Mothers and Daughters (35 page)

One night when Paul was out on call and Zoe screamed and screamed, Connie shut the nursery door and ran into the night garden, far from the noise. I could kill you, she cried. Nothing I do is good enough for you and I can’t cope any more. This can’t go on.

She sat on the bench, sobbing. Why wasn’t there anybody to put their arms around her and tell her she was doing a good job? She felt so alone and helpless. No one told her it would be like this. Now she knew why girls needed their mums at such a time of crisis, someone to take over, someone to console, but midnight was a lonely place to be with no comfort at hand.

‘Don’t leave Baby on her own, she needs you,’ came a voice into her head. ‘Go back in and tell her who is boss, try loving her and she will love you back.’ Where did these words come from? What if she was choking or being sick in her distress? What if something terrible happened to this baby?

Connie raced through the garden up the stairs two at a time as she heard the rasps and little sobs of her crying child. Zoe was only a tiny baby in a strange world. I’m the grown-up here and she needs my comfort, she thought. Suddenly from nowhere a wave of such protective love and tenderness washed over her and she flung open the door, relieved to see Zoe was still breathing.

‘Mummy’s here … Come to Mummy.’ She gathered
up the hot bundle with such concern. ‘There, there. Perhaps if I sing you a lullaby, it’ll get better.’

The words and the tune to that famous ‘Liverpool Lullaby’ came into her head. She rocked the baby and sang some new words of her own.

Zoe settled snuggled into her breast and sucked until she was drunk. You are mine, Connie smiled. No one will take my baby this time … no one in the world. You are, all I have and I’m the only mother you’ve got. We’ll muddle along somehow.

When Paul found them later they were curled up together, dead to the world. The first of many battles had been won that night.

Connie smiles, thinking of Zoe, now a mother of two,
herself a busy GP. Over the past few years she’s been
a source of strength and pride. Somewhere along the
line they must have been good enough parents. Best of
all she was there for her daughter when Sam and
Susannah came along. It’s always good when parents
become friends in later life, but it’s a gift not a right
.

It was Zoe’s suggestion that Connie came out here
alone to sort out this business once and for all. Her
children love Crete as much as she does
.

After that first visit she and Paul had never stayed
away long, and it got easier after the Colonels were
deposed and even better when Greece was brought into
the EU. That’s when the tourist rush really began
.

Connie and Paul have no need of a plot of land. There’s
always a family house at their disposal for a couple of
weeks or more. First they came with baby Zoe, and then
after Alex was born three years later. The children came
out with Connie when they could to learn the language
and meet Granny Ana’s relations, who spoiled them
rotten. Even Paul tried to muster some of the language,
but gave up, promising that when he retires he’ll try again
.

Doctors in the seventies and eighties had it hard, on
call night and day, extra clinics and constant change
within the NHS. There never was time for Connie to
have a full-time job. When she married Paul and his
job she became married to the phone night and day,
but she did try running the pre-school playgroup for a
while, taking over Brownies when Auntie Lee retired,
helping in The Silk Route when it expanded into the
Country Style Homemaker outlet. This gave Joy and
her new partner, Harry, time to go on trade visits to
Thailand and the Far East. Kim was trained up to be
the heir to the Empire
.

Connie smiles, thinking how she struggled against her
role as a doctor’s wife but with middle age gradually she
got sucked into its way of life. If she was bored and put
upon, neglected and left to her own devices, she created
her own social life. She grew used to finding a way through
to be herself, training first in listening skills, and then for
a counselling certificate. Then she was asked to be a
magistrate, though no one in that role was expected to
harbour a secret like hers, a secret loss that never diminished.
However long ago it happened, every time she
looked at Zoe and Alex the pain of it stabbed her heart
.

‘The Manchester plane’s landed, Connie.’ One of the
reps tapped her on the shoulder. ‘Sorry about the delay
but they’ll be a little while yet. I’m afraid three British
planes have landed at once and you know what that
does for baggage!’

Connie began to feel the panic rising.
Will there be anyone on that plane for me?
Even now she couldn’t
be sure
.

This is the final piece of the jigsaw … I’ve waited for the right time to open my heart; all those dutiful years of parent evenings, charitable committees, seeing Zoe and Alex through the difficult years to university and beyond, the prospect of retiring, all our plans for the future. There never seems a right time to go in search of the truth.

