I won’t try to discover anything else about my real grandmother. I think her short life may have been quite sad. Even her love affair with Patrick Symondson, for which she paid such a terrible price, sounds sad.
I spend a lot of time with May now. We go for walks, my pace suddenly so slow it matches hers. There’s a little park near her – well, it isn’t so much a park as an open area, a square, with some grass and a sandpit and a couple of baby swings. It has railings round it and a gate into it and no dogs or people without children are allowed. But with May being an old woman and me heavily pregnant we are no threat to anyone and nobody has ever stopped us sitting on the benches. At the moment, it’s mostly too cold or wet to consider sitting, but we make this area the object of our ambling and on the odd mild sunny afternoon we perch a while and watch the children. It makes May supremely content.
‘You’ve got no park near you,’ she said, yesterday.
‘I’ve got a car. I can drive to one.’
‘Not the same.’ Pause. ‘You could move to my house, the two of you, when it’s born. You could bring it here every day, get the exercise and fresh air and have somewhere safe to sit.’ I laughed. ‘What’s so funny?’
‘Just the idea.’
‘What idea?’
‘Of me pushing a buggy here every day, of that being the highlight of my day.’
‘What do you think you’re going to do, then?’
‘Not that.’ I didn’t add that the mere prospect made me shudder.
‘You’ve got high and mighty ideas, you have, madam. You need to come to your senses, sharpish.’
‘OK.’ Another pause, and then May said, ‘I’ll be leaving you my house in my will. It’s all done proper, signed and everything. Your mum’s got enough, and my boys and their lot don’t deserve nothing. So you could move in, knowing you wouldn’t have to move out.’
I waited a fraction too long before telling her how overwhelmed I was, and she took offence. ‘O’ course, you might not like my kitchen, you might not want to live in a house with an old-fashioned kitchen, though it’s good enough for me.’
‘I love your kitchen.’
‘Well, then. Suit yourself. I’ve made the offer. You can make your own mind up. It’ll stay open. I don’t mind babies crying, it won’t bother me. It’d be three generations together, think of that.’
I thought of it. Three generations . . . it should appeal, instead of alarming me. ‘One generation missing, though,’ I said, playing for time. ‘One generation skipped.’
‘Oh, your Mum would never come home.’
‘Well, she’s got her own very nice home.’
‘I know that, clever clogs. You know what I mean. We ain’t comfortable, Jean and me. Nobody’s fault.’
‘I’m flattered.’
May grunted. ‘So you should be.’ She nudged me, and we both laughed as though some joke had been made. I laughed out of nervousness. I don’t know why May laughed.
I said, as we walked back to her house, that I’d think about her suggestion, see how things worked out with Ian. He hadn’t moved out yet, and we had four months’ rent paid in advance between us. That seemed to satisfy her. I don’t think she felt rejected. In fact, maybe she was quite optimistic that I would move in with her, which will make the realisation that I never will all the harder. It makes me feel guilty.
Ian has heard of a flat he could take over for two years while a friend of his is in America. It’s only a fifteen-minute walk from my flat here, so it would be ‘very convenient for popping in’, as he puts it. I told him to take it, if he wanted to, it made no difference to me. But of course it makes a huge difference (and not just because of the rent), it makes his threat of moving out a reality. Though I’m using an ugly word like ‘threat’ when what he’d said he would do wasn’t meant as such at all. He’d merely, at the time, been stating what his decision would be if I went ahead and had our baby. My baby. He would have to move out, he’d said, provoked by me, and now with the birth imminent, he was going to. Yet I sensed he was waiting for a reaction from me that might influence his decision. Telling him to do what he liked wasn’t what he expected, or even wanted, to hear.
He said he’d settle things with his friend and start moving his stuff in soon. I shrugged, determinedly offhand. I chose that inappropriate moment to ask if he was going to be with me for the birth, knowing perfectly well what the answer would be but still masochistically wanting to hear it.
‘No,’ he said.
‘You’re not frightened, are you?’
‘Of what?’
‘That the “miracle of birth”’ – I put on my best mocking voice – ‘will make you wonder how on earth you could not have wanted this child to be born.’
‘No, I’m not afraid of that,’ he said, quietly.
‘Heart of stone and proud of it, eh?’
Sensibly, he didn’t bother replying to that cheap jibe. He knew that I knew he hadn’t a heart of stone. But I hadn’t finished trying to provoke him, trying to hide my distress (as he realised) by being sarcastic.
‘So, Mr Scott,’ I said, ‘are you going to let your name appear on this child’s birth certificate?’
‘Yes, of course. Issy, I’ve never tried to deny I’m the father.’
‘But you don’t want anything to do with it, right?’
‘I don’t know, I think . . .’
‘Ooh, so if the baba is very good and very clever and very beautiful and a credit to you, you might graciously say hello now and again?’
‘Issy, Issy . . .’ He sighed, and shook his head, knowing quite well that I was lashing out stupidly because I was upset.
‘They can make you contribute to its upkeep, you know.’
‘I’m happy to do that, as you know.’
