Mother's Day: A completely addictive psychological thriller from T J Emerson for 2024

1

THEN

Friday 15 September, Royal Edinburgh Hospital

What would she say if she were with me? I imagine it sometimes – the two of us together. A reckless delusion, but I can’t help myself. My image of her is never a clear one. How could it be? Sometimes she has my dark hair and brown eyes; sometimes she is a stranger.

In this fantasy, we are sitting together at a kitchen table. The heart of any home. In this fantasy, she is calm and willing to listen. I try to explain why I did what I did to her. I describe the circumstances, give her my reasons.

After a while, she holds up her hand. Her reproachful silence is a demand for truth. No more excuses.

I confess. I tell her that I had to survive. I say that in the end it was either her or me.

I chose me.

2

GRACE

September, twenty years later

I am abandoning her. Leaving her to the care of strangers. Leaving her here in this tiny room, the last space she will ever inhabit.

I have no choice. I have no choice and this is the best place for her. These are the facts, but the facts don’t stop me feeling guilty.

She is sitting upright in the narrow single bed, held captive by the television fixed to the wall opposite. News 24 is on mute, white headlines tacking along the screen as soldiers in green uniforms dodge the smoking entrails of burnt-out cars.

‘You’ve got a perfect view of the TV there,’ I say.

She glances at me, bewildered.

‘We’re at Birch Grove Care Home,’ I explain. ‘You moved here from the hospital this morning.’

‘I know, Grace. I know where I am.’ Her wavering voice suggests otherwise. The effort of birthing the words leaves her wheezing, her tired lungs struggling to do what she once took for granted.

This woman is my mother, but sometimes I hardly recognise her. She no longer looks like an older version of herself; she just looks old. White wispy curls have replaced her black hair. Withered breasts hang defeated beneath her yellow nightgown. Only her dark brown eyes have remained unchanged. We still have those in common.

‘I hope you like what I’ve done with the room,’ I say. ‘I wanted it to feel homely.’ Mum’s gaze doesn’t budge from the screen. ‘It’s very cosy in here,’ I add.

The ground-floor room is stifling. An overheated pharaoh’s tomb, a stopgap between worlds, crammed with treasured possessions – family photographs, a collection of Neil Diamond CDs, a wooden crucifix hanging above the bed.

I rearrange the framed photographs on the sideboard. Mum and Dad’s wedding portrait, my graduation picture, an assortment of holiday snaps of the three of us. I can barely recognise myself in my graduation picture. My face was much fuller then, and my hair reached down to my waist. A year later, I had it shorn into a pixie cut, a style I have kept ever since.

‘Why aren’t you at school?’ Mum says. Is she in the present, asking why I’m not teaching, or does she think I’m a child again? She keeps travelling in time, random leaps that make me anxious. No telling where she might end up.

The TV claims her. I cross to the window and press my palms against the cool glass. Outside, the sky is a grey lid, sealed shut. Not long until the last of the evening light disappears. What time should I leave? A fast train from Brentham station will get me into London in half an hour. All I want to do is get back to the flat, pour myself a glass of red wine and drink it while soaking in a hot bath. All I want to do is climb into bed beside Mum, wrap her arms around me and beg her to never let me go.

Half an hour later, I’m sitting in the green armchair beside the bed. My head is muzzy, my legs leaden – Mum’s energy taking hold of me. The room is slipping into darkness, but I cannot motivate myself to reach over and switch on the bedside lamp. Bored and petulant, I feel thirteen not forty-two, but the time for such childishness has passed. Mum is my responsibility now; I’ve signed legal documents that say so.

I twist the silver puzzle ring on my right ring finger back and forth. An old habit. ‘They’ve got loads of activities here, Mum,’ I say, ‘plenty for you to get involved in.’

‘Don’t think so, dear,’ she replies, the dim light of the TV flickering across her face. She isn’t stupid. She knows as well as I do that she has come here to die, and that it won’t be long. A severe chest infection could finish her. The consultant at the hospital told me she probably wouldn’t last the winter.

