The Bad Mother's Handbook

by Kate Long

  ‘Did you get that picture sorted?’ Paul asked, his eyes roving round the room. We were getting better at the post-coital business. ‘The one you broke that time.’

  ‘The one you broke, you mean? While we were scaling the heights of passion? No. Although I did get as far as buying a new frame. I couldn’t get the old one off so I gave up.’

  ‘Bloody feeble girly. Do you want me to have a go? Give it here.’

  I fished about in the bedside cabinet under the magazines and brought it out.

  ‘Couldn’t get it off? What is it, super-glued or summat?’

  ‘Just you have a look.’

  He turned the frame over in his hands and examined the back. ‘Jesus. I see what you mean.’

  Wires criss-crossed the thick cardboard; they had been stapled into the frame at irregular intervals. Blobs of ancient brown glue bulged from the corners. ‘I took off another layer of card and Sellotape to get to that. I thought I’d damage the picture if I went any further. Does it need a screwdriver or something to lever the staples out? We have got one but I don’t know where.’

  ‘Nah, a penknife should do it. Pass us my jeans.’

  He set to work, absorbed. I watched him and thought about my little ghost.

  Finally the sections eased apart. ‘There you go. Just needed the masculine touch.’ I took the pieces in my hands and laid them on the covers. ‘If you bung us the new frame I’ll put that on for you an’ all.’

  ‘Hang on a minute.’ I was taking off the layers of card. ‘There’s something in here. My God, look at that, it’s a letter.’ I unfolded two sheets of thin yellowing paper. ‘It looks like . . . Shit, listen to this.’ And I started to read.

  Dear Miss Robinson,

  Re Sharon Pilkington.

  Thank you for your letter informing me that the Adoption Committee have accepted this little girl for a direct placing adoption. I am as certain as it is possible to be in these cases that the mother is quite definite about the adoption. She will not change her mind.

  Yours sincerely,

  P Davis

  ‘Sharon Pilkington? Who’s she when she’s at home? Somebody’s cut the top off so you can’t see the address or date.’ I turned the paper over but it was blank. ‘Let’s have a see what’s on the other.’

  Notes for the Information of the Case Committee

  Name of child: Sharon Anne Pilkington

  Weight at birth: 7lbs 2oz

  Date of birth: 13.4.63

  Present weight: 9lbs (at 3 weeks)

  Child of: Miss Jessie Pilkington

  Occupation of Mother: mill worker Aged: 16 years

  The Natural Father is: Aged:

  Whose occupation is:

  Recommended by: Mrs P Davis

  The Child is at present: with mother at

  Mother and Baby Home, Hope Lodge, 46 Walls Road,

  London N4

  General Remarks

  Jessie Pilkington is unable to keep and support her baby, she is only 16 and has several young sisters and brothers at home. She feels that it would be unfair on her parents and particularly her mother to bring up another young child. She is unwilling, or unable, to supply the identity of the father, so there is no possibility of support from that quarter. Therefore Jessie feels it is in the child’s best interests to be adopted and have the chance of being brought up in a happy family atmosphere.

  She has asked that the baby be placed with an acquaintance of hers, a Mrs Nancy Hesketh, who is unable to have children of her own. Jessie feels sure that she has made the right decision to give her baby up and will not go back on it.

  Particulars of Mother

  Character: good character and reputation

  Appearance: good complexion, 5ft 7ins, grey eyes

  Health: a strong and healthy family

  Particulars of baby

  Mrs Davis has seen this baby and she says she is a nice little baby with light brown hair and grey eyes. Her skin is very slightly dry in parts. She has a tendency to colic but a lovely smile.

  Additional notes

  No history of mental illness, nervousness, alcoholism, bad temper, brutality, delinquency, history of crime in the mother’s family.

  ‘So what do you reckon to all that, then?’ Paul was busy fanning out all the blades on his penknife and admiring them. ‘Charlie? Y’ all right?’

  I didn’t know what to say for a minute so I read the pages again. ‘Oh, Paul . . . I don’t believe this . . .’ I went back up to the date of birth at the top and my throat went tight. ‘Paul, stop a minute. I think this is my mum.’

  ‘Who?’

