Then She Was Gone(70)

Then one day, and you’ll remember this day, Floyd, it was pretty significant, you told me you were thinking about home-schooling Poppy. I’d just filled in the forms on the internet for a place at our local primary school. But that wasn’t good enough apparently: oh no, nothing was good enough for your precious Poppy. Only you, Floyd. Only you.

‘My mini-me.’

That’s what you used to call her.

As though I literally had nothing whatsoever to do with the child. And as though only a child who mirrored you in every single respect could possibly be worth loving.

Anyway, you said, ‘She’s very bright. Really very bright. I wouldn’t be surprised if she was Mensa level. I don’t think a mainstream school is going to know what to do with her. And if I’m going to home-school her it makes sense for her to come and live with me permanently.’

And you know, I think you thought I’d be relieved. I think you thought I’d say, OK, fabulous, well, that’s a weight off my mind. You knew how hard I found her at home. You knew how much we clashed. And you knew, deep down, that I wasn’t a natural-born mother, that I wasn’t a nurturer.

But what you didn’t know was what I’d done to get that child for you. You had no idea. You had no idea that my life was not a life, not in any real sense of the word, and that the only thing that lit the path for me was you, Floyd. And if you had full custody of Poppy then, really, what was the use of me? You’d have no reason to see me any more. You’d have no reason to keep me on side.

I couldn’t let you take Poppy. She was my ticket to you.

We started that conversation like adults and finished it in a red heat.

I knew then that you wouldn’t let it go. And a few weeks later you found your moment and you pounced.

I couldn’t bear to leave the house with that child half the time. She was a liability in public places. In shops she wanted me to buy her everything. And I mean everything. There was no shop that didn’t sell something she wanted. And if I didn’t get it for her then I was ‘mean’ and I was ‘horrible’, and she’d scream the place down. So I learned to do all my errands when she was at the nursery. But that afternoon I remembered that I needed ketchup – not for me, mind, oh no, I could live without ketchup without having an epileptic fit, but Madam couldn’t. So I left her. I was gone for ten minutes. Possibly fifteen.

She had climbed up on to the work surface in the kitchen, looking for food – of course, because she might die if she didn’t eat something for ten minutes – and she’d fallen and bashed her head against the corner of the unit and there was a cut and there was some blood and I called the 111 number and they told me what to look out for and when to bring her in if necessary and I did everything right, Floyd, everything. I behaved like a proper decent parent. But of course the next time she saw you she had a huge black eye and she was all wan and bruised and oh, mummy went out and left me and I was hungry and I just wanted some cereal, that was all and blah blah blah. And you turned to me and you said, ‘That’s it, Noelle. That is it.’

And I knew what you meant and I knew it was going to happen. So that was when I decided. Me and Poppy. We were going away. And if you wanted us back you’d have to come and find us.

I had it all planned out. I would take my bonny, brown-eyed girl back to Ireland! My mother and father would be captivated! All my brothers would say, Well, look at the child, sure if she isn’t the prettiest Donnelly in a generation. And after a few weeks I’d phone you to tell you where we were and you would get on the first plane into Dublin and you’d see me there in the bold green light of the Emerald Isle, in the bosom of my family, our child with cheeks like rose blossoms, and I’d take you to see the perfect little village school where we went ourselves when we were small and you’d meet my mother and father, the cleverest people I know, and my brothers with their huge brains and you’d see the shelves in their big Victorian villa heaving with the books and the trophies and the shields and you’d know that I’d done the best for my child, that she was in the best place and that you could not take her, not now she was so happy and so settled, cousins all around, the sheep and the sea and the sweet meadow air.

In this fantasy, you would decide to stay. You’d rent a small windswept cottage and eventually, because we were all so happy and everything was so perfect, you’d ask us to move in with you. And that was how we’d end our days. The three of us together. The perfect family.





Fifty-one


‘Where did Poppy get those candlesticks? The silver ones in her bedroom?’

Floyd looks up at Laurel from the newspaper. It’s Tuesday morning and they’re having breakfast. Laurel nearly didn’t stay last night. She’d nearly said she had a headache and wanted to sleep in her own bed. But something kept her here: the promise of a shared bottle of wine, the proximity to Poppy, unanswered questions.

‘The art deco ones?’

‘Yes. On her bookshelves.’

‘Oh, I found those at Noelle’s when I went to collect Poppy’s things. Lovely, aren’t they?’

She draws in her breath and smiles tightly. ‘I used to have a pair,’ she says, ‘just like that.’

‘I did wonder if they might be worth something. That’s why I took them. And it was strange because Noelle literally had nothing. All her stuff, all of it, just tat. Yet she had those. Genuine art deco I’d say they were. I meant to get them valued, but I never got around to it.’