Screams erupt in the corridor, high-pitched and piercing. Panic flares beneath my ribcage. Outside the door, a few members of staff arrive and pacify the offending resident. There, there, Mrs Palethorpe, let’s get you back to your room. My pulse thrums in my ears. I wait for it to settle before standing up and leaning over the bed. ‘Bye for now.’ Mum’s cheek is warm against my lips. ‘See you soon.’ A rap on the door.

‘Come in,’ I say, as it swings open. The slight figure of a girl hovers in the corridor, her pale face luminous in the gloom. For a split second, I wonder if she is even real.

‘Hiya, Mrs Walker.’ The girl steps into the room and flicks on the overhead light, flooding us with brightness and life. ‘I’m Emma. One of the care assistants here.’

Emma’s dark, cropped hair frames a friendly, heart-shaped face. She wears a short-sleeved lilac tunic over black leggings. Lilac slouch socks spill over the top of her white trainers. Behind her in the corridor stands a trolley laden with large steel flasks and cartons of fruit juice. ‘Lovely to meet you,’ she says, pushing her fringe to one side.

‘You too,’ I reply, but she is looking at Mum.

‘Anything to drink, Mrs Walker?’ she asks.

Mum ignores her.

‘Sorry,’ I say. I can’t help apologising for Mum. I want people to know she wasn’t always this rude. That manners once mattered to her.

Emma smiles. ‘That’s all right. It’s been a long day, hasn’t it, Mrs Walker?’

‘Please, call her Polly,’ I say, ‘and I’m Grace.’ Emma asks me what Mum likes to drink, and I advise strong tea with half a sugar. ‘She’s fussy about her tea, I’m afraid.’

‘She’s allowed to be fussy, aren’t you, sweetheart?’ Emma has the local Essex accent, the one my parents never let me acquire, even though my dad spoke with it. Her high, girlish voice suggests she isn’t long out of school. Hard to say how old she is.

‘So, Polly,’ Emma says, ‘strong tea with half a sugar?’

Mum remains silent. A protest perhaps at how small her world has become. A world in which the topic of tea can sustain a lengthy conversation.

‘What about you, Grace?’ Emma asks. ‘Bet you could do with a drink?’

Her concerned tone undoes me. My throat is hot and tight, an omen of tears to come. Emma must sense them too because she pulls a tissue from her tunic pocket and hands it to me. I shove it in the back pocket of my jeans, determined not to need it.

‘Moving day is well tough for the relatives,’ she says, ‘but remember you can come and see her as much as you like.’

‘I’ll only be coming on Saturdays for a while.’ Why am I telling this to a stranger? ‘The past few months… There’s been all the hospital visits and social services to deal with, and I recently started a new job so⁠—’

‘You need a break, course you do. That’s why I’m here, isn’t it, Polly?’

Mum tears her gaze from the TV and looks at Emma for the first time. She watches as the girl hurries out to the tea trolley and returns with a white beaker.

‘Let’s try you without a straw first,’ Emma says.

She places the beaker on the bedside table and rearranges Mum’s sitting position. She is stronger than her petite frame suggests and has no trouble easing Mum forward as she rearranges the pillows. ‘Right,’ she says, picking up the beaker, ‘let’s see if my tea is up to your standards.’

Mum’s expression is curious, thoughtful. ‘Call me Grandma,’ she says.

My stomach knots. Emma freezes, the beaker clutched in her hand. Poor girl looks lost for words, but just as I’m about to speak she giggles.

‘I’m sure you’d be an awesome gran, but I’m going to call you Polly. Shame not to use such a lovely name.’

‘Grandma.’ Mum’s face darkens.

‘Mum, this is Emma.’ My harsh delivery startles me. Mum, full of fury, jabs a finger in my direction.

‘No,’ she says. ‘No.’

‘How about a drink?’ Emma says, but Mum’s hand shoots out and knocks the beaker away. Tea cascades down the front of Emma’s tunic. She gasps as Mum forms a fist and drives it against her chest.

‘Mum. Stop it.’ I step forward just as Emma backs away from the bed and stumbles over the chair. I catch her as she falls, her body light in my arms. ‘I’m so sorry,’ I say, helping her upright. ‘Are you okay?’

‘I’m fine.’

I keep hold of her arm, even though she is out of danger now. Her wide brown eyes gaze up at me. I sense a pull deep inside, a fish hook tugging at my guts. Without thinking, I reach out and brush her fringe away from her forehead.

