Mindsight

‘Tell you what. It’s too nice to sit inside. Will you show me the garden?’ I jumped up, hoping to make it impossible for him to refuse.

We left Alice in the kitchen and my tall son strode down the tiled path so quickly that, as I tried to match his pace, my skirt caught on the overhanging plants and a sweet herby smell filled the air. Alice had worked magic on the garden too; its flower-filled lushness bore little resemblance to the vast expanse of lawn bordered by huge woody shrubs that I recalled. He led me to the far end where a bench overlooked a vista of fields. The sun was hot once more and the fields flared with the painful yellow of oilseed rape, dotted here and there with a flush of poppies. It reminded me of a Van Gogh painting – too bright, too hectic.

I sat on the bench, but Tom stood by the low wall staring over the fields. His hair was a slightly darker blond than it had been when he was little. ‘I’m sorry I stopped writing to you,’ he said.

‘Tom, it really is OK. You don’t need to feel bad about anything.’

‘I was mad at you.’

I gripped the bench, the rough wood biting into my palms. I wanted so much to help him. To tell him if he wanted to shout at me, to hit me, it was only his right.

‘You lied about me not being allowed to come and see you in prison. Mark’s dad’s a solicitor and he said.’

How stupid we’d been. ‘You see, Tom, I didn’t want you to come there because Holloway’s not a very nice place and …’

‘That’s bollocks.’ His voice broke and the word hung in the air. I think he was as shocked as I was. ‘Sorry.’ When he turned I could see his eyes were glassy, and I was beside him, my arms round him, rubbing his stiff back. He was too big and too bony, but then I felt him relax, his head resting on my shoulder as he muttered again, ‘Sorry, sorry, Mum.’

I led him to the bench and made him sit. He scrubbed his face ferociously, as I patted his other forearm and echoed his throat clearing and sniffing with my own small cough. ‘Tom.’ I laid my hand over his larger one. ‘You’ve got nothing, nothing at all, to say sorry to me for. I can’t make it right again, I know, but please don’t blame yourself for anything. All I want is for us to be friends.’ Even as I said it I knew I’d got it all wrong. But what would have been right?

He looked up, and there in his clear grey eyes was my little lost Tommy. ‘OK, and if it’s all right with you, I want to live with you again. Alice says I can’t, but you are my mum aren’t you?’ The words came out in a rush and I guessed he’d prepared them.

My own eyes filled with tears, but whether they were tears of joy at hearing the words I’d never dared hope he would say, or of pain that I couldn’t take him home right now, I didn’t know.

Don’t lie to him again. ‘Well… Alice does have custody you know.’

‘Yes, but you’re my mum.’ His voice was hard.

‘And there’s nothing I want more than to have you with me all the time. But, you know, it’s going to take me a while to get settled. I’ve already found a job so that’s a good start. And, if it’s all right with you I want to see you as often as I can, because we need to get to know each other properly again. So will you be patient for just a while longer?’

He jumped up and began pacing the little patio. I couldn’t tell if he was angry, disappointed, excited, or just too full of life and energy to sit still.

When he turned to me, his eyes were shining. ‘One thing, one thing I’ve been thinking, is that I could help you.’

‘What do you mean, Tom?’ I loved saying his name.

‘You know, to show them they made a mistake; to show them it wasn’t your fault.’

Chapter Four

Alice had roasted a chicken with all the trimmings and opened some wine. I knew she was trying to make this a celebration of sorts for my homecoming, but I couldn’t force much down. My mind whirled with it all, but mostly with the idea that Tom still believed I was innocent. At the trial I’d pleaded not guilty, but in prison I finally had to accept what Mike and the others told me: that my amnesia was caused by my inability to face the reality of what I’d done. I’d tried to explain it to Tom in my letters, and I cursed myself for not making it clearer.

We didn’t speak much, but he ate well. When he’d cleared his plate he pushed back his chair, looking at Alice. ‘Got to do some homework,’ he said.

As he thundered upstairs, Alice touched my hand. ‘It’s bound to be hard for him. Give him time.’

‘He thinks there could be some way to prove I was innocent.’

She shook her head, and I followed her to the kitchen where she fiddled with a fancy-looking coffee machine. ‘I was afraid of something like this.’

‘What?’

