Chapter 22
22
A couple of days later, halfway through Lili’s holiday week, Adeline was in the shop trying to simultaneously search for books on the Internet and keep an eye on Lili who was drawing at the tiny desk with crayons that could easily ruin a book or a wall if the urge occurred, when her phone pinged with a new email. It was from Kevin.
Dear Addy,
Hope your week is going well! Just thought I’d drop a note to say thanks again for putting me up (and putting up with me) on my impromptu visit. I’m already looking at tickets for the summer, so watch this space.
Also, I wanted to say that I’ve taken a leaf out of your book. No, I’m not moving abroad to take a job in a tiny village. But I am putting myself out there. Kind of. What I mean is – I’ve downloaded a dating app. Not the one I was on before, but one (and don’t laugh) that’s for professionals looking for that special someone.
I’ve decided it’s time to look at my own life rather than trying to boss you around. Although, as your big brother, I still reserve the right to do that, obviously.
I’ve been thinking about Mum too. I mean, obviously – right? I think about her all the time. What I mean is, I’ve been thinking about what life was like those last months. How tired we both were. How she took up every waking hour we had outside of work. And for you, in those final weeks when you got leave from work, every moment you had.
I’m proud of us. I think Dad would have been proud of us too. We looked after Mum to the best of our abilities and gave her the best possible care. And I don’t regret it for a minute. BUT I guess I’ve started to realise the impact all of that had on my life. On our lives.
It’s hard, going from 24/7 caring to nothing at all. And it’s not just grief, is it? It’s that kind of vacancy of time – not knowing what to do with ourselves. All the things I used to do before have sort of fallen away. And I think I’ve been a bit lonely.
So there, this is me getting out of my slump. Dipping my toe into the dating pool and hoping for the best.
And I wanted to thank you. Because I came to persuade you to come home, but instead you kind of showed me that I needed to make a change.
Don’t get a big head though. You’re still wrong about most things.
Love
KEV x
‘What’s that?’ Lili’s voice made her jump. Adeline turned her face away from her phone to see Lili standing at her side, peering towards the screen. ‘Just a message from Uncle Kevin.’
‘For me? ’
‘No sweetheart, for me. But he said to send his love,’ she replied, knowing that despite the fact it wasn’t explicitly stated, it was definitely what he meant in his sign off.
‘OK.’ Lili didn’t seem too bothered about it. She scuffed her shoe on the edge of the counter, kicking at a bit of wood that had splintered slightly.
‘Leave that, Lili, you’ll get a splinter.’
‘Lili, why don’t you help me with something,’ Monique said, appearing as if from nowhere. ‘I have some new children’s books and I’d like you to help me choose which one to put in the window. Do you think you could do that?’
Lili nodded, eyes wide at the prospect, and Monique gave Adeline a little wink over her shoulder as she led the child to a box of books. This afternoon, Lili was booked into the playscheme, but she’d chosen to have her in the store this morning as Tuesday mornings – their first proper open morning of the week – were often quiet.
Adeline tucked her phone away and got back on with the job in hand – Monique had given her a list of titles to find, some vintage, some current – and she was searching on second-hand selling sites to try to locate decent copies. As she was typing in a particularly complicated title, the bell rang on the door and she looked up to see a woman who looked familiar step into the shop.
‘Hello,’ the woman said, her blonde ponytail swinging as she walked confidently over to the counter. ‘Oh, and bonjour ,’ she added, noticing Monique in the corner with a large cardboard box.
‘Hi Stacey,’ Adeline smiled. ‘Back already!’
‘Yeah, I’m surprised too,’ Stacey grinned. ‘But that book you recommended last time, I loved it,’ Stacey said. ‘Read it in two evenings. And I wanted to know if she’d written any more. ’
‘The Catherine Cooper?’
‘That’s the one.’
‘Yes,’ nodded Adeline. ‘One or two. We’ve got some in stock actually.’ She pointed over to a shelf where contemporary novels were organised in alphabetical order.
‘Brilliant,’ Stacey said, giving her a wink for no apparent reason. Then she went and busied herself at the shelf, looking over the titles and flicking through until she made her selection. Seemingly decided, she came back and paid. ‘Probably see you next week. Thanks again!’
‘Thank you.’ Adeline smiled.
‘Don’t forget to ring me for a coffee… if you need,’ she added.
‘Definitely.’
When the door closed, she looked up to see Monique smiling at her. At her feet, Lili had laid the new books out in a line and was carefully inspecting the first one, taking her choice seriously.
‘ ?a va ?’ Adeline asked, after a beat.
‘ Oui ,’ Monique smiled. ‘It just makes me happy that you are so good with the customers. That you have a gift.’
Adeline shook her head. ‘Oh, this wasn’t… that ,’ she said, not quite knowing how to put in words the way in which she’d recommended a book to Claude. Instinctive perhaps? Looking back, it seemed bizarre at best, and in all honesty she was trying to forget it had ever happened. ‘I just… she’s English and we had a good chat – her French isn’t good – and I was able to recommend something for her to read, based on her preferences. That’s all.’ She smiled, tightly, and turned back to her screen.
But she could feel Monique’s eyes still on her. And when she looked up again, the woman was still staring at her, the same sliver of a smile gracing her face.
‘Monique!’ she said .
‘I’m sorry.’ Her boss shook her head. ‘I was dreaming.’
‘It’s OK.’
Monique walked over to the counter, her floral skirt swishing at her calves. ‘I think it’s so wonderful you came to work here. Like it was fate, perhaps.’
