by Amanda James
I close my eyes against the sadness in his, but all I can see is Megan.
I bite my lip as Megan grabs my hair and yanks it back, hard. ‘Oi, I’m talking to you!’
I think about running, but Megan’s hand is wound tight in my hair; I’m forced to look up into dark eyes framed by over-mascaraed lashes and cold with anger. Megan’s nostrils flare, her mouth twists down at one side. She tugs my hair again and then the sting of a slap on my cheek competes with the ache in the back of my neck. To my shame, I feel my eyes fill. Megan’s face and the gathered crowd merge together, become a dark smudge at the margins of my sight.
There is nothing for it. I open my mouth and into the silence I hear my voice, small and tremulous, say, ‘Yes. I’m adopted.’
I force my eyes open and a surge of sadness engulfs me. I want to reach out and take Dad’s hand. But I know that if I did, I would cry and be unable to stop. I take a swallow of lukewarm tea and say, ‘I suppose I didn’t want to believe that I was adopted. You know that day when you told me about it all when I was seven? It was as if I was in a bad dream, but the next day I woke up and found the dream was still real.’
‘It wasn’t easy for us either. Sorry we didn’t do a better job,’ Dad says with a wistful smile.
I can’t bear to see the pain in his eyes – pain that I’m causing. ‘No. Please don’t think that. You didn’t do a bad job. You told me you could never love me more and that I was special because you had chosen me, wanted me so much. No. It was all me.’ I rub my eyes and think about my seven-year-old self. Then I just let the words come.
‘I felt bereft, as if someone had taken away my parents overnight, even though you were still there. And, as time went on, I wondered why I had been rejected by my birth mother. I blamed myself for her rejecting me, and then blamed myself again for feeling so resentful that you weren’t my natural parents. I always felt different from everyone else somehow. Nobody at my school had been adopted as far as I knew, and the whole thing got so screwed up in my head until I didn’t have much faith in who I was. I thought there must be something wrong with me. That bitch Megan really hurt me, and I don’t mean just physically. She told me I was ugly and that there must be something really wrong with me for a mother not to have wanted her baby.’
Dad puts his hand on mine and mutters a curse under his breath. I blink away tears and hear … Shrill laughter blending with the bell sounding for the end of lunch break. I continue to look down until the crowd disperses, their footsteps echoing away across the black expanse of tarmac.
Hatred for Megan, Gill, but mostly for myself swells and fills the empty centre of my chest. Megan is an evil bitch, Gill is my only real friend and she’d betrayed my confidence, but it was true what Megan said. I have thought the same things about myself every day since I’d been told I was adopted. There must be something really wrong for a mother not to have wanted her baby.
Perhaps it’s true that I’m ugly. Perhaps it’s something else. Whatever it is, it’s in me, about me … because of me.
I look up and around the empty playground. The breeze picks up dust and sweet wrappers, drops them at my feet and then whisks them away again. A tall figure steps out from the shade of a classroom door, but before the teacher can spot me, instinct sweeps me out of the school gate.
Aching lungs slow my pace and, minutes from home, I lean my head against a bus stop to catch my breath. Panic flutters as realisation dawns that I’ve truanted, would be found out and would be confronted with the disappointed faces and concerned questions of my parents. We would all be called into school – perhaps even by the head teacher – and I would be punished.
Dried bits of metallic paint have become indented in my forehead from the bus stop. I pick them off and walk on. School is not an option this afternoon. An image of Megan’s hateful eyes won’t leave and my cheek throbs. I swallow tears and force Boris back into my mind. Only a little while now before I can hold him against my face, inhale that woody smell of straw and carrots on his fur and tell him everything. He will understand, even if nobody else does …
There’s no stopping my tears now and I curse myself for getting in a state. This won’t help the situation. I draw deep breaths in … out … in, to try and calm myself.
‘But why didn’t you talk to us?’ Dad’s eyes are moist too and he reaches for my other hand. ‘We always asked if we could help, said we would help you contact your birth mother when you turned eighteen if you wanted, told you the little information we had about her being a young girl and living in Cornwall. You just said you didn’t want to know.’
