The Other Life of Charlotte Evans Read online

But hell, she’d sneaked off to see Carol, popped out to grab lunch, sat in the office on the phone; it could have been any number of times. ‘You confided in my boyfriend while asking me to keep it a secret. I don’t understand.’

  ‘Yes. My head’s all over the place, and I haven’t seen you on your own for a while. But I don’t like the way this conversation is going, Charlie. Do not say something you might later regret just because you’ve been drinking.’

  ‘It’s not because I’ve been drinking. I’m not drunk.’ She let go of the straps and held out her hand to show Lissa how steady it was.

  Lissa grabbed it. ‘Then trust me. Trust him, Charlotte. We were just chatting and you happened not to be there. It’s no big deal.’

  Shame wormed its way through Charlotte’s gut. Because no, she didn’t need to start creating scenarios in her head about her best friend and her fiancé. They were both loyal and honest. And she didn’t deserve either of them in her life. ‘Does Ryan know yet?’

  ‘Yes.’ Lissa’s eyes widened.

  ‘Oh.’ That was a surprise. ‘What did he say?’

  ‘He was pretty pleased actually.’

  ‘Is that why you’re so grumpy?’ Because only Lissa could be pissed off about a good guy liking her and being positive about her disaster-mongering.

  ‘I don’t know. A little, maybe. It’s pretty full-on talking things like us and we. But what’s annoying me right now is you. I’ve organised this whole weekend for you. I’ve been there for you. I’m here now pretending I’m feeling sick – actually, there is a lot of that happening anyway – but a lot tells me you’d rather shout my head off about something you think happened between me and Ben. Focus on what’s important, Charlotte.’

  ‘I’m trying to.’ Charlotte could see Lissa’s profile again. The little belly. Was there time to get the dress altered? The baby. ‘You know what? Life can be pretty bloody cruel.’

  ‘What’s cruel now?’

  ‘Oh. That you get a baby, and I don’t. That I get the cancer gene, and no one else does. You know… stuff like that.’ She couldn’t help the antagonism and yes… outright envy… infiltrating her words, because yes, there were a lot of women a lot worse off. But there were quite a few out there who didn’t have this in their lives.

  Lissa squeezed her hand. ‘That’s life, hun. You’ve had a pretty good one up until now but sometimes things suck.’

  A good life? Yes. But with holes in it. Holes that were getting bigger and bigger. Charlotte shook her hand away. Maybe she was a bit drunk. Maybe she wasn’t. But what she did know was that she felt a lot better saying these things out loud. ‘You don’t even want your baby.’

  Lissa snapped up. ‘Don’t tell me what I want.’

  ‘Well, I know what I’d want if I was pregnant. I’d want to keep it. I want a baby and Ben won’t let me. And then I get to have my boobs off anyway, and my ovaries out. How’s that for a sucky life?’

  Lissa huffed. Her eyes sparked irritation. Frustration. Annoyance. ‘I know you would keep it. Most people would, and you of all people, Charlotte, would want to keep your baby because of what happened to you. But I’m not that kind of woman. I don’t see myself singing nursery rhymes, or playing Mozart to my bump.’

  Charlotte’s whole body ached at what she might never have. ‘Maybe you’ll learn to love it.’

  ‘Yeah. Maybe. Maybe. I just need time to get accustomed to things. Like Ben does. It’s a lot to work through.’

  ‘Yeah. And I’m stuck with it. He can walk away. So can you.’ And then, all the emotion that had felt choking and restrictive in her throat came tumbling out. ‘He already has, Liss. He walked away. We had a fight. A big one. And I haven’t heard from him since. I don’t know what he’s thinking or feeling. We can’t talk without fighting. I’m starting to think we should postpone the wedding.’

  Lissa’s eyebrows rose and she shook her head. ‘Talk about overreaction. You’ve had a hard few months and you’ve been knocked for six. You found a lump. Found your mum. And now discover you have a dodgy gene and the future’s not as rosy as it could be—’

  ‘Not rosy? I’m going to die.’ Now she was feeling as angry as Lissa sounded, she tried to lower the tone and the volume, but failed.

  ‘Not right now, though, and there are things you can do to prevent it. We’re all going to die at some point. Stop being so bloody dramatic. I don’t know what’s happened to you recently, Charlotte, but you’re not you. You’re behaving as if everyone’s against you. You’re keeping secrets, you’re suspicious, and actually, not being very nice.’

