Things I Want My Daughters to Know (42 page)

Neither of them had a single word to say, and Barbara had said everything she had to say for now. For long, long seconds, the three of them sat there, staring at one another, and at Barbara’s offending uterus—Jennifer looking like she might cry, Lisa with an expression of pure revul-sion, and Barbara, defiant and, in every sense of the word, expectant.

Lisa broke the silence. She burst out laughing.

“Why are you laughing? I’m not joking. You realize I’m serious.”

“But I’ve never met him.”

“I know. You haven’t been home. You’ll meet him now. You can meet him tonight, if you want to.”

“Does Amanda know him?” Amanda was at school.

“Yes, of course. She lives here! This isn’t some flash in the pan, girls.

I know it’s a shock.”

On reflection, that year was probably the time the two sisters had been closest. It all went very fast after that. Mark was introduced and inspected. Then the house was on the market. Boxes marked “Lisa’s stuff ” and “Jennifer’s stuff ” were filled and put into storage. That had particularly horrified Jennifer. “What if I need things from it?” The dis-mantling of the home the four of them had shared since Amanda’s birth was painful and felt cruel. It was “their home” suddenly.

“For God’s sake, you two,” Barbara had exclaimed in exasperation.

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“You haven’t lived here since you both went off to university. You’ve been using it as a doss house for the last I don’t know how long. I don’t understand what all this sentimentalist rubbish is all about. You’ll always be welcome in the new house. You’re acting like you’ve suddenly been turned into Brazilian street children.” They weren’t welcome in the caravan. At least, however welcome they may have been, there was no bloody room for them. Lisa christened it the “Passion Wagon,” a name Jennifer loathed and never used. She and Jennifer tutted together, and rolled their eyes together, and tried not to look at Barbara’s swelling form too much together, and it made them closer.

The détente didn’t really come until Hannah was born. It was hard to stay disgusted when something so small and perfect and sweet smelling entered the fray.

Lisa had arrived. She looked tired. She bent over and kissed Jennifer and then slid into the chair beside her, shucking her jacket off her shoulders to the back of the seat. “Hiya, snow bunny!” Lisa peered at Jennifer, who looked tanned, except for startling white panda eyes, and relaxed. “You look good, by the way. Must have been sunny.”

“It was. It was fantastic.”

“Wow. Fantastic? You hate skiing. Have you finally got the hang of it?”

Jennifer smiled to herself. “Something like that! How are things with you?”

“I’m okay.”

“How is life with Mark and Hannah?”

“Tense. Hannah’s turned into a teenager. A teenager with exams coming up. Grumpy? Just a bit. She’s making up for lost time, I think.

Slamming doors, four-hour phone calls, monosyllabic conversation.

Too much eyeliner, not enough manners. She’s driving Mark nuts, I think.”

“Poor him.” Jennifer wondered if her cheeks were red underneath
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the tan. She hadn’t spoken to him in ages. Not since she’d been such a bitch.

“Poor Hannah, too. I feel sorry for her. She’s had the shitty end of the stick for ages now, hasn’t she? I think it’s probably only normal, a bit of rebellion. Normal for anyone, actually, but when you’ve had a couple of years like the couple of years Hannah’s just had, it’s no wonder, is it?”

“I guess not. . . .”

“Have you heard from Amanda?”

“Not much—you?”

“You know Amanda.”

Lisa wasn’t sure either of them did, particularly. “I had a postcard.

From Rio. Pert bottoms in neon thongs.”

“Me, too.”

“Do you think that represents forgiveness?!”

“Or is she just saying ‘up your bum’?”

“Room for one more?”

It was Mark. Jennifer’s heart began to race when she saw him, and she wondered if her cheeks reddened. Lisa didn’t seem to notice anything.

“You came!”

“Couldn’t rouse Hannah from her pit, and I didn’t fancy eating lunch alone, so I thought I would . . . unless I’m interrupting.”

“No. Not at all. Sit down.” Lisa pulled out a chair.

Mark bent and kissed Jennifer on the cheek. “How are you? You look well.”

Jennifer touched her face, where his lips had been. “Thanks. I’m good.”