‘I know. I was just too confused and upset about it all to tell you how I felt. In fact, I didn’t know how I felt. I do now, though. Took me long enough, eh?’
Dad nods and squeezes my hand. ‘So how do you feel?’
‘I feel more grateful to you than you could ever know for looking after me and I love you so much, Mum too.’ I blow my nose on a bit of kitchen roll and look away. If I look at Dad I will crumble again. ‘But I need to meet this woman who gave birth to me. See if I have anything in common with her, find out more about my birth father if I can. I suppose it’s like you doing your jigsaws. You need all the bits before you can have the satisfaction of seeing the whole picture.’
‘But of course. That’s only natural, love.’ Dad gets up and put his arms around me. ‘As I said, I always knew it would happen. It was you who didn’t.’
I stand and hug him tight, my face in his shoulder, breathing the comforting smell of the soap he’d used since forever. ‘You’re not mad with me?’
‘Course not, Lu, you’re my daughter. I love you and want whatever you want,’ he says thickly.
We stay like this in silence until Adelaide walks in a few minutes later with another jigsaw under her arm. She looks at our tear-stained faces, raises her eyebrows and heaves a sigh. ‘I can see that a nice cup of tea is called for here.’
Dad and I give each other a look and bite back laughter. Thank God for Adelaide.
6
The old brown leather suitcase that we’d had since I was a child sits next to two holdalls, a pair of walking boots and an iron – still boxed – in the boot of my car. I always pack too much when I’m going anywhere, but this lot for just one week in Cornwall is a little over the top, even by my standards. The iron is especially excessive as I never use one, but I remembered Mum saying, ‘Be prepared for every eventuality,’ so I’d put it in at the last minute.
Sunday morning in our street looks the same as it does on every other day except that privet hedges look less green, the windows hide behind curtains, flowers in gardens seem a little more faded and the garden gnomes look hung-over. It’s as though the week had been so hard to deal with that the collective energy of houses, humans, plants and gnomes alike have been reduced to emergency levels only. Today, the first of August and the third of a heatwave, adds an extra layer of apathy and inertia, unbroken even by the tolling of St Bartholomew’s bell calling all parishioners, willing or reluctant, to morning service.
Adelaide closes our front door behind her and hurries down the path towards me. ‘Right, I’m off to church and I’ve just popped the roast in, so it will be well on the way when I get back.’ She cocks her head birdlike to one side and looks me up and down. ‘Now, don’t worry about anything while you’re away. I’ll look after your dad. This is your time, go for it, as you young ones say.’ Her lips twitch at the corners and then lift for at least two seconds.
There’s an unexpected lump of emotion growing in my throat, and before I can talk myself out of it I step forward and put my arms around her. She feels solid and dependable and I wonder what I’d do without her. Adelaide says something that sounds like awumah and pats my back a little too hard.
‘I can’t begin to thank you for everything you’ve done lately, Adelaide,’ I say, looking away from her moist eyes in case mine try to copy them.
Adelaide flaps her hand and looks into the boot of my car. ‘Nons
ense, I did what any good neighbor worth her salt would have done.’ She eyes the iron and frowns.
‘We both know that’s not true,’ I say, closing the boot and leaning my hip against it. ‘You made me realise it was time to cast away stones and that is the most important thing ever.’
Her mouth twitches again and she nods. ‘Good. I’m glad. And now I’d better pop off or I’ll be late. Safe journey.’ She touches my cheek lightly and then I watch her small figure hurry away down the street. As she passes each house, it seems to me that the privet hedges and flowers regain their colour, the windows throw back their curtains and the garden gnomes stand to attention and salute her. Okay, perhaps the last bit is taking things too far.
