In Her Mothers' Shoes

by Felicity Price

  ‘Oh, God!’ It slipped out, just like that. She’d have to tell him. Now. She couldn’t let this nice man take her down the aisle without knowing about her past. But she couldn’t tell him here, not with all these people staring. ‘I’d really like to marry you, Steven,’ she said hesitantly. ‘But there’s something you need to know. Something I haven’t told you about me.’

  Steven closed the lid on the little blue box and stood, clearly taken aback, then sat down hard in his chair where he continued to stare at her, wide-eyed. The box containing the diamond ring sat tantalisingly on the table between them.

  The waitress passed by, giving her a rueful look.

  ‘What is it?’ he said after a moment.

  ‘I can’t tell you here, not in front of all these people.’

  ‘When can you tell me?’

  She thought for a moment. ‘Tomorrow. I’ll tell you tomorrow. After netball. We’re going up the coast, remember, to take photos?’

  He sat back in his chair, his hands falling into his lap.

  ‘We can talk then,’ she said. ‘There’ll be nobody around.’

  ~ ~ ~

  The walk along the coast and around the estuary was unaccountably busy on Saturday morning; the whole way Steven was unusually tense, on edge, glancing at her nervously whenever it seemed nobody was around then looking equally irritated when someone appeared around a corner, or voices could be heard approaching from far off. He cursed several times when he missed a shot he would normally have caught easily – a bird that took off as he fumbled the focus, a seagull arching its back and ruffling its feathers to defend its split shellfish. By the time he unclipped the lens cover, its opponent had backed off.

  ‘I can’t seem to get anything right this morning,’ he said.

  Lizzie was waiting for him to say something, to blame her. But he simply clipped the cover on again, wiped his brow with the back of his hand, and kept walking.

  She was just as apprehensive, waiting for the right moment to broach the subject she’d hoped never to mention again.

  As she walked she planned what she would say, but every time she came to the most difficult bit, her mind went blank. Did she want to marry Steven? Did she love him? She liked him; she knew that much. But she wasn’t sure if she loved him. Julia used to talk about chemistry, about the sparks that were supposed to fly between a couple in love. There were no sparks with Steven, but perhaps they would come. Perhaps once she got this awful secret out in the open, she could relax more with him, be herself again. Maybe she would come to love him.

  They stopped to eat their sandwiches under the shade of a macrocarpa tree. At the water’s edge, estuarine crabs were scuttling in and out of their holes. Steven pulled his camera strap over his head, set the camera gently on the grass and plumped himself down beside it. He wiped his glasses on his handkerchief before putting them on again then looked up at her expectantly.

  ‘I won’t keep you waiting any longer.’ Lizzie sat next to him.

  ‘I was beginning to wonder if you’d been pulling my leg,’ he said. ‘If you really did have something to tell me. Or if you were just looking for an excuse to put me off.’

  ‘Oh no, it’s not that. I wouldn’t do that.’

  ‘So what is it then?’

  This was the moment she’d been dreading. She knew she’d been looking for excuses, to put this moment on hold. The people on the track hadn’t been so numerous that she couldn’t have found the opportunity to say something. But each time they’d had the track to themselves, she’d found a distraction – a bird he could photograph, an unusually shaped piece of driftwood, a striking land formation.

  ‘Lizzie, you’re exasperating. What is it you don’t want to tell me? Have you had another boyfriend?’

  ‘No, I … That is, yes.’ There, she’d said it. Well, half of it – the easy half.

  ‘Do I know him?’

  She took heart from the fact that he didn’t seem angry. ‘No. You wouldn’t know him.’

  ‘So how long ago did you go out with him? Is it over now?’

  ‘Yes. It’s over. It was a while ago. Over a year ago, maybe two.’

  ‘Well, that’s all right, I suppose. As long as it’s over. I don’t see…’

  ‘That’s not the … I’m not doing this very well.’ She fiddled with the zip on the backpack then faced him front on. ‘You see, I did it with him and I got pregnant and I had the baby down in Christchurch and I gave it away and came back here and …’

  ‘You had a baby?’ Steven’s eyes were bulging and his adam’s apple was bobbing up and down furiously.

  ‘Yes.’ It came out as a whisper.

  ‘Christ!’ he shouted.

  Lizzie winced.

  He jumped up, strode over to the macrocarpa tree, kicked at its exposed roots and stood there, his hands braced against the trunk, his back to her.

  A crab popped out from a hole close to her feet making her start; she watched it scuttle sideways across the mud until it reached the water and disappeared down another hole. Another crab surfaced; then another. She blinked. She was not going to cry.

  Steven was just standing there, silent.

  She didn’t know whether to get up and go to him, put her arm around him, say she was sorry; or leave him be, wait for him to recover.

  If only Jessie were here, she’d know what to do. Of all the girls in the dormitory, Jessie was the one she admired the most, would like to have remained friends with. Not long after she’d come home from Christchurch, she’d started a letter to Jessie, asking her advice about period pains and why her stomach wouldn’t go flat again the way it used to be. But each attempt at the letter ended up torn into shreds and she’d never sent it. She regretted that, regretted not writing to any of the girls.

