Firstly I just want to say thank you for the reviews, they are greatly appreciated. Secondly, although I know I should not use my story as a personal messageboard, I just wanted to ask whether anyone else uses the YTDAW forums and if so whether it is just me who is unable to access them right now? I'm just trying to establish whether it is my computer or a more general problem. Anyone who could shed some light on this would be of great help. Thanks.
Anyway, enjoy act five...
Em xxx
All the world's a stage,
And the men and women merely players:
They have their exists and their entrances;
And one man in his time plays many parts,
Its acts being seven stages…
Act Five
The curtains draw on a peaceful scene. A new mother, cheeks glowing, lies in a hospital bed. In her arms, a swaddling baby sleeps serenely. There is something familiar about this picture. This time the woman's hair is not quite as thick and it hangs slightly lank. There is no light cast through the curtains; it is the early hours of the morning. But the tired woman and the baby are equally as beautiful as the first time round.
The man who enters is also familiar, but he is not the same one who appeared at his wife's bedside nearly forty years ago; that man's life ended long ago, long before the life of this baby began. This man has a beard, a subtly happy smile and loving eyes, particularly as he gazes upon his wife and daughter.
"How are you feeling?" he asks.
"Exhausted," she replies. "But I wouldn't trade this feeling for the world."
He moves over to the bed and sits down beside her. Gently he takes the sleeping baby from her arms and welcomes his daughter into the world.
"I was thinking of Jennifer," the woman says.
"I like it," her husband replies, smiling down at the child.
And so Jennifer Grissom-Sidle begins her life.
IIII
Happy Birthday to you,
Happy Birthday to you,
Happy Birthday dear Jenny,
Happy Birthday to you.
Sara helps her one year old daughter extinguish the candles on her absurdly large cake. She knows that all this fuss is her attempt to replace the less happy memories of her own childhood but she cannot help the extravagant celebration. She is surrounded by balloons, banners, cakes, biscuits, sandwiches. The ideal children's birthday party, although the only guests are Sara, Gil and Jenny.
"Shall I take you upstairs?" Gil asks rhetorically as he scoops his little girl up from the ground. She starts to cry.
"Leave her," Sara says, reaching out for her daughter, but Gil heads towards the door.
"She's tired, Sara."
"It's her birthday."
"And she's only one."
"I wanted it to be special," Sara replies, sounding angry.
"And it was."
"But now it's over?"
"It's way past her bedtime."
"Fine." Sara turns away and picks up the cake. "I'll just go and throw this away then."
"Don't be stupid, Sara."
"Oh, I'm stupid now, am I?" She marches into the kitchen and we hear the sound of a smashing plate. Hurriedly, Gil follows her. The squashed cake is in the sink, mingled with smashed crockery.
"Why did you want to do that, Sara?"
"You tell me. Maybe it's because I'm stupid."
"Please, Sara, don't do this. You're upsetting Jenny."
The little girl's crying gets louder and louder as she attempts to wriggle free of her father's grasp.
"Just put her to bed, will you, Gil!" Sara cries.
"I thought you wanted her to stay up?"
"It's a bit late now," Sara retorts. "Just take her upstairs."
Gil does as Sara says. When he comes back down, Sara has gone. She returns two hours later to find him asleep on the sofa. She cries herself to sleep that night. It seems that even with her best efforts, her upbringing cannot be buried. Just as her own birthdays ended in tears and broken crockery, so will those of her daughter.
Two hours later Sara, still awake, is pulled from her bed to attend to Jenny's crying. She does not stop for another two. By the time Sara goes back to bed it has gone midnight. What a way to end the day.
IIII
"Is she asleep?" Gil asks.
"Yes. So you better turn the television down." Gil does so. The scientific bug television show is not teaching him anything he does not know.
"Are you ok, Sara?"
It is two weeks since Jenny's first birthday. Sara has not spoken very much since and her hurt upsets her family. Jenny has not been sleeping well and neither has Gil.
"I'm fine."
"Don't lie to me Sara. I thought we were past this."
"Past what?"
"Putting up a front. We wasted so many years. Let's not waste any more."
"Am I a bad mother?"
"What?" Gil seems shocked.
"Am I a bad mother, Grissom?"
"Don't call me that."
"Why? I called you nothing else for years."
"And then it changed, along with our relationship. Let's not go backwards. We've got so much."
"You haven't answered my question."
"You're a wonderful mother, Sara. The best."
"How do you know?"
"What kind of question is that?"
"If you'd asked me whether my mother was a good mother when I was young, I would have answered yes."
"That's totally different."
"How?"
"You're not your mother."
"No. I'm her daughter. And Jenny is mine. Look what my mother did to me. What if I do that to our little girl?"
"What exactly did she do to you?"
"She killed my father!"
"Well, I presume you're not planning to kill me," Gil replies, trying to laugh.
"I'm serious, Gil."
"I know. So am I. You're a wonderful mother. And a wonderful wife."
Sara seems to give up. "I love you, Gil," she murmurs.
"I love you."