  Charlotte struggled to keep in control. No, actually, she lost it. And it felt good to finally say what she really felt and really meant. ‘Whoa. Says the woman who mysteriously spills her guts to my boyfriend. Who has a gift—’

  ‘Shut up!’ Lissa’s voice got louder. Harder. ‘Stop it. Right there. You have a man who loves you but you’re forcing him into a corner.’ She started to count Charlotte’s lucky stars on her fingers. ‘A real loving and caring mum who’d give her right hand to help you through your tests and whatever the hell you’re going to need to fight the cancer. But do you tell her? No. You keep her in the dark and have secret meetings with your birth mother behind her back. And you have a best friend who loves you to bits but now you’re lashing out at me too, because for once in my life I have something you want and can’t have… a baby. I’m sorry about that. I’m so sorry about the stupid gene too. But none of this is anyone’s fault and certainly not mi—’

  There was a sudden creak to their left. A noise. Lissa whipped round, her face glowing red. Embarrassed for the first time ever in her life. ‘Oh. Hello, er… Eileen. Niamh. Hi, Shel. Sonja.’

  They were all crammed into the doorway. Silent. Faces glowing. Eyes not quite focused, swaying a little but suddenly very sober and stunned.

  But worse, much worse, was the look on Eileen’s face. It was the same look Lissa had given her, and Ben too.

  Devastated. Shocked. Betrayed.

  Chapter Sixteen

  So that was it.

  Charlotte’s whole body tensed. She’d alienated her fiancé, her best friend and her mother. She’d pushed them all away in one way or another in her attempt to find out who she was. Oh, that very idea that she might feel part of something bigger than herself… and now she felt small. Tiny. Hurting.

  And so very alone as she stood on one side of the boat and they all stepped down into the hull.

  ‘You’re having a baby?’ Niamh was open-mouthed, wide-eyed in disbelief, staring at Lissa.

  ‘You’ve got cancer? Cancer? Oh my God. Why didn’t you say? What the hell…?’ Pity. Pity in their eyes. Each of them. And it hurt like a thousand wasp stings. The last thing she wanted was that.

  ‘A lump?’

  ‘Your birth mother? Carol?’ Charlotte didn’t even have to see who said that. She registered the emotion constricting her chest.

  ‘A baby?’ Mia stumbled out of the bedroom and joined them all. ‘What baby?’

  It was like a flipping tea party. And yet also like that long, slow wait for the gallows. Charlotte looked at each of them in turn, at the shock, the raised eyebrows, the fresh crop of tears. And her heart scraped all over again.

  ‘Okay. Okay. Shut up everyone, for God’s sake.’ Lissa waited for them all to gather into the room. Eileen sat on the sofa, her back ramrod-straight. Her face stone. Her hands were shaking. Trembling. And Charlotte’s heart ached even more. There was so much she should have said. Done. She wanted to wrap those hands round her and curl into her mother’s embrace. But it didn’t look as if that would happen any time soon. Lissa sat down. ‘So, clearly you all heard.’

  Shelley nodded. ‘It’s a bloody lightweight wooden boat. Of course we heard.’

  ‘Every word?’ For a moment Charlotte felt hopeful. Maybe they hadn’t caught everything. Maybe she could take her mum to a quiet place and tell her everything without this crowd watching. Knowing. Judging. Panicking. Pity. She could
n’t bear any of it.

  Shelley nodded again. ‘Every word.’

  Sonja swivelled to look at Lissa and Charlotte was grateful to be out of the spotlight. ‘Pregnant, eh? Holy moly, I was not expecting that. I thought it was weird you’d take this antibiotic thing so seriously. I had no idea. I never guessed. Not happy?’

  ‘No.’ Lissa ran a protective hand across her belly. She didn’t even know she was doing it. But when she did it seemed as if her whole body softened. Until she remembered she needed to appear as if she didn’t care. Until she remembered she was supposed to be fighting. She glared hard at everyone. ‘Not entirely. No.’

  ‘You’d make a good mother, Melissa.’ It was Eileen. Her voice was small and she looked shocked. Pale.

  ‘I don’t think so.’

