Rebecca was surprised to see Paige and Hugh sitting at the kitchen table when she arrived home late that afternoon—she hadn’t been expecting her daughter for dinner and her car wasn’t out the front. She looked at the half-drunk wine bottle sitting between them, then noticed Paige’s eyes were red, her lashes damp and her cheeks blotchy as they always were whenever she’d been crying.
She looked from Paige to Hugh and then back to Paige. She knows.
Rebecca’s knees almost went out from under her. ‘You told her?’ Yet even as her voice rose to ask this question, the answer dawned. The letter.
‘Don’t blame him,’ Paige said tersely. ‘I found the letter. I can’t believe you’ve lied to me and Dad all these years.’
Rebecca eyed the wine. Surely one small glass wouldn’t hurt. Hugh and Paige wouldn’t approve but then she was already in their bad books anyway.
‘I’m sorry, Paige,’ she said, resisting the urge to grab a glass. She took a seat at the table instead, and not a moment too soon—she felt more than a little dizzy.
‘That’s all you have to say for yourself?’ Paige’s tone made Rebecca feel more like the child than the mother here and she wasn’t sure she had the mental energy to defend herself. At least she no longer had to work out how to tell Paige about Josie—three hours in dialysis, she’d been rehearsing different speeches in her head all that time and she hadn’t been sure about any of them.
Now she only had Josie to worry about.
Rebecca took a deep breath, hoping oxygen would slow the spinning of her head. What exactly did Paige want her to say?
‘What if I was a lesbian and had fallen in love with Josie?’ Paige screwed up her face. ‘The two of us could have been intimate and—’
‘Don’t be silly. You’re not a lesbian so that’s an unhelpful line of thought.’
Hugh raised an eyebrow at her and she knew what he was thinking, that until recently she’d thought she had a son and it could have been a problem if Paige had fallen for him.
‘How much did you tell her? Did you tell her about Mum and Dad’s underhanded behaviour?’ Paige had always been closer to Rebecca’s parents than she was herself but she should know what kind of people her grandparents were. ‘Did you tell her no one ever gave me a choice? Did you tell her about their lies?’
Paige shook her head in obvious disgust. ‘You always have a choice, Mum, and anyway, we’re not angry about the fact you had a baby, it’s the fact you chose to hide it from us all these years.’
Hugh nodded. Paige’s anger and indignation seemed to have rejuvenated his, just when she’d thought he was beginning to forgive her.
‘When were you planning on telling me?’ Her rage was unrelenting. ‘When were you planning on telling Josie?’
‘Soon. Very soon. I’ve spent all afternoon trying to work out how. I know you’re angry but I had to consider how Josie might feel when she finds out. As far as I know she’s never tried to look for me, so I need to approach this with sensitivity.’
‘It’s too late for that.’
Rebecca’s heart ground to a halt. ‘What?’
‘She was with me this afternoon. We found the letter together.’ Paige held her chin high, her expression smug as if she was kind of proud of this fact.
Rebecca was winded a few moments, and then, ‘How did she react?’
‘How do you think she reacted? She was bloody shocked. She’s probably wondering why you’ve suddenly decided to find out about her now.’
‘Because,’ Rebecca said, ‘facing your own mortality is a sobering experience, it makes you—’
‘She might be a match!’
For a moment Paige looked full of hope and Rebecca felt heartened by the fact that deep down her daughter obviously still cared about her health, about her, but she couldn’t allow her to go down this path.
‘That is not why I requested that information,’ Rebecca said forcefully. ‘Even if she is a match, I would never ask her of that. And I forbid you to either.’
‘Instead, you’re happy to let my fiancé sacrifice his kidney? That’s why you suddenly agreed, isn’t it? So you could find Josie without her thinking you wanted something from her.’ Paige shook her head again. ‘Well, you can forget using Solomon’s kidney now. It’s been withdrawn.’
Rebecca couldn’t win and her usually sweet daughter’s rage had her stomach squeezing. Was it possible to feel any more worthless? She looked to Hugh for some support but he remained irritatingly silent.
‘By the way, who is Josie’s father?’ Paige asked, almost giving Rebecca whiplash with her quick change in direction. ‘There wasn’t a name for him on the letter. Is he one of the guys you were in that band with?’
‘Yes,’ was all she decided to say right now. No matter how angry Paige was, Josie definitely deserved to hear these answers first.
‘And do you know where he is? Have you spoken to him? Does he know you’ve found Josie?’
At least she could honestly answer this, ‘No. I have no idea where he is these days.’ The thought of Robbie lost filled her with sadness—if only he were here right now; at least there’d be one person happy with this revelation.
‘Well, do you at least have a name?’
Rebecca forced breath into her lungs. ‘I’d rather be the one to tell Josie that. Could you please give me her phone number?’
Paige looked incredulous. ‘I’ll call her and let her know you want to talk to her. I’m not about to hand over her number without her permission.’
Rebecca had never felt more like slapping her daughter as she did in that moment, yet at the same time, she couldn’t afford to anger her any more. Paige too was hurt and in shock. ‘Okay, I understand.’
Silence filled the room a few long moments and Rebecca found herself saying, ‘Are you going to stay for dinner? Maybe we could order takeaway.’ She wasn’t hungry but if her daughter was fed, maybe she’d be in a more amenable mood to listen to Rebecca’s side of the story.
Paige and Hugh exchanged glances and then she pushed back her seat. ‘Dad, can you please give me a lift home?’
‘Sure, honey.’ He stood as well.
‘Are you right to drive?’ Rebecca asked, gesturing to the empty wine glasses on the table. ‘I could drive her instead.’
She heard the desperate hope in her voice just as strong as the scorned disbelief in her daughter’s reply. ‘I’d rather risk my luck hitchhiking than ride in a car with you right now.’
Rebecca looked to Hugh—was he going to let her speak to her in that manner? She waited for the old ‘Don’t you speak to your mother like that’ but instead he shrugged and grabbed his car keys from the hooks on the wall.
As her husband and daughter headed for the front door, Rebecca slumped back in her seat. This whole situation was breaking her heart.
It was time to stop being a coward and start trying to clean up the mess she’d created.