‘So what is it you’re not bloody happy to do?’ I was shouting, on the edge of tears, wanting him to say that of course he wasn’t going to move out, he’d never meant to anyway.
But he didn’t, and how could I expect that he would? Instead, he repeated that he was going to take his friend’s flat but still see me often, and he’d wait until he’d sorted out his own feelings, about the paternity thrust upon him, to decide what to do. He wasn’t going to abandon me, he still loved me, but he just didn’t think he could pretend to love a baby as well – he hadn’t wanted one, and he was full of resentment that I’d completely ignored his wish that I should have a termination. He said he had to wait, at a distance, to see what happened to that resentment. ‘Fine talk,’ I sneered, but I understood, I really did, and do. Ian doesn’t feel what I feel. He hasn’t had the family, the upbringing I have had, so how can he be expected to? But he has a grandmother, who helped make him the man he is. That should count for something.
He is still here. Four weeks to go, and he hasn’t moved out, though he’s made one or two half-hearted attempts to take some of his stuff to his friend’s flat. He’s very considerate, looking after me in all kinds of ways. No one would ever know he is a reluctant father-to-be.
I have a lot of time to think at the moment. I sit for ages at the front window, watching what goes on in the street below. It’s a quiet street, but a surprising amount of activity, however ordinary, goes on: vans delivering things, traffic wardens ponderously writing down numbers, people using the street as a short cut between two main roads. It means the street is rarely completely empty and I can always rely on something or someone to watch. Sitting there makes me think of being ill or old, stuck, dependent on whatever passing show might come my way. I would adapt well, I think, to the sitting still bit anyway. I am far too fond of sitting still, daydreaming. I don’t obey Sarah Bernhardt’s instruction to do something with my ten fingers. They rest idly in my lap. I don’t grow restless, like Elizabeth Fry, when I am at home. It would have annoyed Isa to see me slumped here at my window, but it pleases May, so long as I don’t have a book in my hand (which I do) – sitting still, in her opinion, is good in my condition, though reading is not. She will n
ever accept that reading, my work, is not physically damaging, she would never agree with George Sand that the love of work can save us from everything – ‘I bless my grandmother for having me acquire the habit’.
What do I bless my grandmothers for? Plenty of time to ponder that one. Isa, I think, tried to teach me two things: to be determined, to aim for what I want, at all costs, and to adapt events to my own needs, not quite the same. I suppose her philosophy could be seen as a belief in being ruthless, if necessary, not allowing anything to interfere with the smooth trajectory she wanted her life to take. I would say she failed, but Ian might say she succeeded, that I have gone ahead and let my wishes transcend his. Victory to Isa, then. But when I look at the example she set me, I know I reject it. I might be wrong, but I feel I could never pretend a son was my own if he was not. I could not ignore the ‘communications’ of a brother, no matter what his state or circumstances.
May’s influence, her legacy, is different. She is a stoic. She puts up with things, even if she moans about them. Her words, so often repeated, ‘it can’t be helped’ enrage me, because very often they are an excuse for not taking action. It almost makes her happy that ‘it can’t be helped’; it means she is not to blame. There is no element of that in me. But May can also be honest, sometimes brutally so, and I have absorbed that trait as well as her obstinacy. I am having a baby whose conception was an accident and whose father does not want it. I think I’ve been honest with Ian, though maybe he wouldn’t agree.
I am beginning to wonder if Ian is right about it being better to ignore the past. He has tried so hard to shake it off, reinvent himself, disown his parents, whereas I have done the opposite, clung on to it, tried to make it responsible for so much, tried to ‘reach across the void’. Right now, that reach fails; the void is deeper and wider than ever.
Not long to go now. Sixteen days maximum. They are going to induce the baby if it is not here by then. I like the idea of that, of having a set date when I know something will definitely be done. Waiting does not suit me any longer.
Ian is in his friend’s flat. It was part of the deal, that the flat shouldn’t be left empty, and that Ian should move in the day after his friend left. He – Ian – was quite reluctant to go, which must mean something. He’s left a lot of his stuff here, which I don’t mind, I like seeing the evidence that he hasn’t vanished. ‘Vanished?’ he said, when I remarked on this. ‘What do you mean? I’m not going to vanish, you know that. I’m just down the road.’
‘You might. Mr Mystery Man, the man with no past. I could easily vanish from your CV, just like others did. Isamay Symondson? Never heard of her, what a peculiar name.’
‘Amuse yourself, then.’
‘I will. Now, let’s see, when did your life start, again? Not before you were born, I know that, that’s not permitted, and not when you were born, though your mother says differently. No childhood acknowledged, I know you’re firm about blanking that out, so shall we say eighteen? Nineteen?’
‘I’ll indulge you. Eighteen.’
‘Right. So at eighteen, what?’
‘You know – uni.’
‘That doesn’t tell me much. You’ve never talked about your uni days. Chums? Interests? Work? All you’ve said is that you went to Glasgow University and took a degree in physics.’
‘All there is to be said. I don’t do reminiscing.’
