Chapter 4
NOW
Dear Lexie,
Life wasn’t always easy for us. But is it for anyone? I chose to focus on the happy times, on giving you and Ollie what I could. I tried to support your dad, too, however hard that was. It was the only way I could see us staying together. And I wanted that, so much – for all of us.
I suppose that’s what I wanted to write about.
Life isn’t easy – and it isn’t perfect, either.
We’re all human. Are all beholden to our pasts in some way.
I don’t think I ever got to the bottom of why alcohol had such a grip on Dad.
But I suppose only we know what’s really going on inside ourselves.
I’ve often wondered if that’s why you always wanted to move so far away. Remember that day you told me you were thinking of going to New Zealand for a year? I tried to persuade you that Europe was a better idea! Eventually you changed your mind – not to Europe, though.
I’m going to Vietnam, Mum! Then Cambodia.
You were drawn to the rainforests of Malaysia, too, your adventurous spirit craving more of this world that I’d barely scratched the surface of.
Whether you were running away or not, I knew I’d have to let you go.
But I’d known for a long time that your destiny was different to mine.
And it’s the paradox of parenting that what you need most as children is wings that ultimately will take you away from us.
Wings I didn’t know how to give you. But you had it all worked out!
Mother cats teach their kittens to hunt and kill. When fledglings leave the nest, they’re alone. Nature has it right; humans get everything wrong, you told me, adding quickly, I don’t mean you, Mum.
But your message had reached me; sunk in, heart deep. You knew I didn’t see things the way you did.
After Ollie, then you, had flown the nest, there have still been happy times, family times, when I’ve joined Ollie and his girlfriend, Jenna, for one of their spectacular Sunday lunches.
You’ve been there too, when you weren’t busy, the four of us sitting around their dining table eating a meal Jenna had spent most of the morning preparing.
You and Jenna were very different people.
But from the start, you loved her – she’s a homebody, everything she does imbued with love.
Now and then, you’ve dipped into my world, not that you get it.
It’s nuts, people going to all this trouble, for one day of their lives.
I still remember the day you said that. Lucy and I were setting up for the biggest wedding in the history of our tiny flower business.
‘I am so fucking stressed,’ she muttered through the ribbon she was holding between her teeth. ‘When this is over, remind me to never do another wedding.’
‘You love them,’ I remember saying to her. ‘Anyway, it’s like childbirth. Once it’s over, you forget.’ But I was stressed, too. There are no second chances when it comes to weddings. Everything has to be perfect on the day.
Our workshop was crammed with scented roses and other seasonal flowers, freshly cut from Mary’s garden.
I even remember the flowers from that day combined with stems of unripe blackberries from the hedgerows, trays of herb plants in terracotta pots, while we’d hired in some trees to decorate the marquee.
Amidst our stress, you came breezing in, in loose-fitting jeans and a plain white T-shirt, your long hair streaked from the sun. Calm and unruffled, you looked the opposite of how we were feeling. ‘Would you like a hand?’
‘Oh God. Yes,’ Lucy said fervently. ‘There is so much to do.’
You pulled on one of our florists’ aprons. ‘Where would you like me to start?’
Your creative side, plus years of helping out, meant floristry had become second nature to you. And just by being there, you calmed us. You probably thought we were mad! I mean, getting so flustered over wedding flowers?
‘Here, Lex.’ Lucy gave you a bucket of flowers, then passed you her notebook. ‘This is the brief. Make us the bride’s bouquet of your dreams.’
I smiled as she said that. But I knew you didn’t dream about bride’s bouquets. Your dreams were bigger than lavish weddings; woven of kindness and justice in the world.
But you rose to the challenge. It was as though your fingers gently coaxed each flower, gently interwove the most delicate foliage; that bouquet was one of the most stunning ever to come out of our workshop.
You passed it to me. ‘What do you think?’
My eyes met Lucy’s before I smiled at you. ‘I think you’re better at this than we are.’ It was a moment of connection between us; so many times, I wished for more of them.
You shrugged it off. ‘I don’t know how you do this every day.’ The moment passed. You stayed another couple of hours before taking off your apron and setting off for your shift at the animal sanctuary you loved.
The memory stays with me this evening, into tonight as I’m falling asleep, when yet again, I’m wishing I could go back to that day, that I could have made you see how talented you were. Maybe if I had, you might have chosen to stay.
A tear rolls down my cheek. It’s hard sometimes as a parent, the act of letting go. Realising that your children have to follow their dreams, however you might feel, wherever that ends up taking them.
But you’ve always been braver than I am.
As I drift off to sleep, in my dreams, suddenly I’m back in your childhood years.
You with pink-cheeks and tangled hair, aged about six, Ollie two years older, an anxious look on his face.
And I know why. Ryan has just come in. Instead of hugging you both, he pours himself a drink.
As for me, I simply stand there, say nothing.
Yeah, well, Dad’s emotions were bottled in more ways than one, Mum. Did you ever ask him why? Or were you scared of him?
It wasn’t long ago you said that to me. I was shocked. I hadn’t known how aware you were, the extent of the impact of his drinking on you, on Ollie. On all of us.
Really, Mum? D’you expect me to believe that?
My eyes spring open. Lying here, I gaze at the ceiling.
In the darkness, it’s like a spotlight being shone into the furthest corners of my life, on all the mistakes I’ve made, my regrets.
You can be confrontational, Lexie – in a way that always made me uneasy.
But in the context of our lives, you had every right to be.
Suddenly there’s a lump in my throat. I underestimated the reality of Ryan’s drinking on you and Ollie, on the dynamics of our family. I got so much wrong.
As I lie here, I miss you desperately. There’s so much I want to tell you. If I could go back in time, I’d change so many things. First off, I’d be more aware. I’d have left Ryan before the damage happened. I would have made sure you’d known that home would be a place of safety for you, always.
A need to make things right consumes me as I lie here; with it, a desire that’s overwhelming to come and see you.