Bad Mothers United (29 page)

Fairly soon we’d left the grand streets and we were out into a grittier urban landscape. The road became an expressway, crossing the Thames, ducking under flyovers.
Then we were moving through streets packed with high- and low-rise flats, back-to-back terraces, 1930s council semis like mine. I saw parades of shops, bookies and off-licences, kebab houses and
launderettes, warehouses, lorry parks, leisure centres, occasional playing-fields. We passed a schoolyard where children in blue sweatshirts queued in lines; an ornate church that was now a
carpet-fitter’s. All these people going about their normal days. Eventually the taxi pulled up by a tyre-fitting yard. The driver pointed across to a row of stone bollards.

‘Pedestrian precinct. Can’t go no furver. But that’s the road you want.’

My legs went weak. I scrabbled in my purse and extracted from the special zipped compartment what felt like a huge amount of cash (Mum was going to do her absolute nut when she saw how much
I’d taken). I offered no tip, though. Our eyes met in the mirror but I stared him out. Something told me to keep tight hold of every penny I had.

As the driver pulled away I panicked again, this time at the sensation of being left alone on a strange street. But then Jessie – Jen – would see me right, wouldn’t she?
She’d give me a lift back to the station, after I’d travelled all this way. ‘I’m dying to see you,’ is what she’d said.

I stood for a moment, getting my bearings. Around me was a modern estate with flat-roofed buildings, concrete balconies and walkways. A metal pedestrian bridge, painted blue, flaking metal
garage doors. Murals, graffiti. Not a lot of greenery going on. I followed the house numbers till I came to a three-storey block, plain and functional. The balcony directly above me had a folding
chair set out on it and the one next door was being used to dry baby laundry.

And here I was. This was Jessie’s place. I rang the bell for the ground floor and stepped away. Daft, I told myself, to get worked up when it was all going to be fine. This was a good
thing I was doing, for my mum. Across the street two teenage boys in sweat-tops slipped out of an alleyway and watched as I rang once more.

By the time she opened the door I was a bag of nerves. I pretty much fell into the dark little hallway, and began babbling immediately about what sort of journey I’d had. She stood it
for thirty seconds, frowning, then nudged me into the lounge and got me to sit.

First impressions: I wasn’t in a nice place, it didn’t look very cared for. For a start there was hardly any furniture, not even a TV on top of the TV unit, which meant you could
see every scuff on the walls and every mark and dent in the carpet. The wallpaper under the window was peeling and even where it was in decent nick the colour scheme was pretty rank, a lot of
burgundy and gold and blue, stripes and swirls, Mum would’ve had a fit. And the light-shade had a loopy fringe that was lower on one side than the other, and on top of the gas fire was a
lone crappy ornament, a china pig cuddling a duck. Skank. Tat-orama. And then I thought, For God’s sake, stop being so mean, Charlotte. Jessie’s only just moved in, hasn’t she?
It takes time to get a place straight, install your stuff. Half a pot of wallpaper paste and a go with a steam cleaner, it’d come up a different room.

And still I couldn’t stop talking, spilling my life out in one big gush. Where I was at uni, how I adored my tutor, how I missed Will, the Daniel situation. Meanwhile I was drinking in
Jessie and trying to see Mum’s face, or mine, in hers. She was a smallish woman with brown hair, though you could tell it was dyed because there was a good two inches of grey at the
parting. The eyes were similar to Mum’s, the same creases in the corner and the same-shaped forehead, but Jessie was quite a lot more wrinkled. Her lips were thinner; she was thinner all
over. Her hands had gone a bit clawed, big knuckles pushing against chunky resin rings.

She sat down opposite me, crossed her legs. The jeans she wore had sparkles down the seams.

‘Well,’ she said.

I knew it was time I shut up so she could get a word in. But there must have been something wrong with me because I just carried on rabbiting. Paul Bentham, I now found myself describing, and
how it hadn’t been my fault I got pregnant in the first place but I was so glad Will was around, not that I’d ever judge anyone who didn’t keep their baby, it was such a hard
call, you had to do what you thought was best, and Mum had taken a while to get over the shock of Will but now she was fine with it. Jessie’s brow creased. What the hell’s up with
this girl? I guessed she was thinking. Is she on drugs, or what?

It was my ringtone that shut me up finally. I jumped as if I’d been shot, grabbed the phone, dropped it, retrieved it from where it had spun under the sofa, checked the screen and it was
Mum. MUM! Jesus. I switched the mobile off, shuddering.

‘All right?’

‘It was no one. No one important.’ I looked up shyly. ‘You know it’s funny, I can’t think of you as “Jen”.’

‘Well, I am. That’s who I am. That other was a different time. Do you understand?‘ She sounded quite fierce.

I nodded. Don’t we all have periods of our lives we’d prefer to gloss over?

