Ribbons in Her Hair

by Colette McCormick

  The next morning I didn’t know what sort of reception to expect. I hadn’t seen my parents since I’d told Dad about the baby. I hadn’t left my bedroom and no one had come up to see how I was. I didn’t mind so much because I’d wanted to be alone but I couldn’t stay there forever.

  I’d heard Dad leave for work an hour or so earlier just like he always did and I’d lain in bed since then and listened to Mum moving around downstairs. I waited for her to shout me down for breakfast, but she didn’t. I looked at the clock on the bedside table and waited, but still the call didn’t come. Eventually I got up and started to get ready for school.

  I came out of the bathroom after having a wash to find my mother waiting for me. She had a basket of ironing in her hands

  ‘You’re up then,’ she stated the obvious.

  I nodded my head and avoided eye contact as I squeezed past her. ‘I need to get ready for school,’ I said quietly.

  ‘School? I don’t think so, lady,’ she said.

  ‘But I’ve got to,’ I said. ‘I missed yesterday.’

  ‘Yeah, well you’ll be missing another one today. I’ll ring and tell them you’re not very well.’ She pushed towels into a cupboard and slammed the door.

  ‘Are you going to tell them?’ I asked nervously.

  ‘Are you stupid?’ she hissed. ‘Of course I’m not going to bloody tell them.’

  ‘But what about my exams?’

  ‘What about them? You can kiss goodbye to them.’

  ‘Why? Carol Malone was pregnant and she still did her exams.’

  ‘I don’t care what Carol Malone did.’ She folded towels as she talked. ‘You’re not going to school pregnant. They’re not even going to know that you’re pregnant.’ She spat the word out every time she said it. ‘You remember your dad’s Aunty Rose in Scarborough…?’

  ‘But she’s old.’

  ‘Is she now?’ Mum stopped folding the towels and stared at me. ‘Well her daughter’s not and she’s the one that you’ll be staying with. Your dad rang his cousin Sally last night and she’s agreed to have you. Your dad’s going to take you over on Sunday. You can stay with her until the baby’s born and that’ll give us time to sort out an adoption.’

  ‘Adoption!’ Even though I’d known what she was thinking I still couldn’t believe that she was really suggesting it to me.

  ‘Yes, adoption.’ Mum started folding clothes again. ‘What did you think you were going to do?’

  ‘Keep it.’

  ‘Keep it?’ She made a noise that was a mix between a snort and a laugh. ‘And have your life ruined?’

  ‘Why would it be ruined?’

  She sighed heavily. ‘Because it would.’

  That didn’t seem like much of an explanation to me.

  ‘What about Tim?’ I almost didn’t dare to ask the question.

  ‘It’s got nothing to do with him.’

  ‘It’s his baby.’

  ‘He didn’t want you, Susan,’ she said callously, ‘so what makes you think that he’d want you and your baby?’

  That hurt so much. ‘But he has a right to know.’

  The look in Mum’s eyes told me that she didn’t agree with me.

  Thank God she couldn’t bring herself to look at me for very long because I couldn’t stand the look on her face. All I had ever wanted to do in my life was please Mum enough for her to love me and now that was never going to happen. I had brought the ultimate shame on the family and I knew that she would never forgive me.

  JEAN

  I knew there was something wrong as soon as Susan wasn’t home by four o’clock.

  I’d nearly gone to the doctor’s with her but that would have set tongues wagging. There’d be bound to be someone in the surgery who knew us and it would be bad enough when they saw Susan go in alone – you know, wondering what was wrong with her – but if the two of us were there that’d be it; we’d be the talk of the place. I mean, Susan wasn’t a kid any more; she didn’t need to be taken to the doctor’s. Me being there with her would scream pregnancy test. In the end I’d had to let her go on her own while I stayed at home to get on with what needed doing. Not that I could concentrate, I just went through the motions really, working on auto-pilot and looking at the clock every five minutes.