  ‘You would. I’m not saying it’d be easy. But you’re strong, so strong that anyone you gave your love to could only feel cherished and protected. And who knows? Maybe all those things you want to do won’t seem so important once you hold your child for the first time. Or maybe you could go and explore together. It’s not beyond the realms of possibility. People do it.’

  Lissa’s face crumpled a little. ‘But what if… what if I don’t love it? My mum didn’t exactly dote on me. In fact, I can safely say she didn’t like me. At all. Never mind love me.’

  Eileen smiled for the first time since she’d walked in on the argument. She still hadn’t even looked at Charlotte. It was almost as if she couldn’t. Dealing with an emotional Lissa was easier. ‘Trust me, Melissa, you have a lot to give. When I was given a screaming, red-faced baby who wouldn’t stop crying for hours, and who had the worse case of reflux the doctor had seen in years, I was so scared. Frightened. I thought that whatever I did would be the wrong thing. But one day I said to John, I don’t know what I’m doing. I’m scared. I’m out of my depth and she can feel it. She knows I’m not her mother and I don’t know if I can love her the way I’m meant to.’ And he said, You just have to choose to love her. And then you will.’ Her voice cracked and this time she did look at Charlotte. ‘And so that’s what I did. I just chose to love her.’

  Choose? Choose. Charlotte’s heart rate escalated. And she could un-choose at any time, right? That was the deal.

  But her mum was still talking. ‘And even though it wasn’t plain sailing, we did get on a lot better after that.’

  Lissa’s palm stayed on her belly. Her eyes filled with tears, just like Charlotte’s. ‘I’m scared to love it.’

  Eileen’s hand ran up and down Lissa’s back. ‘I know. I know you are. But that doesn’t mean you can’t.’

  They sat for a few moments as Lissa digested this. She looked at each of them in turn – except for Charlotte, which felt like a knife stabbing her gut. Then Lissa looked down at her belly and nodded.

  ‘I think I’d like to try.’ Then there was a tear running down Lissa’s cheek, bringing her thick mascara and eyeliner with it. More tears. More streaks. And a huddle of girls promising her everything would be okay.

  And for Lissa, it would be. She was strong and feisty and would love that baby fiercely.

  But still Lissa didn’t meet Charlotte’s eye, and Eileen turned her back. And Charlotte still hadn’t heard from Ben. And she still had this stupid bloody gene. And no baby and not much of a future.

  So Charlotte doubted everything would be okay at all.

  Finally, Eileen turned to Charlotte and tugged her away from the group. ‘We need to talk. A lot. I want to know everything.’

  ‘I didn’t want you to find out like this.’ All the bricks of Charlotte’s carefully constructed life were starting to fall around her. It felt as if her bones were dissolving in her legs, her heart crumbling into sand. ‘I just wanted to know who she was. Who I am.’

  ‘Later. We’ll talk about her later. And I’m okay with it, Charlotte. Honestly. I’ve been expecting it for a long time. None of that’s important compared to everything else.’ Eileen shook her head, took Charlotte by the hand and walked her to the deck. Outside they could see the Amsterdam lights, hear the city at midnight sounds: heavy bass beat. Laughter. A shout on the gentle breeze. ‘The cancer, Charlotte. Tell me about the cancer.’

  She’d thought her mother’s first concern would be about Carol, about being usurped, but Eileen was sure of her place in Charlotte’s life. Of course she’d want to know about the illness first… anything else would pale into insignificance compared to that.

  But how Charlotte wished she didn’t have to think about the cancer. How she wished it didn’t dominate her every thought, her dreams, her future. How she wished she’d never heard of the word, never found that lump, never set off on a trajectory that seemed as if it were bounding out of control.

  How she wished she was seven years old again, slipping silently onto her mother’s knee and holding on to her waist, innocent of where she’d come from. Unaware of the importance of keeping a check on her parents’ feelings. Blissfully, blindly innocent of how her world could change with one sentence. One word.

  It was harder to say these words out loud to the woman who’d cared for her for so long than to say them to anyone else. She could see the worry etched in Eileen’s features, in her eyes… the luminosity of earlier having faded to anxiety. ‘It’s a faulty gene, which means a whole lot of trouble in the future. Actually, now, too, in a lot of ways, if I’m honest.’ Especially where her wants clashed against Ben’s.

