The Second Life of Amy Archer

by R. S. Pateman

  ‘But I’m Amy’s mother,’ I say, conscious that such a statement would have brought howls of derision from the press.

  ‘Right,’ Libby says, nodding her head. ‘You’re Amy’s mother. For as long as you choose to be. If you have second thoughts – and you could – it will crucify Esme. I’m the one who’ll have to pick up the pieces. It’s been hard enough holding her together up to this point. I have no choice – as Esme’s mother. You do.’

  ‘You make it sound like it’s not been easy for me.’

  Libby snorts.

  ‘We haven’t even started yet,’ she says. ‘Have you any idea how tricky all this is going to be? How painful? It’ll be brutal. Maybe even downright bloody dangerous for Esme. She’s just a kid. You’ve got to remember that.’

  ‘How could I ever forget it?’ I pull my coat tighter around me. ‘And I promise I’m not going to walk away either. I couldn’t bear losing Amy twice.’

  Libby shrugs.

  ‘I hope you’re right,’ she says.

  ‘Well, if you’re worried I’ll let her down,’ I say, ‘why bring her to my doorstep in the first place?’

  Libby lifts her head and stares at the sky. Her eyes are brimming.

  ‘Because my sweet, precious little girl was turning into somebody I didn’t recognise. Instead of hugs and bubbles at bathtime, instead of giggles in front of the telly with fish-finger sandwiches, instead of a healthy, clever and hard-working schoolgirl . . .’ she wipes her eyes, ‘I got an anxious little madam who tells me – and everyone else – about her other mother who loves her more than I do. A kid who gets all weepy during her lessons for no good reason, who spends playtimes kicking a wall until her toes are bruised and bleeding, who has terrifying, violent fits – after which she tells me stuff that makes no sense and then moans at me for not believing her.’

  She takes a tissue from her pocket and blows her nose.

  ‘And through all this,’ she continues, ‘I still get glimpses of the daughter I once had. One who does eat ravioli and who likes Lady Gaga. Who helps me out with the hoovering and washing-up and lets me snuggle up during Corrie.’

  Her eyes snap to mine.

  ‘That’s why I brought her down here,’ she says. ‘To try and make sense of everything and hopefully find some kind of happiness.’

  I nod slowly, think of taking her hand, but pull back, certain she’ll spurn it.

  ‘I’m sorry,’ I say. ‘I had no idea. I mean, how could I?’

  ‘No, well you will from now on. First-hand. Because all the confusion, all the agony you’ve no doubt been through since last night, all that is only the beginning. You have to know what you’re signing up for before I tell her you believe her.’

  I blink, uncertain if I’ve heard her correctly.

  ‘You mean, she doesn’t know yet?’

  ‘That’s right.’

  The hand I was going to offer her only a moment ago is now clenched in a fist. How dare she not tell her? But then, I think, she is only doing what she feels is best for her child. What I would do if our roles were reversed. Besides, maybe it’s better Esme doesn’t think I believe her, given that I’m not sure I do.

  ‘I don’t want to get her hopes up until I know you really understand what’s involved,’ Libby says firmly. ‘Like I said, you can choose to walk away. I don’t have that luxury.’ She leans towards me. ‘It took me a while to even begin to get my head around this. You’ve done it in less than a day – apparently. How can you be so sure it’s not just wishful thinking?’

  I can’t help laughing.

  ‘I wouldn’t wish for this.’

  ‘Really? Isn’t it a second chance?’ Libby says. ‘A painful and unlikely one, I admit, but better than no chance at all, surely?’

  I shake my head.

  ‘No, not if it doesn’t feel right. You know, right here,’ I say. My hand hovers over my heart but doesn’t touch my chest. ‘I may not have been a mother for a long time, but the instincts have never left me.’

  Libby leans back and blows a stream of iced breath into the air.

  ‘So what’s changed?’ she says.

  ‘You want me to tell you?’

  ‘No. I want you to convince me.’

  I toss my head back angrily.

  ‘This is ridiculous,’ I snap.

  ‘That’s what you said last night. So, like I said, what’s changed?’

  I’m indignant that she wants to hear my reasons, but can understand why she does. And saying them out loud to her might also make me more certain of them.

  I push my hair back from my face and sit up straight.

