… an intelligent loving boy… missing out on a wonderful opportunity…
“Luke, that’s… terrible,” I say inadequately.
“The worst thing is, I used to take it all out on my parents. When I was a teenager. I used to blame them.”
I have a sudden vision of Annabel, and her kind, warm face; of Luke’s dad, writing these letters in secret — and feel a pang of outrage toward Elinor. She doesn’t deserve Luke. She doesn’t deserve any family.
There’s silence except for the rain drumming outside. I reach out and squeeze Luke’s hand, trying to inject as much love and warmth as I can.
“Luke, I’m sure your parents understood. And…” I swallow all the things I really want to say about Elinor. “And I’m sure Elinor wanted you to be there really. I mean, maybe it was difficult for her at the time, or… or maybe she was away a lot—”
“There’s something I’ve never told you,” interrupts Luke. “Or anybody.” He raises his head. “I came to see my mother when I was fourteen.”
“What?” I stare at him in astonishment. “But I thought you said you never—”
“There was a school trip to New York. I fought tooth and nail to go on it. Mum and Dad were against it, of course, but in the end they gave in. They told me my mother was away, that, of course, otherwise, she would have loved to see me.”
Luke reaches for the whiskey bottle and pours himself another drink. “I couldn’t help it, I had to try and see her. Just in case they were wrong.” He stares ahead, running his finger round the rim of his glass. “So… toward the end of the trip, we had a free day. Everyone else went up the Empire State Building. But I sneaked off. I had her address, and I just came and sat outside her building. It wasn’t the building she’s in now, it was another one, farther up Park Avenue. I sat on a step, and people kept staring at me as they went by, but I didn’t care.”
He takes a gulp of his drink and I gaze back at him, rigid. I don’t dare make a sound. I hardly dare breathe.
“Then, at about twelve o’clock, a woman came out. She had dark hair, and a beautiful coat. I knew her face from the photograph. It was my mother.” He’s silent for a few seconds. “I… I stood up. She looked up and saw me. She stared at me for less than five seconds. Then she turned away. It was as though she hadn’t seen me. She got into a taxi and went off, and that was it.” He closes his eyes briefly. “I didn’t even have a chance to take a step forward.”
“What… what did you do?” I say tentatively.
“I left. And I walked around the city. I persuaded myself that she hadn’t recognized me. That’s what I told myself. That she had no idea what I looked like; that she couldn’t possibly have known it was me.”
“Well, maybe that’s true!” I say eagerly. “How on earth would she have—”
I fall silent as he reaches for a faded blue airmail letter with something paper-clipped to it at the top.
“This is the letter my father wrote her to tell her I was coming,” he says. He lifts up the paper and I feel a small jolt. “And this is me.”
I’m looking into the eyes of a teenaged boy. A fourteen-year-old Luke. He’s wearing a school uniform and he has a terrible haircut; in fact he’s barely recognizable. But those are his dark eyes, gazing out at the world with a mixture of determination and hope.
There’s nothing I can say. As I stare at his gawky, awkward face, I want to cry.
“You were right all along, Becky. I came to New York to impress my mother. I wanted her to stop dead in the street and turn round and… and stare… and be proud…”
“She is proud of you!”
“She isn’t.” He gives me a tiny half-smile. “I should just give up.”
“No!” I say, a little too late. I reach out and take Luke’s arm, feeling completely helpless. Completely sheltered and pampered in comparison. I grew up knowing that Mum and Dad thought I was the best thing in the whole wide world; knowing that they loved me, and always would, whatever I did.
“I’m sorry,” says Luke at last. “I’ve gone on too much about this. Let’s forget it. What did you want to talk about?”
“Nothing,” I say at once. “It… doesn’t matter. It can wait.”
The wedding seems a million miles away, suddenly. I screw up my notes into a tight ball and throw them in the bin. Then I look around the cluttered room. Letters spread out on the table, wedding presents stacked up in the corner, paraphernalia everywhere. It’s impossible to escape your own life when you live in a Manhattan apartment.
“Let’s go out and eat,” I say, standing up abruptly. “And see a movie or something.”
“I’m not hungry,” says Luke.
“That’s not the point. This is place is just too… crowded.” I take Luke’s hand and tug at it. “Come on, let’s get out of here. And just forget about everything. All of it.”
We go out and walk, arm in arm, down to the cinema and lose ourselves in a movie about the Mafia. Then when it’s over we walk a couple of blocks to a small, warm restaurant we know, and order red wine and risotto.
We don’t mention Elinor once. Instead, we talk about Luke’s childhood in Devon. He tells me about picnics on the beach, and a tree house his father built for him in the garden, and how his little half-sister Zoe always used to tag along with all her friends and drive him mad. Then he tells me about Annabel. About how fantastic she’s always been to him, and how kind she is to everyone; and how he never ever felt she loved him any less than Zoe, who was truly hers.