Page 49 of The Love of Our Lives
‘Nine months in my belly and eighteen years under my roof,’ she says, ‘and you treat me like a stranger, if I can even call it that,’ she says.
Heat reaches up my neck, as she moves about like a wasp trapped in a bottle, picking at the blankets on the sofas, and glancing at my still-technicolour wall. And all the while, I stand at the side, uncertain what to say, what to do.
Shit, how long did I actually think I could hold off a mother for? What have I been playing at? Just ignoring Emily’s old life like this. I don’t know exactly what happened between Emily and her mum, but perhaps I should have taken the bloody time to find out.
Emily’s mum finally takes a seat on the sofa, perches there like it’s deeply uncomfortable.
‘Would you like a tea?’ I try, my heart thudding.
‘That’s obviously not what I’m here for,’ she says slightly softer now.
‘Then what are you here for?’ I falter.
Her eyes widen, something like real anguish in them now. ‘How could you just drop your responsibilities like that, Emily? How could you quit your job like that? And that wonderful man?’
She starts shaking her head and I find myself unable to speak.
‘This whole life you’re living up here is a dream, Emily,’ she says, standing up again. ‘A child’s fantasy. You’ve always lived ina wonderland, and right now, you’re risking all of it, everything we’ve worked so hard for.’
Something sparks in my stomach at her words.
Because she’s right. These past six monthshavefelt like a dream to me, a fantasy. I have lived more in the past six months as Emily than I did for my whole life as Maggie. I have felt more joy and experienced more excitement than I ever dreamed possible.
And I won’t let anyone take it away from me.
Emily’s mum spies something on the mantelpiece, walks towards it. She picks up a selfie I put up of Adam and me at the Christmas markets – we’re on the Ferris wheel, clearly freezing, but we’re both grinning away madly, our faces right up against each other. She just stares at it for a long moment, before turning it around to me.
‘And who is this?’ she says, holding it out to me with both hands, as though I didn’t take the photo myself, as though I haven’t stared at it in wonder a hundred times already.
‘That’s Adam,’ I say, steadier now and take the photo from her. ‘The man I’m seeing.’
Emily’s mum looks at me, lost. ‘We’ve just worked too hard for this, Emily. We had a plan. Think of all the schooling, all that work at university and to get that promotion,’ she implores. ‘I poured my life into your father’s business so that you could have every opportunity I never had, and now you’re throwing it all away for some photography hobby and some man who looks like a nobody to me.’
The words cut.
How can she say that about someone so kind and wonderful and vibrant? He’s the most alive person I’ve ever known, after Cat. And suddenly, that spark in my stomach turns into a flame.
‘Don’t you dare say that about him.’
‘And why shouldn’t I?’ Emily’s mum says, clearly frustrated too. ‘Why should I let you destroy your life like this?’
‘I’m not destroying it,’ I say steadily.
I look around myself, at the shabby living room, which is popping with colour and life. I look at the picture of Adam in my hands.
‘I’m finally living it,’ I say then, as though a dam from somewhere else has been opened; as though someone else’s words are passing my lips. ‘I’ve spent my whole life trying to live the life that you wanted me to have, I forgot how to live the life thatIwanted to have. But if I don’t go out and give it a proper shot now, then I might as well be dead already.’
Emily’s mum walks towards me until she’s standing right in front of me.
‘Come back with me now, Emily,’ she pleads.
My heart is beating so very fast, and I don’t know what is happening right now, but it’s like I’m here, and also not, as though I have the thoughts in my mind, but someone else’s too.
This is the life I was always supposed to have,they’re saying.
This is the life I always dreamed of.
‘I won’t leave,’ I find myself saying, ‘I won’t be scared anymore.’
