As soon as he was born, I started saving for him, salting away a small chunk each month into an account imaginatively called Joe le Nephew. I had no idea if I would ever get to meet him, and it was the only way I could think of to try and show that I’d always been thinking of him. It’s been one of the greatest sadnesses of my life, not being involved in his.
Now, he’s here. In the gangly, man-child flesh, and I feel a sudden rush of happiness as I watch him squinting through his fringe.
I’m not quite sure what to do with all my feelings right now; they’re tumbling over me like a waterfall – grief and pain at losing Mum; relief and fear at having Rose back in my life; sheer affection for Joe.
Affection doesn’t have much of a place in my emotional repertoire, and I’m not sure how I’ll fit it in – or even if I’ll be allowed to. That, as ever, will be down to my sister, who has certainly made it clear enough over the years that I’m not welcome in her life.
Rose follows him out of the car, and she looks terrible. I was shocked at her appearance at the funeral, and it is still shocking now.
The Rose I remember was curvy and pretty and had this lovely, wild, curly hair. She was confident and laughed a lot and just had that certain something about her that people automatically liked.
This Rose … well, this Rose is almost unrecognisable. Mum had stopped showing me pictures of Rose a while back, after that time we were having afternoon tea in Claridge’s, and I burst into tears. I don’t know who was more embarrassed, me or the poor waiter, who was hovering in the background not knowing whether we wanted our cucumber sandwiches or not.
She’s gained weight, quite a lot of it, and her hair is a mass of grey-streaked frizz, tendrils clinging to the sweat on her forehead and neck. She’s still extremely pretty, in a pre-diet Dawn French kind of way, and her eyes have retained their show-stopping glory, but right now her face looks bloated and puffy, not helped by the fact that it’s bright red from the heat.
She’s trying to arrange her expression into something presentable, but I know her too well, even after all these years, not to see the pain and the anxiety creeping through.
She looks old, and tired, and as if she hasn’t laughed in years. It’s painful to be presented with the real-life evidence of exactly how much of a train wreck she seems to have become.
I know that at least some of that is down to me. I’ve always known this, and I spent a long time trying to get her to forgive me – years of my life were consumed by it, until I simply couldn’t be both people at once any more. I couldn’t be me, and move on with my own life, as well as being the grovelling sister who would do absolutely anything to make things up to her sainted sibling.
I gulp, and hope she doesn’t hear me. If I crack, she’ll crack, and poor Joe will be left with two hysterical middle-aged women to mop up from the gravel.
‘Nice of you to join us,’ I say, more sharply than I intended, cringing inside when I see her flinch. Joe gives me a look that says he’s not happy, and I realise I am not making a brilliant impression on my long-lost nephew.
‘The traffic was bad,’ replies Rose, finding enough steel to give me a little glare. ‘Tough tittie.’
That almost makes me laugh, the way she says it. ‘Tough tittie’ – just like she used to when we were kids, and we had a fight about something. I roll my eyes – just like I used to as well – and give Joe a small smile. I’m not evil, or unfeeling, or cruel – I’m just well practised at faking it – and I know I’ve started this off exactly the way I didn’t want to.
‘I’m dying for the loo,’ I say, bouncing around on my wedge heels as if to demonstrate. ‘Could we go inside, do you think?’
She nods, and fishes the keys out of her bag. It takes an age, and I try very hard not to look as annoyed as I feel. It’s not her fault I need a wee. It’s not her fault our mum is dead. It is, however, her fault that her handbag is the size of a small African republic and just as crowded.
‘How are you, Joe?’ I ask, as I follow Rose to the front door. He’s taller than me, even in my heels, and is at that painfully lean stage where he is only growing in the one direction.
‘I’m okay, thanks,’ he replies, super-polite, looking at me over his shoulder. ‘And she’s right. The traffic really was bad.’
I’m being told off, I understand. Gently, but definitely. Good for him.
‘I’m sure. There’s always a bottleneck near Ludlow. We’ll all feel a bit better when we’re out of the heat.’
