‘Hey,’ Mitch reprimanded, giving her a slight push as he laid a place setting in front of her. ‘That’s rude. You don’t just invite yourself.’
But Erin was unperturbed. ‘Oh, you wouldn’t want to stay with me. My apartment’s way too small. But I can recommend some really cool places near the beach. Much more fun.’ She shifted her enormous handbag to the floor, making room for Mitch to set out knives and forks.
‘Is that where you live?’ Lauren asked. ‘Near the beach?’
‘No. I’m right in the city. You guys wouldn’t like that so much.’
‘Could we do surfing?’
‘I guess so. Some of the hotels do water sports.’ She turned to Tessa. ‘I can probably work you a nice discount on a package.’
Tessa could tell that Erin meant her offer hospitably enough, but hurt and deflated, couldn’t help endorsing Mitch’s expression of faint contempt. Not sharing their disappointment, Lauren turned to Tessa: ‘Oh, Mum, can we?’
‘We’ll see.’ Tessa smiled stiffly. ‘Some day, perhaps.’ And she watched how easily Erin let this subject drop too.
NINE
Pamela stood in the driveway and waved farewell. Hugo had insisted on driving Erin to Heathrow, and Erin had told Pamela gently not to accompany them, that it was easier for her to go into work mode and not have to say goodbye amid the bustle of the airport. Watching Hugo’s car disappear along the lane, Pamela wondered what they would talk about on the journey.
She went back indoors, remembering her last parting with her sister all those years ago. Standing for a moment in the quiet hallway, she allowed herself a brief glimpse back into the torment she had felt, sitting in that rented flat in Burton upon Trent, Tessa almost weightless in her arms, feeding her a bottle of warmed formula even though the air still seemed to bear traces of the heady smell of her teenage sister’s milky breasts. She had bent down to kiss the downy little head and promised herself that every kiss she ever bestowed would be on behalf of Erin, never herself. What she had not known then, but knew now, was how tainted and unworthy she would feel every time the growing child kissed her.
Yet despite the brevity of Erin’s whirlwind stay, and the sadness of seeing her leave again, in many ways Pamela felt lighter than she had in years. The past three nights, she and Erin had sat up long after Hugo had gone to bed, catching up on everything in each other’s lives that could not be said on the phone, and cramming in decades of unspoken words. It was as if they were back in the cramped bedroom they had once shared in the B&B. Reaching out to hold her sister’s hand, Pamela was well aware that there were still things left unsaid, unasked, and she hoped that she had not done wrong by leaving them unresolved, but she had not wanted to spoil the joy of having Erin back beside her.
She had been nine when Erin was born, twelve when their father died, and, as their mother fought to establish a business that would ensure their financial survival, it had been she who had volunteered to take care of her little sister. She would delay her homework until Erin had been put to bed so she could play with her, had taken her onto the beach each summer with a bucket and spade, held her hand when she started primary school, and dried her tears when the other girls wouldn’t let her join in their skipping games. Erin was eleven when Pamela married Hugo, and Pamela had occasionally persuaded their mother to allow Erin to spend weekends with them; the girl had much preferred a night on their couch to the chores, errands and constant press of strangers at home in the B&B.
Barely five years on, it had been Hugo who first guessed that Erin was pregnant. Pamela was devastated that she’d failed to notice how withdrawn the teenager had become, to question her preference for loose smocks. And she would never forget Erin’s terror when left with no choice but to confess to Averil, or hearing through the closed door Averil’s fury and disgust as the incoherent explanations and excuses poured out. Even after Erin had joined them in Burton upon Trent, Averil had made excuses not to visit until the baby was a couple of weeks old, and had barely looked at her grandchild until she’d received word from Brenda that Erin had arrived in Sydney.
Shivering at the unbearable recollection of her own cowardice at not standing up for Erin, at remaining silent as Averil imperiously arranged their futures, Pamela went to fetch the Hoover. She started in the spare room where Erin had slept, throwing open the windows and stripping the bed. She heaped the linen in the hallway, adding Erin’s towels from the bathroom, ready for the washing machine. Pulling on yellow household gloves, she squirted cleaning cream around the bath, ran the taps and began to wipe around the tub, trying to efface the memory of Averil’s refusal to let Erin speak, and the shame of her own silence in the face of Erin’s distress.
