The Child(15)

“Lentil casserole,” she said. “Used to be your favorite.”

Emma smiled and murmured, “Thanks.” But Jude watched as she pushed the food around the plate, rearranging it to make it look like she was eating.

Back to your old tricks, Jude thought. But decided not to say anything.

She was about to speak when Emma suddenly said: “Did you see that a baby’s skeleton has been found in Howard Street?”

“Really?” Jude said. “Howard Street, of all places? What a horrible thing to happen. Where was it found? I bet it was one of the heroin addicts from the end of the street. Do you remember them?”

“No,” Emma said. “Oh, was that the house with all the rubbish and empty milk bottles outside?”

“That’s it. How did you hear about it?” Jude asked, pouring herself another glass of wine.

“It was in the paper.”

“But what happened? Was it murdered?”

“They don’t know,” Emma said and put some lentils in her mouth.

Jude did the same. When she finished her mouthful, she said, “Well, we don’t want to talk about dead babies, do we?” and moved the conversation onto Emma’s work.

“Are you still in touch with Will?” Emma said, cutting her off mid-sentence.

“Will?” Jude was caught completely off guard. “Er, well, yes. On and off. Actually, he rang me a few weeks ago. Out of the blue, about some university fund-raiser. We had a bit of a chat.” She looked at Emma’s face for clues but there was nothing.

“Why are you asking about Will?” she said, nervously. She wouldn’t have dreamed of telling Emma that Will had been back in touch. She knew it would have been taboo. But her daughter had been the one to mention him.

“I just wondered,” Emma said, and there was silence at the table apart from the scrape of spoons on plates.

“He was an important part of my life for eight years, Emma,” Jude said defensively, her face flushed by the alcohol. “An important part of yours, as well. For a couple of those years at least.”

Emma’s face froze.

“Well, I know you had your differences,” Jude said. “But that was so long ago, Emma. Surely you’re not still sulking about that.”

Emma looked up from her plate but said nothing.

She’s jealous, Jude thought. She always had a crush on him.

The subject appeared to be closed and Jude’s disappointment sucked all the energy out of the room. Her daughter stood wearily to help with the washing up and they both knew she would leave as soon as was decent.

At the sink, Emma dried while Jude washed. They’d turned the radio on to have voices in the room.

“I ought to get back—Paul will be home soon,” Emma said to her mother’s back. “Thanks for the lovely book and lunch.”

“You didn’t eat it,” Jude said over her shoulder. “Don’t think I don’t know. You can’t hide anything from me, Emma.”

Emma kissed her mother’s cheek once more and walked out, closing the door quietly behind her, the only sound the click of the latch.





TWELVE


    Emma


SUNDAY, MARCH 25, 2012

The walk back to the tube seems to take twice as long because my legs are so shaky.

I’d got it all wrong. I’d steeled myself for the baby conversation, had my responses ready for possible interrogations, but I’d had to ask her that last question. About Will. To reassure myself that he was no longer in the picture. But of course he is. How could it be otherwise?

I try to do my breathing, but my heart is still bumping against my ribs when I finally sit down on the Central Line train.

I sit in a daze. In between stations, I can see myself reflected in the window opposite.

? ? ?

When I finally get home, hours later, Paul has cooked his chicken thing—I can smell it; it smells of home—and is waiting patiently when I turn the key in the lock. I’d remembered to call him earlier to tell him I’d decided to have a look round the shops while I was in town.

“Darling, you look frozen,” he says. “Come in and get warm. Shall I run you a bath?”

“I’m fine, Paul,” I say and sidetrack him with how the lunch went.

“Jude cooked lentil casserole,” I say and he laughs. He knows I’ve always hated it.

“Of course she did,” he says. “What was her flat like?”

And I have to think.

“Wall hangings and scarves over the lamps,” I say. “She’d probably describe it as shabby chic but it’s more shabby shit.” Paul smiles.

“Did you have far to walk?” he says and pulls my feet into his lap to warm them.

“It’s miles from the tube—in the land of shops selling secondhand fridges. Actually, I felt a bit nervous walking down her road. I don’t know why she chose to live there.”

Jude moved north of the river years ago. She’d felt like a change, she told me later, when I got back in touch, when I made the first move to make the peace. It had been years since we’d spoken, but you know how things reach a stage when decisions get stuck in stone. My own anger about being chucked out would probably have cooled down pretty quickly if I’d been left to myself, but I went to live with my grandparents for a bit and Granny loved the opportunity to be proved right about her daughter’s shortcomings as a mother. She ramped up all the ill feeling, putting the phone down on Jude so she couldn’t talk to me—“It’s for your own good,” she told me. And by the time I left to fend for myself, the silence was total.