A Scandalous Secret

‘Cor! I remember you said you were half Indian but, bloody hell, that’s a long way away. Not quite like my little trip around to that council block in Merton I told you about, eh?’

Conscious of Tim standing by, Sonya said, ‘You don’t mind if I put Tim in the picture, do you, Chels?’ She waited until Chelsea nodded before explaining, ‘Chelsea’s an adopted child too, Tim, and, when she turned eighteen recently, she went off in search of her birth parents. I more or less got the idea from her when we met at Tabitha Stott’s birthday party recently.’

‘Was it difficult, your search?’ Tim asked Chelsea.

‘Took all of two weeks,’ Chelsea laughed, ‘and eventually I found the couple who gave birth to me living not more than a mile away from where I grew up in Wimbledon Village!’

‘Wow!’ Tim responded, ‘What was that like?’

‘Terrifying, I can tell you now,’ Chelsea said, her blackened witch’s teeth gleaming as she laughed. ‘I took to waking up in a cold sweat for days after, imagining them trying to break into my parents’ house to get me. And anything else they could find while they were there!’

‘But you’re still glad you did it, yes?’ Sonya asked.

Chelsea nodded. ‘I think I needed to plug a few gaps in my head. Luckily, I had the full support of my parents who helped me every inch of the way. My dad especially. But he was an adopted child himself, you see, so I think he really understood. Are your parents okay about your search?’

Sonya hesitated for a moment, reluctant to say anything disloyal about her parents. ‘Poor Mum and Dad,’ she said. ‘They’re just a bit confused right now. But they’ll come around in the end, I know. They love me far too much.’

‘Well, what have you found out so far?’ Chelsea persisted.

‘Not a great deal. Just that the woman who gave birth to me lives in India. Apparently, she refused to divulge the name of the man who’d fathered me so there’s nothing on him in the records. But, as I’m going to India next week, I may have more to tell you after that.’

‘Going to India? Hey, what an adventure – my trip to Merton does rather pale by comparison! Are you going too?’ Chelsea asked Tim.

‘No,’ Sonya responded swiftly, ‘I’m going with Estella, actually.’

‘Cool,’ Chelsea repeated, although Sonya knew that was not how Tim felt at all.

A couple of hours later, Sonya told herself mournfully that the party wasn’t quite working. Only for her, that is, going by the general whoops of merriment that were audible from the yard outside and the growing mountain of empty beer cans she could see just outside the door. She cast a glance around the mill from her uncomfortable perch on a wooden stool. She was sitting as close as she possibly could to the ovens without singeing her eyebrows because she had found herself freezing to death in her skimpy sari. It was also preventing her from helping Estella, who was at this moment laying out great platters of food on the trestle tables at the far end of the kitchen. This was supposed to have been a joint party, Sonia thought with an annoyed humph. But here she was, stupidly forced into being a guest because she was sure she would trip and snag Priyal’s mum’s beautiful sari if she ventured to undertake domestic chores while wearing it. How on earth did Indian women go to parties and do their household chores wearing these things, she wondered.

Chapter Five

Sharat walked towards the breakfast room, humming a jaunty tune. Last night’s party had been an unqualified success and the icing on the cake had been the Home Minister’s promise as he’d left. ‘Don’t worry, I’ll have a word with the PM,’ Vir-ji had said, leaning out of the window of his liveried car. ‘Leave it with me for a few days, Sharat. And keep your fingers crossed – there are many vying for the same seat, you know!’

It had been less than a year ago that Sharat had first voiced his ambition of becoming an MP to a few friends with political connections and, even though he knew what an asset he would be to any party, the haste with which the Congress party had opened its doors had been astonishing. Now, from his very energising conversation with the Home Minister last night, it was clearly only a matter of time before the offer of a safe seat came. One of the South Delhi constituencies would be best, Sharat thought, areas where the educated newly rich were desperate to see the face of politics change for the better. And better he would make it, that he was sure of. It was a natural calling, to be mindful of the welfare of other, less fortunate people. He had insisted on egalitarianism even as a child: persuading his mother to give away his clothes to the cook’s son before he had even outgrown them and preferring to play cricket with the children of their factory workers rather than Scrabble and caroms with Shashi, his sickly and rather snobbish cousin who was Sharat’s only companion in the family home. Most of all, he was fortunate to have money from the cloth mills started by his grandfather and didn’t see the need to waste his time building up more wealth, especially when there were no children to pass it on to. Even his cousin, Shashi, was childless.

