Chapter 27
27
‘Are you sure this is OK?’ Adeline said as she leant heavily on his arm. Her ankle pain was ebbing away a little but it was still quite painful to walk. Later she’d ice it and it would hopefully feel better.
‘Of course,’ André said, supporting her weight effortlessly with his – ridiculously muscular, now she could see it up close – arm. He was wearing a T-shirt, and feeling his skin against hers as she hobbled felt strangely intimate.
As they rounded the corner she could see the bookshop, the light reflecting slightly on the glass, making it impossible to see beyond the book display in any detail. But she hoped that Monique might be there, peering out and hoping to witness the result of the engineered ‘meet cute’ between her and Michel.
‘How about,’ Michel had suggested in the cafe, ‘André takes you back to the shop. Perhaps you can look a little romantic together? Perhaps, at last, this will show Monique that she may be able to control some things, but she cannot force two people together if they are not right for one another. ’
‘Oh, no,’ Adeline had protested. ‘We can’t ask André to do that.’
But André was smiling. ‘I am happy to help,’ he’d said, offering an arm. ‘It will be a pleasure.’
She wondered now, feeling the heat of his body close to hers, whether he’d meant it would be a pleasure to help send a message to Monique, or perhaps a pleasure to help his friend, Michel. Or was there any part of him that had meant it would be a pleasure to help her in this way?
And was it her imagination, or the fact that she’d spent too long in Monique’s company, or did she really feel some sort of connection between them where their arms touched? A sort of tingle of recognition, as if he was both a brand-new acquaintance and someone she’d known for a very long time.
She looked up at his face, his jaw strong and set from this angle, his long-lashed eyes and tousled hair, and – perhaps sensing that she was looking – he glanced down at her.
She felt suddenly silly, hanging on to the arm of a man she barely knew, imagining all sorts of things. Could he sense it? She dropped his arm.
‘I think I’ll be OK from here,’ she said, gesturing to the door of the bookshop just a few metres ahead.
‘Are you sure?’
‘Yes. Don’t worry. And thanks for… you know, helping.’
‘It was a pleasure.’
Which bit? she wanted to ask.
‘I hope Monique will have got the message that she shouldn’t meddle with matters of the heart,’ André said. ‘I hope she has seen us together.’
‘Yes,’ Adeline agreed.
‘But perhaps…’ he stepped forward so his body was just inches from hers again, his face leaning in towards her, his voice qu iet. ‘Perhaps we should make sure she definitely knows there is no chance for you and Michel.’
She looked at him, his earnest eyes hard to read. ‘And how would we—’ she began.
He gently leaned down and put a hand under her chin, tilting her face towards him. Then slightly hesitantly, he brought his lips to hers and kissed her carefully.
There it was again, that feeling of this being both a first kiss and something timeless. Before she had time to question herself, she found herself leaning into him, kissing him back.
Lili was finally asleep and, barely daring to breathe, Adeline stood and made her way out of her little girl’s bedroom, closing the door softly behind her. She felt a flood of tiredness as her body finally acknowledged that she was exhausted – and still aching a little from her fall earlier.
Thinking of the fall made her think of André. The softness of his lips on hers. How, suddenly, he’d gone from being a virtual stranger to someone quite different. He’d pulled back. ‘Do you think Monique has got the message?’ he’d asked.
So it had all been for Monique. ‘Yes, I think so,’ she’d said, suddenly shy. ‘Thank you.’
‘And have you?’ he’d added, his tone slightly faltering.
‘What do you mean?’
He had stepped back slightly, his eyes glancing at her face then over her shoulder, avoiding eye contact. ‘I like you, Adeline,’ he had said.
She touched her lips now, feeling a mixture of pleasure and anxiety. He’d asked for her number and had already sent a message asking her out for a drink that week. And she’d found that although she was checking her phone for messages from Sophia, she was also now hoping to see messages from André too. She couldn’t seem to help it.
She’d resolved not to get involved with anyone. Not to complicate her life when the pieces it had fractured into weren’t yet set into place. But when his name flashed up on her phone, her reason seemed to go out of the window.
Downstairs in the living room, she sank into the chair and picked up her notebook from a side table. Using the Emily Dickinson book as a rest, and feeling slightly guilty about it, she turned over a new leaf and began to make a list.
