Things I Want My Daughters to Know_ A Novel - Elizabeth Noble [60]
“Did you find what you were looking for?” Mark asked her, when she emerged from the spare room some long while later. Hannah was sprawled on the sofa, watching television, and Mark was reading the paper and drinking a glass of wine. He poured her a glass when she came in and pulled out the chair next to his.
“Not really.”
“Can I help?” He was watching her face. He looked concerned. For a moment, she thought about telling him. Trouble was, she believed her mum when she’d written that he had no clue. And she didn’t want to be the one who told him. She loved him. Lisa was right—he was, by a very wide margin, the best father of the three of them. She pushed the urge back into her throat and smiled at him.
“You can give me a hug.”
BARBARA’S JOURNAL
Today is a bloody awful day. I don’t know whether I should write for you on days like today. It won’t make easy reading. Still…
Today I feel sick and tired. In every sense of the words. I’ve thrown up so many times my diaphragm aches. There’s been nothing to get rid of for hours, but it doesn’t stop convulsing me. And tired…? So tired. I saw my reflection in the mirror (Note to self: Get Mark to cover all the mirrors) and it’s just possible my hair is having a worse day than I am (what’s left of it, but that’s a whole other story). But, do you know, I can hardly bear to lift one hand above my head to brush it. Don’t suppose I’d win any prizes for penmanship, either…Do you have any idea how debilitating it is to be this exhausted? The main problem is that I haven’t the energy to drag myself out of this mood. This terrible, black, desperate mood. I’m so bloody sad. I said I wouldn’t do this, but I can’t help it.
I don’t want to die. I’m not ready. I’m not finished. You’re not finished. Nothing is over. I don’t want to die.
It’s like the world is suddenly all new and wondrous and exciting again. Like I’ve been wearing blinkers, or something, all these years. Never lay back and watched clouds changing shapes. Or raindrops hit leaves. Or saw just how perfectly smooth a baby’s skin is. Never really listened to children laughing or choirs sing or how beautiful an oboe sounds.
All at once, the world—the same one I used to view with indifference—is the most perfect, fascinating, amazing place that I cannot bear to leave.
And you, my girls. I don’t want to leave you. I haven’t finished. I haven’t told you often enough how much I love you and how amazing you are. I haven’t helped you enough. Confronted you enough. Listened to you enough. SEEN you enough.
Every minute you already had that I wasn’t with you feels like a waste, a missed opportunity. I should have homeschooled you. I should never have left you with a babysitter because I thought I’d scream if I didn’t have an hour without you. Why did I ever think that, anyway?
I sound like a crazy person, I know. I just never knew I didn’t have that long. I never heard the tick-tock.
If we all knew—if there was some fortune cookie you could open and find out what your allotted time was—would we all live entirely different lives? Would we waste less time? “Carpe” the “diem” more. Really?
I daresay I’d still have felt like I was going to strangle you if I didn’t get away for an hour. I wouldn’t have homeschooled you. (God knows you wouldn’t have a maths qualification between you if I had’ve done.)
But I’d have played in the playground more. Swung, climbed, hung. Instead of hogging the bench and reading the paper.
Could I have loved you better? Maybe. If that’s true, then I’m sorry. Could I have loved you more? I don’t think it’s possible.
Jennifer
Home alone. Jennifer was home early. These days she was clockwatching, switching off the computer on the dot of 5:30, leaving the calls she would once have returned until tomorrow. Work wasn’t as much fun as it had been. She used to think she had the dream job. She organized perfect upmarket holidays