A Proper Family Christmas (30 page)

But it wasn’t that simple. Inside, Ronnie was not sure she wanted to be a donor at all, which was why, though she put up a good argument in favour of donating, she was secretly glad that Mark was suddenly quite strongly against the idea. He’d been investigating the process too and was not in the least bit comforted by what he had found online either.

‘It’s a proper, major operation, Ronnie. We’re not just talking about an afternoon in hospital. You could be in there for weeks. And we’ve got our own kids to think of,’ said Mark.

‘And that’s why I should do it,’ said Ronnie. ‘Because if the situation was reversed and we were the ones who needed help, I’d bloody well hope she would do the same for us.’

‘But what if you get ill from the operation? What if one day Sophie needs a kidney? Or Jack? And I can’t give them one of mine like Richard can’t give one to his daughter? Or what if we lose you altogether during the op? It’s possible.’

Yes, Mark was giving Ronnie all the excuses she needed to tell Annabel that she could not go under the knife. But when it came down to it, Ronnie was going to have to be the one who looked Annabel in the eye and actually say it wasn’t going to happen. That was why Ronnie hadn’t invited Annabel in that evening. That was why seeing how happy Sophie had been to spend time with the Buchanan family was so difficult, because there was no way that Sophie would be invited to spend time with them again. Not after Ronnie dropped her bombshell.

Ronnie felt absolutely physically sick at the prospect. She understood Annabel only too well. What fellow mother wouldn’t? What decent human being wouldn’t?

Annabel texted with potential dates for their ‘girls’ night’ the very next morning. And when Ronnie didn’t respond at once, Annabel texted
to make sure you got my text.
And then she called and left a message.

‘I’m not sure my texts are getting through,’ she said. ‘Would you call me to let me know which of the following dates might work for you …’

Ronnie was frozen. She couldn’t possibly call Annabel back. She didn’t know what to say. But while she was holding off on making that call, she found it impossible to settle. Eventually, she texted Annabel back to suggest the very latest of the dates Annabel had offered her. Anything to buy some time. Ronnie would pluck up the courage to tell her before Annabel took her out on the worst possible girls’ night Ronnie could imagine. She would. She had to.

Alas, Ronnie didn’t pluck up the courage to tell Annabel she didn’t want to go through with the kidney donation and the date of their ‘girls’ night’ soon came round. When Ronnie woke up in the morning, she felt physically sick but she knew, alas, that it wasn’t from some sort of virus that could have given her a reason to cancel the night out. Ronnie was sick from worry and that was a nausea that wasn’t going to go away until she addressed what it was that was on her mind.

This was to be the first time Ronnie and Annabel had spent time alone. Annabel had chosen a lovely little restaurant in Warwick. It was somewhere that Ronnie had seen reviewed in the local paper, run by a young chef who had trained under Gordon Ramsay. Ronnie had fantasised that one day she and Mark might go there for a romantic evening. There was a moment when she’d thought that perhaps they could even have their wedding reception there. But it was so expensive. They could only afford the King’s Head. And now Annabel was taking her to this fancy place. Ronnie’s fantasy of dinner for two with the man she loved was over. She had to tell Annabel she wasn’t going to do the transplant and the ensuing row would ensure that Ronnie never wanted to go anywhere near that restaurant ever again.

‘Maybe she’ll be OK about it,’ said Mark. ‘She’ll understand what a big deal it is. She’s probably expecting it, after the way you were with her the other night. Just make sure you get something to eat before you do the deed.’

‘Mark,’ Ronnie sighed. She was so sick with the anticipation of what she had to do that she was pretty sure she wouldn’t be able to eat so much as a bread roll.

Annabel was bang on time. When Ronnie went out to the car, she saw her neighbours’ curtains twitching. It wasn’t often you saw a Porsche on their street. The two little boys who lived three doors down actually came outside to have a look. Seeing them, Jack insisted that he too be allowed out to look at the car, even though he was already in his pyjamas, and had of course seen it before.

‘Let him put his coat on and come out for a minute,’ said Annabel. She played along, letting each of the boys take a turn behind the steering wheel.

‘This is my auntie,’ said Jack proudly. ‘And my uncle has got a James Bond car. A Martin Aston.’

‘An Aston Martin,’ Ronnie corrected him. ‘Come on, you. Time for bed.’

