Her father had seemed on firm ground, sure of himself and what he valued, and Moira stood close beside him.
She was once, and remained for him, “ my little one,” born seven weeks premature.
Molly, the eldest of the three children, was more like their mother and an easy daughter.
It was Max in the middle who was often a challenge.
Max’s independence charmed his mother while their father seemed sure that, if the boy didn’t knuckle under authority, he was heading for trouble and Moira didn’t question this.
But all three of them grew up without too much drama.
Keeping busy suited Moira as a child and as an adult.
When others needed her that seemed to satisfy.
Having two children of her own and a home to run gave years of assuming herself fine.
Of course, there were hard patches – when her mother died or when her in-laws required more care than she could give with good grace – and when their teenage son seemed to have lost any respect and only found Moira irritating – when their daughter Cassie’s close friend turned on her, after joining another group, and Cassie then turned on herself, cutting and feeling a failure.
Cassie went in for despair, her mother did not.
Although those years of their children growing up merged and Moira could not really trust her memory, she was inclined to assume she and Patrick had been reliable parents and done well enough.
Their son, Thomas, was soon finishing his master’s degree as Cassie went off to Scotland to university.
It was around then that Moira began to falter.
She could still keep busy with work and the house but some days, too many days, she had to push herself through a reluctance.
Patrick remained alongside, unlike his favourite colleague who left his wife to begin again with a baby and young partner.
Moira’s brother-in-law, a year older than Patrick, was doing the same and one of their close friends was divorcing.
The making a family tracks, which they had all been on, no longer looked reliable.
Moira noted what seemed to absorb Patrick and realised that it had not been her or family life for some years.
He seemed to have withdrawn as the children did. He went to cricket with his brother, he kept up regular email exchanges with old friends and shared an allotment with a father they met in ante-natal classes.
Yes, she and Patrick both did the cooking and he put effort in to maintain their garden, but as they ate side by side most days intimacy was jaded.
If they had been drinking sex happened occasionally but much else, unnoticed, must have slipped away.
Moira hesitated to ask Patrick if he was still interested in her, since she suspected that, for a long while, she had taken him for granted.
Was it even years since she’d snuggled close to wonder what he was thinking, or whether they could delight in each other now?
Patrick was absorbed by what she considered abstract ideas and the past.
For her there had been perpetual future as small babies grew, starting to talk, beginning school, getting bigger feet and shoes, then walking to places on their own.
Days slid by taking them forward.
Not looking back.
Not then.
While Patrick was preoccupied by historical errors she could not accept as her responsibility.
If they lived in a nice home because Patrick’s grandfather had exploited Africa, what could she do about it?
If her father had ignored that one of his teachers abused boys it was hardly her fault and her father was a kind man, fond of his two girls and son.
He was still alive and got considerable companionship from his club, which had been male only till recently and he could not be blamed for finding change difficult at his age.
Patrick no longer challenged her or her family – it was best if she and Patrick kept off these topics, though he found them worth long discussions with his friends.
Moira could not see that she owed her comfort to anyone and never joined him on demonstrations.
But where did they join?
This question began to unsettle her.
They slept along side, sharing a bed but the quality of contact had shrunk to paltry.
What had this not bothered her sooner?
So that made another question, which circulated and had no answer.
It had not seriously occurred to Moira before that the ground she assumed solid, her decent life and marriage, might be in question.
Self-doubt was not a feature of her parents or a childhood where she was sufficiently armoured by respectability – with her father the headmaster.
Uncertainty, coming to her in her fifties, along with the menopause, was disconcerting and she felt ill equipped to deal with it.
When she finally tried to speak to Molly, her sister immediately recommended HRT.
“It’s just hormones, Moira.”
It’s also a transition out of other familiarities Moira wanted to say but wasn’t sure of herself.
She was concerned she might sound like one of the weak or self-pitying.
She had never been in those categories!
Moira woke earlier than usual and Patrick was not in the bed.
When he walked in the back door as she made coffee, Moira did not trust herself to speak.
How could she not have sensed if his attention had gone elsewhere?
Patrick was smiling – making no attempt to hide his good spirits.
Moira turned her back on him to, unnecessarily, clean a few dishes in the sink.
She would not fling the plate and cereal bowl to the floor but would scrub and scrub.
It was as Patrick began to hum that something snapped.
He should at least be very apologetic!
“No need to gloat,” she shouted turning to fling the washing up brush at him.
His astonishment stopped her and they stood face to face.
“What?”
“Where have you been?”
“Where I often am first thing. I leave clothes ready in the bathroom to go walking before you wake. Where else would I be?”
It wasn’t that she doubted his sincerity but Moira remained churned.
Was it that even his leaving the bed seemed a small desertion or that she hadn’t known?
What else didn’t she know of him, of her children or anyone?
What she might fail to see or understand had not surfaced like this through five decades.
Of course, she recognised that many subjects could be left to experts but a certain confidence must have been maintained by belief that she saw what was needed.
