Vivienne twisted the cap of a small transparent tube back into place and watched a trickle of blue liquid merge with the saliva she’d just deposited inside. When it was done she looked at Michelle and their eyes sparkled, the way they had when they were small and up to no good.
‘I’ll send it off first thing,’ Michelle promised, taking the tube and dropping it into a package already addressed to a laboratory in Ireland. ‘This is so cool. I can’t wait to find out the results.’
Vivi’s nerves fluttered. Having decided to spare Gil – and herself – the ordeal of confronting her mother over her father, at least for the time being, she was now torn between the fascination of having her ancestry traced using her DNA, and the trepidation of what it might bring – if it brought anything at all. The website had asked for as much information on her family as she could provide, which wasn’t difficult on her mother’s side. On her father’s …
‘Six weeks is a long time to wait,’ she sighed. Time had a different meaning to her now. She wanted everything to happen right away, before it was too late, but had to accept she had no control. Reaching for her glass of iced tea, she said ‘I just can’t see how they’re going to find anything when I’ve given them next to nothing to go on.’
They were relaxing on the spacious deck of Michelle’s house on Westleigh Heights, where cosy wicker chairs and sofas were small islands between all the toys, magazines, kiddie shoes, compost sacks and huge urns of vibrant flowers.
‘The thing is,’ Michelle responded, tilting her face to the sun, ‘we don’t know the science of it, so we’ve got no idea how they go about it. So, we need to have faith – and in the meantime have you ransacked your mother’s bedroom yet to see if there are any old letters or photos hanging around, or something that might give us some sort of clue to work with?’
Vivienne had to smile. The idea of them as detectives kept reminding her of when they were young adventure-seekers trying to identify the source of treasures found on the beach, or attempting to discover a new secret pathway that might link their houses. This was before Vivi had also lived on the Heights. When she’d moved here with her mother and Gil they’d simply had to make a hundred and fourteen skips to reach each other’s front gates. ‘I did the ransacking years ago,’ she reminded Michelle, ‘but OK, I have looked again, and what I can tell you is that she still has the bronze sculpture all wrapped up in the bottom of a drawer. Do you remember how I used to think it was him?’
Michelle laughed. ‘I do, and it was a kind of romantic notion, thinking of him as a gangster-dancer, or I thought so at the time. I wonder why she keeps it hidden away. From what I recall it’s quite lovely. You’d think she’d want to display it somewhere, if only in her bedroom. Why don’t you ask if you can have it in your room?’
Vivi arched an eyebrow. ‘Because I’d have to admit I’d been snooping through her things,’ she pointed out, ‘and because I haven’t forgotten how she laid into me the last time I mentioned it.’ She sighed and drank more tea. ‘There’s definitely some sort of mystery surrounding it,’ she murmured, ‘but the chances of her telling me what it is are about as good as her telling me who my father actually is.’
Michelle looked thoughtful. ‘Which is why we keep connecting the two,’ she declared. ‘The sculpture and your father.’
It was true, Vivienne did feel there was a connection, though she could offer no good reason why. ‘Maybe she stole it,’ she ventured.
Michelle pondered this before shaking her head. ‘I reckon it was a gift to her from him, but that’s about as far as I can get with it, because it doesn’t answer why she won’t display it or tell you where it came from. She’s got more secrets than MI5, your mother, which actually makes her quite interesting in a wholly maddening sort of way.’
‘Tell me about it,’ Vivi muttered.
Glancing at her watch, Michelle stretched and got to her feet. ‘It’s time Ash was awake or he won’t sleep tonight,’ she said. ‘I’ll be right back.’
Resisting a check of her emails since there were rarely any these days, Vivi strolled over to the balustrade and rested her hands on the warm stone as she gazed out at the view. From here it was spectacular, especially on such a clear summer’s day. The sky over the bay was a perfect cerulean blue, with only a wisp of white cloud floating across the far horizon, and the mesmerizing rise and fall of the birds as they soared through the air and dived into the glittering mass of waves. She envied their freedom with a longing that seemed to burn; she even wondered how possible it would be for her to fly from the cliffs and look down on the coast in one of the hang-gliders that had just come into view.
