The Sea Sisters (11 page)

‘Our invites went out today,’ Ed said.

She had ordered them through a design company that were laser cutting the edges with flowers. She hadn’t realized they’d be sent so soon.

He added, ‘The wedding is in four months.’

‘Yes.’

‘You’ll be home in time?’

‘Of course.’

‘Because,’ he said, his voice softening, ‘I’ve no idea what I’d do with a hundred Cath Kidston tea-light holders if you’re not.’

She smiled. ‘I’ll be home.’

She put the phone away and lay down on the crisp green sheet with Mia’s journal. Despite Ed’s concern, for the first time since she’d left England, she felt as if she was thinking more clearly.

She opened the journal at the page with Mick’s address and trailed a fingertip over the unfamiliar words. It was strange to think of her father living nearby; she imagined a large modern house, a man with silver hair, a wardrobe of smart suits.

When they were girls, Katie and Mia would sometimes talk about their father in low voices after dark. Mia would lean over the edge of the bunk, poking her head under the princess canopy to ask, ‘What is Daddy like?’ Katie thought she was being clever by making up abstract comparisons that kept Mia confused for days. ‘He is like Moby Dick,’ or, ‘He reminds me of the songs in Mum’s David Bowie album.’ When Mia asked what she meant, Katie would just shrug and tell her to read the book or listen to the record.

The real reason she avoided giving a proper answer was because she didn’t know what their father was like. Her memories were pieces of two different puzzles that wouldn’t slot together. She held a few crisp, wonderful recollections – like the one that played out in their old kitchen in North London where the red-tiled floor was freezing underfoot, even in summer. Katie was meant to be asleep, but had come downstairs to ask for a glass of milk. Not finding either of her parents in the lounge, she had wandered towards the kitchen where she heard music playing. Her mother was being swirled in her father’s arms, laughing wildly. She watched for a moment; she saw the glint of her father’s gold watch where his shirtsleeve ended, caught the smell of his aftershave mixed with a sweet tang of whisky, saw her mother’s hair coming loose from a tortoiseshell clip. Spotting Katie, her father stopped dancing. Fearing she might be told off for being out of bed, she began to yawn, but he took her by the hand and spun her, too. She laughed as she’d seen her mother do with her head thrown back and her mouth open.

There were other memories, though, that she had been careful not to share, like the time when Mia was 2 and she needed seven stitches across her right temple. Katie and her mother had been at a ballet performance and, during the interval, when Katie was pirouetting in the drinks lounge, her mother’s name was called over the tannoy. At the front desk, the theatre manager said, ‘Grace Greene? Your husband is on the phone.’ Katie watched the colour drain from her mother’s face and her eyes grow frighteningly wide as she held the phone close to her ear.

After that she remembered the evening in frames, like the illustrations in a comic book. She recalled a taxi ride in the dark. A hospital desk she couldn’t see over, even on tiptoe. Her sister lying in a bed with polished metal sides. Her mother’s pale hands clasped around her bag as she spoke to their father.

He said that Mia had tripped on the landing and fallen down the stairs, but over time other clues surfaced that suggested something entirely different. A nurse mentioned a motorbike; a neighbour had said her father’s name and used the word ‘irresponsible’.

They returned from the hospital the following day to find that their father and his belongings were gone. It wasn’t the only change. As time went on their mother seemed listless and vacant and, when she took her evening bath, Katie would hear her crying above the gush of the water.

Even as a child she could see the link between Mia’s accident and their father’s leaving. She remembered standing in the doorway of their mother’s bedroom, watching as Grace dabbed concealer on the dark circles beneath her eyes, and asking, ‘Did Daddy leave because of Mia?’ Her mother had dropped the gold make-up pot, taken three paces across the carpet, grabbed the top of Katie’s arm with one hand and slapped the back of her thighs with the other. Three months later, their belongings were in boxes and they took a coach to Cornwall.

Now, turning the pages of the journal, she had an uncomfortable feeling that this meeting with Mick would somehow be entangled with the rest of Mia’s trip. Stretched on her bunk she read swiftly but closely. She didn’t notice two other travellers coming in and out of the room, or hear the tropical rain begin to beat against the window. She simply continued to read, utterly absorbed in the pages of the journal as Mia recounted what happened the evening she arrived at their father’s house.

M
ia waited on the doorstep. Even at dusk the air still held its warmth and she could feel a thin slick of sweat under the waistband of her shorts. She hooked a finger into the back of them and waggled it a little, encouraging air to reach her skin. Sweat prickled underarm and beads of moisture formed between her breasts as she waited.

She listened, barely breathing, for the sound of footsteps and eventually heard them, fast strides to reach the door. She took a step back, folding her arms and then refolding them less tightly.

Mick was exactly her height. He wore a loose white shirt with black shorts, to which a mobile was clipped. His face was rounder than she’d recalled from his photo, a definite fullness about the jowls, and his hair was steel grey, thinning at the sides, but cut short. He had Katie’s eyes, she could see: hazel with pale lashes.

They studied one another closely. Mia wondered what he made of the young, silent woman on his doorstep. Should she have dressed so casually in shorts and flip-flops, when perhaps a dress and sandals might have been more appropriate, more like something her mother or Katie would have worn?

Then, Mick chose his first word. It had the force of a slap: ‘Yes?’

He didn’t know who she was.

Her gaze fell away from his and came to rest on the doormat between them where a fly, caught in the weave, struggled to turn itself upright. When Mia had imagined this meeting – and she had imagined it many, many times – she had pictured an embrace of sorts, Mick instinctively reaching for her, and that first hug between father and daughter sealing an unspoken connection. She had prepared for rejection, too: Mick explaining that too much time had elapsed, or shielding her from the view of a second wife who didn’t know of her existence. Yet, in all the imagined scenarios, she had never once considered that he wouldn’t recognize her.

