The Second Child Read online

  ANNE

  I walk back through to the lounge, conscious of the unusual sensation of the house being full of people. Lauren looks up as I enter. She sees me and pats the cushion next to her, beckoning me to come and sit down, which I do.

  For a few moments we simply sit there, Lauren watching her video clips, me listening to her breathing and looking at the thick, puckered scars that run along the tops of her thumbs. But suddenly, inexplicably, she starts chuckling. She shuffles around so that she’s facing me and she reaches out for my hand, which she tugs. It takes me a moment to realise that she’s asking me to do the actions to ‘Incy Wincy Spider’. When I self-consciously oblige, she makes a gesture that I’ve seen her use before, placing the palm of one hand flat on top of the fist of her other hand. She restarts the rhyme and I do the actions again. Next she picks ‘Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star’, an old favourite of Rosie’s. When I tentatively sing along, the words coming back to me unbidden, she beams. She reaches out again and, for the duration of the song, she holds my hand lightly. Her skin is soft, her fingers short, square-tipped. Her pale, scarred hand in mine, feels like a small child’s.

  We move onto ‘Ten Currant Buns’, followed by the ‘Dingle Dangle Scarecrow’, then one I’d forgotten, ‘I Hear Thunder’. The song ends and she taps her palm on top of her hand again.

  ‘She’s asking for more.’ I hadn’t realised that Sarah had come back. She stands in the doorway and makes the sign herself. ‘I see she’s got you doing the full repertoire.’

  Suddenly I feel foolish. How long has she been standing there, listening to my terrible warbly voice, watching me put up imaginary umbrellas? ‘Yes.’ I’m lost for anything else to say. There’s an awkward pause before I remember that I have a lot to do. ‘Well, I really must go and get the food sorted out.’ I stand up and head for the kitchen.

  Sarah replaces me on the sofa next to Lauren.

  PHIL

  When Rosie and I come back inside, Sarah’s brow has lifted and the atmosphere seems okay. Anne is in the kitchen, pulling platters of food out of their enormous fridge. Rosie leans across her and grabs two bottles of cold water, which we gulp down in synch. I’m suddenly aware of how sweaty I am, so I make my excuses to go and freshen up.

  By the time I’m showered and back downstairs, everything seems to be geared up for ‘the party’. Sarah has changed Lauren into a pretty top and brushed her hair and Rosie has showered and changed. She’s wearing skinny jeans and a crop top, and her long hair, which is still damp, is twisted up in a bun. The kitchen is awash with food. Not your average sandwiches, chips and dips, but plates of salmon, sushi and prosciutto, with some tiny vegetable tarts and a spread of amazing-looking salads. And there’s a cheese slate with at least six different types of cheese, accompanied not by bog-standard grapes, but by lychees and fresh figs. When Anne’s back is turned, Rosie pinches a couple of the handmade cheese straws and throws one to me. I’ve just finished cramming it in my mouth when Anne asks me if I would be kind enough to take some more ice out to the bucket in the garden. I grunt through a mouthful of flaky, buttery pastry and do as asked.

  Outside the sun is shining. I dump the ice onto the beers already chilling on the patio, then turn my face to the sun. All I can hear is the rustle of the trees and the preparations going on inside the house.

  Sarah was wrong. This was a good idea.

  SARAH

  As promised, the party is small and teenager-free; none of Rosie’s friends appear to have been invited. It’s just us, Anne’s sister Clare and her husband Robert, and Anne’s friend, Steph. Clare is obviously the elder sibling and her husband is even older, a whole generation, or two, or so it seems once he starts talking. He’s an insurance broker and she volunteers for a debt charity. Nice people, but earnest. Steph, in contrast, is a breath of fresh air; she arrives late, clutching a pack of beers, a badly wrapped present and, for reasons that are not immediately apparent, a plastic bag full of courgettes. The present gets added to the pile on the kitchen counter and the veg gets stowed in the fridge. The mood lightens considerably with Steph’s appearance. She asks us all about Lauren, but in a way that’s genuinely interested, and her presence seems to relax Anne. Against all the odds, I feel myself starting to enjoy myself. The champagne helps.

  An hour later we’re all standing in the kitchen chatting quite happily, nibbling at the vast array of food, when the phone rings. Anne reaches out and answers it while topping up her sister’s wine glass, but the moment she hears the voice on the other end of the line she stops. Her stillness attracts everyone’s attention and, before she has a chance to shield herself from our curiosity, her smile dies. Something akin to panic flits across her features. She turns away abruptly, crashing the bottle down on the kitchen countertop. Unfortunately this only increases my prurient desire to know who’s calling.