  ‘This Sharon Pilkington. Because, because Nancy Hesketh is Nan, and it’s the right birthday, let me just count on . . . 63, 73, 83, 93, 97, yeah. And, oh God, it all makes sense, Nan was really old when she supposedly had my mum and everyone said it was a miracle because she’d tried for years. That’s the word Nan used to use herself, a miracle.’ I’d put the letter down on the bed and was holding my head between my hands. ‘I can’t take it in. She doesn’t know, surely? My mum, I mean. Oh, Jesus, Paul, this is just amazing. It means Nan’s not my nan. It’s this Jessie woman. Whoever she is. Wherever she is.’

  Paul shrugged. ‘Well,’ he said closing up his penknife with a click. ‘There’s summat your psychic didn’t mention.’

  *

  ‘THERE’S BLOOD in your shoe.’ I spotted the smear on Nan’s tights as she knelt to pick up half a Rich Tea she’d spotted under the table. Her joints really are amazing for the age, the doctor at the hospital couldn’t believe it. Wouldn’t believe me either when I told him how mad she gets, because Sod’s law, she was on top form and completely coherent, chatting away as if she’d known him all her life. Even flirted with him. ‘I feel champion today. Are you courtin’?’ she asked him. ‘You’re a bonny lad. Have you a car?’ He thought it was sweet; I thought it was monstrous. I wanted to hit her over the head with a bedpan, only that would probably have got me admitted instead. Maybe that wouldn’t have been such a bad idea.

  I spotted the blood in the morning as I was opening the post. Sylv reckoned – I know I said I’d never tell her anything again but she’s got this way – Sylv reckoned I could just write off for a copy of my birth certificate and that would tell me who my mother was. So I’d been running to pick up the letters from off the mat ever since.

  ‘Have you hurt yourself?’

  ‘No. Where?’ She turned her head this way and that, trying to see down her own body.

  ‘Your leg, your ankle. Sit down a minute. Leave the biscuit. Sit, Mother.’

  She sank down and pulled at her tights. ‘Where? I can’t see owt.’

  Then I saw her heel was filled with blood.

  ‘Oh, God, lift your foot up.’ I squatted down and gently eased off the shoe.

  ‘That’s not my blood,’ she said immediately.

  ‘Well, who the hell’s is it?’ I didn’t mean to shout so loudly.

  ‘Eeh, you’re nowt. I know what’s up wi’ you. What you want is another baby.’

  ‘Jesus, Mum. You are so wrong. What would I want with a baby when I’ve got you, eh?’

  In the end it was only a scab she’d knocked on her ankle and nothing like as bad as it first looked. But pulling her shoe on again I thought, Why am I doing this for you? Who are you, anyway? And when I went back to the post, there it was; my birth certificate. And she was right. I’m not her daughter. I’m Sharon Anne Pilkington, from London, from limbo.

  So my mother – real mother, birth mother, whatever you call it – is from round here. What I was doing popping out in London, God only knows. She must have run away. I can understand that. Only it’s funny I ended up back in the north. Perhaps it was policy then. Maybe they thought babies with northern genes needed weaning on cow heel and parkin. Or maybe they didn’t want me polluting southern stock.

  I’d like to say I still can’t believe it, except that’s not true. It kind of confirms a feeling I’ve always had, that I never
fitted in. When I was little and Dad was still alive, on winter evenings we used to draw the curtains and all sit round watching rubbish: Wheeltappers and Shunters, or Bullseye (super-smashing-great!). Mum’s favourite was The Golden Shot. I’d have a bottle of pop and a big bag of toffees to pass round, and there’d be this crackly telephone voice droning on: left, left, stop, right a bit, down, stop, up a bit, up a bit, fire! Silence, groans or the rattle of coins and cheers. Once Dad dropped his coconut mushrooms in the excitement and there were white flakes in the rug for weeks.

  Happy times, sort of, but even then I used to feel I didn’t really belong. Somewhere out there was a Beatrix Potter sort of a childhood that wasn’t like mine, dandelion and burdock and Jim Bowen. I can remember thinking, Is this all there is? So perhaps I should have stayed in London. With my mother.

  I imagine her looking like Julie Christie, swinging her bag and wearing a short belted mac and black eyeliner. I bet she sat in cafes and looked soulful when she was pregnant, with the rain lashing down outside and people hurrying past. Everyone’s always in a hurry in London. Or maybe that’s just an image from some film I’ve seen. It seems like a real memory, now I know the truth. Can you do that, tune into other people’s memories?

