Please feel free to crit!! Thanks. Sorry if the spacing is a bit odd.

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Lyla. Part 14.

“She’s staring again.”

Mum sighed heavily and briefly glanced up from the latest brand of washing powder that she was holding.

“No she’s not. You’re really paranoid.”

I turned my back on my mother and whilst pretending to examine an air freshener took a peek at the woman further down the isle. She appeared to be in her thirties, with short blond hair and a casual yet stylish suit on, the kind that hugged the body but not in a revealing way. I couldn’t help but wonder why she was shopping in our sloppy town. She looked like the kind of woman who would shop at Harrods.

I looked up to her face and our eyes met. She raised her eyebrows at me and then in an obvious way stared at my protruding stomach. Picking up her heaving basket, she walked off shaking her head.

I felt a hand on my shoulder.

“Am I still being paranoid?” I asked shakily. Mum gently guided me up the washing isle, her basket swinging on her arm.

“Some people are just very… judgemental and rude,” she said.

‘Like you used to be,’ I thought, but stopped myself from saying.

I began to wish that it was winter and I could hide my bump under baggy jumpers and sleeping bag-like coats. Then I’d just look fat. Perhaps that would be more socially acceptable.

“I just need some bits for dinner. We’re running low on fruit and veg, so I’ll stock up and tonight we can have rice with vegetables in some sort of sauce. Tomato maybe.” Mum stooped to pick up a jar of dried basil. “How does that sound?”

“Sounds fine to me,” I said, feeling sick at the thought of eating. “What vegetables do you need?”

We had arrived at the fruit and veg isle at the back of the supermarket. People were rushing around, filling their baskets and trolleys, most with a vacant expression on their face.

“Potatoes, carrots, peppers, cauliflower, onions and some green beans. Oh, be a dear Lyla and pick up a few of those corns. Enough for one each.” Mum pointed to a huge crate of corn on the cob. I nodded and pulled a plastic bag out of its container and began to fill it with corn. I put three in the bag and stood holding one more. Was I supposed to put a fourth one in the bag for Tom? Surely he wouldn’t have sorted things out with his mother that fast…

I shoved the fourth corn into the bulging plastic, dropping it into the basket before mum could count them. Mum swung a bag of potatoes into the basket.

“Done. Let’s pay and go home.”

I felt like a trained dog, trailing after my happy owner as we walked to the packed tills. We found one with only one customer in the queue and mum set the basket on the floor. I played with the corners of a magazine on display as I thought of names. Baby names. This was going to be a hard task. Tom and I hadn’t spoken about it much, but time was slipping away. I hated the idea of having the baby and not having a name for him. A name is your identity – it’s so important. I needed to think of one. Fourteen weeks seemed like no time at all to do anything. I needed to be a lot more organised.

“How did you and dad name me?” I inquired. Mum stopped moving. She seemed shocked at my question, but she composed herself and gave me a sad little smile. “Mum?”

The conveyer belt began to move and mum started to unload the shopping rhythmically, with purpose.

“I used to know a girl called Lyla. Back when I lived in Italy on the farm. She was…one of my best friends.”

I was confused. All the photos we had in the house from when mum was younger and living in Italy only featured family and her friend Nadia. I knew mum had other friends, but I’d never heard of a Lyla. I couldn’t help but wonder why I didn’t know about my namesake.

“I thought you grew up with Aunty Nadia. You’ve never mentioned Lyla before.” I placed the empty basket on the checkered floor as I spoke. Mum’s normally animated face looked lost and dreamy.

“It’s hard for me to talk about her, honey,” mum brushed the side of my face with her long, delicate fingers. “I miss her a lot.”

