Page 22 of The Next Chapter

And then before I can chicken out, I say, ‘Shall we get started, then?’

Lola shuffles again but nods. Quiet Lola makes me a bit nervous.

To distract myself, I press record.

‘Try not to worry about it recording,’ I tell her. ‘Just say whatever feels natural to you. It’ll help me get a sense of your style. And don’t worry about being too specific, we can go over dates and stuff at the end.’

Lola nods again and then takes a deep breath. Visibly swallows. But then, she begins.

My ma said that I was born on the coldest day of the year.

Which is saying something. Because down in Greenwell Springs, Louisiana we never got cold weather.

But that year, 1974, there was a freak storm.

Ma said the walls were rattling with the wind and rain was coming through the windows and she really hoped that I’d stay put a little while longer.

’Cept I didn’t. Da was singing, playing his guitar to distract the others when Ma felt the first twinge.

Apparently, she knew then that I’d be trouble.

’Cause of the storm, the midwife couldn’t get to them. Greenwell Springs was a half-hour drive from Baton Rouge, though if anyone ever asked, that’s where we always said we were from. No one ever heard of Greenwell Springs, after all.

Not that it mattered so much, about the midwife being stuck in the city.

Ma had four babies by then, all under six.

So, I guess her body just knew what to do.

Not even two hours after that first contraction, I was here.

Pa said that I screamed so loud that I drowned out the howling wind.

Ruined the bedroom rug too. It was Ma’s favourite and I’m not sure she ever forgave me for it.

For being born in a storm or the rug either.

All’s I know is that right from the off, I was in the way. Inconvenient.

Like I said, I was baby number five. Two more came after. Real quick. All born on bright sunny days like we were used to. There was so many of us, we all got labelled with one thing or another, you know?

Stevie was the clever one.

Molly was the one who looked after us when Ma and Pa were busy. Everyone said she was the kind one. That’s what she got for being the eldest, I suppose.

Jessie was the cute one. The baby of the family.

And me? I was the difficult one. The one born in a storm.

I didn’t mean to be a problem. I was always just under Ma’s feet, in the way. And if we were all playing, I’d be the one to fall and rip my dress.

Pa wasn’t around a lot. He was a singer so he went where the work was. Did a few stints in prison too. I sometimes wondered how Ma managed to have so many babies, seeing how much time she spent on her own with us.

There were some happy times too, course there was.

Ma had this garden at the front of the house that was real beautiful.

Pa used to say that she’d grow a flower from a stone given half the chance.

Sometimes, she’d let me help her. That’s when I didn’t feel in the way so much.

When me and Ma would plant in the garden together. Growing flowers from tiny little seeds.

But it was hard too. I think we all felt like the walls of the house might fall down at any time.

It was this rickety old thing. Down a path that got so dusty in the summer.

It’s not like here, where houses are built of bricks or stone, solid like.

The wood was nailed together for a wall, and here and there you could see the outside through it.

It had been in Ma’s family for decades. They’d been farmers and it was the old farmhouse.

Pa was no farmer, though. I reckon Ma’s parents thought him a right flighty thing.

He had these big ideas about how the world should be, but he never bothered so much with all of us in the farmhouse.

The world at home. I know that now, looking back.

At the time, I think I blamed Ma for driving him away.

For never smiling when he came home and always nagging at him to fix this or to get a proper job.

It got to the point where all they did was argue.

I guess that’s why he started coming home less and less.

I think I was about twelve when he stopped coming home at all. He didn’t even take his guitar with him. One day he just got up after supper and walked out of the door.

Didn’t look back.

‘Do you mind if we stop there?’ Lola asks and I jolt.

‘Of course.’ I reach to turn off the recording, finding it harder than I should to look Lola in the eye.

It’s just… sad. I’d known that Lola’s family were poor, you can find it out on any internet search of her: ‘Lola Starr grew up in poverty on the outskirts of Baton Rouge, Louisiana. ’ But hearing it brought to life… It makes Lola more real than I was prepared for.

‘It’s nice that you come from a big family,’ I say, even though we’re not really meant to pass comment on what the clients have revealed. My eyes flicker to the guitar again. I wonder if that was her dad’s?

‘I don’t know, all those little ’uns put me off babies for life.’

It’s a throwaway comment, but I feel it sting like a slap to my cheek.

Lola must realize that she’s said something to upset me because she says, ‘I’m not trying to make anyone feel sorry for me.’ I have to look at her, then. She’s clasped her hands together, linked her fingers so tightly that her knuckles are pulled taut.

‘I know, don’t worry,’ I say, forcing myself to relax.

It’s not like I don’t already know that she left.

It’s hardly a surprise to hear that she doesn’t like babies.

‘This is your story,’ I tell Lola, because she still looks troubled, shifting around on her stool, hands still tight.

Even the dog seems restless, he’s twitching away in his sleep.

‘It’s your recollections that we’re noting down here. We can work it however you want.’

‘I want it to be the truth.’ She looks at me then with piercing blue eyes. Like she’s willing me to believe her.

‘The truth,’ I agree.