  ‘Is this why I haven’t seen you so much recently? You’ve been worrying about it on your own. Or is that the… er, Carol business?’

  Everything Charlotte had been worrying about swelled into a huge knot threatening to overwhelm her. She hadn’t realised just how much she’d been hanging on by her fingertips, surviving. ‘It’s everything, Mum. I’m scared. Scared about everything. About dying, about not having my own child, about losing Ben. Losing you. I’ve been trying hard not to worry, but I can’t help it. I don’t want to die. I don’t want to get sick.’

  ‘No one does, love.’ Her mum slipped her arm around Charlotte’s shoulders and tipped her head to her daughter’s. ‘Just tell me all about it.’

  So Charlotte breathed in her mum’s comforting scent and spoke about the nightmares of the last few weeks. About the blood tests and the results. The options. The choices. The ovaries and the boobs and babies. About Carol. About Ben’s reaction and the fight. And about the wedding she thought might never happen.

  Once she’d finished she felt lighter. Still burdened by all the decisions and the worry, but relieved to have shared it all. Finally.

  Eileen’s eyes shone with tears but she flicked them away with her fingers. ‘Right then. Well, we’ll deal with things in order. First thing Monday morning, we’ll phone Dr Carter and make an appointment for after your honeymoon. To chat. We need facts, not guesses. Then we’ll know exactly what we’re looking at. How much time you have to fit in everything you want to do before you have to have the op.’

  ‘Ben says I should have it tomorrow.’

  ‘You can’t blame him for loving you and wanting to keep you healthy.’

  ‘I know, but what about kids? I don’t want adoption to be our only option.’

  ‘Oh, you know… it’s not so bad. You’re not so bad.’ There was a light in Eileen’s eyes. Maybe it was a reflection from the street light. Maybe it was just a symbol of a mother’s love.

  Charlotte nudged her, a small smile forming in her chest. ‘Watch it.’

  ‘After we spent so long trying for a baby of our own, you were like a miracle. You saved us.’

  Charlotte thought about Carol and the uncles who wouldn’t want to know her, and the difficult, dysfunctional family she could have ended up in. And no, Carol wasn’t bad, not at all… but she hadn’t had what it took to bring a baby up. She wasn’t, after all, Charlotte’s mum. Whereas Eileen and John had given her everything. She owed them everything. Eileen had paid for the breast consultant, she’d been at the lump appointments. Hell, she’d been
nothing but supportive of her daughter her whole life and Charlotte had repaid her with secrets and mistrust, trying to find someone who would love her better than Eileen did. And, truth was, no one ever could.

  What kind of a woman did Charlotte want to be? One just like Eileen. Loyal. Determined. Loving. She had a long way to go, but she was determined to start now. Start over. ‘You know, it really was the other way round. You saved me.’

  ‘I know we’ve had some difficulties, but I hope you don’t doubt… don’t ever doubt me, Charlotte. I chose to love you, yes. But that grew and grew until it wasn’t a choice at all. It was a fact. An immutable fact, as unconditional as the sun coming up every morning. It just grows and it sticks.’

  ‘Thanks, Mum.’ Honesty was the best policy, she knew that now. ‘I thought… this is going to sound silly, but I believed you might want to give me back. You know, if I mucked up. If I was too much trouble, or pissed you off. Pardon the language.’

  ‘Really? Oh my goodness. No. Never. Never, ever did that cross my mind. I love you, more than anything.’ Her mum’s hand was warm as it squeezed Charlotte’s. ‘And there may be a baby, or babies, out there who need saving too. Who you could choose to love. Perhaps you could think about that for a while before you make a decision.’

  ‘Is it really very selfish that I want to have the same DNA as someone else? Mind you, mine’s got a little crinkle in it, hasn’t it?’

  Eileen smiled. ‘No one’s perfect… although you’re pretty damned close. Do you want some advice from an old lady?’

  ‘You’re not that old. Please note, you were the only one who ended the evening on the arm of an attractive gentleman. But yes. Yes, advice please.’

  ‘Make things up with Ben. Have your wedding. Go on honeymoon. Take time out from all of this doom and gloom and decision-making – nothing’s so urgent that you have to decide your whole future right now. Today. Tomorrow. Or even next week. Enjoy being just the two of you, healthy and happy together. And then, when you come back, talk to Dr Carter again.’