‘Well, it should,’ I said.
I didn’t manage to persuade Rosie to come with me, but she did help me find a florist that was stocking sunflowers in pots that didn’t look half dead. When I took it home, Mum watered it and set it on the kitchen counter.
‘Rosie thinks it’s weird,’ I said, looking at the yellow petals, even brighter against the cream kitchen tiles.
‘Taking Suzanne flowers?’ Mum asked.
I nodded. ‘It would be better if we were both going.’
‘It’s a lovely thing to do,’ Mum said. ‘And I think it means even more that you’re prepared to go by yourself.’
I was trying to remind myself of this as I walked to Suzanne’s the following afternoon, carrying the sunflower in one hand and the gift bag in the other. I kept imagining turning up on the doorstep and both Sarah and Suzanne craning their necks, looking for Rosie behind me. Twice I almost turned around and went home.
It looked like the lights were all off in the flat, even though it was just starting to get dark. I was instantly seized by paranoia – what if they weren’t even there?
Thankfully, Sarah opened the door almost as soon as I knocked. When she saw me, her eyes widened in surprise. And then an odd expression passed over her face, a strange kind of smile, almost like she was about to cry.
‘Caddy,’ she said. ‘Caddy and a sunflower.’
‘Hi,’ I said. I could feel my face going red. ‘Um . . . I just wanted to bring Suzanne her presents. And say happy birthday.’
She smiled properly then. A big, friendly smile. ‘How lovely. That’s really lovely.’ She took a step back and gestured for me to come in. ‘I can’t promise you’ll be able to see Suzanne though,’ she added, closing the door.
‘That’s fine,’ I said quickly. ‘I can just leave this here. But I thought it was . . . worth a try, you know?’
‘If you want to come into the kitchen, I’ll go and see how she’s feeling. Do you want something to drink?’
‘No, I’m fine, thanks,’ I set the sunflower down on the kitchen counter.
Sarah hesitated in the doorway, as if about to say something else, then smiled again and left the room. I glanced at some of the papers on the counter – all recipes for chocolate truffle cake – and then the small pile of cards that had been left, undisplayed, on the windowsill. I managed to contain my nosiness for about thirty seconds.
There were six cards in total. A standard niece card from Sarah; a dogs-dressed-like-the-Beatles card from Brian; three general sixteenth-birthday cards from names I didn’t recognize. The final card said daughter on the front. I really did hesitate this time, knowing I shouldn’t look, but my hand reached out anyway and flipped the card open. ‘To Suzanne’, the handwriting read, ‘from Mum and Dad’. The card’s text said ‘Happy Birthday’. The card didn’t even have a ‘16’ on it.
My stomach felt queasy. I turned the card over, as if I was expecting to see a proper message on the back. Was that really it? The most basic of daughter birthday cards? It was almost worse than nothing at all.
I heard footsteps in the hall and I turned quickly, pushing the cards back into place, hoping to see Suzanne. But it wasn’t her, and by Sarah’s face I knew it wouldn’t be later either.
‘I don’t think it’s a good idea,’ she said. ‘I’m sorry.’
‘Does she know I’m here?’ I asked, just to check.
‘She’s asleep,’ Sarah said. ‘And I don’t really want to wake her up. It’s been a tough couple of days.’
I hesitated, then reached out my hand to touch the cards. ‘Was it . . . ?’ I let the sentence linger.
‘You saw the card?’ Sarah sighed and came over, reaching straight for the daughter card. ‘Quite something, isn’t it?’ She looked angry, and she was shaking her head. ‘I’d have ripped it up before she saw it, if I’d got to it first.’
She turned the card over in her hands, exhaled again and put it back. ‘She took it hard,’ she said quietly. ‘I think she’d got her hopes up for more than this.’
‘Was there any present?’ I asked, almost afraid of the answer.
‘Yes,’ Sarah said, her expression grim. ‘A bank transfer.’
‘Oh,’ I said. ‘Well, that’s something.’
‘Yes,’ Sarah said. ‘It’s something.’ She paused, looking at me. Then, gently, she asked, ‘What did your parents give you for your sixteenth?’
I thought about the comically oversized card shaped like a cupcake, my beloved laptop, the silver bracelet, the whole bunch of new clothes. My mother had stuck a photo of me as a baby in the card and written underneath: ‘16 years of joy!’
After a silence, Sarah reached for the gift bag I realized I was still holding. ‘I’ll tell her you came by as soon as she wakes up.’
‘I could come right back if she wants me to,’ I heard myself say.
A smile spread across her face. ‘You’re very sweet.’
‘I just want to make it better,’ I said, feeling helpless.
Sarah didn’t reply. She didn’t need to. I knew what she was thinking, because I was thinking it too. It looped in my head as I walked back home.