Things I’ve lost:
Connection with friends – especially Chris
Sense of purpose?
Sense of home/family
She chewed the end of her pen thoughtfully, thinking of the things that had fallen away from her life in recent months – friends, colleagues, even her sense of what she wanted, where she wanted to be…
Her relationship with Kevin had been damaged over the last year: they’d stopped joking, stopped talking about trivialities and instead spoken almost exclusively about Mum’s care, the finances, how they would split their time; then the will and funeral arrangements.
Their argument and Adeline’s subsequent escape to France had severed their bond completely for a while. Now, it was time to rebuild. Try to find the kind of playful, supportive relationship they’d had before. Something both old and brand new.
Before finding the papers, she’d had a sense of where she belonged; she’d grown up in London and had lived there all her life. But finding her true birth certificate had thrown even that into question. She’d raced to France, convinced she was getting in touch with a piece of herself, but looking back, she’d been running away.
Michel was right; it had been a devastating time, but she could see that there were opportunities on the horizon too. To find a home that was right for her and Lili, to reconnect perhaps with her birth mother. To make new friends and rediscover old ones.
The sudden trill of her mobile phone sent her pen scuttering across the pad. She reached into her handbag and brought it out, convinced for a moment that it must be her birth mother – although of course she hadn’t given out her number. Instead, the screen read ‘Monique.’
‘Hello?’ she said, answering.
‘Hello, Adeline. I’m sorry to call you in the evening.’
‘It’s OK. How can I help?’
There was a silence for a moment, the sound of breathing. Adeline realised suddenly that Monique was crying.
‘Are you OK?’ she asked.
‘Everything is fine, but I need you to mind the shop tomorrow. Will that be OK? You have your key.’
‘Of course!’
‘Because I have to take a trip.’ A pause. ‘I have decided to go visit my mother.’
‘Oh my God. Monique! I mean, that’s wonderful,’ she said, hoping this was the right response. ‘Terrifying’ might have been a better word.
‘ Oui , it is perhaps. I have called. I spoke to my sister. She was a little cold. But I understand. And my mother, she is quite old now. Almost ninety. A little frail. But she has her mind. It was only when I came to call that I wondered whether it might be too late, that I might have lost my chance.’
‘Oh, Monique! What did she say?’
‘Ah, nothing. I did not speak with her. She was in bed. But my sister told me I should come. That she would talk better in person. And I am sure she is right. I cannot wait now that I have decided. So I will take the train to Paris, early. And be back, I hope, by the evening.’
‘That’s fine. Of course. Longer if you need.’
‘Thank you.’
‘I can…’ Adeline began.
‘ Pardon ?’
‘I can come with you, if you need,’ she offered.
There was a short silence. Then, ‘ Non ,’ Monique said. ‘But thank you. That is a kind offer.’
‘It’s fine. Just take care, OK?’
The next morning, the shop felt odd without Monique’s presence. Although Adeline had been left in it alone many times previously, Monique had never been far away – either busying herself in the apartment above or out running errands and calling in and out as she did so.
Today it was as if something was missing from the small space – an energy that was usually there. Adeline smiled, greeted customers and tried as best she could to watch Lili who was alternating between being wonderful, reading or colouring at her small table, or racing around the shop to expend excess energy and occasionally having a near miss with an unsuspecting browser.
There was a steady stream of customers, once in a while a queue would form at the counter which was almost unheard of when Adeline and Monique were both in position. Once, Adeline lost sight of Lili for a moment and worried she’d taken the opportunity to exit through the open door and onto the sunny street outside. But then she’d spotted a little blonde head behind one of the stacked tables and felt her insides relax.
When lunchtime arrived, she was relieved to be able to turn the little sign in the window to ‘Closed’ and lock the door on any customer who might try the handle just in case. With Lili in tow and the shop busy, she hadn’t felt able to go up to the flat and make herself a coffee; her throat felt dry and her whole body heavy and tired. It wasn’t just the busyness of the shop, or the need to look after her child – or at least keep half an eye on her – while working. It was the thought of Monique, too, somewhere on a train or walking towards her childhood home, her head full of questions, that weighed on Adeline’s mind.
‘Come on, Lili, Monique said we could use the apartment for lunch. Shall we go up?’
