I wanted to go downstairs. I still felt embarrassed and humiliated. But I had to move things forward. I had to overcome my feelings and find out the truth
I let the lid of the suitcase fall back onto the bed and stared down at the jumble of clothes inside. I thought back to when I used to pack in a hurry to go and sleep at a friend’s house. Or if the three of us went to stay anywhere. Mum would always ask if I wanted her to check my packing. I never did.
I opened the door and walked to the top of the stairs. The photo frames were still scattered on the floor. At least one of them had broken, and glass sparkled on the carpet.
I carefully stepped over the frames on the way down. I didn’t stop to pick any of them up. That could wait.
The living-room door moved silently as I pushed it open.
Mum and Dad were sat together. Mum in the armchair and Dad perched on the arm. His hands rested on her shoulders. Their faces were blotchy and damp. I wondered how much they had cried.
Dad stood up and Mum looked up at me. They both seemed awkward, unsure of themselves. I felt the same way too. Family. The pressure that I had felt in the room before, had evaporated completely. I felt no tension.
I realised I was staring at them. Trying to look into them, but also trying to see them on the outside for the first time. Like meeting a stranger. I couldn’t do it. I couldn’t sufficiently remove myself from my recognition of them to see them in any other way than as my parents.
I had no doubt I could generate dislike. Perhaps even hatred. But what would that achieve? And how long would it last? It wouldn’t help me. And now was the time in my life when I needed help more than ever.
The air in the room grew still. As though time had paused and was waiting for us to catch it up.
Dad caught up with it first and started it moving again.
‘How are you, Chris?’ he said. ‘Are you… OK?’
I thought I would cry, or run to him. But I did neither. I sat back down on the sofa and put my hands on my knees.
I opened my mouth to speak but my throat and vocal chords weren’t yet ready for speech.
I swallowed, straightened my back and rolled my shoulders, and took another run at it.
I thought my first question would be “Why didn’t you tell me?”. It took me by surprise when I spoke.
‘Thank you,’ I said. I swallowed again. ‘Thank you for my life.’
Mum burst into tears again. Dad moved towards me but I held up my hand. He hesitated and stayed where he was.
It’s funny how things come back to you out of the blue. Mum was always one to sit down to talk, probably so she was at the same level as the person she was talking to. She must have felt comfortable with herself that way. Whereas Dad was a pacer. He couldn’t sit still for long. If things were unresolved he would be on edge until the problem was sorted.
He wasn’t able to sit down now. This problem wasn’t sorted yet.
‘I feel ashamed,’ I said, ‘and embarrassed and humiliated. I feel like I was lied to my whole life. That everyone knew about it but me. And I feel utterly broken-hearted.’
I closed my eyes and waited for the excuses to come. The reasons why they had lied to me. What would they tell me to wash the guilt from their hands? Which other could they blame for their deceit?
‘We’re so sorry, Chris,’ Dad whispered.
I tightened the grip on my knees, tried to control the surge inside me. A nerve in my neck reacted to something.
‘Sorry?’ I said.
Dad said nothing.
Was sorry supposed to wipe it all away? Did the word sorry carry enough power with it to obliterate that other word — adopted?
The pebble was already a part of me. It was there for good. In reality, it had always been there, I just hadn’t known about it.
‘Sorry?’ I said again.
My legs shook. I gripped my knees tighter still. I opened my eyes and gave the surge that had been building up in me permission to do its worst.
‘For fuck sake! What the fuck do you mean by sorry? How can you say sorry and think that somehow that makes it alright? How does that make things alright?’
As I screamed out the first few words, Mum jolted up in her chair. Dad’s head twitched back and to the side, as though he had just taken a punch on the cheek.
I wiped the spittle off my chin with as much dignity as I could muster. My throat was raw.
‘Sorry isn’t enough,’ I said.
I looked down at the carpet. Focused on the fibres, the pattern. As a child I had pretended that the pattern was a country lane leading to a secret world. I followed it with my eyes now. It didn’t feel the same.
I didn’t hear my mum move from the chair. But a warm hand touched the back of my neck. I let it rest there, massaging my neck. Her hands had always been slender. Now her hand felt almost bony. But her touch was soft. I reached up and rested my hand on hers. Lay my head to the side, touching my cheek on our hands.
