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“You’re still in your pyjamas?” were the first words out of Henrietta’s mouth when she entered the room.
Teresa realised Annabel was still in her pyjamas and glued to the television. She had been so busy searching for jobs, she lost track of time.
“Come on,” she said to her daughter. “Let’s get you dressed.”
“Aw, let me watch this first,” Annabel protested, pointing to Shaun the Sheep on the TV.
“You can watch it on iPlayer,” Teresa took Annabel by the hand, pulled her up, and led her from the room.
“It’s not fair. I want my dad,” she began to cry.
“Do you think your dad would have let you sit in your pyjamas watching TV until lunchtime?” Teresa said and then regretted it. “Look, Annabel. It’s difficult. We all want your father to be here, but he’s gone. There’s nothing we can do about it.”
This made Annabel cry even harder, and Teresa knew she wasn’t doing a good job. When they got to the landing, she stopped and knelt in front of her daughter.
“Give me a cuddle,” she said, stretching out her arms.
Annabel walked towards her, and Teresa wrapped her arms around her and gave her a big squeeze.
“I’m going to get a job here so I can be with you all the time. I love you.”
She kissed her daughter on the head.
“But first, you need a shower and get dressed, and then I’ll make us all some lunch.”
“But I had a shower yesterday.”
“So what? You need to have a shower every day, you filthy animal.”
Teresa laughed and steered her daughter into the bathroom.
“Hurry and get ready while I make some lunch.”
She descended the stairs to find Henrietta giving her a disapproving look from the lounge.
“What would you like for lunch?” Teresa was trying to sound upbeat.
“You see what happens when I leave you alone,” Henrietta snapped. “She would have been there all day if I hadn’t come home.”
“I’m sorry. I was looking for jobs and lost track of time.”
“There must be plenty of teaching jobs. They are always advertising for teachers.”
“I’m not qualified to teach in the UK. I need my PGCE, and I’d have to be a teaching assistant until I qualified. Teaching assistants don’t earn enough to get a visa.”
“So what do you plan to do, then?”
“That’s why I was looking for jobs. Also, I have a friend here in London who might help me. He sent me a message saying he can only meet me tonight. I was wondering if...”
“You want me to look after Annabel while you go out on the town with your friends?”
“It’s not like that.”
“Isn’t it? Then why don’t you invite your friend to meet you here?”
“OK. I’ll send him a message,” Teresa thought about mentioning that José was gay, but wasn’t sure whether that would help or make matters worse. “Why don’t I make us lunch while I’m waiting for him to reply? How about egg mayonnaise sandwiches?
“OK.”
As Teresa walked through into the kitchen, she wondered whether it was possible for Henrietta to be nice about anything. Then she saw the wine rack. Teresa hadn’t had a drink since the in-flight meal on her plane from Sao Paulo. She could do with a drink, but she had to maintain the illusion for Henrietta that she didn’t touch the stuff anymore. She shook herself back to reality and took the eggs out of the fridge, placed them in a pan which she filled with water and placed on the stove to heat.
Her phone vibrated. It was a message from José.
‘Wimbledon is the other side of London for me. How about we meet in the centre?’
Teresa sighed. She walked through to the living room.
“My friend lives on the other side of London. He is asking whether we can meet in the centre.”
“Not my problem.” Henrietta didn’t even look at Teresa.
Teresa returned to the kitchen.
“My ex-mother-in-law is being a son of a bitch and doesn’t want to let me go,” she typed.
Teresa watched the water in the pan, willing it to boil.
Her phone vibrated again. It was José.
“I have a friend I think you should meet. I’ve told him about your case, and there is something you need to know. But he won’t go south of the river.”
‘Won’t go south of the river?” Teresa texted. “Who is he? A taxi driver?”
A moment later, the phone vibrated again.
“He’s an immigration lawyer.”
Teresa made the sandwiches as quickly as possible and took them through to the living room. She handed a plate to Henrietta, then went to the foot of the stairs.
“Annabel. Your lunch is ready,” she shouted up to the bedroom. “Come down and eat, darling.”
She returned to her plate on the table and sat down.
“The thing is,” she began. “My friend wants me to meet an immigration lawyer, but he won’t come south of the river.”
“Why? Is he a taxi driver?”
“I don’t know why. I said the same thing.”
Henrietta sighed.
“Okay,” she said. “I’ll look after Annabel. But make sure you are not too late home.”
Teresa thought she sounded like her mum. Then an idea occurred to her.
“Are you sure you will be okay? When I go back to Brazil on Saturday?”