  ‘It’s her memories,’ I say. ‘The details she knows. All of them are spot on, yet none of them were in the press reports.’

  ‘I know,’ Libby says. ‘I checked.’

  ‘But it’s not just that she knows them. It’s her certainty. Not a flicker of doubt. No trace of a lie. She couldn’t have made it all up.’

  Libby raises her eyebrows.

  ‘And that’s all it took to convince you?’

  ‘There’s what Ian said too, of course,’ I say, laying my hands on the table.

  ‘Ian?’

  ‘A psychic.’ I feel my cheeks flush, as if I’m confessing to something embarrassing. ‘He told me a little girl was close. A girl whose name began with an E. He suggested various names, Ellie being one of them. A few hours later Esme was at my door.’

  ‘Could just have been a fluke,’ Libby says. ‘And he didn’t say anything about Amy, did he? Only Esme – and even then he got her name wrong.’

  ‘But don’t you see? It’s not the detail that matters. Not this time. It’s the fact that he got anything at all.’

  Libby shrugs.

  ‘Sorry,’ she says. ‘I’m not with you.’

  I shuffle closer to her.

  ‘I’ve been going to psychics for years,’ I say, ‘and none of them even came close to reaching Amy on the other side. Now I know why.’

  Libby frowns.

  ‘Sorry,’ she says. ‘I still don’t get it.’

  ‘Don’t you see? Amy wasn’t there to hear him because she never actually made it to the spirit world.’

  ‘Aah,’ Libby says, nodding slowly. ‘I suppose that makes sense – even if I’m not much of a believer in all that sort of stuff myself. That’s why it took me such a long time to see what was really going on with Esme.’

  ‘What about God? Do you believe in him?’

  ‘God?’

  ‘Yes. He pointed me towards the truth.’

  Libby’s eyebrows shoot up in surprise.

  ‘I wouldn’t have had you down for one of the God squad. Not after what you’ve been through.’

  ‘I don’t go to church, if that’s what you mean,’ I say. ‘But I did the Sunday school thing and went to a church school. That sort of drip-feeding leaves its mark – however much you might rebel against it later, whatever tragedies life throws your way.’

  I look away from Libby, grind the heel of one shoe into the frozen turf.

  Esme glides across the ice. The Tower’s battlements shine like bleached bone. I shudder and rub my gloved hands together.

  ‘So, have I convinced you? Do I pass the test?’

  ‘It’s not like that, Beth.’

  ‘Yes it is,’ I say, patting her hand. ‘But I understand.’ I clear my throat. ‘What was it that first made you think Esme was different?’

  Libby looks me directly in the eye.

  ‘It was about a year ago, I suppose,’ she says. ‘It was little things at first. Like her saying she missed hearing the bells of Big Ben from her bedroom. I thought she meant the bongs on News at Ten.’ She twirls a strand of hair around a finger. ‘Esme spoke about London so much her teachers thought we’d lived here, when she’d never even been. And on Saturday mornings she used to wonder why Live and Kicking wasn’t on TV. I watched that when I was a girl. She was only a year old when it went off the air.’

  I remember Amy entering
the programme’s talent show. She and Dana and three other girls were going to sing a Spice Girls song. They didn’t even get asked to audition. A few weeks later Amy sneered and snarked at another group of girls doing the same song.

  ‘Then,’ Libby says, ‘she kept talking about friends and teachers from school – only none of them were actually at her school.’

  ‘Most kids have imaginary friends.’

  ‘Which is why I didn’t think anything of it at first. But other mums said their kids made them lay a place for the invisible friend at the table. Esme never did. Her “friend” Dana was real to her and had a house and table of her own. The other kids soon forgot their made-up friends. Esme’s stories got more vivid. Then the fits started.’

  ‘Yes,’ I say, trying not to sound too suspicious. ‘I wanted to come back to that. Amy wasn’t epileptic, you see.’

  Libby holds her hands out.

  ‘I don’t think Esme is either,’ she says. ‘The doctors do, but I don’t agree. I think they’re brought on when Amy is stretching in Esme’s body. Flashbacks. That sort of thing.’

  My heart is thumping hard, pushing out the question I’ve most needed an answer to during the last ten years. The one that’s given me more sleepless nights than any other, the one that drove my darkest nightmares whenever I did manage to get to sleep.

