Secrets My Mother Kept (31 page)

‘Well,’ Marion said, ‘I certainly don’t think she has ever loved me.’

It was Margaret who broke the silence.

‘Of course Mum loves us,’ she said. ‘She’s the best mum in the world.’

Marion looked at us carefully. ‘Yes, I think you’re probably right. She does love you two, but I don’t think she has ever loved me, or Marge and Mary.’ Her eyes slid away from ours as she continued. ‘What you two still don’t understand is that she was never there when we were small. In fact I remember her coming to see us in Valence Avenue once, and we didn’t even know who she was. Aunty said to us, “Come and give your mother a cuddle,” and we just looked at this stranger standing there. We didn’t know her at all.’

‘Where was she then?’ I asked. ‘Not prison again?’ Margaret gave me a look. It felt a little disloyal to say the words aloud, but we both needed to find out the truth.

‘No, not that time. Who knows? It might have been London or Southend or anywhere. I don’t suppose we will ever know now Aunty is gone. Mum had another life, a secret life wherever she was, and it didn’t include us, her ever-expanding brood of children, that’s for sure.’ Marion hesitated, and then went on, ‘And when she finally did come back to Valence Ave to live, she used to send us to bed you know, we had to be upstairs by half six even when we were older, just to get us out of the way. You never had that, you and Margaret; you were always the favourites, the babies. We just got sent to bed without any dinner, just bread and jam for our tea. How do you think that made us feel? Loved? No, I don’t think so.’

As we walked back to the house in silence, my mind was in turmoil. If Margaret and I could find out where Mum used to disappear to and with who, we might just be able to solve the questions that eternally tormented us: the identity of our father, and why we had never known him. Then I remembered Aunty and the loss hit me again like a slap. What did any of it matter anyway? The person who had stood up for us, who had been beside Mum through all of it, that person was dead, and then I remembered a saying my friend Anne had often used: ‘You never miss the water till the well runs dry,’ and I smiled. Aunty would have appreciated that.

49

Josephine

By the time Sam was three and a half, Colin and I had plucked up the courage to try for another baby. I was frightened. I knew that Sam’s condition wasn’t thought to be hereditary, but that didn’t completely reassure me. Margaret was expecting her fourth baby and I knew that if I didn’t have one soon, I never would. I wanted desperately to know what it would be like to have a ‘normal’ baby with no problems. I wanted to be able to enjoy the excitement and happiness that other women felt after they gave birth, without the crushing terror that had accompanied my experience and followed me throughout the first year of Sam’s life. Within a couple of months I was expecting. When I told Margaret she was overjoyed.

‘That’s great,’ she said, ‘they’ll be born about the same time apart as Becky and Sam.’

I was devastated when I miscarried my baby at twelve weeks. There didn’t appear to be any cause; I was just told to try again in a few months. Depression began to overwhelm me. I couldn’t believe I would ever have a healthy baby. When Margaret gave birth to her fourth daughter she called her Faye, the name that I had picked out for our baby. The name suited her completely. She was tiny and fragile, with fine wisps of black hair, and enormous blue eyes. When I visited Margaret in hospital I looked down at the baby enviously.

‘She’s beautiful,’ I murmured, stroking her pale skin.

Within a month of Faye being born I found out that I was pregnant again.

The doctor was very cautious. ‘Bed rest!’ he advised sternly. ‘Bed rest and lots of good food!’ The hospital had now identified that I had a fibroid, and it was that which they thought may have caused my previous miscarriage. Colin was very strict with me, but I put my foot down when he suggested that I might use a bedpan!

‘I hope you’re joking?’ I said, ‘Because that is not going to happen!’ But I did rest. I wanted this baby desperately and I wasn’t taking any chances this time.

About six weeks before my baby was due, I was watching a new comedy series,
Blackadder
, which I thought was hilarious. As I watched I felt a few minor contractions. When I told Colin, he was worried.

‘Why don’t you ring Margaret and ask what she thinks?’ he suggested.

