Past Secrets Read online

  Take a scarf in case it’s cold.

  I don’t care if everyone else in the class is going, you’re not.

  She meant well, but she’d never accept that Amber was an adult with adult desires and her own choices to make.

  Amber knew with sudden certainty that there would be no easy way to tell her mother about Karl. The umbilical cord couldn’t be stretched – only severed.

  ‘Open it.’ Faye couldn’t understand why Amber hadn’t launched herself on the gift and ripped it open, the way she used to do with presents.

  Amber shot a tense look at her mother, then carefully opened the gift.

  ‘Well, do you like it?’

  Amber bit her lip. The portfolio was beautiful, and had cost her mother a fortune she didn’t have. Worse, the treacherous thought slipped into her mind of what she and Karl could have done with that money. It would have paid Amber’s ticket to America. The band’s fare would be covered by the production company but she and Karl had to come up with hers.

  This present was so typical of her mother: spend what she didn’t have just so Amber could have the best. It was so unnecessary. And it made Amber feel guiltier than ever.

  ‘Of course I like it.’ She managed to keep the irritation out of her voice.

  ‘Really?’

  Amber felt the tension coil in her.

  ‘Really,’ she said. ‘It’s lovely.’ Lovely but totally bloody useless, since she wasn’t going to art college and wouldn’t need it. Not yet, anyhow. She could study art anywhere, any time. When she and Karl were settled, she’d do it. A gift like hers couldn’t be lost.

  ‘I thought you’d prefer the cream but we can change it if you’d prefer a black one,’ Mum went on fondly.

  The hands holding the portfolio tightened and Amber felt as if she was holding in a scream. Would her mother ever stop?

  ‘Thank you, it’s lovely,’ she said, forcing the words out of somewhere. She pecked her mother on the cheek. ‘I’ve so much work to do.’

  ‘But what about dinner?’

  ‘I’m not hungry. I ate at Ella’s,’ improvised Amber.

  ‘Amber, I know you’re worried about the exams…’ began Faye, desperate to get her daughter talking.

  The tension in Amber finally sprang free. ‘The fucking exams aren’t what this is all about!’ she yelled. ‘You don’t understand, you don’t understand anything!’

  Faye’s face was stricken. ‘Amber, please, talk to me. We’ve always talked about everything. What’s wrong?’

  ‘I told you,’ hissed Amber, ‘you wouldn’t understand. You’ve never done anything with your life, you’ve never taken a single risk. I’m different from you. I need space, not you hanging over me waiting and hoping for me to live my life the way you want!’

  ‘I never wanted that.’ Faye could hardly speak with the hurt. How could Amber accuse her of this, of expecting too much from her, when all she’d ever wanted was for Amber to be safe and not to have to go through what she had. ‘I only ever wanted you to be happy.’

  ‘No,’ shot back Amber, and it was fear and guilt talking, making her say hateful things because she couldn’t bear her mother looking at her with those huge wounded eyes. ‘You wanted me to be happy in your way. The sensible, dull and boring way. That’s not what I want. I don’t want to end up like you.’

  ‘Oh, darling, please, listen to me…’

  ‘No, I won’t listen to you any more, Mum. I’m an adult now and I’ve got my own life to lead, and so do you.’ Amber paused, flushed with emotion. ‘I can’t be responsible for being here with you, you’ve got to move on and not stay stuck in the past, stuck remembering Dad. Being a widow shouldn’t define your life.’

  There, she’d said it: told her mother to move on. It wasn’t quite how she’d meant to put it but it was a start. She wouldn’t be around any more, she’d be away with Karl and even if she hadn’t got round to saying that, she’d said the main part. They weren’t a little family unit any more. She and Karl were the unit. Her mother had to be made to understand that.

  Faye said nothing at all. She watched Amber as she tucked her present under her arm and left the kitchen, anything to be away from her mother’s anxious face and the weight of her expectations.

  Alone, surrounded by flapjacks, Amber’s favourite feta and filo-pastry pie, and torn wrapping paper, Faye felt lost and unbearably hurt. What had she done wrong?