‘Sorry,’ Mum gasps, ‘I’m sorry.’

Emma breaks away from me and rushes over to the bed. ‘It’s all right, darlin’. I know, I know.’

‘She didn’t mean it,’ I say. ‘She’d never hurt anyone. Not physically.’

‘It’s not your fault, Polly,’ Emma says. ‘You’ve had a difficult day.’

Mum emits a pitiful sob, and I struggle to hold back my own tears.

‘This is so hard,’ I say.

‘Bless your hearts,’ Emma murmurs. ‘The two of you must be very close?’

I hesitate, wondering if Mum might speak, but she is lost in her loud, ruinous tears.

‘Yes,’ I say, ‘we are.’

We were close, many years ago, so this is not a total lie.

3

CASSIE

July

There she was. My mother. Sitting in the café at the heart of the Museum of Childhood in Bethnal Green. I’d found her. So many years apart, and finally there we were. Cassie Harrington and her mother, about to have lunch together. I could hardly believe it. She couldn’t have chosen a more fitting place for us to visit. My second favourite tourist attraction in the whole of London.

She looked so out of place. A child-free woman, surrounded by tables packed with parents and their manic offspring. She glanced around her, seeming so lost and uncomfortable I almost felt sorry for her.

I’d hoped we might enjoy our lunch alone, but shortly after my mother arrived, her friend turned up. From the way they hugged and the frenzied tone of their greetings I could tell they hadn’t seen each other for some time. I stayed in position at the table behind hers, sipping my Earl Grey tea, observing my mother as she chose her lunch at the café counter and carried it back to the table on a tray, unaware of me watching her.

The museum throbbed with the shrieking, squealing and laughter of the hyped-up children bouncing around it. The iron-frame structure soaring overhead kept the noise trapped beneath it. The two floors of galleries that rose up either side of us were packed. Visitors leaned on the railings, gazing down at us in the open-plan space below. Hordes of primary school kids waving worksheets pelted round the outskirts of the café before veering off to explore the glass display cabinets on the first floor. Every Saturday for the past nine weeks, I’d trailed the exhibits there, marvelling at the toys and games of the past as well as those of my own era. Imagining the other childhoods I might have had and the mother I might have spent them with.

The general din smothered most of the conversation at my mother’s table, but I picked up the odd exchange. Her friend – a Californian woman called Zoe dressed in flowery yoga pants – explained that the museum was just round the corner from her brother’s flat so she thought it would be an easy place to meet.

‘It’s fine,’ my mother said. ‘The food’s pretty good.’

I pointed my phone in my mother’s direction and took what I knew would be the first of many pictures. She looked good for her age. Tall, quite slim. Hadn’t let herself go. I couldn’t help making comparisons between us. She had short, dark hair, while mine fell in thick blonde waves past my shoulders. I felt betrayed by my bright blue eyes but reasoned that lots of daughters have different-coloured eyes than their mothers.

My mother and Zoe reminisced about Singapore. Sounded like they’d lived there at the same time.

‘Honestly, Grace,’ Zoe said, ‘we haven’t had half as much fun since you left.’

Grace. Such a beautiful name.

A man and a small, blond-haired boy occupied the table to my mother’s left. The child, happy and boisterous, clapped his hands together and began to chant at full volume.

‘Alfie the bear,’ he said, ‘Alfie the bear. Alfie, Alfie, Alfie the bear.’

The chanting continued. The boy’s father, eyes fixed on his phone, made no attempt to quieten his son, an error that earned him black looks from my mother and her friend.

‘This is my idea of hell,’ my mother said in a stage whisper, and they both laughed.

I’d always wondered how she’d act around kids, and now I knew. Her flippant comment hurt me, and I began to wonder why I’d bothered. Why did I want to be with her anyway, after what she’d done to me?

The boy stood up on his chair. ‘Alfie the bear,’ he yelled, ‘Alfie the bear.’ His father looked up from his mobile and gave him a half-hearted order to sit down. ‘Alfie,’ the boy continued, ‘Alfie, Alfie, Alfie the⁠—’

His chair tipped backwards, sending him flying. His father reached out, but my mother got there first, catching the boy as he fell. I smiled, thrilled and relieved at this demonstration of her maternal instinct.

