Grace, page 28
‘Yes, I’m going out like this,’ she said, too tired to pander to Piers and his views on female clothing. She was wearing the tunic Rachel had bought her, and in a brief moment of inspiration that morning, she’d tied an old purple scarf around her new red bob, with a large bow at the top. She’d also put on a small amount of makeup – just some lipstick, blusher and mascara – as she’d found the colour in the material had made her face look far too pale. She felt good in this outfit. So good, she’d even smiled at herself briefly in the mirror as she had applied the makeup.
‘Tell me again who paid for this… outfit?’ he said. ‘Was it that Jake guy?’
‘No, Piers, it was Rachel. You know that.’
‘And she doesn’t want you to pay her back?’
‘No.’
‘I wonder what she wants, then?’ he said, his presence looming over her from the top step.
‘She doesn’t want anything, Piers.’
‘Why don’t I give you the money, and you can pay her back?’
‘You don’t need to do that.’
‘I can’t have people thinking I can’t afford to support my wife,’ he said. ‘Can I?’
‘No one knows she bought it, Piers. Come on. Be sensible.’
‘Fine. Whatever. So where are you going?’
‘To the Priory. I thought I’d take Dad to a social club thing there.’
Piers was silent for a few seconds. Even he couldn’t find anything bad to say about that, she thought.
‘Okay.’
‘What are you going to do while I’m gone?’ She was beginning to wonder what he was doing for all of those hours in his study.
‘I’m going to write a letter to those bloody social workers,’ he said. ‘And their bosses. I will not be treated like this. They have used us, Amelia. They’ve used us as bloody foster parents. They probably knew that this was a possibility all along.’
Of course social services had known that, thought Amelia. They had both known that too. It had said so in all of the literature, admittedly as a small caveat. But they had both, to various degrees, chosen to ignore it.
‘Okay. But don’t send it yet, please? I’d like to read it,’ she said.
Piers raised his eyes to the ceiling.
‘If I must, I’ll wait. What time are you coming back?’
‘Oh, in a couple of hours, I suppose.’
‘You’re not going to go gallivanting off for coffee with one of your new friends afterwards, then?’
Amelia thought of Rachel. She wished she could be heading off to meet her. She desperately needed to talk to someone about how she felt. And unfortunately, that person definitely wasn’t Piers. She decided to send her a text and let her know she needed a chat as soon as she’d managed to leave the flat.
‘No, Piers, I’m going to take Dad out, that’s all. I’ll be back as soon as I can. Are you going to be okay while I’m gone? I know that this is… hard.’
Amelia saw Piers soften.
‘Look, Amelia, sorry… I am finding this all very difficult. I’m sure you are, too. What with Leila, and now this… Go on with you, go and have a trip out, and I’ll see you later, yeah? I have some work I need to do, anyway. And I’ll draft that letter. But I won’t send it yet, I promise.’
Amelia was relieved. She really didn’t want to go out after they’d had a row; it took hours to bring Piers back from the brink when he got angry. It was why she always tried so hard to avoid it.
‘Okay,’ she said, taking hold of the buggy, which was parked at the bottom of the stairs. ‘So I’ll see you later, yes?’
‘Yes. Don’t rush back. Enjoy yourself,’ he said, managing something approximating a smile. ‘Say hi to your father for me.’
*
‘Are you sure this is going to be my sort of thing?’ said Amelia’s father as she pulled into one of the disabled parking bays outside Malvern Priory.
‘Well, Dad, given that it turns out you’ve started to attend church every week, perhaps you could tell me?’
Amelia hadn’t meant her statement to sound so accusatory, but she had little patience today for her father’s complaints and obfuscations. There was a short silence, during which Amelia focused on the steady, sleepy breaths of Grace in the car seat behind her and not on her father, whose breathing was still very laboured and who had a guilty expression on his face.
‘Yes,’ he said, finally. ‘How did you find that out? I have started attending Evensong occasionally. For the music.’
Amelia’s upbringing had been entirely, resolutely atheist, with trips to school chapel maintained strictly for appearance’s sake. The idea of her father attending church, proper church, regularly, and not telling her, had unsettled her. And she found his excuse incredibly dubious.