Annabel helped Jack down from the driver’s seat and gave him an effusive hug. He squealed with delight when she tickled him.

Once Jack had kissed his mother good night, Mark took him inside. Sophie waved from the window. Annabel got back into the car. Ronnie settled into the passenger seat.

‘Are you warm enough?’ asked Annabel. ‘I can put the seat heater on if you like.’

‘That’d be nice,’ said Ronnie. It was a bit chilly.

Before long, however, Ronnie could feel the heat seeping through the seat of her jeans and it wasn’t much longer after that before she started to feel
too
warm. She didn’t want to say anything, however, because she didn’t want to put Annabel to any trouble. Even if that trouble was only flicking a switch. Ronnie tucked her hands beneath her bottom in an attempt to stop herself from getting any hotter.

‘Are you sure you’re comfortable?’ Annabel asked when they stopped at a traffic light.

‘Oh yes,’ said Ronnie. ‘Who couldn’t be comfy in this car?’

The staff at the restaurant seemed to know Annabel well. They assured her that they’d reserved her ‘favourite’ table. It was the perfect spot, in a corner right by the fireplace. Very romantic if you were there for that sort of thing. Very private if you needed to have a serious discussion. The flickering light from the fire was incredibly flattering too. But also very hot. It wasn’t long before Ronnie was sweating like a pig, as Mark would have said. She downed a gin and tonic and sucked on the ice cubes. Annabel seemed completely unflustered. But then she wasn’t having to deal with guilt as well as the heat. She wasn’t the one who was going to have to be a complete bitch that night.

As Annabel sipped her mineral water and Ronnie raced through her gin, they looked at the menu. Mark had told Ronnie that, given what she had to say, she should probably offer to pay for her share of the meal, if not for the whole thing. For that reason, Ronnie swooned when she saw the prices. The cost of a starter was more than she would have paid to feed the whole family at their local pub.

And Annabel wasn’t stinting on her choices. She chose salmon to start with and a sirloin steak to follow. Apparently, lately she had been craving red meat. Ronnie, already imagining her credit card being refused at the end of the evening, chose a pea soup followed by the vegetarian option – some pasta – that was cheaper than everything else on the menu but still cost a whopping twelve pounds. For pasta! The raw ingredients could not have cost more than a quid.

Then there was the wine. Annabel said she was only going to have half a tiny glass to be sociable, seeing as she was pregnant
and
driving, but that perhaps they should order a bottle because there was no need for Ronnie to hold back. But Ronnie did want to hold back because there wasn’t a bottle on the menu that cost less than thirty-five quid. Adding up the things they’d ordered so far in her head, Ronnie saw her family having to eat baked beans on Christmas Day. So Ronnie suggested that they both just have one glass.

Annabel ordered two glasses of Cabernet Sauvignon at fifteen pounds apiece.

‘Might as well have a couple of really nice glasses if we’re not having a whole bottle,’ she said.

The food arrived. It was delicious, but Ronnie could only think of the money as she spooned the pea soup into her mouth. Pea soup shouldn’t cost so much. Not even if the peas were picked by virgins under a crescent moon.

‘Isn’t this lovely?’ said Annabel. ‘Just the two of us having a chance to get to know each other properly.’

‘Yes,’ said Ronnie.

‘Richard and I come here quite a bit,’ said Annabel. ‘It’s the perfect place for a casual dinner.’

‘Casual?’

‘Yes.’

Ronnie thought it was the perfect place to come if you’d won the Premium Bonds.

‘Could we have another bottle of water?’ Annabel asked a passing waitress.

The water was a fiver a bottle!

‘Tap’s fine,’ Ronnie said.

The restaurant was lovely, the food was delicious but the conversation was difficult and Ronnie was soon grateful for the bottle of wine she couldn’t afford (Annabel had ordered the whole bottle in the end). While Annabel sipped at just that half a glass, mindful of the baby on board, Ronnie powered on through the rest, hoping that she would find the point at which it made her brave enough to say what she needed to before it made her incoherent. But then Annabel started to open up.

‘Richard and I got married really young,’ she said. ‘We met at university and it was love at first sight. For me, anyway. I had to work on him a bit.’

‘He really adores you,’ Ronnie observed.

‘We were the first of our friends to tie the knot and the first to have a child. Once we were married, Richard was desperate to start a family. I took a bit of convincing. I didn’t think I’d be very good at it.’

