My Secret Sister: Jenny Lucas and Helen Edwards' Family Story (30 page)

Right, I thought, I’ll just to have to get on with trying to locate Mercia myself.

I went back to my original birth certificate and started from there, at the address in Seghill, so amazingly close to my own home. I looked on a Seghill street-map and marked the address.

I’ll go and find the house,’ I said to Richard.

‘You must be mad. You’re going to go looking for a stranger, a woman you’ve never met, with your name emblazoned all over your car.’

I smiled – it did sound preposterous. I had forgotten that I was currently driving a sponsored car.

‘She won’t live there any more,’ he continued. ‘She could have moved lots of times. You won’t find her and you’ll only be more upset.’

This fired me up. ‘Well, I’m definitely going anyway. I have to start somewhere.’

‘And what if you do find her . . . and she denies it all, or doesn’t want to have anything to do with you?’

‘I guess I’ll just have to deal with that if it happens.’ Ever the optimist, I couldn’t see the heartache I was letting myself in for.

The following day, I drove to the street on the birth certificate, 6 Northcott Gardens, not far from the old pit-head, and parked outside the small, neat-looking semi. I sat there for a moment, trying to imagine this place in 1948, the year of my birth. I walked up the short path in a daze, wondering what to say. For some reason, I hadn’t thought about that before and I wished now that I’d planned my visit better. I had been assuming it would all go well, but what if it didn’t?

I knocked on the glazed wooden front door, tentatively at first, then again with more determination, though I wasn’t feeling that inside. As I waited I began to shake with anticipation, or perhaps fear, at what I would find out. My heart beat wildly as I stood on the front doorstep and leaned in to hear the slightest noise. But there was none. I knocked once more, even louder this time. Finally, as I turned, an elderly chap doing his garden next door stood up. I froze.

‘There’s nobody in,’ he said. He put his head to one side. ‘Can I help you?’

‘Well, I’m not sure. I’m looking for the family of Mercia Dick.’

‘Ee, she’s long gone.’

I went cold. ‘You mean she has died?’

‘Haaway, no. She doesn’t live here any more.’

A wave of relief flooded through me.

‘But her sister Dorrie lives in the next road.’ He told me the number and pointed in the general direction.

I trembled as I walked round the corner to a very similar house with a painted wooden door. I rang the bell and stood there for what seemed an eternity, watching for any movement in the net curtains at the window. I rang again. But once again it was a disappointing result – there was no one at home.

The next day, first thing in the morning, I went back to Seghill, parked my car down the road and approached Dorrie’s front door. I rang the bell and rapped the knocker too, just in case. Immediately I heard a bustle inside as someone’s fast footsteps approached, almost as if the resident had been expecting me.

The large figure of a woman opened the door and loomed over me. She looked about sixtyish. She had a determined expression, and was wearing a pretty dress with a working pinny over the top, as older Northumberland housewives still did in those days.

‘Are you the lady who came here asking questions yesterday?’ she asked, unable to hide her blunt curiosity.

Word had obviously got round. I smiled because I knew that in these narrow village streets, everyone knew everybody else’s business. It was the same in Jesmond, though they didn’t make it as obvious there.

‘Yes, I am,’ I said, almost gasping for breath in nervous anticipation. ‘I knocked on your door, but there was no answer.’

She said nothing; just stood there, waiting for me to speak.

Embarrassed, I blurted out, ‘My name is Jennifer . . .’

There was a loud intake of breath as she gazed intently at my face. What I didn’t know at that moment was how greatly I resembled my birth mother.

She breathed out. ‘Hhhh. We knew you’d come back. We knew you’d find us one day.’

She almost jumped forward and wrapped her arms round me. ‘I’m so glad you came back.’

It was as if all my worries just dropped away at that moment. This was immediately followed by a strange inner confusion that I was glad of such a warm welcome from someone I didn’t know.

She must have sensed this as she stood back. ‘I’m your mother’s sister, Dorrie.’ Then she took my arm. ‘Come on in, hinny. Step inside and have a cup of tea.’