Lights will guide you home.
And ignite your bones.
And I will try to fix you.
IIII
"Mummy!"
A little girl crawls around on the floor. Her hair is blonde. This reassures Sara. She is not a mini version of her mother, as Sara was of hers. She is her own person, with her own personality, her own opportunities.
"Yes, honey."
"Bis-kwit."
"Biscuit, Jenny," Sara laughs. "No 'w'."
"Bis-kwit."
"No bis-kwit now."
Sara scoops up her daughter from the floor and spins her around in the air. The little girl giggles delightedly.
"I love you, Jennifer Grissom-Sidle," Sara sighs.
The reply is decisive.
"Bis-kwit."
IIII
"A spider bought a bicycle
And had it painted black
He started off along the road
with an earwig on his back
He sent the pedals round so fast
he travelled all the day
Then he took the earwig off
And put the bike away."
"I never heard of a spider on a bicycle, and I've been studying insects for a very long time," Gil laughs as he enters the room.
The little blonde girl has her head nestled delicately on her mother's chest, a hand clasped around the silky dark hair which hangs from her mother's head.
"Shh," Sara whispers, closing the poetry book. "Your science ruins the fun."
Gil sits himself down so that Sara herself can rest her head on his chest.
"My girls," he murmurs.
IIII
Birthdays are getting progressively better, Sara thinks. They have reached number five.
Twenty little girls and boys swarm around her feet as she carries in more food which is immediately grabbed by the little gannets. The noise is deafening. A smash is heard. Jenny is standing shamefacedly with a smashed plate at her feet, the biscuits on the floor already being picked up by hungry children.
"Sorry, Mummy," she chokes, her eyes filling up.
"Don't worry, sweetheart," Sara replies. "It doesn't matter."
The tears immediately dry up and Jenny returns to playing with her friends.
It takes Sara a full three hours to clear up the house after an hour of polite conversation with the parents of Jenny's friends. She smiles her way through it. Even though Gil manages to make putting Jenny to bed last an hour, whilst she is doing the vacuum cleaning, Sara does not get angry. She clears the plates, sorts through the piles of presents, scrubs at a juice stain on the carpet and smiles the whole time.
IIII
"Don't worry, honey," Sara murmurs down the phone. "Jenny's asleep upstairs. I'll enjoy the quality time. See you later." She hangs up.
Gil has moved himself to the dayshift but the job is still not quite nine to five. Sara expected to miss her work more, but she unofficially occupies herself with Gil's cases and she tries to see her ex-colleagues as frequently as possible.
She pours herself a glass of wine and reaches for the television remote control. As she does so, the doorbell rings. She wonders who could be visiting at this time of night and it is with wariness that she slides the door open.
"Sara?" asks a woman on the doorstep. She appears to be in her sixties but her face is pale and drawn. Her hair is thin and grey and looks in need of a cut; it hangs limply way below her shoulders. Sara peers at her.
"I'm sorry- I- " she begins before something dawns on her. "Mum?" she gasps.
"Sara," the woman repeats, just before they both break down in tears.
IIII
A month later and the scene is clinical. We are not in a hospital, but some kind of care home; sterile and smelling of disinfectant. In a white washed room, some pink tulips hopelessly try to brighten the atmosphere. The woman with long white hair is lying in a bed, her face more haggard and her eyes dull. Sara sits beside her, clutching her hand, stray tears lingering on her cheeks.
"It's ok, Mum, I'm here," she murmurs.
"I'm so sorry, Sara."
"It's ok," Sara replies.
"I never meant for it to be this way."
"At least you found me."
The woman nods; the effort is obviously painful for her.
"I always loved you, you know."
"I know."
"Every day in that prison I thought of you. I imagined you in school, going to university, starting a career; getting married; having children."
"You imagined right."
"Yes."
"I'm so glad you got to meet Gil and Jenny, Mum."
"Not as glad as I am. Can you ever forgive me, Sara?"
"I forgave you long ago."
"When I first found out that this thing was eating away at me, my first thought was, 'I can't die without finding Sara.'"
"And you didn't."
"I got to spend my last weeks free, with you and your family. You cannot imagine how much that means to me."
"I can, Mum. It meant just as much to me."
"I love you, Sara, so much." Her voice is growing weak.
"I love you too, Mum," Sara replies, the flow of tears starting up again. "Please don't leave me."
"Sara, I have to go. My time's up."
"No, Mum, please." Sara is sobbing now.
"I've had a good life."
Sara cannot find words. "Good?" she repeats weakly.
"Good," her mother echoes. "From my life came yours. Very, very good."
Sara clutches at her mother's hand. "I've only just found you again."
"We've had our time, Sara. Let me go."
"I can't."
"Please. Just close your eyes, Sara."
Blinking through the tears, Sara does so. When she reopens them, her mother has closed hers.
The curtains fall.
IIII
The joys of parents are secret, and so are their griefs and fears.
Francis Bacon
The high-minded man does not bear grudges, for it is not the mark of a great soul to remember injuries, but to forget them.
Aristotle