  The next step, apparently is to contact the Adoption Register. It’s a list of people who want to trace each other, so if Jessie Pilkington wants to find me, she can.

  I’m sure she’ll want to. I can hardly wait.

  *

  People were moving as if they were under water, ponderously. The air was thick and warm, you could tell it had just been in someone else’s lungs. The beat of the music pummelled your chest, and then the strobe started up making everything look jerkily surreal. I closed my eyes but the light cut straight through the lids.

  Fifty-five minutes to go till closing.

  I was in Krystal’s Nite Club in Wigan, and it was one of those times where you think, I should have stayed in.

  Gilly Banks’ birthday and at least half the lower sixth were there, maybe all of us; I hadn’t exchanged two words with her since the beginning of term and I’d got an invite, so she wasn’t being particularly discriminating with her guest list. ‘+ friend’ it had said on the gold-coloured card, but I was on my own because I’d had a row with mine.

  ‘Do you think we ought to try summat different?’ Paul had said after the last session. When his hair’s all ruffled from sex he looks almost too pretty, like something out of a Boy Band. That day, though, it was irritating, not cute.

  ‘What, you mean like actually going out somewhere? Or talking to each other? That would be a novelty.’ I’d been in a temper all week, what with the burden of the Nan revelation and the next History module coming up, and feeling sort of generally not myself. He’d also managed to locate the only Valentine card in the universe which didn’t have the word Love on it.

  ‘All right, there’s no need to take my head off. We’ll go to t’ pictures if you’re that bothered, bloody hell. I just meant we could try some new positions, I’ve been reading up on it.’ He pulled out a magazine from under his bed and began to flick through. ‘There’s this one where you get on top but face my feet.’

  ‘Sounds charming, what a view.’

  ‘No, come on, don’t be like that. It’s supposed to mean you can, er, Control your own Pleasure. Or summat. I can’t remember exactly. Oh, forget it.’ He flung the magazine across the room and began feigning interest in a ragged fingernail. ‘I just thought . . .’

  ‘What?’

  ‘Nothing.’

  ‘It’s this orgasm thing again, isn’t it?’ I reached for my knickers so I could argue with more dignity. ‘Why do you keep going on about it? What’s the big deal? It’s not an issue. But I’m beginning to feel like there’s something wrong with me.’

  He opened his mouth and the words dropped out. ‘Well, you could nip down the doctors and get yourself checked over. Check there’s nothing . . . amiss.’

  (‘YOU OK?’ shouted Gilly over the racket. ‘HAVING A GOOD TIME?’ She was breezing past on her way to the bar, birthday girl, in combats and a little vest, bra strap showing. She’s one of those people who doesn’t give a toss. I bet she has loads of orgasms.

  ‘OH, YES. EXCELLENT. NICE ONE.’ I raised my glass through the smoke and smiled at her and Paul’s voice said again in my ear, ‘Get yourself checked over.’ Bastard.)

  ‘Bastard!’ I’d shouted at him, before pulling on the rest of my clothes in a frenzy. ‘I can’t believe what you just said! What the hell are you suggesting? That I’m abnormal?’

  He lay there chewing his nail and watched me struggle with my trousers. I’d got my toe caught in the hem and was pushing at the stitching, making it rip, wanting it to rip.

  ‘You want to watch it, you’ll tear ’em.’

  ‘Jesus!’ Some threads gave and my foot shot out. I staggered against the bed end.

  ‘All I meant was, it’s not been, oh, you know. Like you hear it’s going to be.’ He looked embarrassed, but resolute, like he was going to say his piece whatever. He held out his hand to me in a gesture that might have been meant to reassure. ‘Did you not think the same though, really?’

  ‘And could it not be,’ I put my burning face close to his, ‘and could it not perhaps be that it’s you who’s getting it wrong? That it’s your amazing technique that’s failing to deliver?’ I nodded at his flaccid cock which lay across his thigh innocently. ‘That your mighty equipment is not quite up to the job?’

  He pulled the sheets across himself and flushed.

  ‘No,’ he snapped. ‘’T i’nt, actually.’

  ‘Really?’

  ‘No. An’ I’ll tell you why.’

  ‘Go on.’ I sensed what was coming.

  ‘Because. Because Jeanette Piper never had any trouble, that’s why.’

  So I finished dressing and let myself out. Past next door’s sad Alsatian, past the bench with no slats left, and the tyre-marked verges, past the shattered bus shelter and home to my room where I cried for half an hour.

