Little Miracles Read online

  GISELLE GREEN

  Little Miracles

  Copyright

  This novel is entirely a work of fiction. The names, characters and incidents portrayed in it are the work of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or localities is entirely coincidental.

  A division of HarperCollinsPublishers Ltd.

  1 London Bridge Street

  London SE1 9GF

  www.harpercollins.co.uk

  Copyright © Giselle Green 2009

  Cover photograph © Shutterstock

  Cover design by Alison Groom © HarperCollinsPublishers Ltd 2018

  Giselle Green asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work

  A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library

  All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the nonexclusive, nontransferable right to access and read the text of this ebook on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, downloaded, decompiled, reverse-engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins ebooks.

  HarperCollinsPublishers has made every reasonable effort to ensure that any picture content and written content in this ebook has been included or removed in accordance with the contractual and technological constraints in operation at the time of publication

  Source ISBN: 9781847560681

  Ebook Edition © MARCH 2009 ISBN: 9780007320066

  Version: 2018-08-13

  Dedication

  To Eliott, because we both believe in miracles …

  Contents

  Cover

  Title Page

  Copyright

  Dedication

  Julia

  Charlie

  Julia

  Julia

  Charlie

  Julia

  Julia

  Charlie

  Julia

  Julia

  Charlie

  Julia

  Julia

  Julia

  Julia

  Julia

  Charlie

  Julia

  Charlie

  Julia

  Charlie

  Charlie

  Julia

  Julia

  Charlie

  Julia

  Charlie

  Julia

  Julia

  Julia

  Charlie

  Julia

  Julia

  Charlie

  Julia

  Julia

  Julia

  Julia

  Julia

  Julia

  Julia

  Julia

  Charlie

  Julia

  Charlie

  Julia

  Julia

  Julia

  Charlie

  Julia

  Julia

  Charlie

  Julia

  Charlie

  Charlie

  Julia

  Charlie

  Julia

  Julia

  Julia

  Julia

  Julia

  Preview

  Prologue

  Chapter 1

  Acknowledgements

  About the Author

  By The Same Author

  Back Ads

  About the Publisher

  The child with the long hair. It is him.

  The moment I caught sight of him I knew he was mine. He had his back turned to me, bending over the flat grey stones he had been gathering along the seashore, but a mother knows such things. He has grown, of course. He is no longer the baby that he was. But that lock of strawberry hair that always curled just so, under his ear, it’s still there. The way he holds his arms so close to his body, fists clenched, crouching over his stones, it is just the same and I know in my heart he is mine.

  Oh, I have searched so long for him. The woman who he turns his face to, calling out to her, Mama, Mama; she would never know how my heart feels, to see my child again. I have waited so patiently and endured so many bitter tears for this moment of reunion; so why do I hesitate now?

  I have sweeties for him. Gummy bears. He likes the red ones. After the memorial service this morning I went out and bought some because I knew, I knew, deep in the deepest part of my heart, that my boy was not really dead. I have never accepted it. I have prayed so hard that he might be delivered back to me. I have never given up faith. Even when all my staunchest allies and supporters gradually fell by the wayside, one by one, I never gave up believing. I never let him go.

  And now I am vindicated, because he is here.

  They will all see that I was right. I will have my child again, hold him in my arms again, touch the soft skin of his hands and smell the scent of his hair while he sleeps. Ah, how I have dreamed for that, longed for that.

  So why do I hesitate now?

  He turns, like an animal sensing he is watched. I have the dark sunglasses on, the ones I always wear so I may scrutinise others undetected. It’s a habit that I’ve got into; it’s been necessary. But he knows I am watching him. His unafraid eyes look directly into mine. He is secure within the boundaries of his own safe little world. His mama has marked out her territory in the usual way; the beach bags and the wind-breaker, the damp towels lining the sand, the children’s playthings, buckets and spades and plastic starfish surround the periphery like guards on patrol around the central watch-tower where she sits, under the beach umbrella.

  She has another baby in there. I can see that now. A newborn, judging by the size of the basket it’s in. She’s talking to it, singing a little, softly, laughing, touching the baby’s face, and I see my boy get up to go and join her.

  ‘Helados! Helados!’ The man with the bright yellow ice-cream box passes near them and I can see her shaking her head, smiling, as the child pulls on her arm. Later, she seems to be saying; I’ll get you one later, and I watch my son clap his hands in anticipation, do a little jig.

  The pang of jealousy that shoots through me right then, it feels like the sharp end of a sword. It feels as if this woman – this unknown woman, who has stolen my baby – she would kill me with her happiness. But it is all over for her. She will see. I will have him back and then she will know what it is to suffer as I have suffered. She will know what it is to be bereft of a child.

  How could a woman do such a thing to another woman? She cannot know, she cannot, what she has done to me. How she has caused me to become twisted in such knots. I can scarcely breathe for thinking about it. I can scarcely force my feet nearer to the place where her bastion lies, the place I shall soon enter to take back what is mine.

