The Day Of Second Chances

by Julie Cohen

  ‘And it was exactly as it’s described in the books.’ Lydia said it like the often-repeated phrase that it was. They had gone through this story many times before, the story of the moment when her mother and her father had fallen in love.

  ‘It was,’ Jo said. ‘Exactly. He had the most beautiful hazel eyes, just the same colour as yours, Lydia. We stood there staring at each other in that café for what felt like for ever but I suppose it was only a few seconds. I don’t think I breathed for the entire time. And then he cleared his throat and asked me if we could see each other after I finished work, and the rest is history. Instead of going to uni, I married him, and then you came along.’

  ‘But how did you know he loved you? I mean, how did you know?’

  ‘Your father had a wonderful gift of concentration,’ said Jo. ‘I’d seen it already with the way he studied his books, which was part of why I was attracted to him, I think. But it wasn’t just Physics. When he loved something or someone, he threw himself wholly into his feelings. I never doubted that he loved me. It was in everything he said, everything he did. The way he touched me, and looked at me. And you know, he shouldn’t have fallen in love with me. He was about to get a First in Physics at Cambridge, he had a brilliant career in front of him, and I was a waitress in a café with no university education. But your dad didn’t care about any of that. He loved me, and that was enough for him. He was exactly the same way with you, when you were born. You were his world.’

  ‘If it was like that, why did you settle for someone like Richard? Doesn’t that cheapen what you had?’

  ‘My marriage to Richard wasn’t the same as my marriage to your dad,’ said Jo carefully, ‘and it didn’t end well, but that doesn’t mean it was cheap. We have Oscar and Iris now. I wouldn’t change anything for the world, if it meant losing them. Just like how I wouldn’t change a thing that happened with your dad, even though we lost him. All the pain was worth it, because of the good things, because I loved him.’

  ‘But you didn’t love Richard.’

  ‘Why do you say that?’

  Lydia let out a huff of exasperation. ‘All that stuff you just said. Richard never treated you that way. And you were never happy with him, not really.’

  ‘Lydia, when you’re grown up, you’ll realize that there are lots of different kinds of—’

  ‘Bullshit.’

  Jo blinked. ‘Pardon?’

  ‘Bullshit. There’s only one kind of love, and that’s the kind of love that you feel for ever. Even if you can’t have it, you still feel it. You never let the person you love go, and you never stop missing them.’

  She was so vehement that Jo risked a glance at her, even though the traffic was getting heavier.

  ‘Yes,’ she said. ‘You’re right. You deserve honesty. I married … I married Richard because he was – he seemed steady. It wasn’t easy, Lydia, working fulltime as a single mother. He seemed like a good choice. I thought he would look after us. And I cared for him. I really did care for him.’

  ‘But you didn’t love him.’

  ‘I … he swept me off my feet. You know what Richard is like. I thought at the time that it was the right thing to do.’

  And it was springtime. Springtime and I didn’t want to remember. I wanted something else to think about when I lay awake at night.

  ‘I thought it was right,’ she said again, hearing the weakness in her own voice.

  ‘Don’t do it again, Mum. Don’t go with some guy just because he’s good-looking and you fancy him, and because you think it might be a good idea, or because you need a man to make you feel better about yourself.’

  Jo gripped the steering wheel and tried to ignore the insult. She tried to hear what Lydia was really saying, underneath the accusations and the anger. The hurt, and what had caused it.

  ‘Is that what you felt it was when I married Richard? Did you feel that I was betraying your father?’

  ‘Just don’t. Don’t. Please?’

  ‘All right.’

  ‘Promise me.’ The girl leaned forward in her seat, straining against the seatbelt, her arm braced against the dashboard, trying to look into her mother’s face. Full of the same intensity that her father had used to have, the same hazel eyes. ‘Promise me you won’t.’

  ‘I promise.’

  When they arrived at the hospital, Honor was sitting in a chair next to the main entrance, her belongings beside her in a neat pile.

  ‘Hello!’ said Jo, as usual wondering whether she should offer to shake hands or kiss, and deciding on neither. ‘I hope you haven’t been waiting long?’

