A Sister’s Gift (8 page)

‘No!’ My hands fly up to my mouth. ‘Have a baby for you? Are you…
completely
mad, Hol?’

There’s a silence again. A wide grey silence that bounces off the walls, gets stuck in the faded yellow hops she’s got hanging from the oak ceiling beams. For a few minutes we both stand there looking at her pastry sitting in a bowl in the middle of the table.

‘I can’t.’ It makes me feel queasy even thinking about it. I get up and bolt out of the kitchen door and Ruff follows me loyally out into the garden. How could she ask me that? She’s out of her mind, she knows what I’m like, what my life is like right now and I
can’t
give it to her. A year of my life. A life sentence more like…

The crisis in the Amazon – the work I’m doing there – it needs tending to now, it’s not going to wait and I can’t either.

‘I’m sorry,’ she calls out desperately after me but she doesn’t get up to come after me and I don’t want her to. I need her to leave me alone.

I need her to let me get on with my own life.

When I look out into the silent garden, growing dark now with the early evening that’s drawing in, there’s still no hide nor hair of her. For an instant I feel the twinge of an old ache, the familiar worry of not knowing where my sister is, who she’s with, if she’s even all right…

How many nights would I go out and catch her sitting up on a wall by The Vines. The irony of it never escaped me then, either – that the garden where medieval monks from Rochester Priory once grew grapes for their wine should end up being the place where local kids hang out to drink their cider. And often enough that’s where Scarlett would be, when she should have been in her bedroom, doing homework. But she’s a grown woman now.

Still though, she’s a runner, Scarlett. She always was. If she didn’t like what was going on she’d scarper. I often never knew where it was she went, though, boy, did I search. She could be away for hours. A couple of times, almost a day went by before I saw her but never quite the twenty-four hours needed for the police to get involved. She was just happy to take it close enough to the wire.

I wonder if she even knew what she did to me on those occasions when, at fourteen, fifteen, she’d just disappear? I don’t suppose she ever cared enough to consider. She’d be guided by her own moods. If I was upset or worried or concerned…well, why should she fret?

I straighten now at the sound of Jay’s and Richard’s cars pulling up at the front, feeling a small tensing in my stomach because they’re all here – everyone except her – and any moment now I’m going to officially learn that Sarah is already pregnant.

I should be glad for the happy couple. I
am
glad for them. We’re all going to have a new addition to the family, that’s one way to look at it. Rich becomes an uncle. Christine and Bill become grandparents at last. Christmas next year will be even better, I tell myself firmly, because Christmas is a time for kids, I’ve always said so.

I’m getting jaded, that’s all, and I don’t want to be. I’ve always loved this time of year. All the anticipation and the preparations and the little rituals that surround the Christmas season, I’ve always been in my element.

So why has this year felt like a huge effort?

I didn’t want to be bothered with making all my own mince pies or preparing that bowl of mulled wine for my guests. Or laying out the table settings so beautifully as I always do. Or dressing the tree, hanging the garlands.

I wanted to do…
nothing
.

I should never have asked Scarlett to be my surrogate. I should have known what her response would be. I did know it, I just didn’t want to accept it because every so often in life a wave of change comes along and then – given the right tide – things can all work all right. I lean back, closing the curtains, hearing the family’s excited voices approaching now down my drive and wanting to join in their Christmas cheer. But I sense that this year, it’s really going to cost me.

Damn it
.

I close my eyes, pull my legs up to my chest on the wooden bench in the gazebo, and Ruffles jumps up after me.

I
saw
Hollie’s face when they all trooped in about half an hour ago, announcing the ‘happy news’ that Sarah and Jay were expecting in the autumn. She immediately broke open the champagne, good hostess that she is, but I thought that the effort of smiling was going to make her face crack. Christ, what kind of timing is that?

I can hear them from here, clinking glasses and laughing and moving about in the kitchen, but I don’t make a move. When I peer through the glass, it isn’t raining outside but there is so much water in the air that long rivulets are running down the windows. I hope they can’t see me in here.

‘I can’t stay outside forever pretending to take you out for a walk, can I?’ I lean forward to scratch Ruffles under the chin. ‘They’ll know something’s up.’

