The Secret Daughter (2 page)

‘I just
am
.’

‘But—’

‘Sabina! Leave it.’

For the second time that night I was shocked speechless, this time left staring at my mother’s back as she walked to the stove and began checking on the various pots and pans there. I couldn’t miss the way her hands shook as she lifted the lids or the noisy way those lids clattered down as she replaced them.

When I found my voice again, it would have been far too easy to drop the subject. Mum and I were close – closer than any other mother and daughter I knew, and the idea of upsetting her further was beyond upsetting to
me
.

But there was something new at stake, and it was something precious and already loved. A lot had changed in the medical field in the years since Mum had been pregnant, and if my pregnancy
was
at risk, maybe there was something that could be done about it if I had enough information. I decided to try a less direct approach.

‘Maybe you can tell me about your pregnancy with
me
,’ I suggested softly. ‘Did you have morning sickness? I’ve been lucky so far, I didn’t even realise I was pregnant.’

Mum was still staring at the pots. I had the distinct impression that every single word I was saying now was wounding her, and I had no idea what to do about it. I hesitantly reached to touch her back, just as the front door sprung open and Dad and Ted returned. Their booming voices were jovial and loud, a distinctly uncomfortable contrast to the strained tension in the room with Mum and me. Mum looked across our little living space, straight to Dad at the front door, and I watched the colour fade from his ruddy cheeks.

‘Megan . . . ?’ Dad’s footsteps and his words were suddenly slow and cautious.

‘We need to leave,’ she whispered.

‘Hey, no!’ Ted held up the icy bottle in his hand. ‘We’re celebrating, remember? What’s going on?’

‘Mum, no, I’ll drop it,’ I pleaded with her, but she shook her head, and marched past Dad and Ted. I knew she was in a panic when she only scooped her handbag and scarf off the coat rack, neglecting to carefully rewind the scarf on her neck as she would have on any other occasion.

Dad looked at me.

‘What did she say?’ he asked.

‘She just told me n-not to get excited about the baby,’ I whispered, and at the sound of my stutter, I burst into tears. It had taken years of speech therapy to get my stutter under control, inflicted upon me mostly by my mother and her iron will. I couldn’t remember the last time I had tripped up on a word, but then again, I also couldn’t remember the last time I’d been this upset.

‘She told me you two had lots of miscarriages and that we shouldn’t be telling anyone yet. Then I asked her why she’d had problems and if it was genetic and she got really upset. I’m sorry, Dad.’

‘Is that
all
she said?’

‘What else
is
there?’

Dad made a frustrated sound somewhere between a growl and a sigh.

‘I’ll take her home, I’m so sorry she’s ruined your night.’ He picked his mug up and made a beeline for our front door. ‘Let her get used to the news and calm down, and we’ll make it up to you both, I promise.’

The door slammed behind Dad, and the sobs I’d held back broke free. Ted dumped the champagne on the sofa and pulled me close.

‘What the hell just happened?’ Ted asked.

‘I h-have no idea,’ I struggled to form the words. ‘But I think w-we’d better go to the doctor tomorrow.’

He gently spun me around, turning my back towards the couches so that we could sit together, and as he did so, I saw Mum’s mug still sitting on the dining room table.

TWO

Lilly—June 1973

Dear James,

I’m in so much trouble, James.

I’ve been keeping a secret from you. I wanted to tell you, but I was so scared. And we only ever speak on the phone and I’m always talking to you within earshot of
someone
. Then I was going to write it in a letter, but Tata posts my letters to you. And if he read it . . .

Well, if he read it, I suppose things would have turned out like they have.

I’m pregnant, James. I know this must be a huge shock and I’m so sorry to tell you this way . . . but to be honest, right now, I’ll be lucky if I can even figure out how to get this letter into the post to actually
tell
you at all.

