The Decision: Lizzie's Story (17 page)

And I had rejected her.

Immediately I grabbed for my phone in my pocket, intent on calling my best friend. I wanted to make Shona turn the car around, come back up the country lane so I could throw my arms around her and tell her I was sorry. Sorry for rejecting her, sorry for sidelining her, sorry for not getting what she was trying to do for me. I wanted to say I understood now: adoption was wrong for me, but more than that, it was wrong for the rest of my family, too. My family, for all its problems, would welcome another child, even one conceived in less than ideal circumstances. My mother would
want
to help me; my sisters would want their first niece or nephew kept in the family. We could figure everything else out later.

But before I could punch in Shona’s number on speed dial, my phone lit up in my hand and started ringing, its harsh tone sounding even louder in the middle of the dark field. Surprised, I peered at the old LCD screen.

On it, my little sister’s name, SAL…

ALL OF THEM

… “Don’t say a word, just listen, okay?”

The room swam into focus swiftly, leaving me breathless. My vision felt threatened by blue tinges, as if I had just woken up, my limbs heavy and sluggish. I jumped at the sound of the words: they seemed to boom around the grotty toilets and echo back at me like I was in a cave. I was even more startled to realise those same words were coming from my own mouth.

“You don’t even know why I’m calling!” Sal objected testily at the end of the line. “I wanted…”

I interrupted her. “… I need to talk to Mum.”

“So call her!” Sal said. Her tone was more bewildered than annoyed now. She’d never heard me talk to her like this before.

“I can’t, I haven’t got any credit.” I said, “Just go and give the phone to Mum! Please Sal!”

“You’re not wasting my credit.” Sal began but again I cut in:

“I’m pregnant.” I said.

There was silence at the end of the line. “Are you sure?” Sal said at last.

I looked at the pregnancy tester in my hand. The line and the dot were proof enough. “Oh yes.” I replied.

“Get rid of it.” Sal said suddenly.

“What?” My mind was reeling. “Just get Mum…”

“Get rid of it, or you’ll be ruining your life.” Sal said earnestly.

“I don’t know what I want to do yet!” I tried to point out, “This is why I need to speak to Mum!”

“You know what she’s like! It’s babies, babies, babies with her!” Sal was keeping her voice down, I heard a door close. She was hiding away somewhere, trying to plead her case and get me to see sense.

“I told you: I don’t know what I want to do yet.” I repeated.

“Mum will make you keep it.” Sal declared.

Was this really the vision my sister had of our mother, a mere baby maker? To me, Mum had always been a bit of an enigma: caring yet cold, thoughtful yet introverted. She was hardworking, always. Her reactions could not always be predicted: questions could herald long, involved conversations or she could snap as easily as a dry twig. I felt both infuriated by and admiring of Mum in equal measure. In contrast, I thought of Sal’s consistency, her endless sniping and defensiveness. Her lack of engagement with the rest of us, preferring the sanctity of her bedroom, hunched over her desk, reading endlessly into the night. Perhaps she had set the bar for her life already? Maybe she would always be like that: there would be no friends to speak of, no husband or family: just work. If that lifestyle had the potential to make Sal happy, I would not have felt sorry for her, but instead congratulated her on a choice well made. Yet my little sister was starved for affection, desperate for it, but would conversely let no one give it to her.

“Please get Mum.” I said measuredly.

I heard Sal swear at the end of the line and then there was silence, but for a door opening and the rustling of a phone on the move. I heard the tinny radio in the kitchen, playing Mum’s beloved Euro Pop. Sal muttered something, there was more rustling and then suddenly Mum was on the phone:

“Hello darling,” Mum said breezily, “I’m making your favourite for dinner.”

My favourite: lasagne, then. Curiously, the change in tack of conversation brought a lump to my throat and the sting of tears to my eyes. “Great,” I gulped, the air seeming to press on my chest now. “Mum, I need to talk to you.”

Mum’s initial breeziness was gone in an instant. “What’s the matter, Lizzie?” She coaxed, concerned. “Are you alright?”

“Yes.” I said immediately, “… No. Can you come and get me?”

