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Chapter 16
‘Lili – what are you doing here?’
Lili was standing on Connie’s doorstep, intending to ask her the question as soon as she opened the door:why did you lie to me?But when Lili saw Connie, she burst into tears. She was thinking of Alex ending their relationship, and then her new friendships in Suffolk – people whom she missed already, especially Nate, William and Bella the dog. ‘Oh, Connie!’ she said, ‘I’ve made such a mess of things!’
Connie immediately joined her on the doorstep, putting her arm around Lili’s shoulders and guiding her into the house. She still lived in the old Edwardian three-storey townhouse she had lived in for decades. It was where she and her late husband had raised their three daughters. She had four grandchildren – all girls too. Photos of her family adorned the walls, and small framed pictures sat on the sideboard by the phone.
The place hadn’t changed a bit; the décor was a throwback to the eighties, when Connie and her husband had set about renovating their new home. Lili glanced up the stairs at the stripped wooden banisters, the patterned brown carpet extending from the hall downstairs, and the beige wallpaper with its delicate flower pattern. She remembered the nights she had stayed in this house vividly. Lili had so desperately wanted to be part of Connie’s family when she was younger, to live here, and for Connie’s girls to be her little sisters. Her first stopover there – or sleepover, as Connie’s children had called them – had been when she was four. Connie had been expecting her youngest.
The foster parents that Lili had been with since she had arrived in England from Corfu had thought they couldn’t have children of their own. They had been intending to adopt Lili until the woman discovered she was pregnant. Suddenly, they didn’t want to adopt anymore. As soon as they found out the good news, they decided that fostering wasn’t practical after all and wanted Lili placed elsewhere.
Connie had brought her home to stay a few days with her and her family. After that episode, Lili realised that if she was naughty, or threatened to run away, any foster parents she was staying with would be on the phone to social services, and Connie would have no option but to come and fetch her. Lili recalled that she’d often have her bag packed with the few possessions she had before she caused trouble. Connie would take her to her own home for a night or two until she arranged a new foster home.
There was no shortage of people willing to take care of a little blonde-haired four-year-old – until she misbehaved. This went on for another year; she was in and out of foster homes, in and out of Connie’s place. Then everything changed. The last time she packed her bags, ready to move back to Connie’s after her latest foster parents had washed their hands of her, she found herself in a small cubby-hole of a room in a new children’s home instead. Social services had decided they weren’t looking at fostering her anymore. Her plan to get Connie to allow her to stay with her family permanently, if no one else would have her, had gone disastrously wrong.
Then, three years later, an opportunity arose that meant she could leave the children’s home. She sat the entrance exam for a posh boarding school on the promise that if she was accepted, she could spend the holidays with Connie and her family.
Everything worked out splendidly to begin with, until Connie’s husband was posted abroad with his job, and his family went with him. Although Lili stayed in contact, especially with the three girls, things weren’t the same on their return. Lili was older, and she was spending the school breaks with Hannah and her aged grandparents. The visits to Connie’s during the holidays stopped.
Lili would never forget the one time she’d heard Connie and her husband arguing. It was the last sleepover she had at this house, when she was in between foster parents, before she ended up in the children’s home. She’d heard raised voices, and had crept halfway down the stairs, where she’d found Connie’s middle child, who was three years older than Lili, sitting on a stair. She’d whispered in Lili’s ear, ‘Why are they arguing?’
Even though Lili was a lot younger, she’d put her arm around her foster sister to comfort her, wishing she was her real big sister, and this was her real family. It was why she could never settle down in any of the foster homes. She just felt she belonged here.
Lili would never forget that conversation she’d overheard.
‘Why don’t we permanently foster her?’
For a moment, Lili had held her breath thinking,this is it. It sounded as though Connie’s husband, who Lili had thought would be against the idea, wanted her to stay.
It turned out that it was Connie who was opposed to the suggestion. ‘You know why we can’t.’
They said nothing more. Lili assumed it was because Connie was her social worker, and it just wouldn’t be the done thing to show favouritism to a child in her care. Even so, she prayed that one day Connie would make an exception. She never did.
Standing in the hall, Lili would rather not revisit that memory. She was wiping her eyes dry when she heard someone call out, ‘Mum, who was at the door? You’re missing the baby shower!’ Connie’s middle daughter, heavily pregnant, stepped out of the lounge. ‘I didn’t know you had company.’ She paused. ‘Lili?’
The little girl she’d hugged on the stairs all those years earlier was all grown-up and expecting another baby.
‘Oh, god, I’m so sorry for interrupting—’
‘Don’t be silly. Come in, join us.’
Lili could hear other voices in the lounge, her sisters and friends. Lili started to shake her head. This wasn’t a social call.
‘I’m not staying.’
‘Oh, but you are,’ Connie insisted. ‘The baby shower is winding down. Take yourself up to the spare bedroom. You remember where it is?’
Lili nodded.
Connie steered her daughter back into the lounge saying, ‘Lili’s had a long day. I’m sure she’ll speak to you all in the morning.’
Lili overheard her as she walked up the stairs. Connie’s three daughters were all staying the night after the baby shower.
‘Lili,’ Connie called out before joining the others. ‘You can stay for as long as you want, all right?’
Lili paused on the stairs and glanced down at Connie. ‘All right.’ She was too tired to argue, or bring up the other thing – did Connie know who had paid for her schooling? The answer mattered more than ever. She had nobody – apart from Connie. Not even Hannah was going to put herself out to help her. All Lili wanted was to find her family, although the question remained: did they want her to find them? She’d avoided that quandary all her life, but with nothing to lose, she was ready to discover the truth. But not right at this moment. All Lili could do was drag herself, and her suitcase, upstairs and have a lie down. She felt exhausted.
She opened the door to the spare bedroom at the end of the hall and stopped in the doorway. The room hadn’t changed one bit, with its old-fashioned chintzy, flowered wallpaper, matching bedspread and pink curtains. Was this how it felt to return to your family home, your childhood bedroom, your childhood bed? Lili didn’t really know; all she could do was imagine.
