The Accidental Mother (4 page)

“Yes, well. Most of them have moved away or have families of their own. There’s no one willing to take the kids on. And besides”—Tess looked at Sophie with renewed determination—“Carrie named you. You agreed to it. Surely you must have thought about what it would mean when you agreed to be guardian?”

Suddenly Sophie felt the walls of her office close in on her, and the air seemed to leak out of the room. She stood up abruptly. “I have to go, Miss Andrew,” she said. “I have a lunch.”

Tess stood up too. “Lunch?” she said, looking bewildered. “Lunch can wait, can’t it? Look, I know it’s a lot to take in, a lot to ask—But Carrie must have thought she could ask it of you or she wouldn’t have put you in her will. And we’re thinking of what’s best for the girls in the short term. There aren’t very many options, Sophie. Until Carrie’s will was found, there was only one—foster care or a home until we could find their dad. We’re not asking you to keep them forever; we’re asking you to have them until then. On a short-term basis.”

Sophie stopped by the door. “Short-term basis?” she repeated the three words as a question.

“As you pointed out, the girls
do
have a father. We’re looking for him, and I’m sure that when he knows what has happened, he’ll want to come back and look after them. It would just be until we find Louis Gregory and let him know what’s happened.” Tess coughed into her hand as she finished the sentence.

Sophie thought for a moment about two bereaved children she hardly knew living in her flat. There were a lot of things that Sophie was very good at. Pushing the envelope, thinking outside the box, making lists about lists, and devising pie charts. She was extremely good at pie charts. But she’d always said that when she discovered her limitations, she’d be happy to admit them. That time had come.

“I’m sorry, Tess,” she said. “I really am. But I don’t know anything about children. I hardly even know Bella and Isobel. It would be wrong of me to say yes. Wrong for them. They need someone who knows how to help them.”

Tess’s face remained impassive. “Perhaps you’re right, Sophie, in an ideal world that would be best. But do you know how many children need foster care in London tonight? Hundreds. Do you know how many foster parents we have? Nowhere
near
enough. Look, if they don’t go to you, I have no choice but to place them under a care order. They’ll be going to a home, if not tonight then tomorrow at the latest. They will stay in a local authority home until a foster place comes up or their dad comes back. They try their best at the homes, but trust me, they are always a last, last resort. It could be weeks, months until we find a foster home. I might even have to put them in separate homes.” Tess looked intently at Sophie. “If you agreed to take them, you wouldn’t be on your own. I’d be able to apply for a supervision order, and I’d be assigned to you as your support worker, with you all the way. They are missing their mum, Sophie. If they could be with someone familiar, it would really help them. Please, please, at least take a moment to think about it. You are their only hope right now.”

Sophie hesitated for a moment. She thought of the day her dad had died. After her headmistress had sent her home, Carrie must have seen her out the classroom window, stumbling across the playing field in tears. She’d put her hand up, told the teacher she needed to go to the girls’ room, and walked right out of school and run after Sophie.

“Don’t tell me you’ve finally got yourself expelled,” she’d said to Sophie when she caught up with her. Sophie had dissolved into tears and told her what happened. She remembered the feeling of Carrie’s arm around her shoulders for the rest of the walk home until she’d stopped at last outside the front door. The dogs had started barking.

“I could come in,” Carrie had offered.

Sophie had shaken her head. “No, I think I have to go in on my own,” she’d said, wishing she didn’t have to. “But thanks.”

“Look,” Carrie had said. “I know it’s not the same, I know you love your dad and I hate mine, and that your dad is dead and mine ran off with the neighbor and made my mum go mental, but…well, I do sort of understand a bit. I know what it feels like losing your dad. Even though mine’s a bastard and yours was great.” She’d paused for a moment. “You realize that now there are two fatherless only children at a Catholic school. I’m not the weirdest one anymore!” Incredibly, Carrie’s stumbled attempt at words of comfort had made Sophie almost smile. Whereas other people would stifle her with sympathy and sensitivity, Carrie had done the one thing that had made life bearable. She had made Sophie laugh and let her forget for a few minutes every now and then that her dad had dropped dead of a heart attack at a gas station without any warning at all. Carrie had let Sophie be angry, let her cry, let her talk about boys, clothes, and cry again if she wanted to.