When she looked up, Mick was still waiting, his eyebrows raised and his head tilted slightly to the side. His lips were turned up in one corner, a half-smile. She couldn’t tell if it was encouragement to speak or bemusement at her silence.

‘I am—’ she began, her eyes searching his face, hoping to catch the moment when it might click and she’d be spared this humiliation. ‘I’m Mia.’

His expression didn’t change.

Would she have to say it? Did she need to tell him that he was her father? It was a relief that Finn hadn’t accompanied her; for someone to witness this would have been too much.

Finally she said, ‘I’m your daughter.’

The half-smile vanished. He blinked rapidly and his gaze mapped her features, perhaps searching for clues he’d missed before. ‘Sorry, I … I didn’t realize who…’

She remained facing him. After a moment he stepped aside and said, ‘You’d better come in.’

She walked through a cool white hallway, following it until she reached a tastefully designed kitchen. An L-shape of granite-work surfaces framed the large room and glass-fronted cabinets housed elegant wineglasses. Many of the appliances had been chosen in stainless steel: a cordless kettle, a double oven with a digital clock, a sleek fridge. The walls, white again, were bare save for an electric guitar sculpted into a clock, and four discreet Bose speakers pumping out a Neil Young track.

Mick picked up a slim remote from a glass dining table piled with magazines, song sheets and post, and stopped the music. He looked shaken. ‘This is a surprise.’

Mia still couldn’t find her voice and was aware of heat rising in her cheeks.

‘Take a seat on the deck,’ he said, indicating a set of French doors thrown open onto a garden. ‘Drinks. I’ll make us drinks.’

She moved outside and was drawn to the edge of the garden where a low stone wall was all that separated Mick’s property from the beach. The air was salt tinged and fresh, and she breathed in deeply. In the low light of evening she could just make out the faint line of the horizon, a washed-out blue fading into deeper shades of mauve and dusky navy. Somewhere far off, waves were breaking and she centred her thoughts on the sound.

‘Magnificent, isn’t it?’ Mick said, joining her. He handed her a large glass of something clear. He watched as she took a sip. It was sweet, alcoholic and ice cold, fulfilling all her requirements.

They moved back to the deck and Mia took a seat at a teak table with a parasol positioned at its centre. Mick unhooked his mobile from its clip and placed it in front of him before sitting. A tiny blue light on the phone flashed every few seconds. He took a packet of cigarettes and a lighter from his pocket. ‘Do you smoke?’ he asked, offering her one. There was a tremble to his fingers.

‘No.’

He lit a cigarette and inhaled deeply, closing his eyes. It afforded Mia a moment to look at him. Mick had changed dramatically from the trim, suited man in her photo. The muscles in his arms had turned slack and a neat paunch strained against his shirt. Thin red skin stretched over the bridge of his nose and his eyelids looked heavy.

He exhaled a drift of smoke into the air, the cigarette returning much of his composure. ‘So,’ he said, stretching forward to tap ash into a wooden bowl, ‘are you here in Maui alone, or is Katie with you?’

Her sister’s name so soon was a small surprise. ‘I’m with a friend.’

He nodded and she wondered whether he was disappointed or relieved.

‘Where are you staying?’

‘The Pineapple Hostel.’

‘I know it. It’s only a few minutes from here.’ Mick rested his left arm over the back of his chair. ‘Will you stay long or are you travelling elsewhere?’

She understood that he was gauging her intentions. Who was she with? How long would she be here? What did she want from him? ‘I’m travelling for a few months,’ she told him. ‘We started in California. Thought we’d make Maui our next stop. From here we’re flying to Western Australia.’ It was the most she’d said since she’d arrived and her throat felt dry and tight. She picked up her drink and let an ice cube knock against her tongue.

‘We?’

‘Me and Finn – my best friend.’

A long silence stretched between them. Mia focused on the contents of her glass. She had imagined that the words would come easily – there would be a flow of conversation to start filling in the years – yet now that she was here, she felt as if there was so much to say that she couldn’t decide which words should come first.

They finished their drinks in silence. Mick stubbed out his cigarette and went to the kitchen, returning with fresh drinks and two citronella candles that he lit, their sharp lemon scent filling the air. He drank quickly, the alcohol barely touching the sides of the glass. In that she recognized their first similarity.

‘I heard about your mother passing away,’ he said finally.

She wondered how.

‘It must have been hard for you and Katie.’

‘Yes.’ She couldn’t think about her mother now. This, being here, was already too much.

‘How is Katie?’

‘Good. We have a flat together in London.’

‘Yes?’

‘She’s working in recruitment.’

He smiled, and she took that as encouragement. ‘And yourself?’ he asked. ‘What do you do?’

She shrugged. ‘I’ve been doing some casual work – bar jobs, waitressing, that kind of thing. I’m not sure what I want to do yet.’

‘I trained as a chef before I found the music industry.’

It was the first new fact she’d learnt about him. Her father had been a chef. Had he ever cooked for them? She considered whether she had any inherent culinary know-how, but couldn’t think of any.

Mick explained how his career began at a French restaurant in West London. One of the young waiters there had an incredible singing voice but lacked the confidence to do any gigs. Mick put him in touch with a fantastic guitarist he knew from university and later began taking bookings for them – for a cut. Within six months, Mick had brought on a drummer and bass guitarist, and the new band were doing so well that he found the money for an album to be recorded. That was the start of his first record label.

Mick talked quickly, one sentence rolling into the next, one story unfolding into another, either to avoid the quiet awkwardness or else to delay the more serious discussion of why Mia was there. The more he spoke, the more she felt herself withdrawing, silence closing around her throat like a pair of hands. She knew she was being odd, but it was as if the subject of his desertion was too big to even broach.