‘He spends a lot of time at his friend Mark’s and, according to Mark’s mum, the two of them have started watching that bloody programme about miscarriages of justice.’

I knew the one she meant; it was a favourite with some of the women inside. ‘But you should have told him there was nothing like that with my case.’

‘It wasn’t so simple, Clare. I tried, but what could I say? If your letters didn’t convince him how could I? I couldn’t tell him about your past, the drugs, and everything, could I?’

‘But you should have made him understand.’

‘Look Clare, it’s you who doesn’t understand. You haven’t lived with him all these years.’ She slammed a brimming mug on the table so that coffee dripped down the yellow stripes on the china. ‘He believes what he wants to believe. I tried to talk to him about it, but all he would ever say was, “My mum’s a good driver and when they find out she’ll come for me.” Lately he just won’t discuss it, not with me anyway.’

I sat down, gulping at the scalding coffee. ‘I’m sorry. I know it hasn’t been easy for you.’

She shook her head, looking suddenly very grey. ‘Tom’s a great kid and he deserves to know the truth. But that can only come from you.’

‘But I can’t remember, you know that. Just those few images I’ve told you about. I’m not even sure they’re really memories. I’ve heard so much about what might have happened that I could have invented them to fit.’

Alice pushed her fingers through her hair. ‘Well, tell him what you do know then.’

‘Be completely honest, you mean?’

She nodded, taking my hand and gripping it hard. ‘I’m sure most kids are wiser and more realistic than we imagine.’ I put my hand over hers and looked into her blue eyes. They were shining with tears and for the first time in years she looked like my little sister again. ‘Go on,’ she said, ‘speak to him now.’ She sniffed and smiled and when I stood she kept hold of my hand for a moment.

I paused in the doorway of Tom’s room. It was the one the twins had always slept in when they stayed here. His choice or Alice’s, I wondered? At least I was thankful it looked different from the room where I’d kissed my boys goodnight so many times.

It was large, like all the rooms in the house, and seemed larger with only one bed now instead of two. There was a distinct, though not unpleasant, tang in the air: a mixture of damp socks, orange peel, chocolate, and peppery sweat. The bed was rumpled, a shirt and a bath towel in the middle of the floor, but otherwise it was surprisingly tidy.

The mantelpiece and the shelf next to it held a row of metal trophies and the walls were decorated by several large posters – The Hobbit, Hunger Games, and a couple of footballers.

I noticed Tom’s hair still stuck up at the back and his shoulders, bent over the keyboard as he tapped away, were surprisingly broad.

‘Come in if you want,’ he said, making me jump and slop coffee onto the pale hall carpet. I rubbed it in with the toe of my shoe.

‘I’m just admiring your room.’

‘Oh that’s Martha, Mrs Cooper. She cleans up. But just in the week.’ A glance back at the messy bed and the clothes on the floor. ‘I’m s’posed to do it at weekends.’

I stayed in the doorway, fingers pulling at the fabric of my dress. Say something. ‘How’s the homework going?’ Stupid, stupid idiot.

Without looking at me he pushed at the chair next to him. ‘Nearly done.’

I sat on the chair, put the coffee I couldn’t drink on the floor and sat watching as he did something complicated with a spreadsheet. ‘That looks impressive.’

He laughed. ‘It’s not really.’ A glance at me. ‘But thanks anyway, Mum.’

It was the name that did it, and I found myself burying my face in his hair, breathing in the musky boy smell, different to what I remembered, but not so different that I didn’t know it for the scent of my child. He tolerated it for a bit then twisted very gently away. ‘You all right?’

When I could speak I apologised. ‘I’m silly I know, but it’s just so nice to hear you call me Mum.’

‘What do you expect me to call you?’ A long pause, his face and neck mottling pink. ‘Mum, do you – you know – often think about Tobe and Dad?’

‘Of course I do, but sometimes it hurts too much.’

He looked at the floor, swinging his chair back and forth and chewing at his nails. ‘You know the party? The one I went to? Toby could’ve come too.’

‘But he didn’t and there’s nothing we can do to change that now.’

‘But Daniel’s mum wanted to ask him as well, and I said he wouldn’t want to come.’

‘Well that was probably right. He was excited about going to the Lake District on his own with the grown-ups. And Daniel was really your friend.’ I fought to keep the tremors from my voice.

