In Her Mothers' Shoes (49 page)

David gave her shoulders another light squeeze. ‘He’d like that.’

Chapter 4.

Mid-2011

‘Hey sis! Where‘ve you been all my life?’ Rick was standing in the Circa Theatre foyer grinning, shifting from foot to foot, then started moving towards Kate while calling her name. The heavy door banged shut behind her as she hurried across the foyer and hooked her arms around his shoulders, feeling the soft leather of his figure-hugging motor-bike jacket. It slipped through her fingers, releasing that wonderful animal smell. She suspected she would remember this moment, the feel of this smooth leather and breathing its pungency for the rest of her life.

‘I should have recognised you the first time we met,’ he said. ‘How could I not see that? You look just like my mother looked twenty years ago.’

‘Do I?’ Kate stood back from Rick and studied him, fingering her hair self-consciously. ‘I don’t know if I look like you though. You’re different somehow.’

‘That’s what they all say. I think I’m a throwback to my grandfather rather than my mother.’ He stood profile on and pretended to preen. ‘What do you think? My grandfather was a handsome bugger.’ Then he laughed, a hearty, deep-throated husky chuckle, not at all like Kate’s. ‘Come on, let’s go over to the café and order a coffee.’

They ordered and sank into the deep leather settees facing the waterfront.

‘A sunny, calm day,’ Kate said. ‘Wellington Harbour looks so beautiful when it’s like this.’

‘It’s
always
like this in Wellington,’ he said, grinning.

‘That’s what you all say here.’ She paused, unsure whether to refer to her letter so soon. ‘I want to thank you for taking this all so well. I didn’t …’

‘No, thank
you
. You’re the best thing that’s happened to us for a long time.’

Kate took a moment for that to sink in then said, ‘But what about Liz?’

‘Penny and I went to talk to her last week and she seemed fine with it. In fact, she seemed quite relieved to be able to talk about it at last. I didn’t think she was going to stop.’

‘What did she say?’

‘She talked about being sent away from her home, how lonely she felt in Christchurch, how the time dragged by until at last you were born, then she wasn’t allowed to even hold you. She said she’s never forgotten that moment when you were taken away and she never saw you again.’

Kate swallowed. She’d often imagined what that must have been like for Liz, but couldn’t even begin to understand. ‘What else did she say?’

‘She told us about your father, that he was good looking, swept her off her feet so fast she just couldn’t say no. He was tall, sporty, she said, and he looked so handsome in his uniform, she just went along with him. She said she had no idea what she was doing, what he wanted her to do. She said she’d talked about ‘it’ with her friends, but when it came to it, she had no idea what ‘it’ was, what was expected of her. She was under the impression she’d be able to do ‘it’ with her pants on.’

‘That’s incredible.’

‘Penny and I weren’t expecting that at all. It was like the floodgates had been opened at last and out it came in a rush.’

‘Was Penny shocked?’

‘I don’t think so. She told me she’d known about you for years. ‘

‘Yes, she told me that when I met her.’

‘She said she’d been thinking of telling me and Jessie but didn’t ever find the opportunity. I think Penny’s quite glad the secret’s out.’

A waitress brought their coffees.

Kate pulled hers towards her, picked up the spoon and played with it.

Rick poured a finger of sugar into his black coffee and stirred it. ‘I hope I haven’t upset you,’ he said.

‘What? No, I …’

‘I didn’t mean to go into all that detail about what Mum said. Certainly not so soon after we met.’ He lifted the spoon out of the cup and set it down. ‘I don’t even know how you feel about all that. It’s so personal.’ He picked up his cup and blew across it, fixing her with his eyes. ‘I was going to say “I don’t know what came over me”, but I do know. It’s you. It’s like I’ve known you all my life. I just feel so comfortable with you, like I can say anything….’ He tailed off.

‘So do I.’ Kate felt close to tears but made sure they didn’t spill. She didn’t want him to think her emotional. Instead, she sipped her coffee. It was hot and burned her tongue. The tears came closer to spilling.

After that, they couldn’t stop talking. An hour flew by, two, three. The waitress brought more coffees and a flask of water, then tea with carrot cake. They talked about everything – their partners, families, family traits and foibles, their work and their hobbies, their favourite movies and books, plays and music.

And then it was time to go – Rick to record a radio commercial, Kate to meet her friend Vanessa. By then, they’d agreed there would be a family reunion at Rick’s place as soon as it could be arranged to get everyone there – everyone from Kate’s family as well as his.

‘I’m sorry Mum isn’t still with us. She’d have loved to be at the reunion,’ Kate said as she hugged Rick goodbye.

‘It won’t be family without both your mothers,’ Rick said.

