Chapter 41 Maia #2
Walking up her front path was surreal. Part of me still didn’t believe she lived here.
But the door opened a few seconds after I pressed the doorbell and … it was her.
Not the skinny, decaying mess of a human being who used to slap me around when she was agitated and in need of a hit.
This was an older version of the Maryanne from my early childhood.
She was a healthy weight now that she wasn’t injecting heroin into her body.
When her lips parted in a strained smile, I was surprised to see white veneers.
The last time I saw her, her teeth were wrecked.
Somewhere along the line, she’d gotten the money to fix them.
Her dark hair, while still quite thin, was shiny and styled poker straight around her face.
The T-shirt and jeans she wore were clean and quality.
The only giveaway to her past was her skin, which had a weathered look beyond her age.
Her dark eyes roamed over me and to my surprise, they brightened with tears. She stepped back. “Come in, Maia.”
My legs shook as I stepped into the hallway of the small but modern home. It was well-decorated and nicely furnished. And it didn’t smell like human waste, which was how I remembered our flat in the end.
She gestured for me to follow her into the living room, and I could tell by the way she kept crossing and uncrossing her arms that she was nervous too. “Can I get you anything? Tea, coffee, water?”
I shook my head and stared around the space, taking in the good furniture and the large TV. There was framed artwork … and photographs of her … with a man and two kids. The more I looked, the more I realized that there were photographs of those kids everywhere.
Agony sliced across my chest as I realized she didn’t live here alone.
“Please sit.”
I turned back to stare at her, trying to reconcile this person with the woman I knew.
Slowly, I sat on the edge of the velvet corner sofa.
Maryanne nodded and sat down on the armchair next to it. “You must have a lot of questions.”
I snorted bitterly. “You think?”
She rubbed her hands together nervously, and it reminded me of when she used to do that when she was itching for a hit. “If you’ll indulge me, I’d like to tell you my story and not that shite you read in the paper.”
“So, you didn’t say I abandoned you?”
She winced. “That arsehole of a journo took it out of context. I felt abandoned, My, but I said more than that. I had no idea he was going to come at it as an attack against you.”
“Why talk to him in the first place?”
“Because I was naive and … I’ve faced everything else in my life but you.
You represent all of my behavior I’m most ashamed of, and I’ve found you the hardest to face.
” She looked away even now, unable to look me in the eye.
“I took the coward’s way out by never reaching out to you when I got clean, and I …
when that dickhead approached me, I stupidly thought it was a way to reach out without forcing it on you. ”
My emotions were rocked because this wasn’t what I’d expected. At all. And I honestly didn’t know what to believe. She’d played with my emotions so much as a child.
Maryanne finally met my gaze. “When I was fucked up, it was difficult for my brain to process anything but wanting the escape that I got from smack. Smack was all I could think about. But when your dad came to me and I knew you’d found him, there was this wee part of me …
” She struggled to speak, her jaw moving in and out as she tried to stop the tears from escaping and failed.
Maryanne brushed impatiently at them. “There was this part of me leftover that was still your mum and as callous as it seemed at the time, I knew you needed to be away from me.”
“That’s not quite how you put it.” I glared, refusing to give in to the tears that stung in my own nose.
She shook her head. “I can imagine. I can’t remember everything I did, but I remember some stuff, and I know it was bad, My. I know that I put you in situations that no fucking bairn should ever be put in. I know that. And believe you me, I work every day to fight my self-loathing over it.”
I stared at my shoes.
It was all I’d wanted to know.
If she felt remorse.
Or if my own mother was a villain.
To know that she’d felt remorse was a relief.
But it didn’t miraculously wipe away all my heartbreak and resentments.
“It’s … it was about six months after you went to live with your dad and … well, the universe has a funny way of fixing what’s broken. I was in a car accident with Kells. I don’t know if you remember him.”
My eyes flew to her in surprise regarding the car accident. I did know Kells. He was her dealer. I nodded.
“Kells died. I was in a coma for a couple of weeks. I had no choice but to go through withdrawal in hospital. I’d have never gotten clean otherwise, Maia.
There was a nurse there who really cared about me getting clean and staying sober, and so she went above and beyond.
