‘No!’ exclaims Kate. ‘See, this right here is what I’m talking about. It wouldn’t occur to me to believe it, not for even a second, yet you, having had time to sleep on it, have decided that it’s a possibility. That’s the difference between you and me, Lauren. I trusted Dad with all my heart, and I will continue to do so until my dying day. No matter what that woman may say, or what you may think.’
‘Well, then I think you’re deluded,’ says Lauren, under her breath.
‘Just do yourself a favour,’ says Kate, forcing herself not to rise to the bait, ‘don’t ever let Mum know your true feelings. The man she loved and lived with for the past forty years has been suddenly taken away from her. We might think we know what that must feel like – he was our father after all – but I don’t think we can possibly imagine how it must feel to lose your life partner, the person you woke up to every morning, the person you shared your innermost thoughts with—’
‘But—’
‘She won’t thank you for it,’ says Kate. ‘And she might never forgive you for it either.’
‘So, you think we should lie to her,’ says Lauren. ‘Just to keep her memory of Dad preserved.’
‘I won’t need to lie,’ says Kate abruptly. ‘Because the father I remember is the father I had. Nothing you or anyone else says will ever change that.’
‘We can’t just ignore what Jess is saying. If what she’s saying is true, it might just make the pain of losing Dad that little easier to bear.’
‘You’re willing to believe her because you think it’ll somehow ease our grief?’ Kate exclaims incredulously.
‘I just think that it might give us all some perspective, especially Mum, who’s not been herself since he’s been gone. If she realized that maybe he wasn’t the man she thought he was, she might not feel his loss so profoundly.’
‘Now who’s deluded?’ hisses Kate.
‘You never know,’ says Lauren. ‘Jess might even bring us closer.’
‘Over my dead body.’
‘Let’s hope it doesn’t come to that,’ says Lauren, before hanging up.
7
Lauren
Lauren was going to tell Kate that she’d seen Jess, but their conversation hadn’t gone the way she’d hoped. She doesn’t know why Kate is so adamant in shutting herself off to the possibility that their father might not have been all that they thought he was. She naively hopes that their mother isn’t going to be quite so opposed to the idea.
‘Hi, it’s only me,’ she calls out, at pains to sound normal as she lets herself into her parents’ semi-detached home. A familiar warmth immediately wraps itself around her, the smell of baking merging with the dulcet tones of BBC Radio 2’s Ken Bruce, as he quizzes a contestant on PopMaster. This is Lauren’s safe place, though she has to admit it doesn’t feel quite so dependable since her father’s been gone. It shouldn’t make a difference, not in the scheme of things, not when she hadn’t confided in him about what was going on with Simon. But still, if she was honest, she’d known that if it ever hit the fan, like really kicked off, her dad would have been the first in line to protect her.
‘I’m in here,’ says Rose, sticking her head around the kitchen door. Lauren gently puts the car seat down, with a sleeping Jude inside, and carries Emmy, who’s kicking her little legs with excitement, down the hallway towards her Nana.
‘Hello, my precious girl,’ says Rose as she discards her oven glove and takes Emmy in her arms. Lauren looks at her quizzically, noting that nothing about her mother is any different. She looks just the same as she looked yesterday, before a girl arrived claiming to be her dead husband’s lovechild.
‘You okay?’ she asks hesitantly.
‘Absolutely,’ says Rose, and Lauren hears that lilt in her voice that gives the game away. She’s far from okay.
‘Listen, I just wanted to talk about Jess and what happened,’ says Lauren. ‘I can’t imagine how you must be feeling about it all.’
‘I’m fine, absolutely fine,’ Rose insists. ‘Now, what does this baby girl want for breakfast?’ She tickles Emmy and the little girl squirms delightedly in her arms.
Lauren could leave it. She almost feels compelled to, so that they can go back to pretending that they’re just like every other family. But this isn’t about them. This is about Jess, and Lauren knows that she has set something in motion that