‘But Daniel liked Toby a bit and he said his mum was going to ask Toby anyway, and I told him I wouldn’t be his friend anymore if Toby came. And then I told Toby Daniel didn’t like him.’

I laid my hand on his back. His guilt seemed so ridiculous compared to mine, but it was clearly a huge burden to him. ‘Maybe it was a bit mean of you, but you weren’t to know what would happen. And don’t forget, Toby was sometimes nasty to you.’ Thank goodness he was still looking down and couldn’t see me shaking the hot tears from my eyes.

‘Yeah, well, that was why really. I wanted to get back at him cos he took my Gameboy and broke it.’

‘You were always breaking each other’s things. What about the time when you had kites for Christmas and you lost yours up a tree that same day? And then Toby laughed at you, so you trod on his.’

‘And when he kept stealing the batteries from my remote-control car, and I kept stealing them from the TV channel changer, and Dad went mad at us both, and you went mad at Dad?’ We laughed at that, although the laughter was forced. Then he turned to face me. ‘What about Dad? Only sometimes, when we were little, Tobe and me thought you might be going to get divorced.’

I told him this was probably because of what was happening to the parents of other kids they knew. ‘Dad and I argued a bit, but all married couples do.’ I’d promised myself I’d be honest with him, but it was going to be so difficult, when I often didn’t know the truth myself.

I took a breath. ‘Alice wants to take me back soon, but what about a quick walk?’

We didn’t talk till we reached the little wood down the lane from the house. It was quiet and cool, the late sun sending delicate fingers of gold low through the trees.

‘I remember coming here when I was small, usually when I’d done something wrong,’ I said.

He scuffed his feet through the dry leaves and twigs covering the ground. ‘I know. You used to bring us when we came to see Granddad. You were always telling us that.’

I bit my lip. Of course. What else had I made myself forget? Odd, disjointed memories came back: Toby dancing in the Indian headdress he’d been so proud of; Steve chasing two screaming five-year-olds with a discarded snakeskin; and little Tommy jumping out from behind a tree to shout Boo at us all so loudly it made Toby cry.

Tom’s new, deep voice jolted me back. ‘Me and Tobe used to think it was a forest. Used to pretend we were outlaws.’

The name hung in the air between us and I began kicking at the leaves, matching his rhythm.

A pheasant burst from a bush just ahead and we bumped shoulders as we stopped: me with a gasp and Tom with a gruff chuckle.

‘Tom,’ I said, when we were moving again. ‘I’ve been thinking about what you said earlier.’ I didn’t look at him as we continued to scuff along together. ‘You know I don’t remember the accident: that I lost my memory?’

‘Amnesia, yeah.’

‘And you know why they put me in prison?’

He kicked hard at a pile of leaves making them rise into the air. ‘Course I do.’ His voice was curt. ‘They said you took drugs – amphetamines.’

Don’t treat him like a baby. ‘Well, I pleaded not guilty at my trial because I didn’t believe I could have done that.’ His intake of breath told me he was about to speak, but I had to get this out. ‘But you see, I had a lot of time to think in prison, and I came to realise I must have done it – somehow got hold of those pills and taken them. I don’t know why I would have done it, but it means I was guilty.’

‘But maybe you didn’t want to take them. Someone could’ve put stuff in your drink. You know, at the wedding. I’ve been looking up amphetamines on the internet and it says they can be dissolved in liquid.’

I could have smiled if it hadn’t hurt so much. ‘But why would anyone want to do that?’

‘Maybe it was a joke, or someone had it in for you or Dad – or for Granddad. He was important wasn’t he?’

‘Well, he ran a successful company, yes.’

‘’Cos I looked him up, and he’s on Google. He was just the kind of guy people might have a grudge against. There was all that stuff with the arthritis drug too. It was in the papers.’

‘You have been busy.’

His voice was stubborn. ‘I want to help you.’

‘I know and thank you.’