The doorbell chimed as she started on the basin. Still in her yellow gloves, she went reluctantly to see who it was.
‘Hi, Mum,’ said Tessa. ‘Thought I’d come and see how you are.’
‘Busy,’ answered Pamela, still in thrall to her memories. She kissed Tessa’s cheek and headed back upstairs, leaving Tessa to follow. Tessa came to stand in the bathroom doorway, watching as she wiped down the basin.
‘Are you glad she’s gone?’ Tessa asked, as Pamela scrubbed at a stubborn bit of limescale.
Pamela lowered her head. ‘No.’ She turned on the tap to rinse the bowl.
‘Can you stop doing that? Come and talk to me?’
Stricken with competing emotions, Pamela didn’t know what to say or do.
‘What did she want?’ asked Tessa. ‘She didn’t seem that bothered last night about saying goodbye to me or the kids. I don’t understand why she finally came now, after all this time.’
Pamela put down the sponge, stripped off her gloves and laid them over the edge of the basin, then sat on the side of the bath. ‘Cousin Brenda made her promise that she would. Apparently she’d tried to get Erin to come before, but …’
‘But what?’
Pamela leaned sideways to straighten the bottles of shampoo and conditioner beside the bath taps.
‘Mum, talk to me, please!’
‘Erin didn’t want to reopen old wounds.’
‘Didn’t she want to see me?’
‘She didn’t want to interfere.’
‘But this Brenda thought she should?’
‘Cousin Brenda was dying.’
‘I still don’t understand.’
‘Apparently Brenda knew how much Erin regretted not making her peace with Averil before she died.’ Pamela thought back to their late-night conversation. ‘Erin told me that Brenda had asked her how she thought you’d feel if you discovered that your real mother had died and never come to see you, never given you the chance to meet her.’
‘So her solution was to turn up on my doorstep but not tell me who she was? That doesn’t make sense!’
‘You’re our child. Well, hardly a child. But Erin didn’t want to destroy that. That’s why she turned up here the next day, to explain what she’d done.’
Tessa nodded. ‘She wasn’t expecting to find me here as well.’
‘No,’ agreed Pamela. ‘She wanted me to know she’d been so that if you ever asked about her, you’d know your mother had come to see you.’ The words felt strange in her mouth: no matter how riven with guilt she’d been whenever she’d used the word mother to refer to herself, it was alien to say the truth out loud.
‘But why would I ask about her?’ pressed Tessa, reminding Pamela of what she had been like as an argumentative teenager. ‘Why would anyone enquire into a secret they never even knew existed?’
The previous night Erin had revealed that although Averil had written her a weekly letter full of local news, she had never once referred to the birth or adoption. And when, in the early years, Erin had begged her to come out to Sydney to see her, Averil had simply ignored her request. Pamela knew, without Erin having to say it, that she had been no more forthcoming herself. ‘It’s my fault,’ she told Tessa now. ‘I should have ignored my mother and taken you out to Australia years ago, when you were smal
l. I should have told the truth.’
‘Why didn’t you?’
‘I knew what Averil would say. I wasn’t able to defy her.’
‘And now?’ persisted Tessa.
‘We all tried to do what was best,’ said Pamela. ‘I’m not saying we got it right, but we tried. Erin was little more than a child herself, and Averil had so much on her shoulders after our father died. We tried to arrange things as best we could.’
‘Why didn’t Erin stay longer? Did she really have to get home for her dogs?’
Pamela’s heart bled for the pain in her daughter’s voice. She had begged Erin to stay on, to remain as long as she liked; but Erin had said that it was all too much, that she’d made a new life for herself, and returning to Felixham had turned her into a child again, expecting Averil to come in at any moment and disapprove of her. Pamela had understood perfectly. ‘Maybe we’ll all go out soon to visit her,’ she suggested.
‘Erin didn’t come back because she wanted to see me, did she? Not really. She only came because of a deathbed promise. And to see you,’ Tessa added.
