Sins of the Mother (30 page)

Two months later, when my relationship with Arnie crumbled to pieces, I called my parents, begging them to take me home.

‘I can’t do it any more,’ I told Mum on the phone. ‘I can’t get out of bed.’

For the first time in years I felt like a child again, and my parents swung into action and rescued me. Mum and Dad packed up all my stuff and moved me back home. When I really needed them, they
were there for me. They always had been, I guess, I just didn’t know it.

In the first couple of weeks Mum made a big effort, cooking nice home-made stew for me and talking to me about my work at college. Dad did his best but I don’t think he realized just how
independent I had become. One night, after a particularly fierce row over which channel to watch, Dad snapped, ‘This is my house and if you don’t like what we’re watching you know
where you can go. To your room!’

I stormed upstairs, angry with myself for being back in this position again. Angry at him for so many reasons! Mum came up half an hour later and knocked tentatively on the door before sitting
down on the end of my bed.

‘Don’t be angry with your father . . .’ she started.

But I was already ranting. ‘You know if he had got off his arse to go to work he could have prepared for my future and saved some money so that I didn’t have to go to work all the
time. I mean, he wants me in education but then he doesn’t make it easy for me! I’ve had to do everything myself. EVERYTHING! It’s not like he’s got any other children!
I’m it!’

‘Your father is doing his best,’ Mum sighed. ‘But you know, you already have so much more than he had as a child. You’re a lucky girl. I wish you could see
that.’

‘It doesn’t feel like it sometimes.’ I looked away, my eyes now filling with tears. ‘I mean, sometimes it feels like he doesn’t even want me around.’

‘You know why he didn’t come to help you move in with Arnie?’

‘Because he couldn’t be bothered?’ I said bitterly.

‘No,’ Mum reproached me gently. ‘Because he was too upset that you were leaving.’

‘Really?’

Mum nodded and touched a hand to my shoulder. ‘You know he can’t say these things. But that doesn’t mean he doesn’t feel them.’

After that, I tried to be a bit more considerate around my father. It helped that I didn’t have the pressure of trying to pay the bills, I had more time to relax and give
my degree my full attention. I was also grateful for the opportunity to get closer to Mum again. Now that I knew what she had been through, I had a new appreciation and respect for her. So instead
of walking away when I caught her crying, I’d give her a hug and make her a cup of tea. I’d remind her that she was a strong woman and she always had me to talk to. I would always be
there for her.

Now, when we were alone together, I asked her questions and encouraged her to talk about her life. I started to understand the roots of the strict regime that she had instilled in our household
and to see where all her anger came from. One thing I knew for a fact, it wasn’t from me. She loved me and I knew it now. It was just that she was tormented by the painful memories of her
past. One day she told me she was trying to write a book about her experiences and I thought that was a fantastic idea so I encouraged her to keep going.

Meanwhile, I was finding ways to reconnect with my dad too. I don’t know why but with every year that had passed we had grown further and further apart. When I was a
little girl we had been inseparable, always painting, gardening or doing woodwork together, but as I got older, he closed himself off from me until we could no longer communicate properly. I wanted
to get back to how things were. So one day, when he said he was going to the garden centre to buy some seeds, I offered to go with him.

‘Ah now, you don’t really want to come, do you?’ he said dismissively.

‘Why not?’ I replied. ‘I could give you a lift if you like?’

Dad had given up his car many years before when they could no longer afford the running costs. Now he paused to consider my proposal. Finally he nodded. ‘Sure. Why not?’

We didn’t talk much on the way down but once we were there, it was like my dad came alive. He started chatting animatedly about planting, soils and seeds, and the words just seemed to
tumble out of him.

We walked up and down the rows of different compost bags and he stopped at each one to explain the type of compost we would need for our soil and the vegetables he was growing. I listened
carefully and asked questions, and for the first time in years it felt like we were having a normal, natural conversation. I don’t think he had any idea how happy it made me.

