sorry,’ Anneliese said and she felt as if the ground had been ripped away from under her feet. Beth didn’t seem to understand that she was in pain and shock. No, Anneliese, who had always been in control, must still be in control in Beth’s eyes. Somehow, she’d also been cast as the villain of the piece. She hadn’t broken up the family; Edward had, but she was the one getting shouted at. She’d hoped that she might get some sympathy from her daughter. ‘It hasn’t been easy for me.’
‘I could have helped,’ shouted Beth.
You’re not helping by screaming at me, Anneliese wanted to yell right back but she didn’t. She never yelled at her daughter.
‘But you didn’t give me the chance to be there for you. You are so controlling, Mum!’
‘I wasn’t trying to control things,’ Anneliese said with absolute honesty. Or at least, the only controlling she’d been doing was trying to keep her own life under some control so she wouldn’t fall apart.
‘Yes you were,’ Beth interrupted. ‘This is all about controlling how you told me, Mum. Please, give me some credit for understanding you. I’m not a child any more, I have to face things, OK? And if you’d told me when it happened, that would be better, because then I wouldn’t have to get all this information on the day when I want to tell you something very special. But you’ve ruined it now.’
‘What?’ breathed Anneliese.
‘I’m pregnant,’ Beth said. ‘Three months. Marcus and I are going to have a baby.’ She laughed, but there was no humour in her laugh. ‘I didn’t tell you because I didn’t want to worry you until I’d passed the three months’ mark and knew everything was all right. You see, Mum, you’ve brought me up perfectly! You tell me nothing because you don’t want to worry me and I tell you nothing because I don’t want to worry you. We’re a fabulous family. No wonder Dad left.’
It was like being shot, Anneliese thought. She’d never experienced a bullet, but she imagined it must feel the same, that sudden arc of pain and weakness and the feeling of blood draining out of your body and everything going dark. How could Beth say that about Edward? Like it was all Anneliese’s fault. He’d left her, didn’t Beth realise? Or had he said she’d pushed him away? She felt sick at the very thought of what Edward might have said in an attempt at damage limitation, but she couldn’t collapse, not here, not in front of Beth. Not after hearing this news.
She summoned up every ounce of strength from inside her.
‘I am so thrilled for you both,’ she said. ‘It’s the most wonderful news. I love you, darling, and you’ll be the most incredible mother.’
‘Thank you.’ It was like a magic cloth had rubbed away the anger from her daughter’s face and now Beth looked serenely happy.
She’d been the same as a child: able to flick a switch between her passions. It was what made Beth so different from her mother. Beth’s moods changed like quicksilver and Anneliese had always envied that ability. It was as if Beth’s mind said, ‘OK, that’s horrible stuff, let’s not deal with that now, let’s deal with something nice.’
‘Marcus, I’m thrilled for you both,’ Anneliese said and she put her arms round Beth, willing herself not to faint. She would have a grandchild, how wonderful that would be. But the pain and the ache was still there, because there was a fault line in her relationship with Beth, and that was horrific. Beth blamed her for everything, and in her fury hadn’t even acknowledged the pain Anneliese must be going through. The love of a beautiful new baby couldn’t mend that, surely?
‘Thank you, Anneliese,’ Marcus said proudly. ‘It’s wonderful, but scary too!’
‘It’s taken me quite a while to get pregnant. We were trying for well nearly a year and then just when we thought we better get some help, it happened! We had a scan – I’ve pictures here,’ Beth said.
The proud parents-to-be crowded round and they looked at the scan. Anneliese kept her arm around Beth and tentatively touched her daughter’s gently budding belly. There was no kick from her future grandchild in there, and she thought of how often she’d longed for this news. How ironic that it had to come today of all days.
Yet she was happy to think that her daughter would experience that great mother-child love that she’d had. Except, they never told you, when your baby was little, that it could bring such heartbreak too.
‘I’m so sorry, darling,’ she said, a lifetime of suppressing her own needs allowing her to do so again. ‘I’m sorry that you had to find out about me and your dad today, but let’s just forget about that, that’s not important: this is important –’ she touched Beth’s belly again ‘– this new life. I am so happy, let’s focus on that. Maybe your dad and I are better off apart, who knows?’ There, she was doing it again, making everything nice and safe and sanitised for Beth. And Beth seemed to like it.
‘I hope you’re right, Mum,’ she said. ‘I don’t understand what’s going on in Dad’s head –’ She stopped. ‘We don’t have to talk about it, if you don’t want. I’m sorry I shouted at you. It’s just that what with Lily and now this…I wanted everything to be perfect when I told you about the baby.’
‘Forget everything else,’ Anneliese insisted. ‘It will all work out in its own good time. Your news is what matters now.’
Beth grinned. ‘It’s so exciting. Will you come and stay with us when the baby’s born? Because it’s going to be difficult, and you know I don’t know anything about babies. I was saying to some of my friends that they’re lucky to have older sisters and brothers so they have nieces and nephews. But being an only child, well, I don’t have that experience. I suppose I’ll learn!’ she laughed. ‘I was thinking that it’s going to be hard to tell Izzie,’ Beth went on, ‘because, well, I never really knew if she wanted kids or not and there’s nobody special in her life, so –’ She broke off and sighed. ‘I sort of thought there was someone. She referred to a guy in emails, but she sounded a bit vague about him so I didn’t like to pry.’
‘She hasn’t told me about anyone,’ Anneliese said, surprised. She and Izzie spoke a lot. But then, she hadn’t been on the phone filling Izzie in with her own life-changing details, had she?
‘She was probably afraid to tell you and Gran, because you’d be planning the wedding as soon as you heard and, well, it doesn’t work like that nowadays,’ Beth said wryly.
Yes, Anneliese thought grimly, that’s me – poster girl for marriage.
Once she’d started talking about the pregnancy, Beth kept going. Marcus took their bags upstairs to the spare room and got his wife some water, while she told her mother how she felt tired at night, how she hadn’t really had morning sickness but the nausea had been quite intense, although it was improving now. And she’d developed a burst of energy the past week. Some people found that after the first trimester, she explained.
‘You sound so knowledgeable,’ Anneliese smiled. ‘You must have been reading loads.’
‘Yes, tons. Actually, last night, I was reading a baby magazine and it mentioned this new book about the first year with your baby. I’d love to get it,’ Beth said. ‘Maybe we could try the bookshop here?’
‘Of course,’ Anneliese said. ‘I’ll just run upstairs and brush my hair.’
In