‘Oh for goodness sake, it is just practice contractions, I think they’re called “Braxton Hicks”,’ I said, but I rang Margaret anyway just to be sure.

‘How bad are they?’ she asked.

‘Well, I suppose they’re quite painful,’ I replied as I paced up and down our tiny living room.

‘And how frequent are they?’

‘About every five minutes or so, I suppose.’

‘I think you should ring the hospital,’ she advised, ‘just to make sure.’

Luckily our cottage was immediately opposite the hospital that I was booked in to have the baby, because when I rang they insisted that I come in immediately.

‘Okay,’ I said, ‘I’ll walk over with my husband.’

I couldn’t believe it when they insisted that he drove me. It was literally as far to our driveway as it was to the hospital, but Colin insisted we do as we were told, so I climbed into the car for the thirty-second journey!

After chauffeuring me, Colin drove Sam to my mum’s. By the time he arrived home later that night the phone was ringing to tell him that if he wanted to see his baby born he had better get over there quickly. Our baby girl was born as Colin walked into the delivery room. I heard the midwife say to her assistant, ‘Thank goodness, her airways are clear,’ and I knew that my baby was going to be all right even though she had been in such a hurry to get here. She had arrived six weeks early and was the most beautiful baby ever. She was tiny, weighing just 4lb 10oz, but was perfect, with the same red-gold hair as her brother and the same enormous blue eyes. She was like a baby doll and I fell in love with her immediately. Unlike my previous delivery, I felt really well and was out of bed by the time Colin arrived the next morning with Sam.

‘Be careful,’ he said. ‘Do you think you should be out of bed already?’

I laughed. ‘I’m fine. Look Sam,’ I said, calling him over, ‘here’s your baby sister.’

Sam peered into the cot. ‘What’s her name, Mummy?’

I looked at Colin over our two little ones’ heads. We hadn’t had a chance to decide yet, but in my heart I knew what kind of little girl my baby would be. She would be strong, fiery and creative, just like my favourite heroine in
Little Women
, and just like her Aunty Josie.

‘Shall we call her Josephine?’ I suggested to Sam and Colin. They nodded their agreement. ‘What second name shall we give her?’ I asked Sam, ‘You can choose if you like.’

Sam gave it no more than a couple of seconds thought and then suggested firmly, ‘Jet Plane – I think we should call her Josephine Jet Plane.’

Colin and I exchanged a smile; we might have to persuade Sam to think of a slightly more conventional name. Later that morning we agreed on Kate – Josephine Kate, our perfect baby daughter!

Jo, as we called her, was indeed a perfect, contented baby. She was easy to feed, slept well, and was a peach of a baby, always smiling and happy. Those early days as a family of four were some of the happiest of my life.

50

Trying to Hold On

By this point, Margaret and Marion lived with their families just around the corner, so we saw lots of each other.

Marion had decided to train to be a teacher and was now attending a local teacher training college.

Mum had not been very encouraging to poor Marion.

‘You’ll make a terrible teacher,’ she said when Marion told her. ‘You don’t even like children.’

Marion was hurt and upset. ‘I don’t understand why she’s always so horrible to me,’ she said later that evening when she popped in for a cup of tea. ‘It’s as though she always has to put me down, make me feel useless.’

‘I’m sure she doesn’t mean to be hurtful,’ I assured her. Mum had been just as dismissive of Marge when she had decided to go into nursing, telling her that she wouldn’t be any good because she was afraid of blood. ‘Perhaps she’s just trying to protect you, in case it doesn’t work out.’

Marion took a gulp of tea. ‘Yes, maybe, though I think we both know that’s not the real reason,’ and with that she left for home.

I knew that Mum was funny about some things. She liked to be able to boast about us to other people, but she would always remind us, ‘Don’t tell the devil too much of your mind,’ as though she was always expecting the worst to happen. It is strange how you retain an irrational fear for your whole life, and the worry that something bad was waiting just around the corner was something that we all still carried with us.

I had another miscarriage shortly after Jo’s first birthday, and had been very upset, but we knew we were lucky to have two lovely children, and so were able to put it behind us the best that we could.