But fate had other ways of pulling her up short, she
sighed
.

Here I am waiting, and all because of a little lump …

One night when they were christening, the new mattress of the antique French bed Paul had bought for Connie’s approaching sixtieth birthday, he paused, holding his fingers over her breast.

‘How long have you had this lump?’ he said.

‘Oh, stop being a doctor!’ Connie laughed. ‘What lump?’

‘The one I can feel here,’ he replied, fingering into her breast. ‘There’s a thickness, and it’s hard. Feel?’

‘That’s not a lump, it’s just my breast, being my breast,’ she whispered.

‘Sit up,’ he ordered as he palpated round her right breast, and in the soft candlelight she could see he wasn’t joking. He led her own hand under the nipple to the round thick spot. ‘And when was your last checkup?’

‘I think I’ve got one soon,’ she said, her heart sinking.

‘I want you to see Alison tomorrow. She’ll refer you to the Breast Clinic immediately.’

‘You’re joking, I’m fine. I’ve been off the HRT for three years now.’ After the last episode of bad research results they’d agreed it wasn’t worth the risk her taking it any more, what with her mother’s history. They’d been so cautious, but Paul was right. There was something as hard as a rock inside her. How could she not have noticed this?

They sat drinking tea until dawn and suddenly she kept fingering round the thickness.

‘Have you not been examining yourself?’ Paul sighed.

‘I’ve been meaning to but I never get round to it,’ she confessed.

‘Oh, Connie! I thought you of all people would know what to look for?’

Then everything went into overdrive – appointments, mammograms, ultrasound scans, revealing a tumour that was certainly no benign cyst. In the days that followed Zoe and Alex rallied round. Joy, Rosa and Neville came to cheer her up.

‘It’ll be OK,’ Joy smiled.

‘But what if it’s gone walkabout in my lymph glands? What if it’s all too late?’ Connie tried to put a brave face on her terror, drawing strength from the kindness of friends who had been through the ordeal
themselves. She was being admitted to a special club of women who showed her their scars and talked of chemo and radiotherapy, prosthesis, reconstruction; a whole new vocabulary to learn.

Suddenly her busy world shrunk to a hospital bed, a kindly consultant and a wall plastered with pictures of Zoe’s children, Sam and Susie, and Alex’s new daughter, Esme-Kate. Why? How? Why now? Her mind was racing with the possibilities of a mortal wound. What if it was all too late? There were cards and a florist’s shop full of encouragement and hope.

‘If anyone can wrestle this thing to the ground, you will, Connie!’ Rosa and Marty wrote.

Zoe gave her reams of Internet information and books to read. Paul went quiet, and the night before the op sat on her bed, holding her hand. ‘I know it’ll be all right, but whatever it takes I’m not going to lose you or let you go. We’ll battle this together.’ She saw the tears in his eyes.

‘What did I do to deserve you?’ she replied, knowing, for all their scraps and the ups and downs in their marriage, it was a good one.

Why was this happening to them now? Why not? There were thousands of women like her each day battling with the same diagnosis. Was it the years on the pill or HRT? She was slim and fit enough, didn’t smoke now. It wasn’t fair, and yet she supposed there was always a randomness about life; it was just another of its little challenges to overcome.

But it was Neville’s card that challenged her the most, with just a few words of Quaker wisdom he’d been given by a friend: ‘Look thy sorrow mightily in the face and fathom it.’

What did that mean? Standing staring cancer in the face was not for cowards. How dependent she now felt on the good offices of Paul’s colleagues, putting her trust in their skills to give her a second chance. And why should she be so lucky when others weren’t?

I’ve done my job, passed on my genes to the next generation, who in turn have passed on theirs, she mused. Perhaps she was redundant in that respect, but not ready to pop her clogs and go quietly. I’ve only just got my bus pass, she laughed, but to lose a breast and the possibility of further, wearisome treatments was not on her agenda.

She lay alone after the operation, sore, tired, tearful and suddenly aware of Neville’s words. The news was better than she had hoped. Her chances of remission were good. The lymph glands were clear. Perhaps there was a future after all, but the shock of it would take some time to settle down.

