Amanda Brittany - Tell the Truth

‘A year?’ I cut in. ‘Jeez, Lawrence, how could you?’ I felt my chin wobble. ‘You were seeing her when we were together?’ My stomach heaved. I’d had no idea.

‘Not seriously.’

‘Well, that’s OK then,’ I spat.

‘I’m sorry.’ He tried to take hold of my hand, but I dodged his, my arms flapping like helicopter propellers as I smacked the cold air, and skidded around on the ice like Bambi.

‘I didn’t want to hurt you,’ he said, catching my elbow.

‘Well, that didn’t work out for you. Just leave me alone,’ I cried, snatching my elbow away, and storming past him, almost slipping again as I fumbled for my keys – desperate to get inside before tears came. ‘Grace, come on, lovely girl.’

‘Farrah adores Grace,’ he called after me. ‘She can’t have kids, so …’

I turned, glaring at the car. The woman faced forward, a fur-lined hood obscuring my view of her. I wanted to rush over, bang on the glass, scream that she could have Lawrence with knobs on, but Grace belonged to me. ‘Keep her away from Grace,’ I said calmly.

I opened the front door, and Grace ran to my side. ‘Wave to Daddy,’ I said, trying hard not to show her how angry I was.

‘Bye, Daddy,’ she called, waving.

‘Bye, chipmunk,’ he called back, and it took all of my willpower not to pick up a clump of snow and chuck it at his stupid shiny black car.

October 1987

Laura stood in the dense darkness at the water’s edge rocking Rachel, hoping the night air would send her daughter to sleep.

‘Shh, please,’ she whispered, but Rachel continued to yell – a piercing sound, like an incessant dentist drill inside Laura’s head, screwing with her mind, twisting her thoughts so they were no longer recognisable as her own.

She couldn’t see her baby’s face, but knew it would be red and blotchy, coated with tears and snot, because it always was. It always is.

The birth had been problematic – a bad start. Laura’s hopes that the anger she felt towards Jude would dissipate once she held her child in her arms hadn’t happened. Rachel had been premature, with respiratory distress syndrome and severe jaundice. She’d been kept in intensive care for almost a month, and Laura had struggled to bond with her. In fact, she felt nothing. Was she no better than her own parents?

Now Rachel was three months old. The midwife and health visitor were long gone, leaving her to it, believing she was OK. She’d somehow convinced them of that.

She had nobody to turn to. If she’d only kept in contact with the other students at university – accepted Abi’s offer of help when she’d called. But it was too late now they’d gone their own ways. In fact, the only people she saw were those behind shop counters, or old ladies who cooed at the child, telling Laura how beautiful her daughter was. She wished she could see what they saw. The consuming guilt was unimaginable.

But she still saw Dillon sometimes – Dillon who’d put up with her tears, and her weirdness. How had it happened that her only friend was a teenage boy?

He hadn’t mentioned his family since July, and Laura sometimes felt she should ask, but she was struggling so much with her daughter, she wasn’t sure she could take on his problems too.

Laura squeezed the child to her. ‘Shh! Shh! Please stop crying,’ she said, moving towards the lake. Once there she looked down, her eyes adjusting to the shimmering water, like tar beneath her. ‘I’m so tired,’ she said, stepping closer still, so close that her toes curled over the edge, and the earth crumbled. If she jumped it would put them both out of their misery.

As though sensing her mother’s thoughts, Rachel stopped crying, and drifted off to sleep. Laura looked down at her daughter. This little thing with soft, downy hair, and blue eyes, was an innocent victim of a heartless man and a desperate woman. She hadn’t asked to be born.

Laura laid the child, wrapped in a thick blanket, on the ground, and fell down next to her. They would sleep outside tonight.

***

The sun was rising in a cloudless sky when Dillon woke Laura.

‘What the feck are you doing out here?’ he said, nudging her with his foot as though she was a corpse. He knelt down and picked up the baby. ‘What you up to, mischief?’ he said to Rachel, touching the child’s bare feet that poked from under the blanket. ‘Jaysus, your tootsies are freezing.’

He stared at Laura, who was clambering to her feet with the aid of a tree. She ran her fingers through her greasy hair, catching them in tangles, blinking to adjust her eyes to the daylight. ‘God, what’s the time?’ she said.

‘About eight – you been out here all night?’ He jiggled Rachel up and down, humming ‘Hush a bye baby’ as the baby attempted to consume her fist.

‘Not all night,’ she said, avoiding meeting his eye. ‘Let’s go in – Rachel will be hungry.’

Inside, Dillon gave Rachel her bottle, the baby’s hand gripping his little finger as she gulped down the milk, making contented noises. ‘You need to see someone, Laura,’ he said, sounding far too grown-up for his years. ‘You’re always crying, and so is this little one. It’s not right. Do you even wash?’

‘You’re a fine one to talk,’ Laura said, pushing a pile of newspapers and some dirty mugs across the table, and plonking down a coffee and a can of cola. She sat down beside him.

‘I don’t know who to turn to, Dillon.’ Her eyes filled with tears. She couldn’t keep burdening a thirteen-year-old kid – it wasn’t fair. ‘I can’t manage; I know that, but the thought of busybodies interfering – maybe even taking Rachel away – doesn’t bear thinking about.’

‘I could ask me ma to help?’

Laura stiffened. The woman who allowed a child to be put in a cupboard? ‘No, I’ll be OK,’ she said. ‘I’ll make an appointment at the doctor’s. Honestly.’

‘But Ma would be company for you.’

Laura didn’t want anyone in her home, finding fault, judging her. And to get involved with Dillon’s family worried her. Tierney O’Brian had left her with a cold feeling in the pit of her stomach.

‘She could come here when Da’s working,’ Dillon continued, looking about him at the half-drunk bottles with milk curdling at the bottom, the used diapers that smelt awful, mugs, glasses … the hellhole she lived in. ‘Ma could help tidy up a bit. She’s good at keeping things clean.’

Laura looked at Dillon, scruffy and grimy, as ever. She snatched up her mug of coffee and took a gulp. It burned her tongue. ‘I’m fine, Dillon,’ she said, her eyes on Rachel now sleeping in his arms.

‘But she’s used to three kids, Laura. She took me on, and that couldn’t have been easy.’

‘Took you on?’

He rubbed his hand across his mouth, as though he was unsure of the words he wanted to say. ‘Imogen ain’t me real ma,’ he said eventually. ‘She just likes me to call her that. I don’t mind so much now, but at first it felt wrong.’ He placed a tender kiss on Rachel’s head.

‘Why didn’t you tell me?’

‘Never came up.’ He rose, and placed Rachel into her Moses basket, covering her with a lemon-coloured blanket. ‘Me real ma walked out just after we moved to the farm.’

‘Oh, Dillon, I’m so sorry.’

‘Me real ma invited Imogen to live with us when she was preggers with Bridie. Her parents had kicked her out.’ He paused, rubbing his hand across his mouth. ‘Can we talk about something else? It’s just I don’t like talking about it – me real ma never said goodbye.’

‘I’m so sorry.’

‘It’s fine, Laura,’ he said, but it clearly wasn’t. ‘So, should I ask Imogen?’