Lili – clearly delighted – raced up the stairs and through the door before Adeline got her shoe on the bottom step. Once Adeline reached the top, she’d already flung herself on Monique’s special chaise longue, a piece of furniture that Monique guarded fiercely and had only let Lili sit on once, after removing her shoes and making sure that her hands weren’t sticky.
‘Off that,’ Adeline said.
Lili acquiesced sulkily and plonked herself in her usual chair at the table, slumped. It was at times like this, when defiance broke through her daughter’s happy exterior, that Adeline wondered exactly what might be waiting for her when puberty hit .
Luckily, at five, the mood didn’t last long and was cured by the offer of baguette with Nutella and a glass of milk.
Adeline watched her child dig into her rather unhealthy lunch and sipped from her own cup of tea. She’d cook something proper for dinner, but right now she just wanted to take a weight off.
She dug out her phone and unlocked the screen for the first time since she’d opened the shop, seeing several notifications flash up. A sale at one of the stores she’d frequented back in London, an offer for virus protection for a laptop she no longer owned, a newsletter from an IT specialist she couldn’t remember signing up to, and a message about a book she’d enquired about online.
A text pinged in from André and she opened it with a smile. He asked her to call past the patisserie on the way home. He had a cake he’d saved for her and Lili.
And then she saw the last message in her inbox. A notification from the DNA site.
In all the chaos and busyness, she’d forgotten her usual email refreshing. And of course that had been the moment when her birth mother had decided to get in touch. She felt suddenly cold as she tapped the link and entered her password to get onto the site. And finally read the words, written in French.
Adeline, my baby girl. I am so glad to hear from you. Of course I would like to get to know you.
It was impossible to eat. To drink. To do any more than act as normal as possible on the surface and get through the rest of the day.
Her fingers itched to write a response, but she didn’t want to fire something off without thinking about it – and had no time to think about it as Lili, newly energised from her sugar intake, rushed around the shop, the customers flowed in and out and time seemed to move at a frustratingly stilted pace.
By six o’clock, things had quietened down. Lili was in the apartment watching YouTube on her mother’s phone – a rare treat but much needed – and Adeline was tidying and stacking and making the final checks on the shop before closing time, when the bell at the door tinkled.
She straightened from where she’d been reorganising a low shelf, ready to serve yet another customer and determined to – this time – stay focused enough to at least hand them the right book.
Except it wasn’t a customer.
Standing just inside the door was a woman she recognised, but who didn’t look quite like herself. Her skin was paler, eyes seemed larger, their shadows deeper and more ingrained into the skin. Her hair was tied up but strands escaped to wildly frame the face. Her cheeks and eyes were tinged pink, her dress rumpled. The bag she was carrying dropped from her hand.
‘Monique!’ Adeline exclaimed, alarmed at her friend’s appearance. She rushed forward to support her, picking up the bag and guiding her to a chair. ‘Are you OK?’
‘ Oui .’ Monique’s voice was flat, monotone.
‘But you seem… Have you been crying? Was it OK? Was it awful? Did your mother?—’
‘It was incredible.’
‘It was? Oh, I’m so pleased. Did you… your mother – did she answer your questions? Did she…’ Adeline realised she was babb ling. She took a breath, steadied herself. Part of her longed to blurt out the fact that she’d heard from her own mother. But it wasn’t the right time, clearly. ‘Did you get some answers?’ she asked at last, her tone carefully controlled, more measured.
‘ Oui . But Adeline, I did not expect the answers I received,’ Monique said, her expression unreadable.
‘Oh.’ Adeline was trying to phrase a question correctly – forming the words in her head before blurting them out. She wanted to ask whether that was a good or bad thing, whether Monique’s mother and sister had been friendly or hostile. Whether she had more information about what had happened all those years ago. But she didn’t want to overstep the mark. This was Monique’s story, Monique’s private business. She didn’t want to push her before she was ready.
But Monique suddenly turned to her, clutched at her hands, making her jump. ‘I found out that my mother lied to me,’ she said, her eyes filled with an indefinable emotion.
Adeline nodded, seeing that there was more to come.
Carefully, her voice trembling slightly, Monique looked her in the eye. ‘Adeline, my baby. My little girl. She is not dead. She didn’t die.’