‘Morning, sweetheart,’ Sharat said, his voice cheery as he saw Neha’s figure already seated in her customary swing chair that overlooked the blooming flower beds in the garden. He noticed in a glance that she looked exhausted. ‘Still recovering from last night, eh?’ he enquired, unfurling a yellow gingham napkin over his lap. When Neha only muttered a response, Sharat looked at her more carefully. She really didn’t look very well. At thirty-seven, she was still a very attractive woman, with creamy smooth skin and a trim figure, but this morning her skin was sallow and there were grey shadows under her eyes. It was also unusual to see her still in her dressing gown, rather than in the exercise gear she usually wore for her walk around Lodhi Gardens. ‘It was a fabulous party, thanks in no small measure to you,’ Sharat said, leaning over to plant a big wet kiss on Neha’s cheek. Helping himself to a cinnamon bagel from the toast rack, he proceeded to spread a generous smear of butter on it, grinning as he saw Neha wince visibly. Neha did enough exercise for both of them, Sharat sometimes said jocularly, content in the knowledge that he was blessed with a naturally thin frame. Of late, however, Neha had been at him to stay off the fatty foods because of the slightly high cholesterol count that had been revealed in his last six-monthly checkup. But Sharat really did love the raisin and cinnamon bagels that Neha bought for him from the Hyatt bakery, and a bagel without butter was worse than poories without aloo. ‘Carbs and fat, a marriage made in heaven, just like ours,’ he sometimes teased.

‘You’re unusually quiet, Neh. Are you okay?’ Sharat asked, turning in his chair to face his wife as he took a sip of coffee and chewed on his bagel. ‘Didn’t you think it all went wonderfully well yesterday?’

Neha finally roused herself, sitting up from her slouching position. She swallowed a mouthful of coffee and put her cup down before speaking. ‘It did go very well. No, I’m fine, Sharat, just a bit tired.’

‘Well, you won’t have to do this for another six months,’ Sharat said, unscrewing the pot of marmalade. ‘By the way, I’m thinking of going off to Lucknow for a couple of days.’

‘Oh, when?’

‘Well, if I can get on the evening flight, I may even go today. It’s important for me to go see the old boy and get his blessing, given what the Home Minister said last night. I may even ask him to contribute to the campaign. Which I think he’ll readily do. Want to come?’

Neha thought for a minute before shaking her head. ‘No thanks, Sharat. But I may get away for a couple of days myself.’

‘Anywhere special? You were talking about Damascus and Samarkand the other day, weren’t you?’ Sharat enquired.

‘Not right now, that’ll take some planning. No, I was thinking of a week in Ananda up in the Himalayas, actually. Or any other decent spa within easy reach. I’ve been longing for some R&R for a while but it’s been one thing after another, as you know,’ Neha replied.

‘Ananda’s a great idea, sweetheart,’ Sharat said. ‘You love it there, don’t you? I must say I was worried at the thought of you wandering around Samarkand on your own. Let’s do that together some other time, yes?’

‘Well, Sandhya went on her own to Samarkand and Tashkent, and said it was fine. But, yes, I’d rather go there with you. There’s no hurry …’

‘For now, Ananda will be the best break and do you some good before the winter sets in too. And I’m happy for you to indulge, seeing how little I care for all that alternative yoga-shoga stuff myself! Get Chacko to book it for you today.’

Sharat left the house in a flurry of phone calls, still talking into his BlackBerry as he got into the back seat of his Mercedes. As was customary, Neha stood on the step watching his car leave the gates to be swallowed into the morning traffic on Prithviraj Road. If she could only tell Sharat about the letter … Over the years, she had grown used to telling him everything, even the tiniest details collected over the day. But this was different. This was a revelation that would shatter his world … rob him of every last ounce of love and trust he had for her …

Neha turned and returned indoors, her steps lethargic and heavy as she climbed the sweeping stairs up to her bedroom on the first floor. She locked the big teak door behind her and then, almost as though pulled by a magnetic force, made for the cupboard where the letter lay. She had not been able to reread it since it had arrived yesterday but she had thought of virtually nothing else. Her sleep had been broken by strange dreams in which she was wandering through a paediatrics ward full of screaming babies.

Using the big bunch of keys that was almost always tucked into the waistband of her trousers or sari, Neha unlocked the outer doors before opening the safe that housed her jewellery when it was taken out of the bank vault. She had tucked the letter behind a stack of cheque books and could see a corner of the white envelope sticking out from under the large blue velvet case of her antique pearl choker. Holding the letter to her chest, Neha climbed back into bed and pulled the silk razai over herself. She read and reread the words, running the tip of her forefinger over the childish writing and the name ‘Sonya’, before starting to cry. At first, she cried quietly, sobbing softly into balled fists, the letter lying now in her lap. Then, helplessly, as the tears grew more copious, Neha tried desperately to muffle her moaning and hiccupping by holding a pillow over her face. It was the kind of weeping fit she had not indulged in since she was a child. The floodgates had opened up and Neha – strong and controlled and always in charge – was back to being a frightened and confused teenager all over again.

