Christmas at Claridge's Page 39

  ‘Oh! What? You think it’s so hard? You’d be amazed what teenage girls can get away with. Baggy clothes, puppy fat . . . I barely had a bump, my muscles were so tight. It was almost easy!’

  He stared at her, his eyes darting over her face, trying to keep up with the story that took a twist with every answer. ‘But Chiara . . .? If she was your pen pal, why would she take Luca for you? She would hardly have known you. It doesn’t make sense.’

  Clem fell silent. ‘It does when you know her. She’s the best person I’ve ever met.’

  Clem sank back into the pillow, her voice lower as she stepped back into the memories. ‘There was a storm that night, too, just like last night’s. She had heard the gate banging and she went to investigate; she found me moments after Luca was born. She was amazing, completely calm – well, after a couple of minutes anyway. She took total control of the situation. I was . . .’ She shrugged, unable to condense the feelings down to one word. ‘Delirious. Frightened that it had happened so early, and so far from home, but so happy, too. He was strong, I could sense it immediately, even though he was so small.’ She blinked, looking down at her empty cupped hands. ‘So small.’

  A beat pulsed. ‘What did Chiara do?’

  Clem looked up at him, as though pulled from a trance. ‘She gave him to her mother.’

  The words clanged around the room as if they had bells attached. She was monstrous again.

  ‘You handed them Luca and they took him? Just like that?’

  ‘No! Not just like that! They spent the week begging me to take him back with me . . .’ Her voice faded. ‘But there was no way I could go back home with a baby in my arms. I’d have had no home for him. My mother had made it perfectly clear that she wasn’t prepared to start on the babysitting rotas just yet. She would have thrown me out on the streets.’ She began to sob, decade-old anger choking her even now.

  Gabriel walked to the foot of the bed in silence. ‘Why did Chiara’s parents keep him? They could have put him up for adoption for you.’

  ‘Because they wanted me to have a way back to him. They were good people; they made the mistake of thinking I was good, too.’ Her eyes flicked towards him, dully. ‘They believed I would come back for him when I could.’ She was quiet for a long moment. ‘They weren’t entirely selfless; Chiara’s an only child. Her parents had tried for years to have another baby, but Rosa kept miscarrying. She was older; they’d given up trying . . .’ Clem shrugged. ‘They decided to say he was an orphan of their cousins’ and they were raising him.’ Her voice broke and she raised her hand to her mouth, trying desperately to keep control. ‘I knew they would love him . . . I named him and nursed him for as long as I was there . . . I didn’t sleep at all that week. I couldn’t bear to close my eyes and lose a minute with him.’ Her voice cracked again and her lungs gasped for air with the same urgency as they had when she’d broken the surface of the water the night before. ‘Chiara wrote to me all the time, keeping me informed of every milestone: when he first walked, his first word, his favourite toy . . . She sent pictures.’ She thought of the letters in the silk envelope, which had sustained her for all these years.

  ‘But you never saw Luca yourself? Not once, in all that time?’

  She shook her head vehemently. ‘I couldn’t take the risk. Leaving him behind was the hardest thing I’ve ever done in my life.’ The tears fell harder again and her entire body contracted as the sobs heaved her body like waves in a storm. ‘I thought I was going to die. Rosa gave me a tranquillizer to help me get on the plane. She had bad arthritis so . . . There wasn’t a day when I didn’t think of him.’

  Gabriel sat on the bed beside her, his warm hands finding hers as he tried to understand. ‘Why didn’t you go back for him?’

  She stared up at him through blinded eyes. ‘How could I? It sounds so easy in principle but in reality . . . Rosa was his mother by then, Chiara his sister, this was his home. He didn’t speak any English . . . He was happy here. How could I take him away from all that just because I wanted him with me?’

  ‘But what you must have gone through . . .’

  ‘It was the right thing for him.’ Clem sobbed. ‘That was all that mattered.’

  ‘My darling,’ Gabriel murmured, pulling her into him so that her face was buried in his neck, soaking his skin with warm tears. He stroked her hair as she wept, her shoulders trembling beneath his jaw. Finally, he pulled back, tipping her head up to his. ‘I’m so sorry I forced you back here.’

