Mum Rocks

I love it, I love it, I love it, I love it, I love it, I love it.

I still find it hard to believe, but I totally love my mother’s idea.

When she came to tell me about it, I must say I went through a whole bunch of conflicting feelings. At first, I felt all weird. She told me she wouldn’t judge what I’d written in the notebook, that, if it was there, she’d do it. That she was going to inspire me to surpass myself, so I could join her and live all my dreams. If I hadn’t been in this condition, I’d have said no, for sure. My notebook is a private thing. But, seeing as I couldn’t protest, I listened to her. And, in the end, I told myself that she must love me to bits to do that. It did me good to feel her emotion and hear her talk the way she did. She’s never spoken to me like that before. But I felt bad for her, too. I told myself that she must be suffering terribly. I understood that she’d made a big scene and quit Hégémonie and was going to get a load of dosh, but I know how much her career means to her, so I pictured her moping, alone, in the living room, and I felt bad. Immediately after, I could hear Grandma saying, ‘Pull yourself together, for pity’s sake, don’t let yourself go. Have you finished feeling sorry for yourself?’ (yes, Granny Odette says, ‘for pity’s sake’, ‘poppycock’ and ‘shhh . . . sugar’, and a whole load of expressions from two hundred years ago), and that made me smile again, and I kept on smiling because I started to imagine Mum living my dreams.

The things I’d written in the notebook slowly started coming back to me, and just picturing her in some of those situations made me laugh myself silly. Inwardly, of course. Outwardly, still poker-faced. Well, not as poker-faced as all that. I kept bursting out in silent laughter, and, at one point, Mum interrupted my laughing fit by letting out a shriek. Apparently, I’d shed a tear. For me, too, that was insane. Were the nurses right – had Mum imagined it? Or had my manic inner laughter triggered a visible reaction? I felt a sort of rush of hope and joy. It lasted all day, and has stayed with me ever since.