Page 107 of Forever, Maybe
Her handbag, a neon pink mock designer tote with oversized, interlocking CCs, sat by her feet. She leaned forward and pulled out the printouts she’d stashed there earlier—the ones she couldn’t stop rereading.
People didn’t always go by their given names. That’s what the probate researchers had said on the TV show she’d watched. It was a passing comment, but it stuck. Eleanor Stephenson had been a dead end—every search led to a brick wall. But when she tried Nell Stephenson, after first exhausting Ellie Stephenson (apparently an annoyingly common name), she found something. She foundher.
It had happened almost by accident. The article was buried deep in the Google results, a relic from over a decade ago, but there it was—a news piece about an art exhibition at a Glaswegian gallery. The accompanying photo showed three artists standing proudly with the owner, all beaming at the camera.
According to the article, Nell Stephenson was one of the featured artists, specialising in charcoal landscapes of urban settings inspired by Scotland’s largest city. It also mentioned she was married to a local entrepreneur, Daniel Murray, who ran a chain of sandwich shops and food vans.
Chrissie had double-checked the date of the article, amazed by how young Nell looked. But with the new name—Nell Murray—this time, she’d been able to track her down on Instagram. She followed her using the account she’d set up for the cake business, the one conspicuously free of Mikey’s suggestion to post him eating the giant Jaffa cake she’d made “for marketing purposes.”
Nell didn’t post often, but her feed offered glimpses into her life—her husband, her friends, her job. There were no photos of children, but Chrissie knew some people preferred to keep their kids off social media.
She swallowed hard, the words pressing against her throat. Finally, she said it. “Mikey, I found your mum.”
There. It was out now.
Mikey turned his head slowly, his expression clouded with confusion, not anger or shock. “What?”
Chrissie stretched over and placed the stack of papers on Mikey’s chest—the original news article and a few recent Instagram photos she’d printed out. Nell didn’t look much like him, but there was a faint resemblance if you stared long enough. She explained how she’d found the woman, her voice wobbling slightly as Mikey lay motionless, making no move to touch the papers.
When he rolled onto his side to sit up, the stack slid to the floor in a fluttering heap.
“Why did you look for her?” he asked, his jaw tight, irritation bleeding into his tone.
“Because I thought you’d be interested, and that you would—” She hesitated, faltering under his sharp gaze.
He held up a hand, cutting her off. “If I was interested, I’d have done it myself.”
Fair point. She opened her mouth to respond but thought better of it. Instead, she tried a different tack. “But Luce says—”
“Luce?” His voice rose alarmingly. “You’ve talked to Luce about this?”
“Not about your mum specifically,” she said quickly. “Just… adopted kids finding their biological parents in general. You know, for closure. Knowing where you came from and—”
Mikey groaned, burying his head in his hands. “Spare me Luce’s self-help claptrap. She knows fuck all about me.”
Woah. Mikey did not swear. Neither of them did out loud. Their parents’ habit of swapping out rude words was ingrained in him, and like her he loved the inventiveness of coming up with silly alternatives.
“Did you tell Pops about this?” he asked, the tension in the room easing slightly when she stated emphatically that he knew nothing about what she’d been up to.
The doorbell rang, and she sprang up to answer it. The transaction took longer than expected, since the delivery guy had to scrabble around for change. By the time she returned to the living room, three flat boxes warming her palms, Mikey had disappeared.
He jogged down the stairs a few minutes later, a rucksack slung over one shoulder.
“What are you doing?”
“Obvious, innit? I’m off to Jaden’s. You shouldn’t have looked for that woman, Chrissie. I’mnotinterested. I never have been.”
The last sentence wasn’t true but contradicting him would only add fuel to the flames. “What about the pizza?” she asked. Perhaps Mikey’s legendary appetite would persuade him against walking out. The wretched order had cost a fortune.
“Youeat it.”
He slammed the door on the way out, the sound rattling through the house.
Great. She'd have to explain his absence to Dad later, and he’d be cross as well. And the ruddy meat feat pizza was siren-signalling her name,Eat me, you know you want to…One woman couldn’t possibly eat an entire two pizzas and doughballs in one sitting, could they?
Regrettably, the answer was a resounding ‘oh yes she can!’. Later, as she shoved the empty boxes into the recycling bin out the back of the house, along with the paper print-outs Mikey had refused to look out, Chrissie rubbed her by-now uncomfortably swollen stomach.
Was Mikey ever going to forgive her?
