January 10, 2010
Dear Jessica,
This all feels a little dramatic, like something from one of those spy movies your dad used to watch on a Sunday afternoon, but if you’re reading this, then I must presume I am no longer with you. Your father passed away a few months ago, which called for a visit to the solicitor, and for me to get my affairs in order.
I have no clear idea of what I want to say, but mainly it is this—I love you. You were the delight of my life, my bright, imaginative girl. I always wanted more children, but it wasn’t to be—and I consoled myself with the fact that if I was only to have one, at least it was the best child a mother could have hoped for.
I love you so much. These are words we rarely say in our home, and that makes me sad. So many lost opportunities to say what is most important to us.
I also want to say that I am sorry, for this and for many other things. You never really knew your grandparents on my side, and now is not the time to dig up the dead, but Rosemary and I were raised in a household where my father’s word was law, and any infringements were severely punished. I have had my faults as a mother, but I never laid a hand on you, and neither did your father—because I experienced too much of that as a child.
It wasn’t by any means unusual in those days. My father was a military man, as you know, and we moved around from base to base, our own family unit, with our own dark secrets.
Perhaps it is no coincidence that both Rosemary and I married men who were so very controlled. Your father was never a violent man, but he always believed he was right—and perhaps that gave me a sense of security.
You, though, were different. You wanted the opposite. You wanted to be shaken, you wanted to be stirred, you wanted so much more than the small, safe world we had planned for you. Again, I don’t think your choice of man was coincidence—Joe was as wild and free as you, the very opposite of your father. You were always so very brave, and that terrified me. I knew how cruel the world could be and wanted to protect you.
So now I must come to the other thing I should apologize for. You may have found it by now, or maybe not—but there is a box in my attic. One of your father’s old shoeboxes. It contains letters and cards sent to you by Joe, which we never passed on.
Your father insisted that we destroy them, and we went to great lengths to keep them from you. He wanted to eradicate all trace of the man. I told him that I’d burned them, and I meant to—but something inside me said no. It is a small act of defiance, I know, and hardly one that calls for a medal of valor.
I should have been braver. I should have fought harder. I should never have kept him away from you. For that, I am so, so sorry. Perhaps because of the way I was raised, I wanted too much to keep you safe—and perhaps because of the way I lived, I chose the wrong way to go about it. I realize that I kept you safe from everything—including the happiness and joy you deserved.
I have no excuses. Your father was, as usual, sure that he was correct—and I will not hide behind the ghost of a dead man, because I agreed with him. We’d seen your life spiral out of control after you met Joe: the financial struggles and the sordid flat. We saw you throw away your future, abandon your dreams, all for Joe. You gave up your stability and your comfort, discarded all that you were and all you could have been, for Joe.
Of course, what we refused to acknowledge was how happy you were. I saw it, from the corner of my eye, and I ignored it. You were breaking all the rules, and in my life, it has always been important to follow rules.
After Grace’s death, when you became so ill, Joe reached out to me for help. I can only imagine what that cost him, with his defiant pride. And in return, we disposed of him. We shut him out, and kept him away from you, and hid those letters.
I told myself it was the right thing to do. I told myself that without Grace tying you to him, you could be free. You could get better, go back to your studies, even meet someone else. Have more babies, with someone who could offer you a better life. I remember struggling with it, seeing you so devastated without him, and your father likening it to ripping off a bandage.
I came close, in that moment, to defying him. But I didn’t—because, again, part of me agreed with him. Joe was dangerous and he threatened your sanity. Without him, I convinced myself, we would get our little girl back.
Of course, I am now starting to understand that perhaps we might not have been right. You are home now, and working at the school, and living with me—but I still only have part of my little girl back. Part of you seems to have gone forever; when you said goodbye to Grace and Joe, part of you seems to have died. The wildness, the imagination, the joy.
I’ve never been a huge fan of wildness, or imagination, or even joy. They are terrifying creatures, unsafe things. I still want to keep you safe, so I am leaving those letters in that box in the attic for now. You appear strong to the outside eye, but I sense that inside there is still so much sadness. That knowing the truth right now might break you, that you are still too fragile.
Perhaps you will never read this. Perhaps there will come a point when I feel you are strong enough to know the truth, and I am strong enough to face the consequences—because I am under no illusions that you will simply understand and forgive me. I have only just lost your father, which has left me rudderless for the time being, and I cannot face losing you as well. So yes, I will continue to be selfish, and pretend that it is for your own benefit.
I can’t possibly imagine the circumstances in which you will be reading this. I only hope that you are not alone. I hope that you can believe that I loved you, and I loved Gracie—that beautiful, beautiful girl. She was all that was good in the world, and when we lost her, nothing was ever the same again. Seeing the way you were, at the funeral, like a ghost of the person you used to be, broke my heart.
Please try to remember that you are my Gracie—and that whatever I did, I did for what I convinced myself were the right reasons.
I wish you nothing but joy, my darling—dangerous, uncontrollable joy. You were always braver than me.
With love,
Mother