“I’m glad I’ve got you, Carrie,” Sophie had said as her mum opened the front door, and the girls had hugged each other for a long time, until eventually Sophie knew she had to go in.

“I’m here for you,” Carrie said. “Always, forever, whatever.”

“I know,” Sophie said. “Me too. Always, forever, whatever.”

Sophie hadn’t thought of that moment for years, but now that she did, she could remember exactly how it had felt and exactly how much strength the unwavering friendship of a thirteen-year-old girl had given her. “Always, forever, whatever.” It was something the girls had said to each other daily, until they’d almost stopped thinking about what it really meant. But when it had mattered, Carrie had been there for Sophie, supporting her through the very worst time of her life. Sophie had been waiting a long time to return the favor. Self-assured, stubborn Carrie, tired and embarrassed by all the handouts she and her mother had received from well-meaning church members after her dad left, had prided herself on never asking anyone for help. She’d never needed help—until now.

“How long?” Sophie said, not quite believing what she was thinking of agreeing to.

“Pardon?” Tess said, clearly expecting a flat refusal.

“How long until you get hold of the father?” Sophie asked her.

Sensing fragile progress, Tess pursed her lips and made a professional judgment. It was important she didn’t lose her now. “Well, like I say, Social Services has only been involved for a few weeks. Mrs. Stiles tried to get by on her own for as long as she could—But now we have the case, I don’t think it will be long. A week maybe—two at the most?”

Sophie considered the information. “Two weeks—okay then. For Carrie. She would have done it for me. I wouldn’t let the girls get split up, I couldn’t. So I’ll take them for two weeks, as long you promise to move heaven and earth to make more suitable arrangements at the end of that time.”

“I will,” Tess said, lifting her chin a little.

Absently, Sophie touched the cool back of her hand to her blazing face. It was always the first part, actually the only part of her to show visible signs of stress. She could tame it and hide it with concealer, but she always resented the fact that she couldn’t control it. She took a deep breath. “Right, well, let me know dates and times and things. Get back to me later in the week.”

“Pardon?” Tess said again.

“I have a lunch,” Sophie repeated with some frustration.

Tess looked at her. “Actually, Sophie, I was rather hoping you could come with me now to pick the girls up. I brought all the paperwork for you to sign.” She reached into her glittering bag and produced several forms, which she waved at Sophie as proof.

“You mean now, right now? You want me to have them right now?” Sophie repeated herself, incredulous.

“That is the idea,” Tess said with a tight smile. “After all, the girls need your help
now.
Not when you have a window in your diary.”

Sophie wondered how all of these events had managed to erupt and tumble down on her head at this precise moment without her even noticing they were coming. She looked at the pink toes of her new boots and knew she just had to accept that her day wasn’t going to go the way she had planned, because nobody knew better than she did that sometimes your life turns itself on its head without asking you for permission.

She looked up at Tess and gestured to the visitor’s chair. “Okay,” Sophie said simply. “If you’ll excuse me for a few minutes, I just have to rearrange some appointments.”

At last Sophie opened the door and stepped back into the normal world, where things were happening just as they had before she got dragged into the alternate reality that was seething in her office. For a split second, she considered making a run for it, and then she knew she couldn’t. She just wasn’t the sort of person to walk away from a problem without solving it. Even if she wanted to, and her pride wouldn’t let her.

Jake Flynn was sitting on the edge of Cal’s desk. He turned and smiled at her as she emerged, and behind his back, Cal swooned in his chair.

“Are you ready?” Jake asked her, smiling warmly.

Sophie looked at him. “No, I’m not ready,” she said, feeling every word.

Jake’s face fell.

“Look, Jake, I’m really sorry, but I…I just found out that a close friend of mine died, and I…” Sophie could not put the last part of the sentence together, but it seemed like she didn’t have to.

“Oh, Sophie,” he said gently. “I’m sorry. Well, of course, you aren’t ready. Don’t worry about lunch.” Jake paused for a moment, as if assessing what he should say next. “Work can wait. I only wanted to go over a few last-minute details you’ve probably already taken care of. Don’t worry about it at all. And I’m really sorry for your loss.”

Sophie nodded, not knowing whether to feel relieved or disappointed that Jake had been taking her out for a business lunch after all. She looked at Cal. “I’m going to be out of the office for the rest of today,” she said. “Cancel everything, and ask Gillian if she’s got five minutes, okay?”