  I try to speak but my mouth is too dry to shape the words. I swallow and try again.

  ‘Has she . . . ever said anything about what happened to Amy? I mean . . . where her body is?’

  My heart breaks once more as soon as the words leave my mouth. I can barely breathe as I wait for Libby’s answer.

  ‘No,’ she says. ‘Not yet.’

  I’m caught between disappointment and relief; knowing might be just as painful as not knowing.

  ‘And you mustn’t quiz her about it,’ Libby says. ‘Okay?’

  ‘But I—’

  ‘Yes, I know you need to know, but we can’t force it out of her. These fits are . . .’ She screws her face up in anguish. ‘They’re horrible to see. She’s so scared when she comes round, dazed and trembling. She looks so . . . bloody vulnerable. All I want to do is hold her and tell it will be all right, but she won’t let me and we both know it won’t be all right in the end.’

  She jabs a finger at me.

  ‘Whatever horrors she sees during these fits will come out in their own time,’ she says. ‘I almost don’t want it to happen. But it has to if Esme is ever to move through it. You’ve got to promise not to put pressure on her.’

  ‘But wouldn’t it be better to get it over with?’

  ‘No. Not for her. Or for me. It’s not easy hearing my daughter talk about things we’ve never done. Places we’ve never been.’ She looks off into the distance. ‘She’s becoming a total stranger to me. After each fit there’s a bit more of Amy and a little bit less of Esme. I don’t know which is worse. Losing your daughter, like that,’ she says, snapping her fingers, ‘or watching her disappear bit by bit.’

  I take her hand and squeeze it. She looks up and smiles weakly.

  ‘Promise me you won’t interrogate her, Beth, or I won’t let you near her again.’

  I swallow hard and nod. It’s not the moment to suggest past-life regression therapy. But it will come. Soon. She’ll see the sense of it when I do.

  ‘I promise,’ I say.

  The music from the loudspeakers fades. The announcement that the session will finish in five minutes sends the skaters into a frenzy. Some slither to the exit; most skate faster and more freely as the space on the ice increases.

  ‘There’s one more thing,’ Libby says, standing up. ‘I don’t want her getting even more confused than she already is. So you have to call her Esme – at least for the moment. It’ll be easier all round and spare us any awkward questions. Agreed?’

  I say yes; it’s too early for me to even think about calling her anything but Esme anyway.

  Esme sweeps around in smooth loops, hair streaming behind her, silver jacket glinting. An orbiting star. When the music stops and the stewards herd people to the exit, her transition from the ice to the rubber matting is elegant and effortless.

  As she walks towards us, wobbling on the blades, I see Amy as a toddler, teetering in my high-heeled shoes.

  ‘Hello, Esme,’ I say. ‘You looked pretty cool out there.’

  Her face has a sheen of sweat and is flushed pink.

  ‘Go get your shoes, love,’ Libby says. ‘We’ll wait here.’

  ‘How about a drink?’ I say, pointing to a stall swathed in ribbons of fruit-scented steam. ‘You must be thirsty after all that dashing about?’

  Esme nods.

  ‘Oooh, yes please!’

  It’s good to see she has Amy’s enthusiasm and manners.

  ‘Do you like Ribena?’ I ask. Amy did.

  Esme says she does and totters off to reclaim her shoes from the collection point. Libby and I walk to the drinks stall and wait for her there. I get us both a glass of mulled wine, but Libby doesn’t touch hers.

  ‘I need a clear head,’ she says, and puts the Styrofoam cup back on the counter. ‘You do too.’

  I sip from my cup; the hot ruby liquid burns the roof of my mouth. I blow on it to cool it down, take another sip. And another. By the time Esme gets back, I’ve finished mine and most of Libby’s. I pass Esme the Ribena and she rips the straw from the carton and stabs at the seal on the top.

  ‘Thank you,’ she says, before sucking on the straw. The carton warps and buckles. She smacks her lips as she finishes and squeezes the carton flat.

  ‘Does you being here mean you believe who I am?’ she says.

  I’m about to speak, but Libby gets in first.

  ‘Why don’t you put the carton in that bin over there, love? Then we’ll go for a walk.’

