Secrets of a Charmed Life

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lie to her.”
    Mum inhaled deeply. “You won’t have to. I’ll tell her my own way, on my own day. If she asks you where he is, you tell her you don’t know. Because you don’t.”
    Her mother was staring at the letters on the table. It occurred to Emmy that if Neville’s mother knew about Mum, she might also know Neville had a daughter.
    “How did his mother find you?” Emmy asked. “Does she know about Julia?”
    “She knows,” Mum said slowly, her tone calculating. “He told his parents as he lay dying in a hospital in Dublin that he had a daughter in London. That’s where he was. Dublin. Living with a woman half his age, no doubt.”
    “And?”
    Mum swung her head around. “And, what?”
    Emmy set the tin down. “Do they want to see her?”
    Mum picked up the top letter and pocketed it. “Doesn’t matter if they do.”
    “What’s that supposed to mean?”
    “Just that. It doesn’t matter if they do. They’re not going to. I want them to want to for a good long time. I want them to
want
to see Julia and not be able to. I want them to want it so much, it drives them near crazy.”
    Emmy forked out a watery slice of meat and slapped it on top of one of the slices of bread. Juice spattered on the counter. “Brilliant idea, Mum. So very fair to Julia.”
    Mum rose on unsteady feet and yanked on Emmy’s arm, forcing her to look at her. More meat juices erupted from the tin in Emmy’s hand and speckled the floor.
    “That’s right. It
is
a brilliant idea. It’s my brilliant idea. Julia deserves to have what is rightfully hers. Just like we all do. Just like you do, Emmeline.” Mum let go of her arm. “And I intend to see she gets it.”
    Emmy watched as her mother kneeled down and used the handkerchief wet from tears and whiskey to mop the meat juice off the floor.
    “They obviously know where you live, Mum. Do youreally think you will be able to keep these people from seeing Julia until you have what you want from them?”
    Mum rose to her feet in one swift movement. “Is that what you think? That this is about what I want? When has anything ever been about what
I
want?”
    Emmy turned back to the sandwiches. “That’s all it ever is,” she muttered.
    Mum pulled at Emmy’s arm again, more gently this time. Her calm touch surprised Emmy.
    “You’re wrong, Em.” Mum reached up to touch her daughter’s face and Emmy involuntarily flinched. Mum tenderly tucked a curling wisp of hair behind Emmy’s ear. “Someday I am going to prove it to you.”
    For a moment, there was no age difference between the two of them, no crossed purposes, no opposing forces. They were just two women trying to chisel a happy life out of a giant hulk of rough-edged circumstances.
    Then the moment passed. Mum pulled the letter from her pocket, held it over the rubbish bin, and saw that Emmy was watching her. She shoved it back inside the pocket and sat down again.
    “There’s a designer who wants to teach me how to make patterns for my wedding dresses,” Emmy said a moment later. “He’s Mrs. Crofton’s cousin. He wants to see a couple of my sketches. He might mentor me in exchange for some hours working in his studio. He designs costumes for the West End, Mum.”
    Mum furrowed her brow in consternation. Emmy could see that her mother was forming a response that Emmy would not want to hear.
    “I’m nearly sixteen. Practically an adult,” Emmy said, already in defense mode.
    “Nearly isn’t is, Em. You’re not an adult yet. Not in the eyes of the law.”
    “But I know I can handle the extra work. Even when school starts in September. I can handle it. I’ve only a year left, anyway.” Emmy’s voice was rising in pitch and volume, and she tempered it to prove she was the rational adult she was claiming to be. “It’s not going to be a problem, Mum.”
    “School isn’t starting in September.”
    “What do you mean? Of course it is,” Emmy said.
    Mum picked up the other envelope that had come in the

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