She ushered me into her small front room, dark and old-fashioned, but tidy, with everything in its place, lots of photos on display, pictures on the walls and glass vases on the mantel-piece. Although it was warm outside, it felt cold in the room, but I expect that was just me and my apprehension.

The kindly woman gave me a cup of tea and showed me some of the photos. I was overwhelmed as she pointed out various relations whose names, of course, I’d never heard of. They went in one ear and immediately flowed out of the other, missing out my brain completely. The more photos she showed me, the more confused I became. It seemed to be a very large family.

Dorrie showed me a photo of Mercia, taken when she was about my age. I missed a breath. It was the first time I’d ever seen my birth mother. It was an amazing feeling to have a face to go with the name. And even I could see a resemblance between us, though another photo of her as a young woman showed that she had once been a real beauty, with a look of knowing it.

It suddenly struck me how bizarre this situation was. Here I was sitting in my birth mother’s sister’s front room, with this woman who was my aunt, and who knew so much about my mother whilst I knew nothing but her name. Dorrie was very relaxed and genuinely welcoming, but I couldn’t quite adjust to this new concept.

And now that I’d seen Mercia’s photos, I wanted to know more.

‘What about my father?’ I asked tentatively.

Immediately her expression hardened. ‘Oh, he’s long gone. He was a bad bugger. He’s six foot under. You don’t want to bother about him. You’re better off not knowing him.’

She seemed so definite that I didn’t doubt her. In my usual trusting way, I took this information at face value and changed tack.

‘Where does Mercia live?’

‘In Tynemouth,’ she said.

That was about ten miles away. I must have looked a little disappointed.

‘It isn’t far, pet.’ She stood up. ‘Let me call Mercia now and tell her about you.’

My hopes soared. After more than half a lifetime, I was now only a phone call away.

She obviously got through as there was quite a conversation going on, but of course I could only hear one side of it, and that was indistinct because the phone was out in the hall.

‘Jennifer came this morning. She came back, looking for you.’

‘Aye, Jennifer is here. You see, I told you she’d come back.’

‘Aye, she’s in ma front room now.’

‘She wants to see you.’

‘Oh, don’t you think . . .?’

‘I could bring her to the phone to speak to you . . .’

‘Are you sure?’

‘All right, pet. I’ll tell her.’

It didn’t take me long to work out what was happening.

Dorrie came back into the room, wringing her hands.

I couldn’t wait. ‘What did she say? Can I go and see her?’ My heart was pounding with hope, despite what I’d heard.

‘No, I’m afraid not. I’m sorry,’ she shrugged. ‘She doesn’t want to see you. She says too much water has gone under the bridge and it’s best left alone.’

‘Ohhhh.’ My hopes deflated and my whole body turned suddenly cold and clammy, shocked by the mixture of emotions that flooded through me – disappointment, anger, defeat, betrayal . . . and yes, the terrible pain of rejection.

‘Please forgive her.’ Dorrie looked anguished. ‘It was the end of the war and times were hard . . .’

I said nothing at first, only nodded in a non-committal way. I was born well after the war. But then I felt sorry for this woman who had given me such a warm welcome. She seemed to have done her best.

‘It’s OK. I had a happy childhood with great parents. I don’t feel bitter.’

She appeared relieved, but I was suffering. I felt dazed and numb, in a sort of bubble, rather like swimming under water – I could hear a muffled voice from outside, but not what it was saying. I felt sick and faint. I tried to take deep breaths to calm myself down.

For the second time in my life, my birth mother had rejected me with barely a moment’s hesitation. That hurt desperately. Yet, in a strange way, I also felt a sense of relief, that I could walk away from this overpowering stranger who was related to me. It was uncomfortable to think she had seen me as a baby, knew all about me, was part of the secret and yet was the barrier between me and my birth mother. Could I really be sure that was what my mother had said? Maybe this aunt had made it all up? For a moment I saw a chink of light, but then it disappeared. No, the conversation had sounded genuine. It must be so.

As I was leaving, Dorrie gave me a photo of Mercia to keep, the pretty young Mercia’s photo. So at least I would have that. But I knew I had to accept that my birth mother didn’t want to know, and there was nothing I could do about it.