Adeline had thought the same herself from time to time, but hearing the words aloud, teamed with the look Monique had given her, made her shoulders tense. ‘Yes, well, I really enjoy it.’
‘And you have a gift! Ah yes, I know that you will say you do not. That you just listen and recommend books like a librarian. But deep inside, I think you know that it is more than that. That you can read people, just like I can.’
‘Honestly, it’s not…’
‘And to have found someone else who has this… instinct, it is a wonderful thing for me.’
Adeline glanced up to see that Monique was once again smiling at her, fingering the moonstone at her neck, her eyes full of emotion. She turned away from the keyboard and looked at her. Because this had to stop. It really had to.
‘Monique,’ she said slowly. ‘I saw Michel on Sunday.’
‘Oh, was he well?’ she asked. ‘Where did you go?’
‘We bumped into each other. On the beach.’ Adeline watched Monique’s face to see if there was a reaction. ‘We got to talking.’ She dropped her voice to a near whisper, aware of Lili’s almost supersonic hearing. ‘And we spoke about his argument with you.’
Two spots of colour appeared on Monique’s neck. ‘But that is all forgotten!’ she said, her volume matching Adeline’s.
‘Yes. Yes, he told me you were both OK now,’ Adeline confirmed. She took a breath. ‘But he mentioned something that… worried me a bit.’
‘ Ah oui ? ’
‘Yes, Monique.’
A silence descended over them. Lili picked up one of the books and walked decisively to the window. Otherwise, nothing moved; Adeline could feel her heart thundering. Clearly Monique wasn’t going to help her out here.
‘He told me that he was worried you’d begun to imagine I was your daughter,’ she said at last, forcing the words out.
Monique turned her face sharply towards the far wall, as if preoccupied with something there.
‘But you know that’s not possible, don’t you, Monique?’ she added gently, feeling horribly cruel.
She watched the woman’s face, usually graced with a smile, crumple in front of her. Monique put a hand up to hide her expression, and her shoulders slumped. She made a sound, a tiny almost indistinguishable cry.
‘I’m so sorry,’ Adeline said. ‘I know how hard it is to want to believe something. I know how hard it is to feel that ache for someone. But I needed to say it. Because I think Michel might be right. I think perhaps on some level you were starting to believe it.’ She felt suddenly as if she might be sick – a prickle of sweat traced her brow. She put her arm across Monique’s shoulders. ‘Even I had thought… well, imagined I felt something between us before I found out that your baby… About what happened,’ she said, trailing off. Monique was standing still, her eyes fixed on a point beyond Adeline’s shoulder, at the rows and rows of books, their spines glistening in the light.
‘You’re right,’ Monique agreed eventually, her voice so quiet that Adeline had to lean down to hear her properly. ‘It is impossible. I know this. But it seems that my heart does not know. And I suppose just sometimes I allowed myself to dream…’
‘Oh, Monique. ’
‘No. It is stupid. I am a silly old woman.’ She batted Adeline’s arm away and straightened up. She took a deep breath.
‘I thought I had felt the deepest pain possible when I gave my child to another woman and watched her being taken away from me. I didn’t sleep for days, I couldn’t eat. Even my parents began to worry. I was just sixteen but I was running out of reasons to live.’
Adeline touched Monique’s arm and this time she wasn’t shrugged away.
‘But in time it got better. I began to get up, and go to school and I told myself I would be OK. Because the moment I was old enough I would find her. And we would be together again. Oh, I know, I was young and stupid. I did not realise that sometimes this is impossible; that they make it impossible.’ Monique turned her eyes towards Adeline now and they were shining. ‘But before I found this out for myself, my mother sat me down and told me that my baby had died. That she had caught a fever and it had been too much for her little body. And this pain, the pain I felt then in my heart, I was worried it might tear me in half.’
Monique paused and took a deep breath. ‘That’s when I ran. And over time, I learned to live again. Learned to forget. Staying in a new place, breaking ties with my past. It was my way to cope. But every day I find I think of her still – and my heart knows that if the baby had been with me, she would not have died. I would have known she was sick sooner, taken her to the hospital more quickly. Because she was mine ,’ she said, her voice louder now, emphatic. ‘ My baby. And I was her mother. And that is why I will never forgive my mother for what she did. Not until the day I die.’
Adeline watched her silently, then, cautious as if approaching an animal that might dart away, she reached out and gave her a hug. They gripped onto each other tightly, both overcome. ‘I’m so sorry,’ Adeline said. ‘I can’t even imagine…’
‘This is why…’ Monique pulled away and flicked the tears from her face as if dismissing her emotions. ‘This is why I let myself dream, just a little. This is why I believed my heart knew you when we first met. And I decided that fate had brought us together. That somehow my baby was still alive; my mother had been given the wrong information. It was a delusion. But such a beautiful one, I allowed myself to have it, just for a little while.’
Adeline nodded. ‘Of course,’ she said, slightly guilty to have forced Monique to bring the dream out in front of them both and expose it to the light. ‘I…’ she began.
But at that moment, two things happened. Lili raced across the shop, oblivious to the emotional trauma happening just next to the counter, and excitedly showed Monique her choice for the window display. At the same time, the bell jangled as three customers entered the shop, chattering happily. The moment was broken, the heaviness began to dissipate from the air. Adeline took a breath and stepped into her work mode, feeling the weight of everything set aside for now. Looking at Monique, hand in hand with Lili by the window, she could sense the woman had done the same.