By the time Jo was three, we had decided we would definitely like another baby. I had always wanted a big family, and was envious of Margaret’s growing brood. I needed to catch up! I was feeling very tired, and Margaret persuaded me to go to the doctors to get checked out first.

The doctor’s surgery was small, and the doctor that I saw was the only member of the practice. He was a kind man, but unfortunately had a rather insensitive bedside manner. When he examined me he smiled. ‘Ah Mrs Hardy, you are pregnant! About three months at least I should think.’

‘I can’t be,’ I replied. I knew that I wasn’t expecting a baby, I wasn’t an idiot.

‘Well I’m afraid you can be, and I think you are,’ he stated matter-of-factly. ‘What makes you so sure that you’re not?’

‘Because I have been having periods, heavy ones,’ I told him, ‘and anyway, I don’t feel pregnant.’

The doctor looked perplexed, and then called his nurse into the consulting room.

‘Feel this,’ he indicated to her.

She felt around. ‘Mmm yes,’ she said nodding.

‘Do you feel the lump?’ he asked her. I felt my insides turning to water. A lump? A hot prickly sweat broke out on my neck and hands.

‘Yes, yes I can,’ she murmured, palpating my abdomen.

‘It’s enormous,’ the doctor continued, talking to the nurse over me, as though I was invisible, ‘the size of a melon!’

‘Well Mrs Hardy,’ he said, as though he had just noticed that I was there, ‘you have a very large lump in your womb, and we need to get it checked out as soon as possible. I’ll get you referred to the hospital immediately.’

‘So this is it,’ I thought to myself. ‘I knew things were too good to be true. I’ve got cancer and I’m going to die.’ The faces of my two children came into my mind. How could I leave them? How would Colin cope on his own with two young children? The negative thoughts swam around inside my head, panic spiralling out of control. As I drove down the country lane close to our cottage, I considered driving into a ditch. For a few seconds, in my mind that was an actual possibility. I just didn’t want to have to face up to it.

Then I remembered the doctors speculating about me having fibroids. I desperately clung on to the possibility that the lump was something like that – something fixable.

I shuddered to myself as I turned my key in the door and heard Sam and Jo calling out, ‘Mummy’s home! Daddy – Mummy’s home!’ My heart did a somersault as I thought, ‘Yes, but for how long?’

I went into a downward spiral of depression, worse even than the months after Sam was born. I suppose that I had never really fully recovered. People didn’t expect me to be depressed. I wasn’t ‘that sort’ of person, whatever that means. When the social worker used to wander round the neonatal ward that Sam was in as a baby, she would often go up to the other mothers and ask them if they were OK. I knew that many of them were given counselling and other types of support, but she would look at me reading my book as I sat next to Sam’s cot, and say ‘You’re fine aren’t you, Mrs Hardy,’ as a statement, not a question, and every time she said it I would smile at her and nod my head.

‘Yes thank you.’ I would say. ‘Absolutely fine,’ when inside I was falling apart. Oh the lies we learn to tell to protect ourselves from ourselves. My drama training came in handy, here. I was still a good actress;, no one knew how shattered and damaged I was inside.

It was the same now. I hid my terrors from almost everyone, but Colin knew. I cried myself to sleep some nights while I was waiting to go into hospital.

The consultant had been kind.

‘Mrs Hardy, without opening you up and having a good old poke around, we can’t be sure whether it is a fibroid or something a bit more troublesome,’ he told me. Then he hesitated before going on. ‘ You have two children, don’t you?’

I nodded fearfully.

‘Well I want you to have a good think about whether your family is complete,’ he went on. He was a tall slim man with kind eyes, and he was looking at me now questioningly. ‘Because that will help us to decide what to do next’.

I wasn’t sure what he meant.

‘I don’t understand,’ I said. ‘Can you explain please?’

‘Of course,’ he said obligingly. He lent forward and took my hand. ‘I am almost certain this is just a fibroid,’ he started by saying, ‘but there is a small chance that it is something more sinister that we will have to deal with promptly.’ I knew what he meant now.