Authors: Amanda Prowse
‘How far gone is she?’
She hadn’t asked that either. ‘I don’t know. I lost it. Shouted at her. I’m so mad! So angry, I can’t think straight. She’s messing up her life.’
Pete stood and reached for the car keys on the sideboard. ‘Do you think she’ll be at Steph’s?’
Jacks didn’t know how to respond. She had no idea where her daughter was. She’d heard the front door slam while she was dealing with Ida, that was all she knew. Pete’s words made her feel bad.
‘I’ll go and see if I can find her.’
‘Yes.’ Jacks wanted Martha home; there was still time to make her see sense.
‘I can imagine how disappointed you are. Upset. But it’ll be okay, Jacks.’ He gave a small smile, as usual looking for a way to placate, make things better.
She looked at her husband. ‘Will it?’
He smiled. ‘It will. It’s not the worst thing that can happen, is it?’
‘Isn’t it?’
‘No. No, love, it isn’t. You know that.’ The two exchanged a long look. ‘We need to talk. Later, when Jonty’s in bed. I’ll go see if I can find her. Shan’t be long.’
Jacks sat at the kitchen table, wishing she were able to go and find Martha herself, fearing they were all in conference somewhere. She wanted to intervene, have her say. She was worried that Pete would simply say that things had a way of figuring themselves out and then they’d all sit back and watch another life spiral out of control.
She imagined confronting Gideon, pictured their exchange. Dipping into her mind, she sorted through the fog of anger and upset, plucking phrases that she wanted to launch at him.
‘Why do you think you might be good enough for her?’
was one she kept repeating. Along with,
‘She had the whole world at her feet and you came along and pulled her off track, so now what? You are destroying her chances and one day she will resent you for it!’
Or maybe she would try a softer tack, try appealing to the kind nature he had displayed when he brought her flowers and chatted to Jonty.
‘It’s not too late, Gideon; it’s not too late to change the outcome. Everybody makes mistakes.’
Even me
, she thought
. ‘But you are both so young that you can fix things and put it all behind you and have the life you were supposed to have…’
The life I was supposed to have…
This thought caused her tears to spring again.
It was an hour later that she heard the front door close. Pete walked into the kitchen. ‘Here she is, safe and sound.’ He smiled as he patted his daughter’s hair.
Jacks glanced at Martha’s complexion, blotchy from sobbing, her lids swollen and her eyes bloodshot. Her heart flipped at the signs of her distress. She was torn between wanting to hold her and wanting to shout some more, trying to make her see sense.
‘Do you want anything to eat?’ she asked, carefully avoiding eye contact while trying her best to be conciliatory.
Martha shook her head. ‘No thanks,’ she said, her voice nothing more than an embarrassed whisper. ‘I got something at Steph’s.’
‘Does Steph know?’ Jacks fired at her.
Martha nodded.
Then so will the whole of Weston…
Jacks kept that thought to herself, but it was another blow. She was certain that once people knew, it would be harder to fix and impossible to ignore.
‘How far are you?’ She looked at her nails, attempting to keep calm.
‘’Bout ten weeks,’ Martha whispered before more tears came.
Jacks thought back.
Christmas, New Year, you were sneaking out, meeting up, probably going to his empty house or his garage. All that covert texting at the table, that bloody buzz that set my teeth on edge because I knew it was him. Can’t believe I was so bloody stupid!
‘Get yourself up to bed, love. I’ll bring you up a cup of tea.’ Pete smiled at his little girl.
Martha hesitated as she walked from the kitchen. She looked at her mum. ‘I’m sorry, Mum. I know you think I’ve let you down, but I didn’t plan any of this. It just happened.’
Jacks opened her mouth to comment that these things didn’t ‘just happen’, but no words came out.
Pete stood back to let Martha pass, leant against the sink and waited until she had climbed the stairs. ‘You need to stay calm, Jacks, for everyone’s sake but especially Martha’s. We need to keep her close, to look after her and we can only do that if she feels comfortable here.’
‘Oh, well, I’m sorry if it’s me that’s messed up! Why do I get the feeling that I’m at fault here? As if it’s me that’s flushed her one chance of happiness down the loo. I might have known it would come back to something that I’ve done!’
