Cuckoo

by Julia Crouch

  ‘But look how close you were to the sea,’ Anna said, looking dreamily at the horizon at the end of Rose’s old street. The sun had finally won its battle with the grey, and now the sea reflected the chalky blue that Rose had only ever seen here, on this coast. ‘You were so lucky, Mum. I wish I lived by the sea.’

  ‘Who’s the father?’ her father had screamed, yanking her hair and raising his fist above her that day in the parlour.

  Rose really, honestly, didn’t have a clue. And she told him as much.

  ‘Slut!’ he roared. ‘Jezebel!’

  It was a good job Polly had stopped him the way she did. Otherwise Rose’s father would no doubt have killed his daughter.

  ‘But you’re lucky, Anna,’ Rose said. ‘You’ve got all the fields and the countryside. Isn’t that lovely enough for you?’

  ‘It is lovely, Mum,’ Anna said, taken aback by her mother’s tone of voice. ‘But I like the sea, too.’

  ‘Well, that’s funny. I always wanted to live in the countryside when I was here,’ Rose said. She had to get away from this place. ‘Come on, then. They’ll be wondering where we are.’

  They walked up the hill to Queen’s Park, where Rose stopped to change Flossie and let Anna explore the playground, which had acquired a safe, bouncy pink surface since Rose had played there. She still had a little speck of the black asphalt that used to be here tattooed into her knee from an over-hasty slide descent when she was seven.

  Rose ordered a cup of tea and some cupcakes for the girls from the café hut. They were doing a roaring trade with the local mummies and their children. From the crowds of kids clutching blue bookbags, it seemed that school had just got out. A few older, secondary-school children swaggered through the park, smoking. They were an alarming sight. The boys had their shirts hanging out of trousers slung so low that they revealed their underwear. The girls, all wellfed, appeared to burst out of their too tight Aertex blouses. The mothers with young children instinctively shielded them from the sight, tutting to one another. You could see them thinking that their offspring would never end up like this, all dishevelled and sexual, despoiling the haven of the Friday afternoon park. But of course, they were wrong, Rose thought. All lovely things get spoiled with time. The little Rose girl did, that was for sure, all those years ago.

  She knew she was procrastinating, but the last thing she felt like doing was going up to Lucy’s house and pretending to be friends. It was even worse now she was here in Brighton: walking the streets had woken up pathways in her memory that she had long ago closed down. Lucy was the other one who ended up pregnant at school. But Lucy stuck with it. More to the point, her boyfriend did. Her pregnancy hadn’t been a mystery, not like Rose’s.

  But it was time now. She had to face it.

  ‘Anna – come on.’ Anna had joined a group of girls on a groundlevel, safety-conscious roundabout and was wheeling around, whooping. She was confident, outgoing and, even with an eyepatch, she didn’t have any problems making instant friends. This was one of the very few things that Rose could call a victory in her life as it stood today. That thought brought back the studio and what she had done. Had Gareth found out yet? Her stomach turned and she felt sick. She bent over and retched, turning a few concerned heads her way, causing a few of the mummy hands to be put around small children again, in case this was a crazy lady.

  Flossie sat in her buggy, awake now, cramming cake into her mouth and staring at the children playing.

  ‘Anna! We’ve got to go now.’

  ‘Ohhh,’ Anna sang. But she came, obedient as ever, and they pushed on up the steep hill at the north end of the park, avoiding a pile of dogshit that stood sentinel in the middle of the footpath.

  At the top of the hill, Rose paused, panting a little. The small of her back felt damp as she reached under her corduroy jacket to rub it. Anna looked up at her with her one good eye, concerned.

  ‘Are we nearly there yet?’

  ‘It’s just across the road there.’ Rose pointed to the house. Her hand fell as she saw Polly standing in the front bay window, her arms crossed, her face like thunder. She clocked them as they moved along the pavement and she ducked inside. Rose lugged the buggy up the steps that led to the house then knocked on the chipped red front door.

  After a few minutes, Polly appeared, with a bright smile on her face.