Pamela thought for a long while, hearing the echoes of Erin’s confession and tearful pleas for understanding all those years ago, of Averil’s harsh rejection of Erin’s story, of her own horrified but frozen silence. When she glanced up she found Tessa watching her, a deep frown on her face. ‘I don’t think that’s true,’ said Pamela carefully. ‘But it was complicated. What happened was a catastrophe for her. And if anyone got it wrong, it was me.’
‘You mean you didn’t want me either.’
Pamela felt her lips close tight in the familiar rictus of secrecy. She hated it, resented it, yet felt helpless to overcome it.
‘You didn’t, did you?’ asked Tessa, upset.
‘That’s not true!’ The words burst out and Pamela reached for Tessa’s hand, but Tessa whipped it away childishly behind her back. Pamela strove to explain: ‘Every time I held you in my arms, every time you hugged me or snuggled up to me, it was like a knife in my heart because of Erin.’
‘You used to push me away.’
Pamela stood up. ‘You were hers. It wasn’t fair for me to have everything while she had nothing.’
‘But look at her!’ cried Tessa angrily. ‘She’s fine. She’s perfectly all right. She never wanted me anyway! Why didn’t you all just get rid of me, abandon me in a phone box or on the church steps?’
Pamela took her yellow gloves from the basin and watched her hands shake as she smoothed them flat. ‘Let’s have a coffee,’ she said, herding Tessa out of the bathroom. ‘Go and sit in the lounge while I make it. I won’t be long.’
To her relief, Tessa did as she was told. Pamela slipped into the kitchen, closing the door softly. She opened the fridge and poured a little orange juice into a glass, aware that the tremor in her hand was more pronounced. Reaching into a cupboard she drew out the bottle of gin she kept hidden behind the bags of flour and poured a handsome measure into the juice.
By the time the kettle had boiled, the alcohol had done its job and she felt calm and empty. She made the coffee, put everything on a tray and took it through to where Tessa waited in the lounge.
‘No family is perfect,’ she said with a glassy smile as she handed her daughter a steaming mug. ‘Every parent makes mistakes, but we try to do our best.’
TEN
Later in the week, Tessa returned from the farm shop laden with the staples of the organic cooked breakfasts she advertised on her website. Upset by the owner’s cheerful assumption that she’d surely be familiar with every detail of the contract to supply Sam’s brasserie, she was irritated to find Hugo in her basement kitchen helpfully checking a loose washer at the sink. His retirement had more or less coincided with Sam’s departure to London, when Hugo had possessed himself of a set of keys ‘just in case’, then striven to give Tessa the impression that, with time on his hands, it was a kindness to let him potter about and find odd jobs. Even though she knew he had plenty of more attractive occupations to keep him busy she played along, pretending to an exasperation she sometimes actually felt – as she did now.
‘Hi, Dad,’ she greeted him. The look of delight on his face puzzled her for a moment, until she realised it was in response to the word ‘Dad’.
He came to kiss her cheek, grasping her shoulders. ‘How are you?’ he asked.
‘Fine.’ She kept hold of the carrier bags, rebuffing his attempt to take them from her.
‘We thought we’d let you alone, allow a bit of time for things to sink in. But maybe now you’d like to talk?’
‘Not really.’
‘Especially when … Mitch told me about you and Sam,’ Hugo explained gently.
‘Right.’ She opened the door of the big fridge ready to put away the meat, relieved that she didn’t have to find the words herself.
‘I’m so sorry, Tessie. It can’t be easy.’
‘No.’ Tessa began filling the fridge, moving things around to make room to put the fresh produce at the back.
‘If you want advice over the legal stuff, I know a couple of good people. Divorce lawyers,’ he added unnecessarily. ‘I’m sure you’ll want to be fair, but equally you don’t want to-’
‘Leave it, Dad, please!’ Flushed with anger and distress, she buried her face in the carrier bags.
‘Ok. Sorry. But you’re not on your own, Tessie. We’ll get past this together, I promise.’
‘Same old cosy pretence, you mean?’
‘No. Let’s start afresh, shall we?’
Tessa nodded, not able to meet his eyes. Hugo leaned down to pick up an escaping tomato that had rolled out of its bag. ‘So what did you make of Erin?’ he asked. ‘How did the two of you get on?’