‘I’m not saying that. I’m just saying that it’s already a difficult time and we know it’s going to get a lot harder, so we need to smooth things over. Things have a funny way of working out.’
‘Oh, for Christ’s sake, Pete, will you listen to yourself? Do they? Honestly? When are things going to start working out for us, eh? When will our fortunes turn around? I’ve been listening to you say that for the last nineteen years and I’m still bloody waiting.’
Pete turned his back to the table and stared out of the window into the narrow strip of garden.
‘That’s the thing, Jacks. My fortunes did turn around, the day I got you and then Martha and Jonty, our little house, everything. I think I’m the richest man alive. I might not have boats and flash watches, but I’m not stupid, Jacks.’ He shot her a look. ‘In fact, I’m clever enough to know when I’ve got it good. Things might not be perfect, like having your mum call on you every five minutes, like living without enough space to swing a cat, not being able to afford the luxuries I want to give you all or send Martha to Paris with her mates. But on the whole, things could be a lot, lot worse. So things have worked out for me. I’m just sorry you don’t feel the same.’
‘Pete…’ She drew breath, choosing her words carefully. ‘I didn’t mean it like that. I didn’t—’
‘It doesn’t matter what you meant. It is what it is.’ Pete clicked the kettle and concentrated on making a cup of tea for his daughter, who was upstairs crying into her pillow with her heart fit to burst, trying not to wake her little brother on the other side of the room.
Nineteen Years Earlier
Jacks sat in the front room of her mum and dad’s terraced house while her mum cried into her handkerchief and her dad nodded quietly by her side. She felt the walls pressing in on her; it was as if the air was being sucked out of the room. She thought she might suffocate.
‘And where’s the boy now?’ her dad asked gently as he calmly set aside his crossword and placed his pencil on the little dictionary that balanced on the arm of the sofa.
‘I don’t know. America, I think. Possibly Boston, but definitely America. I’m not sure…’
‘That doesn’t narrow it down much; it’s quite a big place. Bigger than Weston.’ Her dad tried to lighten the moment.
‘I know it’s bigger than Weston! Everywhere is bigger than Weston!’ Uncharacteristically, Jacks flared at her dad, who shrank from her jibe.
‘You’re a fool if you think you’ll ever see him again. I knew it! I said, didn’t I?’ Ida shook her head as she drew on her cigarette.
‘He doesn’t know, Mum! He’s not like that. It’s not his fault – I never got the chance to tell him and then his family had to leave in such a rush. I’m sure that if he did know, he’d be right here.’
And when he contacts me, I will tell him and he will come for me…
Ida tutted. ‘But he’s not right here, is he?’
Her mum’s question caused her hot tears to fall once again.
Ida turned to her husband. ‘I said, didn’t I? Find a nice local boy, someone who is good to his mum, a family man. But no one listens to me, they never do. I just wanted what was best for her, for her future. I want her to have the best life possible.’
‘We both only want what’s best for her, Ida.’
Her dad’s support and her mum’s words of kindness, despite her disappointment, only heightened Jacks’ distress. Now she felt guilty as well as everything else. More tears fell. Tears she thought would never stop, clogging her throat and filling her nose and mouth, a river of sadness that she just couldn’t stem.
Her dad patted her hand. Her lovely dad, always trying to make things better for her. For the first time she understood what real grief was – all previous little spikes of sadness seemed like mere rehearsals by comparison. Jacks closed her eyes, knowing she would never forget the moment, nor the scent in the room: her mum had been baking and the aroma of cinnamon and mixed spice was strong. Her nausea didn’t need much prompting.
‘What are you going to do?’ Ida asked from the chair in which she was curled, her cigarette extended between two fingers held high, her voice softer now.
Jacks shrugged. The details were sketchy, but she was certain of one thing. ‘I’m having this baby and that’s that.’
Later, Jacks lay on her little bed staring at the ceiling and thinking. Why had he gone without even saying goodbye? She pictured lying on the grass with her hand inside his, feeling like the whole world was open to her, that she could go anywhere and be anything. It had felt good.
‘Meet me on the Lake of Dreams…’
She looked up at the moon, which now seemed to haunt her though her bedroom window. She turned and buried her face in her pillow.