‘Well, I got pregnant by accident,’ said Ronnie, failing to pick up on why Annabel might have worried about her parenting skills. ‘I definitely wasn’t trying. I was going to do my A levels and go to university. But one unlucky shag …’

‘Or one very lucky one,’ Annabel observed.

‘Yeah,’ said Ronnie. ‘I can see it like that now. Sophie can be a right pain in the proverbial but I wouldn’t be without her.’

‘I know. The teenage years are tough – it was like Izzy became a different person the day she turned fourteen – but she is so precious to us. I don’t know what I would have done if we’d lost her back in the summer. I don’t think I could have carried on.’

‘It must have been horrible,’ Ronnie agreed.

‘When she was first in intensive care it was as though I had stopped breathing. I couldn’t think of anything except how we were going to save her. I couldn’t eat. I couldn’t drink. I was like a zombie. When she opened her eyes and looked at me, it was just like it was all those years ago when I’d just given birth and the midwife handed her to me. Such a rush of relief and love. I felt I had been given a second chance.’

All the while that Annabel was telling her how much Izzy meant to them, Ronnie was feeling worse and worse. And then Annabel said, ‘Sometimes, it’s the very darkest times and the worst possible circumstances imaginable which change life for the better. I mean, we’re sitting here now. You and me. Sisters who might never have known one another. And because of your generosity, my daughter – your niece – will have a shot at an ordinary life. She won’t have to spend those years when she should be out there enjoying herself with friends, getting her degree, perhaps meeting a husband … hooked up to a dialysis machine in her bedroom.’

Annabel reached across the table and grabbed Ronnie’s hand.

‘Ronnie, I can’t tell you how much what you are doing means to me. You could not have given me a greater gift if you had given me your own child. You’re giving me back my daughter. And you’re able to do it because you’re my sister. I think I finally understand the saying that blood is thicker than water.’

Ronnie nodded.

Annabel’s eyes started to swim with tears and Ronnie understood that there was no way on earth she was going to be able to break the news to Annabel that night. Ronnie took the opportunity to wrestle her hand free of Annabel’s grip on the pretence of looking for a paper hanky.

‘Here,’ she said, handing a tissue to Annabel. ‘You’re making your mascara run.’

‘Oh, I don’t care,’ said Annabel. ‘I’m not unhappy. These are happy tears.’

That made it even worse for poor Ronnie.

‘But I need to tell you something,’ said Annabel. ‘Because I think it’s only fair that you know everything about the situation before we go any further.’

Ronnie leaned forward. Was Annabel about to give her an ‘out’?

‘When you talk to the specialist Dr Devon, she will probably tell you that Izzy’s kidneys were damaged because she took ecstasy. Now, we don’t know that for certain and, given the circumstances, we haven’t pressed Izzy on it too much. We’re furious at the very thought of it of course. We always told her to stay away from drugs and we didn’t think she ever mixed with the kind of people who supplied them. But teenagers do make mistakes and I wouldn’t want you to hear that out of the blue and draw all the wrong conclusions. Izzy is certainly not a drug addict.’

‘Of course not,’ said Ronnie.

‘So, I don’t want you to think that she is. It’s very important. She deserves this second chance you’re giving her. She really does.’

Annabel nodded along with her assertion and Ronnie found herself nodding too.

‘Of course she does,’ said Ronnie.

‘She won’t waste it.’

‘I know.’

Ronnie’s ‘out’ all but disappeared. If she told Annabel she wasn’t going to do the transplant now, it would seem as though it was because of the ecstasy and Ronnie would look an even bigger bitch than she was already going to. All she could do was sit and smile as Annabel once again told her what a difference her generosity would make to the Buchanans’ lives.

When they got back to Ronnie’s house, Ronnie couldn’t wait to unclip her seat belt and get out of the car. But Annabel wasn’t finished with her. She got out too and practically ran round the car, despite her ungainly size, and insisted on giving Ronnie a huge hug. She squeezed so hard that Ronnie actually felt slightly winded.

‘You are the most wonderful sister a woman could ever hope to have,’ Annabel told her. ‘I mean it. Not just because of the kidney thing. Because you’re a really good person. You’re kind and straightforward and down to earth. I really wish I’d got to know you sooner, Ronnie. As it is, I know that we are going to be great friends for the rest of our lives.’