After my mother had lowered the boy to the ground and the father had stopped thanking her, she sat down again and rolled her eyes at Zoe. They continued the conversation as if nothing had happened, but I could tell the incident had unnerved her. She didn’t finish her lunch, and she kept checking her watch when Zoe wasn’t looking.

When they stood up and strolled towards the museum entrance, I joined them, pleased to overhear that Zoe’s visit to the UK was only a flying one. As they said their goodbyes, my mother assured her friend they would see each other soon.

‘Absolutely,’ Zoe agreed. She walked away, stopping once to wave before she disappeared from our sight. My mother turned to go in the opposite direction and then hesitated. She glanced back at the museum entrance, and I could see how much she wanted to explore the place. How it had cast its spell on her.

Giving in to herself, she dashed inside. I waited, not wanting to follow too close. When I did enter the main building, she came storming towards me in a hurry, her face tight and angry. As if she couldn’t cope with what the museum and its contents must have reminded her of. As if she had to get out of there as soon as she could.

Our first day out together didn’t end there. After leaving the museum, we took the Tube from Bethnal Green. Two line changes later, we exited the Underground at Angel and turned left. At the end of Upper Street, we turned left again onto City Road. Unfamiliar with the area, I took pictures of the street signs for future reference.

We crossed over to Goswell Road and kept going, the traffic relentless at our side. She set a fast pace in her trainers, and I struggled to keep up in my wedge sandals. Trust me to have a mother who’d rather walk than catch the bus.

The late afternoon sun still had a sting, and before long my pink shift dress was sticking to my back and stomach. My mother marched on ahead, unruffled in grey linen trousers and a white T-shirt, her arms swinging at her sides.

We turned left into Lever Street and a few minutes later took another left towards a block of high-rise flats. After passing an Astroturf pitch surrounded by a wire fence, my mother headed for the front entrance of the grubby white block. Northfield Heights. I waited by a row of recycling bins while she entered a code into a keypad by the front door.

As soon as she disappeared inside, I hurried over to the area of patchy grass and trees in front of her block – the optimistically named North Green Park. I spotted a metal bench partly hidden by a droopy oak and got myself settled. To my right and left stood four-storey blocks of flats. Satellite dishes clung to their balconies, fighting for space with dead plants and racks of washing. Hardly the nicest of areas and not where I’d pictured my mother residing.

My eyes scanned her building, looking for a sign. Where was she? My body shook and a wave of nausea rolled through me. Fear or excitement? I was twenty years old, but felt reborn. As though my life had just begun.

A light flicked on and off again in one of the upper windows of the building. I counted upwards to the ninth floor. My mother? The usual emptiness hovered at my edges. I wrapped my arms around myself and tried to hug it away.

Then she appeared at the window.

I spy with my little eye. Something beginning with G.

I decided then and there to buy some binoculars. My mother stared out of the window for some time, off into the distance. She probably thought she was looking at the view, but I knew better. She was searching for something. She was searching for me.

4

GRACE

September

Where the hell is my front door key? It jangles as I search my handbag but won’t give itself up.

‘Oh, come on.’ After a long day of teaching – two intermediate classes and one beginners – I’m desperate to get into the flat and unwind. My fingers locate the jagged outline of the key, which has slipped through a tear in the handbag’s lining and now lies trapped behind the silky fabric. This keeps happening, but I never get round to repairing the offending hole. Removing the key will entail taking everything out of the bag.

I give up and turn to the potted rubber plant next to the front door. Hidden in the grey stones at the base of the plant is my key safe, a fake stone in a slightly darker grey than the rest. I take it out, open the compartment on the stone’s flat base and remove the spare key hidden there for emergencies. With my track record, I make regular use of it.

The front door only opens halfway, hindered by the morning’s post. Crouching down, I gather up the envelopes and takeaway leaflets, holding them against my chest as I traipse along the hallway, finally depositing them next to the tall vase of lilies on the breakfast bar that separates the narrow kitchen from the living room.