  ‘I’m not.’ She blinked, her eyes refilling instantly every time, the tears streaming down her cheeks. ‘Even as I said no to Tom, part of me knew I would go. I was so frightened, but at the same time, just the thought of it made me feel alive again. As soon as the thought was planted, I couldn’t hold back any more. I told myself I’d be able to cope with it, that it was worth the risk.’ She closed her eyes. ‘I fell apart when I saw him for the first time. I felt as though he could tell, as if he could see right through me.’

  Gabriel rubbed her hand, watching her closely. ‘But he didn’t.’

  She shook her head. ‘I was so terrified of him to begin with.’ A tiny, disbelieving laugh escaped her as she thought back to their first meetings. ‘I could hardly speak to him. But . . . but then I got to know him’ – her voice was as soft as fur – ‘and I fell in love with him all over again.’

  ‘And you’re prepared to leave him again?’

  It would have been kinder to punch her, and she squeezed her eyes shut, her face scrunched tight with pain. ‘I have to.’ She wept. ‘If there’s one thing being here has shown me, it’s that I did do the right thing. He’s had a much better life here than I could have given him. He’s happy! But the longer I stay here, the more I run the risk of him finding out who I really am. I have to go, Gabriel, for his sake.’

  Gabriel nodded. ‘We can leave tonight if you wish.’

  Clem stiffened, a small vein of disgust opening somewhere inside her that he’d answered too quickly, was too ready to whisk her away from her child and restore her as his alone.

  But it wasn’t just that. He knew everything now, but he still didn’t understand. It wasn’t just Luca he was competing with.

  ‘No . . .’ she faltered.

  ‘You want to wait a few days to make sure he is OK?’

  She couldn’t reply. She stared up at him through full eyes again. She may have broken her twelve-week rule for him, but it hadn’t meant anything after all; it really was just an arbitrary number that had kept things tidy, neatly glossing over the messy truth that no one else would ever be enough. Her heart had never been in danger of being broken by him, or by any of the others, simply because her heart wasn’t hers to give.

  Gabriel recoiled in understanding as she remained silent. ‘But the ring – you changed hands?’

  ‘That was a misunderstanding, I’m sorry,’ she whispered. ‘I never intended for you to think it meant more.’

  He blinked at her, fear running through the eyes that had made a prisoner of her for a while. ‘The passion between us—’

  ‘It’s amazing, I know. But it always is. That’s all it ever is. It’s what I do. It’s how I . . .’

  ‘Hide?’ He got up from the bed, pacing to the window, anger suddenly prowling through his body like a cat in the night.

  She swallowed, remembering Chiara’s words that night in the kitchen when they’d been washing up; how she’d seen through Clem’s bluff of using one man to get over another.’ . . . cope. It’s how I cope. It’s just a game; it’s not . . . it’s not . . .’ She couldn’t say it.

  ‘Not love?’ he finished for her. ‘No! How can it be when you’re still in love with him?’

  The room echoed with silence. They both knew to whom he was referring, but that wasn’t what had caught Clem’s attention.

  Still?

  ‘How did you know that I ever loved him?’ she asked, pale.

  He turned his face away, a twitchy irritated gesture loaded with pride. ‘I am
right, aren’t I?’ he demanded, ignoring her question.

  She knew he had been suspicious of Rafa’s antagonistic behaviour towards her – didn’t they always say the line between love and hate is a thin one? – but there was no way Gabriel could know about her past with him. Chiara had never known, so it wasn’t in the letters she had hidden so carefully in the mattress. But if he knew that they had had a past . . .

  She met his stare and his eyes narrowed in recognition of the truth. ‘I know exactly what he is to you . . . and to Luca.’

  Clem’s jaw dropped. ‘Gabriel—’

  ‘Does he know?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘No?’

  She scented the threat in his tone. ‘He was back here by the time I found out.’ She pushed the covers away, climbing onto her knees. ‘Gabriel, please, you can’t tell him.’

  ‘Does Chiara know? She was in on the secret. You kept it from him together?’

  Clem shook her head vehemently. ‘No, she never knew. She only met him a few years after Luca was born. She never knew that I knew him.’

  ‘And it never occurred to her? How could she not see the resemblance? It is so obvious!’

  ‘Why? Because they have brown hair and brown eyes? This is Italy, Gabriel! And who would have looked for it anyway? Why would she have ever considered I might have met him? He was my brother’s pen pal; it all happened a year before I even met her.’