The thin blue line on the home pregnancy kit was unmistakable. Could it be faulty? Please, please, let it be faulty! It had to be wrong! This was not how pregnancies happened, surely. But someone was outside the toilet now, awaiting their turn. Must hurry, get rid of the evidence, stuff it into the bin, cover it up with lots of tissue, pull the flush and get out before anyone realizes something’s wrong!

I emerged from the toilet, and my life was changed. I was a child no more because I now had a dark secret. Nothing like the kind of secret children keep. A big and terrible secret that would need to be covered up, like that pregnancy kit in the bin, hastily shoved under soiled tissues and detritus.

Chapter Six

Waking up the day after her party, Sonya studiously avoided looking at herself as she went past the mirrored wardrobes to her bathroom. Day-old mascara was terrible – more panda than princess on the morning after!

She slipped off her nightshirt and examined the top half of her body critically. Tim had told her again last night that she had the perfect figure, trying to be romantic by snogging her under the stars and struggling to stick his clammy palm under her sari blouse, telling her how much he was going to miss her. But, in reality, there had been nothing romantic at all about that fumbling grope in the middle of a wet field stinking of manure. Sonya had finally shoved Tim away, put out by his sour beery breath and worried he would tread on the edge of her sari and get mud all over it. His eagerness to please was truly starting to irritate rather than endear. He had made such an ass of himself at the party too – he’d never been able to handle too much drink. When on a sudden impulse a few of the girls had piled into a car to go into Orpington town centre for ice creams, he had insisted on coming along. And then, instead of going into the ice-cream parlour, he’d stood outside, still dressed in his Roman toga and squirting startled passers-by with his plastic sword that doubled as a water pistol. One elderly pensioner had been so enraged by the unexpected attack that he had chased Tim down the road, waving his brolly and shouting profanities until Tim had been rescued by an escape car full of giggling girls.

Sonya counted in her head while brushing her teeth. Tim had been her boyfriend for eight months now and, at first, Sonya had thought they were made for each other, both of them being clever and bookish and ardent followers of Man U. But lately (and she should admit that perhaps her unexpected four As and subsequent admission to Oxford had something to do with it), Sonya had started to find Timothy’s adoration clingy and suffocating. She would probably upset Mum something terrible if she dumped him, however, as Laura had taken an early shine to Timothy’s shambling diffident manner. She had always been a bit of a sucker for middle-class manners and speech too, all that mumbling and swallowing of consonants. ‘An accent snob, that’s what you are, Mum,’ Sonya was given to joke. ‘Oh, and a sucker for the starving millions! You don’t need to feed him every day, you know. He’s perfectly well-fed at his own house.’ But the mere sight of Tim’s thin, gangling frame entering their home seemed to set Laura off on a reforming mission into the kitchen, where Timothy had of late become a habitual visitor, treated to the Shaw household’s typically robust and nutritious meals. ‘You may not think so now but this lad will make something of his life,’ Laura Shaw often said soon after Tim had gone, sometimes adding darkly, as though reading her daughter’s mind, ‘Do hang onto him, love – good boyfriends are like gold dust, you’ll soon discover.’

Sonya towelled herself dry before she wandered back into her room and opened her wardrobe to find something suitable for what promised to be a warm day. Was there a dress code for a dump-your-boyfriend-day, Sonya wondered, only half joking with herself. It was best not to look too scrummy, lest the dumpee’s pain was thus intensified. And not too plain so as to cause no pain at all! Sonya shook her head. Perhaps she did not need to agonize so much over splitting up with Tim. It was very likely that his imminent departure for Durham University would finish things off between them anyway, the distance between Oxford and Durham being not inconsiderable for a pair of penurious students. But Sonya had always liked clear lines and stated intentions and the last thing she wanted was to skulk around avoiding Tim when it was so much easier to just tell him the truth.

Would she miss him at some point, Sonya wondered, hooking together her bra while staring at herself hard in the mirror, trying to induce some guilt. Then she shrugged her shoulders. Given the way Tim had whinged on about her going off to Asia with Estella, she thought not. And it wasn’t even as if he presented a viable option! His delicate stomach had made him nervous of travelling abroad (a take-away from the Shalimar down the road invariably brought on the runs, from what he’d once let slip) and so Tim had never been seriously considered as a travelling companion for the two girls, despite both their parents suggesting it at some point. Besides, in a crisis, Sonya was sure that she and Estella would keep their heads a lot better than Tim ever would.