I wanted you to take me with you. Take us with you! Oh, Sven, I love you. I really do. I wish I could talk to you…
It was a week later that his note arrived. The reality of her situation hit her with the force of a punch in the gut, making her vomit and leaving her weak. She let the bath run full. It didn’t matter that the water was only lukewarm; the purpose was to let the sound of the running water drown out her crying.
‘All okay in there, love? Were you being sick?’ her mum asked as she passed, knocking twice on the door with the hand that wasn’t holding a cigarette.
Leave me alone. Please just leave me alone.
‘Yes. But I’m fine now,’ she added, with as much brightness as she could muster. She waited till she heard Ida’s slippers pad down the stairs towards her comfy chair.
He had gone to America, to live in Boston with his family in a big house where there was room to breathe. And he would not be making contact or coming to fetch her any time soon. She reread the note in her hand, hoping to find a line that told her this was all a horrible mistake and he was on his way, coming to take her hand and tell her everything was going to be okay. She studied his spidery writing, his words poetic and meaningless, muting any sentiment they might have conveyed. Gone was the roaring passion that had made her fall into his arms and lie with him under the stars. Gone was the excitement of planning, the painting of a future so real she could smell the dusty Montana dusk beneath its low-hanging moon. There was no message of hope, no words of longing. This was his goodbye.
If she were being honest, she’d known this was how it would end, known he would continue on his adventure while she remained there, living in Addicott Road with her mum and dad and hoping for a place at college. Although even that now seemed beyond her reach. She placed her hand on her tummy and read his note once again.
I think maybe we were right in our assumption that the beginning is the most exciting part. We were just beginning and it was exciting, wasn’t it? The reality is a harsh lesson. Geography may be our jailer, but time will see that distance eroded and we must dance beneath the stars until the day that the miles disappear and who knows, maybe we can embark upon a new beginning…
‘Who are you trying to kid, dance beneath the fucking stars?’ Jacks pressed her hand against the mirror, leaning on it for strength as tears coursed down her face and splashed into the olive-coloured sink. ‘It’s rubbish, Sven, all of it. I’m not dancing anywhere, just like I’m not gong anywhere. I’m stuck here without you and I’m pregnant!’ She howled again as the whisper left her mouth. ‘I’m pregnant, Sven, and I don’t know what to do…’
She pulled the note into shreds and threw it down the loo, instantly regretting its disposal as she watched the waterlogged message sink to the bottom before flushing it away.
The bright, sunny weather was at odds with the mood in the Davies household. It had been a week since Martha had told her mum and dad and the atmosphere was still strained, with every member of the family struggling in their own way to come to terms with the situation. On the drive to school, the car was uncharacteristically quiet. There was no chirpy banter from Jonty in the back seat, no witty exchange with Martha as she applied her make-up and hummed along to a tune on the radio.
‘All okay back there, mister?’ Jacks asked in as light-hearted a tone as she could muster. ‘Are we buckled up?’
Jonty nodded, looking quite forlorn.
She tried again. ‘You’re very quiet. Got anything good on today?’
Jonty shook his head before piping up, ‘Martha was crying in the night. It woke me up and then she was talking to her boyfriend under the duvet. I heard her whispering and then crying again.’
Jacks stared at him in the rear-view mirror, watching as he fidgeted with the zip on his coat. When would be the right time to tell him? When would she finally have to admit that her family was just like everyone else’s and that there would be no graduation ceremony for her clever girl, no cap and gown worn for the formal photo, no letters after her name and no travelling with a little black case on wheels as she attended business meetings in far-flung capitals.
‘Sorry if I woke you up, Jont.’ Martha turned and smiled at her little brother.
‘Are you okay now, Martha?’ he asked.
‘I will be,’ she said, before getting out of the car, her bag of useless textbooks flung over her shoulder.
Jacks spent the return drive chatting out loud to her dad.
‘Oh God, Dad, I feel like everything is slipping through my fingers. I’ve never felt this low. I could run away, I really could. I could just run away. I’m trying, you have got to believe that I am trying, but I don’t know how much more I can take. I’m sorry. I don’t want to let you down, but I feel like I can’t breathe.’