Tease (36 page)

Accordingly, Rex had taken Georgia for a meeting at the expensive Kube Hotel in Knightsbridge last night to start working out a PR strategy. Personally Sienna had always thought the place was swarming with high-class hookers, but then if Rex was taking Georgia there she must be mistaken. Sienna had gratefully taken the opportunity to spend the night at her own flat, wanting to have a girlie evening on her own and have a think about how best to go about finding her nephew. It would be a lot easier now he had probably read the newspapers himself, she thought. She was hoping Rex might have called to wish her sweet dreams last night, but he didn’t; Sienna guessed he had probably been shattered after an evening talking business with Georgia. Well, Sienna would now give him a night to remember to make it up to him, poor lamb.

Sienna heard loud banging and she rolled her eyes up at the ceiling. The neighbour upstairs had taken to complaining about her music. She turned it up another notch to make a point. Shovelling her make-up into her handbag, she saw a little white wrap, and remembered she had a couple of lines left from the weekend. Waste not, want not, she thought, emptying the contents onto her marble windowsill and quickly racking up a huge line. The banging continued. She polished off her chemical hit and dabbed her nose daintily. More banging.

‘Alright alright!’ she yelled up at the ceiling and cut the music dead. She realised the banging was coming from her front door.

‘Jesus, don’t tell me he’s actually come downstairs to complain,’ she muttered under her breath, traipsing across the hallway. She opened the front door and stared.

‘Can I help you?’ she asked in a surly manner, wondering who the fuck this woman in a headscarf was. Maybe one of the neighbours had ordered a takeaway and given the wrong flat number.

‘Sienna, can I come in?’ asked a familiar voice. Sienna stood, bewildered, for a few seconds and watched as the woman pulled off her scarf to reveal pink hair pulled back from her pale, gaunt face.

‘Tiger?’ Sienna ventured, shocked by her appearance. She stepped aside and watched transfixed as Tiger made her way into the hallway; scrawny in her plain work-out gear, short in her ballet pumps, and haggard without her make-up. She looked terrible – as though she hadn’t slept – and her eyes were bloodshot and swollen. She had a solemn expression. Great. Sienna did not want her sister messing with her buzz right now.

‘Hey,’ said Tiger. ‘Sorry for dropping in on you like this. You look nice. Going out?’

‘Yeah. I need to leave in about ten minutes actually, so can you make it quick?’

‘Oh, right. Yes of course. Well, I need to share something with you … I guess you read the newspapers.’

‘Might have done.’

‘I thought you might have rung to talk to me about it …?’

‘Heh. I thought you should be the one calling me actually.’

‘I couldn’t be sure you’d pick up the phone to me.’

‘No, you’re right. I wouldn’t have. So, have you come to tell me where my nephew is then? Only, you need to make it quick, I have things to do tonight.’

‘I wanted to explain… tell you the truth. The thing is …’

‘Don’t even think about telling any more lies, Tiger. Just tell me where I can find him. I have a right to see him and tell him the truth about what his mother’s like. He deserves to know.’

‘Look, maybe I should come back when you have more time, I’m not sure this can be rushed.’

‘No way, I want this over with.’

‘No no, I should come back—’

‘Just get on with it, you lying fucking bitch!’

Tiger stood silent for a moment and blinked, her eyes visibly filling with tears at Sienna’s tangible venom. Tiger took a deep breath.

‘Sienna, you don’t have a nephew.’

‘Excuse me? But the interview that your school friend—’

‘You don’t have a sister either.’

‘What? Are you on something? What are you talking about?’

‘I’m not your sister.’

‘Oh come on, this is getting ridiculous—’

‘I’m your mother.’

They say that when you are about to die your life pulls up before your eyes – a little home movie to accompany you through your last remaining seconds. Right now, Sienna felt the world about to crash down on her, a quick-fire family slideshow playing behind her retinas, flashing up scene upon scene, but each now coloured with a different hue; each now tinged with the possibility of an entirely different reality. She staggered slightly and put her arm out to the wall. Tiger reached out.

‘No. Don’t touch me. Don’t come near me,’ Sienna whispered. She stood for a moment wobbling on her heels, thinking. ‘Now, just run that by me again. You’re my … mother? But what about Mum and Dad? You’re not my
mum
!’

