Grace resigned herself to waiting for David’s anger to cool, sinking into her new life with Johnny. They both worked the obligatory eight hours a day, then spent all of their free time together. Unstructured by the demands of caring for a baby and keeping home, time took on an elastic quality. Days stretched out endlessly in the present, yet weeks and months contracted themselves into what felt like mere moments.
They did nothing much, really. Each was the only planet in the other’s orbit. They’d come home, have a drink, cook supper or buy takeaways, fall into bed. They made love and spoke for hours, both greedy to imbibe as much of the other as they could. For the first time in her life, Grace felt fully understood. Johnny knew how to really listen, to ask questions that no one else had ever bothered with. They explored each other’s minds and bodies at leisure. The space Sindi left in her life filled up with a love for Johnny that ran deeper and deeper every day. They went nowhere and saw no one. Slothful Friday nights bled into slothful weekends: lacking the structure of work days, Saturdays and Sundays passed in a blur of sleeping, drinking, and fucking. They would sleep until noon, get something to eat, go back to bed until early evening, and then venture out on the town. They frequented bars and cafés, always just the two of them. They drank a lot, laughed a lot. Nothing was hidden; everything was free—they flowed like wine across each other’s jagged surfaces; soothing and medicinal. With Johnny, all her missing pieces came back together, rearranging themselves into some sort of a broken whole. Restored—that’s how she felt. Nothing to hide. With him she could just be. If Sindi had been in it, life would have been perfect.
Grace kept trying to talk to David, but her old home remained barricaded, impenetrable, and he did not take her calls. Some nights, after dark, she stood outside the house, staring at the exposed window, trying to get the merest glimpse inside. Johnny was always there to hold her when she got back into the car, kiss away her tears, and tell her things would soon be better.
Her isolation deepened her dependency on Johnny. They spoke a great deal about family, the making and loss thereof. They had shared the experience of losing parents early in life, but also knew the power of being taken in and nurtured by people who didn’t have to do it.
“I believe in created families,” Johnny mused.
“What do you mean? All families are created. When a man and woman get together, have children—that is creating a family.”
“That’s not what I mean. I mean we choose people. Choose family. Create family in ways that have nothing to do with blood. Scrape it together. Like, even the riff raff, people you’d look at in the street and want nothing to do with. Even people like that. If you’ve both been thrown away, you can become a family to each other. I feel like you and me, that’s what we are, Grace. We’ve seen the ugly side of life. That makes us family. Not a wedding ring or a baby that looks like both of us. You’re my family now.”
This made sense to Grace. “That’s really sweet, Johnny. Yes, we’ve been each other’s family for years.”
They lay together in companionable silence.
“I’d give anything to see my parents just one more time,” said Johnny.
Grace knew what was coming, but mellowed by liquor, she let him have his say.
“Have you thought about it, Grace? Going to see the old man?”
How funny that Johnny referred to him as the old man when, for Grace, Patrick lived forever as that robust thirty-something year old who had thrown her across the room with one hand.
In the intimate space of a late night conversation, had with wine in bed, it was difficult to be angry with Johnny. Grace listened without attacking.
“Why does it matter to you so much, Johnny? Why do you want me to see him?”
“For the reason I just gave you. I would do anything to see my father again, just for an hour. But I can’t. He’s gone. And once Patrick goes, he’ll be lost to you forever.”
“Well, your father didn’t murder your mother. Maybe one reason why you wouldn’t want to see him again?”
“I know, Grace. I know. I don’t know how that must feel. I’ll never know that. But you know—he’s your father. And once he’s gone, he’s gone. You won’t have the opportunity again. You’ll never know why he did it, or what he’s suffered with it.”
“Wait, wait, Johnny. You know an awful lot about him. What’s going on?”
Johnny didn’t reply, but his look gave her pause.
“What? What is it? What are you not telling me?”
“It’s no use, Grace, I can’t keep secrets from you. He made me promise that I wouldn’t say anything.”
“What are you talking about?”