  ‘Hello.’ I’ve never heard such a cool greeting. ‘No, not really, we’re having a small get-together for Rosie’s birthday.’ The atmosphere in the room shifts out of neutral, but I’m conscious of listening more to Anne than to the conversation about possible solutions to the infestation of blackfly at Steph’s allotment. ‘Now?’ Anne’s voice is tight. ‘Can’t she just ring you later, on her mobile.’ There’s a pause. ‘Well, if you must, though in the circumstances it’s seems a little unreasonable of you to insist.’ A longer pause. ‘Very well.’ Anne turns and beckons Rosie over to the phone. ‘Your father would like a quick word.’

  Rosie looks reluctant to take the receiver, but she has little choice. She keeps her voice low, presumably hoping to keep the conversation private, as she has every right to, but this doesn’t stop me straining to hear every word of it. ‘Um, hi. Yep, thank you. I opened it this morning.’ There’s a long gap. Rosie twists the phone cord between her fingers. ‘Yeah. Okay, yes.’ She listens, staring at the floor. Clare asks Phil about our garden in Leeds. Thankfully he responds, keeping the conversation afloat. Rosie’s voice drops even lower, almost to a whisper. ‘I’ve already said sorry, what else do you want me to say?’ Another gap. ‘Okay, bye.’ And the receiver goes back onto the wall. For a brief moment she doesn’t move, just straightens up and flexes her shoulders. A look passes between her and Anne.

  ‘Right, birthday girl! Are you going to get any of these presents open any time soon?’ Steph bounces the atmosphere back up to party mode. ‘I insist that you start with this impeccably wrapped offering.’ She lobs her gift across the room and Rosie catches it, deftly.

  Anne recovers her smile and her voice. ‘Wait just a minute. If we’re doing presents, I’ve something that I just need to fetch.’ It passes through my mind that Rosie has quite enough to be going on with as it is, but when Anne returns, with a small stack of beautifully wrapped parcels, she puts them down on the sofa next to Lauren. This does get a reaction. Lauren loves presents, or rather she loves unwrapping presents. Without waiting, she snatches the top parcel and starts pulling at the ribbon.

  In the race to get the wrapping off, Lauren beats Rosie hands down. The first gift is a box of chocolates, which is immediately discarded once she realises that she can’t get into it, then she’s straight onto the next one. Rosie’s present from Steph turns out to be a Rubik’s Cube, which must be some kind of shared joke, because Rosie looks delighted with it. She laughs and goes to give Steph a hug. Lauren steadily ploughs through her pile, revealing a DVD, a T-shirt and some bubble bath. She moves swiftly onto the last parcel. This she needs some help with. Anne helps her peel the tape free and she pulls out… a hat, a black trilby, shot through with silver thread. This, Lauren does not chuck. We all watch as she turns it round in her hands a few times, getting the feel of it, and then, deciding she approves, plonks it on her head. Anne smiles and I feel touched by her thoughtfulness. I also feel unsettled.

  Everyone’s attention switches back to Rosie. Her remaining presents include cash from her aunt and uncle, and an iPod from Anne, which comes with the request to please take better care of this one. F
rom her friends she gets a selection of make-up and American confectionery. She keeps our presents to the end. She opens the parcel from James and Ali first. A new pair of shin pads, the discounted price-sticker still clearly visible on the pack.

  ‘Thanks. I really needed a new pair, my old ones are knackered.’ Her pleasure seems totally genuine. I wish she hadn’t left our gift to the very end, thereby ramping up the pressure. As she takes the paper off the box, I look at Phil, who is watching her intently. She slides the lid off and goes quiet. ‘Oh, wow, thank you.’ She takes a second, then she looks up. ‘It’s lovely. Thank you so much.’ And she comes to give Phil and me a ‘thank you’ kiss.

  PHIL

  She loves it. Thank God, she loves it.

  I didn’t know where to start; how do you buy the first present for your daughter, after fifteen years? It had to be something special. Sarah’s suggestions were lame: a football shirt, a school bag, a bloody gift card! All so ordinary and everyday. I was panicking about it quite severely until Jess came to my rescue. She was round with Ali, a barbecue to celebrate the first properly warm days of summer. She crossed her long legs, sipped her beer and really gave it some thought. ‘Well, some of the girls at school are obsessed with those charm bracelets, the ones that are hideously expensive. There’s a shop in the mall that has a queue of teenagers outside it every weekend. But she’s not a “girly” girl, is she?’