Ruffles growls, as if in agreement. Hollie’s been organising her dinner party all day as if everything is normal, as if we didn’t have
that
conversation this morning.

But everything isn’t normal. Ruffles is sitting stock-still, eyes locked devotedly on mine as if he really understands what I’m saying.

‘I know she’s upset about this whole baby thing, but I offered
her what I could. I said I’d donate eggs for her. And even that is more than I want to do; I only offered because she is desperate and sad and I felt I somehow
should!
I give Ruffles a rueful smile. ‘Just to give her even
more
reason to be upset with me, I just remembered I already ate half the raspberries that she set aside for dessert earlier. Just you wait till she discovers that!’

There is a rap on the wet glass of the gazebo. I sit up guiltily.

‘Just you wait till Hollie discovers what?’ Richard enquires.

‘I ate Hollie’s raspberries,’ I confess. ‘But apart from that…look, if you’ve been sent out here to fetch me, I need to know she’s not still upset about what happened earlier.’

‘Sarah announcing that she’s expecting, you mean?’

‘No!’ I give a small laugh. ‘Though I don’t imagine that went down too well. I mean…about what happened between Hollie and
me
earlier.’

‘I don’t know, Lettie.’ He ducks under the doorframe, running his hands through his damp hair and I remember he hasn’t been back home long. ‘Was she upset with you earlier?’

‘I think so…’I tell him quietly. He sits down beside me and I shove over a bit. ‘Yes, she was upset with me. She’s been rushing around like a demon all morning…’

‘Poor Hol. This dinner party has given her a lot of work, hasn’t it?’

‘She
loves
it,’ I retort. ‘She loves being the hostess with the mostest and having her family all around her…’

‘She does,’ he agrees softly, ‘but she’s under a bit of strain right now. Don’t take it to heart if she snapped at you. Is that the reason you’re hiding out here?’

I shake my head. He hasn’t asked me what I’ve done to upset Hollie, I notice. Perhaps he already knows?

‘Oh, I don’t know! Sometimes families are so complicated, aren’t they?’ Ruffles is standing up on the bench now, nuzzling his face into Richard’s neck. ‘It’s not so for dogs, is it?’

He smiles into Ruffles’ fur.

‘D’you suppose Ruff still remembers the day he and I first came into your life? Is that why he adores you as much as he does?’

‘Do you remember that?’ Rich glances at me for a second. ‘I’d never seen such a forlorn sight. That hit-and-run driver just left you with the dog after he’d run over his legs.’

‘And you were just on your way to some important meeting. I remember you had your suit on and a briefcase. It was a Tuesday and it was raining and it was dark and there was hardly anybody else about and you picked him up and you told me to come along with you and you said…’

‘Whoa! A Tuesday?’ he interjects. ‘You’ve got some memory.’

‘You said…’I shoot him a glance ‘…you would take him to the vet’s for me and you did. You put him in your car and then you walked me to Hol’s office because you said I shouldn’t get in the car with a stranger.’

‘You were only – what – ten?’ He shrugs.

‘I was thirteen. Nearly fourteen. I was a late developer, that’s all.’ My fingers accidentally brush against his as we both stroke the dog and I put my hand in my pocket instead, getting out my mobile phone. ‘Look,’ I tell him, clicking on the photos icon on my phone and changing the subject. ‘These are the people who I need to get the money together for.’

‘These are your friends?’

My friends. Yes. That’s Guillermo standing there in the middle with his arms about my bare waist. I look pretty good in that one. Pretty fit. There’s no mistaking the way he’s looking at me while everyone else is busy posing for the camera. I glance up at Richard to see if he’s noticed but if he has he isn’t showing it.

‘These people?’ he frowns.

‘No. Those are PlanetLove people and – other friends. I’ll show you the Yanomami now.’

‘Oh!’ Richard laughs at the next one, leans in closer towards me so he can get a better look at the screen.

‘That little guy brandishing the venom-tipped spear is José. He’s my best buddy out there. Either him or his dad, the shaman Tunga, are always my guides when we’re out scouting for plants. His mother Lalu is teaching me their dialect and I’m trying to teach her some English…’I trail off because seeing them makes me feel sad. They need me and I need to get back to them.