“Aah, Grace! I can’t lie anymore. He’s sick. Patrick is sick. He’s dying. He didn’t want me to tell you because he didn’t want you to feel obligation. He wants to see you, but wanted you to come of your own free will, not because he is sick.”
Grace had no words. She just stared at Johnny in disbelief. “He asked me to find you. That day on the train. It wasn’t the first time I saw you. A few months before, I saw the place where you worked. I told him. He asked me to give you a letter, but I just couldn’t go up to you like that, after all the years. I said no. So he asked me to follow you home. I got your address. He posted a letter. Didn’t you get it?”
Again, Grace couldn’t answer. He had seen her before? That day on the train she knew fate had brought them back together again. God had answered her prayers and brought Johnny back to her. But here he was now, saying he had seen her before, even followed her to her workplace and to her home. He’d known where she worked and lived for months. If she hadn’t opened her eyes and found him in front of her, would he ever have come back to her?
Johnny, not comprehending her silence, kept on talking. “He’s dying, Grace. Doesn’t have much time left. He really wants to see you. Before it’s too late.”
“Wait.” Grace held up her hand. “You lied to me, Johnny. You said you were always thinking about me, that you’d always loved me. If you loved me and missed me so much, why didn’t you come to me the first time you saw me again?”
“What? I’m telling you your father is dying. Listen! We can talk about your romantic illusions later.”
Grace jumped out of the bed, ready for a fight.
“My romantic illusions? You said you were always thinking of me! Always wanting to see me. Now I find out you lied. For months you knew where I was, could have come to me. Why did you wait?”
“I was scared, Grace.”
“Scared?” Her voice rose in disbelief. “You followed me home! That is what’s scary! You made me believe this fantasy of it being our destiny to meet on that train. You see Patrick all the time. You keep secrets from me. I left my fucking family for you. But you were scared? Scared of me?”
“Yes, Grace, I was scared. Scared you wouldn’t recognize me. Scared you would recognize me but not want to know me. Look at you. Educated. Beautiful. A clever woman. What would someone like you want with me? I never even finished high school.”
Grace melted. Yes, of course. She hadn’t thought about it that way. Of course he would have been scared to approach her. She got back into bed. Johnny refilled her wine glass. She kissed the beloved curls on his head, stroked his cheek with the back of her hand. She couldn’t stay angry with him. They had finished their bottle of wine before a subdued Grace asked: “What’s wrong with him?”
“Cancer. Liver cancer.”
“Is it curable?”
“The last I heard there was nothing they could do for him anymore. He was okay when last I saw him. He can still move around and stuff, but he’s not going to survive this.”
Grace lay in silence, digesting the news. Sharing the news seemed to distress Johnny—the two must be much closer than she had realized.
“And he’s not lying. Some of the neighbors saw him at the hospital,” Johnny added.
Grace felt nothing—not sympathy, not revulsion. A hundred more questions raced th
rough her brain. Where was her father living? Who was taking care of him? Was he alone? He had loomed so large in her mind all her days as a killer, a taker of life, that she had never given one moment’s thought to his mortality. He was vulnerable, sick, no longer all powerful. Finally. But the thought of his suffering gave her no joy.
The next day at work, Grace went straight to her desk drawer. She reached inside and her fingers felt the edges of the envelope. She tore it open and took out the single, folded page. It was covered in a scrawled, slanted hand.
Dear Grace,
I hope this letter finds you well. So many years have passed since I last saw you. I know there is nothing that I could possibly do or say to make amends for what I caused you. I am so sorry for what I did. I need to tell you that I am sorry. I think about her every day, and you too. This may be asking too much, but I would so appreciate it if you could give me the chance to see you. I want to tell you how sorry I am. You probably don’t want to see me, but it would mean so much to an old man.