  ‘Thank God, Rose,’ she said in a too-loud voice. ‘We were getting so worried.’

  Forty-Four

  ‘Is she here then?’ A voice came from behind Polly, and a large-hipped, middle-aged woman appeared at her shoulder. There was a tea-towel flung across her shoulder, and her hair was scraped back to reveal a scrubbed, thread-veined face and a dry skin etched with lines. So this was what had happened to Lucy, then.

  ‘Come on in, Rose.’ Lucy bustled forward and took the buggy, pulling it down the narrow hallway that was lined with coats hanging from hooks and untidily piled shoes on pine racks. There was a strong smell of dust and Nag Champa incense. ‘So, this is Flossie, and where’s Anna?’

  ‘Hello,’ Anna said, popping her head round from behind Rose.

  ‘Ah, there you are. What have you been up to? We were just about to call the police,’ Lucy went on, backing into the living room. ‘You take them down to the kitchen, Polly, and I’ll get this poor baby out of the buggy. My God, she’s frozen.’

  Polly took Rose by the hand and led her down to the back of the house, to a long kitchen lined with stained pine units and worktops. The cupboards petered out at the far end into a large, heavy wooden table surrounded by mismatched wooden chairs. Every surface was covered with piles of papers, folded washing, half-eaten pies and pots and pans. At the very back was a set of French windows through which Rose could see a pile of mouldering bikes and an uncut jungle beyond.

  ‘Where the hell were you?’ Polly hissed, clearing a chair of a sewing basket and pair of jeans and pushing Rose down onto it.

  Rose, who hadn’t spoken a word yet, drew Anna towards her. Something was up, and she wasn’t quite sure what it was. When she had seen Polly’s face in the window, she was worried that Gareth might have found the studio and got in touch. But now she was pretty sure that hadn’t happened. In any case, Polly’s phone was back at The Lodge, and Rose was certain that Gareth had no idea of Lucy’s address or number.

  Lucy bustled through to her messy kitchen and stood in the doorway, filling it up with her bulk. Flossie was balanced on her hip, resting her head on her shoulder, her eyes taking in the new space.

  ‘Poor Rose,’ Lucy said. ‘You’ve really been going through it, haven’t you? Polly’s told me all about it.’

  Rose frowned slightly. ‘I’m fine,’ she said.

  ‘Course you are,’ Lucy whispered, winking. ‘Now, can I get you something to drink, Anna? Would you like a piece of cake? I bet you’re all starving.’

  ‘Lucy’s a feeder, like you, Rose,’ Polly said from over by the kettle.

  ‘We had cake in the park,’ Anna said.

  ‘What – the park down there?’ Lucy said, pointing in the direction they had just come from. Anna nodded.

  Lucy turned to Polly and raised her eyebrows. Polly nodded, as if this were confirmation of something she had been saying to her. Polly moved over to Rose with the cup of tea, and sat down opposite her.

  ‘Look at the state of you all. You all look so windswept,’ she said, smiling.

  ‘I’ve put the hot water on,’ Lucy said, ‘so you can have a nice bath and possibly a little sleep before supper. You do look worn out.’

  Rose wished she had a mirror, so that she could check the evident horror of her own appearance. She wanted to tell Lucy that she didn’t look so hot, either, but she wasn’t being given the opportunity for that.

  ‘You’re in Molly’s room,’ Lucy went on, slicing a homemade carrot cake and putting it onto chipped plates. Molly was, Rose remembered, Lucy’s oldest child, the one she had had when they were at school. ‘Polly’s unpacked your stuff for you. Yo
u can just take it easy.’

  Polly looked at her, smiled and nodded, as if Rose were some sort of idiot.

  ‘Where are the boys?’ Rose asked.

  ‘Molly and Frank have taken them to the cinema. Frank’s her boyfriend. He’s such a nice boy. You’ll love him,’ Lucy said, nodding significantly at Polly. Rose sipped her tea and looked at these two women and wondered what on earth she was doing here.

  ‘Won’t Molly mind if I take her room?’

