I manage to flip the satchel closed but not thread the buckles so I stand and clutch it close to my chest, holding it so tightly I can feel my heart beat beneath the brown leather. Mum is putting on her coat in the hall and I take one last look at the books I have to leave behind.Robinson Crusoe,Anne of Green Gables,Adventures of Huckleberry Finn,The Old Man and the Sea. But it isn’t only them I’m leaving behind, it’s my dad, too.
The noise of the taxi honking its horn outside makes me jump and now I am at the station. Euston. I don’t like how everyone is rushing and Mum still isn’t speaking. She didn’t say a word in the taxi so neither did I. Instead I fiddled with the buckles of my satchel and fastened it properly.
A porter helps Mum with our cases and loads them onto a trolley and I follow them both in silence to the ticket office where I listen as she speaks to the man at the window. ‘Two singles to Manchester, please. One adult, one child.’
Manchester. Why are we going there?My mind races and all I can come up with is that Mum likes watchingCoronation Streetbut it’s not real, it’s a telly programme. Elsie Tanner is made up so we can’t be going to see her.
We’re on the move again, racing along the platform, the porter loads our bags, Mum gives him a tip and then we find a seat, next to the window, facing each other and I can’t bear it anymore. ‘Mum, why are we going to Manchester? Where will we stay? Does Dad know where Manchester is so he can come and see us?’
‘We’re going to stay with an old friend, a lady I knew at school. She’s nice. You’ll like her. She works at the airport and has a spare room in her house and when we get settled, I’ll ring your dad, okay?’
I see her suck in a breath and then I spot the tear that’s leaking onto her cheek, just before she flicks it away and I can tell she is sad. And that’s when I feel sad too, for my mum who was looking forward to Christmas and had made it all so nice before that nasty Martha came and ruined it all. And it was Martha that stole my dad, and made him go and live with her so it wasn’t really his fault. He had to choose. But he didn’t choose me. Perhaps Martha doesn’t like children. That will be it. And that’s why I start crying and Mum rushes over and puts me on her knee, holding me tight while she cries too.
The train jerks, then starts to move, slowly at first but within seconds it’s picking up speed, going into a tunnel, then back into the light, leaving our life behind, taking us away from London and my dad and before I know it, before I can wake up and make it all stop, we are gone.
12
Violetta
Cheshire
Present day
The fourteen-minute drive from Darcy’s school to Appleton had never seemed to take so long, getting stuck at every single traffic light on the route and now she was crawling along behind a tractor. Violetta sighed her irritation. Her brain throbbed as another Christmas tune came on the radio: ‘It’s the hap-happiest season of all…’No it’s fucking not!Jabbing the button on the console she switched off the sound and tried to clear her head, put things into perspective.
It was a glorious wintery morning. The sky was cloudless and blue, and even though the sun was low and unable to warm the frost-covered fields, the sight of the yellow orb was guaranteed to lift anyone’s spirits. Unless your name was Violetta.
To start with she’d lied to her daughter and she never did that but the situation called for it. Darcy had picked up that something was wrong. So Violetta had pleaded a migraine and put on dark glasses to hide her puffy eyes.
Violetta also felt guilty about asking one of the other mothers to walk Darcy in but she simply couldn’t face anyone, faking it wasn’t an option, or throwing up in the bin in the yard. Not today. She’d cried again, behind her Ray-Bans but forced a smile as Darcy happily jumped out of the car and after a quick wave, held hands with her friend Mabel and chatted all the way to the gate. Vowing to make amends, Violetta was glad it was a Friday, Darcy’s favourite day of the week when they had a chippy-night tea but the mere thought of food turned her stomach.
Pushing the button that lowered the window, she welcomed the gust of icy air that whooshed around the car as she inhaled deeply to calm the swell of nausea. It came in waves, a toxic combination of Pinot Grigio and nerves. On either side of the road that wound towards the village where she grew up were fallow fields that stretched for miles and miles, some of them belonged to her mum, the knowledge of which always filled her with immense pride.