  Honor only shrugged, which Jo took as meaning that yes, she’d been waiting for ages. She stood up by herself and walked slowly with her cane out of the sliding doors towards the car, which Jo had left on double yellow lines, hazard lights flashing, with Lydia in the back seat to guard it. After their conversation, with that oddly intense bit, Lydia had plugged herself back into her phone and put her music back on, as if she’d said all she intended to say and now the topic was closed. And Jo hadn’t pushed it, too busy concentrating on the directions from the satnav.

  ‘Looks as if you’re getting on well with that cane,’ Jo said, opening the car door for her.

  ‘Irritating thing.’ Honor handed Jo the cane. She winced, and Jo hurried to take her arm.

  ‘Let me help you up into the car.’

  She supported Honor’s arm, kept her steady as she stepped up into the Range Rover. Honor let out a little huff of breath as she pulled herself up, which was her only betrayal of pain.

  ‘Can I help you with—’

  ‘I can buckle a seatbelt,’ snapped Honor, though by the time Jo had put Honor’s belongings in the boot, then come round to her own side of the car, Honor was only just clicking the belt closed. She stared ahead through the windscreen, her face unsmiling. Lydia had greeted her grandmother when she’d climbed in, but now she was firmly plugged back into her headphones.

  ‘Well,’ Jo said cheerfully, ‘let’s get going!’

  Honor said little as they drove. Jo tried asking about the hospital food, and the doctors and nurses she’d met, about Honor’s physical therapy sessions, but it was as hard as trying small talk with Lydia, so she gave up and listened to the satnav’s pleasant voice instead.

  She pulled up on the double yellow lines in front of Honor’s house and put on the hazard lights again. ‘I’ll just write a little note for the windscreen, and hopefully we won’t get a ticket,’ she said, and then looked at Honor, whose face was inscrutable. ‘It must be good to see your house again.’

  ‘For the last time in a while,’ Honor said sourly and unbuckled herself. She got out of the car more easily than she’d got in, by sort of sliding off the seat. She stood on the pavement looking up at the flight of stairs to her front door. To Jo, it looked more or less like Everest.

  ‘So, we can help you up these, no problem. Right, Lyddie?’ Lydia, who had at last taken her earphones out, nodded.

  ‘I can climb these stairs. I don’t need help.’

  ‘But we’re happy to—’

  Honor turned to Jo. ‘This is all going to work out a lot better,’ she said, ‘if you stop offering me help. If I need help, I will ask for it.’

  It felt like a slap. ‘Oh. Oh, well, all right then, that is good to know. How about – how about Lydia stays here to keep you company and I’ll go on ahead and put the kettle on.’

  She flew up the stairs, opened the door and retreated to the kitchen. It was probably unfair to leave Lydia in charge of Honor, but Jo felt a sharp reply hovering on her tongue and she knew she couldn’t. They had to get off on the right foot. They had to.

  Honor was an old lady, in a lot of pain, facing a lot of changes. She was bound to be tetchy for a while.

  She has been tetchy since I’ve known her. And she has never, ever liked me. Jo tried to suppress the thought, and filled the kettle with fresh water.

  The house felt abandoned. The fresh scent of cleaning
fluid had dissipated and it smelled like old linoleum and damp. Dust lay in a film over everything. It was best Honor wasn’t coming back here to live right away; she’d never be able to keep on top of it, and she wouldn’t like a stranger in her house.

  Is it going to be any better with her in my house?

  Jo found a fresh cloth and wiped down the kitchen surfaces, listening for signs of life upstairs. It was going to be a struggle for Honor to get up those stairs; she wouldn’t want more of an audience than necessary. The kettle had boiled and she had wiped down everything, swept the kitchen floor, opened the window to let a bit of air in, and set out a tea tray with pot, cups, spoons, strainer, sugar and milk jug, before she heard voices. She rinsed and folded the cloth, hung it to dry, and put the kettle on to re-boil before she went upstairs.

  Lydia had brought a chair for her grandmother from the living room, and was standing beside her taking instructions about what Honor wanted. She was smiling, nodding patiently, and Jo felt a wave of love for her daughter.