‘It doesn’t matter how I found out, does it? So – just the music, then?’
‘Well, yes, I love choral music. I always have. And also, I love the building. I have always loved it, you know that. All those school services, all of those years here, with your mother…’
‘Oh, Dad.’
‘Anyway,’ he said, opening his door. ‘Let’s get this over with.’
It’s a social club for pensioners, Dad, not your bloody execution, Amelia thought, as she opened her own door and lifted Grace out of her car seat and into her buggy. Then she offered her father her arm, which he took in preference, she knew, to the only other options – a walking frame or a wheelchair.
‘Now, I think it’s over here, just to the left,’ she said, as they entered the church, their pace glacial. She looked down the aisle and saw a group of people sitting around small trestle tables, drinking hot drinks from mismatched china and munching on slices of cake. ‘Yes, here we are, Dad,’ she said. ‘Do you recognise anybody?’
She looked around at the group of pensioners seated in front of her. They were at least seventy per cent female, but there was a smattering of men amongst them, some of whom were playing cards together. Amelia looked at her father’s anxious face and searched around for the face of someone who might be in charge. Then she lighted upon a woman in her late fifties, with sleek brown hair. She was wearing a striking red knitted dress and black boots. She was definitely, definitely not a pensioner, thought Amelia.
‘Excuse me,’ she asked. ‘My father is new here. Is there somewhere he can sit?’
‘Oh, of course,’ said the woman. ‘Yes. Apologies, I should have come over as soon as you arrived. How rude of me.’ The woman looked towards Amelia’s father and smiled. ‘Hello, my name is Gillian. I think I recognise you, but you’ll have to excuse me, I can’t quite remember your name.’
Amelia looked at her father, who she could see was wrestling with a desire to bolt out of there as soon as possible, mixed with a desire to please this woman, who was both good looking and charming.
‘I’m… David,’ he said. ‘David Darke.’
‘Well David, you are very welcome here. As it’s your first time, how about I come over to sit with you, while I introduce you to one of our other gentlemen? I think Derryck would love to chat.’
Amelia watched as the charming, persuasive woman managed the impossible and led her father through the crowd to a spare seat on the far side. When he’d sat down, the woman, Gillian, gave her the thumbs up. Amelia knew that the session lasted an hour; that was one whole hour of peace away from the flat, one whole hour of time to think. She decided to go and take a seat at the back of the church, hoping that Grace would remain asleep for as long as possible. She needed to silence the many different voices in her head.
She walked up to the font, and selected a seat on the far side, near a pillar. She parked Grace next to her, checking as she did so that she had all the equipment she needed if Grace needed a feed. Reassured that she did, she sat back in the pew, and closed her eyes.
Please, please, please let me keep Grace. I have failed at so much. Please let me succeed at this, at least. I’m only just beginning to learn how to do everything properly. And please, please let us both cope with this period of uncertainty. We have been through more than enough already.
Shit, she thought, I’m praying again. What on earth is wrong with me?
‘Hello.’
Peace, it seemed, continued to elude her. She opened her eyes and saw that Mark, the organist, was standing next to her. ‘Oh I’m so sorry, I didn’t mean to disturb. I just saw you there, and thought I’d say hi,’ he said. ‘And I wondered what you thought of the carol service?’
‘Oh goodness, that feels like a lifetime ago,’ she said, rubbing her eyes. ‘But it was lovely, yes.’
‘I played a piece for you. Well, for Grace, really. I wasn’t sure if you’d spotted it or not.’
Amelia looked at him blankly.
‘Obviously not,’ he said, laughing nervously. ‘Oh well, ha… I have to practise, so…’
‘I’m sorry,’ said Amelia, recovering herself. ‘I didn’t mean to be rude. I’m just having a shit day. Sorry, make that week. Year. Please do tell me. Do you want to take a seat?’
Mark looked awkward at this suggestion, she thought, but he nodded and sat a few feet away on the same pew, as if she had a disease that might be catching.