  There wasn’t a crab in sight now. The water lapped towards her, the sand was empty of life.

  Suddenly, Steven was sitting beside her. He unzipped the backpack and extracted the packet of luncheon sausage and pickle sandwiches she’d made, unwrapped the greaseproof paper, pulled out a sandwich and started munching on it, his jaw clicking softly as he chewed.

  She waited a moment, hoping he would say something.

  ‘I’m sorry, Steven,’ she said at last.

  ‘Let’s not speak of it again, shall we?’ He sounded tight, constricted, as if he were fighting to contain himself, not let his feelings show.

  It was for the best, she decided. It would be easier for her, too, to keep quiet about it, to keep it a secret. Maybe that way Katharine would be more easily forgotten.

  ~ ~ ~

  Lizzie thought her parents would be overjoyed to have her off their hands, especially so soon after disappointing them so badly. She wondered herself if she might be rushing into the union for that very reason, but brushed it aside. Steven was right for her: strong, sporty, always doing something at weekends – if he wasn’t taking photographs he would be playing rugby for Old Boys’, crewing on friends’ yachts on Wellington Harbour. And he was a hard worker.

  ‘I’m not sure you’ve given it long enough,’ her mother said. ‘You know he’s not the same as us, don’t you? His parents have …’

  ‘Oh, Mummy, don’t be such a snob.’

  ‘Elizabeth, how can you say such a thing? I’m not a snob.’

  She suppressed a smile. ‘It doesn’t matter about his social status, or his parents’. Besides, he’s got very good prospects in his job.’

  ‘Does he know about what happened? Did you tell him about that?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘And what did he say?’

  ‘He didn’t mind.’ At her mother’s raised eyebrow, she added, ‘Like you, he thinks it best if we don’t mention it again.’

  Her father’s first question was about Steven’s prospects. But then he surprised Lizzie by asking about her own career.

  ‘What about your job at the architects’ office? I went to a lot of trouble to get you that job.’

  ‘I know, Daddy. I’m sorr
y, but …’

  ‘And Joe Simes was encouraging you to do that course at the Technical Institute. He must have seen something in you. Surely you wouldn’t throw that all away so soon.’

  ‘But Daddy, Steven wants me to marry him. I can’t keep on working after I’m married.’

  Her father sighed. ‘I suppose not.’

  On Sunday afternoon, when Steven came round to formally ask her father for her hand in marriage, affecting a confidence she knew he didn’t entirely have, her father said yes. Eventually.

  Steven told her later there’d been a lot of discussion, though he never told her what about, and that her father had a bit of a heart-to heart with him, ‘as a future son-in-law’ he’d said, but the end result was what she wanted.

  ‘So that means it’s a yes?’ Steven said when they were alone on the front porch. ‘You will marry me?’

  ‘Yes.’

  He slipped the ring on her finger.

  ~ ~ ~

  The wedding preparations absorbed her mother from that moment on. Lizzie could tell she was determined to see her daughter return to some sort of social standing, as if the past had never happened. The wedding was to be done properly: St Mary’s Anglican Church in Karori Road, with the vicar presiding; a traditional long white dress, flowing silk, pearl buttons, with guipure lace bodice and sleeves, her mother’s triple string of pearls – because her mother wanted to keep up appearances, even though she knew virginal white was not quite telling the truth; Julia, her only bridesmaid, and Penny, the flowergirl, in pale aqua satin, three-quarter length frocks with scalloped hems; and the venue for the reception? Despite all her objections, her father insisted on hiring his cricket club rooms: the Karori Pavilion.

  Chapter 8.

  London, Late 1986.

  The Harrods saleslady, immaculate in black, not a hair out of place, took the Bunnykins mug and bowl from Liz and started to wrap them in tissue.

  ‘Thanks, Mum,’ Jessie said, nudging against her affectionately, a touch of intimacy in the midst of crowded commercial excess.

  Behind them in the queue for the sales counter was a crush of people from seemingly every country in the world. Liz had never seen so many different coloured faces, never heard so many foreign languages, never imagined so many people could be so wealthy. Some of the big spenders were women, covered from head to toe in a black sheet, anonymous, a bit scary; all you could see of them through the post-box opening in the shroud were their heavily made up eyes, beautiful eyes. But these strangely dressed women were just as attached to the Bunnykins china as she was.

  ‘Bunnykins is traditional,’ she said, studying the brown bunnies leaping across the grassy rim of the plate. ‘You had one when you were a baby, and so did I. I want your little girl to have one too when she’s born.’

  ‘Hopefully that’s not going to be too far away,’ Jessie said, cupping a hand under her full-term belly.

  ‘Well I hope it’s not today,’ Liz said as she handed over her credit card to pay. ‘I don’t know how you manage it, on your feet all afternoon pushing though these crowds of people – you’ll be worn out.’

  ‘I’m fine, Mum, really. Pregnant women don’t stay locked up at home these days, you know.’

