‘And I don’t expect anything. I might have, perhaps, until I saw you. But now, not only do I know that there isn’t going to be a grand reunion, or hugs and tears and love, I’m not at all sure that is what I want either. The only thing I want from you, John, is answers. When you left, you changed my life for ever and I want to know why, and I want you to meet your granddaughter, and find out about me, about the life you left behind. You don’t have to care, you don’t have to love me. I just want you to listen and answer my questions. Which, quite honestly, is the very least you can do.’
Rose wondered at her own coolness, her control. Perhaps Richard had taught her this also; when faced with unbearable pain to simply cut off all emotion, to numb every nerve-ending so that no matter what might happen next, nothing could hurt her.
After several seconds, during which John did not respond, Rose spoke once into the void, emboldened by her self-possession and immunity to his cruelty.
‘Do you mind if I make a cup of tea?’ she said, crossing to the stove, where a battered old kettle sat squat on the hob. ‘Do you want one?’
‘Rose,’ John said quietly, ‘you can’t just turn up here like this. You can’t just foist yourself on me. I’ve told you, I do not want it.’
‘Well, I do.’ Rose stopped, clenching the handle of the kettle, forcing herself to keep her voice low and quiet as decades of angry words she had never had a chance to voice began to boil away quietly in the pit of her stomach. ‘Dad, you left me when I was nine years old and I’ve never asked you for a single thing from that moment until this. All I want is a cup of tea.’
John took the kettle out of her stiff hands, filling it himself from the clanking, creaking tap.
‘Why?’ he said wearily. ‘What do you think that talking to me will change?’
‘It will help me understand,’ she said quietly, firmly. ‘I don’t think I realised until now that I need to understand everything that’s happened to me since you left. I thought I could perhaps ignore it, sweep it under the carpet, get on with things. But I can’t. My marriage is over, my daughter is … unusual. I somehow
got
this life that doesn’t feel like it’s got anything to do with me and –’
‘You blame me,’ he said, not as an accusation but as a statement of fact.
‘I don’t know,’ Rose said. ‘I don’t think I blame anyone. I just … I need to know now, soon, why my life turned out like it did, because I think I only have one chance to change it. I ran away here because … I was chasing a silly daydream, and I found you. I have no idea what is going to happen next, but I do know that that has to mean something, or if it doesn’t then I have to
make
it mean something.’
John shook his head, putting the kettle on the hob and lighting it with a match, the gas flaring in a brief roar before settling into a steady blue flame.
‘I live alone, I work alone, I don’t make conversation. I don’t play with small children. I don’t drink any more. I haven’t had a drop for nearly three years. If I keep myself to myself then I know I can stay sober and work. And I can’t let anything get in the way of that.’
‘Not even me,’ Rose said, her voice unintentionally small at the thought of that last kiss that her father had planted on her forehead.
John shook his head. ‘Not even you.’
Rose drew in a sharp breath, as if he’d slapped her physically in the face with his words. Maybe that touched him, somehow, more than everything she’d said, because there was the smallest shift in his expression, something barely visible, as if in that second he truly recognised her for the first time.
‘Very well. Come back tomorrow then,’ he said wearily. ‘If that’s what it takes to go back to your life and get out of mine,
then
I will try and answer your questions, but I must warn you, it is very unlikely that you will like what you hear. And now I need to work. Shut the door behind you when you’ve finished your tea.’
Rose stood stock-still in the small, dingy living room for several moments longer after John left the cottage, presumably making his way to the barn across the yard, waiting for the wave of tears, of emotion, bitterness and hurt to hit her, but nothing came. Nothing at all, though she was rooted to the spot, caught in a moment that didn’t seem real to her.
The spell was broken and Rose jumped when the door creaked open and an uncertain-looking Ted appeared around it.
‘I was just checking he hadn’t axe-murdered you or something,’ Ted said a little anxiously, advancing further into the room. ‘Are you OK? You’re as white as a sheet. You look like you’ve just see a ghost.’
‘Perhaps I have, in way.’ Rose shook her head. ‘I have no idea what just happened but it wasn’t exactly a conventional reunion.’
‘Do you need a stiff drink?’ Ted asked her. ‘I’ll pop you back to the pub and sort you out a single malt.’