  ‘How convenient.’

  ‘Convenient?’ Clem replied shrilly. ‘Do you know what it did to me when I got her letter saying she’d met him? Do you have any idea what it was like knowing that, not only was my son here, but they were going to marry? But how could I tell her, after everything she’d done for me?’

  He looked at her as if he were studying a butterfly – beguiled by her beauty, baffled by her purpose. ‘You know he hates you.’

  The words hit their mark and she slumped back on her heels. ‘I know.’

  ‘And you will settle for that?’ he whispered, incredulous. He rushed at her suddenly, grabbing her by the shoulder. ‘I love you! Why is that not enough? I can give you everything.’

  Clem shook her head helplessly, crying again as her hair stuck to her wet cheeks. Gabriel released her, a look of disgust on his face. ‘You would rather have his hate than my love.’

  She juddered, trying to catch her breath – out of words, out of explanations. She had spent ten years living a lie, covering the fatal cracks within her and trying to build a life on shifting sands. She gave a tiny nod.

  ‘Say it!’ he shouted.

  ‘Y–yes.’

  Silence fell like snow as he rose from the bed in disdain. Her lack of pride had gifted him his, at least. ‘Then we are done here.’ His voice was quiet. Final. ‘There is nothing I can do. You are determined to suffer because it is all you know. You will never be happy.’

  ‘Gabr—’

  A familiar sound – so familiar – outside startled them both and they turned to look towards the open windows.

  No! Her heart pounding against her ribs, Clem threw the bedcovers off and ran to the nearest one, looking back up the path towards the garden gate.

  Tom turned back, looking up to face her at the window, his eyes red-rimmed, his face full of sorrow as he pressed his palms to his temples. By his feet was a posy of flowers from Chiara’s garden, and a football bouncing slowly down the path – the calling cards of a broken family who’d come in thanks. And left in tears.

  PORTOBELLO

  Chapter Forty-Three

  ‘You’re a mum.’

  Stella’s voice was as weak as Clem’s colour and Clem couldn’t meet her eyes. She hadn’t met anyone’s for nine hours now – not since Tom’s had joined hers in despair as Chiara, Rafa and Luca’s door had remained defiantly shut to them both. She hadn’t closed them, either. Sleep wouldn’t come, and she’d spent the entire flight home staring at the haunting image of Luca coming down the aisle, her handsome, nervous little boy looking over to her – for the first time in both their lives – for encouragement. Her tears were constant, merely coming at variable speeds, and Tom squeezed her hand as a fresh batch splashed onto the rough, wooden, slightly sticky table.

  It was lunchtime and Charlie’s Café was rammed – Clem hadn’t been able to face going straight home – although Stella, in her excitement, had arrived early and bagged the last table. A converted, whitewashed chapel with the original church chairs and a sunny courtyard outside, it was the perfect back-to-Blighty hangout, with colourful pictures of Portobello hanging on the walls and high tea behind the counters. On the table, a large teapot, three flapjacks and several bags of ready-salted crisps – ‘welcome home’ presents – lay untouched between them all, and even Stella wasn’t eyeing them up. One look at Clem and the story Tom had told swiped her appetite clean away

  ‘A mum,’ Stella echoed in utter disbelief, as though she’d been told Clem was an alien and had come to obliterate planet earth.

  ‘Yes, I’m a . . . I’m a . . .’ Her voice, even to her own ears, sounded strange and disconnected, and she could feel Stella’s and Tom’s stares joining up, like a cat’s cradle, weaving them tightly together with mutual concern.

  ‘You poor, poor darling,’ Stella whispered desperately, batting Tom’s hand off Clem’s and replacing it with her own. It was warmer, Tom’s cool with his own shock. Forced to choose, Chiara had chosen Luca over him. ‘Why don’t you try calling Rafa? He’s probably had a bit of time to . . . you know, calm down. Take stock.’

  ‘What? Of the fact that the boy he loves like a son really is his son?’ Clem said sarcastically. ‘I think it might take more than a day to absorb that one.’

  Stella winced.

  ‘Anyway if you knew how much he hated me before all this even came out . . .’ Clem’s voice trailed away again.

