I’ll be home for Christmas

by Roisin Meaney

  Or maybe not alone: maybe she’d travelled with the woman Ma had mentioned. Two women, one of them pregnant, journeying across the world. The whole thing made little sense to Tilly. She would just have to wait, and hope to learn the truth eventually.

  The phone rang one evening about three weeks later. Pa went to answer it, and came back looking for Ma. He didn’t say who was on the line, but from the guarded look on his face Tilly knew immediately.

  Is it Jenny? she asked, and he nodded yes, his face still full of caution. Tilly lowered her head and pretended to read the book that was open on her lap. Her eyes went back and forth across the words, just like she’d done with the iron on his shirt, until Ma reappeared.

  She’ll meet you, she said flatly, no preamble. In Brisbane, next Saturday.

  A city-centre coffee shop was the venue. Tilly’s mother would be there at half past two. She’ll wear a blue coat, Ma said. She’ll sit near a window.

  It sounded like something out of a spy novel. Was Tilly going to get a password?

  I’ll come with you, Ma said. We can go on the bus— but Tilly said no, no, she’d be fine on her own. She couldn’t have Ma or Pa with her, it wouldn’t work. She wouldn’t be able to talk properly, with either of them sitting at her elbow.

  She looked from one wary face to the other. It’s OK, she said. I just want to meet her, that’s all. It won’t change anything. But she could see they weren’t reassured. How could they be? How could things not be changed after this?

  For the rest of the week she hardly slept. Was she doing the right thing, or should she have left well enough alone, like Diane Potter had done for all these years?

  Matilda Potter. Tilly Potter.

  She was up before daylight on Saturday, trying on and rejecting most of her wardrobe. Pa drove her to the bus station as she sat silently beside him, too keyed up to talk, already regretting her choice of red sweater and blue jeans. Too childish, too casual: she should have gone for a dress, and her high-heeled boots.

  Pick you up at seven, Pa said at the bus station. Good luck, he added – and some impulse made Tilly reach across and place a kiss on his bristly cheek, causing him to blink in astonishment. They never kissed, never hugged: they weren’t that kind of family.

  She arrived in Brisbane with forty-five minutes to spare. It took her thirty to locate the café, double-checking the directions she’d found on Google Maps with three different passers-by. Walking along the crowded streets, hemmed in by towering office blocks, she wished for the solid presence of Ma by her side, or Lien, or anyone. But she’d rejected Ma’s offer, and Lien volunteered on Saturdays at an animal refuge, and there wasn’t anyone else she could think of.

  No: she could do this. She’d chosen to do this.

  The café was two buildings up from the corner of a block, its name spelled out in cheery orange letters. Tilly scanned the three large windows from across the street and saw no woman in a blue coat behind any of them. Too early: still fifteen minutes to go.

  She found a supermarket further down the block and bought Fruit Tingles for Robbie and Jemima, a Violet Crumble for Ma and a pack of gum for Pa. At twenty-five past two, unable to wait any longer, she retraced her steps and pushed open the café door.

  She stood inside, heart thudding, legs watery. The café was about a third full, each table occupied by at least two people. There was no sign of a woman sitting alone, or anybody at all wearing a coat in a shade of blue. All the window tables were taken.

  A waitress appeared. Table for one?

  No, I’m meeting my … someone, but she’s not here yet.

  She should have waited a bit longer: she should have walked around the block a few times. As she followed the waitress across the floor a few people glanced up, and Tilly could feel herself flushing. Was it obvious? Did she look as nervous as she felt? They might think she was on a blind date. And then she thought: That’s exactly what it is.

  Here we go, the waitress said, leading her to a table that wasn’t too far from the window. It would have to do. She was the only person in that part of the room sitting alone: she’d be easy to pick out.

  Something to drink while you’re waiting?

  Coffee, she said, her drink of choice since Ma had finally let her have some, around a year ago. She loved the burned-nutty smell of it, the dark, almost earthy taste. And it would give her something to do with her hands, something to hang on to.

