The Very Picture of You (23 page)

I took another invitation. ‘Well, yes – it’s unusual for young ballerinas to have babies, isn’t it, given how ruthlessly determined they have to be to succeed? And you got married in a register office: so, lately, I’ve been thinking about it all, and wondering whether or not I was… planned.’

‘Oh, Ella.’ Mum reached for my hand. ‘I was so
happy
to be having a baby.’

‘But… weren’t you worried that you’d be unable to get back to fitness afterwards?’

She shrugged. ‘I simply trusted that I would. As it turned out, I was on stage again within four months.’

‘So… presumably my father looked after me in the evenings, when you were performing.’

‘No.’ Mum picked up her pen. ‘He did very little in that respect.’

‘Why was that?’

‘Well… he travelled a lot for his work. At that time he was building a school in Nottingham.’

‘But Nottingham’s not far from Manchester.’

‘Even so… he’d quite often be away: and so I had babysitters for you. Sometimes our upstairs neighbour, Penny, would help. And when I was on tour my mother would come and stay.’

‘I see. So Grandma would have been there in the flat, with my father. That must have been awkward. Did they get on?’

Mum blinked. ‘Not really.’

‘Didn’t he like her?’

‘She didn’t… like
him
.’

‘Oh. Because she knew about his affair, I suppose.’ Mum nodded, grimly. ‘Well, that
would
have put a strain on the relationship.’ I began to write another invitation, to a friend of Chloë’s, Eva Frost. I glanced at Mum. ‘What about
his
parents? I don’t remember them at all – did we ever see them?’

Mum sighed. ‘They lived in Jersey and didn’t come to the mainland very often. They weren’t really… involved.’

‘Even though they had a grandchild?’ She nodded. ‘How mean – not to make more of an effort.’

‘It
was
mean,’ Mum agreed feelingly.

‘But we could have gone there –
did
we?’

‘No… as I say, it was hard for me to take time off.’

‘I see. So I didn’t do very well on the grandparental front, did I?’

My mother nodded regretfully. ‘That’s true. You only had my mother, my father having died two years before you were born. He was called Gabriel, as you know, and so I named you after him.’

‘And… remind me how you met
my
father.’

At first I thought Mum wasn’t going to answer; then she lowered her pen. ‘We met in 1973,’ she said quietly. ‘I’d been with the company for two years and he came to a special fund-raising performance of
Cinderella
. I was the Winter Fairy and wore a costume that hung with “icicles”.’

‘How lovely.’ I imagined them tinkling as she danced. ‘So was my father interested in ballet?’

‘Not particularly; he’d come along… with some other people. There was a cast party afterwards, to which some members of the audience were invited; your father and I were introduced – and we… just…’

‘Fell in love?’

‘Yes,’ Mum answered quietly.

‘So you were what, twenty-three?’

‘I was. And he was twenty-nine.

‘And was he artistic too?’

My mother’s face tightened. ‘Yes. He did a lot of painting and drawing, so I imagine… that’s where you get it. Now,’ she said briskly. ‘We need to write the invitations for Nate’s relations.’ The conversation about my father was clearly over. Mum pushed back her chair. ‘I’ve got their addresses on a separate list – if I can remember where I put it. Oh, I know…’ She stood up and went to the dresser then opened a drawer. ‘It’s in here.’ She pulled the list out, then studied it. ‘There’s quite a gang of them coming. Nate’s organising their
accommodation – Chloë told me that he’s paying for quite a lot of it too – he’s terribly generous.’ Mum returned to the table. ‘Thank
God
she’s made such a good choice. And she knows she has, because she keeps telling me how lucky she is. Yesterday I was on the phone to her and she suddenly reeled off a list of all his great qualities. It was very touching.’

‘That’s just what she did with me, last week.’

Mum smiled. ‘Good. It’s such a relief to see her so happy – and don’t worry, Ella.’ Mum laid her hand on mine. ‘I know that
you’ll
find someone just as wonderful.’ I already have, I thought with a pang. Mum lifted her glasses on to her nose again then peered at my pile of finished cards. ‘What letter are you up to?’

‘G.’ I wrote an invitation for Chloë’s godmother, Ruth Grant, and I was about to address the envelope when I put my pen down, unable to bear it any longer. ‘Mum… Can I tell you something?’ My heart began to race.