‘Of course not! I’ll be asking if you use Facebook next. Let’s move on then, see how far you’ll let me push you. After Glasgow, London, yes? Imperial College? Then a bit of travelling, India, Japan, before—’
‘Why are you doing this?’
‘I’m just taking a personal history, checking I’ve got it right.’
‘But these things don’t tell anything, stuff about where people studied, where they lived, their jobs – none of it is important.’
‘What is, then?’
‘The person. As he, or she, is.’
‘Don’t make me laugh, Ian. It’s like saying a cake is just a cake and doesn’t consist of flour and eggs.’
‘And fat.’
‘What?’
‘Fat – butter, margarine. There’s usually fat in a cake.’
I don’t know why I wanted to go on with such an absurd argument. Maybe I’d always wanted to have it, after the charm of being with a man who tried never to mention anything to do with his past had worn off. I know now about Ian’s mother, and the bare facts about his upbringing, and the existence of his grandmother, but I still yearn to know more. There is so little to pass on to my child – but then perhaps it will be like its father, and not want to know. Perhaps I will get written out of its life too. S/he will tell people s/he is herself/himself, and there is nothing to be known.
But there is. There always is.
I was sent home from the hospital the first time. What a fool I felt. I was so proud of managing to get there on my own (breaking my promise to call my parents), but when I was examined they said I was only one centimetre dilated in spite of what I’d thought were contractions every ten minutes. They said I’d be better off at home until labour had progressed. The second time, Maisie took me. She was on her way to start a night shift when she found me outside the door of our flat, clutching on to the banisters during a strong contraction. She drove me to the hospital and helped me in, and when we reached the maternity unit she asked if I wanted her to call Ian. Groaning with pain, I said yes, and gave her his number. He was the only person I wanted and needed at that moment.
It was two in the morning. He came straight away. By the time he got there, I was in agony, half hysterical with the kind of pain I’d never anticipated. Ian held my hand and talked to me. What about? I’ve no idea, but the mere sound of his voice did help. When, at last, I was taken into the delivery room, he didn’t come with me. I was beyond caring, my body entirely given up to the struggle. But he waited outside until I’d given birth, and he’d been told all was well. He asked a nurse to tell me that he would be back soon.
I am in a room of my own. One hundred pounds (Ian paid) for this blessed privilege, and worth every penny and more. The bed is comfortable. There is a window that actually opens. The walls have recently been painted, the floor is spotlessly clean. ‘My,’ May said, when Mum and Dad brought her in, ‘this is posh.’ There is a chair beside my bed and she took it eagerly, so that she could hold my baby in her arms. It was a touching sight, May bending her white head over the baby, peering at her, and of course the identification process started at once: her nose was her grandfather’s, her chin her grandmother’s, the shape of her head her great-uncle Tom’s. ‘She’s a beauty,’ May said, ‘just like her mum.’ I laughed, and said I was no beauty. May looked fierce and said, ‘If I think you are, you are.’ And then, surprisingly for her, she became sentimental. ‘Thank God I lived long enough to see her, my own great-granddaughter. I can die happy.’ We all protested that she was not about to die, that she shouldn’t talk nonsense, but she repeated her words very firmly and said, ‘I know what I know,’ which, in all its enigmatic glory, at least sounded more like her true self.
I know what I know too. Now I’ve given birth, I know how it feels to be pushed into the future; I know, all the same, how the past keeps on pulling. I am already thinking what to tell my daughter about her great-grandmothers and her grandmothers (both of them, even Moira). If she wishes, my daughter will have the means to find out more and make the connections I see so clearly and which her father would like to deny are of any importance.
Ian did come back, as he’d promised. He’s seen his daughter. He didn’t coo over her, didn’t ask if he could hold her. He simply stood by her little crib and stared down at her, for a long time, his expression impossible to decipher. I thought I saw respect there, perhaps even a touch of awe, but I could be mistaken. Then he sat down beside my bed and looked at me. I held his gaze. This time, I knew I was not mistaken about what I saw in his face. I could read his expression perfectly. I smiled, with relief. He held m
y hand, lightly, and said I’d certainly been through it, he’d hated seeing me in so much pain. I said it had all been worth it. Before he left, he stood and looked at our baby again, and this time he touched her, just stroked her cheek with the tip of his finger.
I lay there, after he’d gone, feeling that some sort of test had been passed. I felt that in some strange way I understood what those grandmothers I’d studied had tried to articulate, and what May and Isa had tried to tell me: there are connections between the generations of women that matter. I accept, as Ian does not, or not yet, that though my daughter will be herself, she cannot be that self without those traces of me and my mother and her great-grandmothers counting for something.
The connections are there, and they are still strong.
This ebook is copyright material and must not be copied, reproduced, transferred, distributed, leased, licensed or publicly performed or used in any way except as specifically permitted in writing by the publishers, as allowed under the terms and conditions under which it was purchased or as strictly permitted by applicable copyright law. Any unauthorised distribution or use of this text may be a direct infringement of the author’s and publisher’s rights and those responsible may be liable in law accordingly.
Isa and May Page 32