The Rumor, page 21
“Hi there,” Karen says. All bright and cheerful. The tone of it grates, like an unexpected insult. “Alfie’s had his supper. He’s got quite an appetite, hasn’t he?”
“Yes, yes, he has. Look, we might be a little late. The traffic, it’s…”
“Hey, no problem. Really.” A pause. “You okay, Jo? Only you sound a bit…”
“I’ve had some bad news.” I screw my face up to hold the words back. The words playing in my brain in a loop. I’ve just found out my mother is a child killer. I’ve just found out my entire history is a fabrication, that I’ve been lied to since the day I was born.
“Joanna? Are you still there?”
“Yes, yes. I’m still here.”
But am I? Am I really? Someone is still here, hunched in the passenger seat like a wounded animal. Someone pretending to be Joanna Critchley. Mother of Alfie Critchley. Daughter of…
“Karen, I have to speak to my…my mother. I’ll be with you as soon as I can. I’m so sorry…”
“Take as long as you need. Alfie will be fine.” She knows something bad’s happened. I can tell by her voice. The way it’s changed from bright and breezy to serious and concerned. “If he gets sleepy I’ll make him up a bed on the sofa. Just do what you have to do. Okay?”
“Okay.” It’s hard to believe that, just a short while ago, I thought she meant Alfie and me harm. I thought she was Sally McGowan’s daughter when, all along, it was…all along, it was me.
* * *
—
IT’S DARK NOW and rain falls hard and fast. Michael puts the wipers on top speed, but visibility is poor. Headlights dazzle and distort in the windshield. Taillights bleed red. It’s the worst time to be driving out of the city, but Michael is a good driver. Calm and steady. If he’s frustrated at all, he keeps it hidden. He doesn’t react when someone cuts in front of us, or when traffic slows to a snail’s pace, picks up again, then slows. He just deals with it all. He just drives.
I’m dimly aware of the city draining into the suburbs through the rain-blurred windows, and then into dark nothingness. Vast chasms of black rearing up at us on either side and only the short span of road ahead, illuminated by the arc of the headlights.
It’s all I’ve got, that short stretch of road. The only thing that’s real. I can’t take my eyes off it.
Michael puts the radio on to break the silence and the sweet, raw voice of Ed Sheeran singing “Castle on the Hill” fills the car. An arm appears from nowhere to turn it off. It’s mine, the finger already poised, but Michael beats me to it. It’s too much. Too real and poignant. A love song for his hometown, and here am I, returning to mine. But everything has changed now. I’ve been dug up like an unwanted plant and tossed onto the soil, my roots exposed to the air.
My roots. I squeeze my eyes shut and try not to think of them. Diseased roots. Gnarled and foul. Kenny and Jean McGowan. The swagger and the fist. The fear and the shame. And Sally, their daughter. Sally, my mother.
The car is warm, the air stale. I open the window just a crack, rest my fingers on the top of the glass so that their tips are poking out into the night air. I used to do this as a child whenever we went on a long car trip. Mom at the wheel—a cautious driver, hands always in the ten-and-two position, gripping too tightly, her knuckles white from the strain—me slumped carelessly in the passenger seat. Gazing out of the windows. Daydreaming.
Cautious driver. Cautious woman. Cautious life. It all makes sense now. The pieces fit. She gives a good impression of having lots of friends and acquaintances from her choir, but now that I think of it, she’s always kept people at bay. She’s never allowed them to get too close. What did Michael say to me that time in the restaurant? That I’ve always been so fiercely independent, that he was worried I’d pull the drawbridge up if he asked for more. I’ve learned that from her, haven’t I? I must have.
“Are you okay?”
The question reaches my ears at the same time as icy water shoots sideways through the gap and spits on my face.
Of course I’m not okay. I lean my head against the window and close my eyes. I’ll never be okay again. The days of being okay are gone forever.
“I’ll come in with you, Joey, if you like. Or do you want me to stay in the car?”
I haven’t even thought about that. About what will happen when we get there. When I climb out of this car and enter that house. How will I drag myself from this warm, protective cocoon? Michael calm and steady beside me. The slanting pool of light beyond the windshield.
What will happen when I come face-to-face with her? What will I say? What will she?
If only Alfie were here in the car with us, we could just drive away and never come back. Start again someplace else. Leave it all behind us. Shed the past like an old skin. It’s what she did, after all. And not just once.
We’re getting closer now. The last leg of the journey. Familiar road signs. The ribbon of road no longer straight but bending. Full beam on. Full beam off. Villages glowing like clusters of jewels. Bars and restaurants. Dunkin’ Donuts and gas station signs. Everything normal and where it’s always been. The only thing that’s changed is me. My past, present, and future. Warped beyond recognition.
The last town before Flinstead winks at us in the darkness.
Liz only calls in the dead of night. Most people dread a phone call at that time. For them it can mean only one thing: Something bad has happened. Something that necessitates immediate action.
An accident.
A tragedy.
A death.
So when I see her name flash up at five eleven on my caller-display screen, I know. I know something is up. The game I’ve been playing all my life. The game I almost won.