He stopped walking; his crossed arms and lowered head telling me I was doing it all wrong again. I looked up into the dark branches above us, knowing it had to be now, however badly I said it. ‘What you don’t know, Tom, is that before you were born, I was an addict for a while. When I was a teenager I got in with a bad crowd and thought taking drugs was cool. It isn’t, it’s stupid, and I managed to get off them. Then I met your dad and I was so happy I never thought about drugs again. You and Toby and Dad were my life. But maybe something happened the night of the wedding to make me slip back into my old ways. I met addicts in prison who’d been clean for years, but who relapsed when things went wrong in their lives.’

He turned and crashed away, almost at a run.

‘Tom. Wait. Please wait for me.’

A bramble twisted round my foot and leg as I tried to follow him, biting into my calf and making me stumble. I pulled at the wretched thing, cursing under my breath, aware he had stopped and was watching me. When I looked up again he was still there kicking at a tree trunk and staring down at its roots. I went to him, daring to touch his arm. He didn’t push me away.

‘I’m so sorry, Tom. I should have told you this before.’

His grey eyes were misted and he shook his head as he spoke. ‘But why did you want to take drugs?’

What to say? ‘You know I was adopted, don’t you? Well my mum, your grandma, was ill. Not physically, but she had mental problems that made her depressed and unhappy. So she was often angry with me. It wasn’t her fault, but I didn’t understand that and so I ran away from home and met people who were very bad for me. That’s not an excuse, Tom, and it made things worse not better. Which is what always happens with drugs.’

He leaned back against the tree, arms folded, and looking down at the crumbled soil as he stirred it with the toe of his trainer. The whole wood seemed to have gone silent.

‘But, Tom, this doesn’t mean I don’t want to know exactly what happened that night. So will you give me some time to think about your ideas and to try to remember more?’

I almost said I needed to find out who could have supplied me with the stuff at the reception, but it was better if he didn’t start thinking that way.

He nodded and I gestured with my head that we should start back. Then took a chance and put my arm through his. He tensed at my touch. Careful, careful. ‘You can help me, Tom. Just give me time.’

‘OK.’

Then we walked back together through the cool, silent wood while phantoms from the past played and laughed around us.

Back at the flat, as I lay in bed, I couldn’t stop thinking about Tommy. My mind churned, veering from a kind of happiness to the sort of despair that makes you want to beat your head against a wall. And I did slam over and over into the pillow, pummelling it into a solid lump. I got up twice to use the toilet, then for water and finally to make a mug of tea that sat growing cold beside me as I stared up at the ceiling.

Night is the worst time in prison. That’s when you hear the sobs and the groans, the shouts of, ‘Shut up, you bitch, and let me sleep.’ It’s then you relive and regret, not in the therapy groups with a gentle voice saying you can rebuild your life. It’s your own voice that curses you as a pariah; a leper who would be better off dead.

At first I tried to remember what happened that night; to piece together fragments that came to me, sometimes awake, sometimes in dreams. Some things were constant: the dark road, the grey shadows overhead, the flashing light, but were they memories, or just images patched together from what I’d been told? After a while it didn’t matter because I didn’t want to remember. But now maybe I would have to if that were the only way to help Tom. And if I didn’t know why I’d done it, how could I be sure it wouldn’t happen again? How could I trust myself to be a real mother once more?

Apart from those horrible fragments, my memory of the day ended hours before the accident. Emily and I were close in age and we’d always been good friends. In fact, because of the five years between me and Alice, I’d probably been closer to Emily when we were kids.

Her husband, Matt’s, family owned a farm in Cumbria and the wedding was held there. Alice was a junior doctor in Newcastle, but we lived close to Dad in Kent. Most of the guests were planning to stay at a country house hotel and, when I said Steve and I couldn’t possibly afford a place like that, Dad offered to treat us. I agreed, on condition he let me pay him back by doing all the driving.

I remembered the journey to the church along sunny, twisting lanes edged by glassy streams and brilliant fields. Then, like a TV with a faulty signal, the picture stuttered and disappeared to be replaced by flashes and bursts of noise.

As those images played over and over in my head I wanted only to push them away just as I’d always done over the past few years. But I couldn’t let myself do that any more.

I got up and went into the living room where the card from Emily and Matt was still standing beside the laptop. I switched on, found Emily’s email address in the notebook Alice had left for me, and sent a message. I kept it short, just telling Emily how pleased I was to get her card. I wouldn’t blame her if she was still upset with me, but I’d love to see her. I gave her my home and mobile phone numbers, added three kisses, deleted two, and pressed send before I could change my mind.