Kate’s Mum had died nearly two years earlier from a massive stroke in her ninety-fifth year. In some ways, Kate was glad she wasn’t still around. Sure, she’d have been pleased that Kate was finally meeting up with her family; Mum had listened patiently for years to Kate’s complaining about how long it was taking. But Kate doubted that she’d want to come to the reunion. She was frail and a plane trip might have been too much for her; besides, the Hamilton family wasn’t her family and she’d have felt like an intruder. ‘No, you go dear, then come back and tell me all about it,’ Kate could imagine her saying.

Mum would have hated the earthquakes too. Her church, the rose window in the Cathedral, the Provincial Chambers, most of the beautiful old buildings she loved were all coming down. If the stroke hadn’t killed her, grief from the earthquakes would have.

Kate missed her every day, missed the ease with which they could share thoughts, feelings, and news both good and bad; missed the comfort of a mother’s understanding; missed the security of her love.

There was another mother now, but she hardly knew her. They’d met only once. Liz knew nothing of the policeman in the nursery, the two hours and forty-eight minutes, the shared effort of picking up her Dad off the floor time after time, the search for identity. She couldn’t know; she hadn’t been there.

~   ~   ~

The taxi dropped Kate in front of Rick’s unpretentious, neat weatherboard villa in Karori just a few minutes after two-thirty. As David paid the driver, she gathered the bunch of daffodils she’d brought for her mother off the back seat, stepped out onto the kerb and looked around at her family – her husband David, relaxed, in jeans and a jacket, not at all concerned about what lay ahead; her daughter Amelia, a bit of an Aucklander now, after five years working in marketing and living across from Eden Park, sunglasses pushed back on her head, her long brown hair sleek and loose. She was dressed to make an impression in tight black jeans and high black boots, as sophisticated as her twenty-eight years would allow. And towering over her, James, twenty-four, as casual as his father, swapping his trackies under protest for jeans and a t-shirt without any holes. He’d managed to change a shift to get the day off – much harder now that jobs were so hard to come by.

‘Right then,’ she said, ‘it’s all …’

‘Yes, Mum, we know,’ James interrupted. ‘It’s important to make a good impression.’

‘Relax, Mum,’ Amelia said, taking her arm. ‘It’ll be fine.’

She smiled and let herself be led up the path.

Rick answered the door and ushered them into the lounge.

His family – her family – lined the room, taking up every available space, sitting on sofas and the arms of sofas, on chairs, and standing in the corners. At the far end, centre stage, was Liz, perched on a dining chair, holding court. For a few moments, as she stood back from the doorway in the hall, there was a tremendous racket, everybody talking at once.

But the second Kate came through the door, there was a sudden hush. Jaws dropped. Eyebrows rose.

Liz held up her hand in recognition.

‘I guess there’s no doubt you’re Liz’s daughter,’ someone said and suddenly, laughter erupted and people started talking again.

‘I’ll introduce you around,’ Rick said.

Kate met Rick’s partner Kim; hugged her mother and shook hands with her husband Steven. Further round the room Penny took over from Rick and Kim, who disappeared into the kitchen to make the tea, and introduced Kate and her family to her Uncle Jerry, his partner Celeste and his adult daughters – her cousins Angela and Sue.

As she made her way round, Kate kept glancing at Liz, their eyes occasionally meeting, until at last she stood in front of her.

‘These are for you, Liz.’ She thrust the daffodils into Liz’s hands, bent over and kissed her cheek, aware that this was the first time she’d seen her in over twenty years. It hadn’t been a deliberate absence; meeting again had simply never been suggested, by either of them, not in any of their many letters. So they hadn’t.

As she quickly studied her mother, she was shocked to see how much older she looked, but then, of course, so would Kate after twenty years. Liz’s hair was now completely grey; Kate suspected hers might be too, if she ever let it return to its natural colour.

Smiling, Liz lifted the daffodils to her nose and breathed in spring. ‘You shouldn’t have.’

Kate introduced her husband and children and Liz commented on how nice they looked then asked if they were the same age as her grandchildren Emily and Johnny.

‘I’m not sure, just a couple of years,’ I think.

‘Do you know if Jessie’s here yet?’ she asked Liz. She’d looked for Jessie as soon as she’d come into the room and realised she wasn’t there; had hoped she might be in the kitchen helping.

But her mother didn’t know if Jessie was coming and suggested she ask Rick.

She stayed with Liz a little longer and talked about Liz’s family, how she’d been looking forward to meeting them. She waited for a reaction, but there was none. She thought Liz might tell her off, might remind her of the promise she’d made to keep the secret. But Liz didn’t mention it. She didn’t say much at all, but Kate could see that she was relaxed and happy, quite the opposite from the way she looked when they’d first met in the café on Oriental Parade. The anxiety, the stress, the fear of what might happen when her family found out the truth were nowhere in evidence. Did Liz know Kate had reneged on her promise and written to her children? Rick had emailed that he and Penny had visited Liz and told her they knew about Kate; Penny had told Liz she’d known for a long time. From Rick’s report, Liz had carried on as if she’d expected it to happen, as if she already knew.

Maybe Liz need not know Kate had been the catalyst. Maybe she no longer cared.