  And I shall, too, because her attention is unevenly divided between the two of them. She lowers her face so gently into the basket, whispering sweet nothings while he, his mind back on his mountain of stones, is forgotten. In a minute he will venture a little further down along the shore to find another stone, and then another one. I know, I have been watching what he’s been doing. Each foray takes him a little further away from the safety of her watch-tower. Each little trip for stones brings him closer to his real mama, back to me.

  And I am feeling calmer, now. Much calmer than I ever thought I would be, considering what it is I’m planning to do. I have found courage from somewhere; the courage of a mother. Clearly, there is no way this woman will ever admit to what she’s done, nor will she willingly give him back.

  No, if justice is to be served, there is only one way forward. I just have to wait here a little bit longer and soon, very soon, my child will be back within my reach.

  Julia

  Everything is going to be all right.

  It’s going to be just fine.

  ‘Have you told him yet?’ Alys’s text, engraved like the guilty secret in my heart, has just popped up on my mobile. My spirits sink right down to my toes and I know Charlie sees it because his eyebrows go up inquisitively.

  ‘It’s nothing.’ I plaster a smile on my face, snapping the phone shut. ‘Just Alys.’ But from the minute we enter the arrivals lounge at Malaga airport, blinking like moles emerging from a tunnel into the bright Christmas lights, the urge to just come clean with him is overwhelming.

  I want to tell him. I’ve got to tell him.

  Sometimes you’ve got to do a thing just because it’s the right thing to do. Even though the thought of doing it fills you with fear. Even though you know that the people you love most in the world might judge you for it; that you might lose them over it.

  The longer I leave this, the harder it is going to get.

  Any second now, all Charlie’s family will be here to greet us. Not just his brother Roberto who is bringing the car, but the rest of them, too; his sister-in-law Eva and the kids.

  ‘And my aunt Laura and her husband,’ Charlie ticks them off on his fingers, ‘and my abuela Agustina and her neighbour Pepi … there’s going to be a whole crowd of them coming to pick us up.’ He stops and gives me a reassuring squeeze around the waist when he sees my face.

  ‘Why so many?’ I swallow.


  ‘They’ll be curious to get a look at you, Julia; you and our son.’ He grins at Hadyn who has one arm wrapped, koala-like, around my neck at the moment. The other, as ever, is gripping tight onto Bap-Bap, the white elephant.

  ‘Moon,’ Hadyn informs his father. He’s been tracking the moon through the airport windows ever since we left the plane.

  ‘Moon,’ Charlie confirms. He’s got that just-woken-up look, his rumpled fair brown hair falling into his eyes, a five o’clock shadow because he was up at dawn finishing off in the surgery. He’s got creases under his eyes but I know it’s the kind of rugged unkempt look that women of all ages can’t resist sneaking a second look at.

  Damn, I’m lucky.

  Charlie grins suddenly, catching me admiring him. He makes my heart jump. I push my mobile phone down into the very bottom of my handbag. I’ll deal with this later.

  Now that our fellow travellers are slowing down, coming to a stop, I take a curious peek out of the windows myself. If I squint hard I can just make out the silhouette of some palm trees way in the distance.

  ‘Moon,’ Hadyn murmurs again, and I make an exaggerated show of looking up. Above the rows of planes parked on the tarmac a crescent moon rides high, much bigger and yellower than it seems back in England. When we stop again, the queue slowing down as people pause to get out their documents, Charlie’s hand steals up to the hairgrip I’ve used to twist my hair into a demure bun, and pulls it out.

  ‘Charlie!’ My hair tumbles down in a mass of dark unruly curls about my shoulders.

  ‘You look better like that.’

  ‘No I don’t!’ Now I’m never going to look how I wanted to – poised and elegant for the relatives.

  He silences me with a kiss on my mouth.

  ‘You’re going to love Spain,’ he promises, and for one split second I forget about the bone of contention that is threatening to loom between us.

  I haven’t got out of the airport and I love Spain already. I love the sound of his abuela’s villa up in the mountains. Charlie’s told me about the prickly pear plants that grow there and the horses that run wild. I love the sound of the little round cakes covered with marzipan and pine nuts that they put out at Christmas. I love Charlie’s description of the rough-hewn stone church of San José where he was christened; it backs out onto the cemetery where the bones of his ancestors have been interred for centuries.

  I don’t think my dad was buried with his forefathers.

  I think what it must be like to have a place back home where all my ancestors were buried. It would be nice to think of them all being in one place; it gives a person a sense of stability, knowing that they’ve come from somewhere. Me, my dad’s side were from Donegal and my mum’s from Croydon, but the way I feel inside I might have been blown in on a Gulf-stream breeze, a milk-thistle seed that’ll just set up store wherever it happens to land. At least Charlie has got roots.

  Anyhow, that crescent moon – if I put my hand up to the window I can cup it in my right hand, so that means it is waxing, getting bigger. My Irish nan Ella would have said that means we are heading towards something. We’re on a path that hasn’t completed its course yet. My thumb slides automatically over the engagement ring sitting newly on my ring finger.