‘You’ve got to live for now. The past is over. The future, who knows … The present is all we’ve got. That’s how I got through,’ said Rosa. ‘I kept thinking of running my dancing classes again and having my own child. You have to be positive, Connie. Now you’ve got a cancer eye.’

‘What’s that?’

‘It sees things differently. It’s the eye of someone who’s had a brush with their own mortality. It looks to see what really matters to you. It makes you do all the things you’ve dreamed of. Don’t make too many plans and get bogged down. Just sort out any unfinished business and follow your heart. You’ve been given a gift of a second chance. Go for it, kiddo!’

Joy brought diet plans, vitamins and goodies to build up Connie’s strength. ‘When you’re stronger we’ll take days out, all of us. Your illness has brought me up sharp, made me take stock of my own life and slow down to rethink my priorities. There’s so much of the world I want to see. I’d love to take Mummy back to Burma, if we can get permission. It’s not the world she knew but I’m going to give it a try. Now is what matters!’

On the sixth night after her operation Connie couldn’t sleep, her drain was slow to clear, her mind racing and she felt very alone.
Fathom it
. She knew from the practice how hidden grief could make people sick. Who was it that said that the mind can forget bad things but the body never forgets? This tissue rock of sadness and regret had grown quietly in her breast, close to her heart. This lump of sadness, never acknowledged, had turned rotten.
Fathom it
.

Yes, there was unfinished business in her life. Much as she loved her two children there was always the one she’d never held for long, the child she still held close to her heart, now grown to an adult, the child she could never forget.

No one can weigh such grief or the cost of it. All those lost years when she’d done nothing to find her – it was never the right time; the children were too young; the promises she made to those long dead; a myriad excuses. Who was there to hurt but herself?

If ever there was a right time to change things, it was now. The future was uncertain.
Fathom it
.

In the wee small hours of the night, she was doing just that. For years she’d skirted round this hole in her heart, patched it, darned it with silken excuses, filled the gap with busyness. But it was always there, this unfinished business.

So no more shillyshallying: it was time to open deeper wounds than the visible scar on her chest. That tissue would heal given time but the other wound must weep and heal as best it could. Why not start to search for information that was rightfully hers? There were new laws and guidelines for mothers such as she. Attitudes were changing. She had rights too. Time to share her secret, to ask for help, to make some meaning out of this brush with death.

Fathom its depths and survive. When I’m stronger,
I’ll search for her, my firstborn, my daughter Anastasia,
whatever it takes. I’m not going to give up until I know
just where she is in this world
.

‘Meet me in Santini’s Wine Bar, the drinks are on me,’ was the message on Joy’s mobile. What were they celebrating? Joy searched her diary to see if she’d forgotten a birthday.

Connie was amazing. She’d bounced back from her op in the past few months as if it had never happened. Paul had taken her off to Crete to convalesce and now she was back in town. It was going to be like old times.

Santini’s was now on the up, she smiled, sinking back into soft leather armchairs, listening to a guitarist strumming in the corner, live music, good Italian wine and snacks, ciabatta sandwiches, salads and their gourmet ice creams. Grimbleton was riding high and The Silk Route was expanding into a whole complex of shops, cafés and tourist attractions. Kimberley was proving a good buyer with an eye for upmarket home accessories. She lived with her boyfriend, Mark, and their two children. The dynasty was secure.

Su had a granny flat in the barn conversion after Jacob died, and the Waverley was finally sold. They had bought the old farmhouse close to the business. Harry Tindale, Joy’s partner, was out in Bali tracing some fabulous carved furniture for the shop. Life was
good and all the better for Connie being back among them. When her sister fell sick, it had been such a shock. The ‘it happens to someone else, not one of yours’ had struck home with a vengeance. Over the years, they’d fallen in and out with each other over stupid things but now they were closer than ever and she couldn’t wait to see Connie bouncing back to life again.

Rosa struggled to get in her car with her sticks. Transferring from chair to seat took a bit of negotiating but she needed no excuse to hit the town tonight. Connie was home and it was a girl’s night out, plus Neville. Time for the Silkies to hog the best sofa in Enzo’s emporium and drink to Connie’s permanent recovery.

Connie’s life-changing experience was a second chance. Rosa knew what it was like to feel she’d got her life back, however restricted, and however painful it could be if she overdid things. Marty hovered over her like a clucking hen now that he’d retired.