  Two minutes to half past. The door opened and a woman walked in wearing a pale blue coat. Tilly’s heart fluttered as she watched her glancing around, a small frown puckering her forehead – but then her face cleared and she moved, smiling, towards a beckoning threesome.

  The coffee arrived in a white mug with an orange smiley face on the side. Tilly stirred in milk and sugar, keeping her eyes fixed on the door, everything coiled tightly inside her. In a few minutes, she told herself, I will be looking at my mother. I will be talking to my mother. It didn’t seem real.

  As she waited, she caught snatches of the various conversations that were going on around her. He absolutely must do it, if that’s what he wants … Terribly anxious, not having heard a word … I’d understand if she was allergic, but there was never any evidence … But they’re so alike – it’s uncanny! The words skimmed over her, as meaningless as if they’d been uttered in some unknown language, foreign sounds from different lives that were briefly intersecting hers.

  She sipped the coffee, which was considerably stronger than Ma’s. She added a second sachet of sugar, sipped again. She tried without success to keep her eyes from drifting back to the clock on the wall every half-minute. Twenty to three.

  A couple came in; a trio left. The waitress rushed between tables with menus and plates and glasses. A piece of cutlery clattered to the floor behind Tilly, making her jump. Someone sneezed. Someone laughed. The air was heavy with the smell of food. Fried onions, melted cheese, roasted meat.

  A quarter to three. Where was she? Why wasn’t she here, sitting by the window in her blue coat, like she’d promised? Wasn’t she coming? Had it all been a cruel joke?

  An awful thought struck Tilly: was this the right café? The idea that she might be sitting in the wrong one sent a bolt of panic through her. With trembling hands she rummaged through her bag, searching for the piece of paper on which she’d written—

  Matilda?

  She looked up.

  Grey bag.

  Blue coat.

  Pearl earrings.

  Pale face.

  Dark eyes.

  Gold hair.

  Tiny.

  Are you Matilda? the woman repeated, in an accent that dipped and leaped, like water over stones, in a voice deeper in tone than the slight frame would suggest. One of her hands clutched the shoulder strap of the grey bag.

  Tilly got abruptly to her feet, almost knocking over her chair. She towered above the woman, nearly a foot taller. They stood regarding one another, the table between them.

  Gosh, the woman said softly, looking up into Tilly’s face. Making no movement at all towards her. Tall, she murmured, half to herself, sliding into the chair across from Tilly’s. Well, she said, dipping a shoulder to lower her bag to the floor, folding hands that were small as a child’s one on top of the other on the table. Her nails were short stubs, bitten away to nothing. She wore no rings. Do sit, she said, in her deep voice.

  Tilly resumed her seat, feeling deflated. What had she expected? That they were going to burst into tears and fall into one another’s arms, like in a bad soap opera? No, not that, of course not that – but maybe a little more than this, maybe a little less casual than this. Maybe a handshake, at least.

  She could see little resemblance to herself in the woman’s face. They both had pale complexions, but that, as far as she could see, was their only common feature. A stranger would surely never take them for parent and child.

  Well, her mother repeated, her gaze still roaming around Tilly’s face. You have his eyes. I might have known y
ou’d get those.

  Before Tilly could respond the waitress approached. Green tea, Tilly’s mother told her, in the same soft deep lilting voice, and a glass of iced water with a slice of lime. She didn’t ask Tilly if she wanted to order anything else, although she must have noticed the coffee mug, must have seen that it was almost empty. If you please, she added, half getting up to shuck off the blue coat and hand it to the waitress, you might find a hanger for that.

  Underneath she wore a simple grey shift dress in some stretchy material, its sleeves ending at her elbows. The forearms that emerged were as white as her face, the wrists tiny. Her breasts were little pointed mounds that barely disturbed the fabric of the dress.

  So, she said, tilting her head like a bird. Here we are. Her back straight as the chair, her gold hair gathered into some kind of tight arrangement on the back of her head. I wondered, she said, if you would come along.