We stared at each other for a moment. Then she said, ‘Have you come on your own?’

Again I nodded.

‘You’ve not brought her with you?’

‘You mean my mum? No. It’s a secret. I’ve come in secret.’

‘She’s not sent you?’

‘She doesn’t know.’

‘I thought she’d sent you.’ Jen frowned, as if I was being deliberately obstructive.

‘I reckoned it’d be a surprise when I went back home and told her.’

Something flickered across her face.

‘How long have you known about me, then?’ she said.

‘Three years. I accidentally saw her birth certificate. But we haven’t talked about it much. She did tell me you were young when you got pregnant and you couldn’t cope.
That’s all she said, though. I don’t think she knows any more details.’ I waited, expecting Jen to start filling in some gaps. ‘It must have been a rough time for
you.’

‘Damn right it was. The worst.’ She sat back then, her lips a tight-closed line. Whatever had happened in the past, it didn’t look as though I was going to hear about it
today.

‘So I don’t really know anything about you!’ I said. ‘But I’m excited to meet you, “Grandma”.’

That made her laugh finally, a kind of croaky chuckle. ‘Yeah,’ she said. ‘I suppose I am. No one else is ever gonna call me that, for sure. So, are you stopping for a
cuppa?’

While she disappeared with my bag and coat, I wandered round the room, too wired to sit any longer. I’d hoped there might be a few family photos I could check out, but the only framed
item on display was a naff foil print of a howling wolf. The smell of air freshener was making me want to sneeze.

‘Anyway, your mum,’ she said when she walked back in. ‘Tell me what’s going on there.’

She sat down on the sofa and patted the seat next to her. I came and rested on the edge of the slippery vinyl.

Where to start? I wondered. How truthful should I be?
Well, she threw away that card you sent, left it to stew under tea bags and toddler wipes.
Best not. I said, ‘She’s
the reason I’m here. I couldn’t really tell you the whole thing on the phone, but what it is, she’s really down at the moment, missing my nan, she can’t seem to get over
it and I thought . . .’

I hesitated, not sure how to put it.

‘What?’

‘I thought you might be able to help.’

‘How’s that, love?’

‘I’m not sure exactly. I suppose, lift her, bring her out of herself. Stop her dwelling on sad stuff. Give her a new focus. That kind of thing.’

Jen just looked at me. The china pig went on cuddling the china duck. There was something malformed about the duck’s beak, as if prior to the cuddle the pig might have smashed it in the
face. Then she said, ‘Your mum don’t want to see me, sweetheart. I’ve been writing to her for months and not a peep – ah, you didn’t know that, did you? I can tell
by your face. She really hasn’t told you anything, has she? So then you ring me and I think, Oh, she’s coming after all. Only she’s not, it’s just you turns up. In secret,
you say. Without telling her. But she must’ve showed you the cards I sent?’

‘No. I found one, by accident. How did you know
our
address?’

‘I had a friend who used to be with Social Services. She fixed it for me. Wasn’t supposed to, like. But I made a nuisance of meself till she gave in. I’m an expert at
that.’ Jen gave another wheezy chuckle.

I tried to picture Mum and Jen together, hugging on the doorstep or poring over a photo album.

I said, ‘The problem is, she hasn’t got much confidence at the moment. And since my nan died last year, Mum’s been adrift. And I want her to move on. I’m pretty sure
she would like to meet you, at least once, except she hasn’t felt up to it. That’s why she hasn’t been replying. Not because – well, I don’t think she’s let
herself acknowledge you in case it gets too complicated for her to cope with. But honestly it would do her good to meet you, ask you some questions, hear some family history. She enjoys stuff
like that. Sort of filling in the past and a new start at the same time.’

How much of this was Jen understanding? Her eyes were needle-sharp, as if she didn’t trust me. I suppose when you’ve been hurt, you do put up a few barriers.

‘What do you think, Jen?’

She stood up and walked towards the window, her mouth working as if she might be about to spit. I saw how hollow her cheeks were, and the harsh lines around her mouth. Everything about her
looked dried out. At last she turned and spoke.

‘I was always going to leave it, see. Let the past stay the past. You know? But then lately I thought . . . It don’t matter what I thought. I sent a few cards but I weren’t
going to bother again. I know a closed door when I see one.’

This poor woman, I thought: how utterly bloody awful to be parted from your child for years, believe you’re going to be united at long last and then end up rejected. Watching the post
every morning, and nothing. Silence. If that was Will and me I’d literally die of a broken heart.

‘The door doesn’t have to be closed,’ I said warmly. ‘I can act as go-between. I can help you get back together, if that’s what you want. We might have to tread
carefully, ’cause Mum’s quite fragile right now. I think I can swing it, though. What do you say?’

I got up and went to her and put my hand on hers, and it was chilled, the way Nan’s always used to be.