  After a bit I turned the pan of potatoes off and went to the kitchen window to watch for her coming. The doctor’s surgery was only a ten-minute walk away and I was sure that she’d said her appointment was early afternoon.

  I thought about going along to see if she was there, but how would that look? Then I thought about ringing the surgery to check what time her appointment had been but there was no point because they wouldn’t tell me anything. Anyway, that snotty cow from number thirty-six worked on the reception and I didn’t like talking to her at the best of times. The more I thought about it, the more I thought that Susan had said her appointment was early afternoon. Something about half past two rang a bell.

  It could mean only one thing. She would have been straight home if the test had been negative. She’d have wanted to prove me wrong. There could only be one explanation and it made me feel sick.

  Oh my God, not her; not this. My mind went back to the day that I’d found out I was having Helen, the day my mam had sent me to meet Mick out of work so that I could tell him. I had been terrified that day and I had cried all the way to the factory gates. Back in those days when a lass fell wrong there was nothing to be done but marry the lad and be grateful that he didn’t desert you. Had things changed any? They had if you believed what you read in the papers, and maybe they had in some other places, but not round here. I’d seen the way people looked at girls with a baby and no man. I knew that look because I’d looked at them that way myself. I didn’t want people looking at Susan that way but I didn’t want her going down the same road that I had either.

  I prayed to God that she hadn’t gone to tell that Preston lad, Tim or whatever he was called. I’d known he’d be trouble. The whole flaming family were trouble and I couldn’t stand the thought of one of my daughters being stuck with one of them for the rest of her life.

  I mean, was he even going to want her? They’d fallen out a few weeks earlier and I’d seen him just a couple of days ago outside his grandma’s house snogging on with one of Eileen Jones’ lasses. He wasn’t going to want Susan – not now, not just because she was in trouble. God knows if anyone else would want her now either. Who the hell would choose to take on another man’s baby?

  I was relieved when Julie rang to say that Susan was with her because at least it meant she hadn’t gone to him. I didn’t bother asking why Susan was there, I didn’t need to. There was nothing to do but get on with tea and wait for all hell to break loose.

  I was crying as I put the mashed potatoes on top of the shepherd’s pie and when it was in the oven I sat at the table with my head in my hands and wondered what on earth I was going to tell Mick. I couldn’t do it. I couldn’t be the one to tell him that his precious Susan was no better than her mother. It would break his heart and I wasn’t about to do that. We might not have had a marriage made in Heaven but I thought a lot of him and I didn’t like to see him hurt.

  But never mind what was I going to tell Mick, what was I going to tell the neighbours? Her at the bottom of the street would have a field day. She’d had to take all the gossip when her youngest had had a baby the year before and she be quick to get her own back. Why hadn’t I kept my mouth shut?

  When I heard the van pull up outside and drop Mick off I grabbed a tissue and dried my eyes. He walked through the door and did a double take when he looked at me. He couldn’t help but see that I’d been crying but he didn’t say anything. He did ask where Susan was though.

  ‘Library,’ I said, saying the first thing that came into my head.

  He looked surprised but didn’t say anything, he just sat at the table and waited for his tea to be dished up. I put a plate of food in front of both of us but I couldn’t face mine. I pushed the
plate away and sat back in my chair.

  ‘What’s wrong with your tea?’ he asked as he shovelled another forkful into his mouth.

  ‘Nothing,’ I said, ‘I just don’t feel like it.’

  ‘That’s not like you,’ he said. ‘You only go off your food when you’re pregnant. Not got something to tell me have you?’ he laughed.

  Oh God, if only he knew.

  After he had finished his tea, Mick took the paper out of the pocket of the coat he’d hung on the back of his chair and disappeared into the living room just like he did every night. I set about washing the dishes, looked at the clock every two minutes and waited for Susan.

  When she did eventually come home, Julie was by her side.

  I was washing a saucepan when she came through the door and I kept my hands in the water for a few seconds before I turned round, grabbed a tea towel and dried them. She looked pathetic and I didn’t need to ask her what the doctor had said because it was written all over her face. I did though, because until I heard her say the words there was still hope.