She guessed not possible at all.
She inhaled deeply, felt nothing unusual in the region of her heart, no tightness in her lungs or stirrings of dizziness, and let the breath go. Bizarrely, in spite of two more shocks over the past couple of weeks, she’d been feeling less fatigued, even slightly more positive and engaged, so it seemed the recent change in her medication was working on one level, while the ICD reliably performed on another. She’d get used to the thumps, she’d read on the forums, comments written by those who also had the device. The shocks became less frightening over time, and if she was lucky she might go weeks, even months without experiencing one at all.
She wondered if she actually had that much time, or if a dreaded VAD was even now moving up the calendar towards her, with the end close behind. As though breaking away from the ominous, unseen advance she followed the course of a waterskier winding and speeding across the bay, and remembered the first time she’d been able to do that, taught by Gil. Her mother had been driving the boat, cheering her on, while Mark, also cheering, had impatiently waited his turn.
Something else she wouldn’t be doing again.
There were so many things, but what was the point of working herself into a state of useless frustration? It wouldn’t change anything; no amount of wishing she could be with Mark in Italy now, or skydiving from a plane in a surge of madness, or living it up in Monte Carlo with the GaLs was going to make it happen.
Earlier, she and Michelle had FaceTimed with Trudy and Shaz. It had been fun; they’d laughed a lot while catching up on each other’s news, though Vivienne hadn’t had much to report. They’d wanted to know how she was, of course, and she knew they genuinely cared, but she’d simply said ‘fine’, and tried to move on. No one wanted to talk about her condition, least of all her.
Trudy, however, had asked if her ICD had gone off at all, and Michelle had told her that it had. ‘But she’s right as rain again within minutes,’ she’d added proudly. This was true, that was how it happened, a brutal kick in the chest out of nowhere, a small gasp or groan from her and maybe some nausea or faintness, but not much, and it was over. It shook her up mentally more than physically, but Trey the physiologist was still insisting that there was nothing for her to worry about at this stage. If that changed she’d be returned to hospital for more extensive checks. She couldn’t help but panic every time she thought about slipping away. But thankfully she didn’t have to torment herself with what that could lead to because Michelle had just returned.
‘Here she is,’ Michelle sang out to Ash as she carried him onto the deck.
Vivi turned and felt a rush of tenderness as thirteen-month-old Ash broke into a toothy grin and excitedly reached for her.
Once she was seated Michelle handed him over and Vivi buried her face into the heavenly baby smell of him, loving how sturdy and satisfying he felt in her arms and the way he seemed so thrilled to see her. He grabbed her cheeks and her hair, stuffed her fingers into his mouth to give them a good bite and let out a yell of pure joy for no apparent reason at all. Having been a baby who’d screamed for the first seven months of his life, he was now the happiest child, who loved to eat, play, laugh and be fussed, probably in that order, and hardly cried at all.
As Michelle relaxed back in her own chair a piercing little voice suddenly screamed out, ‘Mummy! We’re home. Where are you?’
‘Out here,’ Michelle called back. ‘There goes peace and quiet,’ she murmured to Vivi, and turned to watch as five-year-old Millie in red tutu and ballet pumps came clumsily pirouetting through the kitchen onto the deck.
‘Auntie Vivi,’ she cried ecstatically. ‘I didn’t know you were here. Did you see me?’
‘I did,’ Vivi confirmed, leaning towards her little goddaughter to receive a bruising hug and kiss. ‘You were brilliant.’
‘My teacher says I might be in the show we do for Christmas. Will you come and watch me?’
‘Of course,’ Vivienne promised, fleetingly seeing the empty chair where she should be sitting.
‘Do I get one of those?’ Michelle prompted, tapping a finger to her cheek.
Millie gave a little leap as she laughed. ‘Sorry, Mummy, I forgot you,’ and running to Michelle she delivered a dutiful adoring hug and nose-bumping kiss.
