The Day She Came Back(87)

‘I’ll see you.’ He held her gaze as he fastened his helmet and jumped on his bike.

‘Yes, I’ll see you.’

‘I like him,’ Sarah stated as they walked along the cobbles towards town.

‘I like him,’ Victoria admitted, and they both laughed.

Espresso House was busy, but they nabbed a table with a view out over the fjord. The coffee was hot and strong and blew away the cobwebs of the night before.

‘I feel . . . lighter.’ Sarah took a deep breath.

‘Yep, me too. It was really hard hearing you read your own words. It made it real for me. I can’t imagine,’ Victoria continued. ‘I can’t imagine what it must have been like for you, or for Prim, when I was born.’

‘It was terrible, that’s the truth, and it has been terrible for me every single day since.’

Victoria nodded. ‘You said you were full of anger. Where did that come from?’

‘Well, it was drug-fuelled mainly, or rather lack of drugs, but I think it was rooted in how Mum viewed Marcus. I loved him dearly, but to her he was the knife that pierced my breast, the bridge from which I might jump, the loaded gun that held the bullet aimed at my temple. Her hatred of him coloured her thoughts, and it never cooled, not once. If anything, it intensified. And that was hard for me and no doubt hard for her, as he was your dad.’

‘Whether she liked it or not.’ Victoria filled in the gaps.

‘Not!’ Sarah offered dryly. ‘I know Mum wanted the best for me, and it was hard for her to give up the image she had of me in her mind; she wanted me to be a professional in neat clothes and with a steady life, not sharing needles on a dirty mattress in some rancid squat or constantly badgering my dad for money, which he gave me.’

‘What parent would want that?’ Victoria spoke her thoughts aloud.

‘No sane ones, that’s for sure. But I couldn’t see that; I felt persecuted.’

‘I bet Prim did too.’ It felt good to be in her corner, loyal.

‘Yes, I’m sure of it.’

‘This is good, Sarah. It’s this kind of detail I have been missing. I have never had anyone to ask because you weren’t there and it never felt like Prim wanted to talk about it, and I understand why now. I can see how things broke down and you both just sort of went around in circles. You trying to get a foothold and her trying her best and not always understanding what you were going through.’

‘That’s about the sum of it. The day you were born feels like yesterday and a lifetime ago all at the same time.’

‘October the twelfth.’ Victoria looked up. ‘Coming up.’

‘October the twelfth,’ Sarah repeated. ‘Coming up soon. Nineteen? How is that even possible? I remember every minute of the day you were born. Every single minute. I was mourning Marcus, hurting so badly and beyond sad that he would never know you or you him. It was made harder because Mum wouldn’t talk about him, wanted me to move on, like it was nothing, but my loss ran deep . . . I was still desperate for drugs: worn down by what was happening with Mum, and I knew my time with you was limited . . . It was the best and worst day of my life.’

‘How was it?’

Sarah drew breath. ‘Because I got you, because I held you in my arms and you clung to me, like you knew . . .’

‘Maybe I did.’ She felt a wave of sadness for the little baby who had clung to her mum, possibly able to sense that their time together was limited.

‘And it was the very worst day because I knew I would never love anything more and I knew I was going to lose you. And I knew I was going to die. I had it planned, and I didn’t fear it. I just wanted that hit.’

‘But you didn’t die.’

‘No. No, I didn’t.’

‘Did you, erm . . . did you see Prim and Grandpa after you had left, after you had me?’ She braced herself for the reply, quite unable to stand the thought of them organising clandestine get-togethers while she lay in bed sending nightly prayers up to her mum in heaven. It was unthinkable. And yet, a small, unselfish part of her wanted to know that Prim and Grandpa got to see their daughter before they passed away.

Sarah made no attempt to hide her distress, now obvious and still apparently lying very close to the surface. A question or mention such as this was seemingly enough to prick the skin and release the sadness.

‘No. I never saw them, and I thought I had got used to the idea of it, until I heard that Mum had passed away and I felt my world crash. It was really hard when Dad died too, of course, but Prim . . . I thought she’d go on for ever. I thought there was always a chance that she’d pick up the phone or answer my letters.’

‘You wrote to her?’ Jesus Christ! Did I unwittingly hand her the mail with your letters in it? Have I sat on the sofa with my nose in a book while she wrote you letters at the bureau, only feet away?

‘Not for many years. She asked me to stop. And I did. When I left the facility . . .’ Sarah spoke plainly and with more than a hint of justification in her tone. ‘Prim, despite our differences and being well into her sixties, stepped up to the plate and came and stayed close to where I was living, in a grotty shared house. She booked into a smart little B&B and she brought you to see me twice a day, no matter what my state. And often that state was not good. Not good . . .’ She looked at the floor with knitted brows, as if even the memory was too painful. ‘It was brave of her. I can see that now. Morning and night, she would come to that lousy bedsit so I could hold you and settle you, every day, twice a day for three months. I would kiss you sweetly on the forehead, trying to imprint myself on your memory – once when you arrived and once when you left. Do you remember anything of it at all? A smell? A thought?’ She asked with such hope it was pitiful.