I have come to see you. Truth is we’re running away. I don’t want to be at home. Too many memories at the moment and Leah is having time out before her stepdaughter moves in with them. This morning, running home to Mummy and Daddy at the Lakes seemed like a good idea.’ I make a face.

  ‘Wel-cc-om-e.’

  I know he means that we’re always welcome. I also know the few sentences he’s shared this morning, more than he’s said to me for ages, exhaust him. I fluff his pillows for him, tell him to rest. The room faces the lake and I look out towards it. Rose is there, as ordered, still in place on the patio next to the house. I can’t see Pug but I can hear her excited barking.

  Standing at the window, I glance around the room. It hasn’t changed in twenty years. A floral wallpaper covers one wall – my mother having invented accent walls way, way before anyone else considered the idea. The pale pink peony growing from the trellis on the paper matches the shade of the other three walls. Mum and Dad sleep in a big old bed that they bought at a local antique market. It’s dark wood, bulky, with intricate carvings on it that must be a nightmare to keep clean. There’s a dressing table next to the window. It’s dark wood but nothing like the bed in style, with clear-cut angular lines. Nothing ‘matchy-matchy’ for Mum … Sitting on top of the dressing table is her array of makeup, an open pot of cold cream. Dad has fallen asleep and, before I leave, my fingers touch his forehead.

  Leah’s back, unpacking a few supplies in the kitchen, muttering something about needing to do a bigger food shop. Mum is watching Rose from the back door. I sidle up to Leah. ‘I don’t like the look of Dad.’

  ‘Let me handle this.’ She leaves the room and I wait to see what handling this actually means. I stand at the door with Mum, both of us quiet. I don’t like this. Suddenly the home that has always been my haven, my sanctuary, seems off.

  ‘Why don’t you go and have a shower, Mum?’

/>   She looks blankly at me. ‘Yes. I should. Of course.’

  Leah arrives back just as she’s about to leave the room. ‘Mum, I’ve just checked and Dad actually has a temperature. I think we should call Dr Rolls.’

  ‘I took it an hour before you all arrived. He was hot but—’

  Leah takes my mother’s hands in hers. ‘You’re exhausted. Really, stop being so hard on yourself and let us deal with this. Now, I’m going to call the doctor. Is this his number here on the calendar?’ She jerks her head towards the calendar hanging on the wall of the kitchen, a number scribbled in the bottom left corner. Mum nods.

  ‘You go and have a shower, Mum,’ I say. ‘We’ll call the surgery.’

  ‘Nanny!’ I hear Rose squeal from the back garden and run to the door. She is standing there, her leggings that I had put on her this morning soaked. ‘Pug peed on me,’ she says.

  ‘Right.’ I look back. Mum has left the room; Leah is on the phone.

  ‘Now, I can wear my new jeans.’

  I know immediately she’s lying. Somehow she’s poured water on herself, probably from a nearby bucket of rainwater. She wanted to wear them this morning and I wouldn’t let her. I march her out to the bag, still sitting in the hallway, and change her into her favoured jeans, wordlessly. I haven’t the energy, but it does not go unnoticed that on the one hand I am struggling with the fact that my daughter has obviously lied openly to me for years, and now Rose has done the same without even blinking. The apple, I shake my head, does not fall far from the tree.