‘What do you mean?’
‘Holly, you were never going to survive my mum – Anna’s questioning.’
‘Well, I’ll have you know I did very well. I lasted about ten minutes before I broke. I know that may not be James Bond or Red Beret standards but –’
‘It’s Green Beret.’
‘Excuse me?’
‘The special forces you’re talking about are Green Berets, not red.’
‘Whatever, Sophie. The point I’m trying to make is that Anna came storming into the pizzeria and started hissing at me in front of the barman, then dragged me outside and was shouting at me. And I still didn’t tell her anything. I only gave in when she started crying. She was hysterical.’
‘Wow! Mum never cries.’ Despite trying not to care, Sophie was feeling queasy at the thought of her mother being so upset.
‘I know! And remember, she’s not just your mum to me, she’s my headmistress too. I didn’t know what to do, so I panicked and told her everything.’
‘She had to find out sooner or later anyway.’
‘Well, Sophie, she’s doing her nut. I’ve never seen her like that. But when I got home from work her car was still there and the light was on in her bedroom, so she must be getting an early flight over tomorrow. I bet she called Joe. Did you ring Mark?’
‘I didn’t want to talk to him because I knew he’d try to persuade me to call Mum, so I just rang his voicemail when I landed and said I was in Dublin for a few days and it was a long story and I might need a place to crash.’
‘Anna kept saying it was all a mix-up and that she saved you and that Laura was a terrible person and that she’s a drunk.’
‘Well, she’s lying. We’ve been here for ages and Laura’s only had coffee.’
‘Maybe she’s one of those people who keeps the bottle in her handbag and pours it into her coffee when you’re not looking.’
‘Holly, she didn’t pour anything into her coffee.’
‘Does she have the shakes or bloodshot eyes or slurry speech or anything?’
Sophie knew Laura wasn’t a drunk. It was just Anna trying to sabotage everything. ‘No. She’s not drunk.’
‘Be careful, Sophie. Some alcoholics never seem drunk and then all of a sudden, bam, they keel over. I think they’re called functioning drunks. My uncle –’
Sophie decided to interrupt her friend before she launched into a long story about her uncle. ‘Holly!’
‘I’ve got it! Why don’t you do that test on her? You know, the one we did in school where you ask the questions – does drinking affect your finances, does it alter your mood, have you ever got into a fight because of alcohol –’
‘I am not going to start quizzing my mother about alcohol dependency.’
‘Ooooh, Sophie, you called her your mother!’
Sophie’s hand flew up to her mouth. ‘Gosh, I did, didn’t I?’
‘You must like her. Is she as good-looking in the flesh as she is on her website?’
Sophie looked at Laura’s animated face. She was beaming as she talked into her phone. ‘Prettier.’
‘Wow, lucky you! You’re going to look like that when you’re older. I’m going to look like my mum, which is scary.’
‘Your mum’s great. Oh, I forgot to tell you, guess what? You’re not going to believe this.’
‘I knew it, you lucky cow! Bono’s your dad!’
‘No! I have a sister.’
‘No way!’
‘I swear. My mum, I mean Laura, just told me. My sister’s name is Mandy and she’s a bit younger than me.’
‘Wow, I hope she’s nice and not a total pain, like Jessie.’
‘Me too. She sounds nice, although Laura did say she was hard to get to know.’
Holly snorted. ‘My mum says that about Jessie. It’s mum-speak, which translates as “My daughter is a living nightmare.”’
‘She can’t be. I’m sure she’s lovely.’
‘I bet she isn’t, and I guarantee when she sees you walking in, all gorgeous and normal and clever and arty, she’ll hate you.’
‘Holly, that’s really mean.’
‘I just gave you loads of compliments.’
‘I want Mandy to like me.’
‘I’m just being honest. If you were my ghost sister I’d hate you.’
‘Thanks a lot. Look, I have to go. We’re driving to Laura’s house now.’
Try and smell her breath before you get into the car. I’m not dealing with Anna if you die in a car crash with drunk Laura.’
‘Stop it. She’s not drunk.’
‘Hey, Sophie.’