  For once, she didn’t bother to tidy up the kitchen, scrubbing with her own solution of bleach and water, eau de Faye, as she used to joke. The dinner sat untouched on the table and she walked, sleepwalked almost, to her bedroom.

  It was a pretty room, feminine, luxurious in its way, a boudoir that nobody at Little Island would easily identify as hers.

  Her office, with its clean surfaces, tables and chairs set at precise right angles, and the pot plant whose leaves she cleaned every week, was a far cry from this haven of soft fabrics. There was a luscious velvet throw in antique rose on the bed, and Tiffany-style lampshades that cast a soft burnished light.

  Not knowing quite what else to do, Faye sat on the edge of her bed. She felt powerless. It was so long since she’d had that feeling and it flooded back into every vein as if it had never been away.

  ‘What can I do now?’ she said aloud. Inner strength could get you through anything. She’d trained herself to believe that and loved to read about other women who’d gone through pain to emerge stronger, tougher, untouchable. They were proof that she was in some kind of women’s club. The We Screwed Up But Hey, We’re Still Here Club.

  But to do it, you needed that inner strength and hers was centred around one central core, Amber. Golden, loving, talented, funny Amber. Without Amber’s love, that strength crumbled. And Amber had just cast herself off like a shard of ice shearing off an iceberg.

  She sat on the bed for a long time, hearing Amber moving around upstairs, then the sound of music thumping through from the attic bedroom. The Scissor Sisters were playing, and Faye managed a half-smile because to her they sounded like a classic seventies rock band, like one of her old vinyl records. She still had some of her old LPs. And the photos.

  They were hidden in the big bottom drawer of Faye’s 1930s wardrobe, under a bundle of spare sheets and a couple of elderly Foxford rugs. She got up and pulled open the drawer. Spare pillowcases, said the label on the box. Who’d open that? Faye had reasoned. Not even Amber, who rooted around in her mother’s dressing table for make-up, would bother to look in there. Perhaps if Amber had known her mother had something to hide, she might have found it. But Faye knew that she’d managed to keep her secret very well.

  What had her daughter called her? Sensible, dull and boring. Seventeen years of trying to become someone she wasn’t had been very successful, it appeared.

  She hadn’t touched the box for years, but now she carried it over to the bed and, settling herself against her pillows, took off the lid.

  On top of the pile of memories inside was a grainy colour photograph of a girl with wide, laughing eyes and tawny hair rippling around her shoulders. Very like Amber, in fact. She was sitting in the middle of a group of smiling people, captured mid-laugh, frozen in time. Behind them was a wall of leatherette from a curving banquette; in front of them, a bar table spread with bottles, glasses, cigarette packs, ashtrays.

  Faye didn’t remember the names of everyone in the picture, but she could hear the music that had been playing when Jimi had taken it – Led Zeppelin, something dark and moody, the mahogany darkness of ‘Kashmir’, perhaps.

  She wondered where Jimi was now. Then, he’d been a sweet guy with spiky punk hair and a lost puppy-dog expression who hung around the fringes of the gang. He was probably unrecognisable now, working in a strait-laced office job with a tie, lace-up shoes and normal hair. But then, she was hardly recognisable herself.

  Nobody looking at mumsy Faye Reid in her high street navy suit and her neat little earrings could imagine her as the girl in that picture, the one wh
o’d been swaying sexily to the music moments before the photo had been taken.

  When she moved the pile of photos, a faint scent of perfume rose from the box. YSL’s heady Opium, she remembered. She closed her eyes, and it was as though she was there once more in her former life. She could almost smell the atmosphere of The Club. Smoke, marijuana, the full-bodied reek of Jack Daniel’s, perfume and sweat. And excitement. The excitement of not knowing what might happen next.

  The mixed-up girl she’d been then was no more, but Faye would never forget her.

  That girl represented both the great tragedy and the triumph of her life, a former life she’d never been able to share with Amber.

  Keeping it all a secret had been an obsession with Faye because if Amber knew, she’d never understand and their relationship would be destroyed. Except that somehow, her relationship with Amber was fracturing more every day anyway. Faye was beginning to wonder if things might be better if Amber actually knew the truth.

  CHAPTER NINE

  Hi Shona,

  How are you? Is all still well on your planet? I miss you, Paul and Ross and the fun we had.