Behind the wheel of my car I turn the key in the ignition and glance up at the bedroom windows to see if Dad has broken his promise. No. There’s no sign of a face or even a shadow behind the curtains. We had said goodbye inside and I told him not to wave from the window. Now he hasn’t I wish I had allowed it; the whole point in him keeping away was so that I wouldn’t be sad. But I’m sad anyway.
I tell myself off – it’s only for a week. Myself isn’t having that though, and answers that it isn’t about the timescale, but about the enormity of what I’m actually doing. My life will be changed no matter what the outcome. I put the postcode for Mellyn Rowe’s house into the satnav and it confirms what I already know. Five hours and fifty minutes in present traffic. I wonder how long it would take in past or future traffic. If only I had a time machine. I tell myself off again for procrastinating with stupid thoughts. This time, myself doesn’t answer back.
Two hours down the M1 the air-conditioning gives up and resorts to huffing lukewarm air at me as if in reproach; the heatwave must have been too much for the ancient system. I have to open the window and then spend the next five minutes wrestling one handed with the wind, which insists on whipping my hair across my eyes. I scrabble in my bag for a clip or hair band, then I remember they’re in the suitcase. A sign at the side of the road says Services in three miles and I decide enough is very much enough.
Sucking an ice cube, I sit at a corner table and watch a tide of people flow in and out of the doors. Some bob towards the bookstore, others to the fast food outlets, and others rush past on a strong current, red faced and determined, towards the sign for the toilets. I love the transience of these places. People passing through, all going to different destinations, all with their own stories to tell. I guess there won’t be many that are off to meet their birth mother today.
On the table I smooth out the letter I had received in response to my own. All the adoption agencies, and indeed the genealogist, Maureen, had advised a letter as first point of contact. I read it again now and a few butterflies shiver their wings in my stomach. In three hours or so I will be coming face to face with her.
Dear Lu,
I was overjoyed to get your letter! When your eighteenth birthday had passed, and after a few years I’d still not heard from you, I thought you had decided not to find me. Then Maureen wrote to me and said you were looking for me but then you changed your mind. I don’t blame you of course; it can’t have been easy for you. Thank you so much for your phone number, but I really think it would be great to meet face to face as you suggest. I’m sure I would become too emotional on the phone and not be able get my words out properly.
I quite understand that you want to stay at the hotel in town, as we don’t really know each other, but the door to Seal Cottage is always open.
I can’t wait to meet you. I have so much to ask you, and I’m sure you feel the same! Let me know when you are coming, and I will put the bunting out!
Here’s my email, it might be quicker than snail mail – [email protected]
Love,
M x
In the two weeks since I’d received it, I’d read it so many times that the paper had grown soft from all the folding and unfolding. Now when I place it on the table it opens all by itself. I can hardly believe it’s real. Everything has happened so quickly. I trace the lines with my fingertips and think about how cheerful she sounded.
Then I trace the word ‘love’ and wonder if she could mean it. I wasn’t sure how I felt at all. I certainly didn’t feel love, but perhaps she did. I had seen accounts on TV and read in books where the birth mother had kept a much treasured and dog-eared photo and had said that she had never stopped thinking about or stopped loving the child she’d put up for adoption.
I watch programmes about reuniting loved ones, such as Long Lost Families, like others watch favourite soap operas; I just can’t get enough of them. Since my decision to find Mellyn, my appetite has become even more voracious. I’d re-watch some and play in my head the meeting that I’d have when I found my own birth mother. My imagination often changes things around, but the meeting would always be emotional and always have a happy ending. Of course, I have to prepare myself for the opposite. The last few months have taught me that life isn’t a fairy tale.
They say that blood is thicker than water, don’t they? But what if blood isn’t enough? Even though she carried me for nine months and gave birth to me, it doesn’t mean that I’m immediately going to like her, does it? She might be so different to me that I could never warm to her. She might be a racist, right-wing, card-carrying Nazi. Then what? People say it doesn’t matter what your parents are like, they are still your parents, and deep down you love them. But what if I don’t? Okay, I know I’m not expected to feel love for her yet, but what if I never do? What if I can’t stand the sight of her and want to leave after five minutes?