  Honor, on the other hand, was pale and her face was shiny with sweat. Jo bit back an exclamation of concern, knowing it wouldn’t be welcome, and went to the car to get the flask of milk and the biscuits. It took her fewer than ten seconds to climb the stairs to the front door. It had taken Honor nearly twenty minutes.

  We are doing the right thing, she told herself again.

  ‘Just sit there and relax,’ she said to Honor, as chirpily as she could, ‘and Lydia and I will have everything packed in no time.’ She held up a flask. ‘I brought some milk; I’ll make you a lovely cup of tea while you wait. You’ve probably been dying for a decent cuppa.’

  ‘Tea is just about the only palatable thing that the NHS can make.’

  ‘I’ll be back in a tick!’

  She made the tea properly, warming the pot, measuring from Honor’s canister of loose tea. At home, she dunked a tea bag. But she was going to have to make an effort now. She put the canister on the table in a prominent place, to remember to take with them; it would be a comfort to Honor to have the tea she was used to.

  When she brought the tray up, Honor looked a bit better. ‘My father bought this house,’ she said to Jo. ‘I’ve lived here for most of my life, except for my time at Oxford. I don’t like to think of it empty.’

  ‘Well, it’s not for long.’ She put the tray on the hall table and poured the tea. ‘As soon as you’re healed you’ll be back home. Now, what do you need us to pack?’

  ‘I’ve written lists.’ Honor gave her a folded piece of A4. ‘This is what I need from my bedroom. Lydia is doing my study.’

  ‘No problem at all.’

  ‘Where …’ Honor began, and then she paused. Jo, who had never witnessed Honor lost for words, put the milk jug down.

  ‘What happened … to the blood?’ Honor gestured at the floor in front of her chair, the path into the living room. Her hand, lined with veins, was shaking slightly.

  ‘Oh, I cleaned it up when I came to fetch some things for you for the hospital.’

  ‘You shouldn’t have done that.’

  ‘Of course I should! You wouldn’t have wanted to come home to that mess.’

  ‘I still see it,’ Honor muttered. ‘Like I still see Stephen.’

  She was gazing fixedly at the floor, the way she’d stared out of the windscreen of the car earlier. Jo had the distinct impression that those words had not been said for her to hear.

  ‘I’ll just push this table closer so you can reach the tea tray,’ Jo said, ‘and I’ll make a start.’ She fled upstairs, as she’d fled downstairs before.

  The list was long and comprehensive. It was written in a round, smooth handwriting – not Honor’s, so Jo assumed a nurse had helped her. She began to take clothes out of the chest of drawers and wardrobe, folding them neatly on the bed, ready to be packed into a suitcase once she’d fetched one from the loft.

  It was when she was holding up two blouses, wondering which one was the ‘white with short sleeves’ one that Honor meant, and deciding to pack both of them, that she saw it.

  It had been there all along, of course. It just happened to be framed between the two blouses as she held them up, and her eyes, tricked into looking in that direction when she’d been training them not to, caught on it, and held.

  It was a photograph of Stephen.

  He was wearing his academic gown on a summer’s day. The sunlight shone into his eyes and he was squinting, smiling, wrinking up his nose in the way he had. He was twenty-one years old and it was after his university graduation ceremony, where he had accepted a first-class degree in Physics.

  Jo had been there. She’d been standing to one side, out of shot, as Honor took the photo. She’d been holding a bottle of champagne. As she stood here, now, in Honor’s room, she could feel the cold neck of the bottle, the drops of condensation on her hand. The sunshine on the top of her head, her new shoes rubbing on her foot, bringing up a blister on the heel.

  I still see Stephen, Honor had said.

  After that photograph had been taken, after Honor had gone home, Jo and Stephen had walked from Cambridge station back to Jo’s house and they had had the first argument of their relationship, and one of the worst. Jo had burst into tears, saying over and over again, ‘She hates me. She hates me, and I don’t know what to do to make her not hate me.’

  ‘She doesn’t hate you,’ Stephen said, but he had to know it wasn’t true.

  ‘She thinks I’m stupid and not good enough for you.’

