Cath Staincliffe - Trio

Nina was scribbling down as much as she could.

‘So, first I need my birth certificate?’

‘Yes, you write to the General Records Office and they will send you a form. I’ll give you their address in a minute. They make a small charge, a few pounds or so, for a copy.’

‘Right.’

Nina wrote the address down.

‘When you’ve got your birth certificate you can ring here again and we can make an appointment with a social worker.’

‘Thanks.’

She dropped the receiver as she replaced it, her hands were trembling. God. Maybe she should just leave it? She looked at what she had scrawled on the paper. If she just got the birth certificate, it didn’t mean she had to do anything else. Before she could get any more confused about it all she went up to her room, got out notepaper and an envelope, wrote asking for her birth certificate, sealed the letter and addressed the envelope. She sent it that afternoon, a sense of occasion. She would have to watch the post. A thrill made her want to run, or jump up and down. It was exciting, there was an undercurrent too, a pull of guilt as though she had done something naughty and might get caught. But it was done now. No turning back.

They told her to apply again when she was eighteen. Nina was furious. ‘I can get married,’ she ranted to Chloe, ‘leave home, work in a poxy little job for forty hours a week, but I can’t find out who I am!’

‘Could you find her without those papers?’

‘Chloe, I don’t know her full name. I can’t do anything till I have that. I’ll have to wait. They said it might be different if I had my parents’ permission but there’s no way I’m asking them. They’d go mad.’

‘You don’t know that.’

‘I do know that. But the day I’m eighteen I’ll do it.’

Chloe leant forward into the mirror and applied thick black mascara to her lashes. ‘What if you don’t like her?’

Nina shrugged. ‘It’s all right for you, least you know where you come from, who you look like.’

‘Yeah, the bloody Adams family!’

‘Give over.’

‘Pink or yellow?’ Chloe held up eye shadows.

‘Pink – and you should do your mascara last.’

‘Says who?’

‘Well, you’ll get pink all over it now, and then you’ll have to do it again.’

‘Are you coming like that?’ Chloe raked her eyes over Nina’s unadorned complexion.

‘No.’

‘Well, get a move on. It’s a pound more after nine o’clock.’

Marjorie

She loved this place. And it was always such a contrast with home. Each summer she’d be surprised afresh at the rough plaster walls, the stone-flagged floors, the simmering views over gauzy hillside terraces and fields. The hillsides were mauve and olive from the wild thyme and lavender. She relished the sound of cowbells in the air and the incessant chattering of the small birds that swooped in and out of their nests under the eaves, the smell of sun-baked pine.

They had all their holidays in southern France.

It had been an idyll, but now…

She waited in the sitting room, close to the drive for any sound that would interrupt the shrilling of the cicadas, swivelling the bracelet on her wrist. Moths batted against the windows, crazy for the light.

At last she heard the crunch of gravel and hurried to the door. It was Stephen on his butcher’s bike. He slithered to a stop and propped the bike against the wall.

‘She’s in the square,’ he said. ‘She’s been drinking. She was in the fountain.’

‘Oh, God!’ Marjorie closed her eyes at the thought.

‘Dad’s bringing her back.’

‘Come in.’

‘I hate her, Mummy,’ he blurted out, his normally placid expression twisted with dislike. ‘She ruins everything. She doesn’t care about anyone but herself. Her top was all wet. Everyone could see.’

She shared his shame and anger. ‘Oh, Stephen!’

‘Why do you let her do things like that?’

What do you expect, she wanted to say, what can we do? If she’s hell-bent on raising Cain how can we stop her. Lock her up?

‘I’m sorry. You mustn’t let it spoil the holiday.’

‘Frederique came out of the restaurant and asked her to get out and she just made fun of him. You could see how upset he was.’

He began to cry and she pulled him close. He was taller than she was now, his chin on her head as he cried. Compassion choked her. And guilt. Could they have done more? What, though? Oh, my poor boy. It’s so unfair. Thank God he was off to university in October. Away from all the awful arguments.

She heard the sound of a car drawing closer. Stephen pulled away. ‘I’m going to bed.’

‘There’s milkshake in the fridge if you want to take some.’

She let him go and watched as the car headlights swept in at the end of the drive, picking out the Bougainvillea that scrambled along the wall. Her stomach fluttered with dread at the shouting match to come.

Robert cut the engine and snapped off the lights. Nina was still. Thank God she’s not singing.

Robert opened his door. ‘Get a towel,’ he called.

She went in and fetched one of the beach towels from the drying rack in the kitchen. When she returned, Robert was by the house. He took it from her and opened the passenger door. Marjorie half-expected Nina to fall out like some comic drunk but she didn’t move.

‘Get out,’ Robert said coldly, holding the towel up, the gesture at odds with his tone.

Nina got out slowly. As she stepped away from the car the light from the lantern by the front door fell on her.

Marjorie gasped.

Nina’s face was cut, an angry gash bled below one eye, her eye half-shut. Her upper lip was split and swollen. Her wet blouse was torn and Marjorie could see another mark on her upper arm. Her hair was plastered to the side of her head. The cloud of moths batted against the light, casting shadows over Nina’s wounds. A bat flew swiftly above.

‘What on earth’s happened?’

Nina looked blankly at Marjorie.

Robert draped the towel around her.

‘Nina?’

‘Leave her,’ Robert instructed.

‘Robert?’ She didn’t understand.

‘Go to your room,’ he told his daughter.

She began to move slowly, walking stiffly, her face still expressionless.

‘But she’s hurt.’

‘Let her go.’

‘What on earth has happened?’

‘She’s had a bloody good hiding, that’s what. Knock some sense into her. And not before time.’

She stared at him incredulous, felt the hairs on her arms prickle.

He gave a short humourless laugh and shook his head. ‘She’s had it coming, Marjorie. There are limits. Should have done it years ago.’ He went inside.

She moved, balanced against the little archway to the side of the door. Traditionally a shrine to the Virgin Mary.

She looked up at the sky but in place of the stars she saw only the brutal damage that Robert had done. It was wrong. No matter how far Nina had pushed him, to do that… break her face, beat her up. She covered her mouth with her hand. She felt sick. She closed her eyes and prayed: Sweet mother of God, help me. Oh, God, help me.

Nina

Life was a mix of work and waiting. She’d got taken on by British Home Stores at the Arndale Centre. She knew her parents were disappointed. They had wanted her to get more qualifications. ‘I’ve five O levels,’ she told them.

‘Well, why stop now?’ Robert Underwood demanded. ‘You’re a bright enough girl, if you’d only apply yourself…’

‘I don’t want to. I’ve had enough of all that.’

‘You could even go to art school,’ he said in desperation. He’d always regarded her success in art as an amusing but essentially irrelevant achievement.