The Very Picture of You (32 page)

‘I
did
recognise that longing… yes…’ I felt my eyes fill. ‘But… I ought to go now.’ I didn’t want to cry again in front of Iris, or have to explain to her that my tears were prompted not just by her story, but by my own. I stood up. ‘So… I’ll see you next week.’

‘I look forward to it, my dear.’ Iris got up and came with me to the door. I picked up my easel, bag and the canvas carrier, smiled goodbye, then left.

I didn’t wait for the lift, but walked down the stairs, my mind filled with the image of my father looking through the window of the café. I imagined his sorrow when he realised that I wasn’t going to come. I thought of him waiting there again yesterday, then going back there this morning.

I left the building and hailed a cab. As it turned off Kensington High Street I saw the sign for my father’s hotel, and was about to ask the driver to stop, when I realised that my father wouldn’t be there. His flight was leaving in less than an hour. He’d be in Departures or making his way to the gate. I got out my phone and re-read his last message.

I hope you’ll find it in your heart…

I hadn’t done so. Now, because of Iris’s painting, I felt that I could. I looked at his mobile number then, with no idea of what I would say or how I would even find the voice with which to say it, I began to dial. 07856 53944… I pressed the last digit.

Call?

I stared at the screen, my hand shaking. Guy Lennox hadn’t abandoned his children. He’d fought to keep them, and had suffered injustice in his attempt to remain close to them. My father had simply left me, and had never looked back.

With a sinking feeling I realised that my mother, for all her bitterness, had been right. It
was
too late. I pressed the red button then put the phone in my bag.

I’d made my decision, I reasoned as I arrived home: my father was now leaving, and after all the agonising and the tears it was time to let things lie.

Which is what I would have done, but for the e-mail that I received two days later…

It was Friday night, very late. I’d been to see a film with Polly, then we’d had a drink. I’d just got home and was in the studio, thinking about my sitting with Nate, who was coming in the morning, when I heard an e-mail drop into my inbox.

I went to the computer and saw that the message was from my father. I didn’t
want
to hear from him again. I’d made it clear that I didn’t wish to be in touch with him. What could there be to say? For a moment I toyed with the idea of deleting it without reading it. Then, with a weary sigh, I opened it. I was surprised to see that he’d written at length.

Dear Ella

I’m very sorry that we didn’t get to see each other in London. I felt so sad as the plane took off, but consoled myself by deciding that I’d write to you, so that I could convey to you at least some of what I would have said, had we met.

Firstly, I’d have asked you about yourself – about your career, your family and your friends. It would have felt strange, having to ask my own daughter such basic questions, but I know so little about your life. Then I’d have told you a bit about me – in particular, that I was widowed six months ago and am still adjusting to that sadness. I’d have told you that I live near a small town called Busselton, not far from Perth, on a winery that was started by my wife’s parents, and to which it had always been her intention to return. I never entirely shared her enthusiasm for this plan, but in the end, coming here became a means by which to escape an intolerable situation. Because, as you know only too well, I’d made a dreadful mess of my personal life.

‘Of course,’ I muttered. ‘I know the whole story.’

When I first contacted you, Ella, I said that I wanted to try and explain. I hoped to be able to sit down with you and tell you why I behaved as I did all those years ago. I also wanted you to know that I did try to remain in touch: but all my airmails came back, unopened, with ‘return to sender’ written on them in your mother’s neat hand.

I felt my insides coil.

I wrote to you many, many times. In these letters I told you that I was living in Australia, but didn’t say why, because you were too young to understand the circumstances that had led me here. I knew that your mum would have told you that I’d simply abandoned you both, which, to my eternal shame, is true. But I wanted you to know that I still loved you, and missed you, and wished with all my heart that it had been possible for me to be with you.

Of
course
it would have been possible – if he hadn’t run off with someone else!

I must say I didn’t have my wife’s blessing in any of this. She was very upset at what had happened.

I wanted to laugh.
She
was upset?

Frances said that if I wanted to ease my conscience I should simply open a bank account for you that your mother could access. I did so, but your mum ignored my many requests for her to sign and return to me the forms that I’d sent her. So then I began sending cheques to her, but she’d send them all back.

Her pride wouldn’t allow her to take his money. Perhaps her pride had also made her refuse to seek maintenance from him after they divorced. I read on.

Then I heard that your mother was leaving her flat –

What did he mean ‘her’ flat? It was their flat.

I discovered this from my old colleague Al, with whom I’d stayed in touch. Al bumped into your mother in the centre of Manchester a couple of years after I’d left. She told him that she’d recently married, and was moving to London. She mentioned that she was no longer dancing – Al assumed that this was because she was very obviously having another baby.

So my father knew nothing about her accident.

I was glad to know that your mother had found happiness with someone else, and I prayed that he’d be a good stepfather to you, Ella. But I still wanted to be in touch with your mum, not just because I intended to provide for you, but because it was my dearest wish to see you again one day. I hoped that you’d be able to come and visit me when you were old enough, though I’d have to have handled that very carefully, as Frances, had found the whole situation so painful.

She’d
found it painful? Having seduced my father away from his family and dragged him Down Under?

So when Al told me that your mother was moving to London, I wrote to the Northern Ballet Theatre asking them to forward to her a letter that I enclosed – but I didn’t hear from her. I then placed an ad in The Stage, with a box number, but she didn’t respond. Your mother was clearly never going to forgive me for the way our relationship had ended.

Their ‘relationship’? What a weird way of putting it.