Dumping my leather jacket, backpack and handbag on the floor, I turn the living room radiator on to banish the early autumn chill. God knows how cold this place will be when winter kicks in. The gas boiler that powers the heating and water is ancient and fickle, but I tolerate it because the ex-council property is cheap and, as I keep reminding myself, temporary. After the short walk to Islington High Street, it’s only another thirty minutes down Pentonville Road to the Capital School of English. Plenty of buses to catch en route if the weather’s bad. The flat came furnished too. Handy, as I moved in with only a suitcase and rucksack. Two small boxes of books have arrived from Singapore since then but I’ve yet to open them.

I fetch a glass of water from the kitchen and sip it while sorting through the post – money requests from Oxfam and Greenpeace and a letter redirected from Mum’s old address, enquiring if Mrs Polly Walker would like to renew her subscription to Baking World magazine.

My chest aches. No, she will not be renewing the subscription. Mrs Polly Walker is still alive, but Mrs Polly Walker’s life is over. No more browsing through recipes for cupcakes and fruit tea loaf. No more baking the perfect Victoria sponge. I drop the letter onto the breakfast bar, resolving to deal with it later. Sometimes the more trivial demands of acting as Mum’s power of attorney are the most upsetting. Right now I’d give anything for a brother or sister to talk to. Someone to call and share tearful laughter with about Baking World magazine. We could reminisce about Mum’s culinary skills – safe territory. Yes, we would say, she was difficult sometimes, but her Victoria sponge was a winner.

There is no one to call. The memories of my mother, good and bad, are mine alone. Morbid questions creep up on me. Who will sort through my post when I die? Who will tie up my loose ends?

The sound of chirping crickets fills the room. Abandoning the post, I kneel down and rummage through my handbag for my mobile. My hands tremble as I pull it out. Always that flood of nerves, always the possibility of answering the phone to someone from Birch Grove and hearing that Mum’s weary body has finally surrendered. The call both feared and hoped for.

My phone displays an unfamiliar number. ‘Hello?’ I say.

‘It’s me.’

I let a few seconds pass before saying, ‘John?’ As if I didn’t recognise his voice straight away. ‘You shouldn’t be calling me.’

‘You shouldn’t have given me your number then.’

‘No, I shouldn’t have.’

In the pause that follows, I recall his hot breath in my ear.

His hoarse voice whispering my name.

‘Guess where I’m calling from?’ he asks. I guess but don’t reply. ‘My car,’ he says.

The two of us squashed onto the back seat of his VW Golf, a jumble of limbs and half-discarded clothing, laughing at the windows steaming up around us.

‘Look,’ I say, ‘that was fun⁠—’

‘It’s not just that.’ He is quiet now, sincere. ‘I enjoyed talking to you.’

‘I enjoyed talking to you, but that’s not the point.’ Or maybe it is. Maybe it wouldn’t hurt to stay on the phone and talk to him again. Last night I spoke to a woman from an Indian call centre for ten minutes, just to pass the time. The woman’s voice was warm and comforting, and to listen to it for longer I answered her marketing survey questions – I don’t own a car, I use a MacBook Air, my mobile provider is Vodafone.

‘You understand what I’m going through,’ John says.

I sigh. ‘Please don’t call me again.’

‘I’ll see you soon though. We can hardly avoid each other.’

‘Goodbye, John.’

I hang up and pour a glass of Merlot. The bottle is half empty, which is odd, as I rarely drink during the week. I thought I’d only had one glass out of it at the weekend but must have drunk more. Opening the door next to the kitchen sink, I step out onto the narrow balcony. A raw gust of wind attacks. I turn my face to it, take a sip of wine. Too weary to analyse my conversation with John, I decide that what happened between us was just a one-off. A mistake best forgotten.

I try to lose myself in the view. Tower blocks with golden windows and cranes studded with blinking lights litter the North London skyline. In the distance, illuminated, the dome of St Paul’s. Stunning. Not quite as dramatic as the outlook from the twenty-first-storey flat I rented in Singapore, but at least I’m still high up. Out of reach.

I miss my old life. Humid evenings in Chinatown with the other teachers from the English Language Institute, washing down dim sum and chilli crab with bottles of Tiger Beer. Weekend trips to Malaysian islands and longer holidays exploring the parts of South East Asia I hadn’t already visited or lived in. Hard to believe I’ve been back in the UK for five months. Five months