‘Do you know,’ I put my hand over Richard’s now as the screen blanks out all by itself, ‘what it is Hollie has asked me to do for her?’

Richard looks down and I see that he does indeed know.

‘She wants me to have your child,’ I continue and the robin redbreast who’s been singing his heart out on the gate flutters down onto the lawn.

I flush. That’s not what I meant. Hollie wants me to carry
her
child, of course. Well, using my eggs. And Richard’s um…I clear my throat. His child, yes, that’s it then, isn’t it? She wants me to have
his
child
for her
.

‘What do you think about that?’ I murmur.

He looks up and his blue eyes hold mine for an instant. ‘It would be the greatest act of charity,’ he admits, and his answer throws me into even further confusion. I never thought of it like that. PlanetLove is charity. I consider the work I do for that organisation to be of a charitable nature because I’m doing it for the greater good. I’m doing it for a very small wage.

But this thing…
he wants me to do it, then?

I cross my legs in front of me, wrapping my arms around them so as to half-hide my face.

‘You want me to do it, Richard?’

‘I’d be very happy if you would at least consider it, Scarlett.’

‘You would?’

‘We both would. It’s not something I’d want you to rush into without considering all the implications first, though.’

‘I owe you so much, Richard.’ I jump up off the bench because I can’t stay still any longer. ‘I mean, both of you. You and Hollie.
Of course I’d love to give you – both – the chance to have this child. I thought maybe if I donated some eggs that might do it but…’

‘I know.’ He picks up my hands for a fleeting instant then drops them. ‘She wants you because she trusts you. We wouldn’t want you to do this thing because you feel that you owe us anything. You don’t owe us a thing.’

‘Of course I owe you! Hollie took me under her wing after Flo passed away, didn’t she? I know she’s my sister and all and she sort of had to, but I still owe her – pretty much everything.’

‘She did everything she did for you because she loves you, sweetie. Not because she felt she had to. If you decided to go ahead with this for her – and given where you’re at in your life right now, it would be a huge sacrifice, let’s make no bones about that – then you must do it for love, too. Not because you want to please her or,’ he lowers his eyes, ‘me. But because it’s an act of love.’

I am silent for a while, taking it all in.

My initial reaction might have been no, but I suppose I
could
do it. Why not? I glance at Richard and I’m aware that my heart has started hammering very fast again. People have babies all the time and it doesn’t slow them down or get in the way of their life.

‘Lettie, don’t give us your answer now. Think long and hard about it before you agree. It won’t be a small commitment. Once you make the decision you won’t be able to back out of it easily.’

‘Do you think that I would?’ I lean back against the glass walls of the gazebo, challenging him. ‘Do you think that I lack commitment?’

‘Lettie, that isn’t what I’m saying. It’s you who I’m thinking of, right now. Thank you for being so…willing. But the more I think about it…’

‘You sound a little bit conflicted over it,’ I prompt. I let my hand come to rest on his knee. ‘Are you?’

‘If I’m honest, I have my reservations.’

‘Because it’s me?’ I ask softly and he looks away. ‘Because I have changed, Richard, I do think more about other people’s interests now and not only my own. Do you believe me?’

He doesn’t look convinced, but it’s true. I smile as Richard -always so proper – takes my hand and places it gently back on my own knee. When I set out to make my way home via Venezuela just under a week ago I had the welfare of my second family in the forefront of my mind. I was absolutely clear about what I had come back to do.

Now everything has changed. I never expected that these two would want anything from me, especially anything so huge and so
intimate
as this, but…

Maybe that’s all to the good. I glance at Richard but he’s already taken pity on shivering Ruffles and is leading him back into the house. I have to hurry to catch up with them as he ducks through the low doorframe now and into the house, but my mind is in a spin, open suddenly to new possibilities, new ways forward out of the different dilemmas which we’re
all
facing.

Hollie wants something that only I can do for her.

I want this cottage. I need it.

Besides, if they start a family, as I said to Hollie, they’ll want something bigger, something more practical. If I have my sister’s baby for her, then she won’t mind moving. She’ll
have
to move. And when they sell Florence Cottage, I’ll get my share of the money due from the sale.