by Imogen Clark
We leave Dad to his book and head to my workroom. Beth is like a kid in a sweetshop as she swoops on my boxes of beads and trims.
‘This is it,’ I say, passing her the fabric. It shimmers in the light. Beth actually gasps.
‘Oh, Cara. It’s absolutely the perfect colour,’ she says and I allow myself a brief moment of smug self-congratulation for anticipating my friend’s needs so accurately.
‘If we cut it on the bias and drape it like this . . .’ I take the bolt from her, unroll a couple of metres and hold it against her body. ‘Then it will fall beautifully. What kind of train were you thinking about?’ I can tell from her face that she has not given this any thought at all. ‘No worries,’ I say. ‘Let me sketch a couple of ideas.’ Reaching for my pad and a pencil, I start to trace the lines in long, sure strokes. I love this part of my job, how the brides gradually see what is in my head as it is transferred to the paper. I am creating their dream right in front of their eyes. It doesn’t always come together straightaway. Sometimes it’s hard for the bride to translate what she wants into words that I can interpret. With Beth, though, it’s almost like translating my own thoughts to pictures. I know exactly what she likes and, while we’ve never discussed wedding dresses in detail, I feel pretty confident that it won’t take me long to get it right. As I sketch, Beth looks at the photos on my pinboard.
‘You’re so clever, Cara.’ Her compliment courses through me straight to my core and makes me glow from the inside. Praise has always been a bit thin on the ground around here.
‘I’m just so delighted that you want me to make your dress,’ I say. ‘Despite the objections.’ It is a barbed comment and I don’t really mean anything by it but Beth pulls a face.
‘I think he just wants to make sure that I have everything I want – and, to be fair, he’s never seen your work. For all he knows, you might be sewing sacks.’
‘Fair enough,’ I say. ‘Well, let’s hope I don’t disappoint him.’ Again, I can hear the sharpness in my response. Beth can too.
‘You do like him, don’t you, Ca? I know he can be a bit pompous but his heart’s in the right place and I know he loves me.’
It’s a thin line between looking out for your friend and bursting their bubble. I remain unconvinced by Greg, but then I’m not marrying him and just because I don’t like him doesn’t mean he’s flawed.
‘I know that too,’ I say. It’s a compromise answer but it seems to satisfy Beth.
‘What did you get up to in London?’ she asks, sliding us neatly away from potential conflict. ‘Apart from buying my perfect silk.’
I have been waiting for this question, pondered on how I might respond. The easy reply would be to say that it was nice to see Michael and Marianne and leave it at that; before I made the trip, this is what I imagined I’d say. Even though I always tell Beth everything, the news about my mother had seemed too precious to share even with her. It was almost as though if I told anyone, it would destroy it, like popping a soap bubble.
But Michael’s reaction has changed everything. If he maintains his position and does not want anything to do with my discovery, then it would be great to have Beth to talk to. In fact, if I don’t talk to Beth then I really won’t have anyone at all.
In the blink of an eye, I make a decision and act on it before I can give myself time to change my mind. And so, I tell her all of it: the finding of the postcards, the internet discovery and finally my discussion with Michael and his response.
Despite the obvious shock of what I am saying, Beth waits until I have finished before she speaks. ‘Oh, Ca. My poor baby,’ she says and puts her hand gently on my damaged one, which is still sketching lines on the pad, as if this can somehow protect me from what I am saying. ‘What are you going to do?’ she asks. ‘I assume you can’t ask your dad.’
I shake my head. ‘You’ve seen him,’ I say. ‘He barely knows who he is, let alone has the ability to deal with something like this. No. I have to do this by myself. Whatever “this” is.’
‘So you really think she might still be alive? Will you look for her?’ Beth studies my face, not missing anything.
‘I don’t know,’ I say. ‘I’m not sure how I would anyway. There was nothing on the internet. And I can’t help thinking that if she wanted to be found she would have left more clues than a box of postcards. If she is alive, though, I really want to know why she left. Well . . .’ I hesitate. ‘I think I do.’
