‘Alice, people are complicated beings. You will never truly know your mother’s side of things. I personally have never fully grasped why I am the way I am. Why I could never be happy. Why what I had wasn’t enough.’
I curl on her floor in a foetal ball, and she rests a hand on my hip. Just the sound of Evelyn’s voice is like cool ointment on a wound. ‘I think part of the reason I didn’t want to find him was in case it proved what I’d already thought – that he really didn’t care. I think it was plain fear. The fear of finding out for sure that I wasn’t worthy of being loved by my own blood parent.’
Justin had once hinted at this being at the root of my insecurity. I’d been horrified to think that my self-doubt was so transparent.
‘It’s a big thing to do. It’s something you have to be ready for. You can’t be pressured into it,’ Evelyn says. ‘Don’t focus on what you did or didn’t do. Just focus on what you can do now.’
‘Hmm . . . You’re a great one to give that advice, Evelyn!’
‘But I learnt from my mistakes, Alice! All that matters is what I’ve done about things, not that I let them nearly destroy me in the process. And you will do it all so differently.’
I swiped at tears. ‘I’m tired, Evelyn. I lost a husband and gained a father in such a minuscule time frame. It says something positive about life. But it’s taking some adjusting to, nonetheless.’
‘I think we should both try to get some rest. It’s been an emotional time.’
‘That’s the understatement of the century, isn’t it?’
She smiles. ‘You’re welcome to stay here tonight. The guest room is always made up.’
‘Thank you, Evelyn. I would like to stay the night. And thank you for something else.’
‘For what?’
‘For loving him the way you did. You’re an amazingly good woman. If it weren’t for you, I’d have assumed he was out there somewhere, maybe remarried, with another family – maybe another daughter whom he loved in my place. I’d never have known he was a lonely old man with dementia who would never remember me – not because he didn’t want to, but because he couldn’t help it. And the truth isn’t pretty, but it’s important. More important than what we choose to believe, and the reasons we choose to believe it.’
We are both too choked up to speak. People were wrong. Love wasn’t about never having to say you’re sorry. Love was forgiving. ‘I’m so pleased it was you that he loved.’ I take her hands in mine. ‘That he was lucky enough to have you love him. No matter how it turned out.’
‘And I’m so very pleased that he has a daughter as fine as you,’ she says.
THIRTY-NINE
‘I want to go somewhere loud and crazy and fun!’ I say to Sally as we trot down the Quayside’s cobbled path from the restaurant, looking for a bar to have a nightcap.
‘Okay.’ She hiccups from dinner. She’s a little drunk. It’s amazing how keen she is to go out at night now suddenly. Or perhaps she’s just being a good friend.
We go into the one bar that has people spilling out on to the road. ‘Just to finish what we were saying,’ Sally says, as we order a drink. ‘Maybe your mother sent you your father, given you lost her and you lost Alan. You know . . . if the dead can affect the lives of the living. Maybe she sent him because she knew you’d lost Justin and you needed a silver lining.’
‘Maybe,’ I say, rather than brush it off. I suppose it costs nothing to think positively about the situation, but far more to think negatively. Evelyn would no doubt approve.
‘Anyway, on another topic . . . I meant to tell you, there’s a nurse. A male nurse. At the care home . . .’ I’m only saying this because I’m drunk. ‘I quite like him.’
Sally looks blown over by a feather. ‘Oh my God! Alice has got a new man already!’ She raises a brandy glass. ‘I wouldn’t have thought that even you could manage that so fast.’
‘I’ve not managed anything! I’m not interested in him! Not like that! I just . . . I like him.’
She grins. ‘I think those are two of the same thing! But go on . . . What’s he like? Describe.’
It’s just mindless conversation. ‘Hmm . . . He’s kind of, well, Italian. Or, half Italian—’
‘Which half?’
‘His father.’
‘Thank God.’
‘He looks a bit like a young Mark Ruffalo—’
Sally’s eyebrows shoot up. ‘So he’s one of the sexiest men on earth?’
‘That might be a stretch,’ I chuckle. ‘But he’s got nice eyes. Big, kind, brown and soulful.’ I can see them right now. ‘And he’s funny, in a dry kind of way. He’s not particularly tidy. He’s got loads of sisters. A warm personality. I love the tender way he treats Eddy, and he seems a little in love with Evelyn, which is cute.’ I sigh.
‘You’re crazy about him and you don’t yet know it!’
‘Oh! I knew I shouldn’t have said anything! You’ve got the wrong idea. Completely.’
‘There’s nothing wrong with having someone else lined up. He sounds charming.’
‘He’s four years younger than me. He is charming. And he’s not lined up.’
‘Uh-oh.’ Sally makes a thumbs-down gesture. ‘A toy boy!’
I know when I’m being teased. I take a sip of her drink, mainly because I’ve finished my own. ‘If anything is to happen, it won’t be for a very long time. I know you think I bounce back fast, but this time’s different. My heart is still very confused. But it gets a tiny bit less confused every day. I suppose the good thing is, despite what I said about being back with Justin and making it work with his baby, I’m not sure I’m cut out for that, to be honest – even if it were an option. To be with a man while his ex hovers on the periphery of our lives . . . And even on the topic of children, I do want to have one of my own – if I can. When I said it didn’t matter and we could adopt, I think I lied. I mean, I think it was just desperation talking.’
I draw breath. This is new insight into myself. I’m gaining it as I speak.
‘And all this is to say . . . ?’