‘Fine, I suppose. I mean, maybe if I’d known all my life that my real mother was out there somewhere …’ Taking the tomato from him, she saw him wince and continued unwillingly. ‘If I’d always known I was adopted, then perhaps meeting her now would be different. But – I really don’t care.’
Tessa’s shameful fear was that Erin hadn’t bothered to stay longer or offer more because, like everyone else, she’d found her daughter such a disappointment. And her heart clenched tight at unbidden thoughts of Lauren and Mitch accepting Nula’s welcome, of them finding what they needed elsewhere. She banged the fridge door shut with more force than she intended. ‘I don’t know how to feel, frankly.’ She turned to face Hugo squarely. ‘What should I feel? What do you feel?’
He returned her gaze steadily. ‘You’ve every right to be angry with us.’
‘Would you ever have told me?’
‘I’m sorry you found out like this.’
‘Would you have told me otherwise?’
‘Probably not,’ Hugo conceded. ‘Not after all this time.’
‘Why not?’ The question burst from Tessa, though she shrank from the answer.
‘Because, to me, you were always my daughter.’ He cleared his throat. ‘Right from the second you were placed in my arms.’
Embarrassed, they both looked away, but Tessa stored away each precious word to take out later when she could fully appreciate them.
‘And I think Pamela was afraid that if you knew the truth, you’d never forgive her. But that’s no excuse,’ he added. ‘We should have told you years ago.’
Glancing around her utilitarian kitchen, a new thought struck Tessa: ‘I thought Grandma Averil left this place to me because I’d earned it. But that wasn’t the reason, was it? This is Erin’s inheritance. That’s why she wanted me to have it; not because I’m me, but because I’m Erin’s daughter and Grandma Averil felt guilty for what she’d done.’
‘Perhaps,’ Hugo admitted with a sigh.
Her grandmother’s legacy was this well-run, sterile machine: despite the perpetual warmth of the overworked Aga, Tessa always felt reproached by the discipline and efficiency of her kitchen, by her failure to create a proper home.
‘I take full responsibility for keeping you in the dar
k,’ Hugo went on. ‘When the subterfuge began, I suppose I never believed it could remain secret. But it did, and then the right moment never came, and we put it off. And besides, I always felt it was Pamela’s secret, not mine.’
She was suddenly buffeted by images of Sam making a new home elsewhere, and her mind seized on an ugly new suspicion – that she had been more blind than she dared admit, that perhaps Sam loving Nula had gone on for far longer than she’d assumed. What if they’d been seeing each other in London? Or even before?
‘But in a way, you’re right,’ Hugo continued. ‘Maybe it does make no difference.’ He cleared his throat again, straightening his shoulders the way he did when determined to say what had to be said, however difficult. ‘I love you,’ he uttered. ‘Nothing changes that.’
‘You don’t keep secrets from people you love!’ cried Tessa, thinking of how Sam had not loved her, and failing to notice how Hugo caved inwards, away from her scorching words. ‘It’s selfish. Cowardly.’
‘You’re right,’ he agreed. ‘We lied to you. That was wrong. We didn’t think it through to the end.’
‘Well, that’s your problem!’ she replied. ‘You created this mess.’
It seemed to take a big effort just for Hugo to remain there, staunch in his refusal to evade her bitterness. ‘I’m sorry. And I want you to know that, in my heart, I always have been and always will be your father.’
He stood there waiting. Part of her longed to run to him: what kept her still was a little voice deep inside that feared his pity. Finally Hugo nodded, as if accepting her decision.
‘Try and be kind to your mother.’ His face, until then pale with worry, flushed. ‘To Pamela,’ he amended. ‘She’s not as strong as you think.’
‘Why is it up to me to make everyone feel better?’
‘It’s not. I’m not saying that. Please, Tessie.’
She ignored his appeal. ‘I don’t care. It’s not my mess, and I don’t want to deal with it. I want to be left alone.’
‘Very well.’ Hugo headed for the door, pausing to touch her shoulder softly as he passed. Although Tessa understood that he was obeying her, that she would have protested if he hadn’t, she also felt cheated. Part of her needed him to fight harder for her.
The Bad Mother Page 6
