36. “When We Were Young” - Adele
“When We Were Young” - Adele
Ihave no recollection of getting to my suite, although I must have, because the next thing I know, I’m curled in one of the armchairs in my sitting room holding a photo album on my lap. My ruined dress is pooled at the bottom of the bathtub.
I flip the pages with no idea what I hope to find there. Proof that I’m not the terrible sister Bea has made me out to be? That I’m not selfish and greedy? That what she said about Henry and me isn’t true?
The words he spoke the day he gave me a ride home come back like the ghost of Christmas past. We’re all selfish. We only do something if there’s a clear benefit for us.
Am I deceiving myself thinking I’ve given up everything for Wesbourne? Maybe that’s why Henry’s rejection stings so badly. I’ve been craving admiration ever since the day he stomped on my heart on his way out the door.
I run my thumb over a picture of my dad at the stove cooking breakfast. It was something he did every Sunday morning before church. He’d tell us one thing he loved about us for each blueberry he stuck into the batter of our pancakes.
Your beautiful smile. Your sharp mind. The way you won’t let me kill a spider but make me put it outside instead.
That’s what I’m looking for. Proof that someone is proud of the person I am.
On the next page, I find a collage of Bea and me in dress-up clothes.
We’d dig through the giant trunk our mum kept in the playroom for coordinating outfits, then parade downstairs and beg her to take our picture.
Rosalind has more patience than I give her credit for. There are dozens of these photos.
I’m wearing my dad’s old uniform in one of them, standing tall and saluting the camera.
Something about it looks odd, though, and I study it for a few minutes before I realize what it is.
His service ribbons aren’t pinned to the jacket, and the more I look at it, the more I’m beginning to think it wasn’t his uniform at all.
The sleeves hang nearly to my knees, and at eleven, I was getting close to my father’s height.
I call my mother. “Do you still have Dad’s uniform?”
There’s silence on the other end, and I start to wonder if we’ve been disconnected by the time she finally speaks. “His uniform?”
“Yeah, the one we used to play dress-up with.”
“Oh, that. I’m pretty sure I gave it away years ago.”
“You gave away Dad’s uniform?”
“It wasn’t actually—” She stops.
I wait for her to continue, but she doesn’t. “It wasn’t his actual uniform, was it? Where’s the real one?”
Her silence sets me on edge.
“Mum?”
“I think it might be best if we have this conversation in person.”
Five minutes, later my mum is at my door, fingers twining together and apprehension bringing out wrinkles on her face that are usually too terrified to show themselves. We sit on the sofa, and I tell myself the worst has already happened: my father is dead, and no news could possibly eclipse that.
She picks up the photo album, and a smile crosses her face. “So many good memories.”
“Only half as many as there should be.”
She raises her head, and there’s pity in her eyes. “I’m grateful we have as many as we do.” She turns several more pages in silence, then says, “Your father was a good man.”
“I know that, Mum. What does this have to do with the uniform?”
“I just want you to remember your father as you knew him before I tell you what I have to say.”
Cold dread grips my spine. “Fine. Just tell me.”
“Your father joined the military when he was eighteen. He was so eager to do something courageous, to make a difference for this country. He was young, much younger than a lot of the recruits. He served faithfully for almost ten years, until you were three years old.”
And you made him retire.
“He loved it at first. But as time went on”—her voice falters—“it started to take its toll on him. He struggled with depression, even suicidal thoughts. I was worried, but he didn’t like to talk about it.
“One day, you and I were in the back garden. Your father was deployed, and I didn’t expect him home for another three weeks. I looked up from the flowers you were picking to find him walking across the yard.
“At first I was overjoyed. But as he got closer, I saw the look on his face. He didn’t look happy to be home.
He looked . . . hollow. He was wearing his civilian clothes, and I just knew.
I knew he’d finally done it. It was the least honorable thing he’d ever done, but in that moment, I only felt relief. ”
There are moments when time seems to hang suspended in the air, everything in slow motion as the pieces fall into place. Like accident scenes in movies, orchestrated to increase their impact.