‘Sienna darling, I know this is a lot to take in. Mum and Dad were my parents, but they were your grandparents. After I had you they took you away from me to bring you up as their own. We moved to England and I was sent away to boarding school. I had brought shame on the family. I was only fourteen, I couldn’t even … I wasn’t even allowed to …’ Tiger trailed off as Sienna was now crying loudly, clinging to the wall as she shook.

‘Wait!’ Sienna shouted through her tears, suddenly angry. ‘You’re lying! You’re twenty-nine! You’re only ten years older than me! Stop lying!’ she choked.

‘No, darling, I’m thirty-three. I’ve always lied about my age. As soon as I turned sixteen I ran away from boarding
school to Spain for a few years to get away; I couldn’t bear you being so close and not being allowed to see you learn to walk, or hear your first words. It was a nightmare time. I got myself into so much trouble, with bad people. I just wanted to self-destruct, to try and forget the pain of what had happened. But, I came back. I came back a different person, Sienna. I changed my appearance, my name, my age, I needed to be someone else, I couldn’t put the past right. Besides, I knew that was the only way Mum and Dad would feel it was safe enough to let me near you,
they
wanted to re-write history, so that’s what
I
had to do, too, for them to let me still see you.’

‘But why lie about your age?’

‘I had to do everything I could to make sure you’d never suspect anything. I just spent a few years being eighteen. I never celebrated birthdays … no one ever noticed … or cared. My god, if you’d ever had any reason to even suspect anything … well you might have thought I actually wanted to give you away. I could never let you think I wanted that. I’d rather play the game so Mum and Dad would let me see you occasionally than risk them cutting me off from you completely.’

‘They said you were in London working, and you didn’t want to see me!’

‘Of course they did,’ said Tiger. ‘They were protecting you. Why do you think they never had pictures of me in the house? They disowned me. I was an embarrassment. I was their dirty secret. And they never liked the idea of
my performing. It just confirmed their views that I wasn’t a good Catholic girl. I won’t pretend I’m not angry at them, Sienna. For nineteen years I’ve carried the anger around in my heart and when they died I knew I’d never get closure; that it would haunt me forever, what they did. I wanted to tell you a thousand times but I didn’t want to hurt you or colour your memories of your grand-parents. Whatever they did to me I know that they loved you so much
.
You were the apple of their eye. You have no reason to be angry at them. But we have a chance to make a fresh start
now
, we—’

‘Wait! But – they wouldn’t have
lied
to me for all these years? Everyone said I looked like my dad …’

‘No! God no. You take after your granddad, yes it’s true … I brought this …’ Tiger scrabbled in her handbag and pulled out her passport. ‘Here. Take a look in the back at my age so you can see the proof for yourself. In a weird way, shaving four years off my age kind of worked in my line of business.’ Tiger let out an uneasy laugh. ‘You know, all the stars lie about their ages. Only my reason wasn’t for vanity. Here. I want you to look, I need you to see that I’m not lying.’ Tiger held out the passport for Sienna to take. She recoiled as though Tiger were holding out a glowing hot poker. How had she missed Tiger’s date of birth when she looked in her passport before? Well, she wasn’t looking for it … she remembered nearly being caught by Blue and having to put the passport back as soon as she saw her place of birth as Clonmel. How could
she have been so stupid! A humungous clue had been right there in front of her nose like a big, pink, velvet elephant.

Tiger knelt down and put the passport on the floor in front of Sienna’s feet. Sienna’s carefully applied smoky make-up now coursed down her cheeks in rivers of black. She hesitated before picking up the passport and checking the back. She let out a tiny wail and threw it across the room, covering her face with her hands as she sobbed.

‘Go away!’ she snivelled. ‘You’ve done too much! I can’t take this. You liar! I wish Mum was here! My real mum!’

‘Sienna,
I
am your mother! Please!’ Sienna collapsed to the floor as she sobbed. So this was what Lance had meant when he told her enigmatically he wasn’t giving her everything on a plate. He must have figured it out for himself! He knew! The bastard! He knew he was getting his cut of the money anyway. He’d probably been watching the whole car crash with fascination. Of course Sienna was in so much of a hurry with her stupid story and the thought of bringing Tiger down she didn’t check things out properly. Now she’d brought her own house of cards tumbling down spectacularly. Oh boy, had she scored an own goal this time! She had single-handedly orchestrated the reveal of her own seedy secret.

Sienna looked about her and felt her world fragment around her as she sat there on the floor. Everything that she’d ever thought was real suddenly took on a new meaning. All Tiger’s visits, conversations, all providing new
answers … and yet more questions. Sienna knew she had to stop thinking, it was all too much to take in. She now deeply regretted that line of cocaine earlier; she felt like she was on the edge of a cliff, and she didn’t know which side was reality any more.