Others might have a different focus, which could be annoying or wrong, but Moira could take for granted that she was well meaning.
She was kind enough, just not sloppy like her less organised, emotional younger sister-in-law, married to Max. With four children, she seemed endlessly breast feeding or cuddling a child, while her house, unlike Moira’s, was not well run and tidy.
Even when they invited family for some occasion you had to be careful not to trip over a toy.
Until her death their mother who, as Moira saw it, favoured Max, her one son, loved visiting them, calling it that warm and lively home and did not see it as a health hazard though, during her chemotherapy, she fell and broke her hip taking those children to the park.
There was one conversation from some years back that remained with her – with Patrick’s words indented as tattoo, not just henna – and not one that was chosen or wanted.
Cassie must have been fifteen with friends who seemed to ricochet from one high drama to the next, and Cassie found good sense infuriating.
“Does Mum really believe a good meal and early night will cure everything?”
Moira heard Patrick say “It might help.”
“So, I should ring and pass that on to Amy, who is wanting to kill herself! Mum never sees what’s going on!”
“I wouldn’t put it quite like that Cass. But from a little girl you would surprise with a question, your mother’s eyes tend to be fixed on the way to cope. She manages us well and keeps her smile even if it frustrates when she fails to see what you think matters.”
“Fails to see” – those were the words that cut deep.
At the time Moira was sure they were not fair – disloyal words.
It was her who noticed when they needed milk or the children’s shoes were getting tight.
It was only now there seemed time to wonder if she’d lacked a certain curiosity.
Some protective seal seemed to have worn off now there was less to do.
But back when she had no time to dither, it was all very well for her daughter to suggest she read better books, the ones full of angst which gave Cassie ideas.
When Moira did get to sit down, she liked to flick through a magazine or enjoy something light.
It was after the children left that Moira decided there was time to join a book club.
When she told Patrick she might challenge herself he was rather too encouraging.
How it started with her father, Moira could not say, though she knew that, in a short time, he took brick after brick out of the sturdy wall, so that where the family and home had once felt solid, they no longer did so.
Her father as he aged remained upright – a few years back he’d acquired a stick and that hit the ground with the same force as his heels.
Long ago schoolchildren had said they could be grateful that you got warning whenever the headmaster was near.
His tread was still as firm.
He coped though his wife’s breast cancer and made it clear that he would manage as he began his years as widower.
His cooking improved but not much else changed.
Moira, having long relied on his clarity of purpose, perhaps grew even closer to him after her mother’s death left a vacuum.
It was her brother, Max, who told Moira that their father was growing confused but she saw little sign of it until he rang sounding flustered and asking if she was on her way.
Weren’t they supposed to be meeting?
But no, their plan was for an exhibition the following Saturday.
Given that he was known for being organised it was disconcerting to see his increasing muddle over arrangements.
Then Max got an email.
Years before Max was given a DNA test and been unimpressed.
The email now told him of a close match.
The man in question found there was no match at all on his father’s side, only the one with Max.
Faced with this information the man’s mother admitted to a two year affair with the headmaster of the school where she taught.
Her husband, now dead, did not suspect that the younger of their two boys might not be from his sperm.
And though the mother had not been completely sure during the pregnancy she grew increasingly convinced after the birth.
She took maternity leave then never went back to teaching.
Yes, the lover knew he was most likely to be the father but, rather than break two marriages, he decided it was better to part.
Were they to tell their father?
Moira thought no, but agreed to meet this half sibling Max had already seen looked like their family.
It was discovering that this man’s birthdate was only two weeks before her own that completely unnerved Moira.
Max, who sounded almost cheerful over his often stern father being caught out, was quite decided that this new relation was entitled to meet his sperm parent.
He told the old man and set up a meeting.
Patrick, too, seemed to find some pleasure in his father-in-law “finally being cornered” – that was how he put it.
“He never shows himself – he draws others out and uses that impressive education to make interesting remarks.”
Moira found everything out of her hands – she had no control over any of it and no one was standing beside her.
She could not banish this nice enough man who shared her birth year and month.
There was no way to restore her father to the place he’d occupied for as long as she could recall.
Had their mother known?
Was Moira’s conception and premature arrival connected to knowledge of this other pregnancy?
Did their father have any more affairs? If so might there be another half sibling yet to surface?
Had he spared thought for this other child while she was assuming herself his only “little one” and his darling?
She could not face the meeting Max had arranged at his house but heard from Molly immediately after it – how their father slid from his usual curiosity about the younger man and offering thoughtful judgement, to a total blank, as if he hadn’t a notion of what was happening.
He made no mention of having met this product of an affair to Moira and, when she finally tried to open up the subject in relation to her own early birth, her father’s face fell into a shocking bewilderment.
Then surprisingly fast he was back in shape and critical of Max stirring trouble yet once more.
Moira could not get the conversation she sought as she watched the pillar of her life slide into confusion.
Although her father kept his straight back and air of being sure, she could see how far he was disengaging.
And was she to be left shaken, alone and awake to new questions?