The Bad Mother

by Isabelle Grey

  The four of them made their way out to the fairground garden, picking up glasses of champagne as they went. Mitch noticed Quinn, a couple of jackets over her arm, checking that people had drinks. She had clearly been relegated to ‘staff for the evening, and was making a bad job of hiding her humiliation, glancing repeatedly towards Charlie, who remained oblivious to her. Although Mitch managed some pity for her – young and far from home, she’d been all too vulnerable to seduction by Captain Gorgeous – he was pleased: faithful only to Tamsin, he had hardened his heart against anyone who did not share his devotion.

  Mitch found himself listening to a humourless thirty-something who seemed to assume that he knew every detail of Charlie’s business, and was glad to be rescued by Tamsin, who’d been giggling in a conspiratorial huddle with her friends. ‘Come with me,’ she said, laughing and pulling faces at Emily and Phoebe, who remained in the garden.

  ‘Where are we going,’ asked Mitch as he followed her upstairs. Instead of entering her own room she opened the door to Charlie’s bedroom. Mitch hovered in the doorway, unwilling to trespass, and watched Tamsin flit over to a modern bureau, open a slim drawer and remove something from it. She glided back to him, whatever she had taken concealed in her hand. She grinned at him. ‘Phoebe wants it for later,’ she said, tucking whatever it was down the front of her dress.

  As they rejoined the party, Mitch felt his phone vibrate in his pocket and discovered it was Lauren. He moved aside to answer it, but could barely hear in the crush. A glass-panelled door led from the kitchen to an inner hall off which were a pantry and laundry room. He opened it and slipped through, though he could still hear music, loud voices and laughter.

  ‘Hey, Lauren. How are you?’

  ‘Dad and Nula are working. Will you come and see me?’

  ‘Not right now.’

  ‘Where are you? At the party?’

  Not wanting to increase Lauren’s envy, he opened the door to the laundry room, assuming it would be quieter in there. Enough light came from the small window to reveal a man leaning back against the row of machines, his mouth open, his fingers rhythmically kneading the hair of the woman who knelt in front of him, her face in his crotch. As Charlie stared right at him, Mitch realised the kneeling figure was Quinn.

  He backed out quickly, closing the door. ‘Have to speak later,’ he told Lauren, ending the call.

  Ten minutes later Quinn, clearly oblivious to the identity of the intruder – if, indeed, she had been aware of any interruption at all – came to ask if he and Tamsin wanted some of the hot food now being laid out in the kitchen. Unable to avoid Charlie’s gaze over Quinn’s shoulder, he knew his intrusion would not be forgiven.

  ‘I’m tired,’ Mitch told Tamsin. ‘How about a bit of time out?’

  ‘I have the very thing to perk us all up,’ she assured him. She beckoned to her friends, and Mitch had to make the best of it. At least she was heading upstairs, away from Charlie.

  In her bedroom, she closed the door, rummaged in a make-up bag, brought out a small mirror and then produced a slip of paper which she handed to Phoebe. Mitch watched apprehensively as Phoebe unfolded it and tipped a tiny heap of white powder onto the mirror.

  ‘Is that cocaine?’ he asked, trying not to sound too shocked.

  ‘What else?’ said Phoebe sarcastically. ‘I need a credit card,’ she told Tamsin.

  Tamsin went to fetch her bag. Phoebe took the card and proceeded to chop the powder into four thin lines. Tamsin rolled a bank note into a straw ready to hand to her. Emily, like Mitch, hung back, watching.

  ‘Have you done this before?’ he asked.

  ‘No, but Daddy and his friends do it all the time,’ said Tamsin. ‘It’s fine.’

  ‘What your dad gets up to isn’t much of a recommendation.’

  ‘What d’you mean?’

  ‘Nothing,’ he said, regretting his slip. ‘Doesn’t matter.’

  ‘Tell me.’

  ‘It’s nothing,’ Mitch assured her.

  Too late Mitch saw Phoebe listening, and didn’t like the avaricious look in her eyes. Tamsin’s vulnerability was heart-rending, and he panicked. Her world was too much for him. He watched in horrified fascination as Tamsin tossed back her golden hair and bent down to inhale the line of coke. ‘Who’s going to care anyway, except me?’ he thought bitterly. She raised her head, looking at him with strange, glittering eyes, and offered him the rolled-up note. Aware of Phoebe’s supercilious gaze, he took it. ‘Show me how you do this stuff,’ he said.