I know what she’s going to say even before she says it and when she does…when she does, the words pierce my heart, over and over again. A thousand vicious stabs.
Joanna knows. Joanna knows. Joanna knows.
I won’t leave the house tonight. I won’t don my running gear and sprint through the streets like a ghost. I won’t be drawn to the glow of her window like a moth to a flame. To the sweet warmth of her eyes and her mouth. To the hot bliss of her bed.
She cannot comfort me now. My dearest love. My Liz.
No one can.
The monster is out of its cage.
45
I’M SHAKING AS THE CAR draws up outside her house. Her house. Not Mom’s house. Is it happening already? The separation?
Michael turns off the ignition and shifts in his seat to face me. He takes my hands in his and kisses them. His lips are warm and dry. His stubble grazes my flesh.
“Do you want me to come in with you?”
I shake my head. It’s easier than speaking.
Her porch light is on. She doesn’t usually put it on unless she’s expecting someone, or if she goes out and won’t be returning till late. She hardly ever goes out at night. She locks the doors early. Always has. Ever since I was a little girl and Dad left us. The doors were always locked by suppertime, and the curtains drawn. Now I know why.
“Nice and cozy,” she used to say. “Just you and me, as snug as a bug in a rug.”
My finger trembles as I press the bell. It doesn’t work. I press it again, harder this time. The jaunty little tune that Alfie and I often dance to while we’re waiting on the step is an affront to my ears. It comes from a happier, innocent time. It has no business striking its relentlessly upbeat message this evening.
I should have knocked instead. A somber rat-tat-tat. Too late now.
As soon as she opens the door and I see her face, I know she knows. Liz must have called ahead to warn her, and I’m glad. Glad she isn’t greeting me in the normal way. The warm smile. The soft kiss on the cheek. The hug. Glad I don’t have to find a way to broach the subject all on my own.
“I’ve been expecting you,” she says, her eyes skating across mine and fixing on Michael’s car, waiting outside.
She turns and walks ahead of me into the living room. A small glass of something amber-colored is sitting on the table by her armchair. She rarely drinks alone. At least, she never did. Although how am I to know what she did when I went up to bed? How am I to know what she does now, when I’m at home with Alfie and she is here, alone with her terrible secret? How am I to know anything about this stranger who calls herself my mother?
She inclines her head toward the sideboard. “Can I get you something to drink?”
My first instinct is to decline. I haven’t eaten anything since lunch and after that first, rasping mouthful of brandy in the hotel, that searing sensation at the back of my throat, the rest of the glass slithered down only too easily.
“I’m afraid I’ve only got amaretto or sherry,” she says, crouching at the sideboard and reaching into its depths.
“I’ll have a sherry.”
This seems wrong. Sitting down sipping sherry like a guest when she’s about to confirm the worst possible news. Expand on the grisly detail, no doubt. Explain. But of course, I know exactly what she’s doing. She’s delaying the moment for as long as possible. She needs this time fussing with glasses and bottles, laying another coaster on the coffee table, shutting the sherry away in the sideboard. These are normal activities. Things one does when someone drops by for an early-evening drink. She’s trying to stretch the illusion of normality till the last possible second. Maybe we both are.
The illusion of normality. That’s all it’s ever been. An illusion.
I take the proffered drink, the too-full glass of Harveys Bristol Cream, my hand shaking as I set it down on the table.
Now, and only now, do we dare to look at each other.
“Where do you want me to start?” she says, holding my gaze. It’s me who looks away first.
I stare at my hands in my lap, the raised veins. “The beginning seems as good a place as any.”
She nods. “But first, I need you to know that you and Alfie are the most important people in my life.”
“More important than Liz?”
She looks as shocked as if I’d just marched over and slapped her. “How can you even ask that?”
“Maybe it’s got something to do with the fact that she knows everything about you and I know nothing. You haven’t been lying to her for thirty-four years. Maybe that’s why.”
She brings her hands to her face—a prayerlike gesture, her fingertips meeting at the top of her nose—and rocks gently in her chair like an injured child. I’ve wounded her with my words, I know I have, but I can’t help it. Something cold and contained has lodged itself in my heart.
“Yes, Liz is the only one who knows the whole story. But that doesn’t mean she’s more important to me than you. You don’t love Michael more than Alfie, do you? Of course you don’t.”
My fingers curl into fists. How dare she bring Michael and Alfie into this? How dare she make comparisons between her life and mine?
“Liz believed in me. She was barely an adult when she started working at Gray Willow. It was her first job after college. It must have been a baptism of fire, walking into that place for the first time.”
She closes her eyes and leans back into her chair.
“Before I was released, Liz broke the rules and gave me a PO box address. She told me I could always get in touch with her if I needed her.
“And I did need her. I sent her letters. It was a risk, writing to her under my new name, giving her my address, but I trusted her. I’ve always been able to trust her. Liz was my touchstone. Still is.”
She breathes in, and her face softens for a moment. “All through that scary time when I was on my own, out there in the world where everyone I met, everywhere I went, there was always the danger of being discovered, Liz was there. In her letters. They were the only thing that kept me going. Until I met your father, of course.”
