Chapter 33 One New Beginning
Five months later
We have been in this pretty town for hours already, because someone—that would be me—insisted on heading out at five in the morning, “just to be sure.” We made the drive down in torrential rain, the same rain that has been battering the land for weeks now, flooding fields and bursting riverbanks and flattening gardens.
As soon as we arrived, it changed—one of those strange moments when the downpour just stopped, sudden and unexpected, as though a giant overhead tap had been switched off. The sun emerged, rainbows appeared, and we all stood in the hotel car park staring up at the dry blue sky as though we’d never seen such a thing before.
It is spring, and we have learned to expect the unexpected. Now we are grateful for the respite, the gentle heat on our skin like a reassuring touch, walking around gloriously unencumbered by raincoats and umbrellas.
The streets of Stratford-upon-Avon have emerged clean and fresh, bright green leaves dripping with liquid, tables and chairs hastily set up outside street cafés. People are laughing and talking to each other, the welcome change in season making friends of strangers.
I am here with Karim and Katie and Erin. Only one of us is missing—two, if you count Bill. The hospital letter that arrived for Margie on the same day as Beth’s landed for me was inviting her for a routine mammogram.
She didn’t think much of it, and neither did I—it’s called “routine” for a reason. The difference this time, though, is that they found a problem. They found breast cancer.
Margie had become such a big part of my life that I think I was more shocked than she was. I simply couldn’t imagine my world without her in it and was devastated at the diagnosis. I tried to hide it as well as I could, because I didn’t want to end up in the ridiculous situation where she was comforting me instead of the other way around.
It was caught early, before it had a chance to spread, and all the signs are good that the lumpectomy and radiation therapy she had have worked.
We have all rallied around her; Bill moved in with me while she was in hospital, and Margie has dealt with it all in her typical stoic way. She has cried and joked in equal measure, and I am in awe of her resilience, her ability to remain optimistic no matter what is thrown at her.
It was—still is—a huge worry. Even being away from her for one night feels reckless, as though it is inviting disaster. As though the cancer will sneak back if I’m not there to stare it down. Also, I just miss her—we all do. Technically, she is well enough to have come, and we all tried to convince her to. Karim even offered to rent a posh Jeep so we could travel in style. She remained firm, insisting she wanted to stay at home to look after Bill—of course, it was nothing to do with Bill, who would gladly have gone to stay overnight with a sitter.
It was because she didn’t want to slow us down, to hold us back in any way.
She is a silly moo, and we all wish she was here, no matter how slowly we’d have needed to take things. We wish she was here, cracking rude jokes and cackling and making us all laugh.
We have compensated for her absence by making constant video calls, giving her a secondhand guided tour of Stratford.
We have taken her on walks around the historic streets, taken her inside the quaint tearooms, held up the screen to show her the Royal Shakespeare Company at the waterside. We have rented a boat, and Karim has rowed us up and down the river, giving Margie a running fake-sports commentary on the way.
We have been on a tour of Shakespeare’s birthplace, which sent me and Katie into some kind of history-induced trance. Seeing those higgledy-piggledy rooms, looking through the windows he’d have looked out from as a child, seeing the fireplaces and furniture and beamed ceilings of his home—it was really wonderful.
We have done all of these things, crammed into a blessedly busy day, and now I am here, standing alone outside an art gallery on the amusingly named Sheep Street.
Karim, Katie, and Erin have gone to the nearest pub, after multiple assurances from me that I am going to be fine. I think Karim wanted to hover nearby, waiting to catch me in case of unexpected swooning. It is sweet that he feels like that, but it would be too much for all of us to turn up at once. If this goes well, there will be time for introductions later. For now, I take heart from the fact that I know he is probably watching me from the window. That he cares. That they all do.
I am early, and I decide to give Margie yet another call.
“Hiya, love,” she says, her voice amused. “Are you going for the world record on how many phone calls I’ve had in one day?”
“Sorry, am I interrupting something important?”
“Well, I’m watching Poldark, if you must know . . .”
“Ah. Fair enough. Just wanted to check on you.”
That, of course, is a lie. I just wanted to hear her voice. I just wanted to hold on to normal for a few more moments.
“So,” she says, “are you standing outside the place you’re supposed to be meeting her?”
I laugh and reply, “Almost. How did you know?”
“I knew because I know you. So, tell me about it—the place where you are right now.”
“Well,” I say, glancing around. “It’s called Sheep Street. There’s a really nice town hall, opened by the actor David Garrick in 1769. There are lots of historic buildings—houses, restaurants, a pub. From what I read before we came, there’s been property of some kind here since the twelfth century. It apparently has the oldest-surviving cobblestones in Stratford . . . and . . . okay. I feel better now. You really do know me, don’t you?”
“That I do. So, remind me, then—what is happening on this day in history?”
“I am meeting Beth,” I reply, smiling. Even the feel of her name on my lips makes me happy. “I am meeting my daughter.”
“You are. So stop blathering and get on with it.”
She hangs up, and I smile as I put my phone back into my bag. Margie might not be here in person, but she is making her presence felt. I glance around at the pub across the way, and sure enough, I spot them all in a window seat, Katie waving at me through the glass.
The café is just around the corner, on a cobbled alleyway. I scoped it out earlier, got a quick coffee, counted the tables, the usual me stuff.
Now I have to walk toward it, and toward her. We have written letters, exchanged photos, swapped phone numbers. We have edged into each other’s lives carefully and cautiously and, in my case, joyously—but we have never met. Not until today, at this kind-of midway point between her home and mine. Between her people and my people.
I wonder idly if her mum and dad and siblings are lurking somewhere nearby as well—maybe our families are all in the same pub, trying to look out of the same window, all feeling nervous on our behalf.
I take the steps I need to take. I cross the cobbles and close the distance. I stand by the café door.
I look inside, and I see her. I see my daughter, waving at me through the window. I see her smile, her deep red hair, her big brown eyes.
I see my baby girl, all grown up. I see her in all her perfect glory—ten tiny fingers, ten tiny toes.
I open the door. I walk toward her. And I make history.
Discussion Questions
When we first meet Gemma, she is giving birth to her baby, and afterwards we read a letter that she has written, to be given to her when she is older. What would you include in a letter to your baby, before he or she was born? What would you like to express to them?
What advice do you wish you could have given Gemma at that stage in her life?
Gemma has built a solitary life as a way of protecting herself from harm. Do you think the trauma of her own childhood explains that, and do you think it worked for her? Did she gain or lose?
As a way of coping with her anxieties, Gemma counts and recites facts. What are your coping mechanisms when life starts to feel overwhelming?
Was Gemma’s assumption about Katie possibly being her daughter understandable, or simply wishful thinking? And what did you think about how she handled the situation?
Are the secondary female characters in this book important? What do Margie, Erin and Katie contribute to the story, and to Gemma’s journey?
What qualities does Karim possess that eventually enable Gemma to take a risk on love?
Was Gemma right to reach out to her own mother as well as her daughter, or should she have left that complicated relationship in the past?
One of the themes of the book is that you can find a family as well as be born into one–are there any examples of that in your own life?
What do you think happens next–do Gemma and Beth become close, do her and Karim stay together? What would you like to see happen?