‘Ah well, I changed the voluntary, to something written by Grace – Harvey Grace, that is. A tribute to the little one, if you will. As she seems to be a fan of organ music.’
‘How lovely,’ said Amelia, feeling her throat tighten and then tears begin to fall.
‘I’m so sorry, I didn’t mean to make you cry…’ he said, still rooted to his spot on the pew, his hands wringing.
‘No, no, don’t worry, I think anything would set me off at the moment. It feels nice, actually, in a way, to cry. I have spent the past week in a kind of hell, where I felt like someone had stabbed me in the chest, left the knife in, and then kept twisting it every few minutes. I haven’t even been able to scream in pain yet, because it isn’t over.’
‘Oh golly, that sounds bad. Do you want me to go? Or should I stay?’
Amelia looked up at him. He had a kind face, a friendly face. Perhaps he would be someone she could tell.
‘Please stay,’ she said. ‘If you’re not in a rush?’
‘Oh no, I have all morning,’ he said. ‘Hours.’
‘Good,’ she said, almost laughing. ‘Hopefully it won’t take that long.’
‘So, what is it?’ he asked. ‘I mean you don’t have to go into detail if you don’t want to, I don’t want to pry.’
‘No, it’s okay. It’s nice to talk about it, actually,’ she said, reaching into the baby changing bag for a tissue. ‘The thing is,’ she said, blowing her nose, ‘Grace isn’t really mine. I mean, I’m looking after her legally, but I’m fostering her, fostering with the intention of adopting her.’
‘I see…’
‘Piers and I waited a good year on the adoption waiting list to be matched with Grace, after years of trying and failing to have a child of our own. We were told that there was almost no chance that her birth parents would contest the adoption order, and that she’d be ours in a matter of months. But on Monday…’ she wiped her nose again, ‘… on Monday, we were told that the mother, the birth mother, is contesting. She’s going to go to court to try to get her back.’
‘Oh, I see.’
‘And so she might… she might be taken from us,’ she said. ‘And I can’t bear it…’ A further wave of sobs took her over, and Mark waited patiently for her to regain her composure, before saying anything more.
‘Well, that is absolutely shit, isn’t it,’ said Mark. Amelia looked up at him, surprised to hear such an apparently mild-mannered man swear. ‘I don’t think there’s much I can say, except I’m truly sorry. If that happens, she will clearly miss out on being brought up by a lovely woman.’
‘You don’t know that,’ she said. ‘You don’t know anything about me.’
‘You really don’t remember me, do you?’ he said.
‘I’m sorry, I…’ Amelia’s head snapped up.
‘I was at your school, for a bit. For a few years, from the GCSE year until A-level.’
‘Oh God, were you? I’m so sorry.’
‘That’s okay. I was a lot fatter then. With lots of spots.’ Amelia looked at him and decided that he wasn’t joking.
‘I have always remembered you, because you were so kind.’
‘Was I?’
‘Yes. When I arrived, you made sure that I knew where lunch was served, where the lockers were, that sort of thing. You anticipated what I’d need to know, and you told me, so I wasn’t embarrassed. And I’ve never forgotten that.’
Amelia searched her memory for a boy who looked a bit like Mark, and eventually lighted on a quiet, podgy, tall shy boy who she’d seen occasionally in Physics, Music and English. Ah yes, she remembered him now; he was a musical wunderkind. The school had boasted loudly of his achievements. How could she have forgotten him? But then of course, the man sitting next to her now was twenty years older, about five stone lighter and had clear skin. And his blond hair, once divided into two enormous floppy curtains, was now kept relatively short and peppered with grey.
‘Oh God yes, I do remember you now. I’m so sorry. I must seem so bloody rude, and also, incredibly self-absorbed.’
‘Don’t be silly. It was years ago. And we were hardly friends.’
‘I feel like an idiot. Sorry.’
‘Please, don’t be sorry. I only told you because I wanted you to know why I’m so confident you’ll be a great parent.’
‘If… she stays,’ said Amelia, her face full of grief.
‘Yes,’ he said. ‘But even if she goes, think what an amazing start you’re giving her. You’ll always have been her mummy for this period, won’t you? Whatever happens.’