Within moments the lasagne duties had been abandoned to a grumbling Sal as Mum dropped everything to come and fetch me as I’d asked, telling me not to worry and she’d be with me soon. I still had at least twenty five minutes before Mum would reach town. I left the toilets and real life resumed once again. I noticed the lack of stalls; over half the pitches were empty, despite the midday sun being high in the sky. This was matched by the lack of patrons: just a handful of old people drifting here and there, examining products and tat with eyes and hands. I must have been the youngest in the market place by about forty years. I wandered stall to stall with unseeing eyes, trying to keep busy but really just going over the same question in my mind:
how was I going to break this news to Mum, where did I even begin?

Then there was a beep in the remainder of the car park beyond the market place. Mum wasn’t supposed to park there on market day, but then she had never cared for rules of the road. As my father was fond of saying, Mum saw the amber light as a challenge. She had a glove compartment full of parking tickets at any time of the year. Twice she had even run over pheasants and brought them back to the house to eat, though she had not told us either time until after the meal. Now Hannah refused to touch poultry at all, until Mum assured her it was not roadkill.

I wrenched open the car door and sat down in the passenger seat next to Mum. She was silent, her face impassive, giving nothing away. The radio was not on. The air felt heavy as she waited for me to begin.

“I’m pregnant.” I said at last, taking the plunge.

“I know, Sal said before I left.” Mum said.

Typical Mum. A flash of irritation burst through me: couldn’t she have spared me my confession? But I knew she couldn’t and swallowed my resentment back down. “Are you angry?” I enquired with baited breath.

“Angry?” Mum seemed genuinely surprised. “No. Worried for you? Yes.”

There was a pause as I drank this in. I had expected even just a half-raised voice, or expression of disappointment. Yet Mum seemed to mean what she was saying. “I don’t know what to do.” I said.

“You’re a bright girl, Lizzie.” Mum chastised. “You know what options are available. What you mean is, you can’t decide.”

“It has to be my decision.” I said hastily, remembering Sal’s assertion on the phone. I didn’t truly believe my little sister could be right, but I had to be sure Mum knew my intentions. I would be doing what I needed to, not what she wanted me to.

“Of course.” Mum said incredulously, as if she wouldn’t even entertain me doing otherwise. I smiled, relieved, feeling hopeful for the first time in an hour – until she followed up with: “Shall we go and see your father?”

Mum zoomed me and the car over to The Belle View Hotel, the latest place unfortunate enough to employ my Dad with his endless tea breaks and juggling – quite literally – of crockery. We stalked into the empty foyer, Mum smashing her hand down on the bell. Pablo, the owner, shuffled into view, face like thunder.

“I tell you before.” He says, addressing Mum, “He working. You cannot visit during working hours. Had to chambermaid whole room again!” Mum took the telling off on the chin. I wanted the ground to swallow me up:
Mum and Dad… Here? When he was on duty? Eeeurgh
.

“Oh do grow up, Elizabeth,” Mum drawled, amused, taking in my horrified expression. “Besides, you can talk!” My mouth dropped wide open: was my mother actually making a joke about my predicament? This was hardly the time. But before I could take her to task, Mum was arguing with Pablo, pushing past him to the kitchen.

“Family emergency,” Mum was saying, then when that didn’t work: “Get out of my way before I knock you down!” Perplexed, Pablo finally got out of the way. Though not a particularly large or meaty man, Pablo was at least a foot taller than my mother; she could no more knock him down than she could a mountain. “Thank you.” My mother said, before barking at me: “Come on, Lizzie!”

Moments later we were down the steep steps to the subterranean, windowless kitchen where my father worked. A CD player was blaring some old band; he had terrible taste just like Mum. It was so loud Dad just about jumped out of his skin when Mum tapped him on the shoulder. He was pleased to see us, though that was short-lived. Mum told Dad my news right away.

“How could you be so stupid?” Dad sighed.

“Don’t talk to her like that!” Mum said immediately, “Besides anything, you’re a bloody hypocrite. We had Lizzie not much older than she is now!”

“That’s different.” Dad said, “We were always going to stay here.”

“Speak for yourself.” Mum scoffed, “I had plans, I got side-tracked.”

“By me I suppose?” Dad countered bitterly; I’d heard them have this argument a million times before.

