What I hadn’t known at the time was that Mum was pregnant. Dad told me he had been utterly torn. That’s if the baby had been his, of course.
Karma intervened. Mum lost the baby, though it was some time before I found out about any of it. At thirty-seven, they had classed her as having a geriatric pregnancy. She’d have loved that label. She already hated being seen as someone with a sixteen-year-old daughter. However, I could imagine her relishing the prospect of wiping me out of her life completely, and being seen as the mother of a new baby instead.
When I later heard she had lost the baby, I can’t say I wasn’t relieved – no doubt she would have treated another kid like she had treated me. Unless it had been a boy. She has never tired of telling me she had wanted a boy whilst pregnant with me. She hadn’t even thought of a girl’s name. I was supposed to be Paul David. Maybe that’s another reason she would never allow me to have long hair or wear dresses as I was growing up.
I didn’t see either of them again until I was twenty-two. Dad made several efforts to contact me in between time, but I ignored him.
For a while, I didn’t even see my grandmother - I didn’t want her to see me in the state I was in. I didn’t know what planet I was on half the time and getting off my face was all that mattered. Luckily, by the time I had cleaned myself up in 2007, I still had a few years which I could spend with Grandma. I moved in with her for her last few months, to nurse her. I’ll always cherish that time.
She never forgave Dad for what she called his cowardice and hated Mum with a passion. When she died in 2011, it had been seven years since she had seen either of them. They tried, especially towards the end, but she was having none of it. Hence, she left me nearly everything she had, and only left Dad fifty thousand pounds. She had clearly done her homework and must have known this gift would prevent him from being able to contest her will, even if he had wanted to.
The relationship he had lost with his mum, and guilt about me, both contributed to Dad’s depression. And though I have never asked him this question, I bet if anyone were to say to him, have you ever felt truly happy being married to Maggie, his answer would be no.
I look back at my phone. People have already been commenting on the Facebook funeral announcement. That’s soon… thanks for letting us know… let me know if you need any help with anything… let’s give him a good send off, etc. Then I notice a Val Turner has clicked ‘like.’
Val Turner. I click through to her page and scan her ‘about’ information. Married to James Turner. Bingo. She certainly looks a different woman to the glamourous, model-type, stood outside a huge house, in the photographs which Rob had previously forwarded to me. Her page isn’t locked up, like her husband’s is. I scroll down. There’s a picture of her, possibly on holiday, with him in the background, at a holiday park in Blackpool. The tower is in the background.
Blackpool, for goodness sake - a far cry from the luxurious villa in the French Riviera, which had also been alluded to. I scroll down some more. Val Turner has posted pictures of dog after dog, and it becomes clear that she runs a small dog grooming business from a shed in her back garden. I can see the modest two-up, two-down behind her and a van in the driveway. Funny looking mansion and Porsche.
If James Turner and his wife are so loaded from his so-called investments, there’s no sign of it. I wonder for a moment if it’s even the same person. There’s a picture of them, on a night out, in what looks like some sort of club. He’s there, clear as a bell, balding and paunchy. I click through to James Turner to check. Yes, it’s him alright. What’s going on? They’ve had three hundred and seventy-five grand of our money, and there’s no sign of it.
I’m relieved to find an address for Klipper’s Grooming Services, there on her Facebook business page. I pull on my usual jeans and t-shirt, grab a banana and a bottle of water from the kitchen and head out towards the Jeep.
I momentarily wonder where Dad might have got to. He should have been back by now, but then decide I need to set off before he comes back. He will only try to stop me if he finds out where I am going. He will tell me to leave the police to do their jobs without my interference.
It seems I’m easy pickings for the police, and I will be surprised if they’ve even bothered to try to contact James Turner, or Rob’s bitch of an ex-wife yet. Perhaps it’s less of a drain on their resources to pin it on me.
If I get on my way now, I can be in Manchester inside an hour and a half. This might be the only way I see my money again. I type the address into my sat nav and ignore the warning voice that nags inside my mind. You’re going to make things worse. It’s as though I’m developing a split personality as I reply to myself - how on earth can anything get any worse?
A loud beep and a screech make me gasp as I find myself in the centre of the road. Shit. I’ve overshot the junction. I’ve been so deep in my thoughts; I haven’t been paying attention. Thank God the other driver was. I reverse back into the junction