Twirling a pair of knickers on her forefinger, Sonya turned to examine her smooth, bare bum in the full-length mirror. Hmmm … not bad at all, she thought, finally recognizing – this recognition having come only well into her teens – how lucky she was to have her unusual golden skin tone that never required the hours on sunbeds and pots of tanning cream that so many of her friends were slaves to. There were some advantages to being of mixed race. Someone at school had, in fact, recently told her that the blend of Indian and European was one of the best because Indian genes, being not as strong as African or Chinese, provided just the right element of exotica to balance out the normal pallor of Caucasian skin without taking over. Her hair was darker than the usual mousy English colouring for one, and her skin came out in what she now knew was a lovely light coffee by June. Dad, being Welsh, had darker aspects to him and it was only when they saw him that people who knew nothing of Sonya’s adoption looked reassured. You could see their puzzlement at Sonya’s long dark tresses and tanned skin, so starkly different from her mother’s pale and rather washed-out blonde looks.

Sonya pulled on her knickers and a tee-shirt and looked more closely at her face again, searching – as she had been doing more and more of late – for traces of Indianness in her bone structure. Virtually everyone had complimented her on how beautiful she looked at last night’s party and Sonya had even caught herself the other day leafing through one of those glossy Indian bridal magazines in WH Smith, looking at the models wearing heavy clothes and make up and searching for some kind of commonality. There was certainly something about her oval-shaped face and high cheekbones that set her apart from the average English look but, on the other hand, not a single model in the Indian magazines had eyes like hers: their startling shade of blue was far from exotic.

Sonya had always known about her Indian blood, of course: Meg Hawkins, her first social worker, told her in as much detail as she was allowed at the time that her biological mother was of Indian origin and her biological father Anglo-Saxon. Although she knew very little further detail, Sonya had always imagined that her biological mother was the sort who lived somewhere like Southall or Tooting, a woman suppressed and cowed-down and forced into giving up her illegitimate but adored love child by a cruelly conservative family who hated the idea of a cross-cultural and mixed-race union. While she had briefly thrived on the drama of this storyline, that world seemed so alien to the cosy suburban English one in which Sonya had grown up that her curiosity (or, indeed, any desire at all to explore her roots) had been quelled many years ago.

And then she had met Chelsea. Or rather, met her again, since Chelsea had gone away to board after primary school. Sonya had always known that, like her, Chelsea had been adopted as a child, but they had never talked about this in any detail until they had bumped into each other at another old schoolmate’s birthday party, just a couple of months ago. In the course of their conversation, Chelsea mentioned having traced her birth parents to a council estate in Merton, describing the sense of relief that had swept over her at knowing how lucky she had been to be adopted. For reasons she could not explain, the story had intrigued Sonya and led to her contacting the Registrar General after her own eighteenth birthday in order to have a look at her birth records. It had been a mere lark at first, some far-off niggling curiosity about her antecedents. She had even told Mum (and the adoption social worker who had provided the initial counselling) that, like Chelsea, it was only her medical history that she was interested in. But the information from the agency that had arranged her adoption had taken Sonya completely by surprise, rattling her very foundations. Who would’ve imagined that her biological mother was a woman who lived in India, rather than Southall or Tooting, and – here was the really astonishing bit – that she had been a student at Oxford too, the very same university to which Sonya was due to go this autumn! It was not just the coincidence of this fact, but the idea that an educated woman had chosen to give her up that had been the really shocking thing to Sonya. Her birth mother was obviously one who’d had choices, not a suffering voiceless woman at all. Sonya could still recall the acrid taste in her mouth at that discovery, the shock and sudden hurt at the knowledge that she had not been prised away from her poor and defenceless mother’s care by overzealous social workers, as she had always imagined, but had, in fact, coolly been given away. That was the really galling bit: that the woman who was her natural mother had made such a cold and deliberate choice, never turning around once to look back at the baby she had abandoned in England.

It was anger that was propelling Sonya on in this search, nothing else. Pure unadulterated anger. She had tried to reassure Mum and Dad of that fact but it seemed to bring them little comfort.

‘Sonya darling!’ Sonya heard her mother’s high-pitched voice float up the stairs.

Sonya opened her bedroom door to shout back. ‘Up here Mum. What’s up?’

‘Dad’s on the phone. He’s in town and wants to know if you need one of those multi-plug thingies for your laptop.’

‘Okay, coming!’ Sonya said, hastily pulling on a pair of shorts before running down the stairs in long loping strides. It was best not to leave Mum with instructions on anything technical, Sonya thought as she took the handset off her mother. ‘Hey, Dad,’ she said, clicking the speaker phone on.