When Glory arrived back at her mother’s house, Faith, Esther and Elijah were in the living room.
“Is that my jacket?” Faith asked as Glory entered, the earlier tension forgotten. “I was wondering where I left it.”
“Sorry,” Glory said, taking it off. “I picked up the wrong coat when I left.” She hung it back on the banister.
“Is that Glory?” Celeste called from the kitchen. “Did she remember to get the rice?”
“You never asked me to get any rice, Mummy! And anyway, I told you we shouldn’t eat long grain any more. I can make jollof with bulgur wheat, it’s just as tasty.”
“She’s telling the truth,” Faith said. “Glory cooked it when she was at ours, it’s really nice!”
Celeste walked through from the kitchen, standing at the threshold of the living room with a frown on her face and her hands planted on her hips.
“Whatever you want to eat in your house is fine, whatever you want to eat in America is your business,” she said sternly. “But as for me and my house, we will eat rice!”
Faith sniggered and reached into her coat pocket and took out her phone. Glory watched her sister stare at her screen, her hair falling forward to obscure her expression. Faith huffed, slipping it into her back pocket. She then reached into the inside pocket of the coat and brought out an envelope.
“I need to put this back upstairs before I forget,” Faith said, checking the contents of the envelope. “I’ve scanned it, so I won’t need it again.”
“Pass it, I’ll do it,” Glory said, reaching out to take it. Inside was their parents’ marriage certificate, delicately worn, the paper furring at the folds.
As Glory read over the details, the date leaped out at her.
“Mummy, I didn’t know you got married after Faith was born!”
“We were married in Nigeria before we came to England,” Celeste said, looking up.
“But this certificate says you got married in 1988—Faith was born in ’87!”
“We were married before,” Celeste insisted. “We had the traditional at my parents’ compound, it was a very big affair.”
“But you had the white wedding here?”
“It wasn’t a wedding—it was a formality.”
“England doesn’t recognize traditional weddings, Glory, you know that,” Faith interjected.
“I know that. But I didn’t know this, I didn’t know . . . never mind.”
Celeste tutted and, irritated by her mother’s offense, Glory turned and climbed the stairs.
Her progress on clearing and tidying the house had been a predictable dance of two steps forward and one step back, with her mother finding reasons to hang on to every other item that Glory proposed was donated to a charity shop or thrown away.
Celeste’s bedroom was the one room that remained in a permanent state of disarray. Entering it now, Glory could see that the file of all important documents was balancing precariously on the closed lid of her father’s desk.
As Glory reached out she knocked it from its perch, and it tumbled to the ground, documents escaping and scattering. Stooping to pick up the file, Glory stopped abruptly when she saw a picture of herself with her two sisters among the loose leaves. All three of them together, complete.
Hope was next to Glory, and Faith stood behind them, while on either side of the three little girls was a white man and a white woman. Faith’s hair was braided in tight rows and she stood upright in a denim pinafore with pink flowers embroidered around the collar. Glory and Hope were shoulder to shoulder in matching outfits. The woman’s hand rested tenderly on Faith’s shoulder and the man had his hands crossed behind his back, looking serious but not unkind.
Glory turned the photograph around in her hand, the paper creased with time but still as glossy as ever. Written on the back in her father’s handwriting was, “Joan and Edward Marksham with Faith, Hope and Glory, March 1993.” Glory had never heard her father once utter her twin’s name, but seeing “Hope” in his handwriting practically summoned his voice back from the grave. The smudged memory of her sister’s existence came into sharp relief as she looked at the little girl wearing the same powder-blue pinafore as the tiny version of herself. While Glory’s face was a suspicious frown, holding the gaze of the camera lens at a careful distance, Hope’s was open and inviting. She looked so pure and helpless. A wave of nauseating grief shook Glory and sent her to her knees.
When Glory collected herself, the first thought that burned through her was why? Why had she never seen this picture before? And were there more photos like this hiding somewhere? She picked up the accordion file and tipped it upside down, emptying the remaining documents onto the floor. Her hands frantically searched the papers and opened envelopes, tossing them aside as she looked for more pictures—more evidence of this version of her life. Then she turned to the file itself, her hands searching the corners and pulling at the cover, her fingers finding the cardboard edges, probing, hoping for a hidden compartment into which it may have slipped.
“Glory? Can’t you hear me calling you?”
Faith walked into the room, interrupting her sister who was wild-eyed and bent over the jumbled pile.
“What are you doing?”
“I knocked it over,” Glory said, trying to sound innocent, even if she felt like a thief, desperately scrabbling for something forbidden. “Why were you calling me?”
“We were talking about Tabitha’s wedding. You know she’s having a traditional? Are you coming?”
“She hasn’t invited me.”
“Why wouldn’t she invite you? She practically lived with us that summer her mum went to Nigeria.”
“We just don’t talk.”
“Since when?”
“Since LA? Maybe before? I don’t know.”
“You don’t talk to Tabitha? Do you have any friends any more?” Faith said with a good-natured laugh. But Glory said nothing, moving her hands over the documents on the floor, pretending to sort them.
“Er, OK then,” Faith said, and turned to leave the bedroom.
“Faith, have you ever . . . ?” Glory was about to ask Faith about the photograph, but something made her change her mind.
“Have I ever what?”
“Did you know that Mummy and Daddy weren’t officially married when you were born?”
“Glory,” Faith said, her voice tired. She rested one hand on the doorknob and another on her hip. “Why do you fixate over these things? I knew, yes—well, I found out later, but I knew.”
“It’s just . . . weird. I didn’t know,” Glory repeated, her mind catching on this fact like the needle of a record player skipping on a scratched groove.
“Did you even read it properly?” Faith asked. “It wasn’t some lavish ceremony, it was at a registry office. Like Mummy said, it was just a formality.”
Glory nodded and let her head hang. She was upset, not for her parents’ pathetic registry office wedding, but for all the things her family thought were fine to leave unsaid.
“OK?” Faith asked.
“Yeah, fine. No big deal.”
Glory cleared her throat and looked up. “I’ll tidy this up and come downstairs in a bit.”
Faith left and Glory slipped the picture inside the waistband of her jeans. She collected the rest of the scattered contents, slotting them solemnly back in their rightful homes. Then, just as she was about to close the file and put it back in the desk, she decided to do one last check. Still no death certificate for her sister, and though she hadn’t expected to miraculously find it, its absence turned her gloom into a stony rage. She was done tiptoeing, she deserved answers. Glory went back downstairs, the hidden photo burning hot against her stomach.
But when Glory entered the living room, she saw her mother with Esther sitting on her lap. Celeste was comforting her granddaughter as she breathlessly explained some injustice Elijah had unleashed upon her.
“Elijah,” her mother called with a soft force. “Come and apologize to your sister.”
Elijah whined stubbornly, keeping his back firmly toward his grandmother and sister, until he was gently coaxed into turning around and standing next to them.
“Sorry, Estie,” he finally said, his pink bottom lip pushed out, his eyes low and sad.
Esther threw her pudgy arms around her brother and Celeste clapped and encouraged them both, before planting a kiss on each of their foreheads. Esther kissed her grandmother back and Elijah shyly pushed himself into Celeste’s bosom. Her mother was lost in the gentle intimacy of her grandchildren and Glory’s own words echoed back to her: Your mother has been through enough. Now was not the time for confrontation.