‘You need to leave,’ said Sienna quietly, trembling there on the floor.

‘I’m not leaving you here like this,’ said Tiger.

‘Get out!’ screamed Sienna suddenly, flying up at Tiger with her fists. Tiger cowered and backed towards the wall, small and childlike in front of Sienna’s wiry six-foot frame, bristling with anger.

‘Oh my god! You’re a whore!’ spat Sienna. ‘Pregnant with me at fourteen? My dad some nameless local boy? I bet you had ’em all didn’t you, lifting your skirt behind the bike sheds like some dirty tart. You probably don’t even
know
which one my father is do you! I bet—’ Tiger suddenly lashed out like a cornered animal and slapped Sienna hard. Her cheek reddened immediately and Sienna drew back in shock, hands leaping to her face.

‘God – sorry – Sienna I didn’t mean—’ started Tiger.

‘Oh my god I hate you!’ hissed Sienna, trembling. ‘I hated you as my sister! And I hate you even more now! A stripper for a sister was bad enough, but now a whore as my mother?’ she screamed.

‘No, it wasn’t like that! Please let me explain!’ Tiger knew deep down she could never explain. How could she tell her daughter she was born out of such cruelty and
violence? Tell her daughter she was brought into the world because of a rape upon an underage schoolgirl? That her father was some
Lolita
-loving gym teacher who had coolly groomed an innocent fourteen-year-old until he got his prize? Or that her parents knew and colluded with the school to hush it all up after the father was arrested and deported? Tiger could never tell her daughter the truth. It might destroy her. It had almost killed Tiger, slowly but surely.

‘To think I even took your stage name!’ raged Sienna. ‘Ugh! I can’t even get away from you in my head now, knowing you gave birth to me.’ Sienna lunged forward and returned the slap to Tiger’s face. Tiger flinched but stood and took it. Tears rolled down her burning cheeks.

‘You’re not my real mother!’ screamed Sienna. ‘You’ll only ever be that woman who gave birth to me! You gave me away didn’t you! You just didn’t want me. Mum and Dad aren’t alive to tell me the truth, so you know you can just lie and cover up, like you’ve done for all these years.’

Tiger shook her head as she cried. ‘They took you away from me, and they took away the name I gave you. They gave you the name Rose against my wishes. I wanted to call you Robin. They couldn’t even do that one little thing for me,’ she whispered. ‘There was never a day that went by when I didn’t think of you.’

Poppy had heaved the last of her suitcases into the taxi. She made her way back up the garden path to the front
door where her mother stood, watching proceedings with a stony face. Her dad was nowhere to be seen.

‘Okay, that’s me all packed,’ announced Poppy, quietly.

‘Good. The driver knows where St Mary’s is, he’ll drop you at the gates. He’s already been paid.’

‘Okay. So … I’ll see you when we break up for Christmas?’

‘You’ll go to Auntie Mary’s in Kilburn for holidays. She may be old but she knows how to discipline.’

‘Oh.’

‘It’s for the best. No distractions. Now you have to work hard. Get yourself some good grades and make something of your life. You’re lucky, you have a second chance now – a chance to pay for your sins – turn your life around. Just you remember that as I’m slaving every hour God sends to pay for your second chance. You really have no idea what pressure you’ve brought upon the whole family; how much I personally have to pick up the pieces of your behaviour. You owe it to all of us to step up to the mark, young lady.’

Poppy looked down at the path and scuffed her shoe on a stone awkwardly.

‘Can I see Robin before—’

‘Rose. She’s Rose now. Don’t you forget that. I don’t think it’s a good idea for you to see her, you’ll probably just upset her anyway. She’ll be safe with us. We have to put the past right now. It’s for the best.’

‘But … just a hug for my baby.’

‘She’s your sister, remember. Now go.’

‘But …’

‘Goodbye, Poppy.’

‘Right … bye then.’ Poppy looked up and leaned in for a hug but her mother was already closing the front door. As it clicked shut, the taxi driver beeped, and revved the engine impatiently. Poppy beat a lonely retreat back up the path, heartbroken and churning with nerves. She climbed into the taxi and as it pulled away she looked back at the house, at the parlour window, hoping to see a curtain twitching on her departure at least. Nothing. As she settled back into her seat with a lump in her throat, Poppy knew she would never return to her old life ever again.