  ‘Not girly, no, but she likes clothes and make-up and the usual stuff teenagers are into, I think.’

  So one evening after work I drove into town and found the shop she’d mentioned. It was intimidating. Stark white and brightly lit, full of clear glass coffins filled with a bewildering array of different beads and charms. ‘Hi, I’m Chantelle, can I help you find what you’re looking for?’ The young woman looked like one of those heavily made-up assistants you get in posh department stores.

  ‘Um. Probably. I’m a bit clueless about this kind of thing.’

  She immediately perked up.

  ‘Who is the gift for?’

  ‘My daughter. She’s turning fifteen.’

  ‘Are we starting from scratch?’ she asked. If she thought I answered ‘yes’, a little strangely she didn’t let on. Forty-five minutes later I’d chosen a ‘sister’ bracelet with a rose clasp; with five charms, one each for me, Sarah, James, Lauren and Rosie. Chantelle carefully wrapped it in tissue, nestled it in a box, tied it with ribbon, then rang it through the till. £195. Expensive, but worth it.

  Because I can tell by her face that Rosie loves it.

  ROSIE

  Aunt Clare and Uncle Rob leave after we’ve eaten, and that means we can all escape from the kitchen. Phil and I go back out into the garden, Phil with another beer and me with a ball.

  He doesn’t need asking twice for a kickabout. He lobs up high balls so that I can practise my first touch. There’s enough light blazing from the back of the house for us to keeping going long after it gets dark. The rhythm of Phil lofting up the ball and me catching it and controlling it is soothing.

  Dad was foul to me on the phone, that clipped coldness that he uses when he’s angry. I suppose I should’ve guessed he might ring the house phone, after I didn’t respond to his texts. I know it doesn’t pay to ignore him. But I’m not going to sweat over it. I’m fairly sure Mum will believe me and not him, so it should be okay. She hasn’t said anything. There are some benefits to him behaving like a shit most of the time.

  ‘Watch it!’ The ball narrowly misses my head. It bounces high and rolls into the bushes. ‘You doughnut!’ Phil happily gets on his hands and knees and starts digging about in the border, trying to fish it out. I kneel on the grass beside him and vaguely pretend to help. ‘Damn, where the hell is it?’ I can tell he’s not really cross. He never seems to get properly mad. They are so different. ‘Whoops!’ Phil grins at me as one of Mum’s plants gets crushed. He rolls over and flakes out on his back. ‘I’m afraid, young lady, that that ball has gone, for ever, to the great football graveyard in the sky.’ It occurs to me that he’s quite drunk. ‘That’ll teach you not to take your eye off the ball.’

  We lie side-by-side, saying nothing, watching the bats swoop around the garden, and I love it. It’s the best birthday I’ve ever had, not because of the presents or the party, but because of this, right now: the feeling of being myself, and that being enough.

  Phil stirs and stretches his arms out wide across the grass. His hand touches my shoulder. ‘Do you know that if you measure from the fingertips on your left hand,’ he waggles his fingers, ‘to the fingertips on your right hand,’ his fingers beat a rhythm against my bare skin, ‘that’s how tall you’ll be as an adult. Not a lot of people know that.’

  ‘Is that true?’ I ask, not caring.

  He laughs. ‘I have no sodding idea.’ He doesn’t move his hand away. Instead it rests heavily on my shoulder, anchoring me to the grass. I could happily lie there, under the darkening sky, talking rubbish with my dad, for ever.

  ANNE

  After Clare and Robert depart and Sarah takes Lauren off to bed, Steph makes me sit down. She presses a large glass of wine into my hand, which I sip to keep her happy.

  ‘That went well.’ She tucks her legs up beneath her.

  ‘Do you think so?’

  ‘Yeah. The food was great. Everyone was talking. In the circumstances, I think it was a resounding success. And Rosie seemed really happy.’

  ‘Yes.’ I obviously fail to disguise my feelings, because Steph scents my disquiet.

  ‘What?’

  ‘Nothing.’

