The Shadow Year (29 page)

They slide past a Turkish greengrocer, a Halal meat shop and a colourful Italian deli. Above a railway bridge hangs a huge advertising hoarding urging passing commuters to
FIND PARADISE
. A taxi blares its horn at a pack of laughing kids scampering across the road. A group of men gesticulate outside a betting shop while a scruffy black dog, tied to a lamp-post, barks encouragement at them. As the bus pulls in to the next stop, Lila averts her gaze from a heavily pregnant woman waddling up the steps and concentrates instead on two lads with matching facial hair, black skinny jeans and Wayfarer sunglasses. They slouch onto the bus and slide into the seat in front of Lila’s, both of them hunched over their mobile phones, tapping furiously at the tiny keyboards. Somewhere far away a siren shrieks. A baby cries. The city is an endless grey but everywhere she looks humanity springs, bold and colourful, like flowers rising up through asphalt cracks, stretching out towards the space and the light.

It’s what she’s always loved about London – the pace, the life; but as she watches her hometown drift past the window, she finds her mind turning in on itself and drifting back to the tranquillity of the lake. It is such a contrast, the valley a place impervious to the rise and fall of the economy, a place relatively unscathed by time. Indeed, the only forces the lake submits to are the shifting of the seasons and the wind racing down from the moors, or the shoreline adjusting with the varying sunshine and rainfall – influences as inevitable as they are natural.

As she ponders the lake, her mind meanders on to William and Evelyn. She thinks of their simple life on the farm; the pleasure derived from feeding livestock or walking a dog, making a bracelet or knitting a blanket. It’s strange: she’s always thought of London as a city pulsing with life and energy, a place where everything is tangible and real; but as she looks around at the frenzy, she wonders if
this
is the illusion. Could it be the cottage and its valley, the wide-open moors and the glassy eye of the lake that are most real to her now? Looking around at the concrete city towering all around her, Lila is suddenly overwhelmed by the sensation that it is nothing more than a flimsy set that could come crumbling down around her at any moment. She looks up into the small patch of grey above and forces herself to breathe.

They’ve arranged to meet in the bar of a chic boutique hotel located just off Regent Street. Lila enters via a revolving door and is directed by the concierge through the lobby and into an elegant room decked out with stylish armchairs, gleaming chrome surfaces and flamboyant wallpaper. There is no sign of her mother, so she perches on a bar stool and eyes the drinks menu.

Lila hasn’t seen her mother since Christmas Day and she is feeling nervous. The day hadn’t gone well. She and Tom had driven out to her old family home in Buckinghamshire – to the Gothic mansion belonging to her parents and set within the exclusive cul-de-sac in the commuter-belt village. There they had attempted to make it a special day, despite the dusty, boarded-up air of the house after weeks of standing empty and the grief lingering over them all.

They’d visited her father’s grave, laying white lilies beside the polished headstone, before returning to the house to warm up with red wine and a roast dinner far too big for just the three of them. She’d tried, but Lila hadn’t been able to snap out of her doldrums. Even the Christmas carols playing on the radio as Lila had peeled potatoes in her mother’s kitchen had lost their cheerful, nostalgic sheen. Somehow, to her ear, they had sounded sad and gloomy. Lila had gazed out at the blank grey sky – an overcast nothingness.
In the bleak midwinter
: she couldn’t have put it better herself.

‘The turkey is delicious.’ Tom had smiled across at her mother but it seemed that the empty seat at the head of the dining table was too stark a reminder.

‘Don’t cry, Mum,’ Lila had tried gently. ‘It’s Christmas, after all. He wouldn’t want you to be sad.’

Her mother had nodded and held her napkin to her lips. ‘I know. I’m sorry. It’s just so hard. This year has been so difficult and here we are now, the first Christmas without him . . . and without . . . without your beautiful baby.’ She’d sniffed and gazed down into her wine glass.

Lila had reached across for her mother’s hand. She looked so shrunken in on herself. Christmas was always difficult for her mother, she knew that much. It always seemed to bring out a morose side of her.

‘Why does Mum get so sad at Christmas?’ she’d asked her father once, as he tucked her in on Christmas Eve. ‘Isn’t it supposed to be a happy day?’

He’d nodded and looked a little downcast. ‘Christmas does that to some people . . . it’s full of memories . . . it can make them feel quite lonely.’