On the way back, I worked up the courage to ask a question which I knew would make him uncomfortable.

‘Dad, I didn’t get to meet Grandpa – what was he like?’

‘What? My father?’ Dad was visibly shocked. I
never
asked questions like this usually. But I’d decided I’d had enough of secrets and hiding.

‘Yes, your father. My grandfather.’

Silence. I was grateful at that moment to be driving so I had something to distract me from the intense quietness in the car.

‘Well, you
did
meet him actually,’ he said eventually. ‘I introduced you to him when you were just a baby but he wasn’t really into babies all that much. Do you
know what your grandfather was?’

‘Was he a bank robber, Daddy?’

A slight pause and, a second later, I caught my dad’s eye. We both burst out laughing – it felt so surreal, so silly to say those words, and yet we both knew that it was the absolute
truth. Over the years I had picked up various bits and pieces from my siblings and my aunts about my dad’s side of the family. He thought he’d been so smart in hiding it from me but I
knew they were all criminals. I just didn’t know anything from Dad directly.

‘That’s right,’ he said. ‘He was a robber, but you don’t really want to know about all of this, do you?’

‘Yes, I do!’ I insisted. ‘I really want to know. It’s my family too.’

Gradually, Dad started to open up. It wasn’t easy – he had been trained to keep his mouth shut from when he was just a little boy. They all had to abide by the ‘code’, it
was drummed into them – and as a result Dad became secretive. Even though he had lived a straight and clean life for over fifteen years, he still found it hard to talk about his life before
coming to England. Instinctively, he kept that part of himself hidden.

‘I don’t know why you want to know these things,’ he’d bluster whenever I brought it up. ‘It’s all ancient history. What’s the point of raking it
up?’

‘Because I’m curious! I’m allowed to be curious, you know.’

‘Well, curiosity killed the cat.’

‘We don’t have a cat.’

‘Don’t be a smart mouth!’

The one thing I could never get him to talk about was the heroin. Since Dad took methadone, I knew he must have been an addict at one time but I could sense he was deeply ashamed of this and the
subject made him uncomfortable. One day I asked him how long he had been clean and he visibly bristled. Then he said to me, ‘Look, Jen, I wasn’t proud of meself when I was doing it.
It’s in the past now and that’s where I want it to stay. You’re my daughter and the way I’ve lived my life, well, I’ve tried to lead by example.

‘You want to know what your grandfather was like? He did an awful lot of talking – saying a lot of stuff and then doing the opposite. As your father, I didn’t always say the
right thing but I tried to do the right thing. And that’s the most important part of being a parent to me. After that, well, nobody does everything right! So you can ask me all these things
but I’m not always going to tell you. I was there for you, that’s all you need to know.’

True to form, on my graduation day my parents turned up but Dad never said a word to me. I knew deep down he was proud that I got a 2:1 but it hurt that he couldn’t bring himself to say
‘well done’. And when I should have been bursting with pride and happiness, I felt a bitter twisting in my guts.

‘What’s wrong?’ Mum asked.

‘Nothing,’ I huffed.

‘No, go on, what is it? You shouldn’t be upset today, not today.’

‘Oh, I don’t know, Mum! It’s just that after all these years of being a good daughter, doing what I was told and not being able to go out, I did it! I got my education, I can
get a good job now. You got what you wanted as parents, didn’t you? So where’s the “well done”?’

‘You know I’m proud of you,’ she replied, a little wounded.

‘I know
you
are,’ I said pointedly, staring at Dad who was stood separately from the crowds. Mum nodded and went over to speak to him. It seemed she dragged him back,
reluctantly, a few minutes later. We stood around in expectant silence for a while, then Mum sighed and rolled her eyes.

‘Well?’ she asked him impatiently. ‘Are you not going to say well done to her?’

Dad caught my eye briefly and grunted something that sounded like: ‘El un.’ And then he walked away. Mum grinned at me triumphantly, as if she had just performed a minor miracle. I
shrugged. I suppose it was good enough. At least he tried.