  I told her straight that she was going to have to tell her dad herself. She wasn’t keen on that at first, she was all tears and ‘buts’, but I wasn’t having any of it. ‘He’s in there,’ I said, nodding towards the living room and, to be fair to her, she went off without another word.

  ‘Be kind to her Mam,’ Julie said.

  ‘Kind to her! What do you mean be kind to her?’

  ‘You know, not too hard on her. She’s just a kid.’

  ‘Who’s having her own kid.’

  ‘Yeah, and she’s not the first and she’ll certainly not be the last.’

  Julie had always been a bit headstrong, but she had never been openly defiant towards me before.

  ‘Your husband’s waiting,’ I said.

  She gave me a look that I’d never seen before but she didn’t say anything else. She went to the back door and opened it. Before she left, she told me to tell Susan to ring her if she needed her. I wondered what Julie had told Chris.

  I leaned against the sink and waited for what would happen next. After a few minutes I heard the door to the hall slam shut and the sound of footsteps on the stairs. She’d told him then. I stood where I was and waited.

  I had to wait for what seemed like a long time and I wondered what was happening in the living room. I’d expected Mick to come into the kitchen but there was no sign of him and the only sound was the television. The news had ended and I could hear the theme tune of a soap opera that Mick hated. He always turned the channel over before it came on, but not tonight. For a second I thought he might have had a heart attack and I wondered if I should go in and check on him, but I was afraid of what I might find so I waited a bit longer.

  Eventually he did come into the kitchen. He had aged ten years in as many minutes. He shook his head. ‘Is she sure?’ he asked.

  ‘Yes,’ I said. ‘She saw the doctor this afternoon.’

  ‘He might be wrong.’

  ‘He’s not wrong, Mick,’ I said. Well there was no point giving him false hope. ‘She’s pregnant all right.’

  He looked at me and I didn’t like what I saw. ‘You knew didn’t you,’ he said and although it wasn’t a physical shout it felt like one. It was certainly an accusation.

  ‘No.’

  ‘Yes you did,’ he said angrily. Mick hadn’t been angry in years, God he hadn’t been anything in years. ‘Yes you did,’ he said again, ‘there’s nothing that goes on in this house that you don’t know about. You knew and you didn’t tell me.’

  ‘What was I supposed to say,’ I said, feeling like I had to defend myself. ‘I thought that she might be but I hoped that I was wrong. She’d done a home test and that had been negative.’

  ‘So this one might be wrong.’ The sound of him grasping at straws was pitiful.

  ‘Oh stop it, Mick,’ I snapped. ‘Of course it’s not wrong.’

  We stood and looked at each other. We hadn’t argued in years and it was like neither of us knew what to do next.

  ‘How did you let this happen?’

  What did he mean how did I let this happen? I hadn’t let anything happen and I told him as much and stormed past him into the living room. By the time I’d turned the television off and turned around he was behind me. I think I said something about how I wouldn’t have been surprised if it had happened to Julie, but not Susan; I just couldn’t believe that Susan could have been that stupid.

  I nearly died when Mick suggested that the Preston lad would have to marry her. What the hell was he thinking? I knew what it was, of course; he was thinking that he’d had to accept the responsibility for what had happened all those years ago, had to deal with the consequences, and if he’d had to why should this lad not have to do the same? Because he was a Preston that was why and I wasn’t having one in the family. Mick thought he was being clever by saying something about there already being a Preston in the family and I wanted to smack him across the face. I didn’t know how he could joke at a time like this. But he wasn’t really joking, was he? He was just stating the bloody obvious.

  Mick went mad when I suggested that we send Susan to stay with his Aunt Rose. ‘She’s ninety-four,’ he said. I was very well aware of how old she was but why would that matter? She might enjoy having Susan stop for a while. Rose had always got on well with her when we used to take the girls to Scarborough on holiday. She used to feed her custard creams every chance she got.

