by Nicola May
Alana closed her eyes, suddenly feeling an intense guilt that her daughter had not crossed her mind all day. She thought quickly.
‘Darling, I’ve ordered you one as the shop had sold out. I can pick it up tomorrow.’
‘But you promised it today,’ Eliska sulked.
‘Eliska, please. I’m very tired. It’s been a busy day. How about I make you a nice hot chocolate, you get your pyjamas on and we snuggle up in front of the telly for an hour?’
Silence ensued as Eliska headed upstairs to her bedroom. Grateful she had managed to placate her daughter without too much trouble, Alana took off her smart jacket and put the kettle on. When silence still ensued, Alana began to worry. She slowly walked up the stairs to find her daughter lying on the top of her covers, curled in the foetal position with her thumb in her mouth. She was sound asleep.
Feelings of love rushed through Alana, and she carefully pulled the duvet up over the sleeping child. As she quietly walked to the bedroom door and turned the light off, she felt a piece of paper underfoot. On it were just four words written boldly in one of Alana’s bright red lipsticks: I HATE MY MUM.
Alana gulped and blinked back tears. Surely she wasn’t that bad a mother. Just as she was considering employing a child psychologist, there was a loud knock at the door. Thank goodness, Alana thought. Inga had come to her senses.
She ran down the stairs two at a time and threw the door open. A tall, smartly dressed woman with grey hair in a neat chignon pushed her way past Alana.
‘Now, don’t dither, Lani,’ the woman slurred. ‘I’ve a fierce thirst on me and I want you to go and fix me a large Scotch.’
– Chapter Four –
‘Beans on toast tonight, kids, as you all had school dinners today,’ Joan Brown told her brood.
‘Can we have chips too?’ Clark pleaded, scratching his head.
‘No, but you can have chocolate ice cream for afters,’ Joan said wearily, going over to do a quick search of his crown for any further nits.
‘And chocolate sprinkles?’ Kent added as Cissy bashed her plastic spoon up and down on her high-chair tray.
‘Don’t push it, Sonny Jim.’ Joan pretended to clip his ear.
She suddenly felt very thirsty again and poured herself a pint of water. She looked at her mobile that was on the kitchen table. Strange that Colin hadn’t texted to say he was going to be late. He was usually as reliable as clockwork. Just as she had that thought – beep – a text message appeared.
Going late night shopping for invitations. See you later sweetness x
‘Silly old sod,’ she said under her breath. She was sure the precinct at Durton, where Colin’s office was, didn’t do a late night on a Tuesday. She called him to let him know and it went straight through to voicemail. She smiled as she heard his cheerful voice and began preparing the kids’ tea.
They had been talking about having a joint fortieth birthday party for years and she couldn’t believe that soon it would be a reality.
‘Right, you lovely lot, television off whilst we eat.’
‘Oh Mum.’
‘You know the rules,’ Joan said sternly, suddenly feeling very unwell. Her vision became blurry again and she massaged her forehead.
‘Mummy, what’s wrong?’
‘I need to ring your father.’ Reaching for her mobile, Joan fell forward, crashing a plate off of the table as she did so.
‘Mummy?’ Skye said again, then screamed loudly. Joan lay face down on the table, lifeless.
Kent leaped up from his seat, acting far older than his nine young years. ‘It’s OK. Quick – give me Mummy’s phone.’
As Clark ran to hug his mother, Cissy screamed in her
high chair. Squidge the dog ran round and around the kitchen table barking furiously.
Kent remembered what his daddy had shown him to do in
case of an emergency and swiftly dialled 999.
‘Hello. It’s my mum, I think she’s dead and I don’t know where our daddy is.’
Mo Collins was rounding the corner to post a letter to Charlie, when she saw the ambulance. Grabbing Rosie’s hand, she sped towards her friend’s house. As she got nearer she could hear the children crying outside. On realising it was Joan she shouted out to the ambulance-men: ‘I’m a friend. What’s happened?’
‘Not sure yet, love. Looks like she just fainted, but she’s still not right so we’re taking her to Denbury General for a check over.’
Mo ran to Joan’s side.
‘The children,’ Joan said weakly.