Sincerely,
Your father, Patrick de Leeuw
“Your father.” Superfluous. As if Grace could have forgotten this fact. She read the letter several times, as if repetition would reveal some different meaning. Patrick was hardly an old man and calling himself such was manipulative, calculated to tug at the heartstrings. Perhaps being ill, he felt old. Certainly his life was coming to an end. Grace’s thoughts turned to Sindi. She had not seen her daughter for two months. Was this excruciating pain she felt at Sindi’s absence something akin to what Patrick was feeling? He could not possibly be missing Grace: how do you miss someone you don’t know?
Grace could see how he could miss Mary. Maybe his longing for his daughter was something different. Perhaps it was a longing for a respite from guilt. Did he feel guilt? So many questions. Grace turned the letter round and round in her hands. The handwriting looked shaky. She tried to picture Patrick as he penned the words—at a desk? on his lap?—tried to conjure his features, but could not recall them. Right then she decided to see him, but only once. Once was more than he deserved.
She dialed the number at the bottom of the page.
By now Grace had got into the habit of waiting in the street every day outside the home she and David had once shared, on the off chance she’d see him. Eventually, her strategy bore fruit. Grace caught him one night as he was scooping Sindi out of her car seat.
“Please can we talk, David? Please? For Sindi’s sake,” she begged.
He didn’t speak, just gestured with his head for Grace to go up the stairs to the front door. Sindi gurgled at the sight of her mother, stretching out her arms toward Grace, who reached for her, but was swiftly blocked by David.
“Just go up the stairs, okay. Don’t make another scene out here on the street.”
They entered the house, an unhappy trio, and once inside, Grace finally grabbed her daughter. Sindi clung to her mother’s neck as Grace wept. Her tears of joy, frustration, and longing bubbled up and spilled over into the soft creases of her baby’s neck. Mercifully, David let them be. Once her tears subsided, Grace covered Sindi with kisses, stroked her limbs, and inhaled her soft fragrance. “My baby!” she exclaimed over and over. Sindi had grown so much—it had been two months since Grace had seen her. The child’s features were changing. She looked more like Grace now than when she was born. David warmed up some leftover mashed potato and butternut squash for her, and Grace stood by awkwardly as he fed her. He was wonderful with her, always had been. Her absence had clearly deepened the bond between them. She wondered if Sindi had missed her. Did she feel the loss? She seemed happy enough here with David. Grace felt comforted by the knowledge that the child had recognized her, and was delighted to see her. She prayed that David would have mercy on her, that he would have a bit of compassion and give her at least some access to her child. Sindi needed her mother, as Grace needed her daughter. She couldn’t imagine a life without her baby in it.
After Sindi had eaten, Grace and David sat down beside each other on the couch in the living room. They watched the baby crawl around the living room floor. She had started to stand up against the furniture, David explained, was walking around the room while holding onto things. It felt strangely familiar, talking like this, having David regale her with tales of the things she’d missed. They even shared a laugh as familiarity warmed the room, but then he became serious again and an invisible shield went up between them.
“So what do you want, Grace?”
It wasn’t really a question, more an admonition to get on with it, state her business.
“David, I want to see her, I have to see her, regularly. We must work out some kind of thing, please. Not just for me. Think about her, David. Please. She needs a mother, she needs me.”
“Well, look at you,” he replied, calmly. “You grew up without a mother, and you turned out just fine.”
Grace flinched, but remained calm. She couldn’t afford to take this attack personally. She needed to remain focused. David was hurt and angry; of course he wanted to strike back and inflict pain.
“Yes, David, I grew up without a mother. Losing her was the worst thing that ever happened to me. I wouldn’t want that to be Sindi’s cross in life. Please, let’s be adults. Let’s work this out for her sake.”
“That could have been easily avoided if you hadn’t gone jolling around—” He was getting fired up.
Grace held up a placatory hand. “Okay. I’m sorry. I’m sorry that I lied to you. I’m sorry that I went behind your back. I was wrong, very wrong. But don’t punish Sindi for my sins, David. Please don’t do that.”
David looked at his wife. “So let me get this clear,” he stated. “Let me see if I understand this correctly, because you haven’t yet said it directly. Do you want to get out of this marriage?”
“Yes.”