  FORTY-ONE

  As Tessa made the short walk across from the Visitors’ Centre, she thought how odd it was that a maximum-security prison should so swiftly have become a place where she felt at home. Yet it was true: she no longer minded the searches, the appraising stares of the officers, the waiting and unlocking, because she so looked forward to the intimacy of the visits room – a confessional with its own ritual constraints. And, as usual, Roy was neatly dressed, his grey hair cut short, his fingernails trimmed: he could perfectly well have been a psychotherapist or a priest. She smiled to herself as she threaded her way though the tables but then, seeing him waiting beside his chair, unable to stroll over to greet her, hands kept in sight of the cameras, she remembered with a pang how very different his experience of the prison was from hers: he was forced to stay while she was free to go.

  All the way here she’d been unable to stop her mind tumbling over itself, various thoughts and ideas revolving like familiar garments coming into view inside the drum of a washing machine. One moment she was remembering Declan’s body rolling over hers in bed, the guest room alien in the pale light from the open window; the next she was thinking about Erin and the impossibility of understanding what she had really meant; then, again, always, her devastation that nearly a week had passed since Lauren had packed up and gone and she still showed not the slightest intention of coming home. The deadliest hurt came from her daughter’s ease with the situation: it was neither defiance nor a sulk. Lauren neither wanted nor needed her. Lauren was happier with Nula.

  Greeting Roy with a kiss on the cheek and taking her seat opposite him, Tessa forced the clamouring tumble to a halt: she must not allow her troubles with her family to muscle in on her treasured oasis here. But Roy was studying her face carefully. ‘You’re upset,’ he said. ‘What is it?’

  ‘Oh, just domestic stuff,’ she said, afraid she might burst into tears.

  ‘You need a holiday. If only I could whisk you away!’

  She smiled, grateful that he had the tact not to press her for details. ‘That would be heaven,’ she told him. ‘I haven’t had a proper holiday in years. I can only really go away in the winter, and then, with Christmas and school holidays, it never works out.’

  ‘Once the kids have left school. Then you and I can travel.’

  She accepted the comforting fiction gladly. ‘That sounds good!’

  Roy sat back, tugging at his cuffs, positioning each button at the edge of his wrists. ‘Did you receive my letter?’

  ‘Yes. And I don’t know what to say! I’m really touched, but it’s honestly not necessary.’

  He looked steadily back at her, his expression serious, although there was something behind his eyes that she couldn’t decipher.

  ‘Every penny was earned by honest means. I’m not a bank robber or drug dealer, if that’s what you’re worried about.’

  ‘Of course not! It would never cross my mind.’ However many times she’d tried rehearsing her answer, she still hadn’t worked out how to confess without insulting him that she hadn’t even mentioned his proposal to her family because of their hostility to Roy’s very existence.

  ‘Is Hugo the problem?’

  ‘He wouldn’t stand in Mitch’s way. But we haven’t got as far as talking about fees and things.’

  Roy nodded, satisfied. ‘Well, when you do.’

  ‘Thank you. It’s extremely generous.’

  ‘If you want to thank me, then I have one very s
imple favour to ask in return.’

  ‘Of course!’

  ‘Don’t forget to bring me photos of Mitch and Lauren. I want to see every minute of my two grandchildren growing up.’

  Tessa had not forgotten Roy’s earlier request, and felt undermined by her reluctance to comply with his wishes. Of course she wanted to show off her children to their grandfather, to laugh over the similarity of physical traits, to recount their childhood exploits, but how would Mitch and Lauren feel about her doing that? Seizing at a straw, she asked if the missing photos she’d brought in of herself had yet been found.

  ‘No,’ Roy answered. ‘They’ll turn up eventually.’

  ‘Should I write to the Governor?

  ‘I wouldn’t bother. The cogs of this malevolent old machine grind very slowly.’

  ‘I can imagine.’

  ‘So how are Mitch and Lauren? Behaving themselves?’

  ‘Mitch is never at home. He has a girlfriend.’

  ‘Ah! So what’s she like?’

