‘I’ll be over later this afternoon with the salmon and the rest of the stuff,’ Lucy promised, finishing her coffee and giving a wry sigh. ‘How on earth do you manage to stay so calm and organised? If I were you, I’d be falling to pieces…’
Kate smiled at her, but said nothing. She could have told her friend that having gone through the crucible of fire into its heart, long, long ago, there were now very few situations which could test her self-control to its limits. She had learned long ago to conceal her feelings…to protect herself and others, and it had been a deeply painful lesson.
The morning flew by. Despite all her careful arrangements there were still small hitches…things to be done. She was running half an hour late by the time she collected the strawberries. On the way back, driving the hatchback estate car which she had had specially fitted with stable trays for carrying food, she slipped a favourite Bruce Springsteen tape into the machine, trying to relax as the familiar voice and music filled the inside of the car.
She was just turning into her own drive, when he started to sing ‘If you’re looking for love’, and her heart somersaulted with idiotic pain, her mouth compressing as she reminded herself that at thirty-seven she should be long past the stage of being affected by a pop song. And it wasn’t even as though she were looking for love. After Sophy’s birth, she had determinedly and resolutely turned her back on the idea of love and marriage.
When her mother had tried to talk to her gently about her attitude, she had said bitterly that she could never expect anyone else to take on both her and her baby, declaring flatly that she was second-hand and used. Her mother had protested vigorously at her claim, telling her gently that she had nothing to feel ashamed about, and that no man who loved her would ever blame her for what had happened…that men these days did not expect their wives to come to them without having had any previous sexual experience. But she had shaken her head and said it was not the lack of her virginity she had meant, but the loss and destruction of her self-worth and trust…the fact that she would never be able to give to anyone else all that she had given so trustingly and eagerly to Joss…and that it was because of that that she, and her emotions, would be second-hand.
She had stuck resolutely to her decision and, over the years, as her first initial terrible shock and grief had softened, she had wondered if perhaps her life was not after all more surrounded by love, more filled with contentment than many a woman’s who did have a husband and a father for her children. She thought of that woman who was so closely linked to her and yet who knew nothing of her existence, and wondered what her life had been. What must it be like to be married to a man who cheated…who lied and deceived. How very much more destructive that must be…a festering, poisonous wound as opposed to the clean, almost killing one she had received—and survived!
She stopped the car and got out, and as she did so the kitchen door opened and she saw Sophy standing there, grinning at her.
Her heart flooded with love and pleasure. She ran towards her and they hugged one another.
‘Hello, little mama,’ Sophy whispered tremulously, reverting to the silly pet name which had evolved when she was tiny and people had confused Kate’s role in her life. She had then started calling Kate ‘my little mama’ and the nickname had stuck, especially when Sophy had started shooting up above her mother.
Once she had released her, Kate stepped back to look at her daughter. This incredibly special and beautiful child who she still could not entirely believe was hers.
Every bit of her gleamed with vitality and happiness, right from the crown of her silky bobbed hair to the polished nails of her toes, peeping through the high-heeled sandals she was wearing.
Looking at them, Kate remarked absently, ‘It’s just as well John is so tall.’
‘Mm.’ The dark grey, black-lashed eyes that Sophy had inherited from her father gave Kate a laughing look, as the girl said irrepressively, ‘We fit very well together…’
She had never been able to resist teasing, and she laughed again as she saw the faint surge of colour sting her mother’s face. ‘Don’t worry, little mama,’ she added chidingly. ‘I’m not about to repeat your mistake. I am most definitely not pregnant. At least, not yet,’ she added thoughtfully.
There was a small silence, and then Kate said emotionally, ‘You, my love, are most definitely the best mistake I ever made.’
It was true. Nearly twenty-one years ago, terrified, pregnant…she had just made the discovery that the man she thought loved her was in fact married to someone else…had had a child with that someone else. She had thought then that her whole world had come to an end, and so it might have done if her parents hadn’t been so wonderful…
If…so many ifs, which had brought her to this day and this place, surely one of the proudest women alive.
She had achieved so much, this daughter of hers…done so much in her short life. A first-class degree from Oxford…holidays spent working abroad, so that she could be self-supporting, a wide circle of friends, leisure activities that ranged from skiing to abseiling…A job that promised to sustain her intellectually all through her life…and now marriage to a man who would genuinely be a true partner to her; moreover, a man whose family had opened its arms to welcome her.
With fervent gratitude she acknowledged that, whatever her own feelings about the circumstances of Sophy’s birth, her daughter had never betrayed a moment’s chagrin or resentment over them. She was a girl who was naturally likeable, who was open and friendly with others, who met life on its own terms. Sophy had grown so much into being the woman she herself had always wanted to be and never could be, and now here she was, adult, confident, in love, with the whole world spread out in front of her for the taking.
Kate felt her heart swell with maternal pride…a pride that was tinged with sadness. It was an intrinsic part of Kate’s personality that she took no credit herself for Sophy’s well-adjusted attitude to life.
Today marked the start of a new life for Sophy…and the end of an old life for her.
‘Well, come on,’ Sophy demanded. ‘Let me see what you’re planning to wear tomorrow…I can’t wait to see the guests’ faces when they realise that you are my mother.’
Tears stung Kate’s eyes. It was an added gift, this one—that Sophy should always have been so proud and supportive of her…almost as though from a young age she had known how vulnerable she was.
She touched her arm now and smiled through her tears.
‘You are the one everyone will be focusing on,’ she chided her maternally, and then a frown touched her forehead and she said quietly, ‘Sophy, I’m sorry that your father won’t be here to give you away. I…’
Sophy hugged her swiftly. ‘Don’t be,’ she told her promptly. ‘Any man who could do what he did to you is a rat and, quite honestly, I wouldn’t want him in my life. I mean it,’ she assured her firmly, and then added, ‘John’s mother was asking me the last time I saw her if I ever wondered about him, or was curious about him.’
‘What did you tell her?’ Kate asked her quietly. It had always hounded her, this fear that one day Sophy would naturally want to seek out the man who had fathered her. Her fear had not been for herself but for her child…that Sophy would be rejected as she had been rejected.
‘The truth. That you explained to me when I was old enough to understand what had happened…That you had fallen in love with someone who you thought was free to love you in return…and that you had then discovered that he was in fact already married with a child. That on the advice and counselling of Gran and Gramps you had decided not to get in touch with him and tell him about me because, as they had pointed out to you, he had already made it plain that he didn’t want anything to do with you, and that anyway, a man who had already betrayed his marriage vows and his child