God she loved her mum, her wellie-wearing, tractor-driving indomitable force who, when she was at her lowest ebb, bereaved, pregnant and skint, had forged a new life for herself and her daughters. And as always Violetta was the one who let her down. She’d been brought home twice in a police car: once when she and Candy had passed out in the village after a cider binge; the second time when they had spent all their money in town and got on the train without a ticket. The village bobby had brought them back, told them off and that was that. Then the shoplifting from Boots, green glittery eyeshadow of all things. Her mum had grounded her each time, and Granny Sylvia had her ten-pence worth too. Apparently Vi carried the rogue gene which was code for,She’s like her dad and granddad. But in the end she’d been forgiven. They were childhood misdemeanours, though, not a huge, great, grown-up cock-up.
She was a mess, and in a mess. That was for sure and the only person she wanted to be with when she felt like this was her mum, although what the hell she was going to say when she got to Appleton was another thing entirely. She’d been up all night, thinking, crying, typing texts to her mum then deleting them, ringing Candy but getting voicemail, pacing the lounge, drinking too much wine then chucking it back up.
At some point in the early hours of the morning, while she stared blankly at the ticker-tape bulletins on Sky News and tried to keep a cup of weak tea down, she’d come up with half a plan and made a firm decision about her future.
As for her moral dilemma she was no further on. How could she tell her mum one thing without divulging another? To expose a liar and a cheat she would have to expose herself and she couldn’t. Her mum was her hero. What she thought of Violetta mattered and in the past, no matter how badly she’d messed up, her mum had supported her, never blinked, just dusted herself down and helped sort things out. But this was different.
To keep a huge secret like hers from her mum and sisters was a form of betrayal but one she had deemed necessary. There was no way of turning the clock back, of being honest from the start. That was what bothered Violetta the most, knowing that they would look at her differently, be hurt by her dishonesty. They might be disgusted, definitely shocked, maybe even turn their backs. And then, wrapped up in all of it was someone else’s little secret and as soon as it was out, there’d be trouble.
Pushing the button that closed the window, Violetta shivered. The fresh morning air had pinched her face, her eyes watery from the cold, while the chilly hand of conscience tweaked her heart.Why couldn’t you just be like Leo and Rosie? Why do you have to be different, the one that messes up? Greedy Vi, always wanting more, never settling for normal, ruining everything.
Finally the tractor indicated and once it turned off the narrow road, Violetta put her foot down, racing towards Appleton and her mum, her mind keeping up the pace, zipping in and out of the past as she tried to make sense of it all.
Macclesfield, Cheshire. 2012
Candy’s sister was jetting off to Australia, taking a whole year out and if her master plan succeeded, she was going to bag herself a hot Aussie husband and never come back. Jenny was sorting through her wardrobe and Violetta and Candy were sitting on the bed of the flat the two sisters shared, staking claim to the best bits and ramming the tat into bin liners.
It was no secret between the three women what Jenny did for a living and they’d had many a giggle over what she got up to at work, and how much she earned as a dominatrix. Her family thought she worked at a recruitment agency in the city and only Candy knew the true source of her income that provided her with a ticket out of there and a very healthy bank balance.
‘What are you going to do with all your equipment? If you’re not planning on coming back, you should sell it on eBay. I bet you’d get a few quid for it.’ Candy was holding a cashmere sweater against her boobs, trying to work out if it would fit.
‘Nah, I might take it down to the Sally Army. Can you imagine their faces when they open the bin liner and find all my outfits… and the whip.’ At this all three of them fell about laughing until Jenny had another idea. ‘Or you two could take over where I left off. I’ll gift you my set of collars and leads as a leaving present and anything else you fancy.’
Candy responded first. ‘Sod off, and anyway as if I’d fit into any of your gear. This body is a temple to my pastries and the thought of leading some nutjob around a bedroom on a lead is not my thing, thanks all the same.’
