No, scratch that, I wouldn’t have let them in in the first place. But Jo’s soft. She’s vulnerable. She walks with her head down, eyes fixed on the pavement, fingers twitching against the tired, worn material of her winter coat. She’s a natural target. How can you have respect for someone like that? Someone who flinches if you look at her the wrong way? Who doesn’t trust her instincts? Someone who is so very, very easy to manipulate …
I didn’t ring the police. I thought about it all evening, debating the pros and cons as Max turned on Netflix and settled back on the sofa with a bag of Doritos and a bottle of beer. I could barely look at him. Every crunch, every munch, every slurp made my skin prickle with anger. When we were first married he’d jump to my defence if someone was even inadvertently rude to me on a night out. He’d walk nearest the road on a rainy night to protect me from splashes. He’d jump out of bed and grab his baseball bat if I heard a noise downstairs. I thought he’d be on to the police the second I told him what had happened. Instead he looked at me like I’m some kind of hysterical neurotic. How can I ring the police if my own husband doesn’t believe me? All I’ve got is a first name and a description. What could they possibly do with that? Then there’s the fact that I’d have to go into the police station and that’s not something I can deal with right now.
At 11 p.m., when Max finally went to bed, I thought about ringing my best friend Helen who lives in Cardiff with her little boy Ben. But it was too late. She’d have been in bed for an hour at least. Instead I sent her a text asking her when would be a good time to have a chat, then I took out my laptop and Googled jobs and places to live in Chester. I’ve been thinking about moving away from Bristol for a while. What happened last night was the last straw.
Now, my shoulders loosen and my grip on the steering wheel relaxes as I pull into the lane that runs behind Mum and Dad’s house on the outskirts of Chester. Elise is asleep in the back of the car, her dark blonde head lolling against her chest, her fingers unfurled and relaxed, Effie Elephant resting on her lap.
Mum appears at the garden gate as I pull on the handbrake and turn off the engine. Her dark, dyed hair looks longer than I remember. It curls over her ears and hangs over her eyebrows. She brushes it out of her face as she approaches the car and taps on the window. I’m shocked by how tired she looks.
‘Jo?’ she says as I unwind the window. ‘What are you doing here? I said to Andy that I could hear a car pulling up.’
Mum’s been living in the UK for over thirty years, we both have, but while my Irish accent disappeared within a year of me starting school, hers is as strong as it was the day we left.
‘Didn’t you get my text?’
‘Phone’s off. You know I don’t like to waste the battery.’
I can’t help but smile. ‘It might have been urgent, Mum.’
‘Wasn’t though, was it? You’d have rung the house phone if it was.’ She glances into the back of the car as Elise stirs in her sleep. ‘Babby all right?’
I want to tell her what happened yesterday. She’d understand why I was so scared for Elise’s safety, why I still am. But she’s got enough on her plate looking after Dad. I can’t put this on her too. Just being here and seeing her face makes me feel like I can breathe again.
‘She’s fine.’ I gesture for Mum to move away from the door so I can open it. ‘We just fancied seeing you and Dad. How is he?’
Mum gives me a long look. ‘He’s not great, love.’
It’s the beginning of February but it’s so hot in Mum’s house that I have to strip both me and Elise down to our T-shirts within minutes of walking through the front door.
‘I keep it warm for Dad,’ Mum says as I hang our discarded clothes over the back of a chair. ‘He really feels the cold now.’
‘Can we see him?’
‘Let me go and see how he is.’
She disappears through the living-room door and into the hallway. A year ago I’d hear the sound of the stairs creaking as she made her way up to the master bedroom but Dad’s been sleeping in the dining room for a while now. He was diagnosed with motor neurone disease three years ago. He’d been unusually clumsy for a few weeks – dropping the coffee jar in the kitchen, spilling tea on himself and tripping over the rug in the living room – and Mum complained to me on the phone that she couldn’t get him to see a doctor. When he started having trouble with his speech he finally agreed to see someone. The diagnosis was made scarily quickly and within six months he was walking with a stick. Two years later he was in a wheelchair. Now he’s unable to leave his bed.
‘What’s this?’ Elise asks and I dart towards her, intercepting her grabby little hand before she can snatch one of Mum’s porcelain figurines from the windowsill.
‘It’s a ballerina,’ I say, guiding her fingers away. ‘Isn’t she pretty?’
She nods enthusiastically, her gaze still fixed on the statuette. ‘Yes.’
I walk my daughter around Mum and Dad’s compact living room, pointing out all the other ornaments: the life-sized china robin, the small crystal vase, the little boy reading a book under a windmill, the fairy plates hanging on the wall and a brown and white cow. Every single thing in this room was bought in the UK. Other than Mum’s accent, this house is devoid of any trace of our Irish heritage. I gave up trying to talk to her about Ireland years ago. She shuts down whenever anyone questions her about where she’s from or why she left. I only know that her best friend was called Mary because Mum got uncharacteristically drunk at my wedding and confided in my friend Helen. She told her that she’d wanted Mary to be her bridesmaid at her own wedding, nearly forty years earlier, but it hadn’t been possible. That she missed Mary and hadn’t seen her for over thirty years. When Helen suggested that it’s never too late to reconnect yourself with someone you love, Mum had replied, ‘It is if they hate you.’ When Helen probed for more information, Mum disappeared off in search of another glass of champagne.
Mum may have briefly opened up about her old best friend but there’s one person she’s never talked about – my real dad. He vanished three weeks before my eighth birthday.
She told me that he’d gone away for work but I didn’t believe her. I’d seen her friends cross the street when she waved hello. I’d noticed the way voices would drop and our neighbours would stare when I popped into the shop to grab a pint of milk. Kids in the playground started telling me that my dad was a bad man and their parents had told them not to talk to me any more. I didn’t understand. I was sad that my dad wasn’t at home any more and I knew my mum was upset too. But no one would tell me when he was coming back.
I was excited when I got back from school on the afternoon of my birthday and found Mum waiting at the front door with two packed suitcases. I thought we were going to visit Dad, wherever he was. I thought it was a birthday surprise. I was still excited when, ten minutes later, Uncle Carey turned up in his battered car and drove us to the train station. I didn’t want to spoil the surprise but I couldn’t stop myself from asking Mum where we were going. She unpursed her thin lips and said, ‘Away. That’s all you need to know.’ Twelve hours later we were in England. And I never saw my dad again.
It was just me and Mum for two years. And then she
