I try the idea on for size – my admittedly still very handsome dad, with another woman – and find that it simply does not compute.
‘No, I don’t suppose he would. Him and my mum… they were pretty special, weren’t they?’
‘Your mum and anyone was pretty special. Never met anyone quite like her. I never said anything to you, because I suppose I didn’t want to overstep at the time, but I know losing her hit you harder than anyone. I know that’s what made it too hard for you to come home, even when… even when the accident happened. I just wanted to say that I don’t blame you, in any way.’
This is such an unexpected and kind thing to hear that I feel tears sting the back of my eyeballs. Even without knowing the whole story, this woman is willing to forgive me in a way that I struggle to forgive myself.
‘Thank you,’ I mutter, blinking away the tears. ‘That’s… very sweet of you. I thought maybe you secretly hated me.’
‘I don’t secretly do anything at all, Suzie, it’s not in my nature. And I certainly don’t hate. Life is way too short for that, we should all know that better than most.’
‘It is. And… Well, it wasn’t just because of my mum. It wasn’t just because it was too sad for me to come back. When I found out about the accident, I was in hospital myself.’
I still remember it all so vividly; like it was yesterday, not years ago. I’d been in Thailand at the time, as settled as I’d ever been in my life. David and I had been together for a couple of years, and he was so good for me – a big, solid American I met when he gave me scuba diving lessons. Neither of us was especially conventional, but we loved each other, and when we found out I was pregnant we were both shocked but delighted. We had long conversations about how the future might look, committing to it with a firmness that surprised me. I’d never been especially maternal, never yearned for a child of my own when there were already so many in the world.
But as soon as I found out, as soon as the scans confirmed it, I changed. Maybe it’s just a biological response, or maybe it’s more complicated than that – I’d spent most of my adult life only thinking about myself, apart from the time I was at home looking after my mum. And that had actually only served to make me more determined to stay free – I’d promised her, after all.
Finding out I was going to be a mum myself unleashed a million different feelings in me. I was scared, and sad that she wasn’t there to share it with, and worried that I’d never be as good a parent as she was. My lifestyle was transient, and even I knew that kids needed stability, that things would have to change. It should have been terrifying and overwhelming, and in some ways it was – but it also felt right. It felt like something joyous.
I’ve started to lose myself in the memories, and am surprised when Bear comes over and burrows his big head beneath my hands. His face grins up at me, and I stroke his supersoft ears. I am not there, I am here. Here with a very affectionate black Lab, and a story to tell.
‘What happened?’ Connie asks. ‘Why were you in hospital? And I should maybe issue a disclaimer here – I am the kind of person who asks a lot of questions, and I know you’re the kind of person who might struggle with that. If you want to tell me to bugger off, I won’t be offended.’
I smile gently. ‘Going on past performance, I’d say it’s more likely I’ll bugger off myself than tell you to… And I don’t mind the questions. I owe you the answers. I was pregnant, Connie. With twins.’
Sophie and Dan are also twins, so it wasn’t a total shock when I found out I was expecting double trouble. David was thrilled – he was older than me, and like myself had never really expected the whole traditional family deal to happen for him. We were like kids ourselves, so giddy and excited about it all.
Connie is silent, a sad look on her face. I am obviously not sitting here with my children, so she’s already guessed this story does not end well.
‘I lost one of them,’ I tell her simply, the words coming nowhere near close to describing how that felt. To know that one of my precious babies had died inside me. To be overwhelmed with grief, but at the same time to be expected to be somehow grateful for the fact that I still had one. It was complicated, and nothing I felt seemed right – so I concentrated on doing what the doctors told me to do, convinced that somehow I’d caused it. That I’d done something wrong. ‘And then I had to stay in hospital, on bed rest.’
‘I had a few weeks of that,’ she replies quietly. ‘Not fun.’
‘No. I felt like I was in jail, and it gave me way too much time alone, trapped in my head going over and over everything, figuring out where I’d gone wrong, how I could have prevented it…’
‘You couldn’t. It wasn’t your fault.’
‘I know that logically, Connie, but I still felt like it was down to me somehow, you know? No matter how many times people told me otherwise, part of me still blamed myself. And I was so determined to do whatever I could for the baby I still had.’
Bear settles on my feet – literally on them, his big body completely covering my Converse in a way that cannot possibly be comfortable for him, but is comforting for me.
‘I was still in hospital when I got the call. I was never great at staying in touch, you know that. But I’d called my dad when I found out about the pregnancy. Not to tell him – it was too early, and I was still too protective of my precious privacy – but just to hear his voice, you know? To remind myself that he existed, that the world back here existed.
‘I suppose I thought I might come home at some point, maybe, and at the very least I think it made me think about family more. About what it meant to me, and how the thought of being a parent was already changing me, giving me a better understanding of him. So, he had my number, and that day he kept calling it, over and over. I was lying there in hospital, grieving one baby and consumed with fear for the other, and he kept calling… In the end I switched the phone off. I couldn’t face talking to him.’
Connie scoots her chair closer to me and takes hold of my hand. I know I am talking about the worst day of her life here, but she is still reaching out to try and make me feel better. ‘It’s okay,’ she says, squeezing my fingers. ‘You didn’t know.’
‘No, I didn’t – not for another two days, when I finally listened to his messages. I’d just been too caught up in my ownsituation to talk to him. I was in my own world of pain, and I assumed he was just calling to chat, to fill me in on the exciting goings on in Starshine Cove, to talk about his grandkids… and I suppose that’s what I couldn’t quite handle. He was so proud of them all, loved them so much, and right then I simply couldn’t handle the idea of listening to how perfect life back at home was. When I found out what had really happened, I… Well, I couldn’t tell him then, could I? He was already going through enough without me adding my dollop of misery as well.’
Connie nods, and wipes tears from her cheeks. ‘No. No, you couldn’t. I understand that now. We… he hoped you’d be back, for the funeral. But when you said you couldn’t make it, he tried so hard to accept it, to not judge you. We all did. Archie struggled the most, to be honest – he was dealing with a lot, a newborn baby without a mother, Lilly constantly asking when her mummy was coming home… I don’t think he ever really understood why you didn’t fly back.’
‘I couldn’t, Connie. I had to stay in hospital. Plus, I was a mess, in so many different ways. It was easier to let you all think I was selfish than to tell you the truth, you know?’
She lets out a long puff of breath, and I can see how hard this has been for her to hear. I believe Connie when she says she never resented me, but I also know that I’ve now shifted a set of beliefs that has been in place for years.
‘You lost the other baby?’ she finally asks, her eyes shining. She already knows the answer to that.
‘I did. Two weeks after the funeral. David was devastated, and I was so screwed up I didn’t know if I was going to survive. I felt like I’d lost everything. Like my whole life was over. I couldn’t reach out to you guys, and I had no clue how to cope.’
