A Stranger’s Sin

Maggie, a 42yearold widow from the tiny village of Ashford, is condemned by the local women the moment her babys head pokes through her coat. Look at her! the gossips hiss by the well. Whos taken her in? they snarl. It must be the devils work, the shame of a widow! Maggie says nothing, shoulders her heavy postbag, eyes fixed on the ground, lips pressed tight. If she had known how things would turn out, she might have stayed away, but how could she turn away when her own bloodstained child is weeping for her?

It all began not with Maggie but with her eldest daughter, Emma. Emma isnt just a girl; shes a pictureperfect copy of her late father, Sam, the villages goldenhaired, blueeyed heartthrob. The whole parish fawns over her. Her younger sister, Lucy, is the opposite darkhaired, serious, and almost invisible.

Maggie pours all her love into the two girls, pulling them both like a cursed mother. By day she is the village postwoman; by night she washes the local farms livestock. Everything she does is for them, for the bloodline.

You girls must get an education, she tells them. I dont want you to spend your whole lives digging mud and lugging heavy bags. You belong in the town, among people.

Emma leaves for the city in a flash, gets a place at the City College of Commerce, and quickly becomes the talk of the campus. She sends photos of herself in restaurants and designer dresses, and a suitor appears the son of a senior manager. Mum, hes promised me a fur coat! she texts.

Maggie rejoices, while Lucy frowns. Lucy stays behind after school, becomes a ward orderly at the district hospital, hoping to be a nurse but lacking the money. All of Maggies pension and her postwomans wages go to Emmas city life.

That summer Emma returns, not with fanfare but quietly, looking pale and withdrawn. She stays in her room for two days, then on the third day Maggie finds her sobbing into a pillow.

Mum Ive disappeared, Emma whispers.

She tells Maggie that her golden fiancé abandoned her after she fell pregnant. Its too late for an abortion, Mum! What am I to do? He wont give me a penny if I have the baby, and Ill be expelled from college. My life is over! Emma shrieks.

Maggie feels as if a bolt has struck her. Didnt you protect yourself, daughter? she asks, horrified.

Emma snaps, What now? Send the child to an orphanage? Throw him away?

Maggie’s heart shatters. That night she cant sleep, wandering the cottage like a spectre. By dawn she sits beside Emmas bed.

Nothing, Maggie says firmly. Well get through this.

Mother! How could you everyone will find out! Its a disgrace! Emma erupts.

No one will know, Maggie cuts in. Itll be my secret.

Emma cant believe it. Your secret? Youre fortytwo, mum!

Yes, Maggie repeats. Ill claim the child as my own and move to my sisters house in the nearby district, pretending Im helping there. Youll go back to the city and finish your studies.

Lucy, sleeping behind the thin partition, hears everything. She clutches a pillow, tears streaming down her cheeks, feeling both pity for her mother and disgust for her sister.

A month later Maggie leaves the village, which quickly forgets her. Six months later she returns, not alone but with a blue envelope in hand.

Lucy, meet your brother Tommy, she says, handing the envelope to her pale sister.

The village gasps. So the quiet widow finally shows up! the women mutter. Is it the council chairmans son? they wonder.

Its not him, Maggie replies. Its the local agronomists son. Hes a respectable bachelor.

Maggie endures the gossip and begins a new, hard life. Tommy grows restless and loud, and Maggies tired legs cant keep up with the endless post rounds, farm chores, and sleepless nights. Lucy helps as best she can, silently washing nappies and rocking the brother. Inside, Lucys anger boils.

Emma writes from the city. Mum, how are you? I miss you! Im broke, barely scraping by, but Ill send money soon.

A year later Emma sends £1 and a pair of jeans two sizes too small for Lucy.

Maggie spins in circles. Lucy stays by her side, her own life also spiralling. Young men stare at Lucy, then leave who would want a bride with such a stained family? A mother who parties, a brother whos a troublemaker

One night, Lucy, now twentyfive, whispers, Mum, should we tell anyone?

No, dear! Maggie panics. We cant. Wed ruin Emmas life. Shes married now, to a good man.