  I watched Mick pace up and down the room. He was muttering something that I couldn’t hear and his eyes were flitting from one side to the other. He reminded me of a bear that we’d seen in a zoo that we’d taken the girls to one summer; it was in a cage that anyone could see was way too small for it and it looked like it was going out of its mind. Mick had that same look on his face.

  His pacing took him to an armchair and he turned around and dropped into it. On any other day I’d have played merry hell with him because that’s how the seats got damaged but that day wasn’t a day for worrying about furniture. Mick rested his elbows on his knees and held his head in his hands.

  I lowered myself carefully into the chair opposite him. ‘I don’t know what to do,’ I said, admitting defeat – and trust me, that wasn’t a good feeling. I might have thought Rose was a possibility but, well, I knew it wasn’t really; if for no other reason than that, at her age Rose could pass away at any minute and then Susan would have to come home and we’d have a hell of a job hiding our shame then.

  What were we going to do? What were we going to do?

  And then it came to me.

  ‘Sally,’ I said.

  ‘What?’ or at least I think that’s what Mick grunted.

  ‘Sally,’ I said. ‘She could go and stay with Sally.’ He sat up straight so I thought that I had grabbed his attention. ‘Think about it Mick. Sally’s granddaughter was eight months old before we even knew she existed.’

  ‘So?’

  ‘So, she’d be sympathetic. She’s been where we are right now.’

  He wasn’t very keen but eventually he agreed to give Sally a ring. I wasn’t any happier than he was about Susan going to stay with her but I didn’t know what else to do. She had to go somewhere.

  I watched Mick dial the number and wait for the phone to be answered at the other end. After the usual pleasantries were out of the way Mick got to the point.

  ‘We need a favour Sally,’ he said and waited for her reply. ‘Susan’s got herself into a bit of trouble and we were wondering if she could come and stay with you for a while.’ He nodded his head as he listened to what Sally was saying. They chatted for a couple of minutes and then he said, ‘Thank you Sally, I’ll bring her over at the weekend.’

  ‘She’ll take her,’ Mick said after he put the phone down. ‘I’ve said I’ll take her at the weekend.’

  I didn’t say anything, had he forgotten that I’d been sitting beside him?

  ‘Do you think we should have asked Susan first though?’
<
br />   ‘She’ll do as she’s told,’ I said. ‘We’re her parents and she’ll do as she’s told. We only want what’s best for her, she’ll see that.’ I’m not sure he believed what I was saying any more than I did. ‘I’ll go and tell her,’ I said, as I got out of the chair.

  ‘No,’ he said, ‘leave her be tonight.’

  It could keep until the morning.

  Mick didn’t say a word to me the following morning. He was up and in the bathroom before I’d even turned the alarm off and he got dressed while I made his sandwiches. He’d put his coat on and grabbed his sandwiches before he even looked at me. ‘Tell Susan that Sally is just an option,’ he said. ‘She doesn’t have to go if she doesn’t want to.’

  Did she not? Well we’d see about that.

  After he’d gone I made a cup of tea and sat at the table. I stared at the tea until it was cold. I knew that I couldn’t eat, but I’d thought that a drink might do me good. But when push came to shove I couldn’t bear the thought of putting anything in my mouth.

  There was so much to do before Sunday so I tried to put my thoughts into some sort of order. I had to regain control. There was no point buying her maternity clothes because who knew what sort of size she’d be? We’d have to give Sally some money for clothes and other things that she was going to need. That, on top of what we were going to have to give Sally for Susan’s keep, was going to wipe out all of the money that we had in the bank but it had to be done and I was already resigned to having no holiday that year even though we had been talking of maybe going on one of those package holidays that were always being advertised.

  Susan was late getting up. I looked at the clock and wondered where she was. She didn’t have an alarm because she didn’t need one. She woke up at the same time every day, but it looked like her internal clock had failed her for once in her life because she was late. I decided to let her rest; there was no rush for her to get up. There’d be no school today so there was nothing to get up for.