Her name was Karisha, and she was one of the most amazing women I’ve ever met.
She took me in and drove me to AA meetings and she got me involved in her local church.
She got me a job working for a charity, and I lived with her for four years until she passed away. ”
I gaped at her in shock. I’d wondered how she’d gotten sober, but the idea of her going to church and working for a charity seemed unreal.
“I was very lucky.” Maryanne nodded, sensing my disbelief. “During all that, I went back to school part time to study psychology, and I worked toward becoming a counselor, specializing in addiction.”
“Oh my God,” I whispered.
She shrugged, seeming embarrassed. “I’ve spent the last decade helping other people make amends to their loved ones, and I couldn’t even reach out to my own daughter to tell her how sorry I was.”
Rage flushed through me like someone had lit a kerosene fire at my feet, but I sucked back the urge to roar at her. Cheeks hot, fists clenched, I took deep breaths because I didn’t want this to descend into a fight. But how could she? How could she be so selfish in her cowardice?
“Did you even want to know me?” I asked.
“Of course. I … googled you. Found your socials. Saw you seemed to be doing well, and I was relieved. I was relieved that I hadn’t royally fucked you up.” She half laugh, half sobbed.
“But you did.” I stared at her like she was nuts.
“You fucked me up, Maryanne. I … for years, I’ve carried the weight of not just your inability to love me like a mum should have, but the years of abuse and torment from other people because of your actions.
I loved you. I was your parent, not the other way around.
You slapped me when I told you one of your boyfriend’s tried to assault me. ”
She covered her mouth, squeezing her eyes closed, but I wasn’t done.
“I left you because I was scared what might happen to me, to you. Every day I lived in fear of coming home from school to either find you dead or find you so strung out that you couldn’t stop it if one of your loser boyfriends raped me.”
Maryanne made a sound like a wounded animal, but I continued.
“Reading that you felt abandoned by me was like having the worst thing you believe about yourself be proved true. To the whole fucking world. Because I did feel ashamed of leaving you behind. Even though it felt just as much like you were throwing me away. Did I leave you behind, or did you throw me away? My heart couldn’t tell the difference.
All I know is that I loved you and cared for you for years and then I went to stay with my dad, so I’m just as bad as you are. ”
“No. You were a kid. I was supposed to parent you, so you need to get that out of your head now, Maia. That isn’t true. That’s not your guilt to bear.”
I calmed a little at her words, hoping they’d sink in and free me over time. “I don’t want to hurt you,” I offered. “But I have other things I need to say.”
She straightened as if bracing herself. “Then say them.”
“I … I bore years of having people look at me like I’m less than, like I’m scum.
People who sexually harassed a fucking child because they thought I was less than human because of you.
And I know that’s not directly your fault, but it’s something I’ve carried for years.
I cared way too much what people thought of me because I was ashamed and embarrassed, like I was unworthy.
If my own mum could throw me away, could defend a trash human being who tried to assault me rather than protect me from him, then there had to be something wrong with me.
I have a beautiful man out there”—I gestured toward the window, to the car parked outside—“who I could have lost because I couldn’t accept …
” I sobbed before I could stop it. “I- I couldn’t accept that s-someone could love me like he does. Th-that I’m worthy of that love.”
Maryanne wiped her tears from her face as she stood, as if to come to me.
“Don’t.” I sniffled, wiping in frustration at my own tears. “I can’t.”
She sat back down, her shoulders shaking from trying to keep her sobs at bay.
We sat in silence for what seemed like forever and then finally I spoke. “So, you moved here?”
“Aye. I …got a counseling job in Livingston. I met my husband, Peter, at an AA meeting there. He’s a recovering alcoholic.”
I raised an eyebrow but let her continue.
“He’s been sober for two decades, but he’s never stopped attending the meetings. Anyway, he’d gone through a rough divorce and the meetings meant more to him than ever.”
“Did you tell him about me?”
“I did.” She nodded emphatically. “I told him about everything. He … Peter has two kids, Gemma and Ben. They split their time between us and their mum. We’ve been married for three years, and we moved here about a year ago.”
I wouldn’t lie and say that didn’t break my goddamn heart.