Cal nodded and looked from Jake to Sophie and back again.

“Will you be okay?” Jake said, reaching out and holding her elbow.

It was such a strange, mannered gesture that Sophie found it rather touching. “I will,” she said. “It’s…complicated, Jake.”

Jake nodded, and his hand dropped back to his side. “I’ll call you,” he said.

“I’m not sure when I’ll be back in the office, but Cal and Lisa have everything under control, so you don’t have to worry…”

Jake nodded. “I’m not worried, and I’ll call
you,
” he said.

Cal watched him heading for the lift. “Mmm,” he mused more or less to himself. “Now even I’m confused.” He looked up at Sophie. “What else can I do?” he said.

She smiled at him. “Right now? Nothing. In the next couple of weeks—probably everything actually.” And she told him as quickly as she could everything that Tess had told her.

“Bloody hell,” Cal said, wide-eyed by the time she had finished.

“I know,” Sophie said.

She turned around and looked at her office door. She took a deep breath and went back in to see Tess Andrew.

F
or twenty minutes Sophie sat and listened to Tess talking about words and procedures she had never thought would be part of her life, let alone her day-to-day vocabulary. Tess explained that she would be granted an interim residency order immediately and with it full parental responsibility.

“Technically,” she told Sophie, “you have it anyway as legal guardian, but because of the unusual circumstances of this case, I think it’s important to keep you and the girls under supervision. You’ll have me for guidance and support until thing are ‘firmed up.’”

Sophie narrowed her eyes imperceptibly. “Yes, but it is only a temporary arrangement, isn’t it?” she reminded Tess. “This all seems a bit over the top for a couple of weeks.”

“Not at all,” Tess said. “It’s standard procedure with a supervision order—a one-size-fits-all policy, I’m afraid, but generally it works very well.” She beamed at Sophie. “Now, we have got the girls down for counseling, but—”

“Counseling?” Sophie picked up on one of the stream of words. “Are they—I mean, are the girls traumatized in a—you know—bad way?”

“As opposed to a good way?” Tess asked, looking slightly perplexed.

“There’s no need to look at me like that!” Sophie retorted, fully aware that, to be fair, Tess had at that very moment been looking at her notebook. “Look, I don’t have much—any—experience with children, except for my own childhood, and that was…unusual. My mother didn’t raise me, a chocolate Labrador called Muffin did.” Tess raised an eyebrow. “Okay, so that’s a bit of an exaggeration, but in any case I don’t have much to go on. I don’t know any children. I have no idea what to say to happy, normal children, let alone ones whose mum had died and whose dad has deserted them!” Sophie caught her rising tone and forcibly lowered her voice. “What I’m saying is, if they need
expert
help, I’m not the one to give it.”

Tess paused for a moment just to check that Sophie had nothing further to add. “Counseling is a standard procedure that is available to the children if need be,” she said. She thought for a moment. “I have only known them for a little while, but I can tell you that Bella is a very self-contained and mature little girl. She never talks about Carrie at all. I think it’s a coping strategy. I think she feels she has to hold it together for Izzy’s sake. And Izzy? Well, Izzy is a typical three-year-old, although obviously the crash has left her rather unsure of cars. She prefers not to travel in one. And as in any event as you are only having them temporarily, I don’t think you have to worry about their deeper issues. Just a familiar face, someone who knew their mother, will help them. Someone to take their minds off things—that would mean a lot right now.”

“But I’m not a familiar face,” Sophie said. “I haven’t seen them in years.”

Tess smiled. “But they’ve seen you. Carrie kept a photo of you and her together—at your high school graduation party, Bella told me. You’ve got different hair, different clothes—but apart from that, you look the same.” Tess slotted in the compliment with professional discreetness. “The girls brought it with them from the house. They know who you are. They talk about you. Apparently you always get them the best presents.”

Sophie looked out her window over Finsbury Circus and watched a woman more or less her age, with more or less her build and probably more or less her life, walk across the concourse wrapped up against the cold in a swath of cashmere. Suddenly she wished she could swap lives with the wonderfully free woman and in the same moment remembered with pressing urgency that she had being trying to find time to make a trip to the ladies’ room all morning. Now she
really
needed to go.

“Okay,” Sophie said briskly as she stood up. “Well, I have to sort things out with my boss. The rest of the day off, you know…”

“Two weeks off, you mean,” Tess said.