‘But Mum doesn’t have to feel lonely – she has us,’ Lila had offered.

‘Yes,’ her dad had smiled and smoothed her fringe off her forehead, ‘she has us.’

Although Lila can see now that her mother never really quite
had
her father, not all to herself. Even on Christmas Day, after the carols were sung and the turkey eaten, the pudding flambéed in brandy and the chocolates opened, her father would retreat, either to drink himself into a stupor in his study, or to conduct intense, hushed phone conversations with whichever woman was keeping him busy at the time. She and her mother would sit up in front of the television, Lila watching a stream of saccharine Christmas programmes while her mother just stared unseeing out of the window, lost in her own private thoughts. No, Christmas had never been a particularly jolly affair in her family home.

But if her father had been the ghost of Christmas past hanging over the day this year, then the ghost of Christmas yet to come was there too – in the looming absence of their baby girl. Not since her due date had come and gone had she felt her loss more keenly than on that day. Her mistake, she knew, had been daring to imagine it while still pregnant and blooming with hope. As her baby had grown inside her, she’d jumped ahead in her mind and imagined her and Tom and their little girl building their own family’s Christmas traditions and memories. So on that day with her mother, while none of them hardly dared address the absence, it was obvious to them all that she should have been there, a four-month-old baby girl, bouncing on their laps, grinning and gurgling. There should have been colourful presents to open, toys and baby clothes to coo over and everyone softened by the presence of a new life and the hope that came with it.

Instead, everything felt wrong – the whole day steeped in grief and sadness, both for her father and her daughter. To cope, Lila had knocked back too many pills with a large glass of wine and then continued to drink steadily as the day wore on. It was only as she’d stumbled and spilled red wine all over her mother’s pale grey carpet that they’d realised quite how much she’d had to drink. ‘I think I should take you home,’ Tom had said as dusk crept over the house. He’d guided her gently out to the car and driven her back to London, her head pressed against the cool glass of the window all the way. ‘Promise me something,’ he’d asked, reaching out to stroke her thigh with his warm hand. ‘Promise me you won’t go back to the cottage – not until we’ve sorted this out.’

She’d nodded, but she hadn’t turned her head because she hadn’t wanted him to see the tears in her eyes. He’d carried her upstairs, pushed aside the expensive silk underwear still lying in its pink tissue paper at the end of the bed where she’d unwrapped it earlier that morning and tried to lay her down. ‘Sh-shall I try it on now?’ she’d slurred, winding her arms around his neck. ‘I’ll put it on for you.’

‘Try it in the morning,’ he’d said gently.

‘Oh come on, make love to me,’ she’d taunted. ‘Go on.’

He’d held her close for a moment, one thumb stroking the smooth curve of her collarbone and she’d seen the heat flare in his eyes.

‘Make me
feel
something,’ she’d urged and she’d seen it then in his face – desire but something else too: a mingling of confusion and pain. Gently, he’d untangled her arms from around his neck, undressed her and pulled the covers up over her naked body. Her tears had fallen silently, as he’d turned off the light and left her there in the darkness; both of them under the same roof and yet still so far apart.

She sees her mother winding her way through the armchairs of the hotel bar, chic as ever in a camel coat and knee-length leather boots, her hair freshly styled at the salon. ‘You look nice,’ Lila compliments.

‘Thank you.’ They kiss each other on both cheeks.

‘Doesn’t look like I’m the only one to think so either,’ nudges Lila, tossing her head in the direction of a grey-haired man seated a few tables away whose eyes are fixed firmly on her mother.

She blushes. ‘Don’t be silly.’

‘I’m not. He’s definitely checking you out.’

The colour deepens in her mother’s cheeks. ‘Oh stop it.’

Lila smirks. ‘What are you drinking?’

‘I’ll have a glass of white wine . . . Semillon, if they have it. You?’

Lila studies the list of drinks in front of her. The prices are eye-wateringly expensive and the memory of her Boxing Day hangover still lingers. Besides, she took those two pills not so long ago. ‘I’ll just have a sparkling water, I think.’

Her mother’s head swings towards her and, too late, Lila realises her mistake. ‘Oh Lila, are you—?’

‘No,’ says Lila quickly, cutting her off. ‘I’m not pregnant, no.’

