Claire Allan - The Liar’s Daughter

But if I was nervous that day in Fiorentinis, it was nothing compared to how nervous this man, Joe, appeared to be. He was fidgeting in his seat and, as he stood up to say hello, he almost knocked over his teacup.

I was as shy then as I am now. I stayed close to my mother, my hand gripped in hers, my cheek pressed against the soft fabric of her coat.

‘Heidi, this is Joe,’ she said. ‘He’s a friend of mine.’

The man smiled, extended his hand towards mine. Dark hairs crawled from the cuff of his jacket. They looked like spiders. I cuddled in closer to my mother.

‘Heidi, say hello,’ she said, an urgency in her voice.

He withdrew his hand and sat down. ‘She doesn’t have to if she doesn’t want to. Isn’t that right, Heidi? I’m a little nervous, too.’ His smile was kind.

The tightness in my chest eased as he lifted his teacup and sipped from it. I dared to take a step away from the safety of my mother’s long, green woollen coat.

‘I know it’s cold and rainy outside, but maybe you’d like an ice cream anyway? Since we’re here?’ he asked.

‘You’d like that, wouldn’t you, Heidi?’ My mother’s voice was more relaxed again, too.

I nodded.

‘How about we get them to make you the biggest ice cream they’ve got?’ he asked and my eyes widened at the thought. There was little that seven-year-old me loved more than ice cream.

‘With jelly?’ I asked, because jelly came a close second.

‘Lots of jelly,’ Joe said with a wink, and I smiled at him and then at my mother.

The smile on my face was mirrored on her own. Then I noticed how she looked at him. How her smile was different when she was smiling in his direction. It was how those men and women smiled at each other on the front covers of her romance novels. She was falling in love. I knew it at once.

It was only when he came back from ordering and reached out to hand me the giant ice cream he was carrying that I noticed the glint of a gold ring on his finger.

I may have been only seven, but I knew what that meant. And I also knew he wasn’t married to my mother. He was grinning at me. Telling me he asked for extra sprinkles. I could sense Mum beaming at him from beside me. I knew she wanted me to smile, so I did. I remembered my manners just like I’d always been taught, and I thanked him and ate the ice cream. I pretended it didn’t suddenly taste a little sour.

I wonder what the official protocol is when it comes to saying no to a dying man. Is it an out and out no-go area, or is it okay in some circumstances?

I chew the nail of my left thumb while I try to build up the nerve to call Ciara.

Alex, my husband, tells me getting her involved might be a good thing. She may be able to lessen any burden on me. Which sounds great, but still I’m not so sure. I’m not sure I have enough emotional energy to deal with a second toxic relationship just now.

I sigh as I realise that despite my misgivings, I have to do this. I just have to suck it up.

Alex is at least sitting close to me as I call Ciara’s number. I draw a little strength from him. My hands are shaking, my tummy tight. Even the sound of her voice makes me nervous.

I take a deep breath. Remind myself that she is an adult now. As am I. I’m a wife and mother, for goodness sake. I should be able to speak to another grown woman without losing my nerve.

But the truth is Ciara has always intimidated me. At times she has utterly terrified me, if I’m being honest. She was the loud to my quiet. The tall to my short. The confident to my terrified. The angry to my sad. She was always bigger and badder and more able to dominate a room than I ever had been or ever could be. She’s the kind of person who can shred your self-confidence to ribbons with just one look.

I hear a soft voice say hello in a calming Scottish lilt. ‘Hello, Ciara’s phone.’

I’m momentarily thrown. ‘Hello,’ I stutter, ‘I’m … I’m Heidi Lewis. It’s about Ciara’s father, Joe …’

I hear an intake of breath. An awkward ‘uhm’, which tells me what I suspected. This phone call will not be welcomed.

‘Is she there? I need to speak to her about him.’

‘One moment please, I’ll check,’ the voice answers, efficiently as if she is speaking to a business associate.

Perhaps Ciara is still at work. Maybe this isn’t the best time to call. I think about hanging up. It would be easier and I’d have a good excuse to do so.

I’m just about to take my phone away from my ear and end the call, when I hear the calming Scottish lilt replaced by a brusque Derry hello.

‘Ciara?’ I say, to be sure.

‘Yes. It’s me. Heidi, what can I do for you?’

She sounds as pissed off now as she did as a truculent teenager. I revert to type and feel inadequate. My tongue feels heavy in my mouth. I feel unable to form coherent sentences.

‘Erm, are you still at work? Because maybe, you know, this would be a call better taken later, a conversation … you know … to have when you’re free to talk.’

I sound like an imbecile.

It annoys her.

‘I’m at home,’ she says, her voice terse. ‘What is it?’

‘It’s your father,’ I begin. I wait for an interruption that doesn’t come. ‘He asked me to call you. Look, Ciara, maybe this really is a conversation better had face to face.’ I realise I don’t want to tell her. I don’t want to have to be the one to say those words to her.

‘I’d rather you just spat it out,’ Ciara says. ‘What is it? Does he need money? Has he met someone else?’

I take a deep breath.

The easiest way to do something you really don’t want to is to do it quickly, like tearing off a plaster. That’s what my mother would say, so I say the next sentence quickly. Probably too quickly. The words rattle off my tongue.

‘It’s nothing like that. Ciara, he’s not well. He’s just been in hospital for surgery and well, the news isn’t good. It isn’t good at all, I’m afraid. And he has asked me to call you to let you know he’d like to see you if you’d be willing.’

There’s a pause. ‘Are you telling me he’s dying?’ Ciara asks, as forthright as she always was.

I nod before saying, ‘Yes, Ciara. It’s cancer. He’s been given maybe three to six months, at best.’

The phone line goes quiet. I wonder if she has hung up, take the phone from my ear to see if the call is still connected.

‘Good,’ she says eventually, although I hear a trace of emotion in her voice that wasn’t there before. ‘Good. He’s dying. Good enough for him.’

‘Ciara …’

I start to talk but the line goes dead. She has hung up. I sit staring at my phone, my face blazing, wondering how I tell Joe what has just happened.

‘Dinner’s ready,’ Stella calls from the kitchen.

I don’t answer. I’m staring at my phone, trying to process the conversation I’ve just had with Heidi bloody Lewis. The golden child. It had to be her to tell me, didn’t it? It couldn’t have been anyone else. He couldn’t have spoken to Mum and got her to break the news. No, he was always one to go for maximum impact. Maximum distress.

The bastard.

Anger wells in me and I throw my phone at the sofa, watch as it bounces off the cushion and hits the solid wooden floor with a crack. I’ll have broken the screen, in my anger.

‘Good enough for him,’ I’d said to Heidi. It had been my gut reaction, to feel angry and shocked and think fuck him for getting her to contact me only to tell me he was dying.

He is dying.

My father, for all that word really meant to me, is dying.

‘Ciara,’ I hear Stella, ‘are you still on the phone, only the pasta …’