Beth nods. ‘I can see why you’d want to know that. It’s an odd thing for a mother to do, to leave her children.’
I am grateful to her for not speculating further. I have not got to that point myself yet.
‘Is there anyone you could ask? Did she have any family?’
I have realised over the last few days just how little I know about my mother’s family. I was so small when she stopped being in my life that I have never really thought about who else there was around her. ‘I don’t know,’ I say. ‘I suppose her parents might be dead by now. They would be in their eighties.’
‘Maybe Michael knows a bit more.’ Beth twists her dark hair around her finger as she thinks. ‘You could ask him. I know that he doesn’t want anything to do with her himself but surely he won’t do anything to stop you looking?’
I think about this. Beth is probably right but I cannot be entirely sure.
The sketch is finished. I turn the pad round and show it to her. The gown on the page is elegant, simply cut with draping lines, a halterneck, a low back-line and no sleeves. It is Beth to a T, even if I do say so myself. Her eyes sparkle when she looks at it and she bites her bottom lip like she always does when she’s excited.
‘That is completely perfect,’ she says. ‘Do you really think you can make it in time?’
I look at the sketch, doing calculations as to the work involved, adding margins for error, alterations, finishing touches. ‘Yes,’ I say slowly. ‘If you like this fabric and I get started straightaway then I think we can just about get it done. There can be no changing your mind, though,’ I warn. ‘Once I start to cut, then that will be it.’
‘It’s perfect, Ca. Why would I want to change my mind?’
‘Well, take it away with you and think it over for a couple of days. We have that at least. I want you to be absolutely sure.’
‘Okay,’ she agrees. ‘And there’s something else.’
‘You don’t want much, do you?’ I laugh.
‘I think you’ll like this bit,’ she says. ‘Would you please be my bridesmaid?’
What with everything, I can genuinely say that I had not given this part of the wedding a moment’s thought. Now that I do, the emotions that have been bubbling under the surface choose this moment to explode. Tears roll down my cheeks. ‘I would be honoured,’ I manage. Then a terrible thought crosses my mind. ‘You don’t want me to make my dress as well, do you?’
Beth laughs. ‘No,’ she says. ‘You concentrate all your efforts on mine. If you don’t mind, we’ll buy yours.’
Outside I can hear Dad moving about. ‘I need to go and check on Dad,’ I say.
‘And I need to be going,’ says Beth. ‘Greg will be home soon.’
I try not to take umbrage at playing second fiddle. ‘Okay,’ I say. ‘Let me know if you want to make any changes to the design. Shall we say by the day after tomorrow?’
‘Yes. That’s fine.’ She picks up the sketch, folds it neatly in two and then slides it into her bag. ‘You should ask Michael about your family,’ she says. ‘You need to know, even if he doesn’t.’ And as she says it, I know that she’s right.
Later that evening, I sit Dad in front of the television and ring Michael’s number. Marianne answers. I listen carefully as she chats, trying to hear if there’s any change in her voice, if she might know anything of my discussion with Michael, but there’s nothing to suggest that she does. When Michael takes the phone his tone is guarded. I dive straight in.
‘I know what you said the other day but I need to
find out more. I can’t just forget about it. I’m not sure I want to find her, necessarily – I’m still thinking that over – but I need to make sense of it all in my head. Does Mum have any other family?’ Using the present tense in relation to Mum feels awkward, unnatural almost, but I’m determined to do it.
There is a silence at the other end of the phone. A long silence.
‘She had a sister,’ he says eventually. ‘Ursula. I think she’s an artist of some kind. She lives in the States. San Francisco maybe? We never saw her but Mum used to talk about her.’ He uses the past tense. That’s his choice. I fight hard to bury the jealousy that I feel because Michael has real memories of our mother. He can recall conversations, the sound of her voice, her smell. I have nothing.
‘Do you know what Mum’s maiden name was?’ I ask.
‘Kemp,’ he says straightaway.
‘How come I didn’t know that?’ I ask.
‘There’s a lot you don’t know, Ca,’ he says.