Rose had been about to trot out her usual line when anyone offered her alcohol – ‘No, thank you, I don’t drink’ – until it occurred to her that she had no idea why she didn’t drink. She’d always thought it was because of her father’s recklessness, her husband’s disapproval, her own distaste. But in actual fact she’d never taken the time to decide if she liked drinking or not for herself. And now, this very strange and difficult day seemed like as good a time as any.
‘Yes, please,’ she nodded, allowing Ted to escort her back to the truck.
‘You knew that wasn’t going to be easy,’ Ted said as the truck bumped and bounced its way down the track and turned back towards Millthwaite, via the petrol station. ‘I mean, I suppose it’s never easy, but when your dad is famous for being horrible, it’s bound to be a bit tricky.’
Rose smiled faintly, enjoying the simple spin he put on the impossible to understand.
‘Yes, I suppose it is,’ she said.
It wasn’t until they were seated in the pub, with Albie regarding them from the other end of the bar, that Ted spoke again.
‘So you left your husband then?’ he asked her, leaning his chin on his folded arms, so that his dark eyes could find hers under her curtain of hair. ‘Ran out on him?’
‘Yes.’ Rose looked up. ‘I suppose you would call it a midlife crisis.’
‘I wouldn’t call it anything, I have no idea what happened, only that …’ Ted hesitated, ‘… you look like you need that drink.’
‘I do,’ Rose replied simply. ‘Maybe a little too much. Dad drank, Mum drank. I must be a shoe-in for alcoholism.’
‘I don’t reckon you are,’ Ted said, scrutinising her with a sideways tilt of his head. ‘One thing about working in a pub is that you get to see the real drinkers, the ones who can’t get through the day without taking the edge off, first-hand. They’ve got a particular look, a way about them. Even the ones that look respectable and in control. You don’t have that. And besides, you’re obviously going through a bad patch. I feel for you.’
Rose shook her head. ‘Don’t pity me. I don’t need to be pitied. I’ve escaped, you see, I’ve made it this far. I might look
like
a waif lost in the storm but, I promise you, right now is the strongest that I have ever been in my life.’
‘Is that right?’ Ted smiled at her, as if he somehow knew different.
Rose found herself returning his smile, as each consecutive sip of whisky seemed to thaw her out.
‘How unchivalrous you are to doubt me,’ she said. ‘So are you saying I look old and tired and worn out from fighting?’
‘Not at all,’ Ted said, slipping just a little closer to her. ‘You look great, as it goes.’
Rose snorted with laughter, inhaling the whisky the wrong way, so it burnt her tubes as she coughed and sputtered.
‘Oh, Ted,’ she said, smiling at him, ‘you are young and naïve, and oddly interested in me for reasons I still don’t really understand. But you make me laugh, and that’s rare, so thank you.’
‘Happy to oblige,’ Ted said, smiling as he took a sip of his own drink. ‘And you are interesting, that’s why I’m interested in you. We don’t get many interesting women round here. You’re like one of those
femmes fatales
out of a film, dangerous and mysterious!’
‘Oh my God, you really know how to spin a line, don’t you?’ Rose laughed, wondering what her life would have been like if she’d met a boy like Ted when she was the right age, before Richard had ever come into her life. How different would she, her life, have been if she’d met a man with whom she could simply laugh, whose eyes she could look into without hesitation, a man who’d made her feel … simply normal? ‘Luckily for you I’m far too old and experienced to fall for it.’
‘So far,’ Ted nodded with a slow smile. ‘So far. That will all change when you come to my gig.’
‘I’m not coming to your gig,’ Rose said firmly.
‘Oh, you are,’ Ted said. ‘I guarantee it. It’s either a night in the pub or another night with my mum.’
‘You make a compelling case,’ Rose said, smiling.
‘Good.’ Ted seemed genuinely pleased.
‘But now I have to get back to Maddie.’ Rose pushed her empty glass across the counter towards him, glad that she didn’t feel the need to have another. ‘Thanks, Ted, for the lift.’
‘Any time,’ Ted said. ‘I’ll drop that petrol can off for you.’ Rose could feel his eyes on her back as she walked out of the pub. When was the last time a man had looked at her at all, let alone that way? Rose knew exactly, down to the very last second.
Rose remembered vividly what it had first been like to be noticed by Richard.
