The Imposter, Anna Wharton [romantic story to read TXT] 📗

‘Ninety-six,’ she says.

‘Ninety-six! Goodness, she must have been quite old when she had your mum then? Or were your parents a lot older when they had you?’

There’s a pause as Chloe stares back, trying frantically to do the maths in her head, wondering what she’d got so wrong. She feels Patrick stop eating and put down his fork. Under the table, she crosses her ankles, putting her left heel down hard on top of her right toes until they burn. The pain helps her to focus.

‘Hmm-mmm,’ she nods, looking back down at her plate. ‘Yeah, quite old. I never knew my dad.’

That much is true.

Patrick looks up at her from the other side of the table. ‘Where did you grow up, Chloe?’ His tone isn’t as friendly as Maureen’s. Chloe feels the need to think before she speaks.

‘In town,’ she says, swallowing too quickly; the food hurts as it goes down. ‘Peterborough. Various places. Nan lived in Dogsthorpe.’

‘Oh, so did we,’ Maureen says, nudging Patrick.

‘Oh really?’ Chloe says, thinking she manages to make it sound realistic.

‘Yes, Chestnut Avenue. Do you know it?’

Chloe makes a point of looking up to the artex ceiling, furrowing her brow, and all the time inside she’s congratulating herself at how she’s making this appear, how she’s pulled it back round. ‘Er . . . I’m not sure . . .’

‘Oh, you must do,’ Maureen says. ‘It’s the big one, the one that crosses Central Avenue, with the shops.’

‘Oh yes,’ Chloe says, as if suddenly remembering. From the corner of her eye, she sees Patrick look back down at his plate. ‘Of course I know it, Nan used to take me to church there when I was little.’ She had been there, that wasn’t a lie.

‘Did she? Well I never . . . Patrick, did you hear that? Chloe only went to the same church.’

Patrick makes a sound from his chair.

‘Did you know Father Cunningham? No, he’s perhaps before your time, although . . . how old did you say you were, Chloe?’

‘Twenty-nine.’

‘That’s it, of course,’ Maureen says. She drifts back to her plate then, wiping a carrot round the willow pattern more times than is necessary. Chloe wonders if this is it. The moment they bring up Angie. Or is Chloe meant to ask? What is the etiquette? She thinks of the woman who had opened their front door to her in Chestnut Avenue just two weeks ago, her big gold hoop earrings. She pictures Maureen and Patrick handing over the keys to her and her snotty-nosed kids. How had she referred to Maureen? That was it, ‘the old lady who used to live here.’ Chloe looks across the table at her; she has a few frown lines on her face, no doubt carved from the worry of Angie’s disappearance, but there aren’t many crinkles around her eyes for a woman of her age. But then, what has she had to laugh about over these last twenty-five years?

Maureen continues eating, letting the opportunity to mention Angie slip by again. Chloe feels a desire then to pick at the scab. A detective would. Or at least they should.

‘Nan was the only one there for me after Mum died,’ she says.

There is silence at the table for a second. But then Maureen looks up, her brown eyes full of concern.

‘You lost your mum as well?’ She puts her fork down and covers her mouth. Patrick yawns from the other side of the table; he rubs his hands over his belly and pushes his chair back.

‘I’m going to sit in front of the telly,’ he says. He leaves his plate on the table. Maureen doesn’t answer him; instead she puts a hand on Chloe’s forearm. Her skin tingles in response.

‘I was fifteen,’ Chloe says, taking the last mouthful of her dinner.

Maureen’s eyes are shining now, trained on nothing but Chloe. She’s glad that Patrick has left the room, that she has Maureen all to herself. She feels as if she can relax a little.

Chloe points at her plate again, more confident now. ‘That dinner really was lovely.’

‘No mum, no dad, no other grandparents?’ Maureen says slowly.

Chloe shakes her head.

‘So you’re all alone in the world, you poor love.’

Chloe feels her tap her arm and her blood pumps harder in response. She’s reminded of visiting Nan when she had her fall – she blushes at the thought that that was only a week ago. She feels necessary.

‘Oh, it’s OK.’ Chloe shrugs. The feeling is still there, right under her skin, but the problem is, it’s addictive. ‘I guess you get used to it. Loss, I mean.’

She holds her gaze this time and it’s Maureen who looks away first. Chloe glances at Patrick’s empty chair, feeling bolder somehow now he’s left the room.

‘Nan took me in after Mum died. I was fifteen then, perhaps I was used to change. I was adopted, see. I’ve often thought about finding them but . . .’

She doesn’t know why she says it. Perhaps to distance herself from the lie about Nan.

‘You were adopted too?’

Chloe nods.

‘How old were you then?’

‘About four, something like that.’

‘Do you remember anything of your birth parents?’

She shakes her head. ‘I wish I did.’

She surprises herself then, how convincing she sounds. ‘Sometimes there are moments – split seconds – when I think I remember something, when a memory comes back to me, but,’ she sighs, ‘it’s all so foggy . . .’

Maureen has stopped eating. She sits at the table, her knife and fork suspended in the air.

‘But can social services not tell you? Do they not have a record of your parents?’

It would make sense, and that makes Chloe panic. She feels rattled inside, though she stays calm. ‘My social worker offered many times to get my file out of the archives, to show me all the paperwork but . . . well, there’s no point in living in the past, is there? I’d rather focus on the present.’

She almost thinks she’s gone too far now. She’s strayed too much from the script, she knows that, but the temptation that fizzes inside makes her feel more alive than she has done in years.