Amelia looked at Mark with renewed interest. She was suddenly incredibly glad she’d invited him to stay and talk to her.
‘Yes,’ she replied. ‘Yes. Thank you.’
‘If there’s anything I can do, you know, just let me know,’ he said. ‘I’m boringly available. I don’t have any responsibilities, except for the church services and a few lessons. I can provide a willing ear whenever. Or potentially, really badly made, cheap coffee? I live in college accommodation, near the playing fields. Look,’ he said, reaching into his pocket, ‘here’s my number,’ he handed over a business card. ‘I have these in case I come across any middle-class parents with aspirations to make their children organists,’ he said, with a smile. The card read: ‘Mark Monvid, organist and organ teacher.’
Mark Monvid. Yes. That was his name, she thought. She was so embarrassed that she hadn’t recognised him. It was not as if she’d been one of the cool kids at school – she had probably been just one step up the ladder from Mark. Or probably, not even that.
‘Thank you,’ she said. ‘I really appreciate that.’
‘Any time,’ he replied, standing up. ‘Right, I need to go and practise now. We’ve a wedding on Saturday, and they are determined that they want a rendering of Ed Sheeran’s “Galway Girl” as the bride walks down the aisle. Should be interesting, on the organ,’ he said.
Amelia smiled. He was a funny guy, Mark. Why hadn’t she noticed that at school? It made her wonder who else she’d missed out on over the years when she hadn’t been paying attention. She watched as he ambled down the side aisle towards the organ loft, his weight balanced slightly too much on the balls of his feet, his satchel swinging by his side. And when he disappeared behind a small door, she switched her attention to the other corner of the church, where her father was – she hoped – still enjoying some company.
She stood up and unlocked the buggy and pushed it over to the area where the social club was meeting. As she did so, however, Grace woke up and began to wail. Amelia frowned. She had only meant to check up on her dad – the club had twenty minutes to go yet. But now the entirety of the social club – or at least, those who actually wore their hearing aids – were staring at her. She felt a rush of heat in her face, and began frantically pushing the buggy back and forth, simultaneously searching her pockets for Grace’s dummy.
‘Oh, poor thing,’ said the woman who’d greeted her earlier – Gillian, she thought her name was. She was standing a few feet away, serving cake to a lady with a very neat top-bun. She had the look of a retired ballet dancer.
‘She’s hungry, I think,’ replied Amelia. ‘Or maybe just tired…’
‘I meant you,’ said Gillian. ‘You, poor thing, having to hang around here with an anxious baby. Look. Shall I get one of the volunteers to run your father home? He’s having a good time, I think…’
Amelia looked over to where her father was sitting. He seemed to be engaged in a very intense game of cards with two other men. Her father was laughing. It had been years since she’d last seen him laugh out loud. Despite her concern about the noise Grace was generating, she was mesmerised.
‘Yes…’
‘We drive several of them home. We have a minibus. It’s no bother.’
‘Really?’ asked Amelia, keen to get Grace out of the church and also keen to give her father a little more time doing something he was obviously enjoying.
‘Of course. Look, give me your number, and I’ll text you later to let you know he’s home safely.’
Amelia followed Gillian over to a small table where she put her number on a signing in and out sheet, next to her father’s name.
‘Lovely,’ said Gillian. ‘I’ll ask your father if he wants a lift here next week, too? Will spare you the bother?’
‘That would be great. Thank you.’
Amelia nodded her thanks and waved at her father, who waved back absent-mindedly before returning to his game. Then Amelia pushed the still-screaming baby back up the aisle and out of the church, where she sat on a bench under a huge oak tree and fed a very hungry Grace a bottle.
Once she was fed, Amelia took a deep breath, packed up their things and headed for the car. She didn’t particularly want to head home already, but she realised that there was little point putting off the inevitable. Piers was clearly going through another difficult patch, and he would need a lot of support and understanding, and she’d just have to muster it from somewhere. He would never tell anyone else how he was feeling, and that felt like a huge weight for her to carry. But carry it she must.