I don’t know when it happened . . . just before you left for university, I guess. I feel like such an idiot. Did you know that what we were doing was how
babies
are made? You’re so smart, of course you knew. Well, I didn’t, and even though you left at the start of January I didn’t even realise I was pregnant until April. The nuns at school always talked about sex . . . but they made it sound so bad and sordid that I didn’t actually realise that’s what
we
were doing. It just happened so naturally for us, didn’t it? We never even decided to be boyfriend and girlfriend, we were just friends and then we were more. I don’t even remember our first kiss . . . do you? It barely seemed important at the time, just another step of this love between us. Every move we took together felt automatic, as if our instincts were guiding us. Not even for a second did I think that we might be doing that
thing
the nuns had warned us away from.

At first, I thought I was tired because I missed you so much. I wanted to lie in bed and sleep all day, and I didn’t much want to eat, which was driving Mama crazy. She kept chastising me, and Henri took to calling me ‘Lovesick Lilly’. Then my appetite came back and my clothes got tighter and tighter, but still I didn’t understand. I thought I was just eating too much, making up for lost time during those early months in the year when I lived off scant bites from each meal.

I only realised what was really going on when one of the girls at school was talking about her period and I realised that I hadn’t had mine since before Christmas. Even
I
know what
that
means.

At first, I tried to pretend it wasn’t happening, and for a while that was easy. The boys teased me for being fat, but I’m pretty used to that. My school uniform got tighter and tighter and no one seemed to notice, and so I didn’t think about the baby, or you, or what this would mean for all of us.

Then the baby started kicking me. I figured that sooner or later someone would join the dots and my secret would be out. I used to lie in bed at night, tossing and turning, waiting for the axe to fall. When I felt like the secret I was holding was growing too big to contain . . . and my fears about Tata finding out would grow too strong, I’d close my eyes and imagine the consequences. I had this crazy idea that I could think away the fear if I could just plan it all out.

I’d picture Tata’s rage and his shame; I’d imagine Mama’s disgust. I wrote a silly movie script in my mind about how things would go – I played around with the story, to see what would happen if Tata found out at night, or in the morning, or while I was at school. I pictured it on rainy days and on sunny days and on the other kids’ birthdays or the day I went into labour.

No matter what details I imagined, the story ended the same; I found myself on your front doorstep, sitting my suitcase on the mat beside my feet so that I could knock and call your mum.

I was right about most things. This morning Tata woke me up and told me to pack a suitcase. He lined up the other kids, all seven of them, and he watched while I said goodbye. Kasia and Henri were both crying, and I could see the pity in their eyes. The worst of it was Mama. She wouldn’t even look at me – she hid in the kitchen and wept and when I tried to make her turn around to say goodbye, she shook my hand off her shoulder and sobbed even harder.

Then, just like I thought he would, Tata threw me in the car and he ranted. All the way down the long driveway to the end of the farm, he yelled with such fury that spit kept flying out of his mouth and I just sat next to him and tried not to cry.

He said vile things to me, and they were things I deserve, I suppose. He talked a lot about me shaming the Wyzlecki name and letting him down, and the worst part – he called me names that I never realised that
my
Tata actually knew. I knew that I’d make him even angrier if I cried, so I tried to stare at my lap and hold myself together. You know how thick his accent seems when he’s angry. Today it really sounded as though he was just roaring at me in Polish. The words were a smooth and endless stream of fury, the gaps between them compressed by his rage.

I held myself together because I told myself that everything would be okay. I thought he’d take me to your Mum and Dad, and they’d be angry at us too but at least they’d let me call you. But Tata didn’t take me to your place. My suitcase was in the back of the car, but I never got to feel the sweet relief of sitting it onto your doormat beside my feet.

Instead of turning left at the end of the driveway to your farm, he turned right, and then at the highway turnoff, he turned towards Orange.

I know it’s only forty minutes to Orange but without knowing where I was going, it felt like we were driving forever. I begged him to tell me where he was taking me, but all that he would say was that he was ‘not dumping our family’s rubbish’ onto yours. I felt like I had been knocked out of orbit and that I was floating through space – all that I knew was that the car was headed
away
from everything I’ve ever known. I tried to imagine every possibility. Was he sending me to Uncle Adok in Poland, who I’ve never even met? Were we en route to an abortion clinic – are those places even
real
?