“I’m going to the loo. Get the waiter to bring me another glass when he comes to take your order, will you?” Lisa grabbed her handbag from the back of her chair and wandered to the back of the restaurant in search of the ladies.

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Jennifer fiddled self-consciously with her fork.

“Mark . . .”

He put a hand on hers, making her leave the fork alone.

“Listen, Jennifer. I’m glad we’ve got a minute.”

“Me, too. I still want to, need to say how sorry . . .”

“I know. I know you are.”

“I was so unhappy. I know it’s no excuse. . . .”

“No excuse, maybe. But it’s an explanation. It’s always unhappy people who make all the trouble.”

“Have I made trouble? For you, I mean. I think Lisa and Amanda and I sorted things out, before she left. What about you? Have I made trouble for you?”

“No. I don’t think you really meant to, and you didn’t. I can’t say I wasn’t surprised by what you told me. I was. But not really . . . shocked . . . somehow. And it’s okay. It had nothing to do with me—what happened.”

“I know.”

“That was how her first marriage worked, I guess. It wasn’t how ours did.”

“I know. But I upset you.”

“Do you know what upset me?”

Jennifer shook her head, still not entirely comfortable with meeting his eyes.

“The thought that she might have believed that I would have thought less of her. The fact that there were things I never told her for the same reason. The wastefulness of that worry. You know?”

Jennifer nodded.

“None of that matters, you see. It’s all so very simple, when you love someone. Really love someone.”

She had tears in her eyes now.

“Your unhappiness. That’s the worst part. She would want me to help you.
She
wanted to help you. She was waiting for you for talk to her.

You know that?”

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He held Jennifer’s hand. Now she looked at him and smiled.

“What?”

“I’m not unhappy anymore, Mark.”

“What do you mean?”

“I’m not unhappy. Me and Stephen? We’re fixing things. We’ve both been making each other so bloody miserable, and we both thought we knew what the other one thought, and never bothered asking, and that’s why things were so bad, why they weren’t getting any better.”

“And?”

“And we talked. Skiing. We actually, finally sat down and really, really talked. About whether we wanted to be in this marriage. And we do. We both do. Baby or no baby. For each other.”

“That’s great. That’s really great.”

She held his hand. “It is great. All this time I’ve been letting my stupid foolish pride, and my oh-so-arrogant assumption that I understood everyone and everything, stop myself from admitting the problem.”

Mark smiled shyly and nodded a little.

“And I made it so bloody complicated. And it isn’t, is it? Loving someone. You could have told me that a long time ago, couldn’t you, if I’d just asked you? Or Mum could have. You two understood it better than anyone else all along.”

“Understood what?”

Lisa was back, looking for her replenished glass. “Understood what?”

she repeated.

“Love. And how simple it is.” Jennifer replied. “I was just saying that Stephen and I have turned things around. Sorted things out. For the better.”

“Bloody hell—how long was I in there? You two have gone all deep and meaningful on me, have you?”

“Sorry.”

“And it isn’t, by the way. Simple. At all. That’s just some hokey Hall-mark thing you’ve got going on.”

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“It is. Like you and Andy. I know what’s happened. But it doesn’t matter. If you love each other. You’ve just got to make him see it, too.”

Lisa was gesturing to the waitress. “Pardon my cynicism. I’m glad you’ve unraveled the deepest secrets of the universe. Doesn’t mean we all have.”

“Either you and Andy love each other, or you don’t. The rest is all crap.”

“I love him. Think I managed to cure him completely of loving me.

When I shagged someone else—someone, incidentally, who I absolutely didn’t love. Smart move, hey? So that’s my problem, isn’t it? End of story. I don’t think a Pollyanna approach is going to be of much use to me, in this situation. Can we talk about something else now, please?

Otherwise I’ll be forced to sound really bitter—and no one likes their Singapore noodles with a side order of bitter and twisted, and then I’ll get drunk, and it’s only lunchtime. . . .” She busied herself with the menu, but angry tears brimmed in her eyes and made the words hard to read.

It was horrible to see her so low. Mark felt it, and Jennifer felt it even more, since it stood in such sharp contrast to how she was feeling.

Lisa sniffed hard and tried to make them smile. “Tell us about your parallel turns, hey, Jen?”