She reached for another invitation. ‘Of course you can,’ she said absently. ‘Tell me anything you like, darling.’

‘Because there’s something that I have to…’ My voice trailed away.

Mum looked at me – her agate blue eyes magnified through the lenses of her spectacles. ‘What is it?’ She blinked, then took the glasses off and let them dangle against her thin sternum. ‘Has something happened, Ella?’

‘
Yes
. Something has.’

She looked alarmed. ‘You’re not in any trouble, are you?’

‘No. But I have this… dilemma.’

‘Dilemma?’ she echoed. ‘What dilemma?’ I didn’t answer.
‘Ella…’ Mum put down her pen. ‘Would you please tell me what this is about?’

‘All right…’ I took a deep breath. ‘I’ve heard from my father.’

My mother’s cheeks instantly coloured, as though all the blood in her body had rushed to her face. ‘When?’ she whispered. I told her, then explained how the contact had come about. She inhaled sharply, snatching the air through her nose. ‘I was appalled when I saw that piece in
The Times
.’

‘I know you were, because you didn’t say anything about it. I did ask the journalist to change it, but he refused.’

‘I
immediately
worried that, were your father to come across it, he’d recognise you – and he
has
done. So…’ She drew in her breath. ‘What did he say?’

I’d already decided not to tell my mother that he was coming to London.

I shrugged. ‘He just wrote that he’d like to be in touch. He said there are things he wants to explain.’

Mum’s face spasmed with anger. ‘There’s nothing
to
explain! You and I
both
know what happened, Ella.’ She blinked rapidly. ‘He deserted us when I was twenty-eight and you were almost five – a little girl. A little girl who
adored
him! He was heartless.’

‘Well… if it’s any comfort, he said that he feels very guilty. He wants to make amends.’

My mother’s eyes were round with contemptuous wonderment. ‘It’s too
late
to make “amends”. He made his choice – to abandon
us
and start a new life with, with…’ She seemed unable to utter the name of the woman for whom my father had left her. ‘He has no
right
to get in touch now.’ Mum picked up her pen as though that concluded the conversation.

I could hear the low hum of the fridge.

‘Of course he has that right,’ I protested quietly. ‘He’s my father.’

My mother’s face flashed with renewed fury. ‘He
isn’t
your father, Ella. He chose
not
to be.’ She nodded towards the garden. ‘
There’s
your father.’

I glanced through the French windows at Roy, in the far distance, his foot on the spade. ‘Roy
is
my father,’ I agreed. ‘And he’s been a wonderful one. But the man who brought me into the world, and who
was
my father, at least for the first five years of my life…’ I felt my throat constrict. ‘That man now wants to be in touch.’

Mum looked at me warily, her bird-like chest rising and falling. ‘So… what are you going to do?’

I shook my head. ‘I don’t know. I feel torn, because a part of me
does
want to see him.’

She blinked. ‘What do you mean –
see
him?’

‘I mean, see him… one day,’ I faltered. ‘If I
do
get in touch with him.’

Mum stared at me. ‘And… have you replied?’

‘No. I’ve been in turmoil about it – so I’ve done nothing.’

‘Good.’ She laid down her pen. ‘Because I don’t
want
you to reply.’

‘But it isn’t
up
to you, Mum – it’s
me
he’s contacted.’ She flinched. ‘But I felt that I
had
to discuss it with you – however painful that discussion might be – before coming to any decision.’

My mother looked away. When she returned her gaze
to me, her pale-blue eyes shone with unshed tears. ‘
Don’t
answer him, Ella. I beg you not to.’

‘But it was all
so
long ago! Why are you
still
bitter about him?’

‘Because of what he
did.
’

‘Okay, so he left you.’ I threw up my hands. ‘People get left every day, but they try and move on –
you
moved on: you’ve had a good life with Roy. So why can’t you get over what happened with my father?’

‘Because I… just… can’t. I have my reasons.
Please
, Ella – let it lie.’ She bit her lip. ‘No good will come of it.’

I’d caught the note of warning in her voice. ‘What do you mean?’ Mum didn’t answer. ‘What are you trying to say?’