Heck, it’s not always the case. Chances are, in most instances, people might tweak things to make themselves look better than they really are.

And I get it. Who wants to come across as anything but the hero in their own life story?

Even when people say they want the truth, they don’t mean it.

That’s our job. To give people a starring role in their own lives.

But something tells me that when Lola says she wants the truth, she means it.

‘Well, I’ll work on typing this up,’ I tell her. ‘There should be enough here for a first chapter. If it’s okay with you, I’ll add some context. Describe Baton Rouge in the seventies, that sort of thing?’

Lola nods, standing up. ‘I’ve got a picture of us all that you can see, if it would help?’ she asks.

‘Absolutely.’ I aim for professional, thinking that it comes off far too breathless.

Lola doesn’t seem to notice. I’m going to see more of my family!

I think, my palms suddenly clammy. My insides squirm as Lola pulls out a black, worn notebook from underneath a pile on a bookshelf and thumbs her way to the back page.

‘I think it’s in… ah yes, here it is. Y’all can keep it for a while if it would help.’

Holding it between her thumb and forefinger, Lola passes me the picture. It’s in colour, but that sort of watered-down colour that makes it seem like everything in the past took place in sepia.

There they all are.

Stood in front of a one-story wooden house, with long grass pushed up against the front and a window shutter hanging on its hinges, there’s Lola’s family.

‘I think I must have been about six,’ Lola says, and I spot her as a child.

She’s closest to the man who must have been her dad.

He has his arm around her, smiling wide.

Lola is half hidden behind him, squinting at the picture, her hair as long and blonde as it is today.

Over his other shoulder is a guitar. It is the one in the corner. I’m looking at a family heirloom.

In the picture, around Lola and her dad, there are the other children, all at various heights. Jessie, her youngest brother, is still a baby, balancing on his mum’s hip.

I wonder what happened to all of my aunties and uncles.

Surely most of them are still alive. They’ll only be Lola’s age, some slightly older, some younger.

They all have Lola’s wispy hair. Her small features.

Obviously, I must get my looks from my birth father.

Maybe I can ask Lola what happened to them in a later session and claim it as research.

Maybe she’ll tell me willingly without even asking.

Because I can’t deny that this session has thrown up a lot.

‘Pa had just got out of jail, I think,’ she tells me. ‘He hadn’t been in long, but long enough to know he didn’t want to go back.’

I nod, clocking a tall, wiry man with long hair and a moustache.

It’s Lola’s mum that I zero in on, though.

Perhaps it’s just what Lola told me about her that’s affecting my perception, but she looks exhausted.

She’s holding Jessie and her other hand is resting on her hip.

She’s thin. Her hair, which is just like Lola’s, long and blonde, is straggly.

She’s smiling, but it looks forced. I think of the difficulty I have keeping Elton and Dad’s plants going and then look at all of those children her mum had before she was even my age. No wonder she was exhausted.

‘Is your mum still alive?’ I ask, before I can help myself.

Lola shakes her head.

‘We lost touch, after I left home. But my brother Jessie wrote to say she’d passed thirty or so years ago.’

Thirty years. I’m thirty. Lola’s mum died the year I was born.

Suddenly, I’m hot all over. It’s like my skin is stretched too tight over me. I don’t fit. The walls in the office seem to get closer, trapping me. I need to get out of this crowded little office and go someplace to think.

‘I’m sorry for your loss,’ I say. It sounds like the platitude that it is, because the truth is, grieving parents who were total top tier, gold star parents is really hard. But I have a feeling that grieving one when things were more complicated is even harder still.

Lola nods.

We do an awkward shuffle as I try to manoeuvre around her and the giant dog to get to the door. My arms and legs don’t seem to be working as well as they usually do.

‘So, if it’s okay with you, I’d like to do another session this week?’ I’m back to brusque, business like, trying to ignore the weird tight skin sensation. ‘We’re a little short on time. It won’t compromise on quality, though, don’t worry. I’ve done it before from time to time.’

I mean when people are dying and they don’t think they’ll have six weeks left. But I don’t tell Lola that.

She nods. ‘That’s good for me. How’s Wednesday after breakfast, same time?’

‘Perfect.’ I smile. I just need to keep my shit together for a few more minutes. ‘If we could finish up your earlier childhood in that chapter, that should work nicely for chapter two.’

‘I’ll see you then, Lily,’ she says.

‘Not if I see you first.’ I have literally no idea why I said that, but Lola leans back and laughs and like before, she looks ten years younger. As if the shadows which hang around her sometimes just disappear, floating off into the stratosphere.

I do an awkward wave and step back into the corridor, letting my breath out once the door to the office is closed behind me.

It’s impossible not to feel like the ground has shifted somewhat. Before I got to know Lola, she was just a figment of my imagination. And even if that figment was a fame hungry, drug-addled egomaniac, it was never more than two-dimensional.

But it’s like every moment I spend with the real Lola, she becomes more fleshed out, and hearing her history is only making it more so. I just don’t know how to feel.

Heading back towards the cottage, I wonder how on earth I’m going to survive the next few weeks.