‘Can’t seem to get hold of her old man on his mobile,’ the other ambulance-man offered.
‘Can you look after them?’ Joan managed.
Mo put her hand on her friend’s forehead to soothe her.
‘Of course. And as soon as Colin gets here I’ll send him to you.
I can stay all night if I have to.’
‘Mother?’ Alana’s mouth dropped to the floor as the tall woman barged past her into the kitchen.
‘That’s me, creator of you, my one and only child – but goodness knows why, for the torment it’s brought me. The word offspring makes sense now,’ the woman declared, her Scots accent almost incomprehensible with drink.
‘You can’t just walk in here after six whole years and start on me. Please go, Mum. I’ve got nothing to say to you.’ Alana went to open the front door.
‘I’ve left your stepfather!’ Isobel Murray’s voice grew more strident.
‘Why, this time?’ Alana was used to her mother’s transient affairs of the heart.
‘He was having an affair with his secretary – been going on for years evidently. Makes a mockery of not only me but the whole bloody Bible if you ask me.’ She plonked herself down at the kitchen table. ‘And I’m drunk, Alana. Drunk as a fucking skunk.’
Alana screwed her face up, finding everything almost impossible to take in. Her hangover was kicking in from lunchtime and this was the last thing she needed. Since her father had died when she was just eleven, there had never been any love lost between herself and any of her mother’s unsuitable suitors. Eric, whom she had only known for a year before her mother turned her back on her, was no exception.
Isobel Murray suddenly put her head down sideways on the kitchen table and began to sob uncontrollably. Alana handed her a tissue and filled the kettle. She had never once seen her mother cry and it unnerved her rather than upset her.
‘It’s OK, Mother, there’ll be plenty more idiots lining up to whisk you off your pretty feet, I can assure you.’
‘Oh, the humiliation!’ Isobel lifted her head dramatically. ‘Where did I go wrong?’
Alana thought she could fill a book the size of the New Testament in answering that one but she kept her mouth shut and put three heaped teaspoons of coffee into a mug.
‘Here, drink this, you’ll feel better in the morning.’
Isobel Murray sat up and blew her nose loudly. ‘Thank you, Lani.’ She looked at her daughter intently for a minute and then at a photo of Eliska in a wooden frame on a shelf.
‘That’s my granddaughter, I take it?’ Pausing, she clumsily got up to stroke the glass. ‘She’s beautiful.’ All of a sudden she turned to Alana and grabbed her wrist.
‘I’m so very fucking sorry for being such a bloody useless excuse of a mother.’ Isobel exhaled deeply as if her whole soul had flowed out with the words. ‘There, I’ve said it. Shit – I missed out the word “shallow”.’
She let go of Alana and raised both her palms outwards, like a preacher. ‘I am so very fucking sorry for being such a bloody useless shallow excuse of a mother.’
‘It will take more than a blue apology to wipe away six years of you ignoring us,’ Alana replied calmly.
‘But you were having a child out of wedlock. You vowed never to tell me who the father was. I mean, what would they have thought at church? Tell me, Alana, what was I supposed to do?’
Alana felt herself welling up now. ‘You were supposed to jus
t love me, Mum.’ She tried to stop herself crying, but a real emotion can never be hidden and suddenly a strangled sob tore from her heart.
‘I cannot believe you haven’t even asked me her name,’ she wept. She eventually got herself under control and then was engulfed by a wave of anger. ‘Now, just piss off and leave us alone! We don’t need you here, either of us.’
‘Where shall I go?’ Isobel said, selfish as ever and seemingly unperturbed by her only daughter’s outburst.
‘You can go to hell as far as I’m concerned.’ Alana pushed her mother out, slammed the front door and put her back against it, then went and sat down and cried her eyes out.
When Alana had not one tear left inside of her, she poured herself a large glass of wine and downed it in one. The even larger whisky that followed caused her to crawl up the stairs. On reaching the landing, she kicked off her shoes, sneaked into her daughter’s single bed and snuggled against her soft, warm neck.
The little girl, oblivious to the anguish of two generations before her, snored gently.