‘Shall we go for a walk?’ she said.
I nodded.
It had seemed that many of our talks and decisions had been made on walks. Talks about schools and teachers; talks about holiday destinations; talks about friends and boyfriends. All three of us seemed at ease outside. Words seemed to flow more easily, as though the cool natural air really was blowing away the cobwebs in our minds.
The sky was darkening, turning the evening into night. Our coats were ruffled by the wind as soon as we stepped from the front door. I pulled mine tight around me. As we walked down the drive, Mum put her arm through mine. I let it stay there.
The pavement by the road was fairly narrow, so Dad walked ahead of us. But soon we left the road, and the pavement opened up. Dad dropped back level with us and walked next to Mum. We must have walked almost half a mile before she spoke.
‘Me and your dad wanted children very much,’ she said. ‘Back before you were born we had tried to have a child. But back then, things were different. Not like they are today. Today they can give you pills and medicines to help you conceive. They can give you fertility treatment. Back then, none of that existed.’
She paused, as though waiting for a memory to fully arrive in her mind.
‘I did get pregnant, once,’ she said.
I saw Dad take her other hand.
‘But it just wasn’t to be, I suppose. It was OK. Me and your dad loved each other. That was what kept us going.’
She squeezed my arm as we walked. We turned down the path to the woods. The rustling leaves sounded as though they were welcoming our approach.
‘But because we wanted a baby so desperately, we decided to look at other options. We had so much love in us, it seemed like the right thing to do, to have a baby. We hadn’t known anyone else who had adopted, but we found out as much as we could about it.
‘It wasn’t so long ago that they were sending babies, whose parents couldn’t look after them, to Australia. It broke my heart to see pictures of these tiny children going off to another country. No parents to wave them off. Not knowing what they would find when they got to the other side of the world.
‘And when I lost… when we couldn’t have a child naturally, it made me think of all those little children that had been sent away because there hadn’t been anyone in this country to look after them. It seemed so unfair.
‘Obviously they had to make sure we were suitable people. They looked into our backgrounds, our finances. Did we smoke? Did we drink? All sorts of things. It was as though they were trying to make it as difficult as possible for people to adopt a child. But they had to get it right, you see. They couldn’t hand over a child to just anyone. So even though it felt like they were trying to put us off, we carried on. We were determined. Just like you are. I think you got that from us.’
A shiver passed across my neck. I squeezed my arm against Mum’s. The leaves in the trees mellowed and turned their noise to nothing more than whispers.
‘Eventually we were approved. And when we saw you, oh Christine — you
were the most beautiful thing we had ever seen. Your beautiful brown hair and your beautiful brown eyes. You were so lovely. We couldn’t believe it. You were so little. Just three months old when we got you.
‘When your dad held you in his arms for the first time he looked like he had won the pools and the lottery all at the same time. I don’t think there was a prouder man anywhere. You were like all our Christmases come at once. A precious little jewel. And from that moment, we’ve never stopped giving thanks that you came to us.’
A gentle breeze brushed against my face. It cooled the wet streaks on my cheeks. I felt the air ripple over the scar on my forehead.
I didn’t want to ever let Mum’s arm go. I felt as though she was holding me up. I was sure I would collapse if it weren’t for her solid, bony arm entwined with mine.
For the entire walk we had all been focusing ahead. None of us had looked at each other. That was the way with walks. That was probably why it was easier to talk. We just focused on where we were going and what we were saying. Expressions and facial reactions didn’t get in the way.
But now I turned my head to her and looked into her face. And I saw her for what she was. A kind, loving, generous woman.
A woman I was proud to call Mum.
Above us and around us the cold air moved through the trees. A huge block of wind pushing its way towards us.
Mum’s face softened, became fuzzy. Misty. I moved my hand across my eyes to wipe away the tears. But there were none to wipe.
Dad had disappeared in the mist. Mum was slowly joining him. I shouted to them, screamed for them to keep a hold of me. But they never heard me. The roar around us smothered my voice.
I was alone. But I knew the girl would be there soon.