‘Yes?’
‘Don’t forget to keep notes. We’ll need them for the screenplay.’
23.
Anna
Dublin, July 2011
As the night dragged on Anna continued pacing the floor, worrying herself sick. Was Sophie in danger? What if Holly had told Nancy – or one of the other girls and they’d told their parents? Her secret would be out. She’d probably be arrested. Oh, God … the pain! She bent over clutching her stomach. Her ulcer was blazing. She swallowed two tablets.
She didn’t know what to pack. How long would she be staying? A day, two, three? Would Sophie come home with her straight away? She’d sounded very angry in her text, but Anna knew that once Sophie had met Laura she’d soon realize how lucky she was to have been saved.
She was so worried about Sophie. What if Laura was drunk and abusive to her, verbally and, oh, God, maybe even physically? Anna would kill that witch if she hurt her daughter. She looked at Laura’s website for the millionth time. According to that and the other articles she had Googled about Laura Fletcher, she was a successful artist. But lots of successful artists were drunks and drug addicts. A talent for painting didn’t necessarily make you a decent human being. Just because you sold a few pictures it didn’t mean you were fit to be a mother. It didn’t mean you weren’t a wretched person who neglected your child.
Anna looked at the clock. God, it was only three. This night would never end. She sat down on her bed and tried to breathe deeply and calm down. But it was hopeless. How could she be calm when Sophie might be mixing with drug addicts and alcoholics? Laura’s friends were bound to be similar to her – ‘artists’ who probably spent all day drinking and getting stoned. Anna had seen her drinking on the boat that day: she was a bad mother.
Anna felt sick. Sophie wouldn’t be able to handle it. She was mature in some ways but very naïve in others. She had led a very cosseted life. She’d never travelled alone before. She’d never even spent a night away from home. What if Laura collected her and was drunk and crashed the car, killing them both? What if one of Laura’s friends spiked Sophie’s drink and molested her? What if Sophie had a fight with Laura and ran out with no clue where she was or who to run to? Anna prayed she would go to Mark or Joe. Surely she would have the sense to call them if she was in trouble. Dublin could be a dangerous place. Anna knew the bad areas all too well from her teaching days there. She raised her eyes to the ceiling. Please, God, keep her safe until I get there …
Not having Sophie near her was like having a limb wrenched off. Anna knew this was going to be the longest night of her life.
She arrived at Heathrow at four thirty a.m. She was desperate to get to Dublin – to be near Sophie, to explain to her, to save her once again from that terrible woman. When she eventually landed in Dublin airport, she hurried through the arrivals door and found Joe waiting for her.
He looked older, more craggy-faced, but handsome. He still had the greenest eyes, and although his hair was white now, there was lots of it. She rushed over to him and he wrapped his arms around her. She sank into them, grateful for their comfort.
‘Oh, Joe, thank God you’re here. I’m so worried.’
He pushed her hair back from her face and kissed her gently on the lips. ‘Poor Anna, you look exhausted. Don’t worry, we’ll sort this out. Have you heard from Sophie since last night?’
‘No. I was hoping she’d have at least sent me a text this morning so I’d know if she was alive or dead.’ She began to cry.
Joe rubbed her back. ‘Mark heard from her late last night. He’d had a message from her and tried to call her but she didn’t answer. Then at about eleven she sent him a text, saying she was with her biological mother and she was fine.’
‘That bitch Laura! How dare she take Sophie away from me? We have to go straight to her house, Joe. We have to go now. Come on.’
‘Hold on.’ Joe stopped Anna. He took her bag and her hand and led her to a bench in a corner of the airport.
‘What are you doing? I don’t have time for this.’ Anna was up to ninety – she couldn’t sit still. Not now, not when her daughter was in danger. What was Joe thinking?
Joe tugged her hand and got her to sit down beside him. In his warm, measured voice, he said, ‘You need to calm down and decide how you’re going to approach this. You can’t go barging in there, like a crazy woman. You’ll just make Sophie even angrier. She’s obviously furious that you never told her she was adopted. You don’t want to make things worse. You have to tread softly here, Anna. There are a lot of heightened emotions involved.’