I reach for the arm of the sofa, afraid it might crumble beneath me if I don’t have anything to hold onto. Like everything I thought I knew.
“Dad was a . . . deserter?” I feel like a traitor even putting those words together in the same sentence.
My mother’s answer is in her eyes.
“How could he?” It’s not humanly possible to keep the accusation from my tone.
She places her hand on top of mine. “You have to understand how hard it was for him.”
I jerk it back. “I don’t understand anything. He deserted his duty, his country, his responsibility. There is no excuse for that.”
“He needed help. And he got that after he left.”
“Nothing you say can excuse what he did.”
She sighs, and I remember the blame I’ve always placed at her feet for what I thought was my father’s forced retirement. “Why didn’t you tell me?” I say.
“You worshiped your father. I couldn’t take away what little you had left of him.”
“So you let me think he was courageous and loyal and good?”
Her face is stern. “He was all of those things, Celia, and I won’t let you speak about him like that.”
“He’s the reason I’m in this place! He’s the reason we’re not at Maison de Lierre right now, the reason I’m married to Henry instead of Beck.”
“No, he’s not.” Mum looks me straight in the eye. “You are.”
I flinch, but she’s not done.
“You are courageous and loyal and good, and that’s why you’re in this position. A lesser person would have said no. You didn’t say yes because you thought your father would have said yes. You said yes because your father raised you to be the kind of person who does what’s right.”
There are hot balls of tears burning the backs of my eyelids, but I forbid them from coming any further. “It still changes everything.”
“If you had known this before, would you have chosen differently?”
I already know the answer, and so does she, but I pretend to give it serious thought. Finally, I whisper, “I don’t know.”
“Your father lost his courage, yes. But it was that shortcoming that made him determined to raise his daughters to be better, to be stronger than he’d been.”
“I’ll never see him the same way again,” I say.
Mum rubs a perfectly manicured hand over her knee. “Which is exactly why I never intended to tell you.”
“But surely people knew? How have I not found this out before now?”
“We paid a lot of money to keep the news from circulating. And to keep your father out of prison.”
“The money from the estate.”
She nods, and I can see that this secret has aged her. “It was the only thing we could think to do.”
It hadn’t been enough to stop the rumors. Even I’d heard them. But they never mentioned his name.
“Did he regret joining?”
She starts shaking her head before the words have all left my mouth. “No. He was ashamed of quitting early, but he never regretted the years he spent in service to this country.”
It’s a small consolation, but it doesn’t change what he did.
“How will I ever hold my head up again?” I say.
“You are not your father. You possess a strength and courage he never did. You’re going to do incredible things as this country’s queen.”
“I’m scared.” My jaw quivers, and I want my mother to pull me against her chest like she used to when I was little.
She doesn’t. Instead she clasps my shoulders and turns me to face her. “Courage is bravery in the face of fear. Your father lacked it, but you don’t. Besides, you’re not alone in this.”
She’s referring to Henry, but I don’t have the strength to tell her that he’s deserted me, too.
Sleep joins the list of deserters in my life. I toss and turn, unable to get the image of my father in his uniform out of my mind. How could he do it? How could he just give up when the going got tough?
I’m secretly glad my mother didn’t tell me sooner. I can’t imagine living with this knowledge for any longer than I already have. To know that my own father took the coward’s way out because he couldn’t handle the what-ifs . . .
My conversations with Adelaide and Bea choose that very inconvenient moment to float back through my sleep-adverse mind.
Are you scared of approaching Henry or of what he’ll say if you do?
Henry is crazy about you. He always has been.
Bloody hell. They’re all conspiring against me.
I mash my pillow into a thicker lump under my head.
I close my eyes and count one hundred sheep (the most futile exercise ever created).
I climb out of bed and into downward dog position for a few minutes.
I sip the lukewarm tea Daphne left on my bedside table.
I even try reading a few pages of a novel, but after five minutes, I can’t recall a single word.
I unplug my phone from the charger. I tell myself it’s just so I can sleep. Desperate times, desperate measures. I send the text to Bea.
Where is he?