She shifted on her chair. ‘Only that… if you
do
contact him, it could cause a lot of unhappiness. He’s decided to get in touch – no doubt because he’s getting older now, and wants to be forgiven. But we don’t
have
to forgive him, do we?’

‘
I
can if
I
want to!’

Mum’s eyes flickered with pain, then she picked up her pen. ‘We
must
get on with the invitations.’ Her voice had been calm, but as she took another card out of the box I saw that her hand was trembling.

‘Mum,’ I said, more gently now. ‘The invitations can wait. Because now that we’re talking about my father, there are other things I want to ask you.’

She started to write. ‘What things?’ she said irritably. She was pressing on the pen so hard that her fingertips had gone red.

‘Well… I’ve been having a lot of memories from
that time – memories that must have been triggered by my father’s contact.’

My mother’s hand stopped. ‘So that’s why you asked me about the holiday in Anglesey.’

‘Yes. In fact, he e-mailed me a photo of him and me standing on a beach. He’s holding my hand…’

My mother exhaled. ‘Which is how you knew about the blue-and-white striped dress.’

‘Yes. I was wearing it in the photo – otherwise I wouldn’t have remembered it. But there are lots of things I
do
remember, and one particular memory is very confused. I’ve been trying to work it out, but I can’t.’

Mum was looking at me warily. ‘And what memory’s that?’

‘It’s of you and him. You’re walking along, with me in between you, holding your hands. It’s a very clear, sunny day, and you’re both swinging me up in the air, going one, two, three, wheee. And you’re wearing this white skirt with big red flowers on it.’ My mother flinched. ‘But the reason I’m confused is because I would have been too young to remember it, because you can only swing children up like that when they’re no more than two or three – yet I
can
recall it, vividly.’

Don’t let go now…

My mother’s already fair complexion had gone paler still.

Okay – let’s do a big one.

‘Why do I remember that, Mum?’

More, Daddy! More! More!

‘All right,’ she answered at last. ‘I’ll tell you. Then perhaps you’ll understand why I feel as I do.’ Mum laid her pen down, then clasped her hands in front of her.
‘What you’re remembering,’ she began softly, ‘is the day that I saw your father with his… with… his…
Frances
.’

This, then, was the ‘traumatic’ encounter. So I
had
been there.

‘She lived in Alderley Edge, a few miles to the south of Manchester, in a very nice house. She had money,’ Mum added bitterly.

‘What was our flat like?’

‘Very ordinary – it was part of a red-brick house on Moss Side, but it was convenient for the University Theatre, where the company was then based. And in September 1979, when you were almost five…’ So, well past the stage of being swung in the air, I reflected. ‘It was a Saturday afternoon,’ Mum went on. ‘I’d been waiting for your father to arrive.’ She swallowed. ‘He’d had to go in to the office that morning. We were due to go for a picnic with him after lunch – the weather was wonderfully clear and sunny – but by three o’clock he still hadn’t turned up, and I had to be on stage that night – I was dancing Giselle – so there wasn’t much time. I guessed that he must be with
her,
and I was… angry and
hurt
.’ Mum looked at me beseechingly. ‘He’d done this to me
so
many times and I couldn’t stand just waiting for him, feeling wounded and disappointed. So I decided to go and find him.’

‘In order to do what? Confront him?’

She exhaled wearily. ‘I didn’t know
what
I was going to do. There was a football match on – we could hear the roars from Old Trafford. I told you that we were going for a ride in the car, so I put you in the back and we drove to Alderley Edge.’

‘How did you know where she lived?’

‘I just… did. Women are good at finding these things out, Ella. So I went past… the house.’ Mum stared straight ahead. ‘There was your father’s blue car, in the drive.’ So he wasn’t even discreet about it, I reflected dismally. ‘I parked about fifty feet away then sat there, sick with misery.’

My heart contracted with pity. ‘How horrible for you, Mum.’

She closed her eyes for a moment. ‘It was…
hell
. You were chatting away in the back, asking me what we were doing – but I couldn’t explain. I then decided that there was nothing that I
could
do – we’d simply have to go home. And I was about to start the car again when you suddenly said that you were hungry. There was a newsagent’s a few yards behind, so we got out of the car and went in, and I bought you some chocolate. But as we were walking back to the car I looked up and, in the distance, I saw your father walking along with
her
, and…’ My mother swallowed. ‘With her and…’