– Chapter Five –
‘Diabetes apparently,’ Mo said once, twice, three times over as various mums questioned why the ever-present Joan was not dropping her kids off. She overheard Emily Pritchard meanly comment that it was probably due to Joan over-eating the wrong type of foods, and Mo glared at her.
Alana held Eliska’s hand and pushed her way through the gabbling throng of morning mothers. Despite her hangover, she still looked immaculate with her full make-up, designer jeans and heels.
‘Where will I find Mr Chambers?’ she asked Dana, who couldn’t believe that after a year of her child attending Featherstone Primary, the other mother didn’t know this. But the quiet Czech girl was not one to judge, and she kindly explained where he could be found.
‘Ah, Mr Chambers, here you are. I’m Alana Murray,’ she said and held out her hand, while Eliska waited outside on the drive.
He smiled, noting that her ‘sugar baby’ lipstick matched his bright pink tie.
‘An agency nanny from Bebops will be collecting Eliska today and maybe tomorrow,’ Alana told him. ‘I don’t have a name.’
‘Wonderful, thanks for letting me know. Is Inga on holiday then?’
‘Yes,’ Alana lied. ‘Everyone deserves a little break. Is Eliska getting on OK, by the way?’
‘Um, well. I guess Inga told you about the kissing incident?’
‘Oh yes, yes,’ Alana lied again. ‘Youngsters, eh?’ She managed a smile, thinking that she’d have to find out what on earth he was on about later.
Eliska hugged her as she came outside.
‘Bye, Mum. I love it when you bring me to school,’ the little girl said, and Alana ignored the pitying glances of those other mothers who were within earshot.
‘Bye bye, darling. Be good for the Bebops person and I’ll see you later.’ She patted her daughter on the head.
‘Oh, hi Alana. Long time no see,’ Emily Pritchard shouted across to her. ‘No Inga today then?’
Alana glanced down at her BlackBerry and then walked towards Emily. She had been the only mother on Eliska’s first day at school who had made an effort to talk to her.
‘The silly girl walked out on me last night, but she’ll be back when she realises the grass isn’t greener, I’m sure,’ Alana explained.
‘Oh dear. I do hope she hasn’t gone far. She said she’d babysit for us next Saturday,’ Emily boomed.
‘Did she now?’ Alana said, suddenly quite annoyed that her ex-employee had already been moonlighting. Her phone buzzed again. She looked down; it was Stephen McNair.
‘Right, must get on, nice to see you again, Emily. Joshua really must come round and play soon.’
‘It’ll probably cost you,’ Emily winked, leaving Alana none the wiser as to her daughter’s antics.
Mo ran up the steps to the GP surgery. She nipped to the loo and hurriedly swept her hair up into its usual bun and powdered her shiny nose. She looked at her reflection and quickly looked away, disgusted at her bloated appearance and grey-flecked hair that was badly in need of a cut. She looked far older than her forty-one years.
She scrabbled in her bag and found an old cover-up stick. Whisking it over the small red mark on her cheek, a present from Ron for getting in late after looking after Joan’s children, she sighed loudly.
If only she could just get enough money together to leave him. It was Wednesday – she must remember to get a Lottery Lucky Dip.
She was thankful that Joan was back home and on the mend. Colin had been completely distraught when he had returned home and found out what had happened to his wife. It was a relief, for all that it was Type 2 diabetes, which wasn’t so serious that it needed injections, just a change of diet and exercise habits.
The ever-effervescent Ffion immediately cheered her.
‘Morning! Grim Lynn is on the war-path as Dr Delicious spilled a drop from a urine sample on her jumper. Heads down, here she comes.’
Mo got so close to her screen to avoid eye-contact that she actually hit her nose on it, sending Ffion into hysterics.
‘This is a serious doctors’ surgery, not a Kindergarten, thank you, ladies,’ the grim one expressed, her cropped grey hair and crinkly jowls making her resemble an old man’s testicles.
‘How many hours till lunch?’ Ffion enquired at ten o’clock.
‘Just the three,’ Mo laughed.
‘Shall we go to Rosco’s?’ Ffion wanted to know. ‘I SO need some lard. I got very drunk on tequila last night – like lighter fuel it was,’ her Welsh accent tilting an octave.