  ‘Not at all! She’s happy to have any excuse to spend the night round at Frank’s. His parents have one of those big white houses round the park. They’re very well off,’ Lucy went on.

  This all seemed like unnecessary detail to Rose. She looked over at Polly, who continued to smile like a queen bee.

  ‘I could have unpacked my own things,’ Rose said. ‘I would have preferred to, you know.’

  ‘Oh no. This is your break, Rose. You mustn’t lift a finger,’ Polly said.

  ‘Now, why don’t you drink up and go upstairs and run yourself a nice hot bath?’ Lucy added. ‘We’ll take care of the girls. You just rest, now. Come on, I’ll show you the way,’ she said, holding her hand out as if for a child.

  Rose looked at the two of them, their faces full of concern, then she turned to Anna who was, she saw with a stab of anger, looking at her with the same expression. Whatever was going on here, she felt suffocated by it. But they were right about one thing, at least. She was exhausted. Her bones ached with all the pushing and ripping and tearing, the late night, the warm champagne, and the sea air. She took the opening that was being offered to her and followed Lucy up the stairs.

  ‘Now, don’t you worry about a thing,’ Lucy said, handing her a clean, fluffy green towel and a bottle of Body Shop lavender bath oil. ‘Molly’s room is that one, second on the left. And you’re to sleep as long as you need, OK?’ Lucy reached forward and stroked Rose’s hair. Rose wanted to rip her arm off, but instead she nodded and turned towards the bathroom.

  Rose put the plug in, turned the hot tap on full and stood in front of the mirror. Slowly, she took her clothes off. She looked at her body with a sense of detachment. The skin on the pocket of fat that sagged a little below her navel was streaked with a Nile delta of stretchmarks. Her breasts, too, had a flayed appearance: the purple lines, still livid from her most recent pregnancy, looked like veins, or a network of lymph ducts. She took hold of her fleshy hips, a handful at least each side, and jiggled them, watching the loose, unconditioned flesh ripple upwards, sideways and downwards. It wasn’t a pretty sight. Perhaps she had only herself to blame if Gareth had strayed. Perhaps she had crossed the Rubicon, done the unthinkable for a woman of her age. Perhaps she had ‘let herself go’. Perhaps she was a deserving subject for Lucy’s pity.

  She turned and poured a slug of bath oil into the tub, swirling it around and inhaling the clean, calming lavender scent. No. Polly was up to something – Rose knew it. She had to stop giving her the benefit of the doubt. She had been far too lenient with her, had felt too sorry for her, had relied too much on their shared history. She climbed into the steaming bath and lowered herself into the too-hot water. As she lay there, her body slowly poaching, she tried to straighten everything out in her head. But she couldn’t. She was too far removed now from any sort of context to have a view on anything. Far better, she thought, just to go to the bedroom and get some rest. Things would sort themselves out one way or another.

  She dried herself. With the towel wrapped around her, she tiptoed along the corridor. There was a sort of foot-level opening, she saw, on the half-landing that turned and led to the attic floor. She squatted down and peered through the wooden spindles that fenced it off from the room below, which Rose saw was the kitchen. From this spot she could see and hear Polly and Lucy, as they sat at the kitchen table, chatting with Anna. Lucy had Flossie on her knee. Anna was telling Lucy about what had happened to her eye. She and Polly seemed to have turned it into some sort of joke-story – Anna was enacting what the kitten had done, swiping her hand across Polly’s face as if it were a clawed paw.

  ‘So, they don’t need me, then,’ Rose muttered to herself. Polly looked sharply up and clearly clocked her. She didn’t alert the others to it. Instead, she just carried on as if nothing had happened. Rose got up and went to the bedroom, where her clothes had been hung on hooks on the back of the door, a travel cot had been put up for Flossie, and Anna’s cuddlies had been arranged on a camp bed. Rose picked up her own night-dress, which had been laid out on what was presumably Molly’s bed, and pulled it over her head. Then she lifted back the clean duvet and curled up underneath it. Within seconds she was fast asleep, in a deep, dreamless hole.