For a fleeting moment I thought he was taking me to the train station, to send me to you . . . how wonderful that would have been.

But when he finally stopped the car we were at the big hospital at Orange, and at first that made no sense at all. For a while we sat there. Tata sat with his hands on the steering wheel, staring straight ahead and now I was the one ranting. It was like he couldn’t even hear me, then I guess I finally got through to him. For the first time in my life, I cried today and Tata did not dismiss me.

No, today he didn’t chastise me for crying, and he didn’t remind me of how much easier my life is than his was as a teen back in war-torn Poland. Today, after his rage was all burned up, all that seemed left of him was shame and sadness. Tata told me that we were not going to the hospital, but to the maternity home opposite. He told me that I have to stay here until the baby comes.

We went inside and we met nurses and social workers. They sat me in a cold little room with Tata and he signed pages and pages of paperwork. There were several folders, and by the time we left, each one of them had been marked with black marker the words
Liliana Wyzlecki, BFA
. I think the BFA is a code, maybe it’s
my
code in here. I am sure I will find out sooner or later.

I’ve let everyone down, James. I was so stupid, and now I’m pregnant, and everything is ruined for all of us.

James, I don’t know if I’ll find a way to post this to you. I don’t know what’s going to happen, or even how I’m going to cope in this horrible place.

All I know is that the love between you and me was such a miracle that without even meaning to, we made a
baby
, and I love that baby already just as much as I love you.

I know that you’ve only just started at university and that you’ve dreamed of that for years. I know that everything that we planned for our future hangs on you getting your degree. So I know . . . I really, truly understand that I’m asking a lot of you.

But if you don’t come back for me . . . for
us
. . . and if we don’t find a way to marry before the baby is born . . . I don’t even know what’s going to happen. I can’t even guess. Tata won’t let me go home with a baby in tow, and I have no way to support myself without you.

There’s no point calling me here or writing back; they have already told me that they won’t let me speak to you. So please just come – get on the next bus and come straight here, so we can tell them that we’ll find a judge and find a way to get married right away and then I’m sure they’ll let me go.

I love you with all of my heart, James. Please forgive me for keeping this secret and please, oh God please . . . come and help me and our baby.

Love,

Lilly

THREE

Sabina—March 2012

I had something of an emotional hangover the next day.

Ted and I spoke in hushed tones over breakfast as we made plans to visit the doctor together on our lunchbreaks. Before, our chatter had been upbeat and excited, but now we dared not risk exuberance. The pregnancy suddenly felt too fragile to expose to further loud voices or emotions.

There were times as the morning passed when I’d fully engage with the class I was teaching and for a brief moment the image of my mother’s distraught face would fade from the forefront of my mind. I had three individual one hour classes to get through – including a kindergarten class which was always a challenge, and I was grateful for the distraction. I’d always felt that it was via music that I became fully alive, and that day, even the sounds of five-year-olds drumming against the desks felt like life support.

After I’d finished my last morning class, I went to my desk and withdrew my phone. I fully expected a missed call or voicemail from Mum, and my heart sank when the screen was empty. I opened a blank text message and tapped out a message.

Mum, I’m so sorry about what happened last night. I know it’s hard but please – can we talk, as soon as you’re ready? I just want to do whatever I can to protect my pregnancy, if there’s anything at all I can do. Love you xo

Our GP was empathetic, and suggested we undertake a series of routine tests in lieu of any firm ideas about where to start looking for potential problems.

‘Fertility issues aren’t always genetic,’ he assured us. ‘And even if they are, there’s nothing to say you’ve inherited your mother’s issues anyway, or that it’s not a problem we’ve managed to solve in all of those years – medicine has come a really long way since you were born. But I do think we should be smart about this, so we’ll send you for a scan next week to see how things are progressing so far, and I’ll order a series of blood tests in the meantime so we can look for the common issues.’