Daniel cleared his throat. ‘Please … it’s just great that we’ve met at last.’
She let out a long, slow breath. ‘I was young. I didn’t realise the implications at the time … how much I would regret what I did. But at the time I felt I had no choice.
My mother was horrified, she refused to support me … And I was so unworldly.’
Daniel didn’t reply at first. His head was turned towards the fire and she had no idea what he was thinking. Should she tell him the details of his adoption now, or wait until he asked? she wondered.
‘I can’t imagine what it was like for you,’ he said, finally looking across at her.
There was an awkward silence.
‘There’s so much I want to tell you, if we can keep in touch?’ Her question was tentative. She heard Richard’s words ringing in her ears: no connection beyond their DNA.
‘I’d like that, if you’re up for it.’
‘I could bring the albums next time. You must want to put faces to some of your ancestors.’
‘That’d be great.’
As they got up to leave the room, Daniel stopped her, laying his hand lightly on her arm.
‘One thing I haven’t asked –’ he frowned slightly ‘– along with a thousand other things of course.’
She waited.
‘I wondered … do you have a family?’
She tried to look him in the eye, but failed. In that moment, her lovely life with her husband and three other children seemed the ultimate betrayal.
‘Yes … yes, I have a husband, Richard, and three children. A son and two daughters.’
Daniel nodded slowly.
‘Do they know about me?’
‘Richard knows. But there never seemed a good time to tell the others. I should have. And of course I will now. I hope you’ll meet them.’
‘Big secret. But then I guess everything’s easy with hindsight,’ Daniel replied, his voice hardly more than a whisper.
It was getting dark by the time Annie and Jamie began the journey home. They waved a final time to Marjory’s upright figure standing in the doorway, backlit by the light from the small chandelier in the hall.
‘I hate leaving her alone in that huge house,’ Annie said, as the car crunched over the gravel.
‘She wouldn’t be happy anywhere else.’
‘I know, but what if she has a fall or something?’
‘Marjory would shoot herself if she had to hang out with some dodgy carer referring to her as ‘we’ all the time …
Do we need a little nap now?
You know the sort of thing.’
She nodded, but her thoughts were elsewhere as she negotiated the lanes to the main road and she didn’t answer.
‘Well, he’s definitely the most beautiful thing I’ve seen in decades,’ she heard Jamie say. ‘Fancy waiting thirty-five years and then finding a son so handsome and clever. I mean he could have been a dog.’
‘You’re so shallow! Although he was beautiful, wasn’t he?’
‘Gorgeous!’ Jamie repeated, and she realised he was probably a little drunk. ‘So, come on. What did it feel like?’
‘It was …’ She stopped, unable to find the words to describe what had happened.
‘Did he seem like your son? I mean, did you sense a link to the baby? Or was it like being with some random stranger?’
‘He looked so like Uncle Terence that I couldn’t help feeling the family connection. But it was hard to believe after all this time that he was really Tom.’
She drove in silence for a while, the headlights of the oncoming cars almost hypnotic in the gathering dusk.
‘Did he ask the dreaded question?’
‘Why I’d given him away?’
Jamie nodded.
‘No, but I half told him anyway. Not the details – he didn’t ask. He wanted to know if I had other children. And he asked a lot about his father, which of course I couldn’t tell him. I suppose I can tell him next time.’
‘Maybe he didn’t want to face the rejection thing,’ Jamie suggested.
‘Maybe. But it wasn’t personal.’
Jamie snorted. ‘I’d say it was highly personal!’
‘No, you’ve missed my point. It wasn’t personal enough. At the time, although I couldn’t help loving him, I don’t think I allowed myself to think of him as a real person, as my son. I only thought about him as something getting
in the way of the life that had been prescribed for me. Seeing him today, so obviously my flesh and blood, brought it home to me that we’ve been separate his whole life because I refused to properly acknowledge him. I could only see him as Mother did: a problem that needed sweeping under the carpet.’ She paused. ‘Of course it hit me later, but by then it was way too late.’
‘I know what you’re saying, but we can’t second-guess how he feels about it.’
‘I’d be angry, if it was me.’
‘Please … I think we’ve done the blame thing, darling.’
‘OK, OK, easy for you to say.’ She glanced across at her friend. ‘Well, next step, telling the others.’
But oddly, now she’d met him, she knew this would be easier. She would be telling them about a living, breathing presence called Daniel Gray, not the shifting memory of a tiny baby.
