Chapter Thirty
S ienna shut the washing machine door and turned it on, stretching her back as she stood up. Debs was coming over in a couple of hours, the kids were with James for the night, and they were going to spend the evening wrapped up with each other, eating junk food, and watching films. Honestly, it was the greatest idea she’d ever heard when Debs rang her and asked if she minded if they could change their plans. They were meant to go out, but Debs had had a long day at the office and was exhausted, and so was Sienna. A night in with just the two of them sounded like heaven.
The sound of her doorbell ringing startled her, and she glanced at the watch, wondering if more time had passed than she thought, but when she saw it was only four o’clock, she realised it couldn’t be Debs. She gave her apartment one last look around as she made her way to the door, hoping that whoever it was, it would be a fleeting visit. Everything was ready, but it didn’t mean she wanted anyone staying for too long.
“Mum?” Sienna couldn’t hide the shock in her voice. The number of times Penny had made an effort to visit Sienna was few, and it usually never ended well.
“Hello, Sienna.”
“What are you doing here?”
“Your dad said it was your day off, so I thought I would come by since you hardly visit anymore.”
“I came for dinner last week.”
“And then rushed off. Rather rudely, I might add.”
“How did you know I’d be in?”
Penny slid past Sienna, not bothering to wait to be invited in.
“What else would you be doing?”
“I could have plans.”
“With who?” Penny retorted with a hollow laugh as if the idea of Sienna having any friends or prior engagements was ridiculous.
Sienna tried to ignore the stab of hurt which came at her mother’s underhanded comment. She bit her tongue, reminding herself that she wasn’t a teenager anymore and didn’t need to retort with childish comebacks.
Closing the door behind her she turned to watch Penny, openly taking in the state of her apartment, waiting for the next barbed comment to come.
“You know, Anna’s daughter has a lovely house. Four bedrooms and a garden out the back. She was showing us photos of it last night.”
“Who?”
“Anna. From my book club. I’ve told you about her before. Her daughter’s a lawyer, very successful, and she has a lovely husband and three children. I wish you’d pay attention, Sienna.”
“Well, she sounds like she can afford something that nice.”
‘Nice’ is such a beige word rang through her head, an unbidden memory of Debs. Except with Penny here, already criticising Sienna’s life in the way she always did, it didn’t fill her with the joy it used to. It hadn’t for days, that familiar fog of self-loathing creeping ever further in around the edges ever since dinner with her parents last week. She hated that Penny could steal her light and joy so easily.
“Yes. Well, you’d be able to as well if you’d stuck with your degree. You only have yourself to blame; there’s no point in passing that onto Laura just because she’s made better choices than you.”
“Who’s Laura?”
“Anna’s daughter. Pay attention , Sienna.”
“I like it here,” Sienna stated, trying desperately to prevent the admonishing conversation that always followed the ‘pay attention’ that so easily slipped past Penny’s lips.
“Beggars can’t be choosers, I suppose. I guess you’ve made the place your own.” Penny spun on her heel, looking around some more. Sienna knew what that phrase meant. It meant that Penny didn’t like or agree with whatever Sienna had done, but then she expected nothing else. “And you can’t be choosy when you’re not earning much.”
“I’m earning enough. And it’s not about the money.”
“Oh, Laura helps people”—Penny emphasised the help as if that’s not what Sienna really did, not like Laura, anyway—“and she earns much more. You could have done something like that if you’d decided not to drop out of university.”
“I’m not having this conversation again.” Sienna walked past her mother, heading towards the kitchen.
“Good. I’m not here to have it again. You made your decision, and I told you then that it was the best choice, but you didn’t listen. I also told you that you made your bed and you had to lie in it.”
“Mum…”
“I mean, I just don’t know what we did wrong with you. We gave you all the opportunities in the world, exactly the same as Cerys, and you just threw them away, thinking you knew better.” Penny waved her hand as if she was metaphorically swatting away opportunities left, right, and centre. She wandered over towards the window, towards where the Bird of Paradise sat, petals still bright and shining in the late afternoon sunlight that streamed through her living room window. Sienna tensed as Penny scrutinised it, body coiled as if she was ready to pounce if Penny dared to take another step forward, dared to reach out and touch the precious petals with her fingertips as if her touch alone could wither and kill the reminder of the only thing which had given her joy in the past few weeks.
Instead, sharp eyes flitted to Sienna, a disapproving gaze once again being directed towards her. As if she was being judged. Which, she reasoned, was not beyond the realm of possibilities. After all, if there was anything Penny Daly was exceptional at, it was casting judgement upon Sienna.
“So, tell me more about this job you seem so keen on. What is it doing again?”
“Oh…” Sienna was taken aback. Clearly, Penny had come here for a conversation, but Sienna actually had no idea what direction it would take. And to show an interest in her job? Penny had never really asked much about it. Not even when she was at dinner last week.
“It’s a community centre. We have a number of different services for everyone.” She was aware she sounded much more like the brochure than someone who was excited about her job, but she couldn’t help it. Something, whether it was the shock at being asked or the hesitation about opening herself up too much to more criticism, had her remaining as neutral as possible.
“And what do you do exactly?”
This time was much more critical, the tone almost sneering as if Penny couldn’t imagine a world where Sienna could be of any use to anyone.
“I work with children and young people. Organise classes and activities. Offer support and advice.”
