Love Always

I find that al my fear of saying these things I’ve never wanted to say has gone. Al the thoughts I’ve been bottling up over the past weeks, over the past thirty years. ‘That’s rubbish!’ My voice is loud, harsh. ‘You’re always trying to be horrible about Granny. Al she ever tried to do was look after you.’

Mum gives a weird shriek, something between laughter and hysteria. ‘Her? Look after me! Oh, that’s a joke.’ She shakes her head. ‘Yes, that’s funny.’ She stops. She looks at a nail and cautiously bites the edge of it. Then she mutters something to herself, something I can’t hear.

‘Octavia said I should ask Guy,’ I say calmly. ‘She says he knows what happened.’

My mother is pul ing a smooth ribbon of her hair through her long fingers. She stops at this and laughs. ‘Guy again?’ She bites her lip. ‘Oh, he’s everywhere now, isn’t he? He’s real y crawled out of the woodwork! Go on, ask away! I’d be interested to see what he has to say for himself.’

‘What does that mean?’

She is speaking so fast she can’t quite get the words out. ‘Listen to me, Nat, darling. In al this, there’s no one I hate more than Guy Leighton.’

‘Oh, come on, Mum—’

Her eyes are burning. ‘He’s ful of shit, always has been, and he hides behind some kind of nice-guy liberalism – I sel antiques, I live in Islington, I like Umbria more than fucking Tuscany.’ She is almost spitting, and the red spots on her cheeks are spreading. ‘He’s fake. He’s worse than the Bowler Hat. At least you know the Bowler Hat’s a lazy fucking right-wing lech. Guy’s worse. He’s the biggest hypocrite of the lot.’ Her expression is twisted and her face is ugly. ‘I’m the one in this family that everyone hates and you know why? Because it’s easier to hate me than look any deeper at them. She slipped, the path was slippery, fine, it wasn’t my fault. But I stil saw it. I saw her die, and she was my sister, and it ruined my life. No one understands that.’

I don’t know what to say to her, she’s so ful of self-righteous anger. She has that quality that a lot of people like her have in spades: I have to be right. Suddenly I find my courage. ‘Stop feeling sorry for yourself, Mum,’ I say. ‘Start taking responsibility for things.’

She bares her teeth at me and lifts her head slightly. And she looks at me with such naked contempt I almost step back. This woman is a stranger, I don’t know her. ‘Oh, you were always a self-righteous little prig, Natasha, even when you were little,’ she says clearly, an edge of cold anger in her voice. ‘God, I loathe that about you. Al this – it’s just so you can have a go at me, accuse me of being a bad mother and blame me for your own little life going off the rails. Isn’t it?’ And then her eyes fil with tears. ‘It’s been hard for me,’ she says. ‘You don’t know what it’s like. They al hated me.’

‘Oh, Mum, they didn’t.’ I am sick of this play-acting. ‘No one hated you. You just . . .’ I trail off, I don’t know what to say. You’re just not very nice?

You’re a bad person?

‘Mummy hated me, Cecily hated me.’ Her voice is rising, whining like a dog’s, and it’s horrible. She moves towards me and I step back again.

‘I was al on my own, with a baby, for years.’ She wipes a tear away. ‘You do have to accept me for how I am, darling. I’m not some fifty-something housewife with a middle-aged spread and a store card at Marks and Spencer.’ She shakes her hair a little, with some kind of assumed bravado.

‘I’m not that kind of mum. I’m different.’

It’s only then that I can feel myself losing it. It’s the shake of her hair, the artificial way she’s talking, the character she’s constructed for herself –

she claims it’s for survival, and I am sure it’s to cover something up. At any rate, I can feel rage bubbling just underneath me. ‘You’ve never been a mum at al !’ I shout at her. ‘What are you talking about?’

‘I tried to do my best by you . . .’ Her voice is like a whimper. ‘And then you went and got married, you total y rejected me . . .’

I hear my voice screaming at her, as if it’s someone else. ‘ Why do you think I got married? I wanted to get away from you!’ I am shaking, adrenalin is pumping through me, and I don’t care any more.

‘Oli liked me!’ she hisses, coming closer towards me. I laugh, as though this is the crux of the argument.

‘Of course he did,’ I say, smiling an ugly smile, blinking slowly. ‘You’re exactly the same, that’s why. I can’t believe how stupid I was, I married to get away from you and I went and married someone exactly like you.’ I put my hands to my burning cheeks and slide them up so I’m covering my eyes. ‘I can’t believe I’m saying al this. This is not the point. We’re not discussing me, we’re talking about you.’

‘About me!’ She laughs, eyes flashing. ‘What, with your cheating husband and this stupid, freezing studio with your necklaces no one wants to buy, just so you can get Granny’s approval?’ She rubs her arms with her hands, her eyes practical y popping out of her head; it’s so strange, how I real y don’t recognise her any more. I see – for the first time, real y? – that she is old. There are wrinkles round her eyes, her neck is saggy. I never real y noticed before. ‘I just wanted you to do wel for yourself. That’s al I ever wanted, so you didn’t end up like me, penniless, pregnant, abandoned by everyone, with no one to love you.’

‘That’s not going to happen!’ I shout at her. ‘I’m not you!’

‘Oh, yes, yes. Of course.’ She nods sarcastical y. ‘What a relief, you’re not me.’

‘I’ve got a proper life, a grown-up life, it’s not perfect, but it’s OK. And I don’t want you in it!’ My cheeks are burning hot. I won’t cry. ‘Stay away from me! I don’t want you in my life any more!’

We are facing each other, her with her arms folded. She registers no emotion whatsoever: my momentary loss of control is enough for her to assert herself again, and the mask is back in place.

‘I know you’re lying, Mum,’ I say softly. ‘I know it must be awful, but I know you did something bad that summer. I know you did.’

‘Wel , I’m sorry you think that,’ she says, smiling the catlike smile again. ‘I wish there was a way I could persuade you otherwise.’

‘Did you know Cecily left a diary?’ I say suddenly. ‘Have you seen it?’