  When she woke, she had no idea what time it was or where she was. Gradually she remembered that she was back in Brighton, in a teenager’s bedroom. She could hear the whiffle and snore of her two daughters, who someone had put into the room with her. She got out of bed and tiptoed across to the window. It was raining heavily and the night was pitch black. She could see the outlines of the houses on the other side of the back garden. They were all in darkness, so it must be quite late. Rose realised she felt hungry, and wondered if she had missed supper. Taking care not to wake the girls, she slipped out of bed and padded along the landing. She heard voices coming from the kitchen, so she stopped and squatted by the little galleried opening, putting herself to one side so that she couldn’t be seen. At the table were Lucy, Polly and two young people, a heavily pregnant girl and a boy, both about twenty. The boy looked familiar to Rose, but she couldn’t put her finger on why.

  ‘I’m sorry, Frank, darling,’ Polly was saying. She was leaning across the table, her hand on his forearm. The boy, a pink-cheeked, round-faced, indie-dressed kid with a mop of dark hair, nursed a can of beer. His body was twisted around and his head was inclined in a way that shouted disappointment to Rose.

  ‘She’s just not up to it,’ Lucy added. ‘She’s obviously in a real state.’

  ‘I can’t believe she did that to her husband’s work,’ the young woman said.

  ‘She’s ill, Molly. She’s not herself,’ Polly explained.

  ‘I wait for twenty years to meet her, and this is how it ends up,’ Frank said, putting his face in his hands.

  Rose gasped and put her hand to her mouth.

  ‘You’ve got plenty of time. She’ll get better soon enough, and then you can take it from there,’ Lucy said.

  ‘It’s just the wrong time, Frank,’ Polly said. ‘I’m so sorry. I don’t know what I was thinking. The signs were all there that the time was right. I just didn’t have an idea just how deranged she is. But she is your mum, there’s no doubt about that. And you’ve met your sisters, at least.’

  ‘It’s not your fault, Aunty Polly,’ Frank said.

  Aunty Polly! Rose bit her fingers to stop herself from crying out.

  ‘And thank God you’ve stayed in touch down the years,’ Lucy said. ‘It’s only because of Polly here that you’re even going to get a chance to meet her.’

  ‘It’s only because of Polly that we met,’ Molly said, taking Frank’s hand and looking into his eyes.

  Rose’s stomach lurched. So this was why Polly had brought her back to Brighton.

  ‘Do you think they’re going to take her away?’ Frank asked.

  ‘I should imagine so,’ Polly said, patting his hand. ‘It’ll be for her own good. She’s probably a danger to herself right now.’

  ‘I feel bad about leaving those children in there with her,’ Lucy said to Polly.

  ‘I think it’s important to act normal,’ Polly said. ‘We don’t want her to suspect anything.’

  Rose looked at the young man, who was sitting so that she could see his face now, turned up to the light. Of course. His features were familiar, because they were her own.

  ‘Do you want to see your baby?’ the midwife had said, as Rose lay, weeping and groggy from the Pethidine that Polly had insisted she used.

  ‘She
doesn’t,’ Polly said. ‘She was very clear about that.’

  The midwife shrugged and carried the bundle of blankets out of the room, into the arms of its new parents. It was all out of Rose’s hands. Polly had contacted a Catholic adoption agency which, with her input, had overseen everything.

  She must have kept in touch with that agency. Had she kept in touch with Lucy with this reunion in mind? Had she engineered the relationship between the two young people? And Aunty Polly? What was all that about?

  Rose had been wrong to trust Polly with anything, ever.

  All Rose had known about the adoptive parents was that they, too, lived in Brighton. That was one of the reasons she had got out of the town so quickly. It is, as her parents had told her before they left for Scotland, a small town. A place for scandal. A place where you couldn’t sneeze without everyone knowing about it.

  ‘Gareth should be here in an hour or so, Frank,’ Polly was saying. ‘You two had better leave. He’s going to be in enough of a state as it is. We’ll save all this until he’s got over the immediate stuff that Rose has done. Then we’ll move on to her past.’