“Of course, I will,” Henrietta dismissed Teresa’s comment, but something in her voice betrayed the fact that she was not at all sure of whether she would be OK after Saturday.
*
When José introduced Teresa to the immigration lawyer, her first thought was whether this man was an ex or even a current lover of his. He looked older than José with greying hair, and he was plump in a tatty grey suit.
“What was it you thought I needed to know?” Teresa asked José when they settled at a table with some drinks.
He had bought Teresa a glass of red wine, Cabernet Sauvignon, and it tasted good.
“Benedito is a good friend of mine,” José began to explain, and Benedito’s smile suggested to Teresa that their relationship was not platonic. “I was telling him about your situation, and he raised some issues I think you should know about.”
“What issues?”
“Beni?” José turned to his friend for the explanation.
“Well Teresa, there is no easy way to say this,” Benedito began, leaning forward. “From what José has told me, I think it is unlikely that they would offer you a family visa for the UK.”
“Why?”
“You would need to satisfy a visa officer that you would leave the UK when your visa expired. If they gave you a five-year work permit, your daughter would be 13, and it is unlikely that you would want to leave.”
“I wouldn’t want to leave.”
“The problem is that you don’t have custody of your child and there is the drunk driving incident to consider, although that is unlikely to be enough to warrant outright refusal.”
Teresa sank into her seat.
“You would have the right to appeal the decision, in which instance an immigration judge would review your case.”
“How long would it take?”
“The application might take anything from a few weeks to... well... your guess is as good as mine. If it went to appeal, you’d be looking at at least another three months, longer. The key test in a case like this is whether you have ties to the UK which would tempt you to overstay. You do.”
“So, if I applied, and it went to appeal, and I wasn’t able to resolve it by Christmas? Would they let me in on a tourist visa for Christmas?”
“They wouldn’t let you in on a tourist visa.”
“What do you think my chances of winning an appeal would be?”
“Slim.”
“Why?”
“It’s a question of custody.”
“But her grandmother might give me shared parental responsibility.”
“Are you sure about that?”
Teresa thought about it for a moment.
“Sure.”
“You don’t sound sure.”
“And if I lose my appeal?”
“They are unlikely to give you another tourist visa because of the risk that you would overstay.”
“So what you are saying is that if I leave the UK and don’t get a visa, then they won’t let me back into the UK again because they’ll think I’ll never leave.”
“Yes, and they are right, aren’t they?”
“So, is there any chance they’d approve my visa application?”
“No. They would refuse you because you don’t meet the basic income criteria and don’t (yet) have parental responsibility. You might get somewhere on appeal, but they are meant to make those decisions on reviewing the evidence available to the visa officer at the time of the decision.”
“But that’s so unfair?”
“Yeah, some visa officers are total dicks and belligerent.”
Teresa was close to tears.
“So, what should I do?” said Teresa, trying to hold herself together.
José and Benedito just looked at her as if they thought she knew the answer already.
“But if I’m caught and deported, then I would be well and truly buggered.”
“Not always,” said Benedito. “But, yes.”
She finished the rest of her wine in one go.
“I’ll get you another,” said José, and got up to go to the bar.
“You’d be surprised how common your story is,” said Benedito.
“But what am I going to do? Where am I going to live? What am I going to do?”
When she lived in England before, Teresa knew plenty of Brazilians who overstayed their visas and were living illegally. She never imagined she would become one of them.
“José and I might be able to help you find work and accommodation.” Benedito gave her a weak smile.
“But what about my job in Brazil? What about my flat? What about all my stuff? My cat?”
José arrived with more drinks.
“I told Teresa we might help her find work and accommodation,” said Benedito.
“Of course,” said José, sitting down.
“But I have a job in Brazil. I have a flat full of stuff. I have a cat. What am I supposed to do?”
“It’s up to you,” said José. “You must decide which is more important to you, your job and your things in Brazil? Or your daughter?”
When he put it like that, Teresa realised she had no choice at all. She could either stay illegally or risk never being able to see her daughter again. She took another large gulp of wine.
“Easy,” warned José. “We have friends. We’ll help you.”
He touched her hand.
“Thank you. So, what’s the next step?”
“The first thing is not to leave the country. Does anyone have a key to your flat in Brazil?”
“My sister-in-law has a spare copy. She’s feeding my cat.”
“Isn’t your brother a lawyer?” José asked.
“Yes. Contract law.”
She could have sworn Benedito rolled his eyes.
“But my sister-in-law is a police officer.”
