Page 56 of The Absence of You
Instead, I turn my body towards her and ask her the question that’s been playing on my mind these past few weeks. “Why didn’t you tell me you went to Heathley Academy?” I don’t miss the shock on her face. My mum shifts a little in her seat.
“I, I...” She falters before quickly recovering. “Didn’t I tell you? I’m sure I did, Dahlia. You must have forgotten.”
“You never told me, Mum. I’d have remembered. It’s odd. You were so adamant that I couldn’t go to school there when Dee offered to pay for me. Yet it was a good enough education for you and my dad.” Mum gulps audibly. “And apparently Grandpa was quite involved in the academy? He was a governor there?”
“Where is all this coming from Dahlia?” She bristles. I’ve clearly hit a nerve. I’ve always been so sure everything she has done for me has come from a good place, but she’s hiding something, and I don’t like it.
Suddenly, my sympathy for her begins to wane. How dare she try to bullshit me over this? Being at Dee’s has allowed me to imagine how different our lives would have looked if she’d made a few different decisions. I can’t help but think if she’d just accepted Dee’s help when we were offered it, things would have worked out differently with Grayson too.
I can’t help feeling a little bitter about it. I never really resented her before, but I feel my skin prickle with anger. I want her to start talking, so I decided to try a different approach and soften my voice.
“I’m curious, that’s all. We’ve had a hard few years,” - Talk about an understatement - “and I can’t help but wonder why we didn’t take an easier option. Maybe all this,” I wave my arms around, “could have been avoided. And I’d like to know a bit more about my father. I’m sorry if it’s hard to talk about, but I feel it’s time. He’s my dad, and I have a right to know.”
Guilt flashes across her face. I can tell I’ve surprised her. It’s been a very long time since I last asked about him. But come on, she must have realised I’d want to know the truth, eventually.
“Your Dad. He had to make a difficult choice. And we’ve been over this before. We were so young, and some people aren’t ready to be parents at that age.”
I can tell she’s desperate to shut down the conversation. I sigh inwardly. Maybe this would be a better conversation to have within our scheduled counselling session later today. The last thing I want to do is upset her and undo any progress she’s made here, so instead of pressing the issue, I let it drop and suggest we get a drink.
At three pm, one of the nurses comes to tell us that Dr Jenson is ready to see us both, so my mum and I follow her down to one of the therapy rooms. We are scheduled to spend four joint sessions with her over the next few days, as well as having a couple of sessions arranged on my own with her. I don’t really see what the point of solo sessions is, as anything I want to say I can do in front of my mum, but I’ll do whatever is asked of me.
The room has a huge window which overlooks the grounds at the back of the facility. If I didn’t know it was a rehab centre, I could have been convinced we’re in a fancy hotel in the middle of the countryside from this view. Dr Jenson sits in a chair next to the window. Her auburn hair falls in tight, bouncy curls around her shoulders. She looks almost too young to be a doctor, in her late twenties maybe. She looks up as we enter and gestures to us to take a seat on the sofa opposite her.
“Dahlia, I presume?” She smiles warmly. “How was your journey today? Your mum said you’ve travelled up here from Sussex. Such a lovely part of the country.”
“The journey was good, thanks. It’s only a couple of hours on the train and there were no delays.” I pick at a loose thread on the knee of my jeans.
“Have you and your mum had a chance to catch up this afternoon?”
“Yes, it’s so good to see her. She told me she’s doing well, and she looks great.” I glance sideways at my mum, the proud smile on her face clear to see.
“Your mum has been working incredibly hard for the last few weeks. We still have a lot to work on, and invariably there will be challenging times again, but we are developing skills together that will help her to cope with those situations. She’s learning how to recognise when she needs help so, in the future, she won’t need to rely on her previous coping mechanisms.”
Dr Jenson spends the next few minutes explaining that the next stage of my mum’s recovery involves her meeting with her family so she can acknowledge the impact of her choices on the people around her.
“This part of the process can bring up things that the two of you may not have talked about before, and often we uncover issues that may not have been resolved. It can be quite an emotional process. My job is to support Rosie to navigate through this, in a way that helps both of you to heal. If at any point you want to stop Dahlia, just let me know, and we can circle back to it at a later stage. Your mum and I have spent many hours talking about her addiction and the impact it’s had on her life. We’ve talked through how she feels it has impacted your life too, but only you know the true impact, and so it is important for your mum to hear it from you directly in this safe space.”
I nod my head. I feel nervous suddenly. We always had a very close relationship and, while I never deliberately hid my feelings from her, we’ve never sat down and openly discussed her addiction.
“We’re going to begin by having a couple of sessions without your mum here, and then we’ll do a couple of sessions with all three of us.”
My mum leaves the room, and for the next hour, I talk to Dr Jenson about my childhood. We cover growing up and when I first realised my mum had an alcohol problem. We talk about the caring responsibilities I’d had at an early age, and we begin to touch on the feelings of resentment I had about not being able to see Dee and Grayson. Dr Jenson suggests we talk in more detail about this with my mum.
“You and your mum clearly have a very close relationship. We have talked a little about Dee and your childhood friend Grayson. Do you have any other people in your life you’d like to talk about?”
“Well, there’s my dad. Or lack of.” I slump back in my seat.
“That must be hard to deal with.”
“What has my mum told you?” I’m curious to know how she’d explained the situation to Dr Jenson, and I feel a little embarrassed at the thought that Dr Jenson might know my dad hadn’t loved me enough to stick around.
“Rosie and I have talked a little about your dad, but I’d like to hear about him from you.”
“Well, I’m not sure what I can tell you. I don’t even know him. He... he-” I stall, “him and my mum were together and happy, and I came along unexpectedly, and I guess, he felt he was too young, and I was too much responsibility, so he split. When I was younger, mum told me he was away with work, but when I was a few years older, she’d had a few drinks and was rambling about how she was left on her own with me. The details weren’t clear, but it sounded as though he had just left us suddenly one day. She tried to backtrack once she’d sobered up, but it was too late. That’s when I realised, he just didn’t want me.” The stark truth of my statement sits there in the open between us, like I’m daring her to correct me. She doesn’t though, and as the silence grows, I avoid her gaze, so I won’t have to see the inevitable pity in her eyes.
“How do you feel about that?” I’d expected her to try to reassure me about it, not ask me how I felt. I’m not sure anyone has ever asked me how I feel about it. I take a minute to think.
“For a long time, I was curious about him. I wanted to know what he was like. What he looked like. What he liked to do. Whether my eyes were like his. Whether, if he met me now, he’d wish he could do things differently or if he thought he’d made the right decision. I wanted to ask him how he could leave my mum on her own with a baby. She was old enough to care for me, so surely, he was too. I wanted to ask him how he could despise his own child so much that he’d cut Dee off, too. He punished her because of me. I’ve accepted I’ll never get the answers to those questions, but starting at Heathley Academy has thrown up all that curiosity again.” I let out a long breath. “But I’m not sure I actually feel anything about it.”
