What Lies Between Us(54)

Because you’re my sister.

Those four words have sent my head spinning for the last twenty-four hours. I look at my phone again and remind myself of the response I sent him, telling him in no uncertain terms that I was an only child.

‘I don’t think you are,’ Bobby replied.

‘Listen, I don’t know what kind of game you’re playing, but I don’t find it funny,’ I responded.

‘I have proof, can I show you . . . please, can we talk about this in person? I can come to you,’ he begged. ‘And then if you don’t believe me, you never have to speak to me again.’ He seemed so genuine in his belief that eventually, I agreed.

‘Meet me tomorrow after work,’ I replied, and sent him the address of a town-centre pub.

And that’s where I am now. I’ve been over and over it to the point of exhaustion, trying to make some kind of sense of it. While I can’t remember much after Dylan’s death, Mum couldn’t possibly have been pregnant, so he can only be Dad’s son. Perhaps Bobby’s mum was the real reason why Dad disappeared – he chose her over us. I’ve always assumed Mum was holding something back from me when she said he left because they hadn’t been getting on. Now I think she was too ashamed to admit she had been replaced.

I’ve spent my entire adult life blaming her for me having no father. And I don’t know how I’m going to begin to make it up to her if what Bobby is saying is true.

‘Nina?’ A voice startles me. Like me, Bobby is early. I stare at him as if he is the first human I have ever come into contact with. I’m relieved to see he looks the same as his Facebook photos. His smile is as nervous as mine as he holds his hand out. Our same-shaped eyes and lips and shared chin dimples are more evident in the flesh than they are in his online photographs. Everything that I want to say and that I’ve spent all day rehearsing vanishes from my head, because instinct tells me that I’ve just met my half-brother.

‘Can I get you a drink?’ he asks, and I politely decline. He leaves a black leather satchel at the table and my eyes burrow through him as he waits at the bar. Suddenly, I’m ashamed of myself for the inappropriate thoughts I had about him before he made his announcement.

He returns to the table with a glass and bottle of lemonade and takes a seat opposite me.

‘Did you find the pub okay?’ I ask, unsure of why this is my first question when there’s so much else to discuss.

‘Yeah, I just followed my sat nav.’

‘Where did you park?’

‘In the Grosvenor Centre car park.’

‘I hope you made a note of the floor you’re on. Otherwise it’s a nightmare trying to find your car afterwards.’

He shows me his phone. He’s taken a photograph of the wall showing the painted lettering 4B. I’d have done the same.

I honestly don’t know what to say next, but I don’t need to worry because he speaks instead. ‘It’s like going on a blind date, isn’t it?’ Then his face reddens. ‘Not that I’ve ever been on a blind date with my sister,’ he adds.

Nobody has ever called me that before. A part of me likes the way it sounds.

‘Why do you think we’re related?’ I ask.

‘Mum and Dad have always been honest with me from as far back as I can remember,’ he says. ‘So I’ve always known that I was adopted.’

‘Adopted?’ I repeat.

‘Yes. You sound surprised.’

So both of our mums were abandoned by the same man. If our blood wasn’t enough to bond us, then this shared rejection by our father is. I’m overtaken by an urge to throw my arms around Bobby, but I hold back. I want to ask him why he has sought me out ahead of his biological parents. Unless he has already found them and they’ve denied him? But I’m sure we’ll get to that.

He goes on to tell me more about his life. His family moved to Leicester when he was an infant; he has two older brothers and a sister who weren’t adopted; he was an average student but excelled in English. He explains how he always wanted to be a journalist, how he’s saving up enough money to travel the world.

He asks me about my life and I offer him selected highlights, which are honestly few and far between. He seems as interested in my every word as I am in his. He has already accomplished so much more than I have. I wonder if it’s normal to be proud of a person you have only just met.

Flashbacks of Dad slide in and out of my head as he chats. For the first time, I now have a snippet of a life Dad had away from mine. I wonder how many more of us are out there; how many more half-brothers or half-sisters has he created and abandoned? We could walk past one another in the street and not have the faintest clue of the blood we share. I want to know what Bobby has learned about him.

‘I’ve thought about Dad a lot over the years,’ I begin. ‘In spite of myself, I still miss him. Have you ever tried to find him? Do you know if he’s still alive?’

He looks at me, puzzled. ‘Dad?’ he asks.

‘Yes,’ I reply. ‘He must have had you around the same time as he left my mum and me.’

‘I have no idea who my father is,’ he replies, and now it’s my turn to be puzzled.

‘Then how are we related?’

‘We share the same mum.’

I push back in my seat. ‘Mum?’ I repeat. ‘I think there’s been some mistake. You and I share the same dad, not mum.’