I finish my drink and notice my hands shaking as I set the glass back down. This what-if scenario isn’t helping, and I need to clear my head before I meet her. Going in with a head full of what ifs and preconceptions will just fuck everything up. Sometimes if you expect the worst, then that’s what happens. That wouldn’t be fair on her or me, would it?
This is my cue to get up, go to the loo and get on with the journey. My resolve is just a bit battered, that’s all. It’s to be expected. My spirits rise as I walk into the Ladies’ – I can do this. Then doubt wallops me over the head. Perhaps I should just turn the car round and go home. Maybe I was right the first time when I changed my mind about finding her. Why not just leave the past alone? What’s the good of poking it, putting it under a microscope? It all happened and that was that – I can’t change it.
Torn between going home and the unknown I wash my hands and try to avoid my eyes in the mirror. I know they’ll look sheepish, guilty. But they don’t have to, do they? Not if I galvanise myself, stop prevaricating and finish what I started. I snap my head up from the washbasin and look at the mirror. There’s no sign of sheepishness, or guilt – just steely determination. That’s better.
The Satnav says I will be at my destination in forty minutes. I look at the clock – 3.02. The air-conditioning is still misbehaving, but I have an unexpected ally: a cool breeze coming off the sea, glimpses of which I had seen tantalisingly to my right as I sped down the A30.
An odd thought strikes me. Perhaps I have always loved the sea because I had been born in Cornwall. Mellyn lived in St Austell originally, not St Ives, according to my birth certificate, but that’s on the sea too. Could someone always yearn for the sea because they had been born next to it? Probably not, but I will believe it to be true. I’m looking forward to spending more time just walking on the beach and exploring the town. As a teenager I’d visited St Ives and remember little winding streets, the lovely gift shops, cafés and, of course, the beautiful harbour and beaches.
At the top of what must be one of the highest hills in Cornwall, I draw my car onto a scrap of a drive and switch off the engine. I rest my hands on my thighs and feel their heat seep through my summer dress; it’s a relief to stretch my fingers after so many hours gripping the wheel. A few deep-breathing exercises help me focus and calm my heart and then I look at Seal Cottage through the windscreen. It looks like the kind of place my imagi
nation would draw if I asked it to sketch the perfect cottage by the sea.
Heavy ancient stone walls support a tiled roof upon which white-framed dormer windows look out over the harbour and towards the main beach, Porthminster, if I’d remembered the signs correctly. Two huge palms stand at either side of a shiny red door. I half expect a bewhiskered fisherman in a striped jumper carrying a lobster pot to come out of it. A stone seal sits to one side of the door and a sign hanging from a chain around its neck reads Welcome to Seal Cottage.
After a few moments fingers of doubt stretch through me and then a twist in my stomach prods me into action. The longer I sit here, the more I’ll feel nervous, and the more I feel nervous, the more I’ll sit, and so it would go on. I step out of the car and my senses come alive. Salt air sharpens a honeysuckle breeze, sunlight dances on waves; at the door, the touch of the stone seal’s head feels rough and warm under my fingers and tumbling from an open bedroom window comes the voice of a woman singing ‘Summertime’.
The singing stops as I bunch my fist to knock, but the door opens before I can. The world has become suddenly silent, holding its breath as Mellyn and I look at each other. We are almost the same height, she perhaps marginally taller. She has long straight hair like mine, but chestnut to my black; we have the same straight nose and similar shaped mouths, though her lips are thinner, and her eyes a light blue to my green. Nevertheless, though sixteen years separate us, it is obvious that we’re related. For me, a completely new experience. My heart’s thumping in my chest, my legs feel weak. I am now looking at someone who is part of me, has the same blood, knows my origins.
The world stops holding its breath and Mellyn holds out her arms, her eyes moist, her lips pressed together as if trying to prevent a cry escaping. I hesitate for a second as I picture her holding a baby in those same arms before she gave it away, and then I step into her embrace.