Something woke me and I lay confused for a moment. Then a loud buzz came from the direction of the living room. I had no idea what it was and sat up in bed, switching on the light. Nearly 2 a.m. That metallic buzz again. Oh, God, it was my door buzzer. I clutched my dressing gown round me. Whoever it was couldn’t get in; they were outside the big main door, not in the hall. In the living room I stood in the darkness, away from the grey rectangles of light from the windows. Another buzz. It must be one of the other tenants, who’d forgotten their key. On the next buzz I picked up the intercom phone, but didn’t speak.

A rasping cough, then, ‘Come on, open up. I know you’re in there.’

I rammed the phone back on its holder, as if it was on fire, grabbed my mobile, and locked myself in the bathroom. Who could I ring? Certainly not the police, and Alice couldn’t help. Instead, I huddled on the floor, my back against the bath, pulling my dressing gown close. I didn’t dare turn on the light or go back to the bedroom in case he came round to my window.

Buzz, buzz, buzz, longer each time. They seemed to go on forever, but finally fell silent.

Who the hell was it? My case had made the papers, five years ago, mainly because of the recent scandal involving Dad’s firm. During my trial I was presented as a druggie debutante, a spoiled little rich girl, too reckless even to care about her own child, and I’d received plenty of hate mail. What if someone was out to make good those threats? Or maybe a reporter was trying to track me down?

After a while, the silence let me slide back the lock and creep to the bedroom. I switched off the light and shivered under the duvet trying to relax, even to sleep.

But now there was another noise. Not a buzzing this time, but an insistent tap, tap, tap on my own front door.

Somehow he’d got into the hall.

Chapter Five

In the living room again, I told myself the door was double-locked and the chain was on. I was safe. And I knew how to look after myself: had to learn that in prison.

The tapping again. ‘Clare, are you there? It’s OK, he’s gone. It’s just me, Nic, from across the hall.’

I put my ear to the door. No sounds of movement or even breathing. I checked the chain and opened the door a crack. Just her, in a shiny blue dressing gown. Behind her the door to her own flat was half-open. She gave me a nervy smile, pulling her fingers through her untidy fair hair.

‘Sorry about all that, Clare, it was my ex. He was so drunk he started ringing the wrong bell. I heard him shouting and realised what he’d done, but I didn’t dare come out till he was gone.’

I leant one shoulder on the wall, trying to speak calmly. ‘Is he dangerous?’

She looked down, kicking the door jamb with her slipper. ‘Oh no, but I didn’t want him waking Molly. And there would only have been an argument.’

I began to close the door, but Nicola held up her hand. ‘Look, I won’t get back to sleep for ages. What about coming over to mine for a drink?’

There was little chance of me sleeping either, but I shook my head. ‘I’ve got work in the morning.’

‘Come on, just one. I’m feeling really jittery. And I owe you one for putting up with him without calling the police.’

I didn’t tell her there was no chance I’d ever do that, but I felt jittery too. It might do me good to relax for a bit and talk to someone who knew nothing about my past. I grabbed my keys from beside the door. ‘OK.’

Nicola’s flat was a messier mirror image of mine. She gestured to me to sit on the red sofa covered in crumpled cushions and called from the kitchen. ‘White wine OK for you?’

‘Thanks.’

She handed me a large glass filled to the top. The first sip made me feel calmer and I leaned back, while Nicola perched on the edge of the matching armchair. ‘This is nice,’ she said. ‘I don’t sleep well anyway, what with sharing the bedroom with Molly and worrying he might turn up in the middle of the night.’ She must have seen something in my expression because she flushed and took a deep drink. ‘Don’t get me wrong, Clare, he really isn’t violent, just a fucking nuisance – pardon my language.’

‘Is he Molly’s dad?’

‘Yeah, and she loves him so much. Kids need their dads, don’t they? So I can’t cut him out of our lives altogether. It’s just when he’s had a skinful or been on the skunk or something stronger.’

I smiled and concentrated on my wine. I’d noticed the smell of hash when I came in, so wondered if he’d been here earlier, and come back after she’d thrown him out. Or had she been smoking too. It was none of my business of course, but I didn’t want to be anywhere near people who might interest the police or cause my probation officer to have doubts.