  ‘Very sweet. Her parents are in the film business, rather glamorous.’

  ‘Sex, drugs and rock ‘n’ roll?’

  ‘I don’t think so!’ Tessa laughed, but was uncomfortably reminded of Carol’s latest warning.

  ‘Do you suppose they’re having sex?’

  Tessa was taken aback by such a blatant question, but Roy’s face showed concern. ‘He is my grandson,’ he said. ‘I’m allowed to ask. There can be consequences, as we know,’ he added with a fond smile.

  She tried to make light of it. ‘Well, not in my house, they’re not.’

  ‘What about drugs?’

  ‘No, not Mitch!’

  ‘Would you know if he was?’

  ‘I think so. I hope so.’

  ‘I know about addiction, how easy it is to be in denial.’

  ‘They’re just kids.’

  Roy turned his head and deliberately swept his gaze around the big room. ‘A lot of these guys were just kids,’ he said. ‘Zero tolerance. That’s the only way.’

  Tessa was surprised. ‘I’d’ve thought there’d be more understanding, here of all places, about why people do drugs.’ As she, too, looked around the dozens of men in their fluorescent tabards, she noticed the angelic young man from her previous visit. He was sitting with his mother, and Tessa noted with dismay that it was the same woman who had cursed her beside the lockers.

  ‘If you turn a blind eye to your kids taking drugs,’ Roy was saying, ‘then you might as well hand them a syringe and be done with it.’

  ‘It must have damaged your childhood, your mother’s drinking?’ Tessa asked gently.

  Roy shook his head in contempt. ‘I knew what she was.’ He leant forward across the table. ‘It’s you I worry about, Tessa. If you do find that Mitch is using, then you can’t help. You must walk away. Addicts have no respect for anyone. He’ll lie and cheat and steal. Him and his little slag of a girlfriend. You have to look after yourself.’

  Tessa was shocked. ‘They’re nice kids. I know you had a hard time, but—’

  ‘Hand on your heart,’ Roy continued, ‘would you know if someone in your family was an addict? Sometimes the secrecy is a big part of it.’ He must have seen Tessa’s flare of alarm, for the tight, angry muscles of his face and neck unclenched. ‘I’d like to be there for you. Teach you, help you. More than just these visits. I’d like to be able to phone you.’

  ‘I didn’t know you were allowed to?’

  ‘Phone cards are a major currency in here!’ He sat back, waiting for her response.

  Under pressure, Tessa struggled to assert the realities of her life. ‘It’s not always easy to speak privately, with guests in the house morning and night.’

  ‘Don’t worry. I can’t phone you if you don’t give your permission.’

  ‘I hardly get a moment to myself, that’s all,’ she apologised.

  ‘When the prison contacts you, all you have to do is say no.’ He gave a brief, stiff smile. ‘I already have your number, from your printed letterhead.’

  It’s so hard to say ‘no’ to you! Tessa thought. And yet, she reminded herself quickly, his demands were not really demands but only further proof of how much he cared about her, how much he wanted to be involved in her life. How could she deny him when he had so little? The thought reminded her guiltily that she had yet to tell him that Erin was back in Felixham. Would he want to see her again?

  ‘Is it possible for me to call you?’ she asked instead. ‘Then I could ring when things are quiet.’

  ‘It doesn’t work that way,’ he said. ‘And I can’t promise to ring you at certain times either. There’s always such a queue for the phones.’

  ‘You might get Carol, my housekeeper, picking up.’ She felt impatient at having to keep making excuses, as if she were being unfairly tested.

  ‘Look, forget it,’ said Roy. ‘Forget I ever asked. I know so little about your daily life, and I’ve no right to expect you to make room in it for me. Or not yet, anyway.’ He reached across and laid his hand on hers. ‘I’ve made you feel bad, and that’s the last thing I’d ever want to do, my darling girl.’

  ‘If it was just me …’ she began, but he gripped her hand to command her silence.

  ‘Three more months and I can apply for parole.’ The red-haired officer, Janice, patrolling between the tables, passed close behind him, but he ignored her, holding tighter to Tessa’s hand. ‘Then none of this will matter.’

  Tessa searched for some consolation she could offer to make up for her intransigence. ‘What you said about addiction and secrecy,’ she said. ‘I think maybe Pamela has a drink problem.’