Penny scoffed. “Advice? What advice could you offer them?”
“I… It’s more like a signposting service that we provide…” Sienna stuttered, already backtracking and reducing her involvement to a bare minimum. Despite her rational brain telling her she could and would offer perfectly reasonable and acceptable advice—and had done so on more than one occasion—she couldn’t help but shrink back, desperate not to overstep and over-promise. It wasn’t as if she was even administering advice to anyone right now; no one was here, and she was in her own home, but her mother excelled in reducing Sienna down to the bare carcass of who she was . She could feel her palms starting to sweat, the churning in her gut that came whenever she was exposed to her mother for any length of time.
“Are you even listening to me, Sienna?”
Penny’s question snapped her out of her reverie. She had, in fact, not heard a word Penny had said, unsure even that she had been speaking at all.
“Sorry.”
Penny huffed, clearly frustrated at Sienna’s drift from the conversation. “I said, are you going to offer me a drink? Pay attention , Sienna.”
She wandered around the space a little more, heading towards the mantle as Sienna made her way towards the small kitchen. She was wary of her mother being in her space; it was her haven, her small piece of privacy untainted and untouched by Penny, and she felt judged with every flick of a gaze, every lingering look over the things Sienna deemed important enough to have in her home. She could still hear her moving around behind her, but she tried to school her breathing, centre herself so as to spiral any further into the black hole her mother could so effortlessly drag her into.
As she waited for the kettle to boil, she chanced a glance at her phone, hoping to see a message from Debs. She really didn’t want her to show up while her mother was here — she wasn’t ready for those two parts of her world to collide — but she knew Debs’ words could calm and soothe her. Something she desperately needed right now.
“What’s this?”
The stony chill in her mother’s voice was even more disconcerting than the disapproval that had laced her previous conversation. Sienna swallowed the lump that had formed in her throat, glancing down at the object Penny had cracked down hard onto the counter in front of Sienna. Her eyes flickered to the mantle, the place where she had rested the framed email which Debs had gifted her weeks ago, as if to confirm she was really seeing what Penny had thrust in front of her. So many times over the past few days, she had glanced at it, studied it, held it intently in her hands as if it would disappear any moment and take her hopes and dreams with it. As if her future and everything she could achieve was solely dependent on the printed words on that page. Sienna was now regretting adding the email to the shelf where she also kept her most prized photographs, knowing that the chances of Penny scrutinising and studying them was higher than she wanted it to be. But then, she wasn’t expecting Penny to show up and intrude into her life.
She closed her eyes, willing herself to breathe deeply and not act rash in light of her mother doing exactly what Sienna predicted she would do if she was to find out this information. She watched, as if from a distant corner of the room, as if having some sort of out-of-body experience, as Penny’s hand clenched subtly around the frame, the silence deafening.
“Well?”
“I’m going back to university,” Sienna said quietly.
“You…” Penny barked out a laugh. “Don’t be ridiculous.”
“I was accepted to study Social Work at Leeds. I start in September.” Again, Sienna had been reduced to just relaying the bare minimum. There was no point in trying to argue anything else, in trying to defend her position, her experience, her fucking talent, that everyone had told her she had. There was no point in relaying the words Liz and Max and Debs had spent so long telling her, reassuring her with, because when it came to Penny, none of that mattered. None of that would be seen because as far as Penny Daly was concerned, Sienna had thrown away her life eight years ago when she dropped out of university. It didn’t matter why she had done it, didn’t matter that she was unsure and scared about her life, suddenly missing a part of her soul and drifting in an abyss she didn’t know how to climb out of. All Penny could focus on was the fact that Sienna had thrown her opportunity away, and with it, all the help and sacrifices Penny and Evan had given her over the years.
“Were you going to tell us? This is dated three months ago.”
“I… Well...” That was a question Sienna didn’t really have an answer for. Because despite Max’s insistence that she really should tell her parents that she was going to go back, she never imagined the conversation actually happening.
“Of course you weren’t. Because if you had, I would have told you this was a totally preposterous idea, and you’re out of your mind.”
Despite knowing that her mother would disapprove, something about the scathing tone of her voice made Sienna flinch. Her hands shook, the boiling kettle clicking off and breaking the heavy silence between them as she swallowed down the bile that rose in her throat.
“You know, we worked so hard to send you to university the first time even though you weren’t naturally gifted like Cerys. Your father always said you should have the same opportunities as each other, and he wanted to give that to you. But then, when you threw it back in our faces after everything that happened…” Penny let the words die off, and Sienna knew it was probably because she was certain the unspoken implication would hurt her more than anything else. “Cerys was so proud of you. And your father. And you just threw it away. And now this. And social work ? What do you have to offer children? Apart from a prime example of how not to live your life?” She let the frame drop onto the counter, clattering loudly and making Sienna jump. “This is a mistake, and we won’t be there to pick up the pieces again.”
If it were any other time, any other conversation, Sienna might have found it in herself to scoff at the implication that her mother had done anything supportive back then. But as it was, she was too dumbstruck by the harsh words being thrown at her to think or do anything.
“Look around. You wasted your life, Sienna, and you have no one to blame but yourself. This”—she jabbed her finger in the direction of the frame that now lay abandoned in front of them—“isn’t going to change that. It’s a dream, a hopeless dream of something you cannot achieve, and the sooner you realise that, the better.”