“Me, too,” Jess said. “I’ve also been speaking to more couples who matched during the problem year at work, and the majority report to be happy, even if their percentage matches are lower.”
Carla gritted her teeth. “You didn’t tell them that?”
“God, no. Ignorance is bliss. I even told some of them you’re getting married, to prove the system works.”
“Perhaps believing they’re well matched makes couples act that way, just like our family automatically thinks their relationships won’t work out,” Carla said. She ran her fingers over her bedsheets, mulling over a question. “Do you think women in our family drive people away, so they can’t get close to us? Is it something I do?”
Jess clicked her tongue. “I suppose we’re a force to be reckoned with, and you need to be a strong character to deal with that. After your divorce, you hardly gave anyone else a chance, and Mum obviously thought we’d be okay without our dads in our lives. Do you think they even know we exist?”
It was something Carla had asked herself many times. Had she and Jess been born out of loving relationships that had failed, or were they the results of one-night stands? Had Suzette ever given their fathers a chance to be part of their lives?
She could remember a few of the men who had dipped in and out of Suzette’s life. She’d seen some of them only once, whereas others had lasted longer. They’d suddenly appear and present Carla with lollipops, dolls, hair bobbles and skipping ropes, saying “Surely this is your little sister, not your daughter” to Suzette. Carla would give them her best death stare while her mother dissolved into giggles.
When Suzette fixed her green-blue eyes on you, it could make you feel like the most important person in her world. But this attention only lasted briefly before shifting somewhere else. She hadn’t been a neglectful mum, just an erratic one.
“I don’t know if our dads know about us or not,” Carla finally replied. “Perhaps they weren’t that interested in us.”
“Doesn’t that hurt you?” Jess’s voice sounded smaller. “To know that someone so important was missing from our lives? I never even tried to win races on school sports day, because there was no one to ruffle my hair and say well done afterward. My dad didn’t know me, or he chose not to be there...”
“Gran and Granddad were always there for us.”
“That was lovely, but not the same.”
Carla understood. She’d also longed for someone to kick a football with, who’d teach her how to skip stones on a lake. Sometimes she’d lain in bed at night and pretended her dad was downstairs in the kitchen, cutting the crusts off her cheese sandwiches and rubbing an apple on his shirt to make it shine.
“I hardly have any memories of Mum,” Jess added. “I remember falling asleep on the bus once, wedged between you both. My head rested on Mum’s shoulder and she was humming to me. The sun was shining through her window and I felt all warm and safe, like I never wanted to leave your sides.”
Carla couldn’t recall this moment. Her memories of her mother were more random and sporadic, like how Suzette once made her a blue nylon jumpsuit to wear to the school disco party when she was nine years old. Her mum proclaimed it was “Coolio” and “Everyone will want one.”
The jumpsuit attracted whispers and smirks because the other kids were wearing all the latest fashions, like Nirvana T-shirts or blouses with puffed sleeves. When Carla had arrived home from the disco, she’d ripped her outfit off and stuffed it under her bed.
Suzette had surveyed her with her hands on her hips. “People laughed at David Bowie and he did okay. You should try to stand out, not fit in.”
But Carla had just wanted to be like the other kids, especially when Suzette got cancer and her copper hair came out in clumps from her treatments.
She remembered her mum pushing Jess briskly in her stroller, the sun bouncing off her bald patches on her head. Suzette had tried to disguise the glassy sadness in her eyes with oversize sunglasses. “Nothing to see here. I don’t need your sympathy,” she’d snapped if anyone looked at her. “If your lives were more interesting, you wouldn’t have to gossip about mine.”
“I still feel guilty about leaving you to go traveling,” Carla admitted to Jess.
“Don’t be. I thought it was cool. I thought you were cool. But I was jealous of you for a long time.”
Her subsequent pause told Carla it might still be the case.
“I have to go,” Jess said eventually. “I promised to go out for breakfast with Evelyn, Gran and Bertrand this morning. Bertrand’s found a knitting café where all the teapots wear little woolen sweaters. Let’s catch up again soon.”
“Yes, let’s do that,” Carla said, her thoughts now in even more of a spin. She lowered her phone and clasped it in both hands, wondering if the curse was a make-believe thing after all. Or was it real, and Lars and Agatha had outsmarted it?
If anyone had told her a few weeks ago that she’d be lying in bed in Sardinia, contemplating her impending marriage and the possibility that her family’s curse was real, all while preparing to meet an old flame and his wife for a day out, she wouldn’t have believed them. It was just all too bizarre.
Carla took a long shower and went down for breakfast in the hotel restaurant. Finding herself surrounded by couples and families, she forced herself to eat some bread and fruit.
She meandered along the seafront, admiring the turquoise waves and watching locals chat over espressos and fresh pastries. Café owners opened up striped umbrellas, and the sound of brush bristles scraping against paving stones filled the air.
She had never really been a people watcher but found it fascinating to look more closely at everyone around her, assessing who might have chemistry together and who didn’t.
Two men with tattooed calves brushed hands as they walked their dogs, their gaze fixed on their Chihuahuas before shifting over to each other. An elderly couple, both wearing matching khaki shorts with too many pockets, sat on a bench and broke a sandwich in half to share. It was not lost on Carla that the man gave his wife the bigger piece. A young man laughed uncontrollably as his girlfriend picked him up for a piggyback ride, his legs jiggling as she broke into a run.
Carla noticed all their wistful smiles, flicks of hair and blatant stares of desire, and it made her feel warmer inside.
Fidele stood waiting for her outside the diving center with his two youngest sons draped around his waist. “Sorry, but Eve is feeling a little poorly,” he explained. “Maybe we shouldn’t have asked our sons to make the food last night. Are you feeling okay?”
“Yes, I’m fine, the food was lovely. That’s a shame about Eve. I hope she’ll be okay.”
“It may take a day or two for her to recover and I have to look after the diving center, so I’m afraid I can’t accompany you today.” He pursed his lips with a regretful smile.
“That’s fine, honestly.” Carla told herself she was feeling very tired anyway. “Please give my love to Eve.”
Fidele nodded and reached into his pocket to take out an envelope of photographs. “She asked me to give you these duplicate photos.” He handed them to Carla, his fingers lingering close to hers when she took them. “You and your husband must come to visit us again soon, after your wedding.”
They both knew it was unlikely to happen, something that made her heart feel heavy. “I’d love that,” Carla said anyway. “I’m so glad you found happiness with Eve.”
“I was happy before her, too,” Fidele said, and they looked into each other’s eyes with a sense of understanding and also helplessness.
Carla could tell Fidele wanted to embrace her, and she wanted to hold him, too, but there were two young boys hanging around his waist, tugging on his T-shirt and wanting to go to the beach. The reality of the situation was unavoidable. “Bye, Fidele,” Carla said softly, hoping they weren’t the last words she’d ever say to him.
“Bye, Carla,” Fidele replied. “And thank you.”
“Thank you, too.”
