Jack.
My heart lurches painfully.
Stay calm, stay calm!
As I pass their table, Jack looks up and our eyes meet, and the laughter vanishes from his face.
But I force a cheery expression and blurt out, ‘Well, we meet again. Twice in one day! As the actress said to the bishop.’ I laugh like a drain to cover my embarrassment.
As the actress said to the bishop?
Jo giggles a bit awkwardly and I feel my face turn scarlet.
‘Hi, Maddy,’ says Jack guardedly. ‘Are you out with your family?’
‘Yes, yes. Too much wine on an empty stomach. Bad move.’
He nods and smiles. ‘Give your parents my regards.’
‘I will. Enjoy your meal.’
I walk away, concentrating on walking in a straight line. Bloody Jo has cute dimples as well as everything else. Why is life so unfair?
I plop back in my seat, my insides churning.
So Jo is apparently his ‘work mate’. Did that look like a work meeting? Of course it didn’t. You don’t get tarted up like that to talk about company policy and stationery supplies. Of course, since they both work in the world of virtual reality, it probably wouldn’t be as boring as that. Definitely not as boring as being a waitress in a café…
‘Hey, she’s back,’ grins Jasmine. ‘We thought you’d got lost.’
‘No. But I wish I had,’ I say with a grim smile. The fact I’m managing to hold back the tears is nothing short of a miracle.
And then Dad says, ‘Oh. Well, if our company isn’t good enough for you, why bother staying?’
I stare at him. ‘What? But I didn’t mean that,’ I protest indignantly, and Mum puts a calming hand on mine. I’m obviously shouting.
‘As a matter of fact,’ I say, lowering my voice, ‘I just bumped into Jack back there and he was with…’ I swallow hard and tail off, and Dad looks pointedly from me to my wine glass. Or at least, that’s how it seems to me. And that’s when I see red.
I grab my glass and take a huge gulp of wine just to spite him.
Then I turn to Mum, tears welling up, the pain of what I’m about to say almost too much to bear. ‘I’m the freak in this family, aren’t I? I don’t really belong.’
Mum stares at me, bemused, amid the stunned silence.
‘What on earth do you mean, love?’ She takes my hand but I pull it away.
I swallow, my gaze flicking to Dad for a second. ‘You know exactly what I mean. My birth certificate says I haven’t got a dad, but that’s not possible. Everyone has a dad.’
In the shocked silence that follows, the atmosphere feels as taut as the strings on a tennis racket. Mum stares at me in horror and the twins murmur an incredulous, ‘What?’
I can’t even look at Dad.
The constriction in my throat is making it hard to get out the words. But I have to ask.
‘Who is he, Mum? I need to know. Who’s my biological dad?’
CHAPTER FIVE
A stunned silence descends. And I suddenly realise how desperate I am for Mum to just laugh and say, ‘Maddy, what on earth are you talking about? Of course your dad is your real dad! There was a mix-up, that’s all, and his name was left off the birth certificate by accident.’
But as I sit there, my heart pounding in terrified expectation, I see a range of emotions cross Mum’s face: shock, dismay…and finally, she closes her eyes, as if she’s overwhelmed with guilt.
‘Oh, Maddy,’ she whispers, and there’s my answer. She doesn’t need to utter a single word more to confirm that my suspicions are true. I can tell by her face that she’s been keeping this massive secret from me all my life.
I glance at Dad, and my heart twists in my chest.
He’s not my real dad. He’s no relation to me…
The hollow, panicky feeling that follows this thought is horrible. However much we might rub each other up the wrong way, I can’t imagine life without him as my dad.
He’s staring at his glass, rhythmically twirling the stem. I long for him to look up at me and give me some sign that everything is going to be all right; that he doesn’t love me any less just because we’re not biologically connected. But he just continues to stare down at the glass, as if he can’t bear to meet my eye.
Clearly, he’s known all along, too.
‘Who is he, Mum?’ My voice sounds croaky, and Jasmine reaches over and lays her hand on mine. The gesture makes my heart swell with emotion and I look over at the twins. Chloe has her hand clasped to her mouth, her eyes shiny with unshed tears. Jasmine squeezes my hand and attempts a smile.
And then it hits me. Even my sisters are no longer my sisters. They’re my half-sisters.
Even though logically, I know this won’t make any difference to the way we feel about each other, it still feels like another punch to the gut.
Mum scrapes back her chair. ‘Let’s go home. We can talk about it there.’
Her eyes are pleading with me to understand, and I nod and get to my feet, and Cloe and Jasmine follow suit in silence.
‘Dad?’ At first, he doesn’t hear me. He seems lost in his own world, still sitting there, his face closed off, twirling the glass. I say it louder and he looks up at me, startled, knocking over his glass. Red wine pools on the white tablecloth.
‘Let’s go home, Barry,’ says Mum softly.
He nods, still saying nothing, and rises to his feet. Then he seems to notice the spilt wine for the first time, and picking up his napkin, starts dabbing at it. But Chloe gently takes it from him and links his arm. And we all troop out of the restaurant.
*****
Back at home, it’s awkward and I don’t know what to do.
Dad excuses himself and vanishes upstairs, and I go into the living room with Mum and the twins, although Chloe and Jasmine hover by the door.
‘Shall we leave you two to talk?’ Chloe asks, and Mum nods.
‘Love you both,’ murmurs Jasmine, and they disappear, shooting each other frightened looks.
I look at Mum, my heart hammering, and I see nothing but pain in her eyes.
‘I should get your dad,’ she whispers, and then she gives an odd little laugh when she realises what she’s just said.
I shake my head, trying to stay calm. ‘He’s not himself. I need you to tell me, Mum. Tell me everything.’
She sits down on the sofa with a little sigh.
She looks crushed, but I force myself to harden my heart, and I perch at the other end of the sofa, instinctively wanting to distance myself from the messy emotion I know is inevitable. Mum has betrayed my trust. She’s lied to me all my life. They both have. It still seems so hard to believe.
‘Maddy, love, let me first of all say that your dad – well, Barry – loves you so very much. That’s partly why we never screwed up the courage to tell you that you’re not his biological child. We were so happy, the three of us, and then the twins came along. And it was so perfect that I guess neither of us wanted to endanger the happy family dynamic by telling you the truth.’
I swallow hard. ‘You should have told me.’
She nods. ‘I know. I know. And I’m so sorry, Maddy.’
‘Who was he, Mum? Just tell me his name.’