‘Oh.’ Her mother’s face falls. ‘Well I’m sure it won’t be long.’

Lila doesn’t reply. She doesn’t feel any desire to share the sparse details of her love life.

The barman appears with a deferential flourish. ‘Ladies?’

Her mother orders a glass of wine from the list and at the last minute Lila changes her mind and orders a vodka and tonic. ‘Might as well, right?’ she says a little too brightly.

‘So how are you?’ her mother asks.

‘I’m OK.’

‘You’re over your nasty bug?’

‘Yes.’

‘Not working too hard?’

Lila shakes her head. She wonders for a moment whether to tell her about the cottage but her mother has already moved the conversation on again.

‘And everything’s all right between you and Tom?’

She eyes her carefully. ‘Yes.’

‘Are you sure? It’s just . . . at Christmas you both seemed a little . . . well, after what you’ve both been through it would be perfectly understandable if—’

‘We’re fine, thank you.’ Lila cuts her off. She can’t bear the thought of marriage guidance advice from her mother, but she doesn’t seem to take the hint.

‘You know, marriage is a long and rocky road, Lila. It’s important you spend the time reconnecting when things get harder between you . . .’

Lila takes a gulp of her vodka and feels it burn all the way down the back of her throat. She takes another big swig and then tunes back into her mother’s words.

‘. . . there’s no shame in admitting when things aren’t going so well and even talking to someone – a professional – if necessary.’

Lila takes another large gulp of her drink and decides she can’t take much more of her mother’s pseudo-counselling. Words that have sat burning on the tip of her tongue for months tumble out in a rush. ‘Didn’t you ever get sick of the pretence?’ she blurts. ‘Didn’t you ever think of leaving Dad?’

Her mother’s eyes narrow. ‘Why would I have done that?’

‘Come off it, Mum. He was my dad and I loved him, but I lived in that house too. I wasn’t blind. I knew what he was up to. All those nights he didn’t come home. The phone calls he took in his study. He even flirted with my violin teacher, Ms Wade. Do you remember her? I’d stand there on her doorstep with my violin case bashing against my legs, feeling like a spare part. He was an out and out womaniser.’

‘That’s enough,’ says her mother sharply. ‘I don’t like hearing you speak of your father that way.’

‘But why not, Mum? Don’t you think it’s time we spoke the truth to each other? Laid it all out there?’

Her mother shakes her head. ‘Do we really have to go here again, Lila?’

‘
Again?
’ Lila stares at her mother. ‘As far as I’m aware we’ve never once discussed Dad’s infidelity, have we? It’s never once been acknowledged. We all carefully and politely tiptoed around it.’

Her mother’s cheeks flush red. She reaches for her wine glass and twirls the stem between her fingers. ‘No, of course, what I meant is I had this out with him a long time ago. It was between us. I’d rather not revisit it all with you. Not now.’ She reaches into her handbag and pulls out a tissue. She blows her nose and then busies herself with the clasp of the bag. Lila is surprised; her mother seems so flustered.

‘I’m just trying to understand,’ Lila says more gently. ‘If you really want to know the truth, I’m angry with him.’

‘You’re
angry
with your father?’ Her mother looks astonished.

‘Yes. I’ll never get a chance to say this to his face now, but I
am
angry. I think he was selfish . . . and cruel to you. I don’t think he made you happy.’

Her mother stares for a moment then shakes her head. ‘You think I was a victim?’ She gives a small smile and shakes her head. ‘You don’t understand. Your father made difficult choices – for you . . . and for me. He gave up so much to give us the life we had – more than you will ever know.’

Lila shakes her head in frustration. ‘So tell me about it. Help me to understand.’

Her mother eyes her. ‘You know he was a man of principle.’ Lila raises her eyebrows but her mother ignores her. ‘And he was very charismatic, very persuasive. That’s why he made such a good lawyer.’ Lila sees the softening in her mother’s face. ‘He believed life should be lived a certain way . . . he didn’t believe in handouts. He believed in hard work and the rewards that came with it. He didn’t give up on things easily . . . and he hated compromise.’

‘You mean he was stubborn as a mule,’ adds Lila with a dry laugh.

‘Not all the time. When you were born we didn’t have very much of anything. It almost killed him having to take a job in your grandfather’s firm.’

‘Is that why things were always so tense between him and Granddad?’