  ‘Come on, Anne, you’re not stressing about bloody Nathan, are you? You know it’s classic him to choose that precise moment to ring, after all these months. He’s got a knack for it. Don’t let him get to you. Rosie doesn’t.’ I go to take another sip of wine, but find I can’t because of the tears clotting my throat. ‘Aw, Anne.’ Steph comes and flumps down next to me, patting my arm. ‘He’s really not worth it, never has been, never will be.’

  But for once I haven’t the energy the keep the bad inside. ‘Rosie lied.’

  That gets her attention. She straightens up. ‘What?’

  ‘She lied about Nathan pulling out of seeing her for her birthday.’

  Steph loves Rosie. She doesn’t want to believe me. ‘No. That’s low, even for him, blaming Rosie for his failings. What a shit!’

  Which he is, but he was telling the truth about the weekend. I knew it the moment Rosie looked at me. ‘No, I thought it was odd when she first suggested we invite them down here, and on the phone he told me that she’s been blocking his calls. She cancelled on him, two weeks ago. He’s been trying to get in touch with her ever since. That’s why he rang the house, risked having to speak to me. She made out it was him, so that I’d feel sorry for her. It was all a ruse to get them here for her birthday.’

  Steph clings on to her long-standing disgust with Nathan. ‘Are you sure? It sounds more like him covering his arse, to me.’

  ‘No, she lied. She was only happy today because they were here. It wasn’t the party or the presents, or all the effort I put in. It’s them.’ And that’s the awful truth. ‘Steph, what am I going to do? I’m losing her.’

  Steph tuts and pats and fetches me a handful of tissues. The clock strikes 9.30 p.m. ‘She’s just confused. It’s such a massive thing. It’s not surprising she’s all over the shop. She loves you. You know she does. It’s going to take a while to settle, for you all to find your new roles.’

  I look at Steph and wish I could buy into her well-meaning platitudes, but I can’t.

  ‘I’m not so sure. They have so many things to offer her – things that she wants. They’re a proper family.’

  ‘Oh, not this again. A single-parent family is a “proper” family. You and Rosie are tight precisely because Nathan left.’

  ‘We were. When she was little. We’re not now. And you saw her with Phil. How can I compete with that?’

  Steph looks at me kindly, but s
he really doesn’t understand. ‘It’s not a competition, Anne.’ Oh, but it is. I go quiet, giving up on being able to explain. It’s sad that our friendship, which I value so much precisely because it is the only true one I have, is so riddled with gaps. When Steph speaks again her tone is cautious. ‘Anne?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘I hope you don’t mind me asking… I know it must be so hard, with all this going on with Rosie, but what are you going to do about Lauren?’

  I let the clock fill the void for a few seconds and the sensation of Lauren’s small hand in mine returns, bringing with it a sense of peace and a sliver of hope.

  ‘I don’t know. But whatever happens, I’m going to have to deal with it on my own, just like with Rosie.’ Steph doesn’t disagree. I think about Lauren, about her presence in my life, and I try to be honest. ‘It breaks my heart every time I look at her. She’s so different from Rosie, from anyone I’ve ever encountered.’ Steph waits. ‘But I’m beginning to understand her a little more. This weekend has been… calmer. It’s given me time to see her. I mean see her and not just her disabilities. She is there, inside all her problems.’ I can’t express myself clearly, because I’m not thinking clearly. ‘God, Steph, I honestly don’t know what I feel or what I’m going to do.’ The clocks ticks. ‘But at least I now accept that she really is my daughter, she is my child.’

  SARAH

  I’m becoming a snoop. After I’ve settled Lauren and switched off the light, I step into the hallway, leaving the door slightly ajar behind me. That’s when I hear… Rosie lied. I stand very still and listen to their conversation without shame. This is Anne with her guard down, the person we never get to see, and she’s hurting: being hurt by Rosie, and by Nathan and, inadvertently, by us. It’s a mess of such epic proportions that I have no idea how it’s all going play out, and then Steph asks the most important question of all… What are you going to do about Lauren? There is a long, long pause, then Anne says, ‘I don’t know. It breaks my heart every time I look at her. She’s so different from Rosie, from anyone I’ve ever encountered.’ Her voice changes, growing quieter, more reflective and softer, so soft that I have to strain to hear her as she struggles to put her heartache into words. I creep closer to the door, stealing up on the truth that hides within Anne. I get my just ‘reward’ for my shameful eavesdropping, because the last thing I hear is Anne saying, ‘… she really is my daughter. She is my child.’