Seth. I need him.
Around the corner, on the busy main road, I stand in the archway entrance to the Ship Hotel, hidden from the street, and from the two people I’ve fled from, and with a shaking hand take my mobile from my pocket.
He’ll understand. He always understands. He’ll know what I should do now. I call his number. He answers halfway through the second ring, I imagine he looked down, saw my name, snatched up the phone and hit the answer button.
‘Smitty?’ It’s only my name, but his voice, that I’ve been hearing for twenty years, soothes its way through my sensibilities. My body unclenches, my chest, which I hadn’t noticed was tight and almost immobile, is now freer, air is entering and exiting my lungs properly. Suddenly I’m able to breathe at the sound of him. I need him.
‘I—I … I—I …’
‘Smitty? Is that you?’
What am I doing? I don’t get to call him. He’s not for that any more. We’re not together, he’s not that person.
‘Clem, are you OK?’
‘I’m sorry, I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have called you. I’m sorry. Bye. I’m sorry.’
With still-shaking hands I cut off the call. I shouldn’t have rung him, it was instinctive, what I’ve been doing for more than ten years. Even before that, if I had a problem, Seth – not Dylan – would be the first person I called. In a moment like this, calling him was the obvious, natural thing to do. I have to break that habit, learn to cope on my own.
A white and aqua-green taxi pulls up outside the hotel. Its passengers spill out, laughing, joking, collecting suitcases from the open boot as if the world hasn’t been turned on its axis. When Dad died, that was the most hurtfully confusing thing of all: everyone carried on with their lives as if something huge hadn’t happened. Half of my world had been devastated and everyone acted if nothing had happened at all.
The taxi driver talks the whole way back to my flat. I must have answered because he kept talking, asking me questions, and there were no long awkward pauses that told me I was meant to be replying.
I am still shaking, trembling violently, as I open the door. When the door clicks shut behind me and I turn the corner into the main part of the corridor, the enormity of what happened descends again and I can’t breathe. I try to draw air into my chest. Nothing happens. I can’t breathe, my chest is on fire, my heart is like a speeding train without wheels that races and races on the spot.
‘Clemency!’ Mum calls from the living room. ‘Is that you?’
My photo album, my bag, the coin change from the cab ride, my purse I didn’t put away, my heavy bunch of keys, and that box create a huge sound when I drop them so I can push my hands against my chest, try to force air into my body.
Nothing happens, no air enters my lungs. I’ve had a panic attack before. It was like this. I couldn’t see. Couldn’t stop myself from shaking. Couldn’t breathe.
‘Clemency?’ Mum calls.
Breathe. Breathe. Breathe. I need to breathe.
I hear Mum put her puzzle aside, take off her glasses, get up from her seat. Or maybe I am imagining hearing all that since my breathing is vociferous, gasping, and my heart is thundering in my ears.
‘Clemency.’ Mum is horrified when she arrives in the corridor. At the mess from all the things I dropped, probably at the state of me. She comes to me, circles me with her arms. When I was ten I came home in tears at the things some of the boys at school said to me. The names they called me, what they said about where I came from, but mainly from the way that my cousin Nancy shrugged and said, ‘Well, it’s true.’ Mum had put her arms around me. ‘I’m going down to that school tomorrow – if their parents don’t skelp their hides, I will,’ Dad shouted. That was one of the few times I’d seen him so angry.
‘Hush, now, Don,’ Mum said. In her arms, so close to her, I could smell the sweetness of her make-up and the bleach that she’d used to clean the kitchen. ‘That’s not important right now. The only thing that’s important is our Clemency.’ She stroked her hand over my hair. ‘You’ll be OK, Sweetheart. You’ll be OK.’
‘What’s happened, love?’ Mum says to me twenty-seven years later. She is filled with concern, over-brimming with worry.
I can’t speak, nor breathe, nor stop my heart from the pain it’s causing me by hammering so fast. She draws me closer and because I am taller than her I have to stoop to rest my head on her shoulder, to let her comfort me. I can smell the lavender and rose citrusy tang of her perfume, the vanilla and cocoa scent of her conditioner.
‘Is it Seth? Has he done something?’ she asks. ‘Said something?’
I shake my head.
‘You need to tell me what’s happened, love, if I’m going to make it better.’ That’s what mums do, isn’t it? They make it better, even if you’re really old, your mother puts her arms around you and makes it better. She doesn’t turn up out of the blue and try to give you gifts she’s made and call you by a different name.
Mum’s hand strokes down my back, soothing me. Considering she doesn’t do this very often, she’s very adept at it, seems to know where to press her hand so I feel better, my body relaxes, I start to be able to breathe. Maybe it’s because we’re all the same. Maybe, no matter who we are, a touch in the right place, a caring, loving hug will cure whatever ails us. Maybe I should have hugged that woman. Maybe I would have felt something for her if I’d let her put her arms around me and do what my mum is doing to me now. It might have changed everything if I’d given her a chance.
‘Come on, love, I don’t like to see you so upset,’ Mum says. ‘You’re not one to cry unless something is terribly, terribly wrong.’
She’s right. I carefully pull myself together, upright, out of her hold until I can stand up by myself. Inhaling, exhaling, is a blessed relief – my entire body rejoices in this simple action. I rub at my eyes until they are dry, then furiously dry my hands on the folds of my dress.
‘What’s happened, love?’ Mum asks. I like that her accent, her real, natural one, comes out when she talks sometimes. It takes away the parts of her that I tend to fight with and lets me see the one who knows how to hug me and tells me I’m her whole world.
‘I just …’ I need to tell her. It’s going to hurt her, my mum with the Yorkshire accent who hugged away my worries. I have to tell her. I can’t not. ‘I just met my— I just met the woman who gave birth to me.’ It wasn’t that hard to say after all. It was really quite simple and easy. Like breathing – until you can’t do it properly. I did it properly, I know I did, because Mum doesn’t look all that shocked.
In fact, her face develops a smile and after a few seconds to let the news sink in, she says, ‘Well, that’s wonderful news. There’s no need to be upset, it’s absolutely wonderful news.’ She reaches out and takes my hand, and I know then that she’s seen the small butterfly box that lies on its side with a few black and white photos of a baby spilled out on the parquet. She saw the box and worked out what had happened. ‘Come and sit down and tell me all about it. It really is the most wonderful news.’