  It’s true, he never actually said he was a virgin. But then again, he didn’t say he wasn’t. I should’ve kept asking, only, what do you do if you don’t hear the answer you want? ‘Stop, it’s all off, put your underpants back on; I only sleep with the undefiled!’ I don’t think so. And it’s not something he could have done anything about, you can’t rewind time. Once It’s gone, It’s gone. I should bloody know.

  No, it wasn’t the fact that he was one step ahead, though to be honest it’s not nice knowing he’s dipped his wick elsewhere (thank God I don’t even know this Jeanette Piper, I think she lives in Standish. He did say she was a bit of a dog before I slammed out, but that was probably only to make me feel better). No, it’s what he said before. About me. My defective body. What if it turned out to be true?

  ‘OVER THERE, BY THE BAR. I THINK YOU’VE GOT AN ADMIRER!’ twinkled Gilly as she squeezed past, a pint glass in each hand.

  I squinted across the room but it was all heads and bodies and there was a great fat man in front of me. I stepped backwards into a bit of a gap and immediately trod on someone’s toe.

  ‘Sorry. SORRY.’

  It was Daniel Gale, recently arrived in our sixth form from somewhere down south and already dismissed as a boring swot. He swept a hand through his wild hair and grinned weirdly. What was someone like him doing here, for God’s sake? He should have been at home chasing Internet porn.

  ‘ACTUALLY,’ he leaned closer, ‘IT’S A PROSTHETIC.’

  ‘A WHAT?’ I was still trying to see over to the bar.

  ‘GALVANIZED STEEL AND PLATINUM BONDED. BIONIC. I HAD IT FITTED AFTER A TERRIBLE FREAK ACCIDENT. YOU COULD DROP A MINI COOPER ON HERE AND I WOULDN’T FEEL A THING. IT’S FULLY MAGNETIZED TOO. IF YOU DROPPED ME IN THE SEA MY TOES WOULD POINT NORTH.’

  ‘YOU WHAT?’

  His shirt lit up dramatically as the ultraviolet came on: it made his head look disembodied and wobbly. I don’t know what my face wa
s doing but I don’t think it was registering anything very positive. His glasses flashed reproachfully at me and he opened his mouth, then shut it again. ‘JOKE,’ he finished sadly and drifted away, shoulders hunched.

  It was then I spotted him; a tall bloke leaning against a pillar, watching me. Black jacket slung over his shoulder like a catalogue model, dark curly hair, thin nose, might have been all right but it was difficult to tell from a distance. He waved. I looked away. I looked back. He started to come over, smiling. Bollocks, I thought. Then, well why the hell not? Teach that bastard Paul, wouldn’t it?

  It wasn’t till he got really close that I could see the leather pants.

  Now the only stuff I know about leather pants, not owning a pair myself, is what I heard some stand-up cockney comedian say once, that they turned your privates into a fiery furnace. As he got closer I could see he was quite nice-looking, but the thought of the turkey-neck testicle skin and the accordian-wrinkled penis cooking gently in there persisted and my brow furrowed.

  ‘PENNY FOR THEM,’ he said as he reached me.

  I could hardly say I was thinking about his genitals.

  ‘YOU LOOK LIKE YOU’RE IN ANOTHER WORLD. YOU DO. WITH YOUR BIG EYES. LIKE YOU’RE WAITING TO BE RESCUED. LIKE A PRINCESS.’ He put his hand on my arm. I didn’t move. ‘SO WHERE DO YOU COME FROM?’

  I couldn’t think of an appropriate reply to this – there was no way I was going to utter the words ‘Bank Top’ – so I reached up and glued my lips to his. Out of the corner of my eye I could see Daniel Gale watching us, so I shifted round and put my back to him.

  This guy knew how to kiss, that was for sure. No bits of escaping spit, no feats of ridiculous jaw-stretching or clashing front teeth, just a nice lazy action. I let myself go with it and after a while we found ourselves a corner and settled in for what was left of the night. The leather pants felt odd under my hands but also safe in a reinforced sort of way. You couldn’t feel anything personal through them, just the lumps and bumps of folds where they creased. We had the last dance together, well we stood on the dance floor and snogged while slowly pivoting, then the lights came on and we were suddenly blinking at each other and looking sheepish. It was then I realized how much older he was.