It was almost four when they left the restaurant. Mark offered to drive Lisa home, saying they could come back and get her car tomorrow, but she maintained she couldn’t park it overnight where it was and said she wanted to get some shopping done first, and that she’d meet him at home later. He figured she just wanted to be left alone for a while. Jennifer hugged her. “Call me,” she asked. “I’ll come looking at flats with you.”

Mark walked Jennifer to her car.

“Daughters. Who’d have ’em?” she joked. “First me, now Lisa.”

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“Don’t forget Hannah. She’ll be waiting to bite my head off when I get home. And then there’s Amanda.” He smiled ruefully. “I sometimes feel like the bloke in that cartoon, who plugs the hole in the dam, and then another one springs, and he has to stick a finger in that one, and then another, and so on, until he’s got all his fingers and toes in holes, trying to hold it all back. And I’m only the bloody stepfather.”

“Left all on your own to take care of us.”

“Exactly. It’s like you all held yourselves together for your Mum, and the minute she was gone, you all fell bloody apart. . . .”

“I think some of us had been falling apart before that. We just couldn’t let it show.”

“I know. I don’t mean it. It’s just that sometimes, I feel . . . tired.”

“Hey. I’m not surprised. I’m sorry I was part of the problem. I’m sorry I was such a colossal bitch. I’m better—I promise. Take me off the critical list.”

“Thank God. I’m really pleased, Jen. Really.”

“That means a lot to me. Now”—she kissed his cheek—“go home and talk some sense into my little sis, will you?”

They’d given him conflicting advice about Hannah—his two elder stepdaughters—over lunch. Lisa advocated a soft approach, Jennifer was for coming down on her like a ton of bricks. Lisa thought he should be her friend, Jennifer that he needed to assert himself as the father.

If Barbara had been alive . . . if she’d been well . . . he knew how they would have played it. Tough cop, soft cop. With Barbara being the tough one. He was happy with soft cop. He could handle soft cop. That’s what he was used to. That was how it had been with Amanda, when she was growing up (how could he have been anything else—the new, young stepfather?) and with Hannah, when she was younger and the issues seemed more manageable. He’d never sided with either one of them against their mother—not outright. But he’d provided the shoulder to 316 e l i z a b e t h

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cry on. The occasional £10 note. When she was about fifteen, Amanda borrowed a pair of Barbara’s dangly, sparkling earrings, without asking, to wear to a party. She’d lost one, walking home. Creeping upstairs, she’d come around to his side of the bed, tugging gently on his T-shirt until he woke up, motioning him to come out so she could talk to him.

Instantly alert and alarmed, he’d done it. And then spent the next forty-five minutes, at two o’clock in the morning, in his dressing gown, re-tracing her steps outside with a flashlight, looking for the bloody earring.

He was that dad.

He didn’t know what to do with Hannah. He remembered Barbara’s mantra. Keep them close. Keep the lines of communication open. Then you won’t lose her.

The trouble was, that mantra didn’t apply. He blamed himself for this new display of independence and rebellion in his daughter. He’d told Lisa and Jennifer he thought it was his fault. “I’ve relied on her too much,” he said. “I’ve made her my confidante, my companion. My emotional crutch, even. No wonder she’s desperate to get away.”

“Nonsense.” This was Jennifer. “She’s just being a teenager. That’s
all
. It’s got nothing to do with what’s happened. She’d be like this
whatever.
Your guilt is her biggest ally.”

“Hang on,” Lisa had retorted. “You can’t just sweep the last couple of years under the carpet. Hannah’s had a hellish time.”

“I’m not saying she hasn’t. I’m just saying that it being an explanation doesn’t make it an excuse. Anyway, it isn’t relevant
why
she’s being like this, is it? It’s what Mark does about it now. He has to stay in charge.”

“I’m running a home, not a detention center for young offenders.”

Jennifer was sounding a little draconian for Mark’s tastes. Not for the first time . . .

“And you’re making it sound like she’s sleeping around and shooting up. Honestly, Jen. It’s not that bad. A bit of attitude, a bit of backchat.

She’s hardly a candidate for rehab.”

“She’s lying. Mark’s just said so.”

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