Chapter 47
CENTRAL PARK, MANHATTAN
‘I think Mr Darcy needs to poop,’ Phoebe said as they crunched across the icy paths of Central Park under a cloud-ridden sky.
‘How do you know?’ Gabriella asked. ‘Don’t they just squat and go?’
‘He’s shaking his butt,’ Phoebe said, gloved hands holding the lead tight as Mr Darcy sauntered forward.
‘Well, Cardi B does that too and she doesn’t always need to poop. I don’t think,’ Gabriella replied, eyes on the screen of her phone.
‘He’s squatting now! Do you have a plastic bag?’
Gabriella looked up. ‘Shit.’
‘Yes, exactly that. Do you have a plastic bag?’
‘No, but let me see what I do have.’ She began to rifle through her small handbag.
‘Chewing gum, no good. Hotel keycard. Phone. Purse.’ Then she stopped looking at the contents of her bag and looked at her hands.
‘Grandmama bought me these gloves. I never liked them. And I think they came from Liberty. Even better. Expensive gloves. Let me know when he’s done. ’
With the poop popped out then wrapped up in the costly alternative to a pick-up pouch, they continued their walk.
‘So, where did you go last night?’ Phoebe asked her.
‘What? When?’
‘Gabriella, you know I’m not stupid so why do you sometimes pretend otherwise?’
That was a good point. But also she wasn’t about to confess where she had been, what she’d been doing or with whom. ‘Sorry.’
‘So, where did you go?’ Phoebe repeated.
‘Just for a walk. To clear my head.’
‘Walking on your own again? Like in London.’
‘Yeah, just me and the moon and Cheyenne’s voice ringing in my ears.’
‘Really?’ Phoebe asked as Mr Darcy sniffed around a bush. ‘I thought you might have gone to check in on Luca.’
‘Oh, well, no, I mean I think it’s an international rule that you don’t check in on a man who’s been covered in a bucket of blood at a Christmas market.’
‘He said it was fake blood!’ Phoebe exclaimed.
‘Yes, that’s what I meant.’
A few seconds passed by and then: ‘So, are there really going to be two more books like Cheyenne was talking about?’ Phoebe asked.
‘Oh, you heard that?’
‘It’s pretty hard not to hear Cheyenne’s voice wherever you are in this city and you were shouting.’
‘Yeah,’ Gabriella said with a sigh.
‘Yeah, you were shouting? Or yeah to the two more books?’
‘I don’t know, Phoebe. About the books.’ She really didn’t know. It all felt so wholly out of her control. If it ever had been in her control. She looked at her niece. ‘What do you think? About the books?’
Phoebe shrugged. ‘It depends.’
‘On what?’
‘On what the books would mean to you.’
Gabriella swallowed. Perhaps it was time for a bit of truth.
She stopped walking, petted Mr Darcy on the head.
‘I don’t know what they would mean. I want them to help people, but I’m starting to wonder if they really are helping people or if they are just, I don’t know, papering over the cracks in people’s lives. ’
She looked at Phoebe, her beautifully soft features coupled with that intense expression she always seemed to wear. She was still so young but, equally, so aware of life, perhaps too aware sometimes.
‘Do you want to know what I really think?’ Phoebe asked.
Gabriella nodded. ‘Of course I do.’
‘Well, I think Mum would want you to be living your life how you want to live it.’
‘I’m not sure what that has to do with me signing a new contract for more books,’ Gabriella said quickly.
‘It has everything to do with it,’ Phoebe countered. ‘Do you like writing, Gabriella?’
‘I like—’
‘And don’t try to talk around the question,’ Phoebe interrupted. ‘I’m not Zeeta Friedmann.’
Gabriella sighed. Her niece sounded as astute as Luca right now. ‘I like sharing things about your mum. Her poems and her love of dance.’ That was truthful.
‘And how do you like it when people like Cheyenne change your words or take them out entirely or suggest a recipe section full of foods you know Mum would have hated? Ones I know you hate too.’
‘It’s a challenge,’ Gabriella said. ‘Admittedly.’
‘It’s not a challenge. It’s a pretence,’ Phoebe said, putting her fingers around Mr Darcy’s collar so he couldn’t run off. ‘It’s like when Grandmama invites all those people she doesn’t like to parties she doesn’t care about.’
‘She loves those parties,’ Gabriella countered.
‘No,’ Phoebe said firmly. ‘She has them to hide her grief and actually also to hide her shame.’
Gabriella shook her head. ‘She’s had those parties since before I was born.’
‘Classic repetitive behaviour to fool everyone around her and also trick herself that it’s some kind of normality.’ Phoebe sniffed like she hadn’t just delivered a truth bomb and headed towards an iron bench, taking Mr Darcy with her.
Gabriella took a breath. Was it true about her mother? If it was, why was it taking Phoebe to say it? She followed her niece’s path until she too was at the bench.
‘I know Grandmama isn’t a very good person,’ Phoebe continued. ‘And she knows she isn’t a very good person too.’
‘O-K?’
‘But she doesn’t care enough to change it because she thinks it’s too late.’
Gabriella shook her head, scuffing her boots on the icy ground. ‘Is this what she’s said to you?’
‘Of course not,’ Phoebe said. ‘She doesn’t say anything of substance to me. She talks about nice things, pretty things, soft, gentle things that won’t hurt me but things that ultimately don’t matter.’
‘And you let her?’
Phoebe shrugged. ‘She’s not ready for anything else yet. I don’t know if she ever will be, but I do know that nobody can change somebody unless they want to change.’
Gabriella swallowed. There was so much bare truth lying in Phoebe’s words about things she didn’t even know about.
‘But I think you want to change, Gabriella,’ Phoebe said with certainty. ‘Because I think you were forced to change who you are already. By Grandmama and Pop-Pop. Little by little. And then by Mum. And also by me and—’
‘No, Phoebe. Nothing is down to you,’ Gabriella said fiercely.
‘Lots of things are down to me,’ Phoebe stated.
‘Nothing that I would change.’
‘But there are many things that you could change. Like with the books,’ Phoebe said. ‘Stop papering over the cracks and try a deep repair. Maybe beginning with you.’
What Phoebe had said was hitting parts of Gabriella that were so tender, bits that had been taped together but never fully mended.
And also her niece was right in so far as the bits weren’t the same as they’d been.
It wasn’t just her path in life that had been altered, it was the whole shape of her.
‘Do you want to get doughnuts?’ Gabriella asked her.
Phoebe looked directly at Gabriella with those eyes that reminded her so much of her sister. ‘Is this you avoiding conversation and the points I eloquently raised?’
Gabriella shook her head. ‘No. The points have been taken on board. I just thought you might be hungry and I also thought… well, maybe we could talk some more.’
Phoebe smiled then. ‘Can Mr Darcy have doughnuts?’
‘How about we find a doggy-friendly alternative?’
‘OK,’ Phoebe said, nodding.
‘Good,’ Gabriella said.
And then she paused, just momentarily, and opened up her arms a little. Should she try? Not force it, but just make a movement of offering a space to physically connect. ‘I love you, Pheebs.’
Phoebe leaned a little towards her, her head connecting with her shoulder. ‘Love you too, Gabriella.’
It was a start.