  God, there is so much to look forward to, so much that I long for.

  I am going to tell Charlie what I need to tell him; I’ll do it tonight. Alys is right. I can’t put it off any more.

  ‘Is Spain going to love me though?’ I bite my lip as Charlie nudges me.

  ‘Spain will love you,’ he reassures me solidly ‘as much as I do.’

  He’s right. And I mustn’t be scared of what’s coming. It is what it is. If I can be matter-of-fact about it, then probably so will they. If only Charlie’s time weren’t so consumed by a million and one things then I probably would have brought it up before. There would have been the right moment …

  ‘Julia, look over by the barrier. They’re all over there!’ Charlie’s face creases into a huge grin. Now I see them, and there must be over twenty of them – a sea of tanned, beaming faces; lots of arms waving excitedly, ‘Aqui! Aqui!’ Here, they call. Over the heads of the line in front of us I can just glimpse the children hopping up and down underneath the rope barrier, the greying heads of the aunties not looking our way at all, chatting to each other, dressed in ubiquitous black; I’m guessing that the well-dressed elegant lady must be Charlie’s sister-in-law, Eva.

  Which one is Agustina, though? The knot in my stomach returns with a vengeance. His grandmother is the one who matters most of all to him, I’ve picked up that much.

  The suitcase in front of us gets picked up. The line moves on but Hadyn is wriggling down now out of my grasp. He runs back a few paces to examine the huge Christmas tree that stands to one side of our route like a sentinel. When I look at him I can’t help feeling some of the tension drain right out of me. He looks so sturdy that he makes me smile. He’s barely fourteen months old but has the determination to match any teenager.

  ‘You coming?’ I ask him.

  He shakes his head, solemn. I changed him into his new cotton PJ top when we were on the plane, and only now do I notice you can see his tummy poking out the bottom. I give it a sharp downwards pull.

  ‘Oh yes, you are. You’re coming with me, mister.’ He doesn’t respond but his hand in mine feels solid and warm.

  ‘All the people have come,’ I tell him brightly. ‘All your cousins and your aunties and uncles. All these people have come here just to see us. Isn’t that kind? Shall we go and say hello to them?’ Hadyn doesn’t budge.

  ‘Come on.’ I need a bribe, quick. I don’t want them to think he’s naughty or anything. I dig in my bag for his bottle. Out comes my Spanish linguaphone CDs that I’ve been listening to on the flight; out comes a large pack of baby-wipes and a spare nappy; some polo mints, my sunglasses. Oh shoot, I didn’t leave the bottle behind on my plane seat, did I?

  ‘Hey, J.!’ Charlie has turned back, eyes shining; he’s already reached the waiting crowd.

  ‘Come on, Hadyn. Your public awaits you.’ I scoop my son up in my arms before he can protest and hurry over to where everyone is waiting.

  ‘Julia, welcome to Spain. Mira el niño, qué guapo!’ The women crowd around me at once.

  ‘So, how’s Dr Lowerby?’ I’m aware, out of the corner of my eye, of Roberto slapping Charlie heartily on the back. The women are all smiling at me, asking me questions, but I can’t tear my eyes away from the brothers. Roberto doesn’t look like Charlie. His eyes are typically Spanish, flashing, dark. His hair is spiked short and still black. He must take after their late mother, Conchita, while Charlie, with lighter brown hair, green-eyed, looks more like their father, who’s a Yorkshireman, Northallerton born and bred. Something, though – I can’t tell quite what – something makes them brothers, places them in a common bloodline.

  Now the woman with the bright red lipstick – who introduced herself to me as my ‘sister-in-law’, Eva – is cooing enthusiastically.

  ‘Hadyn is a true Sanchez.’ A murmur of approval and agreement goes round the crowd. ‘Abuela is going to love him. She is waiting in the car,’ she tells me, ‘because of her legs.’

  ‘He looks just like Conchita,’ she adds, and when Charlie glances back at Hadyn now, I catch a glimpse of a certain machismo pride in his eyes. Hadyn grins broadly at his aunt as she strokes the dimple on his cheek that apparently makes him the spitting image of Charlie’s beloved late mother.

  I wish I could catch exactly what it is they are saying. I’ve drawn back a little now and I can see they have broken up into little sub-groups. The men are walking slightly ahead with Hadyn, talking motorway routes and roadworks.

  ‘There are long delays – road-works – on the E30,’ Roberto is telling Charlie. ‘You can’t take the Costa road to Arenadeluna. We’ll have to take the motorway.’

  My attention is drawn back to Eva as we women all walk along together. Two teenagers are pushing our trolley ahead of them now, the younger children grouped around them. ‘That’s Giorge, my son,’ she tells me with obvious pride. ‘He wants to go and work in the City now he’s left school, but we’re trying to persuade him to find work here.’ She nods encouragingly at me. ‘And you, Julia, you have been to Spain before?’