Emma indeed settles down. She finishes college, marries a businessman, moves to London, and sends glossy photos from Egypt, Turkey, and the capital. She never asks about the brother. Maggie writes her, Tommy is in first grade, getting top marks.

Emma replies with an expensive, utterly useless toy for the village.

Years pass. Tommy turns eighteen, tall, blueeyed like Emma, cheerful and diligent. He loves both mother and sister. Lucy, now a senior nurse at the district hospital, carries the nickname old maid behind her back, yet she bears her own cross, dedicating her life to Maggie and Tommy.

Tommy graduates with a medal. Mum, Im heading to London for university! he declares.

Maggies heart leaps. London where Emma lives.

Maybe the regional university? she suggests tentatively.

No, Mum, I have to push forward! Tommy laughs. Youll see, youll have a palace of your own!

On the day Tommy hands in his last exam, a sleek black foreign car rolls up to the cottage gate. The passenger steps out Emma, looking like a magazine cover model, thin, in an expensive suit, dripping in gold.

Maggie gasps. Lucy, emerging onto the porch, freezes, towel in hand.

Emma, almost forty, smiles brightly, Mum! Lucy! Hello! she sings, kissing a stunned Maggie on the cheek. She scans the yard and spots Tommy, wiping his hands on a rag in the shed.

Emmas eyes fill with tears. Hello, Tommy says politely. Are you Marina? My sister?

Sister Marina repeats, her voice echoing. Mum, we need to talk.

They sit inside. Marina pulls a pack of thin cigarettes from her bag. Mum I have everything a house, money, a husband but no children.

She cries, smearing expensive eyeliner. We tried everything IVF, doctors nothing works. My husbands angry. I cant go on.

Lucy asks hoarsely, Why did you come, Marina?

Marina lifts her tearfilled eyes. For my son.

Mum, are you mad? What son? Lucy gasps.

Dont shout, Mum! Hes mine! Ill give him a life! I have connections; hell get into any university, well buy him a flat in London! My husband agrees! I told him everything!

Maggie exclaims, Everything? Did you tell him about us? About how we were shamed? About Lucy?

Lucy? Shell stay in the village forever! My brother has a chance! Mum, you saved my life, thank you! Now give me the child!

The child isnt a thing to be returned! Maggie yells. Hes my son! Ive nursed him, sleepless nights, raised him!

Tommy enters, having heard everything, pale as a sheet. Mum? Lucy? What what is she talking about? A son?

Milly! Maggie cries, covering her face, sobbing.

Lucy, usually quiet, leaps up, slaps Marina so hard she flies against the wall. Witch! she screams, the sound cracking with eighteen years of humiliation, broken life, anger at a mother. Mother? How can you be his mother? You abandoned him like a stray puppy! You knew the village would point fingers at you! You knew my misery came from your sin! No husband, no children! And you return now to snatch him?

Lucy, stop! Maggie whispers desperately.

Enough! Youve suffered long enough! Lucy shrieks, turning to Tommy. This is your mother, the one who pushed you onto my mother so she could chase fortunes in London! And you, she points at Maggie, are the old woman who trampled her own life for us both!

Tommy stays silent, then kneels before Maggie, hugging her. Mum he murmurs. He looks at Marina, who clutches her cheek, sliding down the wall. I have one mother, here, and a sister. Thats all I need.

He stands, takes Lucys hand. You aunt please leave.

Milly! My son! Marina wails. Ill give you everything!

I have everything, Tommy snaps. I have my mother, my sister. You have nothing.

Marina leaves that evening. Her husband, who watched the whole scene from the car, never gets out. Rumour has it he abandons her a year later for another woman who bears him a child. Marina ends up alone, with her money and her beauty.

Tommy doesnt go to London; he enrols at the regional university to study engineering. Mum, we need a new house, he says.

Lucy, now thirtyeight, blossoms. The agronomist the gossiping women once whispered about finally takes an interest in her. Hes a respectable widower.

Maggie watches them and finally weeps not from shame, but from relief. The original sin was terrible, but a mothers heart cant be covered up forever.