  So much, Maggie thought. How come you only realised how great your friends were when they weren’t around?

  No news here at all. I am sitting in my bedroom at my dad’s ancient laptop on Friday morning and I keep getting this weird feeling that it’s a Sunday night and I’ve got school in the morning. If Hart to Hart was still on the telly, it’d be like nothing has changed.

  Did I ever tell you that I wanted to be Jennifer Hart? She was always so nice, so beautiful, had a rich husband and never had to do housework. I honestly thought that was an option when I was small: that one day I’d grow up to be her and I’d have a gorgeous Mercedes-driving husband who happened to be a multi-millionaire and my hair would look fantastic, auburn rather than carrot, and there’d be a Max around to do stuff. Where have all the millionaires gone? I might sign up to a class to find one. Ooops, can’t. I couldn’t keep up the act: the long nails, the long blonde hair or the giggling at my chosen millionaire’s stupid jokes – which is what all the magazines say is vital. I am also at a loss in the boob department. Millionaires seem to like women with tiny waists and big boobs who simper that they only eat grilled fish and nothing but nuts after six o’clock. My chest and my waist are the same size and I like a proper dinner, plus dessert and maybe a bar of chocolate or two after six. I would not fit in.

  Anyway, I hate men. Except for Ross and Paul, and they don’t count. And Dad. Nice men who don’t hit on me don’t count, either. Not that any men are hitting on me, Shona. So no mad phone calls about how I should put mascara on and wear flat shoes so I’m shorter than them because men like short women, OK? Summer Street is a date-free zone, like wildlife preserves where hunters can’t go after ducks. Men around here are like my parents’ friends, the nice dad sort who worry about when they’re going to cut the hedge.

  And when did men fling themselves at me anyway? Like, never.

  Elisabeth had been on the phone a lot from Seattle telling her to get out and get a life.

  ‘Please don’t say that the only way to get over a guy is to get under another one,’ warned Maggie, which was what Ross had said to her on the phone, adding that if he left it too long between dates, both he and Nureyev got depressed.

  Maggie got depressed just thinking about having sex with another man. That electric attraction she’d felt for Grey could hardly be found twice in a lifetime. All she wanted was him and she couldn’t have him, mustn’t have him.

  ‘That’s old-fashioned drivel about getting another man,’ Elisabeth said, ‘and I’d never give advice like that. A man’s the last thing you need. I mean go out with co-workers, friends. Go to galleries, take up charity work, try a new sport, have fun.’

  Maggie didn’t think she knew how to have fun any more.

  Don’t know if the boss told you but they’ve let me extend my unpaid leave. After that, I have to put up or shut up. Get another job or come back. Don’t know if I can face the college again.

  Mum’s librarian friend who gave me my first job years ago has asked me to do a few shifts in the local library as a huge favour. One of her people is pregnant and has had to go off early because of back pain. So I’m filling in and it’s great, actually. Almost a relief, which sounds unkind to Mum and Dad, but you know what I mean.

  She hadn’t worked in a public library for years and it was quite nice to get out of the house for a few hours, to escape from the claustrophobia of home.

  I’m in the children’s department and I really like it, actually. The kids are gorgeous and no, I’m not broody, so don’t even go there. Kids say the funniest things. They’re so blunt, it’s hilarious. Plus, I get to flick through the books I loved as a kid. I’m rereading the Narnia series. I can’t believe I haven’t read them for years.

  Have you seen Grey? No, don’t answer that. Yes, do. And as for that blonde piece, put a note on her file. ‘Slept with librarian’s long-term boyfriend’ should do it. ‘Known for ripping pages out of books’ might be even better.

  I don’t know what her name is. Probably something like Flower or Petal or Butterfly, stupid bitch. He must still be with her. It’s been two weeks and I haven’t heard anything from him since the first day. Some boyfriend he turned out to be.

  Not that I’m bitter. I am better off without him.

  Love Maggie.

  She logged off. The last bit was untrue. She was bitter and right now, no, she didn’t feel better off without Grey.