Anna crossed her arms defensively. ‘What am I supposed to do? Sit around waiting for her to be corrupted by this Laura? This excuse for a mother who was too drunk to look after her own child? A woman who passed out and left her baby girl abandoned for anyone to take?’
‘What do you mean “take”?’
Too late, Anna realized her mistake. Joe had always suspected something was wrong about the adoption and now she’d given him a clue. Damn. ‘Nothing.’
‘Anna?’
‘Nothing.’
Joe turned her to face him. His green eyes bored into her brown ones. ‘Anna, I want the truth, the whole truth this time. Did you adopt Sophie via the proper channels or did you ignore some of the red tape? This is really serious. You’ve been vague about her adoption all along. What exactly did you do?’
Anna looked at her friend, the only connection she had to her former life. Joe loved her. He would help her. He was such a good person, not one to judge. A man who had been broken-hearted when his marriage failed. A man who had fought for joint custody of his son. A man who never ducked responsibility, who had the biggest heart she knew of. A man she was lucky to have in her life. A man who thought she was perfect. A man who was about to have all of his beliefs shattered …
Anna looked into the distance, took a deep breath, and said, ‘I didn’t adopt her. I took her.’
Joe frowned. ‘Took her from where?’
‘From a boat.’
‘A boat?’
Anna turned and held his gaze. Her voice was steady, as she said, ‘The boat I took to London when I emigrated after Hope died.’
‘How could you take a child from a boat?’ Joe was puzzled.
‘Easily. Her mother had passed out drunk at the bar. Sophie was abandoned, alone, upset, hungry, thirsty and seasick. Completely neglected.’
Joe’s eyes widened as he began to understand. ‘So you just took her?’
Anna’s jaw set in a tight line. ‘Yes.’
‘You stole someone else’s child?’ Joe’s mouth hung open.
‘Yes.’
‘But … how … what … Are you insane?’
‘No, Joe, it was the sanest decision I ever made. If it hadn’t been for me, Sophie would have drowned or maybe been taken by a paedophile or ended up living on the streets because her mother was an alcoholic. It wasn’t even lunchtime and her mother was so drunk she’d passed out.’
‘But how did you get away with it?’ Joe said, rubbing his forehead. He looked shocked. ‘Surely she woke up and realized her child was gone.’
‘By the time she came out of her drunken coma, I was halfway to London.’
‘There must have been an investigation,’ Joe spluttered.
Anna remained composed as she related the story. ‘Not really, because they found the child’s sandals overboard and presumed she’d drowned.’
‘How did her sandals end up in the sea?’
‘I threw them over the side.’
Joe stared at her as if he was seeing her for the first time. ‘Jesus Christ, Anna, how could you? How could you take someone else’s child and pretend they were dead. It’s un–’
‘Unthinkable? Reprehensible? Shameful? Despicable?’
‘Yes!’
Anna sat back and crossed her arms. ‘Is it really, Joe? Is it really such a terrible crime to save a child’s life? To allow a little girl to grow up in a safe, loving, nurturing environment? To make her happiness your priority? To give her a chance to become the best person she can be? Should I have left her with that pathetic excuse of a mother so she could end up like all those beautiful children I taught in school? Most of whom ended up as either drunks, drug addicts or dealers, in prison or pregnant at fifteen living on welfare. Is that better? Is that what we need to do – turn our heads and pretend we don’t see it? Shrug our shoulders and say it’s not our problem? Wash our hands of these innocent children’s fate?’
Joe took her by the shoulders and shook her. ‘It’s not for us to decide. Who made you God?’
‘Neglect is a form of abuse,’ Anna shouted.
People were staring at them. Joe stopped shaking her. ‘You can’t take someone else’s child. It’s wrong. It’s immoral.’
‘No, Joe. It’s immoral to leave a child in danger. Sophie was in real danger. She was crying, thirsty and sick.’
‘Anna!’ he snapped. ‘It was not up to you to decide that the child was better off with you. She had a mother already. Maybe not a perfect one, but for all you know she could have been a good mother most of the time and you just saw her on a bad day.’