As I turned on the doorstep to thank her for the tea, she seemed to make a sudden decision. ‘Wait.’ She turned back to fetch something and handed it to me. ‘You have a brother and a sister,’ she announced, pointing at a second photo she had just slipped into my hand. It was like a sudden electric shock. Transfixed by this news, I could not move for a minute, or perhaps it was only a moment. Then I gave in to the overwhelming urge to run up the road to my car. I did not look back, knowing this person was still at the open door, staring at me.

Only when I was in the car did I look at the small photo of Mercia, middle-aged, looking rather dour, with two young adults, one either side. So these were my brother and my sister, he good-looking with a broad grin and she pretty with a half smile. So now not only did I know I had siblings – a huge shock in itself, but I could also see what they looked like. However, I didn’t know when the photo was taken, how old they were or whether they were born before or after me. I didn’t even know their names.

I wondered if they knew about me; if they’d seen me as a baby. Dorrie had simply said they were my sister and brother, but I presumed she probably meant half-sister and half-brother. Perhaps they had been born of Mercia’s marriage, unlike me. Perhaps she had kept them.

As I drove away, my head pounded as I repeated to myself, ‘I have a brother and a sister, a brother and a sister.’ I should have been jubilant, but all I felt was a great sense of loss that I hadn’t known about them for all those years, that I hadn’t shared those usual sibling things with them. Where were they now? Could I ever find them? The tears flowed down my face and I drove the last mile home in a blur.

Thinking back now, I don’t know why I didn’t turn back to ask the important questions, or at least why I didn’t go back later. But for some reason I didn’t. Perhaps it was the finality of Dorrie’s swift gesture with the photo, or the fact that I could feel her stare boring through my back as I left. It felt to me that she was banishing me from her life after Mercia’s refusal to see or even speak to me.

As soon as I got back home, with a splitting headache, I made myself a strong cup of tea, took some paracetamol, half closed the curtains to darken the room and sat down. My birth father had died and my birth mother didn’t want to meet me. Who was I? It was all too much. My surface composure collapsed and I started sobbing uncontrollably. Hours passed before the torrent ceased. I was completely drained.

When Richard came round that evening, I related it all to him. He was always supportive and listened patiently, but I knew he didn’t really understand how I felt.

‘I knew it wouldn’t end happily,’ he said. ‘I told you.’

Of course it was true. I hadn’t heeded his warning. But I felt resentful that he seemed to be scoring points out of my distress.

Over the following days, I kept picking up the photos and putting them down, over and over again. Every time I looked, I was overcome with indignation and frustration. It sharpened my sense of loss. This was all I had been left with, the dregs, when all the good wine had been drunk. I looked and looked at these people. It brought into focus the feeling of not belonging, being detached, cast aside. It troubled me every time I held that photo that there they were, together, and here was I, apart, discarded, searching for scraps of information about the one person who should have loved me, but clearly didn’t want to have anything to do with me. Equally hurtful, I had siblings I’d never seen or known about. I thought back to all those years of longing for a sister or brother to share my childhood.

I showed the photo to my cousin Wendy when she came round. ‘I’ve found the family,’ I said. ‘But my mother won’t talk to me.’

She gave me a hug. There was nothing she could say, but the warmth of her support helped me more than any words.

After that I just set it all aside. My mam would be very troubled if she ever found out, so she didn’t need to know. My busy tournament schedule continued. But wherever I was and whatever I was doing, a phrase kept resurfacing: ‘Mercia Dick is a real person, living in Tyneside.’

I kept the photo of the three of them, my mother, sister and brother, for a long time until one day, in sheer frustration, I tore it up, along with my original birth certificate. In my mind, that was that. If they didn’t want to know me, I would forget about them too. But of course I could not forget. The revelation of my nameless siblings stayed lodged in the back of my mind for years.

CHAPTER 27

Helen

Three People in This Marriage

When we arrived back in England from Melbourne, we bought a house and settled into life more or less as it was before. We caught up with friends and occasionally went over to George and Joan’s house in Cramlington for a meal and the chance to get away from Mercia, but there wasn’t time for much socializing.