  ‘No, maybe not, but at nine months, Jessie, you ought to take it easier.’ She took the chit from the saleswoman and signed: Liz Davidson. She’d practiced that signature so many times before marrying Steven. Lizzie had sounded too juvenile for a married woman; Elizabeth Davidson was such a mouthful; she’d settled on Liz. She handed the Harrods receipt back to the woman, thanked her and turned back to her daughter.

  Jessie rolled her eyes. ‘I’m fine. I’m a big girl now. Very big.’

  Liz took the Harrods bag with its present for Jessie’s baby.

  ‘Why don’t we go to the tearooms upstairs,’ Jessie added. ‘I wouldn’t mind a bit of a sit-down.’

  There was another queue to get in, but at last they were seated and a waitress arrived to take their order.

  ‘My shout,’ Liz had said when ordering tea and scones. ‘You need building up.’

  ‘I’ve put on quite enough as it is,’ Jessie said.

  ‘You’ll be losing most of it soon.’ Lizzie looked around at the veritable United Nations collected in the café. ‘I can’t believe I’m really here, you know. I never thought I’d get to Harrods, ever.’

  ‘You should have come over ages ago, Mum.’

  Liz had been thinking about it for the four years her daughter had been in England, but hadn’t been able to persuade Steven. He always said he hadn’t been out of New Zealand all his life and wasn’t about to start now. ‘I know, but your father…’

  ‘He’s so insular. Always has been.’

  ‘I wouldn’t miss this for the world.’ Liz smiled, indicated the bustling tearoom, and patted her daughter’s hand.

  ‘It’s good to see you smile, Mum.’ Jessie put her hand over her mother’s and looked concerned. ‘You don’t seem to have been very happy since you arrived.’

  ‘Me? I’m fine. I’m perfectly happy.’

  ‘Is something wrong?’

  Liz took her hand away and fiddled with the sugar bowl. ‘Of course not.’

  ‘Mu-uum.’

  She didn’t dare look at Jessie. Her eyes might give her away. Of course she wanted to see her new granddaughter when she was born. Of course she wanted to be with her daughter at this precious time. But she hadn’t told Jessie the real reason she’d come to London. Jessie would never know. Nor would their son Richard. Now both her parents were dead, Steven was the only one in the family who knew. She planned to keep it that way.

  She could feel Jessie’s eyes piercing into her. She needed some sort of excuse for her behaviour. What could she say?

  ‘It’s just being in such a different place, I suppose,’ she said at last. ‘It’s so vast, and there are so many people.’

  ‘I don’t believe you. You seemed fine when we were driving around yesterday.’

  ‘I like being driven by you, Jessie. I loved watching you negotiate your way through the traffic, so confident, you seem right at home here. I had a lovely day yesterday, driving past all those places I’d only heard the names of before – St Paul’s where Diana was married, and Kensington Palace where she lives. The bus went all over the city, but those were the two places I really wanted to see.’

  ‘But when we got home, you just went up to your room.’ Jessie rolled her eyes. ‘You were up there for ages.’

  Liz felt cornered; she didn’t like talking about herself. She tapped the side of the sugar bowl, wishing their tea would arrive so she could talk about something else. ‘I wanted to get a letter off to Steven. And I started one to Richard.’

  ‘Mum, you’re changing the subject again. Something’s really wrong, isn’t it? You seem depressed.’

  ‘Heavens, I’m not depressed. Just a bit homesick, that’s all. And I worry about your dad on his own.’ She looked around the tearooms. Every table was full; people were crowded in. But there was no sign of a waitress. Where was their tea?

  ‘Dad is perfectly capable of looking after himself.’

  ‘I wouldn’t be so sure. He can’t even boil an egg. I’ve always been there to look after him. And Richard promised to keep an eye on him.’

  ‘Richard? He can hardly boil an egg himself. Besides, he and Dad don’t always get on.’

  ‘I think they get on a lot better when I’m not around. They can talk about men things, like fishing and cars.’

  ‘Richard doesn’t know the first thing about cars. Besides, he’s working three jobs. I can’t see him having time to even go and see Dad let alone cook for him.’

  ‘He won’t need to cook for him. I left Dad a meal for every day in the freezer.’

  ‘I still can’t see why he didn’t come with you.’

  ‘He’d hate it here. All these women in black hoods …’

  ‘Burkas.’

  ‘… yes, all them, and all the crowds, and th
e underground. He’d hate it. You know Dad. He likes to be in the outdoors, not cooped up in a tube train rushing through smelly, sooty tunnels where you get black stuff up your nose.’

  Jessie laughed. ‘You’re an expert at changing the subject, Mum. You always were good at tricking me and Richard into thinking about something else when we wanted lollies.’

  ‘Really, I’m fine. Just give me time to get used to it here.’ Liz recalled the disbelief of her friends that she hadn’t travelled abroad before. But she’d never wanted to. There’d always been so much to do at home, with holidays camping by the sea in their caravan. But the time had come to get further away, to get out of New Zealand, to escape.