He nods, and we both stand around awkwardly while Rose struggles with the keys. Finally, the old wooden door swings open, and we all walk in.
I see Rose pause in the hallway, and understand why immediately. It’s the smell. The smell of lavender and fading fresh flowers and the ghost of puddings past. The smell of our mother, and the life she built for us, and the life she was forced to live without us.
The smell of childhood, and home.
It’s the first thing that hits me, and I know from the look on her face that it is the same for Rose. At once so comforting and so painful – we are coming home, but she isn’t here. The person who made it a home – who lined the drawers with lavender and picked the flowers and baked the cakes – is gone, and has left behind this vivid sensory echo.
I’ve never believed in ghosts, or anything even remotely spiritual, but the way that smell makes me feel is exactly the same as if Mum had wafted down from the ceiling, all made of cobwebs.
I feel suddenly woozy, and lean against the wall.
‘Going to the loo, I’ll be back in a minute,’ I say, fleeing up the stairs, practically crawling up them like an animal on all fours, desperate to escape.
Of course, the bathroom is even worse. I shut the door behind me, locking it, leaning back against it and trying to steady my breathing. I look around, and see all the tiny things that make up a room like this: her shampoo, her shower gel, her make-up bag.
I sniff it, inhaling the familiar scents of Chanel and Lancôme and Max Factor, my nostrils flaring as I am transported to a different time: us, as girls, watching my mother put her make-up on, getting ready for a night out or an audition. The skilful way she blended and coloured, the almost magical transformation, the running commentary explaining what she was doing. The way she always used to give each of us a final pat on the end of our noses with her powder puff once she was done.
I see her Pears soap on the soap dish, dry and cracked now, and feel bad for it. As though it is a person, and feels abandoned, untouched by my mother’s hand. I see the new Egyptian cotton towels I bought her neatly stacked on the shelves, along with a dozen expensive toiletry sets I’ve given her over the years – all unopened, still pristine in their boxes. I should have known, really – despite her proclamations of delight at each gift, she remained loyal to certain brands for the whole of her life.
The same soap. The same make-up. The same perfume. Maybe that’s why the smell of this place is still so powerful, so evocative – it’s like a time capsule for the nose.
I use the loo, and splash my face with cold water. I need to get a grip. I want to sit in here forever, sniffing the used towel hanging on the back of the door, touching her belongings, holding the things that she once held, pretending that none of this is happening. But I can’t. I have to go downstairs, and face Rose, and deal with whatever it is our mother has planned for us. I owe it to both of them.
I open the bathroom door, and see that Joe is in his mum’s old childhood bedroom. I don’t go in there – I’m not quite ready for that yet – but I pause on the landing and give him a little wave.
He waves back, and gives me a sweet smile.
‘Mum sent me up here to have a “rest”,’ he says, grinning. ‘But I think she actually just wanted to get rid of me for a bit, just in case you two have a cat-fight or something.’
‘We won’t, I promise,’ I reply, sensing his tension beneath the smile and the banter. ‘That’s not what we’re here for. Anyway, you’ll have f
un nosing round in there. You can try and imagine what your mum was like at your age.’
‘Maybe,’ he answers, frowning in confusion, ‘although I’m still not sure I can take her seriously ever again now I’ve seen this Boyzone poster on her wall.’
‘That was a joke,’ I reply, craning my head around the corner to see that yes, for some reason it is still there.
‘She absolutely hated Boyzone, so while she was away at college, I covered her walls with pictures of them just to freak her out. All the walls, the entire ceiling, the door – everything. It was one hundred per cent Boyzoned up, took me ages. She ripped most of them down, obviously, but left that one up for a laugh. Don’t worry, your mum’s not a secret Ronan Keating groupie or anything.’
‘Oh,’ he answers, possibly looking even more confused. I suppose it’s a little too early for him to be able to accept that once, a long time ago, his mother and I were actual, proper, real-life sisters – who wound each other up and played tricks on each other and spent a lot of time laughing. Bearing in mind he only met me for the first time a few days ago, anyway.