“So you’re not asking to come back? You don’t want to give up this man and try again?”
“No.”
“Are you sure?” For a second the soft eyes of the David she knew appeared from behind his steely gaze. “If you wanted to come back, we could put all of this behind us,” he said.
Grace couldn’t believe he felt this way, after everything that had happened. But she couldn’t, wouldn’t leave Johnny. They had lost all this time together and were only beginning to make it up. How on earth was she supposed to walk away from that? Grace shook her head slowly. “No, David. I’m sure of what I want.”
They sat in silence for a while, David staring at his hands, Grace at the floor. Sindi crawled up and pulled herself up against her father’s knee, crowing and laughing. He picked her up, squeezed her, and seated her on his lap. She babbled cheerfully, while around them, the final ruins of family came clattering down.
“So, Grace, what do you suggest we do about Sindi? Surely you don’t expect me to just hand her over to you and this stranger?”
“No, no, I don’t want that. I’ve no right to ask. But we could share her. She could live with both of us, taking turns. Or let her come just for short periods to me. Please. I beg you.”
David guffawed. A malicious, sneering sound left his lips. “No bloody way! That’s no way for my daughter to live. Forget it, Grace. Forget it. I am going to divorce you, and I am going to ask for full custody.”
Fear tightened Grace’s chest. She had gambled and lost. Miscalculated. She tried to persuade David to at least give her some access to Sindi, but he became increasingly agitated. Grace begged; she pleaded.
Finally, David said, “I’ll think about it some more, but I really don’t want my child spending time with this man of yours. Now I think it’s time for you to leave.”
Grace had no choice but to scoop up Sindi and give her a final hug. She clung to the child, willing her body to remember the imprint of that sweet skin.
“Goodbye, Mummy’s sweetheart.”
She turned to leave, and Sindi started to cry. The child had no vocabulary yet, but grief came spilling out of her in
the only way she knew. Grace shuttered her ears and her heart as she ran down the passage to the front door. As she closed the door behind her and descended the stairs to the street, her baby’s low cries turned to a full-throttle wail. Oh dear God, what had she done? Breath itself escaped her. She swallowed an unarticulated scream that hammered against her heart: Sindi, Sindi, Sindi!
Chapter 19
Grace spiraled into joyless purgatory. Johnny did his best to cheer her, arguing that David would change his mind once he was less angry; that Sindi would not even remember this time of her life. But Grace, refusing to be cheered, vented at him.
“How do you know! You don’t know David. You can’t know that he’ll change his mind.”
“Oh for fuck’s sake, Grace. David this, David that. You’re right. I don’t know David, and I don’t want to know him. But I feel like he’s living right here with us! It’s all you ever talk about. David, David, David.”
“Well, he’s Sindi’s father! He controls her now. It’s up to him if I ever see my daughter again.”
When the words “We could always have one of our own” escaped Johnny’s mouth, Grace reeled. For the first time, she wanted to punch him. Disdain crept into her heart and made it a permanent residence. For this she had lost her daughter? A man who could glibly suggest that they forget about Sindi and replace her with another? Repugnance seeped into her words, gestures, and body, lacing every expression toward him with a cutting edge. She could not help it—as much as she loved Johnny, there co-existed in her body now the impulse to wound him. Johnny felt the chill even as she tried to hide it. They never exchanged words about this shift in temperature, but it was there, palpable, a pane of glass sitting between them that they could not see, but kept bumping up against even as they reached for each other.
Johnny started making detours on his way home from work, stopping off at a friend’s place or for a round at the pub with increasing frequency. Jealousy made its bed alongside disdain in Grace’s heart. After his nocturnal excursions, she’d greet him sullenly, if at all. Sometimes she’d pretend to be asleep when he got home, but mostly she’d wait, sit in silence, and watch him undress. She would lash him with her serrated edges when he tried to come close. Whatever had lived between them—love? lust?—became brittle. Their love-filled nights retreated into silence, blistered only by the occasional explosive fight.
Unmaking Grace Page 17