“If need be,” Sophie mumbled, hurrying to the door.

“Well, you can’t leave them home alone…”

“I realize that, but—” Sophie opened the door and found herself jiggling on her toes. She felt like a naughty child trying to escape class.

“So you’ll need to take time off,” Tess reaffirmed.

“Fine. I’ll take the week off,” Sophie snapped at her. “I can always work from home. Now, if you’ll excuse me, please, I need to sort things out.” She closed the door on Tess with a good deal more firmness than was strictly required.

“I’ll make her another tea, shall I?” Cal said as Sophie marched past.

“Don’t bother,” Sophie said shortly.

“Sanctimonious self-righteous morally pompous…” Sophie grumbled under her breath as she headed purposefully for the ladies’ room. As she passed Eve’s office, Eve fell in line with her, and four metal-tipped heels clicked purposefully along the tile floor.

“In-ter-est-ing,” Eve said, carefully pronouncing each syllable as she observed Sophie. “What do we have here? Sour looks and bitterness.” She cocked her head sweetly at Sophie. “You didn’t nail the Germans did you?”

Sophie lifted her chin. “Signed, sealed, and delivered. Three conferences, summer party, Christmas party, staff. All corporate entertaining. For two years.”

If Eve was impressed, she hid it well. “Yeah, well, I think they were ripe for a change. I reckon even Lisa could have landed them.” Sophie ignored the gibe and stopped outside the ladies’ room door.

“Are you smoking this morning?” Eve asked her, slipping the top of her packet of Marlboros out of her trouser pocket as if they were illegal contraband, which in a smoke-free office they more or less were. It wasn’t even that smoking was banned entirely; it was allowed outside, but hardly anyone actually smoked anymore, except for Eve, that is, and Sophie sort of, and their involvement with nicotine was possibly the only thing they had in common. It also provided an opportunity for them to size each other up and see how the competition was doing.

Tess Andrew could wait ten more minutes. “Yes, I am smoking,” Sophie said with conviction. Eve pushed open the ladies’ room door.

“I’ll wait for you,” she said.

Five minutes later, feeling considerably refreshed as she stood outside the office building, Sophie found herself lighting a second cigarette from the butt of the one she had just smoked. She was glad that the chill of the morning was providing a cooling antidote to the heat of her cheeks.

“So, considering you’ve done so well,” Eve said, looking Sophie up and down as she channeled a plume of smoke though her pursed lips, “why are you so stressed? And don’t deny it, your face looks like it’s in the early stages of leprosy. You haven’t even flouted your new boots—are you ill?”

Like Sophie, Eve wasn’t wearing a coat; the cold didn’t seem to affect her, probably because she was already cold-blooded. Sophie wound her arms around herself, glanced at Eve, and appraised the situation. Eve couldn’t in any way be described as a friend, because it was hard to be pals with your mortal enemy even if she did throw you the occasional Marlboro Light. But Sophie and Eve inevitably spent a lot of time together during office hours and had developed a sort of mutual resentful respect that had evolved into a relationship of a kind. After all, they were the only two of their breed. Gillian was at the top of the tree, and Eve and Sophie were two of three managers beneath her. The other one was Graham Hughes, of course, but he was so incompetent that nobody really counted him; he only had the job because of his family name. Eve was Sophie’s only real equal at McCarthy Hughes, the only other person who knew exactly what it was like to be her and exactly how much she wanted to move into Gillian’s job if and when Gillian stepped down from the office in order to spend more time with her family. Sophie had been working for ten years toward this moment, and she wouldn’t let her chance to sit in Gillian’s chair go without fighting for it tooth and nail.

Outside the office, Sophie wouldn’t have gone near Eve with a six-foot pole. In fact, if she’d seen Eve walking down a darkened street toward her, she would have run the other way. But sensing that this was one of those times it paid to keep your enemy closest, Sophie decided to tell her everything.

“I just found out an old friend of mine died,” she said flatly.

There was no other way to say it. So far, her feelings about the news seemed to entirely two-dimensional, as if she had read the words off a page but hadn’t really felt what they meant yet. Maybe if Carrie had still been a regular part of her life, the news would have seemed real, but for now at least Carrie’s death didn’t seem real. Sophie supposed that would change when she met the children, and that thought terrified her. Not feeling anything would be much easier, she decided, and also much worse.