“Are you worried?” José asked.
“Don’t tell her you are staying illegally. You are not illegal until your current visa ends,” Benedito said. “Tell her you are planning to stay in England for longer than expected and you need some help to clear your flat. Do you think she would do that?”
Teresa thought about it for a moment.
“Yes.”
“How about this, grandmother? Do you think if you told her you would like to stay longer that she would let you stay for a while?”
“I suppose if I didn’t tell her I was planning to overstay, then she might be okay.”
“Good. That will buy us some time to set something up for you.”
“There’s one thing,” Teresa frowned. “Annabel’s grandmother lives in Yorkshire somewhere. She’s planning to take Annabel to live with her up there.”
“Do you know where in Yorkshire?”
“No. I must find out.”
“Hmm,” Benedito scratched the grey stubble on his plump chin. “That might make it a little more difficult, but I’ll send out some feelers.”
“Don’t worry, Teresa,” said José. “It’ll all work out fine. You’ll see.”
“Thank you both. I appreciate all this.”
“Don’t mention it. Anything for an old friend,” said José
*
“Thank God you’re back,” said Henrietta as soon as she opened the door for Teresa.
“Sorry, I didn’t mean to be this late.”
“No, it’s not that,” Henrietta ushered her into the house and took her coat. “It’s Annabel. She has been giving me the run-around.”
“What’s she doing?”
“I don’t know. Every time I put her to bed, I go in five minutes late, and she’s turned her bedside light on and is playing with toys or something or other.”
“I’ll see her,” Teresa started climbing the stairs.
“Thank you,” Henrietta shouted after her.
Teresa almost fell back down the stairs. The old woman had thanked her for something.
When Teresa opened the door, there was a quick shuffling under the duvet, and the bedside light was switched off. Teresa turned the bedside light back on.
“Annabel?”
Her daughter emerged from under the duvet.
“What have you got under there?”
Annabel lifted the duvet to reveal an assortment of Lego brick constructions.
“Give it to me, please. All of it.”
Annabel handed over all her Lego friends, a Lego horse and a boat.
“Is that everything?”
Annabel nodded. She knew she was in trouble.
“Okay. I’m going to turn the light out, and I want you to go to sleep. No more playing with toys, okay?”
Annabel nodded.
“You need to listen to your grandmother and do what she says. I won’t be able to be with you all the time, and when I’m not with you, you need to respect your grandma and do what she says.”
Annabel nodded.
“Okay, nighty nighty.”
“Pyjama, pyjama.”
“Sleep tight.”
“Don’t let the bedbugs bite.”
“Sweet dreams. I love you, darling. See you in the morning.”
“Love you.”
Teresa turned off the bedside light and got up to leave.
“Mummy?”
“Yes, darling.”
“My tooth is loose.”
“Okay. Don’t fiddle with it. I’ll look at it in the morning. Love you. Try to get to sleep.”
“Love you.”
Teresa left the room and closed the door behind her. She took a deep breath and headed down the stairs. She found Henrietta in an armchair holding a large glass of red wine.
“Want one?” Henrietta asked.
“No thank you,” Teresa still felt it necessary to maintain the illusion of sobriety even though she had just had three glasses of wine herself.
“Is she asleep?” Henrietta took a sip of wine.
“She’s getting there. I’ll check on her in a minute. I told her it’s important to respect you. She will be more cooperative in the future. She’s got a lot to deal with now.”
“Haven’t we all?”
“Yes... well... about that. I was thinking about delaying my return to Brazil.”
“That would be a good idea.”
“Really?”
“It would be helpful if you were around to give me a hand with Annabel for a while.”
“Well, yes, that’s what I thought,” Teresa couldn’t believe her luck.
“Do you think you can get some time off from school?”
“Yes, I’m sure that won’t be a problem.”
There was a momentary silence in which Teresa was sure she felt more awkward than Henrietta.
“Right, I’ll go to bed then,” said Teresa.
“Someone is coming to see the house at eight tomorrow, so if you can be up by then, that would be helpful.”
“No problem.”
“How was the lawyer?”
“Excuse me?”
“The lawyer. Weren’t you seeing an immigration lawyer tonight?”
“Yes. He was helpful. I know what I have to do now.”
“Good.”
“Yes. Good night then.”
“Good night.”
Teresa left the living room before Henrietta thought of anything else to say. On the way up to her room, she looked in on Annabel, who had fallen asleep at last. She climbed the rest of the stairs to her room, where she had a lot of thinking to do and some messages to send.