I wonder what he is trying to say but then he adds, ‘You were only two when she . . .’ He does not finish the sentence. When she left? Is that what he was going to say? Not when she died but when she left. I wonder if this is progress but I decide to let it lie. Softly, softly has to be the best approach here. At least he is talking to me about it all. I don’t want to scare him off.
‘Mum had a friend, too,’ he continues, his voice less certain now. ‘She was always at the house during the day when Dad was at work. I didn’t like her.’
If Mum was still alive then surely she’d have told someone where she was. A best friend could be exactly what I need. I feel my heart beating fast in my chest.
‘I don’t suppose you can remember her name?’
There’s another pause. ‘No,’ he says doubtfully. ‘It was all such a long time ago.’
‘What was she like?’ I ask, desperate for anything that might help.
‘Can’t remember much. She had long, black hair. I used to find it all over the house. And she had a tattoo of a unicorn on her arm. No one had tattoos then. It was unusual.’
There’s a shout at Michael’s end of the line, Marianne wanting to know how long he will be. ‘I’m sorry, Ca,’ he says ‘but I have to go. Zara has a concert at school and if we don’t leave now, we’ll be late.’
‘No worries,’ I say. ‘Tell Zara good luck from me. I’ll speak to you soon.’
‘Will do. Take care,’ he adds as he puts the receiver down.
I pop my head round the door to check on Dad but he’s asleep in his chair so I head straight back to my computer and load up the search site. Now I know Mum’s surname I search against Anne Kemp and 1959, when she was born. There should be a birth certificate. The familiar red words bounce back. ‘Sorry, we could not find any results matching your search criteria.’
How can that be right? First no death certificate and now no birth certificate.
CHAPTER TWENTY
Annie, 1984
Annie unplugs the vacuum cleaner and wraps the cord neatly around the handle as she casts her eyes around for the final time. She tries to imagine how the room will appear to an outsider. The carpet is worn but not threadbare; the stain where Michael stepped on an ink cartridge is now hidden from view under the strategically positioned coffee table. She knows it is there and so does Joe but Babs will never spot it unless she is crawling around on her hands and knees. Annie thinks it is a shame she doesn’t have any scatter cushions. They are all the rage, apparently. She saw an article in a magazine at the doctor’s surgery. The magazine had been almost a year out of date, so she can only assume that every home in the country now has a full set. She’d mentioned the article to Joe in a light, understated way. He had scoffed, questioned what was wrong with the cushions that came with the sofa and then made a comment about unnecessary extravagance. Annie had been going to suggest that she make the cushions herself with remnant fabric from the market, but when she saw his face she decided not to mention cushions again. They would look nice, though, in a sunny yellow maybe.
Satisfied that everything is in its place, Annie hurries through to the kitchen, where a tray is ready-laid with the accoutrements for tea for two. Teapot, mugs, milk jug, sugar bowl, a plate with four Rich Tea biscuits. Did it look odd to have the tray out ready? And four biscuits? Might that come across as a bit mean? She gets the packet from the biscuit tin and adds an extra two. Now the plate looks overfull. She puts one back. An odd number looks less calculated and of course it is fine to have the tray ready. She is definitely over-thinking this.
Annie cocks her head to one side and listens but everything is quiet upstairs. She kept Cara up a little longer after lunch so that she might sleep through. It will make her harder to put down later but it’s Joe’s night to go to the snooker club after work so he’ll never know. As long as Babs arrives on time, Annie reckons they will have a good hour and a half before she has to go and collect Michael from playgroup. Babs has a little boy at playgroup too, although he’s younger than Michael and much more boisterous. She also has Martin, who is in the second year of school. The pair of them are a handful, especially next to Michael and Cara, but whenever her children are noisy or unruly, Babs rolls her eyes and says ‘Boys will be boys’ as if this excuses everything. Annie isn’t sure that boys do have to be loud and badly behaved as a prerequisite of their gender. Michael never bounces on sofas or draws on walls or traipses mud and biscuit crumbs through the house – heaven forbid! – but a part of Annie admires her friend’s approach. It shows a defiant, devil-may-care attitude that Annie just cannot replicate. She imagines what it must be like to stroll through life not worrying about stains on the carpet, not being constantly aware of how her children’s behaviour is impacting on those around them. It must feel so liberating, thinks Annie, although perhaps that would just be how it would feel for her. For Babs it must be different. You can’t be liberated if you’ve never been hemmed in.
