The Girl With No Past by Kathryn Croft Page A

go of my hand and once again stared ahead of her. A young mother walked past, clutching her toddler’s hand, and she smiled at us, obviously assuming we were having a nice chat. Mother and daughter. Years ahead of her and her own girl. But at that moment I felt more as if we were strangers than members of the same family.
    ‘Yes, I suppose it’s more than you normally do, and I should be grateful for that. Anyway, the only thing you can do is ignore this person. They’re just trying to upset you. Stop replying to the messages. I’m sure it will all go away, once the anniversary is further behind you.’ You, she had said, not us. That summed up Mum’s feelings about it all; it was my problem to deal with.
    I wanted to ask her who she thought it could be, but she chose that moment to stand up. ‘We’d better get back, hadn’t we? I’ll make us some lunch, would you like that?’ And as quickly as it had started, the conversation was over.
    Somehow I managed to nod, even though I was confused by Mum’s attitude. She was always telling me to be more open, yet when I had been, about something so personal too, she brushed me off and moved on, filing the problem away in a neat compartment and forgetting it existed.
    And as we headed home, Mum twittering on about her friend, Nancy, who needed an operation, I had never felt more alone. That was what happened when you let people in.

    Back at the house, Mum made cheese and ham sandwiches and we sat at the dining room table, a setting far too formal for the occasion. There was no more mention of my predicament, and Mum didn’t question me further about Julian or Ben. Instead, she asked me about Maria and whether or not I thought of her as a friend.
    ‘In a way,’ I told her. ‘But I haven’t known her that long. It’s more of a work friendship.’
    Mum peeled the crust from her sandwich. ‘I see. Well, friendships take time to grow, don’t they?’ And then she changed the subject once again and told me she was planning to go to Derby next weekend to put flowers on Dad’s gravestone.
    ‘Come with me, Leah. You haven’t been for so long, I think it would be good for you.’
    It was strange she had chosen to have him buried there, in the town they had both lived as children, yet she had stayed put in Watford. But I could never bring myself to ask her about it. I assumed the main reason was because she didn’t want to say goodbye to the memories of Dad. But there was another alternative: perhaps Watford was as tainted for her as it was for me so she didn’t want him laid to rest here.
    ‘I have to work on Saturday,’ I said. ‘But I promise I’ll come next time.’
    After we finished eating, I helped Mum wash up – she didn’t believe in putting the dishwasher on unless she’d had a houseful of guests, so seemed to forget she had one – and then told her I had to go. I was expecting a protest but she only nodded and told me to call when I got back home.
    ‘I want to show you something before you go,’ she said.
    She led the way upstairs and with each step I found it harder to control my breathing. I never went up there on these visits, never wanted to see my room, which Mum had left unchanged since I’d moved out. But she opened my bedroom door and stepped in, urging me to follow. What choice did I have? I couldn’t make a scene. I tried to remember how I had left it, but couldn’t picture it. Was there anything in there that would remind me of it?
    I walked in and what I saw stunned me. The room wasn’t mine. The walls had been stripped of my blue wallpaper and painted lilac. Over by the window, a double bed replaced the single one I’d had, and a matching wardrobe and chest of drawers lined the other walls. There were no posters, clothes or CDs; it was void of everything I’d ever owned. I turned to Mum and she didn’t acknowledge my shock.
    ‘I thought it was for the best,’ she said. ‘Now you might actually want to stay here once in a