They had built a studio from their garage where he still did some recording work and encouraged young hopefuls to make tracks. He’d picked up one or two stars in the making and passed them on to agents. Amber was in the States, flitting around LA. So far there’d been no breakthrough in her film career but Rosa was hopeful.

‘I’m getting as bad as Mamma Mia with her press cuttings,’ Rosa had confessed to Amber. ‘Funny how the stage had struck into the next generation, Mamma would’ve been proud.’

She missed Maria now she was gone, those long nosy phone calls, her gossip, her sparkle, and Sylvio had shrunk at her passing. No one worries about you like your mother, and once she’s gone, that link with past generations goes with her too: Valentina, Marco … Sicily; just sepia photos in an old album and the Olive Oil Club of the 1940s. Only Lily and Su were left now, but Rosa determined she must remember to write down the names of all those relatives and friends for Amber.

Santini’s was looking smart, with tubs of flowers at the door and hanging baskets. No one lived in the flat upstairs where she was born. The street was pedestrianised, but with good disabled parking, full of benches and signposts, and the King’s Theatre was now an arts complex with a cinema, the Little Theatre and meeting rooms.

They still held a dancing display there at Christmas, a modest affair, given the size of the auditorium, but the parents packed it out to see their little darlings perform. The Rosa Santini School of Performing Arts had broadened out from a mere dancing class. It was more profitable to cash in on the celebrity culture and wannabe
X Factor
little stars with singing and drama classes. Rosa’s role was mainly administrative
now, but she had discovered a few budding acting careers and TV stars in her time.

Funny how it all came back to Santini’s and the story of the lost pram, the two war widows, and the search for Mediterranean food in war-time Britain. They’d grown up with those stories. How times had changed. Now their own girls were dreaming dreams for the grandchildren in this very same place and after a few bevies the Silkies’d be comparing ailments by the end of the evening. There was nothing like a night out with friends!

Paul cleared away the plates from the outside table. It was one of those balmy summer evenings in late July when the sun was resting on the patio of Lane House, lingering over the wine and bowls of strawberries from the kitchen garden. Connie watched him sidle away, leaving her alone with Alex and Zoe, as they had planned. It wasn’t often they got them on their own without their other halves but she needed to break her news to them gently.

‘You look so well, Mum,’ Alex offered. ‘The rest in Chania did you good.’

‘I know, and it gave me lots of time to think about things too. You know I believe this happened for a reason,’ she said, taking in a deep breath, seeing Zoe squirm.

‘No one knows why breast cancer develops, Mum. There are risk factors, of course. You were just
unlucky.’ Ever the Doctor, Zoe jumped in, as Connie knew she would.

‘I’m not so sure. Have you heard the saying, if you don’t weep, your body weeps for you?’

‘That’s just psychobabble!’ Zoe again. ‘What have you to weep about? You and dad have a lovely life, a good job and a beautiful house …’

Connie smiled. Trust a daughter to tell it how she sees it. Sons are gentler on their mothers. Zoe was straight to the point.

‘It wasn’t always like that, though. There was a time when I hadn’t a friend in the world and not a bean, with everything collapsing round my head.’

‘You never said,’ Alex said. ‘When was that? I don’t remember.’

‘There was a life before you were born, you know.’ She smiled at her handsome son. ‘When I was fifteen I lost my mother and I went a little wild.’

‘A sixties rock chick, yes, Auntie Joy told us,’ Alex said.

‘What Joy didn’t tell you, because she didn’t know, was that I got pregnant and had a baby in 1964. It was a brief fling with someone who’s now dead but I had to give her away.’ There, her secret was out of the bag and the sky hadn’t fallen down.

No one spoke and she bowed her head. ‘It was your dad who delivered her. One of those strange coincidences in life no one can explain.’

‘I see,’ said Zoe not able to look her mother in the face. ‘Who else knows?’

‘Only my grandma Esme Auntie Lee and Su were told, Neville and his father. It was a different world then, you have to understand. Respectability was everything and the Winstanley name wasn’t to be sullied again so I had to do what the family thought best. When they changed their minds it was too late. I had to sign her away, my little girl. I only kept her for a few weeks but I had to do what was best for her too. Now I want to find her before it’s too late. I feel I need your blessing before I begin.’