‘You all right?’ I ask, reminding myself that he is just a kid – albeit a huge one – and that he’s just lost his grandmother. ‘Is this all freaking you out a bit? Being here in Andrea’s house?’
‘Yeah,’ he says, honestly. ‘It kind of is. I mean, I’ve never been here before, for some reason – and neither of them ever talked to me about why, or what happened. And I know you’re not going to either, don’t worry – but it is weird. And sad. It smells like Granny, doesn’t it? Like her perfume, and … well, her?’
I nod, and do a spot of rapid blinking to get rid of any approaching tears. ‘It does. And yes, it’s sad. Look, I’d better go downstairs for now – is that okay? Hopefully we’ll get more time to chat later.’
‘I’d like that,’ he says, ‘and I think I’ll probably have a bit of a rest now anyway, like Mum said.’
He collapses back on to the bed, his Converse-clad feet hanging off the end, and closes his eyes. He looks younger when he does that, and almost unbearably sweet.
I take a final look at that bedroom. Rose’s room, the one I used to hang round in when she was gone, touching her things and lying on her pillows and wishing she was there. Wishing she’d never met bloody Gareth, and wondering if there was a way I could secretly arrange for him to die in a tragic exploding calculator accident and get away with it. Wishing that things would go back to normal.
Wishing everything was different.
I look Ronan in the face, and stick out my tongue. Screw you, Ronan, I think. Screw all of this – especially the past.
Chapter 24
Poppy: September 1999, Lime Street Station, Liverpool
Rose has forgotten I’m coming this weekend. It’s the only reason I can come up with to explain the fact that I’m sitting alone on my backpack at the train station, where I’ve been for the last hour.
It’s just after 7 p.m., and the place is packed. A few lonely drunks are staggering around asking for change, and one man is playing a rousing rendition of ‘Let It Be’ on a guitar made of cardboard with drawn-on strings.
She was supposed to meet me here just after six, but she never showed. Since then I’ve been drinking expensive coffee, people-watching, and listening to muffled announcements about platform alterations and the delayed 18.43 service to London Euston.
I’ve texted Rose so many times I barely have thumbs left, and so far three separate, disgustingly cheerful, middle-aged Scouse men have told me to ‘cheer up, girl, it might never happen.’
I give up, and head to the nearest pub. I’ve been looking forward to this weekend for ages. Ever since that trip to Dublin, barely a sentence has come out of Rose’s mouth that doesn’t contain the word ‘Gareth’, and I’d planned my visit to coincide with him being away.
It wasn’t easy, as they now live together. He’s been down to the cottage to meet Mum, and they’ve even adopted a cat from the local rescue centre. They’ve been on mini-breaks and been to Ikea and been to dinner with his parents. Bleeeugh. I’m sick of hearing about him.
This weekend, he’s away at some kind of poncey team-building event in the Lake District. I’ve got no idea what that means – presumably learning to make better financial decisions about other people’s money by bungee jumping off Helvellyn or something. I don’t really care. I just care that he’s gone, and that I might get my sister back for a few days.
Mum’s been all philosophical about it, obviously. When I asked her what she thought about him, she’d just shrugged and said: ‘What I think doesn’t matter – he’s not my boyfriend, is he? Or yours. He seems to make Rosehip happy, and that’s all that counts.’
She’s probably right, but I can’t shake the feeling that there’s something … off about Gareth. Which I know covers a multitude of sins, but I suspect he’s committed them all.
I cross the road, dodging black cabs and buskers, and slam the door to the pub open so hard it bangs against the plasterwork. It’s an old place, near a theatre, dimly lit and decorated with old programmes and portraits of the stars who have played there. It’s also empty enough for me to be able to sit, but full enough for me to be left alone.
I stand at the bar, waiting to get served, and ponder it all. It’s not Rose being in love that’s bothering me. Or even the fact that I don’t especially like Gareth. It’s the way she’s somehow becoming less and less like Rose as the months go by.