A loud rap of the door knocker breaks Annie’s train of thought and makes her jump. She stands for a moment, taking a couple of deep breaths before smoothing down her skirt and going to answer it. Babs waits on the doorstep, smiling broadly and holding a striped cardboard box tied up with curling ribbon.
‘I brought treats!’ she says as she pushes past Annie into the hall. Annie thinks of the sad-looking Rich Teas on the plate in the kitchen. She wonders if she can put them away before Babs sees them but Babs has gone straight through and is already running water for the kettle. She follows Babs into the kitchen.
‘You sit down,’ says Babs as she comes in. ‘You look done in, Annie darling. Cara still not sleeping through? You have to let her cry, you know. She’ll never learn to settle herself if you keep rushing in to comfort her.’
‘I know,’ says Annie, grateful to Babs for taking charge so effortlessly. ‘But if she cries it wakes Joe and you know how he needs his sleep. He says he can’t work out the odds properly at work if he hasn’t had a decent night, and that costs us money. She’ll manage it on her own eventually.’
‘Not if you keep pandering to her she won’t,’ says Babs. ‘Shall I use these cups?’ Babs dismantles Annie’s carefully arranged tray. ‘I brought custard tarts. I hope you like them.’
Annie prefers doughnuts but anything is better than the Rich Tea that Joe likes. ‘Perfect,’ she says with a smile.
‘I was just talking about you, actually,’ continues Babs as she tips the water from the kettle straight into the cups, bypassing the teapot entirely. ‘A group of mums from Martin’s class are organising a night out. I didn’t know if you might fancy it. I know that you won’t know anyone except me but they’re a lovely bunch – and you can pick up some tips on how it’s going to be in September, when Michael starts.’
Babs has her back to her as she tugs at the ribbon around the cake box, giving Annie a bit of breathing space as she considers how to reply. It isn’t enough, though. While she’s still working out what to say, Babs has turned round and is staring at he
r. ‘Well?’ she asks as she puts the box on the table. ‘What do you reckon?’
Annie still doesn’t speak. There are too many problems. Can she ask Joe to mind the children? What will she do for money to buy the drinks? What on earth would she wear? The questions fly round her head and then are replaced with possible excuses. ‘I’m not sure I’m free,’ she says as a kind of holding response.
‘I haven’t told you when it is yet!’ laughs Babs and Annie immediately feels stupid.
‘No, but I’m not sure I can come on a night out. There’s the children . . .’ She lets the sentence hang, half-finished, in the air, hoping that this will do the trick.
‘We’ve all got children,’ says Babs. ‘That’s why we need a night out. And you’ve got a husband, which is more than some of them have. I’m sure he wouldn’t mind sitting in for a couple of hours. Give you a break.’
‘I’m not sure,’ says Annie. She can feel her insides squirming. Is she blushing? Annie wants to distract her somehow but she knows it’s hopeless. If only she’d listened more carefully to the plan instead of panicking, then she could have come up with a plausible excuse. As it is, Babs will think that she’s either antisocial or not very fond of her or possibly both.
This isn’t the first time that Babs has invited her out. The last time it was a proposed trip to the cinema to see a film that Annie had mentioned. Cara had been on a bottle and Annie had been sure it would be fine. She would only be out of the house for a couple of hours, three at the absolute tops. If she timed it right, Cara would be asleep and Michael would go to bed with no bother. Joe had had other ideas. She had mentioned the idea casually while she finished the washing up. They hadn’t been out much since the children had been born, as Joe was uncomfortable having someone in to sit. She’d suggested her own mother at one point but he had crinkled his brow and shaken his head slowly as if he were considering the idea and then rejecting it. She had thought that perhaps if they did things separately it might get over this problem. After all, no babysitter would be required and Joe already went out at least once each week. When she had suggested the idea, his brow had crinkled again.