Page 109 of The Next Chapter

Seeing that couple so in love, it felt like I was doing some good. More so than I’d ever done in my life. Like maybe I could break the cycle.

Giving birth was the hardest thing I’ve ever done. Not the physical part of it, though that was mighty tough too, but I knew that this was the last thing I’d do for her, for the baby. Even though I hoped that she’d see that giving her up was an act of love in its own way.

I wanted to call her Lola. If I’d have kept her, that’s what her name would have been. Lola Starr, like me. Maybe it’s a bit vain, I don’t know. I just had this feeling that even then, this baby was all the good I might do in the world. I wanted her to have my name. Course, that was up to her parents, it wasn’t my decision to make. But for those few hours we had together, she was a Lola to me.

There’s nothing much can prepare you for the pain of giving away your child. It’s against the natural order of things. I thought I deserved for it to hurt so bad.

The room was so quiet after she’d gone, even though she hadn’t really made much noise to begin with. She’d been a reserved little thing right from the off, with big brown eyes. They were full of wonder, those eyes. I remember wondering how the right decision could hurt so bad.

It was the kindest and worst thing I’ve ever done. And it ate me up. I tried to go back to how things were before… I just couldn’t. I drank to try to forget about it. I wrote her a song, ‘Eyes Full of Wonder’, and then tortured myself, thinking that she’d hear it and not know it was for her. Jimmy told me that I was ruining everything.

I did try to move on, move forward. I’d given up so much for the sake of the band, it didn’t make sense that I’d throw it all away.

We were due to play in Vegas, and there were rumours that we might get a residency there one day. I don’t know if y’all have ever been to Vegas, but it’s an assault, on the senses. It’s big and busy and I thought it would be the perfect place to drown out everything that I was feeling.

But it wasn’t.

I missed my baby so much; I couldn’t hardly think straight. I’d written her the song, our biggest one, and that helped for a short while, but it wasn’t enough. It didn’t get easier, it got harder.

I was standin’ there, waiting to go on and perform. The lights, the noise, everything was as planned, but I didn’t know what I was doing. It wasn’t what I wanted.

I just… walked away. Right before we were due to go on stage.

I walked away, got on the first flight back to the UK and called the adoption agency. I told them I’d changed my mind, I wanted my baby back.

It was the week after her parents had finalized the court order. I was too late. They told me I had to wait until she was eighteen to get in contact.

That there was the second worst day of my life.

Everyone was angry with me. The label. Jimmy. I didn’t care. I didn’t want to go back to the band anymore. The band was the reason I didn’t have my baby. Or that’s how it felt in my head. Ashton stood by me, though. He asked me where I wanted to go. We were so big in the States by then, it didn’t feel like there was a corner of the country I could go to where someone wouldn’t find me. Skye was the only place I could think of since the band started where I’d felt some peace and calm. Ashton’s aunt had passed not a month before so his family helped me to buy it off them, off the record, even though I didn’t know anything about running a hotel. I had some money, but not as much as people might’ve expected. It’s not the same as it is now, the label had all the power.

None of it mattered to me.

I changed my name, I moved to Skye, I settled down for a quiet life in the only place I’d ever felt close to my baby. And I’ve been here ever since.

Chapter Twenty

‘When did you know?’ I ask her.

‘That you were my baby?’ Lola answers. Both our faces are wet.

I nod.

‘I suspected… But I knew for sure when you sang tonight. Maybe something like mother’s intuition, though I don’t know if I’ve earned the right to call it that.’

‘I felt it too,’ I admit, thinking of that unfathomable thing I’d sensed. ‘I’m sorry,’ I say.

It’s quiet between us then and I wonder if, like me, Lola is thinking about how completely random it all is. That she had me. That she picked my parents. That she was too late. But what she’s said, it means that she wanted me. After all that, she did want me.

‘I’m sorry about Jimmy,’ I tell her.

Lola shrugs. ‘I doubt I was the first girl to fall for him, I certainly wasn’t his last. He died of a heart attack.’

She lets the words hang, neither of us acknowledging the fact that it means I’ll never meet my birth father.

‘Is that why you’re writing your memoirs? To save the hotel?’ I ask.

Another nod. ‘For a long time, it’s been the only thing that linked me to you. I can’t lose it.’