Now I’ve moved in with my boyfriend Lucas and we’re saving up to get married. From the word go, it had felt very natural and easy – as if we were always meant
to be together. He has a daughter who he is so loving and gentle with that I can see he’s a brilliant dad, which makes me really excited about having children together one day. His daughter
is a very special little girl and, luckily, we get on really well when she stays at the weekends. I can honestly say I’m happier than I’ve ever been in my life.

Even Dad gets on with Lucas, something I never expected. I reminded Dad that he stopped me going out with him when I was fourteen, but he only saw this as an example of his excellent parenting
skills. ‘You see!’ he said. ‘If I’d let you go out with him at that age you wouldn’t have gone to university, you would have got distracted, maybe had a child
together, struggled, split up and moved on. You were far too young back then. No, I was quite right, Jen. Look at you both now – so happy together. I think you should thank me for doing you a
big favour!’

‘Urgh! Dad – you’re impossible!’ I laughed, throwing a cushion at his head.

‘It’s true!’

‘Yeah, whatever . . .’

But I can see that in some ways my dad was right. I got my education because he was strict with me – other friends didn’t do so well. Helen, whose parents were both addicts, dropped
out of school when she fell pregnant. Today she’s got four kids from three different fathers and struggles to get by on her benefits. At twenty-two she’s never had a job and I wonder if
she ever will. I don’t judge her for the choices she’s made – in some ways, I wonder if they were her choices at all. She didn’t have the benefit of what I had. She created
a large family so that she would never be lonely. I understand that.

I have a great job now as a laboratory research assistant and I hope to do well in my profession so that I can build a strong career. But I also want kids – I dream one day of owning a
beautiful house filled with noisy, boisterous children. In short, I want what I didn’t have and, like my dad said, thanks to his strict rules I can have it. Lucas and I have even talked about
moving to Ireland one day; though he is not from Ireland himself, and has never been before, he has an Irish father so he’s part-Irish. I know that it would break my heart to leave my parents
but I would love for my kids to grow up with their cousins. My great hope is that one day Mum and Dad decide to move back too, though I know it will take a lot to convince them.

It’s ironic that they came over to England to give me a better life and now I yearn to return to Ireland, but I can’t help it. That’s where all my family lives and because they
are there it is where I feel most at home. Dad doesn’t want to go back, though – most of his family are recovering addicts and criminals still, and every year he gets a phone call from
one of his brothers telling him another member of their family has died. He escaped that life and the idea of returning frightens him. But would it be the same after all this time?

At least we’re having the conversation now. At least we are talking like a family – planning the future and sharing the past. I even know that somewhere out there I have a
half-sister called Felicity. We’ve never met but I’d like to one day, and I hope she’d like to meet me too. It’s strange to think that somewhere in the world there is
another girl who shares my dad’s genes. How ironic that after all these years praying for a sibling my own age I had one all along! I think about Felicity often, wondering what she looks like
and what she’s doing. One day, if she hasn’t come looking for me, I’ll try and get in touch. I have so much to tell her!

Today my mother is coping a lot better. Although she still takes medication, has house visits from social workers and attends a psychiatric hospital, I see her happy days more. Watching her go
through a life of silence and pain inspired me to qualify in mental health and social work so that I could help others struggling with their mental well-being.

I can’t even begin to describe how much I love and appreciate my mum and dad. They suffered a lot in their lives and my mum, in particular, had a brutal childhood. I am so proud of how she
broke the cycle of abuse and neglect to show me the love every child deserves. I don’t idolize celebrities or models, she is my idol, my rock. I see how she suffered and survived and for this
I am so proud of her. I could wish my mother hadn’t gone through this pain, but none of us can change the past. Besides, Mum’s struggles have made her the wonderful, sensitive, kind and
loving person she is today.

It made her the mother she never had.

22

IRENE