“Really,” Eve said, keeping her voice even as she stubbed out the butt of her cigarette with the black, pointed toe of her Prada shoe. “So, were you close to this friend?” she asked.

Sophie considered the question. “We were once, you know at school,” she said. “And for a while after she went to university and I started working here. We kept in touch—met up in the holidays, but you know, we both changed. She got married pretty soon after she graduated and moved away.” Sophie considered the length of time and distance that had grown between her and Carrie. “So we weren’t so close anymore, no—But, well…you know.”

Eve tipped her face back to a glimpse of the sun that a passing cloud had temporarily revealed, and Sophie guessed probably she didn’t know.

“So it’s not all doom and gloom then,” Eve said lightly. “You won’t be having weeks and weeks off for compassionate leave?” She couldn’t help but sound hopeful.

Sophie squinted at her and thought anxiously about the time she would inevitably be out of the office in the next few days. “Not at all,” she said. A significant part of her didn’t want to tell Eve the rest of the story. The part of her that knew Eve was a natural predator. Show her any kind of weakness, and she would exploit it—especially professionally. But Sophie also knew if she didn’t tell her, it would also look like a weakness.

“There is another slight complication that has arisen, though,” she said, carefully considering the best way the play out the situation. Let Eve think that her position was being compromised and then, when she showed Gillian she could cope so well with a crisis and still be on top of her job, Sophie would be a stronger contender than ever.

“Did she leave you loads of money?” Eve asked.

Sophie shook her head and paused for effect. “No—she left me her kids.”

For the first time ever Sophie witnessed Eve at a loss for words, if only for a second. Then she found two that Sophie considered extremely apt. “Good God,” Eve said.

Gillian had two children of her own, eight-year-old Jack and four-year-old Matilda. Sophie knew their names and ages because of the many photos and drawings that adorned Gillian’s office walls and because of their occasional visits to the office.

They were the reason, Sophie supposed, that as she relayed the events of the morning, tears welled up in Gillian’s eyes. A vital and extremely attractive woman in her early forties, Gillian Hughes was Sophie’s inspiration and role model. She had cut a swathe to the very top when other women were still complaining about glass ceilings, and had become a partner in the firm by the time she was thirty-five. She openly encouraged her younger staff to try for promotion and to achieve the dizzying heights she had. With her as your boss, you felt that anything was possible, everything was achievable. Sophie had learned everything from Gillian, and she didn’t mind admitting to herself that she wanted to be Gillian when she grew up. She wanted Gillian’s job, her sense of presence, her innate authority, and also her really great, wrinkle-free skin. Gillian was so tightly in control of every strand of the business that Sophie had been taken aback by her display of emotion. The plight of the children touched her instantly.

“Oh, my God,” Gillian said softly, shaking her head and staring out her window. “It’s your worst nightmare, your worst ever nightmare. The thought of leaving your children alone in the world. Every mother’s deepest fear.” She looked at Sophie. “Your friend must have trusted you very much, Sophie. You should be proud.”

Sophie felt a little guilty. Proud was the very last thing she had been feeling. Beholden, embattled, terrified, and shocked—all of those things had registered, but pride had yet to make an entry in her top five chart of whirlwind emotions.

“Of course I do,” she lied so as not to disappoint Gillian. “And, well, I’m afraid I will need some time out of the office while the children are staying with me. The social worker says—”

“Of course,” Gillian said generously before leaning forward a little in her seat. “How long exactly?”

“Not long at all,” Sophie said hurriedly, sensing that already Gillian was trying to find how much exactly all this would affect her business. “I won’t need long…. It’s just for a week or two, just until they find their dad, you see.”

“So you’ll want two weeks off right away then?” Gillian asked her, sounding suddenly less generous. “To spend time with your godchildren.”

“No, I won’t—” Sophie began reflexively, not wanting to irritate her boss. “What I mean is that of course I
do
want to spend time with them, the poor darlings, but I won’t just walk out on my responsibilities to McCarthy Hughes, Gillian. I know that you are being extremely kind, but I am not the sort of person to take advantage of that kindness. I’ll have to be at home mainly, but I’m sure I can supervise Lisa and Cal from home, and I’ll be in at least twice a week. Three times maybe. Maybe I’ll pop in every day. I’ll get a nanny or something.”