I knew better than to ask anymore. Mum still kept in contact with the people she knew from Italy, if she didn’t stay in contact with or even mention Lyla, then something must have happened. If she wanted to talk about it she would just tell me, without me prying. I moved a packet of pasta further along the shiny black conveyer so that there was enough room to place the plastic toblerone shaped divider for the next customer. It was nearly five o’clock. Tom would be back at the house by now. I imagined him sitting at the kitchen table, waiting for us to get home, wondering what food we had bought. He was going to stand by me through all of this. I just knew it.

“She lived opposite us. On that little chicken farm with the yellow front door. Nadia and I grew up with her.” Mum wasn’t looking at me as she spoke. Instead, she focused on the till screen, the numbers changing as the items were scanned.

‘£1.50………..£4.90………£2.20…’

I gently rubbed her arm, wanting her to go on.

“Her parents had moved to Italy for a quieter life. Her father

died of a heart attack when she was six and my father soon started to fill his shoes. Dad would give advice to her mother and make sure the farm was making good enough profits. So, we became like sisters. I remember when all three of us – Nadia, Lyla and I – would sit under the shade of the big conifer tree near the stream and gossip about boys and life.

When we turned eighteen Nadia got engaged. The ceremony was great, but Lyla was very pale and run down. We persuaded her to go to the doctors the next day.”

Mum paused and looked towards the supermarket exit. The early August afternoon sunlight was flooding through the glass doors.

“The doctor diagnosed her with breast cancer.”

I began to re-load the basket with the packed items. I couldn’t even begin to think of what it must feel like to know that your best friend has an illness like cancer. If it had been Sarah I probably would have broken down. “What happened next?”

Mum paid the cashier before continuing with the story of her past.

“She’d known she had lumps for several months. Lyla was so timid that she didn’t even want to hassle the doctor. Silly. It was really silly. She kept quiet about the lumps until that day at the doctors. Well, the doctor insisted that the lumps were removed as soon as possible.

She went into hospital a few days later. Nadia and I went to visit her after her operation. Lyla was happy even then, joking around and acting like she was perfectly fine, despite the fact that she only had one breast left. She just wasn’t the type to moan. Such a placid person. Beautiful as well, thick blond hair and gorgeous blue eyes.” Mum sighed.

We began to walk towards the car park, my open sandals making a clicking noise that echoed as we walked along.

“Lyla caught an infection. She was in a lot of pain for several weeks and we were all heart broken. Nadia and I spent days just sat by her bed, holding her hand in the dark.” Mum’s voice faltered slightly. “She died in early September.”

I slammed the boot of the car shut, my mind not focusing on the Corsa parked in a dirty car park of a supermarket in town, but on a grave yard in southern Italy, the golden sunshine highlighting the mourning faces of people from the local village.

I crawled into the passengers seat and handed mum a tissue from the packet that had fallen out of the glove compartment earlier. I wiped my own tears away with the back of my hand, turning away towards the window.

“I named you after her because she was one of the most genuinely amazing people I knew. She was so perfect – inside and out. I owe a lot to her. After her death I decided that I needed out. I was nineteen and Italy was no longer were I wanted to be, even though it had been home for the last twelve years. I moved over here to England and met your dad. You know the rest.”

The car grumbled as it revved to life and mum drove us out of the car park, straight into a block of five o’clock traffic.

I stayed quiet for a while, thinking about my mothers past. Sometimes I felt like I hardly knew my mother. Sure, I knew the ‘mum’ side of her, who looks after me and takes care of the house. I knew the business side of her, who shouted in board meetings and worked through the night to meet deadlines. But I didn’t really know Miranda, the woman that grew up on a farm and had a waitressing job for years before she left Italy to come to England in search of a different life. The woman that fell in love with my father and created a home for me.

“Do you have any photos of her? Lyla, I mean.” It felt weird for me to say my own name and yet be talking about someone else. Someone I never even had the chance to meet. Mum ran a hand through her thick, copper – coloured locks in a tired way.

“I think I might have a couple. I’ll see if I can find some later.”

She leaned forward and clicked the radio on.

The conversation was clearly over.