Elisabeth Carpenter - Only a Mother

I grab the cup and saucer from the arm of the chair. Lipstick all over the rim. That Amanda could’ve at least wiped it with a tissue from the box on the table – or even her finger, for goodness’ sake.

I wanted to scream out when Luke showed me that photograph on his mobile. The words wouldn’t come out that it was Craig.

I’m sure they’ll figure it out for themselves soon enough. They probably didn’t believe me when I said that it wasn’t.

I try Craig’s mobile phone but again there’s no answer. It’s ten past five – teatime. I can’t even remember if I have any food in the house and I can’t go outside, not today. Not when the police are probably watching the house and I’ve just flushed all those drugs down the toilet. I washed the tins with bleach and put them back in the shed, but there still might be a trace of it on them. And probably my fingerprints, too, as I didn’t think to wear gloves.

I should go and wipe them again, but all motivation has left me. It wasn’t me who’d grown the stuff.

In the living room, I pull open the curtains. I’ve nothing to hide – I’ve done nothing wrong. All I’ve done is protect my son.

I go over to my laptop. I haven’t been on the forum for a while. I log on to find three messages from Anne Marie, and one from Trevor.

AnneMarie2348:Hi, Erica. Wondering if you were OK after the other night? x

AnneMarie2348:Send me a quick message, will you? I’m worried after what you said about being afraid of Craig x.

AnneMarie2348:I’ve seen the news online. Please message me ASAP. He looks so different now compared to the pictures you showed me. Can you give me your phone number? Can’t believe we haven’t spoken. Lots of love xx

TexanDude:Hey there, Erica. Anne Marie contacted me. Said your boy’s in the news over there. I know how you’re feeling. Shane was arrested three days after he was released, but they had the wrong guy. Let us know you’re ok, hun.

I wish he’d stop calling me hun .

But it’s nice they’re thinking of me; it makes me feel less alone.

NorthernLass:Hi both. I’m fine, just. Craig came home about half an hour ago, so that means he can’t be with the girl, doesn’t it? He wasn’t himself, though (I’m wondering what that actually is these days). He was so angry, but I don’t blame him. I made some bad choices years ago and now they’ve come back. I think some journalists already know what I’ve done. I should contact the police and tell them what I know, but I might make things worse for him.

I stand and walk towards the living room window, resting my hands on the windowsill. The message to my friends was probably too rambling, it won’t have made sense to them, but I can’t put too much on there. If the police were to seize my computer, then it will incriminate me as well as Craig. It’s what I deserve, anyway.

There’s nothing outside to the left, but there’s a car slowly crawling along the road from the right.

I will myself to stay there and see who it is. My shoulders are tight, tense, my legs feel unstable – I hope my knees stay strong. The car’s getting close. I inch my face forward, so my nose touches the net curtains.

It’s him.

Oh God, it’s him.

I haven’t seen him in over thirty-five years. I didn’t know he was out. I turn quickly away, sliding down to the floor, the sill scraping the whole of my back as I do.

He can’t have seen me properly through the nets, but he knows where I live, he’s always known. He’s not in the same car, of course. He wouldn’t be seen dead in an old banger unless it was a classic.

I close my eyes and I can still see inside that rusty brown-coloured Cortina; I can smell the leather seats, my legs stuck to them in the heat.

It was the beginning of March 1979 and I was wearing a dress, because he’d told me to wear one. It was yellow, and it skimmed my knees and was made of a stretchy, jersey fabric. He drove us to Southport and along the road that runs beside the beach. The evenings were getting lighter so Blackpool Tower was visible over the water. I yearned, right then, to be with Denise, and for us to be teenagers when the days seemed to last longer.

I was twenty-three, then. I didn’t feel twenty-three; I felt fifteen. But there I was, with him, parked up in a car park surrounded by sand dunes. He flicked the radio off – even though I was enjoying listening to ‘Hopelessly Devoted to You’.

The silence after that felt charged. He twisted in his seat to face me. I looked out of the window behind him, but it seemed we were suddenly alone. I wanted to shout out of the window or run away, but I had chosen to be there, hadn’t I? I’d got myself ready that evening, knowing what was about to happen. Denise had told me all about it. She said that it would hurt at first and that she bled a bit, but it was good to get it over and done with. She hadn’t wanted to be a virgin forever and neither did I. But she was married now, it was different for her.

I’d waited for him at the top of Brindle Street near the library.

‘Will you pick me up from my house next time?’ I said to him after I closed the passenger door. ‘My mother would love to meet you.’

I don’t know why I said that because an introduction to my mother was the last thing I wanted. But I was curious to hear his reply. If I was about to give myself to him, then I reasoned I could ask him anything and he’d have to give an answer.

‘You know that’s impossible, Erica.’

‘But why? I know you said not to mention I was seeing you to anyone – and I haven’t – but I want to know that you care about me… that we have a future.’

We’d been courting for nearly three months, but our meetings were infrequent: sometimes once a week, sometimes fortnightly. ‘Maybe he’s a spy,’ Denise had said a few weeks before, but I didn’t like talking about him – it didn’t feel right. I felt my loyalties were with him, however misguided. Maybe that was when our friendship began to be tainted.

He reached over and slid my thick fringe to the side. I hated that – my forehead was small compared to the rest of my face; it was mine to hide.

‘Let’s not spoil the evening,’ he said. ‘Do you remember that time when I took you to see Watership Down ? Even though you knew I thought it was a kids’ film. I did that for you, didn’t I?’

He said it as though it were years ago, not weeks.

‘Yes,’ I said. ‘But I wouldn’t show that to a child. It made me cry.’ I laughed.

Sometimes I could be myself with him, at other times I felt shy, self-conscious. He seemed much older than me but, at twenty-four, it was only a year’s difference.

‘Look,’ he said, ‘the sun’s setting. Bet you’ve never seen that before.’

Of course I have, I wanted to tell him. From my bedroom window. I can see the sunset every day in the summer because we live on a hill and I can see the water at the docklands. It’s prettier than it is now, in Southport, I wanted to say, because I can’t see the sea here for the sand dunes – they’re ugly and dry and covered in that grass that almost cuts you when you walk past it at the wrong angle.

Then I looked into his eyes and it was like in the books that I read. His eyes looked deep into my soul and it was only us right then; we were alone in the world and then he kissed me.

After a few minutes (I wanted it to be longer) he said, ‘Let’s get into the back. I can get closer to you there.’

He’d laid a blanket on the back seat; he’d come prepared.

‘We should get engaged,’ he said as he put his hand on my thigh; I was sitting in the middle – he was behind the driver’s seat.