‘Where’s Daddy?’ Michelle asked. ‘Didn’t he bring you home?’
‘Yes, he went into his office. Can I have a drink, please? And one of the cakes I made with Auntie Vivi?’
‘That was over a week ago,’ Michelle reminded her, ‘and you’ve eaten them all.’
‘But there are some Kinder eggs as a special treat,’ Vivi told her. ‘Two for you and one for Ash.’
‘Because he’s too little for two,’ Millie said with wise understanding, apparently not guessing that her brother had already eaten one. Then grabbing the baby by the cheeks she blew a raspberry on his lips and giggled as he let out a shriek of delight.
Minutes later Millie was back with a beaker of cold milk and a chocolate egg, which she placed carefully on the table. ‘Shall I show you some more of my ballet?’ she suggested.
‘Yes, please,’ Vivi encouraged, enjoying the feel of Ash’s head on her shoulder as she stroked his curly blond hair.
‘Clear away some of the toys,’ Michelle cautioned, ‘or you’ll have an accident.’
Millie turned to Vivi. ‘I don’t want to have an accident,’ she told her gravely.
‘No, you certainly don’t.’
Millie’s cute little face lit up with a smile. ‘I’m on holiday for all of the summer,’ she declared, ‘and Mummy said you’re going to be here too.’
‘That’s right. So we’ll be able to bake lots of cakes and do drawings and go to the beach …’
‘Shall I get my doctor’s set and listen to your heart?’ Millie offered, suddenly remembering why Vivi was often there.
‘That would be lovely, thank you, but let me see some more of your ballet first.’
Needing no further bidding, Millie hurriedly kicked Ash’s toys out of the way and struck an opening pose. ‘This is called first position,’ she explained, her heels tightly together and toes turned slightly out. ‘See my arms are like this, because it’s got to be like I’m holding a big beach ball.’ She shuffled her feet so that her right heel was against the arch of her left foot and arced one arm over her head while reaching out to the side with the other. ‘This is second position,’ she announced proudly, then screwed up her face in confusion. ‘Um, I think it might be third. Yes, it’s definitely third, so we don’t need to worry about second.’
Vivi was trying hard not to laugh, while Michelle lost the struggle.
‘Don’t be rude, Mummy,’ Millie chided. ‘Daddy, Mummy’s laughing at me,’ she told him as he came out onto the deck.
‘She’s a terrible mummy,’ he declared sympathetically. ‘What shall we do with her? Hello, son,’ he laughed as Ash started bouncing around in glee, and sweeping him up in his arms he planted a giant smackeroo on his forehead.
Millie was bursting with a good idea. ‘I think we should send her to bed without any supper,’ she told him. ‘And we’ll send the wicked witch to get her if she tries to escape.’
‘Let’s do it!’ he agreed.
Millie squealed with laughter and threw her arms around his legs. ‘I’m only joking, Mummy,’ she assured Michelle, ‘but you shouldn’t laugh at me.’
Setting Ash down, Sam embraced Vivi, saying, ‘I forgot you were going to be here. You’re looking good. Better than good.’
Smiling, Vivi said, ‘Mark FaceTimed us earlier from Pompeii. He said to tell you there’s quite a lot of rebuilding work needs doing if you’re interested.’
Laughing, he said, ‘I take it he’s having a fantastic time.’
‘Oh, I think we can be sure of that, although I’m getting the impression he’s a lot more interested in Italian girls than he is in exploring historical sites.’
‘And so he should be at his age.’ He checked his watch. ‘Sorry, I have to pop over to Deerwood for an hour, but you’re staying for dinner?’
‘That’s the plan,’ Michelle told him. ‘I thought we’d barbecue.’
‘OK, I’ll do the honours. We’ll probably be one extra, by the way, making us six including the kids, unless your parents are coming, in which case we’ll be eight.’
After he’d gone Vivi said, ‘Deerwood?’
‘He does a lot of work out there,’ Michelle explained, scooping up Ash. ‘The owner’s son is an old friend of his going back to schooldays. I expect that’s who our extra guest will be.’