‘Where have you been, Mum?’ Lucy jumped up as her mother came down the stairs to the kitchen. ‘It’s after nine. I called your mobile hours ago, and Dad’s. Neither of you were answering. I thought something had happened.’
Annie gave her a brief hug before sitting down at the table. ‘Sorry, sweetheart, it must have been off. I was with Jamie, we went to visit Marjory Best and you know how it is when Marjory and I get together. I did tell you.’
‘Oh, yes. You did. I forgot. Did you have a good time?’
She looked relieved, but Annie felt Daniel’s presence hovering between them. She hated lying to Lucy, and her guilt drove her to a sudden urge to reveal all then and there, not waiting for the others. But she held herself together and fought down the instinct.
‘Isn’t Dad home?’
‘I haven’t seen him all day. Are you OK, Mum? You look really pale.’
‘Do I? It’s a long old drive back from that bit of Kent.’ She paused. ‘I’ll give your dad a try.’ It was something to do. Her head was still bursting with Daniel; she could think of nothing else. She dug her mobile out of her bag and a piece of paper fell to the tiled floor. It was Daniel’s contact details, scribbled on the torn-off corner of an old envelope – one of many such pieces of scrap paper lying about Marjory’s chaotic kitchen. She grabbed it quickly and stuffed it back in her bag, but Lucy was putting the kettle on and didn’t notice.
‘It’s me,’ she said, unnecessarily, in response to Richard’s greeting. ‘Where are you? … oh, of course … no … yes, it was good … no … alright. See you later.’
Lucy looked questioningly at her as she ended the call.
‘I’d forgotten he had to speak at this conference thing. He says it went well but he’ll be late. Why don’t I do us an omelette? Or some scrambled eggs?’
‘It’s OK, Mum, I’ve eaten,’ Lucy answered. She gathered her stuff from the table. ‘I think I’ll go up now. Do some emails.’ She gave her mother a quick kiss. ‘’Night.’
‘Good night, darling. Sleep well.’
Annie was relieved to be alone and have a chance to run over the day’s events in peace. She replayed everything Daniel had said, wondering most about his adoptive mother. She couldn’t help feeling a twinge of envy for this unknown woman who had chosen to nurture her son. She had loved him. Nothing else matters, she told herself, ashamed of her envious thoughts.
There was some white wine in the fridge from the previous night. She poured herself a glass, reached for her phone and scrolled through to Daniel’s number.
Loved meeting you. Hope we can again
soon. Regards, Annie. X
She read it over and deleted the kiss. Then, for the next hour, she checked every few minutes to see if he had responded. But there was nothing. It reminded her yet again of being young and waiting for a boyfriend to call. She went to bed but couldn’t sleep, gradually convincing herself that she had not measured up to Daniel’s high standards of what a mother should be. She was relieved to hear her husband making his way upstairs.
‘How can we get them all together without telling them why?’
Richard, still half dressed in his shirt and boxers, frowned at her. ‘Ed can never do Saturdays, and you know what it’s like getting him to change those nightmare shifts. We’ll have to make it Sunday.’
‘Can’t we just say we want a family get-together?
That we haven’t had one for a long time. Something like that?’
‘But we have. We had one only a couple of weeks ago. To be honest I think Lucy’ll be relieved to know what the atmosphere’s been about.’
‘Maybe. She keeps giving me those intense looks of hers. You know the ones.’
Richard nodded and smiled as he put on his blue cotton pyjamas and climbed into bed. They lay side by side in the wide bed, not moving, saying nothing, like two stone effigies.
‘I’ll be glad to get it over with,’ Richard muttered.
‘Me too.’ She glanced at her husband. ‘Will they mind?’ Her stomach fluttered when she envisioned the three faces staring at her as she exposed her past.
‘Mind? I doubt it. It was before they were born. They’ll be surprised, but once they’ve got over the shock …’
Annie heard Richard’s reassuring words, but the young girl who had been berated by her mother for being a ‘slut’, for bringing shame on the family honour, for betraying her beloved father’s memory, came back to haunt her. It was the girl she was then, the girl who had given her baby away, not the mother they were so familiar with, who she’d be presenting to her children for the very first time. She hoped they’d understand.
What will it feel like, letting the secret go? she wondered. She had learnt repression at her mother’s knee. So well, that by the time she was grown up she was perfectly trained
to withstand her own emotions. Not speaking about Tom to the children had been second nature to her: a closed compartment in her mind. It was hard to imagine that compartment would soon no longer exist.