I’m sure she must have told you how she and I met. It was after a performance of
Cinderella,
in which she had danced the role of the Winter Fairy, in a beautiful tutu that sparkled with ‘ice’. Frances loved ballet and had bought special tickets that included an invitation to the cast party afterwards: so we went along…

My father had gone to see Cinderella with Frances? Mum had said only that he’d been there with ‘a few other people’. So
that
would explain why Frances had hated Mum – because she’d liked John too, but it was my mother who he fell in love with.

I’d gone to get Frances a drink, and when I came back with it she was chatting to your mother; so Frances introduced us.

This all tallied with what Mum had told me.

By then Frances and I had been married five years.

I stared at the sentence.

I loved Frances. I’d never been unfaithful to her.

It was my mother who was ‘the other woman’.

Ella, this will be hard for you to read, but it’s important that I tell you the truth, which is that I never meant to become as deeply involved with your mother as I did. But she was captivating, and I was weak.

Now I thought of the hotel bill that she said she’d found in my father’s pocket, and the love letter – it had been the love letter of a wife to her husband.

I’d often try to end the affair, but she’d become so distressed that I couldn’t bring myself to hurt her. Six months after we’d met, I told her that it had to stop. It was then that she told me she was pregnant.

I closed my eyes, then opened them again.

I was distraught, because I didn’t want to hurt Frances, or lose her. I was also shocked – which you’ll think is naïve; but I’d never imagined that Sue would risk her career by having a baby; she was young, and very ambitious. It was only then that I realised just how powerful her feelings for me were. I told her that I would never leave my wife. But Sue knew that Frances couldn’t have children, and she must have believed that once I’d bonded with the baby then my love for Frances would fade.

Mum had me in order to get John to leave his wife. That’s why she’d said she was ‘so happy’ to be having a baby. Now I remembered her fury when Chloë had contemplated getting pregnant in order to force a commitment from Max. Mum clearly knew, from her
own experience, that to do so would be – how had she put it? ‘Too big a risk.’ I read on.

Despite my huge anxiety, Ella, I was thrilled when you were born and immediately felt a deep love for you. But your birth marked the start of a double life that was so stressful that at times I wondered how I’d survive it. In saying that, I’m not appealing for sympathy; I’m just trying to explain how I ended up causing so much hurt.

So much, I reflected.

Your mother urged me to tell Frances the truth: but I refused to do so because I was terrified that Frances would leave me. I loved her. I loved all three of you – my wife, your mum, and of course you, my precious baby. I simply didn’t know what to do. So, like many men in that situation, I did nothing. I’d visit Sue and you after work during the week, and at weekends, whenever I could. I’d drive down West Street and I’d see your mother standing at the window of her flat, looking out for me.

I remembered how she used to call out to me, ‘Daddy’s here!’ Now I realised why she always referred to my father ‘arriving’; because he didn’t
live
with us. So many of her elliptical remarks suddenly made sense.

You had no idea that your mum and I weren’t like any other parents. I’d push you on the swings and take you swimming; I could easily have been spotted by someone that Frances and I knew, but I loved you so much that I was willing to take the risk: sometimes I’d take you to the theatre to see your mum dance. I’d read to you and paint and draw with you. I became so deeply attached to you that I decided, many times, that I
would
leave Frances. But then I’d agonise all over again, because I didn’t want to lose her.

So, instead, he lost
me
.

Then Frances began to feel unwell. When she discovered that she was pregnant, it seemed a miracle, not just because she’d been told that it could never happen, but because by then she was forty-two. We were both so happy but I was terrified of telling Sue. So I didn’t tell her. I hadn’t even told my parents about you, because I was worried that they’d tell Frances.

So that was why I never met my paternal grand parents. And that was why Grandma was around so much – because my father wasn’t in a position to look after me, given that he had to get back to his wife every night.

Then in 1978 Frances began to plan for us to return to Australia. At that point my life became hell. How could I go there, when I had you? But how could I not go when I had Lydia, who was by then eighteen months? I was so stressed at the thought of having to choose between my two families that I’d often want to kill myself or just disappear into the bush – anything not to have to face up to such an awful situation.

By now I felt only pity for my father.

Your mother increasingly demanded to know why I was still with Frances. It was to be another year before things came to a head. I’d told Sue that I’d take her and you for a picnic – it was a beautiful Saturday in early September. But I couldn’t get away and instead went for a walk with Frances and Lydia. Perhaps you know what happened next, Ella. Perhaps you even remember it.

‘I do,’ I whispered.

Suddenly there you were, running towards me, looking so delighted and surprised. I remember you chatting to me, then peering at Lydia with innocent curiosity. Then your mother caught up with us, clearly distressed. Frances was staring at you, Ella, then, as she took in the situation, she gave your mother a look of utter loathing, picked Lydia up, and went into the house.

So the situation wasn’t the wrong way round at all. Frances had had every reason to hate my mother.

In that moment all the complexity of my life fell away. Awful though it was, I felt a huge relief that from this moment there were no secrets – only the terror of the decision that I would now have to make. Even up until then, with many of our possessions already being shipped to Australia, I’d been torn as to whether I’d actually go. Some days I’d imagine myself staying in Manchester with Sue and you. At other times I’d see myself boarding the plane with Frances and Lydia. But the events of that day meant that I would finally have to choose. So I chose…

‘To desert Mum and me.’

…to stay with my wife. That choice – and the terrible way I handled it – has haunted me ever since; because the truth is I didn’t have the guts to tell your mother what staying with Frances would actually mean. I didn’t know how to tell her. So, to my shame, I didn’t. I just collected my things from her flat, and then left, because I knew no other way to do it.