Page 35 of The Golden Girls’ Road Trip

‘I’m sorry,’ I say.

‘What are you sorry for, Connie?’ she asks, with a weariness to her voice.

‘I’m sorry I left. I didn’t want to, you know, but I had to. I had no choice. And then I came back, but you were gone.’ I take another sip and then a deep breath. ‘I was pregnant and I panicked.’ It’s so odd to be saying these words to Alex after all these years of keeping them to myself. It doesn’t feel liberating though. I just feel a great gaping sadness for all that has passed.

‘I do know you had a baby,’ she says. ‘I came to find you. I guessed you might be pregnant after you left, something William said, and still I came to find you. Your parents didn’t know where you were and I had to assume you’d gone off to have the baby alone.’

‘You came to find me?’ I can’t believe it. ‘You spoke to my parents?’ That is unimaginable.

‘I spoke to your mother and she was pure desperate, said she didn’t know where you were and that it was her fault. Then your dad appeared. He was so angry and he made it very clear that they hoped you wouldn’t come back. Something was off between them, that was for sure.’

‘My mother is still alive, I believe, but Dad died a few years ago,’ I say, trying to digest all that’s been said. My mother being desperate, well, that’s one word for it. The thought that Alex had come looking for me is both wonderful and also profoundly sad.

‘The father,’ I begin. ‘He was nobody, not important.’

‘But you see, that’s just not true, is it. You have a son and that says differently.’

I try very hard never to think about Simon’s father, but Alex is right in a way: he was important as he managed to shape most of the rest of my life in his one brutal act, but it’s just not in the way that Alex thinks. I have a sudden need to unburden myself and I open my mouth to tell her what happened, so that she will see how unimportant he really should be, but she’s got her hand raised to stop me.

‘I have no wish to hear about it. Just leave it.’

Rachel reappears with more drinks and looks from one of us to the other.

‘Cheer up, you two,’ she says placing the drinks on the table. ‘The night is young.’

‘But, sadly, we are not,’ I say.

‘Speak for yourself,’ Alex retorts, tipping the remainder of her drink into her mouth and reaching for the other.

‘These are on the house, of course,’ Rachel says, and we thank her before she returns to work.

‘What shall we drink to?’ Alex asks.

‘Missed opportunities?’ I suggest, still feeling the melancholy of our words.

‘To shaking off the past and embracing the future,’ she says, without much enthusiasm.

I raise my glass, happy to think about a future that might have Alex in it, but not convinced it’s possible.

18

Alex is in the shower and I’m in the kitchen making a cup of tea when her phone rings. She left it on the worktop when she went to bed last night and I’m just about to put it onto charge when it starts vibrating. She keeps it on silent for some reason. Hank’s name flashes on the screen and I deliberate over whether to answer or not. I swipe my finger across. It might be important, about the paintings and the deliveries.

‘Hello, Alex’s phone,’ I say, feeling a bit silly and there’s silence on the line for a moment.

‘Hi,’ he says, tentatively. ‘Is that Connie?’

‘Yes,’ I say, delighted that after being so dismissed at the exhibition, Alex then must have told him who I was.

‘Is she there?’ he asks, and for just a second I’m embarrassed to say she’s in the shower and how that sounds. I switched to non-alcoholic drinks last night, but Alex continued with the cocktails, and she was becoming morose when I finally persuaded her to get a taxi back to the house. She flopped down on the covers and promptly started snoring. I took off her shoes and resisted the urge to lie down next to her. Other than a request for a large coffee this morning, she’s not said much else and I don’t think she remembers holding my hand in the taxi on the way home.

‘She’s in the shower, Hank. Can I get her to call you back, or do you want me to pass on a message?’

‘No,’ he says slowly.

I’m not completely sure, because I don’t know him, but he sounds a bit pissed off.

‘Actually, can you tell her I’ve arranged the courier for Friday. If she can just be at the house then, that will be all she needs to do, and then we’re done.’