‘I’ll come with you, but just salad and water for me,’ Mo replied. ‘I have to lose this weight now; it’s just getting too ridiculous. It’s a vicious bloody circle though. The more fed up I get, the more I seem to eat.’
‘Bless you, Mo, I promise to keep the biscuits away from you from now on.’
‘Please do, and put both Nil by Mouth signs on my desk!’
A pretty Czech waitress took their order in Rosco’s. Mo thought she recognised her from somewhere but couldn’t think where. She had a Diet Coke to alleviate the guilt of the chips she’d just ordered with her salad – couldn’t resist them – whilst Ffion ordered a burger and gulped back lemonade by the pint.
‘Now tell me about this son of yours,’ Ffion said inquisitively.
Mo Stubbing’s life path had never been an easy one. In and out of care homes as a youngster, she was determined that her own family life would be different. However, being a very promiscuous teen, she found herself pregnant at seventeen. Wanting more than anything in the world to love another human being and have them love her unconditionally in return, there was no question, despite several stern conversations with her carers, that she wouldn’t have the baby.
Oh, how she loved Charlie’s father, but he too was immature at seventeen – a free-spirited boy who lived in the same care home as her. His heart was big and in the right place, but his own issues from an abusive upbringing were significant. She couldn’t or wouldn’t want to rely on him for security, so she went for her best option – Ron Collins, ten years her senior.
Ron had always worked hard at a car plant, making his way up from tea-boy to production supervisor, and becoming a good provider. The guilt of taking advantage of Mo when she was seventeen had always stuck with him, and when she told him he was the father of her child, he questioned nothing and insisted they marry that month.
The relationship ticked along nicely but Mo wasn’t in love with Ron. It was her son’s happiness in a secure family environment that was paramount, and Mo’s sacrifice to this end was all that mattered to her.
It was when her son, Charlie, had grown up and was away at university, that Mo had decided it was time to leave Ron. She didn’t want a fuss. She would just say goodbye and up and go. However, the timing was not good as it happened to be the same day the car plant had decided to make her husband redundant.
Mo was just packing the final items into h
er case, when the bedroom door was flung open by her husband telling her his devastating news.
‘It really knocked him hard, Ffion. Work was his life. Once the redundancy money had run out, he struggled to find a job. He felt a constant failure and didn’t know where to turn. I couldn’t leave him then.’ Mo sighed. ‘It was when he turned to the demon drink that our life became progressively worse.’
Ffion bit her lip as Mo gave a sigh and continued.
‘I tried to help him but he wouldn’t listen. I eventually plucked up the courage to go, but he caught me packing my case, and fuelled by anger and drink he raped me. I became pregnant with Rosie, so what could I do? I had to stay, and here I am now. Unhappy and fat, in a loveless relationship with an alcoholic layabout husband, and nowhere to go.’
When she finished, Ffion had tears rolling down her cheeks.
‘You poor, poor cariad.’
Mo tried to return to her usual upbeat self.
‘Listen to this moaning minnie, woe is bloody me. I just need to pull myself together. I’ve got my lovely lad Charlie, who’s got a good job now, and that little darling Rosie to think about. She is the most loving and beautiful child and I intend the rest of her formative years to be happy.’
‘And happy she will be,’ Ffion stated. ‘I tell you what. How ’bout you take over my three afternoon shifts. I’m starting an evening hair and beauty course next month and I could do with the free time to prepare case studies.’
‘You’re not just saying that?’ Mo frowned.
‘I’m not that nice, Mo. I do need to think about my career path. It’s just encouraged me to do something about it sooner, that’s all.’
‘You’re such a lovely girl, Ffion.’
‘Maybe, sometimes.’ Ffion smiled and raised her glass of lemonade. ‘Cheers to the Mo Collins’ Freedom Fund.’
As Dana delivered the order to the corner table, she was sure that she recognised the plumper lady of the two from the school gates.
She loved the freedom that her new job brought, and by dealing with customers all of the time, her shyness had almost disappeared. She hadn’t received any pay yet, but just knowing it was coming filled her with joy.