  ‘That would explain a lot.’

  ‘I don’t know how serious it is. I’d not even noticed until recently. But I think she keeps a bottle in her handbag. Pretends there’s just juice in it.’

  ‘So many secrets,’ he sighed. ‘You’ve been nourished on them, haven’t you?’

  Tessa nodded, and Roy pressed her hand. ‘Don’t blame yourself. You mustn’t.’

  ‘I don’t!’ she responded. ‘And I don’t really blame them so much now either. They had their own stuff to deal with.’

  ‘So what?’ said Roy. ‘I’ve learnt the hard way how easy it is to make excuses for people, especially people you care about. Leave them. We’ll go to Rome, leave them behind, make up for lost time together.’

  ‘An adventure!’ Tessa laughed, glad of the distraction. ‘Once Lauren’s left school, that would be a treat.’

  ‘Why wait? She can live with Sam. We can go as soon as I get parole. Rent an apartment.’

  ‘I have a business to run!’

  ‘So what?’ repeated Roy. I have enough money for both of us. Come on, Tessa! You’re not just some small-town girl. You’re different. You’re my daughter.’

  Tessa pulled her hand free. ‘Roy, it’s a lovely idea, but I can’t go off and live somewhere else.’

  But Roy just laughed. ‘We belong together. You belong with me.’

  Tessa reluctantly admitted the acute discomfort that had been gathering for some minutes. Had this wilfulness always been here, and she’d failed to see it? It was like one of those trick drawings where you see either a wine glass or an old crone. Sometimes it’s impossible to make out both images, but once you have, their dual existence can’t be denied. Dread began to creep into her veins: had his refusal to hear ‘no’ enabled him to lead Erin in among the gorse bushes and persuade himself it was what she wanted and expected him to do? Had Angie’s ‘illness’ been her attempt to say what he didn’t wanted to hear?

  ‘Why wasn’t it manslaughter?’ she blurted out.

  Roy’s lips thinned with displeasure, but he regarded her steadily. ‘The jury chose to believe Angie’s family,’ he said simply, gesturing with his hands that she could take it or leave it. ‘They couldn’t face up to the fact that they’d failed her, that she needed me, not them.’

  But he killed her, Tessa told herself. What woman needs a man who s
trangles her?

  ‘I don’t blame her parents,’ Roy went on, oblivious to her thoughts. ‘They’d lost their daughter. The guilt must have been terrible.’

  ‘Let me get you some cake.’ Tessa rose abruptly to her feet. ‘Before they close.’ Without waiting for permission, she made her way over to the counter, relieved that he was not allowed to follow her.

  Her hands shook as she handed over the tokens. Taking deep breaths, she glanced at the clock to work out how soon the bell would ring to signify the end of visits. She dragged out the transaction, changing her mind about which biscuits to buy, and promising herself that she would, after all, ask Declan if his colleague could get hold of the transcripts of Roy’s trial. She hoped she was wrong, but she was not the naive teenager her mother had been, and she must not continue this relationship without finding out exactly to what and to whom she was consenting.

  FORTY-TWO

  As Tessa prepared to leave the prison the red-haired officer, Janice, approached her to say that she’d been unable to locate the missing photographs Tessa had previously asked about. Preoccupied, Tessa thanked her and moved on, eager to escape and reach the uncontaminated safety of home. But impulsively she turned back and asked Janice if it would be possible to have a private word. Although the officer did not seem particularly surprised by the request, she spent a long moment considering before quietly remarking that her shift finished in half an hour and she could meet Tessa at the pub in the nearest village.

  Now, sitting with a fruit juice at a corner table in the dingy bar, Tessa wondered what on earth she’d been thinking: how could talking to a prison officer possibly help? And what unintended negative repercussions might there be for Roy? If she wanted to learn more about her father, why hadn’t she taken Mitch’s sensible advice and got in touch with Shirley Weaver? She tried to persuade herself that today’s unease had more to do with how tired and overwrought she’d been recently, that it would be better to slip away before Janice arrived. It was her growing sense that Roy was manipulating her for some purpose he had yet to reveal that kept her there, even while she debated with herself what harm a man safely locked up in prison could possibly do anyone.