  She looked younger than Ma, or maybe it was the girlish figure that deceived. It all felt unreal. Tilly wondered if she was asleep, if she was about to wake up at any minute and see her yellow bedroom walls, the chair by the bed with her clothes slung across it, the topple of her schoolbooks on the desk in the corner. Just a dream, she’d think, watching a shaft of sunlight falling onto the wooden floor. Never happened.

  I suppose, her mother continued, in the same pensive tone, you want to know why I didn’t keep you.

  Was there something detached about her, as if she was speaking at a remove from Tilly? It felt like she was physically there, but her mind seemed to be someplace else entirely. There was no emotion that Tilly could discern behind her words: she might have been reciting lines from a play.

  Tilly found her voice. Yes, she said, the word coming out louder and sharper than she’d intended.

  Yes, her mother echoed, nodding slowly several times, her gaze sliding down to study the pale wood of the table top. Matilda—

  It’s Tilly. Out before she knew it was on the way, and sharp like before.

  Her mother looked up. Tilly, she repeated. Tentatively, trying it out.

  Their eyes met and held. Neither of them smiled. Tilly, her mother said again. More slow nodding.

  The waitress approached. They watched her transferring the items on her tray – pot, cup and saucer, glass, napkin, spoon – to the table. Refill? she asked, looking at Tilly’s mug. Anything else I can get for you? Tilly shook her head. She hadn’t eaten since breakfast at eight: the strong coffee had left her feeling queasy.

  When they were alone again her mother remained silent for several seconds. She lifted the water, took a tiny sip, dabbed her pale lips.

  I was very young when I married your father, she said eventually. Her voice was lower now, so Tilly had to slant a little towards her to hear. I was twenty, just a girl. I knew nothing, I was so innocent.

  You were married to my father, Tilly said. Trying it out like her mother had tried out her name, feeling her way around it. She was the child of a married couple, not the product of an illicit affair, or a one-night stand, or a rape. Her father not unknown, after all. You were married, she said again.

  Her mother didn’t react. It was as if Tilly hadn’t spoken. I was very much in love with him, she said, in the same faraway voice, one hand coming to rest, as lightly as a butterfly, on the lid of the teapot. He was older, and extremely talented, and very successful. I was … completely in awe of him.

  She lifted the lid, allowing pale wisps of steam to trail upwards. She stirred the tea, replaced the lid, poured the yellow-green liquid. A faint scent of something – new-mown grass? – drifted across to Tilly.

  Her mother sighed, shifting her gaze to look beyond Tilly’s shoulder. It wasn’t a happy marriage, she said, not at all. He was … a terribly difficult man, so creative, so … obsessed with his work. Her voice rising in tone, the words becoming more deliberate, less dreamy. Her pale face tightening. His work came first, she said. It always came first. It came before everything—

  She broke off and raised the teacup to her lips – did her hand tremble? Maybe a little. She reached for her napkin again – but instead of raising it to her lips she began folding and refolding it, drawing deep, slow breaths as she did so. Making a conscious effort, it looked like, to compose herself.

  I was completely stifled by him, she said eventually, somewhat calmer now. I was denied the chance to let my own talent blossom. And I had talent, oh yes. She smiled sadly, pressing the napkin between her hands. I could have gone far, if I’d had the chance …

  It had begun to feel like she was putting on a performance, with Tilly as the audience of one. She was telling a story, and it sounded well-rehearsed. Tilly wanted to ask what they did, or had done; she wanted to know what jobs they’d had, her creative father and her talented mother, but she remained silent, stifling her question, sensing it wouldn’t be welcome. Not now, not yet.

  In the end, her mother went on, I left him. I had to – it had become impossible to go on. My health was suffering, I wasn’t strong … I had no choice. She pressed the square of folded napkin to her cheeks in turn, just below her eyes. As if she was dabbing away tears, but she wasn’t crying. For all that, she said, her voice a near-whisper now, it was hard to leave him. It was the hardest thing I had ever done …

  Harder than giving up your child? The question was on the tip of Tilly’s tongue but again she held back, her nerve deserting her.