  ‘All of us?’

  ‘All of us,’ I say.

  Esme smiles and runs towards the bin. A few metres away she stops, takes aim and launches the carton. It sails through the air and lands in the bin, dead centre.

  ‘Bullseye!’ she shouts, and runs back, slipping in between me and Libby. Her hand slides into mine like a key into a well-used lock.

  We cross Tower Bridge, find our way down to the path along the river, where we’re swept along in the tide of families out for a stroll. The thrill of belonging once again brings a rash of goosebumps. I try to ignore that it’s Libby on the other side of Esme, and imagine it’s Brian there instead. Esme tugs on my hand.

  ‘Why didn’t Dad come too?’ she says. ‘I really want to see him.’

  I feel my cheek twitch.

  ‘You will,’ I say. ‘Later.’

  ‘He’s meeting us?’ Esme gives a little skip.

  ‘Not today, no.’

  ‘Is he at home?’

  ‘Probably, Esme,’ I say slowly. ‘But not my home. You see, we don’t live together any more.’

  Esme stops abruptly.

  ‘Is that because of me?’ she asks.

  I swallow hard.

  ‘No, not really. I think we just stopped loving one another.’

  Esme squeezes my hand.

  ‘That’s really sad,’ she says. ‘You did love him, though, didn’t you?’

  Her need for reassurance brings a lump to my throat.

  ‘Yes, of course,’ I say. ‘Very much so.’

  ‘Even though you argued?’

  ‘It’s . . . difficult to explain. Sometimes that’s just how things go.’

  ‘But—’

  ‘That’s enough,’ Libby says, pulling Esme on.

  ‘He does still love me, though,’ Esme says. ‘Doesn’t he?’

  ‘Oh, yes. He never stopped loving you.’

  And I suppose he didn’t. He just found it easier to forget her than I did. And he’ll find it much harder to accept that Amy has returned than I have, too. He’ll be cynical, sarcastic, brutal. I have to protect her from Brian for as long as I can.

  I pull my neck further into my coat and p
ick up the pace. Westminster Bridge divides the glowering sky from the grey of the Thames. Boats and buoys bob in the incoming tide and gulls hang on the breeze.

  The crowds thicken as we get closer to the bars and restaurants at the South Bank Centre. I’m struck by the number of young girls with blonde hair wearing pink coats, hats or leggings, as alike as mannequins on a conveyor belt. Like the girl whose hand is in mine. She could be any of them. And her parents could be any of those passing by. I fight the thought. I like the prospect of belonging once more.

  We pass under a bridge, its gloomy shade made darker by the twinkle of spinning lights at the far end. Oldfashioned organ music grows louder as we get closer.

  ‘Look! A carousel!’ Esme pulls away from us and runs ahead. ‘Can I go on it? Please?’

  ‘Of course.’ I start rummaging in my bag for my purse.

  ‘I don’t think it’s a good idea,’ Libby says to me under her breath.

  ‘Oh, it’s hardly a roller coaster,’ I say. ‘Just a bit of fun. Exactly what you said she needed.’

  ‘Fun that could trigger a fit,’ Libby says. ‘It’s not fair, Beth. You can’t induce these flashbacks just because it suits you.’

  The accusation stops me dead.

  ‘How can you possibly believe that I would want to hurt her?’ I say.

  Libby doesn’t answer.

  ‘Look, Libby,’ I say, starting to walk on, ‘if you’re so worried about her going round in circles, what exactly was she doing at the ice rink? She was going a lot faster than this merry-go-round does and she did it for longer, too. She’s fine now, isn’t she?’

  Libby nods.

  ‘Well then,’ I say, taking some money from my purse and snapping it shut. ‘And she’ll be fine after a go on this. I promise you.’

  Libby shrugs.

  ‘Okay,’ she says. ‘But only if you go with her and keep an eye on her.’

  ‘Come on!’ Esme yells from the ticket booth. ‘Or I’ll miss the next ride.’

  She claps her hands when she realises I’m going on too. She leaps up the steps to the rows of horses, runs her hands over their glossy painted manes and checks the names written in fancy lettering on the saddles.

  ‘Tinkerbell!’ she squeals, and climbs on, pointing for me to get on the one next to hers. ‘What’s yours called?’