  ‘Well, we know you’re not stupid, and you’re more than good enough for me.’

  ‘I can’t do it. I can’t see her any more. It makes me feel—’

  ‘She’s the only person I’ve got, Jo.’

  ‘You’ve got me.’

  ‘She’s my mother. And she’s not a bad person, she’s just …’

  Jo had pushed his arm away from her waist. She remembered the day she’d first met Honor. She’d been so excited to meet Stephen’s mother, the woman he spoke of so highly. She’d even thought, naively, that Stephen’s mother might be some sort of replacement for her own, who had died the year before.

  ‘Have you seen the way she looks at me?’ Jo accused. ‘She looks at me as if I’m a piece of dirt. And you never said anything, not once.’

  ‘You’re trying too hard, it makes you seem—’

  ‘Stupid? Stupid standing there among all your clever friends and your genius mother, me, the waitress girlfriend, the townie? If you think that, too, then maybe we should—’

  ‘I don’t think that, but she’s only trying to protect me.’

  ‘Protect you?’

  ‘Jo, I love my mother. She’s had a very difficult—’

  ‘She’s had a difficult time? She has?’

  ‘I’m sorry you feel this way but I can’t take sides.’

  ‘And if you can’t take sides, I’ll always lose.’

  Now, in Honor’s bedroom, Jo blinked her eyes hard. She lowered the shirts and sat on the bed, heedless of the clothes she’d folded, and she stared at the photograph of her first husband when he had been young and alive and not her husband yet. In her memory she heard her own voice, tear-choked and hysterical, the angry words she hardly ever spoke. She had desperately hoped that their love would make her his equal, that if she just loved well enough and deeply, that everything would turn out for the best. That they would all be a happy family. Humiliation had crushed her when Honor, raising her camera, had asked her to step out of the shot, please.

  She rubbed the fourth finger of her left hand with her thumb. Bare now.

  That was twenty years ago, a lifetime.

  And now here she was, with Stephen gone, and her packing Honor’s things so that she could take her home with her.

  They had lived through that photographed moment together, the three of them, Stephen and Jo and Honor, and they all had different memories of it, and now it was frozen and nearly all of it was gone. A husband lost, and a son. Only Jo and Honor were l
eft.

  Perhaps they had more in common than Jo had thought.

  ‘I still see you, too,’ Jo murmured to the photograph. She got up from the bed and she touched it, her finger sliding across cool glass. She took in the details of Stephen’s face, not the things he shared with Lydia that she saw every day – the wrinkled-nose smile, the hazel eyes, the attached earlobes – but Stephen. How he looked, the facts of his face. She thought about him almost every day, but it was easy to forget the reality of him. How he had once been here, the most important person in her life. They had been so young. They had learned how to love together, and Stephen had never taken sides no matter how many times she asked him to, and Lydia was right: for all its obstacles and shadows, for all of the secrets she’d kept, it was real love. The kind of love you only found once.

  She traced his hair, his chin, his neck, and then she went back to packing Honor’s clothes.

  Chapter Thirteen

  Honor

  HER FORMER DAUGHTER-IN-LAW lived with her three children in an ugly new house on an ugly commuter estate where all the roads, in some unfathomable quest for intellectual cachet, had been named after English poets. The house on Keats Way was brick and ostentatious, faux-Georgian on the exterior but entirely modern inside, the kind of house that had two cars parked in the drive, one of them invariably a Range Rover, one an Audi or BMW or Mercedes. The neighbours were all white and there were no churches or mosques or synagogues or libraries but there was a Waitrose and several chic coffee shops and florists and even a cupcake bakery in the specially-built shopping precinct.

  Honor did not come here often, and when she did, she could not help inwardly reciting Keats’s Ode on a Grecian Urn. The people who built this estate had very little, if any, sense of beauty, or truth, or irony.

  ‘Here we are,’ said Jo cheerily. ‘Home at last!’

  It wasn’t home for her. Nothing would be where she could find it. Her belongings would be sparse and few. There would be children underfoot and unexpected clutter, and she would be dependent on Jo. Every move would be subject to scrutiny. She wouldn’t be able to hide.