  Her mother’s words drifted off, her gaze directed towards the thin fingers that were pleating the napkin, and Tilly had the impression that her mind had left the coffee shop and gone elsewhere.

  She wondered suddenly if her mother was on medication. Anti-depressants maybe, something that blunted sadness, but wiped out other emotions in the process. It might explain the air of detachment, the lack of emotion at meeting the daughter she’d given away sixteen years earlier.

  After a while her mother seemed to collect herself. I met … someone, she said then, her voice soft and calmer. I met Trudi through my work. She helped me, she became a wonderful friend – and Tilly remembered Ma saying she’d shared the apartment with a woman.

  She helped me to leave him, her mother continued. She brought me here. She’s from here, you see, she was coming home, she was leaving Ireland, and she took me with her.

  She lifted her glass, sipped water, dabbed her mouth. I didn’t know, she said. When we left Ireland, I didn’t know you were on the way. She moistened her lips with her tongue. It was a difficult time, she said. My parents had recently died within a few months of one another, and I was so … confused, so terribly uncertain … But for Trudi, I don’t think I would have survived … and Jenny, your – here she faltered – aunt, is she?

  Austin is my uncle, Tilly said.

  Her mother nodded. Yes, yes, Jenny was very good to me too, so kind …

  Did you tell him? Tilly asked then, the question refusing to stay in her head. Did you tell my father about me?

  A beat passed – and then her mother shook her head slowly, her face clouding. No, she said, voice barely audible. I didn’t tell him. He … filed for a legal separation, right after I left him. And I wasn’t well, I was so sick … and so lonely …

  She bit her lip, reached for her cup, her hands visibly trembling now as she lifted it to sip. You must understand, she said, clattering it back onto its saucer, it was all so … stressful. I can’t … She raised a hand, fluttered the fingers. I couldn’t keep you, she said. I wasn’t strong enough to look after a baby.

  Couldn’t Trudi have helped? Or Jenny?

  Her mother made the same helpless gesture. I couldn’t ask them – I couldn’t expect them to. You were my responsibility.

  And yet you abandoned me. Again left unsaid. Silence fell between them. Tilly lifted her mug and drank the last of her coffee, stone cold by now. She wished for water, but she didn’t look around for the waitress.

  Is he still alive? My father.

  A nod. He is, yes.

  In Ireland?

&nbs
p; Another nod. Look, her mother said then, Matilda—

  Tilly.

  Tilly, I know this will hurt – but he wouldn’t want to know. About you, I mean. He’s not … he should never have married – and he was never cut out for children. There’s no room in his life for them.

  Every word landed like a thump. Tilly felt a surge of anger for the woman sitting across the table. How could she have just decided not to tell him? What had made her so sure of his reaction? He might have changed – he might have been thrilled to discover he had a child. How could she have written him out of Tilly’s life by refusing to name him on the birth cert?

  Maybe it had made her feel better, when she’d given up her daughter, to convince herself that he’d have done exactly the same. Maybe it had lessened her guilt to tell herself that neither parent wanted a child. Who knew why she’d done what she had? Certainly not Tilly, who knew nothing at all.

  Her mother spoke again, no doubt reading Tilly’s feelings on her face. Look, I know how it sounds, how it must sound to you, but I did what I thought was best for you, I did, really.

  Everyone doing what they thought was best for Tilly, which basically meant not telling the truth. Ma and Pa saying nothing about the adoption until they’d had to, her birth mother keeping her father in the dark about his daughter. How could any of them think it was best to keep such secrets?

  Trudi felt I should give you up, her mother said. She knew I wasn’t strong enough to raise you.

  Trudi. What was her role in all of this? Was she simply a person who’d befriended a woman at the end of her tether, someone who’d provided an escape route – or had their relationship been more than that? Was it still more?

  And what did it matter really? What did any of it matter?

  Tilly looked across the table and realised that she felt nothing at all for the person who sat opposite her. No love, no bonding, no pity, no hate. They might have been two strangers who’d simply ended up sharing a table because no other was available. To all intents and purposes, they were strangers, nothing in common except a few genes. They probably wouldn’t even meet again.