  ‘You’re always saying how much he hates you—’

  ‘That’s because he does! I’m not imagining it, Stell. I’m not being sensitive. He treated me with contempt at every encounter. He didn’t smile at me – not once – during the entire bloody summer.’ It was true. Even as she’d clung to him, and he to her, their bodies intertwined as one, he hadn’t let go of the anger, resentful of the hold she still had over him after all these years. And even if it had meant to him what it had to her, it was irrelevant now. It wouldn’t have survived this.

  ‘But why should he hate you so much?’

  ‘Pride? I never told him why we broke up.’ She shrugged. ‘I just stopped writing.’

  Stella looked dubious. ‘That’s a pretty long time to hold a grudge for what was effectively just a fling.’

  Clem shook her head. ‘It was way more than that. We had made plans. He was going to transfer his art degree from Florence to the Ruskin. We wanted to be together. Properly.’ Her voice tremored. Didn’t they see? It was supposed to have been for ever. ‘But then I found out I was pregnant and . . .’ She shrugged. ‘Everything changed. I confided in Mum. We’d always shared everything and I knew she’d know what to do.’ Her voice became tiny. ‘I couldn’t believe it when she gave me an ultimatum.’

  ‘Ultimatum?’ Stella echoed.

  Clem looked up at her. ‘Have an abortion or get out,’ she replied fatly.

  Stella and Tom were silent.

  ‘Why didn’t you tell Rafa? Surely he would have w— ’

  ‘What? Wanted to give up his studies, his home, his future – to scrape together a living supporting us? He was nineteen! He wasn’t any more ready for a baby than I was. He would have thought I’d tricked him or trapped him . . .’ She threw her hands in the air despondently. ‘It would only have messed up both our lives.’

  ‘So you just pretended to have the abortion?’ Stella asked, the horror on her face the same as it had been on Gabriel and Tom’s. ‘You went through all that alone?’

  Clem slumped over the table, her forehead only inches from it as she tried to breathe through the wave of agony that broke over her again without warning.
Tom’s and Stella’s hands both reached out, as though trying to hold her up or pull her back, but she didn’t notice their efforts. Breathing hurt. Moving hurt. Thinking hurt – living without Luca – hurt.

  Her blood ran cold again as she wondered what Chiara was telling him about her. How was she recounting to him the story of how his mother had got on a plane and left for home without him? In her dreams and daydreams over the intervening years, when she had fantasized about Luca being told about his English mother, and their subsequent reunion, she had known that Chiara would be her ally – articulating Clem’s distress and anguish, how she’d not left his side even for a moment in the few days they’d had together, how she’d crammed a lifetime of love into those mere hours . . . But that was before Chiara had found out that the man she’d loved for so many years was Luca’s father. It wasn’t only Luca and Rafa who’d been deceived by Clem, but Chiara herself too. So what was she telling him now?

  ‘You’ve got to stop blaming yourself, Clem,’ Tom said quietly. ‘You were eighteen.’

  ‘Plenty of girls are good mothers at eighteen,’ she replied flatly. It was no excuse.

  ‘Yes, but you weren’t given that opportunity. Our mother made sure you had no chance of bringing up that baby alone.’ A foreign note of bitterness soured his words and Clem looked up at him. ‘Just when you needed her most, she threatened to withdraw everything: love, security, your family, a home.’ He shook his head. ‘If anyone’s to blame for all this, it’s her.’

  Clem frowned. She had never once heard Tom utter a word against their mother before. Not once.

  ‘No wonder you hated her,’ Stella said quietly.

  Clem looked ahead at her best friend, her head spinning from the sudden change in direction of the blame game. ‘I . . . I didn’t hate her.’

  ‘No?’ Tom cocked an eyebrow disbelievingly. ‘Well, you bloody well should have hated her. I would have done.’ He stared back at her angrily. ‘In fact, I’m glad you threw everything back in her face, including that fucking bag.’ He shook his head as context gave Clem’s actions a new meaning. ‘She only gave it to you to salve her conscience, to buy your forgiveness for what she made you do. She’s got no fucking idea of the devastation she’s wreaked. I’m amazed you were as civi—’ He stopped speaking abruptly, and both girls looked at him. ‘Hang on a minute! If she thinks you had the abortion then . . . she doesn’t know she’s a grandmother.’ Tom’s voice was quiet, menacing. Clem watched his hand ball into a fist. ‘She needs to know what she’s done.’