‘Don’t insult my intelligence! I know these women,’ Anna spat. ‘I watched them all those years I taught in that inner-city school. They don’t change. They get worse, more abusive, more neglectful. All they think about is their next drink. I’d seen enough – I’d stood by helplessly for years while those innocent children suffered. I had to do something, Joe. I had to help her – she was so forlorn.’
‘ANNA! You can’t do that. If everyone went around taking children from parents they didn’t think were suitable the world would be a mess. Not all children of alcoholics turn out badly. You had no right. That poor woman has spent years thinking her child drowned because she was drunk. Do you have any idea what she must have felt?’
Anna laughed bitterly. ‘I’m sure she just cracked open another bottle of vodka and blacked it out.’
Joe stood up and turned away, running his hands through his hair. ‘I cannot believe you would do something so fundamentally wrong.’
Anna jumped up and pulled him back. ‘I saved her life, Joe. Nothing you can say will make me feel bad about that. And I’ve been the best mother I could be and look how well she’s turned out. She’s an incredible girl. She’s happy, smart, full of joy and warmth and affection. I couldn’t be more proud of her.’
‘Well, she’s not full of joy at the moment, Anna. She’s full of rage because you’ve been lying to her all her life.’ He shook his head. ‘I mean, how did you even get the right papers for her? You’ve taken her on holidays – how the hell did you get a passport?’
Anna shrugged. ‘I had Hope’s birth certificate,’ she said, biting her lip. ‘I just used it as Sophie’s and no one was any the wiser.’
Joe stared at her for a few seconds. ‘Hope?’ he said. He continued to look at her, and his gaze softened. ‘Oh, Anna,’ he whispered.
She turned away from him, hiding the doubts and fears that had been creeping into her mind all night. Doubts and fears that she had never allowed to enter her mind before. Thoughts that she had buried deep down in the bottom of her conscience. ‘It’ll pass. When she sees what a terrible life she would have had with that woman, she’ll understand I was right. She’ll thank me.’
Joe shook his hea
d. ‘My God, Anna, can’t you admit what you did was wrong?’
Anna’s jaw set. ‘Never, because I believe with every fibre of my being that it was right.’
‘I’d never have thought you capable of something so shocking.’
‘It wasn’t shocking. It was instinctive and necessary.’
Joe was clearly shattered by the revelation. ‘It was wrong, Anna, you have to see that.’
Anna’s eyes welled up and she reached for his hand. ‘Joe, you’re my best friend in the world. I need you now. Whatever you think of what I did, I promise you I did it for the right reasons. Please don’t judge me. Please help me get my Sophie back.’
Joe hugged her as he would a stranger in distress, and Anna knew that something had broken between them.
They drove in silence to Killduf. Anna tried calling Sophie over and over again, but she only got her voicemail. She looked out of the window at the scenery she knew so well. Ireland, her birthplace, her home. Not any more. London was her home now. Sophie was her home. This place, this country, had let her down. She had left it a broken woman with a broken marriage and a broken heart. A mother who had buried her child. A wife who had buried her marriage. A daughter who had buried her parents. An orphan, lonely and crushed.
And now here she was, seventeen years and one snap decision later, the mistress of her own destiny, the navigator of her own fate, strong, happy, fulfilled, loved. And best of all a mother, who understood what unconditional love felt like. To love another more than yourself, to value their happiness far above your own, to sacrifice for them, to work hard to give them a perfect life … It was all she had wished for and so much more.
‘This is the village of Killduf.’ Joe broke the silence. ‘Do you know where the house is?’
‘No.’ Anna spotted a man locking the post-office door. ‘Pull over and I’ll ask him for directions.’
Joe did so and Anna jumped out. She ran to the man. ‘Hello, sorry to disturb you, I’m looking for Laura Fletcher’s house.’
‘Oh, are you now?’ the man said, smirking.
‘Yes.’
‘And what would you be wanting there?’
Anna was taken aback by the question. ‘Well, it’s, um … a private matter.’
This Child of Mine Page 23