Mothers & Daughters (53 page)

I'd been ahead of her because she was trailing Matty, but she caught up and came in close to my side. ‘I deserved that, didn't I?'

‘Well. Yes. It doesn't matter any more. Truly.'

Jaz looked down at her feet.

‘It'll be awkward for you, seeing him again.'

‘If I ever bump into him, yes, it'll be awkward. But I know he'd go out of his way to make things as easy as possible, because he's like that.'

I half-expected a response to that, a rebuttal, but again she said nothing. Good, I thought. We've got somewhere.

The main road was busy and we had to wait a long time for a gap in the traffic. Neither of us spoke till we'd got Matty safely across, then Jaz halted on the verge and cleared her
throat. Again her hand moved to her head, seeking tresses that were no longer there.

‘Mum?'

‘Yes?'

‘I need to warn you about something.'

‘What?' That instant shot of dread.

‘David's back. I didn't tell you before. He's here.'

‘You mean, in the UK?'

‘Over there, with Ian.'

A few yards in front of us lay the shelf of the riverbank, then a stretch of green, a bench, a path, a line of trees bright with new leaf. It was under these trees that two figures stood. One was tall and lean, his hands in his pockets and his shoulders hunched forward. The other stood straighter, was shorter and more solidly built.

My legs started to tremble. ‘Oh,' I said.

I'm not prepared
, I wanted to say.
You ought to have let me know in advance. Ian should have rung and tipped me off. I look a mess!
If I could have had half an hour, even, to get myself together.

‘He knows you're coming.'

‘Does he.'

‘Are you OK?'

‘I don't know.'

When I'd rehearsed the moment of reunion, I thought the only real emotion I'd feel would be embarrassment. I assumed I'd have to force myself to approach him and then I'd be standing like an idiot, struck dumb under the weight of shaming memories. I'd not counted on this rush of painful pleasure, so intense it made me light-headed. There he was, in plain and shocking sight, and all I wanted to do was go to him.

‘Ian was saying he's only been back a couple of days—'

I swallowed hard, touched my daughter's arm. ‘Can you take the pram?'

‘Mum?'

‘It's all right,' I said.

‘What are you going to do?'

One, two, three, four swans I counted on the grass ahead.
All mouth and trousers, your swan
, Dad used to say.

I'll tell you what I'm going to do, I thought. I'm going to take a stupid long-shot chance. I'm going to walk over there and tell him properly, to his face, that I was wrong to make him go, that I regret my decision and I wish like mad I had the power to undo it. I don't care who's listening in, Ian or you – let everyone hear. And if David sneers or shouts at me, or worse, if he's kind and shakes his head and says gently that it's too late, then I'll have done my best. I'm no worse off.

I thought of my mother, a life spent skewered on her own martyrdom, it occurring to no one around her to ask what was wrong, not that she'd have spoken up anyway. I thought of Dad, shackled for decades to a woman to whom he was patently unsuited, and without any form of romantic consolation. I thought of the years I'd wasted with Phil. What Jaz said was true: I wasn't afraid to be alone. It was the risks associated with commitment that scared me witless. But at this moment I wasn't motivated by fear. It was purely and simply a need to set something right.

‘Jaz,' I said. ‘Listen, I have to speak to him. I have to try and take this opportunity to make good. I don't know whether I can – I'm fairly sure it's too late, actually – but I want him to know I appreciate the chance he gave me, and how much I regret its loss. If you don't agree with that, then I'm sorry, but I still have to do it, and you really should be supporting me because I've always tried so hard to support you, and I'd never deliberately stand in the way of your happiness, especially if you wanted to start again with a new man, which is damned hard to do when your confidence has been knocked into the ground the way mine has, and yours, both of us, really—'

I ran out of breath.

‘Jesus,' she said, frowning. Matty pulled on her wrist impatiently. ‘I was going to tell you to go. If you must.'

And with those brief syllables, I was suddenly left to fend for myself.

When I looked over, David's face was turned in my direction, waiting. I tried to read his stance: was it disappointed, defensive, calculatedly indifferent? The space between us was wide and unobstructed, the clear sky gave no cover.

I began to pick my way across the lumpy grass, all too aware of how clumsy I must look, lurching on weak ankles, clinging onto the shoulder strap of my bag as though it were a parachute ripcord. The skirt I'd chosen, a dull corduroy thing, was riding up over my knees, my coat flapping open. My lipstick needed re-applying. Ill-equipped fiftysomething, floundering.