  Since she’d been home, her mother had perked up no end having her daughter around, while Maggie herself felt strangely adrift. She was living in the house she’d grown up in with her parents – whom she loved, even if they did occasionally drive her mad – and yet the sense of belonging had gone.

  All the remaining remnants of her younger self – the furry cushions on her bed, the Holly Hobbie dolls on the shelves – only made her feel more alone, more isolated.

  In this bedroom, she’d cried with misery over the hell of school and dreamed of a wonderful future, where she would be wise and successful. Now she was back, futureless and feeling not a lot wiser.

  ‘Bean!’ her father yelled. ‘We’re going to the café for lattes and paninis. It’s the Friday-morning special. Want to come?’

  Sense of belonging wasn’t the only thing to change. When had her parents started having lattes and paninis? What was wrong with a coffee and a bun, which was what they used to sell there. Home had moved on without her, Maggie thought, almost childishly. It wasn’t supposed to change. It was supposed to stay exactly the same so she could come back and refresh. Still, latte and panini was better than sitting in her bedroom.

  ‘OK, coming.’ At least in the café, there couldn’t be too many probing questions about Grey.

  Breakfast in the café ended in a cholesterol-inducing flurry at eleven when eggs done every which way came off the menu, and wraps, paninis and ciabatta bread sandwiches went on. Henry was painstakingly writing the day’s lunch specials on the blackboard outside the café when the Maguires arrived, first Una, regal with her crutches, and then her people-in-waiting, Maggie and Dennis, bringing up the rear, carrying Una’s handbag and a cushion so she could rest her leg on a hard chair.

  ‘Henry, love, how are you?’ asked Una.

  Henry, a fatherly balding man in cords and a checked shirt, stopped writing to greet Una, who was one of his favourite customers.

  ‘How’s the poor leg?’ he asked solicitously.

  ‘Sore but what’s the point of complaining?’ said Una. ‘If that’s the worst thing that happens to me, won’t I be fine?’

  They went in and arranged themselves at a table by the window, Una swivelling herself until she was comfortable before handing her crutches to Maggie. Xu, the petite Chinese waitress, appeared with a silent smile and gave them menus. Maggie smiled hello back at her. There was something that fascinated her about Xu. Imagine coming all that way
to a country where you knew nobody. Yet Xu didn’t appear lonely or sad, just grateful for this chance of a new life in Ireland. Her life must have been hard before, Maggie surmised, but she didn’t want to offend Xu by asking intrusive questions, so she settled, Maggie-style, for smiling a lot at her.

  Henry finished working on the blackboard and came inside.

  ‘Tell me, Henry, what’s good today? We’re trying to feed poor Maggie up or she’ll go home to Galway and Grey will think we starved her here. Grey’s her partner,’ Una added in her version of sotto voce, which meant only half the street heard.

  Maggie managed the required polite smile at this. Had her mother always mentioned Grey this often or was it noticeable only now that he was gone?

  ‘Great soup, wild mushroom,’ said Henry, who had come in after them. ‘Jane’s trying out this new cookbook and herself and Xu were slaving away all morning at it.’

  ‘Let’s have that, then,’ said Una. ‘We love trying new things, don’t we?’

  She beamed at Maggie who was trying to make herself think cheerful thoughts so she could join in this happy family lunch instead of looking like a shrivelled old misery guts. But what was a cheerful thought?

  Let’s face it, she decided, she had better take the bull by the horns. It would be easier to tell the truth than to suffer endless public comments about how wonderful Grey was.

  ‘Grey and I have split up,’ she blurted out.

  Her father immediately looked concerned and laid a hand on hers, while her mother bit her lip.

  ‘Oh, Maggie, love,’ Una sighed. ‘I wish you’d told us before, you poor pet, instead of bottling it up. We love you.’

  There it was: the most simple and most poignant thing any parent could say. They loved her and it didn’t matter if she was single or about to be married to the planet’s most eligible bachelor, they loved her.

  ‘I didn’t mean to cry,’ she said, crying. Honestly, what was wrong with her? It was like being sixteen again, tearful at the drop of a hat. ‘We broke up just before you had the accident and I thought you had enough to deal with without my worries as well. I – well, he – it wasn’t working.’ She couldn’t tell them about the blonde. It would be too humiliating.