6
Ed watched as Marsha vigorously beat butter into the potatoes with a wooden spoon. He had a handful of knives and forks in one hand, but he made no move to put them on the table. Marsha glanced up at him.
‘What? You look miles away.’
Ed shook himself. ‘Oh, nothing. Just thinking.’
‘Always a mistake.’
Emma appeared in the doorway. ‘What is?’
‘Thinking,’ Marsha replied, indicating her brother with a nod of her head.
Emma went over to him and laid her cheek against his for a moment. ‘Love you,’ she muttered in his ear. Which was what he’d been thinking about: love. He would like to talk to Marsha about this love thing when they got the chance. It confused him and made him feel uneasy, in some ways dishonest. Because it felt too easy, Emma loving him like this. Suddenly. Not that it wasn’t what he wanted. And the sex was mind-blowing – he couldn’t get enough of her.
But he just wasn’t sure if she really meant it, or whether it was just something she said sort of automatically when she was in a relationship.
The flat doorbell rang. ‘That’ll be Lucy. Get it, will you?’ Marsha said.
‘So, Sunday it is.’ Lucy helped herself to a couple of sausages. ‘The mystery will finally be revealed!’
They all looked at her.
‘Mystery?’ Marsha asked.
‘Yeah, about Mum. I told you the other day. I knew you weren’t listening.’
Marsha laughed. ‘OK, so tell us again.’
Lucy sighed. ‘She’s been weird for two weeks now. Sort of preoccupied, but then really generous, and cooking all these huge meals. Can’t explain really … it’s as if she’s hiding something.’
‘And you think she’s going to tell all on Sunday?’ Ed asked.
‘Well, don’t you think it’s odd she is so insistent that we’re all there?’
Ed shrugged. ‘Mum’s always insistent we’re there. It’s her thing, all that nurturing stuff.’
‘You didn’t tell me about Sunday, babe,’ Emma chimed in.
‘No, well, she said just us three …’ He saw Emma’s eyes flash and knew he was in trouble.
‘Did you ask if I could come?’
Ed nodded. ‘Of course I did, but she said just family.’
‘And I’m not family?’
‘Emms, this isn’t about you, OK?’ Marsha spoke sharply. ‘Go on, Luce. You really think there’s something up?’
Ed could hear the worry in her voice.
Lucy nodded. ‘Yeah. I can’t think what, but something. I don’t think I’m imagining it.’
Emma got up and stamped off to the bathroom. Marsha rolled her eyes at her brother.
‘And did you ask her why she was being weird?’ Ed asked Lucy.
‘I did, but she and Dad fobbed me off. Sort of pretended I was deluded. But I saw the look between them.’
‘So Dad’s in on it too?’
For a moment there was silence. Emma came back to the table and plonked herself down, her face set in a sulky pout.
‘What are the options?’ Ed asked them, pouring out more wine.
‘Maybe they’re splitting up,’ Emma volunteered, her interest sparked.
‘Very helpful, Emms.’
‘Just saying …’
‘I don’t think it’s anything bad. She seems distracted rather than miserable,’ Lucy said.
‘Maybe Mum’s just about to sell her cake business for millions, and they’re going to up sticks and move to the south of France.’
‘Not!’ Ed laughed at Marsha’s suggestions. He envied his parents’ focused lives. They seemed always to have known
the direction they wanted to take, then taken it.
‘Can we change the subject, please, guys? They’d have told you if it was anything serious.’ Emma sounded bored, but Ed knew she was just pissed off. She wouldn’t let it drop that she hadn’t been included in the brunch.
‘Well, come Sunday, we’ll know.’
Annie took the blueberry muffins out of the oven and laid the baking sheet carefully on the top of the stove. The muffins sat plump and golden in their waxed cases, the tops dotted with crystals of coarse baking sugar.
‘Smells good.’ Richard cast an amused glance at the table, laden with fresh croissants, pains au chocolat, dishes of apricot and blackcurrant jam, hard-boiled eggs in their shells, fresh orange juice in a glass jug, thick slices of ham beside a wedge of Manchego cheese on a white china platter. ‘Are we feeding five or five hundred?’ he teased, but Annie was used to it. After all, she had first met him in the tiny galley kitchen his company used for hospitality, and even on first acquaintance he had been in awe of her culinary zeal.