Almost eighteen years old, she hadn’t realised until she saw that flash of recognition in his eyes that she’d been living for months, since even before Mum died, out of sight. She had made herself invisible, keeping her head down, doing her work without soliciting any attention, happy just to be Rose, the girl who always tagged along, sort of funny, not too pretty, quiet, nothing-special Rose. The one Shona always made come out on a Saturday night with the rest of the gang, even though the rest of the gang could take or leave the Goth girl. In a funny sort of way, those few months after her mother died and before Richard, had been some of the happiest in her life. She had been no one special, but she had been free, and it was a freedom that, at the age of seventeen, Rose was just blossoming into. And then Richard looked at her, noticed her, and she realised in that exact second how much she longed to be looked at,
talked
to, touched by him. How much she wanted him to think she was special.
When Rose left work that evening he was waiting for her outside the café. Momentarily halted by the sight of him, Rose thought about ignoring him, hurrying past as if she had no idea who he was. But she found it impossible.
‘Hello,’ he said. ‘I suppose it would be wrong to ask you if I could buy you an ice cream?’
Now, Rose remembered how warm his smile made her feel, almost like the whisky.
‘I’d be very happy if I never saw another ice cream again,’ she said, brushing her loose hair off her face, making herself look him in the eye. He looked quite a bit older than she was, in his late twenties, with a business suit on and his neat haircut, completely different from any of the people she had ever known. The boys that Shona and her other friends hung out with, the ones that Rose observed once removed, were just that: boys, still. Here was a grown-up.
‘I’m a doctor. I’ve just been for a job interview, for a GP, down the road. I don’t know Broadstairs very well, and as I might be moving here it would be nice if a local might show me a good place to get a cup of tea.’
Rose hesitated, glancing over her shoulder as if someone might be waiting for her. It wasn’t that she didn’t want to go with him, it was just that she had no idea what to say, or how.
‘I mean, don’t worry if you have to be somewhere,’ Richard said, sweetly nervous. ‘You’re probably just about to go and meet your tall, boxer boyfriend, aren’t you?’
‘No!’ Rose found herself laughing; it was an unfamiliar sound. ‘I don’t have a boyfriend.’
‘I can’t think why not,’ Richard said, his gaze focused on her. ‘You are very lovely.’
‘There’s this place, more up in the town,’ she said, feeling heat flare under her skin. ‘Where the cabbies go for breakfast. They do a good cup of tea.’
‘Will you show me?’ Richard asked, holding out a hand. ‘I’m Richard, by the way.’
‘I will show you.’ Rose took it, feeling his warm, strong fingers encircle hers and suddenly discovering that she was reconnected with the world. ‘My name is Rose.’
A long time later, as the moon rose in the sky, and they talked and talked and talked, Richard walked her home.
‘House share?’ he asked her, looking up at the large, looming house.
‘No, it was my mum’s house. Both my parents are dead,’ Rose told him apologetically, as if her unconventional life, lived alone, might put him off her.
‘You poor thing,’ Richard said. ‘Having to live in this great big pile alone. You should sell it, buy somewhere new – a fresh start.’
Rose shook her head and half smiled. ‘I don’t actually know how to,’ she said. ‘And besides I don’t think I can until I’m eighteen.’
Richard’s eyebrows had raised, and Rose realised they hadn’t discussed the matter of their respective ages; it hadn’t seemed important.
‘I’m seventeen,’ Rose told him, adding, ‘eighteen in October, though.’
‘I’m twenty-eight,’ Richard told her. ‘Does it matter?’
‘Not to me,’ Rose whispered.
‘Can I kiss you, Rose?’ Richard asked, so softly it was almost a whisper.
Rose took a deep sharp breath, full of the scent of the roses her mother loved to grow, which were just coming into bloom in the garden.
‘I’ve never … I don’t know how,’ she said. ‘I don’t know what to do.’
‘You don’t have to do anything,’ he whispered.
Rose stood perfectly still on the pavement outside her house, the scent of roses in the air, as Richard kissed her, so sweetly, so gently and tenderly. Her hands remained dormant at her sides, she daren’t even breathe, and yet for every second his lips were on her she was pulsating with life.
Chapter Six
‘FUCK ME, DON’T
they have summer up here?’ was the first thing that Shona said to Rose as she clambered out of her mother’s pride and joy, a ten-year-old lilac Nissan Micra. ‘You better tell someone it’s August.’