“No, actually. That would infer you actually stuck around for more than five minutes here or there.” Mum opposed skillfully.

Dad’s face twisted as if he’d swallowed several wasps.
Ouch.
I watched them argue, disbelieving. I had never imagined this reaction from Mum; my expectations had insisted she would be the disappointed one, the one who would bawl me out for it. I had misjudged her.

“She doesn’t even know what she wants to do yet.” Mum said.

“Lizzie, you have plans…” Dad began, but one look from Mum silenced him.

“It has to be her decision, Dan.” Mum said. “Whatever I think, you think, the girls think… It’s irrelevant!”

“What about the baby’s father?” Dad said.

Mum visibly deflated. It was obvious she’d forgotten about Mike. With a sudden pang, I realised I had too. I’d wanted to avoid thinking about his reaction; I was afraid what it might be. I couldn’t believe he would be angry, but then I did not believe he would welcome the news, either. I knew whatever I said or whatever his reply might be, I would be left with disappointment.

“You need to tell him.” Mum said to me.

I wanted to argue with her, but I knew it would be fruitless; she would never allow me to simply keep my mouth shut. Mum was all too aware of the fact so much of the village looked down on The Carmichaels based on prejudice: the scally father, the chain-smoking mother, the endless brood of children. Every time she’d had to go seeking help at the likes of Social Services, Mum’s cheeks burned with shame at what others would think, especially the inevitable accusation:
why have so many children if you can’t support them?
Except it was never as simple as that. Mum and Dad had never set out to drain the state any more than I was planning on it now; life had got in
the way and rearranged various things for us all. And should our decisions be based on what others thought, anyway? Mum and Dad did what they could; Mum significantly more than Dad. She had raised us all to be honest and to do our best, too. What else was there?

“I’ll tell him tomorrow.” I found myself saying.

“No, today.” Mum saw me baulk at this and her expression softened. She gave me a quick hug for reassurance. “Just get it over with, sweetheart. I’ll wait for you.”

The day felt like a whirlwind: barely an hour past after telling my Dad, I was seated in Francis’ living room with Mike. Mum and Francis sat awkwardly together over tea the colour of dishwater in the kitchen, the radio turned low on Mum’s insistence, “just in case”.

“Your father went mad when I told him I was expecting you,” Mum had said on the way to Mike’s. “Of course, he reckoned it was my fault; I had planned it; I was trying to “trap” him… Though exactly how he could never answer. Anyone would have thought he had a big career planned.” Mum sighed. I could read the expression in her eyes in the rearview mirror:
I wish.

“You didn’t live together then?” I’d said, wide-eyed. This was news to me.

“Oh, no. I was still with GanGan back then. Your Dad and I had Amanda as well before we set up home together.” Mum said, negotiating the road. “And then of course he was gone again more or less after Hannah, even before we had the twins. Not that he could stay away for long.”

“Why do you put up with him?” I asked suddenly, cringing at the thought of the answer. Whatever his faults, he was still my Dad. Yet at the same time, I felt I needed to know.

“I love him, I suppose.” Mum said. There was absolutely no hint of the starry-eyed teen about her as she said it, either. “There were times I tried to break it off, but my heart was never in it. Besides, perhaps I…”

“… Okay, okay.” I said hurriedly, sure Mum was going to say something embarrassing about sex or similar. The thought of them together just made me heave. They’d never gone to any particular effort to hide their sex life. I’d come home to the squeaking of bedsprings even in the middle of the day countless times. It got to the point that if I had friends over, I’d leave them outside first and check out the terrain. Why couldn’t I just have normal parents, ones that actually lived together and couldn’t stand each other?
Everyone else did!

“I was going to say, perhaps I liked my independence.” Mum said frostily. “Raising you girls my way, no interference. A man who was interested in us all, supported us when he could, yet kept his distance. I was both a single mother and one as part of a partnership – and all that includes – maybe I had the best of both worlds?”

I had never thought about the situation like that before: I had always been so wholly focused on the negative, with the blame set squarely at my Dad’s feet. I realised I had seen my mother as a victim of circumstance, dependant on my father’s whims. My mother, a victim! How ridiculous. Yet it had never occurred to me to the situation might suit her, or even suit them both.