The field seemed to elongate as I struggled on; two swans whipped their heads up and hissed me spitefully on my way. What would happen when I reached him? He might use any one of a dozen put-downs, all deserved. He might say, ‘You'll have heard about—' and then some woman's name, some American piece whose hair was not in desperate need of re-colouring, and who was smart enough to hold onto a good man when she saw one. Perhaps he'd pull out a photograph of them together for me to admire, while my insides dissolved in acid remorse. If I was going to get my speech out, I'd need to say it quickly. Or would that be worse, blurting out my feelings with no idea of their appropriateness? I lowered my gaze and concentrated on where I was putting my feet, so at least I didn't go sprawling in front of him.

When I dared look up next I was near enough to see David's face. What struck me first was his tanned skin, and the fact that his hairline seemed further back than I remembered. His expression was stern and my confidence faltered. There was no
hope. He had not replied to my letters because there was nothing more to say. This whole exercise was a pointless humiliation.

It might be better never to speak again.

Suddenly he broke into a grin and said something to Ian, who smiled too. Was it a real smile, or a mocking one? Were they just amused by the state I'd got myself into? Somehow I made myself keep going towards them, until at last I could make out the expression in his eyes. Then I knew.

‘You know it's a myth about a swan being able to break your arm,' I panted. My chest was heaving and sweat prickled between my breasts.

David took one step forward, and opened his arms for me.

‘God, I'm such an
idiot
,' I said.

‘Shh, shh,' he went, holding me tight against him.

‘It's taken me till now,' I said. ‘All this time. Did you get my letters?'

‘I did,' he said.

And?

In the background I could hear Ian beginning to exclaim in that exaggerated voice grown-ups use with small children, Jaz calling instructions about nap times and clothing and pick-up. Underneath ran a piping descant from Matty, thrilled once more to be with his dad, too young to understand that for every reunion there must also be a parting. There was this child, surrounded by adults, all trying their best to build a world around him that made sense, even when their own didn't.

I touched the side of David's face, still terrified he hadn't understood.

‘Can we go somewhere and talk? I've all sorts I need to tell you.'

‘I'd say you and I could go anywhere you like, when you're ready,' he said.

EPILOGUE

Photograph 899, Album Seven

Location: the park, Nantwich

Taken by: Carol

Subject: It is a glorious spring Saturday, the culmination of a week of unseasonably warm weather. People are calling it a reward for last year's wash-out summer. But meteorology doesn't go in for checks and balances, thinks Carol, as she attempts to trap her family inside the camera's viewfinder. For the previous half-hour she's been sitting on a bench holding hands with David, a pose she's found simultaneously foolish and thrilling, given it's in the presence of her daughter. Hovering at the edge of her consciousness comes an ancient memory: the mortifying moment her dad opened the front door and discovered her mid-snog with Phil. But she waves the image away because those days are long gone, irrelevant
.

‘Why didn't you reply to my letters?' she asked, as soon as they were out of earshot
.

‘I wanted to be sure you meant it. I thought you might be just surfing a wave of guilt, and you'd change your mind back again as soon as you were challenged. I don't think I could have stood that.'

‘But the silence. That was cruel.'

No consoling reply. All he'd done was take her hand possessively
.

There's something steely and triumphant about him; she's noticed the sideways glances passing between him and her daughter. God knows how they are going to work this. Another picture comes: Dad showing Jaz the lion on the syrup tin, tracing the minuscule lettering with his soily finger
. And out of the strong came forth sweetness.

Jaz and Ian are talking, or not talking, over by the river's edge; Matty is mooching about halfway between bank and bench
.

‘Every time you let yourself love, it's like being held hostage,' Carol observed earlier. ‘Laying yourself open. We must be mad to do it, and keep on and on.'

‘And yet we do,' he said
.

David observes her now. Matty is plodding over to his grandma, holding some suspicious brown nugget between his finger and thumb. He has the air of a naturalist, discoverer of rare and significant species, who's anxious to log his findings with a colleague
.

‘Look, Nanna,' he says, holding it out to her. ‘Snail's gone.'

‘No,' says Carol. ‘He's hiding in his shell because he's frightened. That's what they do. He'll come out soon, though, you wait.'

Matty drops the snail on the grass and crouches, frowning, waiting for the future to unfurl
.

Carol raises the camera again. She has forgotten everything outside the viewfinder. Just before she presses the shutter, her face is illuminated
.