When she looked at the sad page, devoid of any real baby photographs, she longed for the day when she might be able to replace the blue rabbits with real photographs of her son.
By the end, by the last page where the blue rabbits danced, Barry was crying. They were both crying. Mira had forgotten what it felt like to have a lightness in her soul.
‘I’m so sorry,’ he said.
‘You have nothing to be sorry about.’
They sat in silence for some time.
Barry asked, ‘Do you want me to cancel the lads?’
‘No, no, off you go. You deserve some fun,’ she said, closing the album, realising the time.
She took the album back to the dining room, where it would be safe.
When she returned to the lounge, Barry sat staring at the blank screen.
‘If you stay in, I’ve got control of the remote!’ she threatened.
‘In that case, I’m off,’ he laughed, leaping up and pecking her on the cheek. ‘As long as you’re all right.’
‘I’ve never felt better,’ she said, truthfully.
But Barry took ages to leave the house. He was fumbling around in the hallway, stomping up and down the stairs, opening and closing cupboards and drawers, until finally the house fell silent.
* * *
On the way out to the shed, she passed the dining room and noticed through the open door that a white DL envelope had been neatly placed on top of her album.
She moved closer.
The Post-it said, Forgive me.
Alarmed, she picked it up and popped her head out of the room, double-checking she had in actual fact heard Barry leave.
‘Barry? What’s this?’
There was no reply.
In her hand, the envelope sat, tatty and yellowed. The flap to close it was no longer stuck down. The handwriting on the front was unfamiliar. Everything about it was disconcerting.
She tucked it into the pocket of her wax jacket and traipsed outside into the cold.
The key was stiff in the lock.
Inside, the window was mottled with intricate, feathery ice motifs.
She slipped her worn fingerless gloves over her trembling hands, then put her reading glasses on and pulled out the letter.
A photograph fluttered out onto the floor and her heart stopped beating. She couldn’t pick it up to look at it closely yet. The letter was shaking in her fingers. The rest of the world spun away into oblivion. Every ounce of her being was directed at the words in front of her.
May 7th, 2005
Dear Mira,
I hope you don’t mind me calling you Mira. It didn’t seem right to call you Miss Waters. Or maybe you are married now?
It is my birthday today, as I am sure you, of all people, remember. Or at least I hope you do.
Since I turned eighteen, it has taken me many years to pluck up the courage to write to you. I found your address from the Adoption Contact Register. Thank you for adding your details.
If you would be interested to meet me, I would really like to meet you. My telephone number is: 0207 224 5678.
Best wishes,
Oliver Ivory
* * *
Mira read it over and over and over again.
The door rattled open.
‘Hello Mrs E,’ Rosie whispered, rubbing her hands up and down her arms to warm herself.
Mira glanced over at Rosie by the door, as if she had always been there, as if her presence was inconsequential. She bent down to pick up the photograph and her chest seized up with love. That face. His face. The face of the baby she had seen hanging from the midwife’s hands, high in the air above her splayed legs like a newborn king.
‘Who’s that?’ Rosie asked.
‘That’s my baby boy,’ Mira rasped, holding it out for Rosie to see.
‘Oh! He’s soooo cute!’
‘He’s called Oliver Ivory.’
‘So he wrote to you?’
‘He did!’ Mira cried, as though confirming a miracle.
‘Now do you believe in unicorns?’
‘I do!’ Mira grabbed hold of Rosie and hugged her with joy in her heart.
Then Rosie began to chatter away on Mira’s lap, while Mira’s brain was working overtime, charging ahead to when she would call Oliver Ivory. Oliver Ivory! What a good name. She was thinking about where it would be best to meet him. In London? Or would it be cosier at home? She would bake a cake for him. Thirty-four cakes for every birthday she had missed!
She read the letter again, admiring how flamboyant his handwriting was, with his long ys and curly fs.
And then, for the first time she noted the date.
2005. 2005? That didn’t make sense. It can’t have taken eleven years to reach her.
‘Mrs E?’
‘What?’ Mira snapped.
‘I was telling you about my movie roll.’
‘Were you, pet?’ Mira said, looking at the date on the letter again, trying to find any other explanation than the one she liked least.
‘I learnt it in drama club. Like when you clap your hands in front of the other actor’s face, it sounds like they are being slapped, or when you hit here, like this,’ Rosie said, thumping her chest, ‘and it sounds like you have punched someone in the stomach.’
‘That sounds nice.’
‘But it wasn’t nice! I rolled so fast I hit my head on the wall.’
‘Silly girl. Now, I’m so sorry, Rosie Rabbit, but I’m going to have to go.’
Rosie looked crestfallen. It couldn’t be helped, thought Mira brusquely.
‘But what about my hot chocolate?’
‘I know. Why don’t you stay here and make it yourself. You’re old enough now, aren’t you? There’s the chocolate powder,’ Mira said, handing her the tub and clicking on the kettle. ‘Wait for it to click off before you pour it.’
Mira scooped up the photograph and letter and slipped them back into her pocket.
‘See you soon, Rosie Rabbit.’
Flustered, Mira shut the shed door and locked it with the key, as it was her automatic habit, and slowly made her way, shed keys dangling, across the crispy lawn. The timing of Barry’s discovery of this letter was incredible. The coincidence was uncanny: just as he finds out about her son, he finds a long-lost letter from him. Perhaps he found it lodged under the matt when he was sweeping up today. Perhaps he stumbled upon it in the pocket of an old suit jacket, forgotten about, unopened. Barry could not have hidden this letter from her for eleven years. Could he? He wasn’t capable of such deception. It was inconceivable. He loved and respected her. There was no way he could have betrayed her with such a foul duplicity.
* * *
When Barry finally got home, Mira was waiting for him in the kitchen. She had the letter in front of her on the table.
He stumbled in, coughing, steaming drunk.
She waited for him to notice her there.
Seeing her, he stopped, stock still, his jacket hanging limply from one arm.
‘Come sit down,’ she said.
Dutifully, he wove to the table and slumped in a chair.
The fumes coming off him made her eyes water.
She smoothed her hand over the letter. ‘Tell me you didn’t hide this from me for eleven years.’
Barry’s sluggish muscles tried to form words from his lips, but failed.
He put his head in his hands. ‘You lied to me,’ he slurred.
‘So you punished me?’
‘No, no, no, no,’ he repeated, swinging his head back and forth. ‘I hid it from you to protect you.’
Mira’s whole world tilted. ‘No, I won’t believe it.’
‘You were the one who wanted to keep him a secret. I rrrr… respected that,’ he stammered. He raised his head. His eyes were swimming. ‘I love you,’ he whined.
‘If you loved me, you’d never have held this back from me,’ Mira murmured, in disbelief, amazed by his warped logic.
‘But I thought you didn’t want to remember.’
The magnitude of his misapprehension began to hit her. He was right, in one way. Until the album, until Rosie, she had not wanted to remember. Not more than a split second, in case the trauma of remembering obliterated her. She looked at him, impassively. He had known her better than she had given him credit for. For eleven years he had been living with the secret she had smuggled into their marriage, and he had accepted it. More than that, he had lived with it in his heart, as though sharing it unconsciously was enough, that keeping it might protect her from it. It had been a misguided act of love.