She doesn’t seem to ever mention her old friends any more – the university buddies who used to visit for raucous nights out on the town. And she seems to have stopped socialising with the people from the lab where she works, even though she used to adore them in all their geeky wonder. She’s given up on the tutoring work she was doing, and seems noncommittal about the PhD idea, and hasn’t even been going to the homeless shelter where she used to volunteer.
Running a soup kitchen for people who live out of cardboard boxes was never my idea of a good time, but Rose loved it. And now, she ‘doesn’t have the time’ – not now she has Gareth, and the Cat, and is busy being one half of a couple.
I’ve never had a serious relationship – just a lot of silly ones – but it just feels wrong that being one half of a couple means that you have to chop off one half of yourself.
I take my Foster’s back to a table, and get out a copy of Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban to put anyone off trying to talk to me. I probably look as welcoming as Severus Snape, and set about doing some serious drinking.
I’m on my third pint by the time my phone beeps with a text from Rose: Where R U?
Feeling a bit angry and a lot relieved, I tell her, and she replies saying she’ll be there in two minutes. I fold the corner of the book over, and concentrate on the relief. So, she’s late – it’s no big deal. What’s a few hours between sisters?
There might have been a traffic jam on her bus route, or an emergency plant-cell situation to sort out, or she might have fallen asleep on the sofa and woken up in a panic. She’s coming. That’s all that matters.
Every time the door opens, I look up expectantly, grin ready – until, finally, it is her, a whirlwind of crazy curls and flustered apologies. It’s her, and then it’s Gareth, right on her tail.
I stare at him, open-mouthed, not quite believing what I’m seeing. He’s handsome enough, so I can see why Rose fancies him. Tall, broad, dark hair, blue eyes, perfect clothes. But no matter how hot he looks, he might as well have cloven hoofs and horns.
‘I thought you were away?’ I say.
‘I got out of it,’ he replies, giving me a wink and sitting down on the stool opposite. ‘Threw a sicky, in fact – didn’t want to miss the chance of spending some quality time with the famous Poppy.’
‘You really shouldn’t have,’ I reply, gripping my pint glass so hard my knuckles go white. He laughs, like I’m joking, but I mean every word.
‘Isn’t it brilliant, Pops?’ says Rose, still hovering
above us. ‘Gareth says he can get us into this new club that’s just opened, and you can meet the cat, and you two can get to know each other better. My two favourite people in the world. Do you want another drink?’
I notice, as Rose speaks, that her hair is even wilder than usual. That she is blushing. That the buttons on her shirt are fastened up wrong. I deduce from this that the reason my sister was late – the reason I was left fending off drunks and feeling like such a loser at Lime Street Station – is because she was too busy shagging. For. Fuck’s. Sake.
‘Yeah,’ I reply, biting back the sniping words that I actually want to use. ‘In fact, get me two. I think I’m on a bit of a roll tonight.’
Chapter 25
Poppy: The Present Day
I leave Joe to his nap, and I walk down the stairs – still rickety, still made of old floorboards that seem to wheeze beneath your feet – and into the living room. The ceiling is low and criss-crossed with dark wooden beams, and Joe will undoubtedly spend his whole time here having to duck, or rubbing the bumps on his head.
One of the walls, which used to be covered in family photos, is now strangely bare, the outlines of old frames and the vivid patches of colour where they used to be hanging there like ghostly reminders.
I find Rose staring at the flat-screen telly, even though it’s not on. She is lugging two boxes down from the table, and has tied her hair up into a huge ponytail. I recognise the look on her face – it is the one that means business.
‘There’s a lot to do,’ she says, not even looking at me. ‘We’d better get started.’
She sounds bossy, and a bit rude, and despite the fact that I understand how hard this is for her, for both of us, it still makes me bristle. It’s the tone she sometimes used when we were kids, and she was trying to get me to revise when I wanted to go out; or when Mum had left us chores to do while she was working, and I made excuses not to do them.
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