She leans forward and reaches for her drink. Takes a sip. “But I’ve jumped too far ahead. I was going to tell this story from the beginning. I need to go back. Back to where it started.”
“No, tell me about Dad first. Did he know? Did he know who you were?”
She turns to the wall. “I wanted to tell him, just like I wanted to tell you, when you were old enough to understand, but I couldn’t. I just couldn’t. Every time I tried to find the words, I lost my courage. I didn’t want to lose him, just like I didn’t want to lose you. Don’t want to lose you.”
“But he found out in the end.”
“Yes. And in the worst possible way. Hateful words painted on our front door. A rock through our window. All the neighbors standing outside screaming and shouting.”
I think of that picture. It must have been taken the day after, when we’d all been spirited away. In the ambulance I now realize must have been an unmarked van.
“Is that why he left us? Because of who you were? The other woman, the new family—were those more of your lies?”
“No! Yes. But not lies exactly. We had to come up with something to explain things.”
“We?”
“The small group of people who looked after me. Who look after me still. Keep me safe. Keep you safe. You and Alfie.”
I recoil. Hearing his name on her lips sounds all wrong. I don’t want him to be part of all this. It’s too much. I picture him now, at Karen’s. He’s probably watching a DVD with Hayley, or maybe she’s got him playacting a scene from Frozen. What I wouldn’t give to be back at home with him. He’s all I’ve got now. Him and Michael. The only two people in my life who are real. No, that’s not true. My dad was real.
“Did he have a choice about seeing me again?”
“He stayed for a bit.” She takes a breath. “There was this ex-cop I knew. Brian. He used to work for the feds as a handler for protected witnesses. He and Liz, they…they arranged things. We lived in a boarding house for a while, but it didn’t work. Your dad couldn’t deal with it. He said he still loved me, and of course he loved you, but things were never the same after that. How could they be? He did have the choice, though. He had the choice to stay with us and for all three of us to have new identities, or to leave and move away. Never to see us again.”
She looks at the wall again. “He chose to move away. He went to England. He had family there.”
My jaw aches from where I’ve been clenching it shut. Poor Dad. It must have been an impossible choice. Give up your whole identity—your job, all your relatives and friends—and stay with a woman you no longer know or trust, for the sake of your child; or move away and start again. Shove the whole sorry mess behind you. Part of me hates him for not staying, for not putting me first, but a bigger part understands. How could he love her after all those lies? How can I?
My phone buzzes in my bag. I pull it out. It’s a text from Michael: Are you ok? Do u want me to come in? Or go and get Alfie?
I tap out a reply: Can u get him? It’s Apt. 2A, The Regal. Take him home. Will call u later.
I glance at Mom. Her face is the color of putty and she’s drained her glass already. It’s going to be much, much later before I call. We’ve barely begun.
46
I SLIP THE PHONE BACK into my bag, wishing more than anything that I could be with Michael now. Picking Alfie up. Going home together. A normal evening. Instead of which I’m here, listening to my mother systematically dismantle my life.
“So Dad left and you decided to turn him into the monster instead. Well, thanks for that. Thanks for making me think he was a total bastard, that he didn’t love me enough to even keep in touch.”
All those broken promises. All the times I cried myself to sleep because Daddy was gone. None of it was true, was it? He couldn’t keep in touch. Once we had new identities, he wouldn’t have known where to find me.
“It was hard for me, too,” she says, her voice barely a whisper. “He was my husband, remember? I loved him. And how else could I have explained his absence? Would you rather I’d told you he was dead?”
“Maybe it would have been better, yes. For all I know, he might be dead now.”
“He isn’t.”
I force myself to swallow. My throat feels thick and swollen. “How do you know?” I lean forward, staring at her. “Do you know where he is?”
I’ve never wanted to know before. Never wanted anything to do with him. She saw to that. But it’s different now. This changes everything.
“No. But I’ve been told he’s alive and well and living somewhere in London.” She wrings her hands in her lap. “Not all of it was lies, Jo. He does have another family. Two daughters and a son.”
“What made you do it? What made you kill a little boy?” The words are harsh and jarring in the stillness of this ordinary room. “A little boy not much younger than your own grandson.”
She clutches her stomach as if she’s been shot. For a second or two I almost feel sorry for her. Almost, but not quite. How do I know what’s real anymore?
She stands and walks to the other side of the room. Rests her hands on the wall and hangs her head.
“When I talk about her,” she says, “about Sally, you have to understand that I’m talking about another person.”
She straightens up and returns to her chair. Folds herself back into it, her hands clasped around her knees.
“I suppose in some ways it’s like that for everyone, isn’t it? We change. Evolve. From one year to the next. One month. One week. Sometimes all it takes is a day. An hour. A minute.” She inhales deeply. “A second.”
All the time she’s been speaking she’s been staring into space. Now she squeezes her eyes shut, as if she’s trying not to see something. When she opens them again, they slide toward me. A fleeting glance.
