‘Right.’ Grace nodded.
Bloke’s a bit of a nutter.
‘It worked for me, anyway.’ He smiled awkwardly before turning and walking back into the workshop.
Grace spent the day walking, tramping high and low, concentrating on putting one foot in front of the other and not stumbling as she navigated tracks that led down to the river. She hiked briskly through the mud and overgrown grass of the bank. With her walking boots clogged with soft clay, she ploughed on, working up a sweat inside her ski jacket and enjoying the mindless roaming that made a perfect diversion. She didn’t have to think; she just had to keep walking.
Eventually her legs tired and she stopped to rest on a hillock to catch her breath. With her arms braced against her knees and her breathing rapid, she looked up in time to see a flash of pink disappearing behind a tree. Her heart raced as she narrowed her eyes, staring at the space. She reached across thin air and was about to call out when her phone let out a volley of beeps and rings as it found its signal. An avalanche of messages poured in.
Grace pulled the phone from her pocket. She deleted the countless texts from her mother; the first few were full of wordy sentiments of encouragement, then they decreased in frequency and length, culminating in a single kiss. There were two from Jason, one sending her good wishes and another giving a brief update, informing her that Angharad had approved the costs for their project; she deleted them both. Tom had sent a single message. This she read slowly.
Hope you are having fun. Courtesy would dictate some contact, if you get the time. Tom (husband)
.
She read and reread the lines, absorbing the sarcasm. She knew he was hurting and that thought alone made her feel sick with guilt. She had left her husband alone with his grief, how could she begin to explain that this was necessary for her very sanity? She pictured him sitting on Chloe’s bed, inhaling the scent from her duvet, and she felt a wave of love for him. Closing her eyes, she then saw him sitting at the kitchen table, a fug of brandy fumes hovering in the air and his face twisted with hatred as he fired his poisonous darts at her.
‘Where the fuck have you been for the last three years? Since Chloe was born, it’s all been about you and your bloody career.’
‘I really can’t cope with you, Tom, I can’t cope with anything.’ She spoke to the river that burbled and flowed two feet from where she sat. Grace let her breathing steady and unzipped her jacket; too warm now as the sun sparkled its diamonds through the branches of the huge trees that made a hazy canopy overhead. Her eyes scoured the trunks and branches over the water, searching for a flash of pink. She looked to the right as twigs cracked and something scampered through the undergrowth.
‘Monty!’ She heard Huw’s voice before she saw him.
Monty halted at the sight of her and pushed his nose into her hand.
‘Hello, Monty.’ She smiled. The dog barked loudly.
‘Monty! Shush!’ Huw yelled, before catching up. ‘Oh, hello! Are you stalking me?’ He gave his hesitant smile.
Grace shook her head.
‘I was joking.’ He swallowed, his humour squashed by her blank stare. ‘We’ve been fishing.’ He held up a hook with three fat fish hanging from the end.
‘What are they?’
‘Brown trout.’ He smiled, clearly happy with his catch.
Grace looked at the majestic fish, each a good thirty centimetres in length. They had shiny orangey-brown underbellies and a stunning pattern of little black orbs in slivery orange rings on their backs. They were beautiful. Their dorsal fins were fanned and fragile, their eyes were blank and their mouths hung open. Grace felt her tears gather.
‘I didn’t mean to upset you.’ Huw hid the fish behind his back, like a crap magician.
‘It’s okay, it’s not your fault. Everything upsets me,’ she said, her voice a monotone.
Huw joined her, staring at the water in silence, unsure of the correct response. When he eventually found his voice, his suggestion was practical. ‘Would you like a lift back? I’ve got the Landy up the top.’ He pointed up to the ridge above them.
Grace stood and dusted the damp from her bottom with her flattened palms, not sure if she could face the tramp back.
She climbed into the filthy Land Rover and Monty barked and lay in the space at her feet, clearly put out at having been ousted from his usual seat. Huw placed the fish in a cool box in the back and started the engine. Grace, as a passenger, was able to look out at the countryside, free from having to stare at the satnav.
‘It’s so beautiful here. Do you still think so, or do you take it for granted?’
Huw shot her a sideways glance. ‘I never take anything for granted. Every day when I wake up I take a minute to look out of the window or stand in the yard and just drink it all in.’
‘You’re lucky,’ she whispered, thinking of the rat race in the city, the rushing along crowded pavements, the elbowing onto packed trains, standing cheek by jowl in the fierce heat of summer or wet through in the winter rain.
Huw gave a snort of laughter. ‘That’s me – lucky.’ He stared ahead.
‘Have you always lived here?’ she asked as they slowed and pulled into a shallow lay-by to let a vehicle similar to their own pass.
‘Huw!’ The man in the flat cap nodded and waved his palm in thanks.
‘Richard!’ Huw waved back.
‘No. I grew up in Winchester and moved here six years ago.’
‘Oh, I thought you’d been here forever.’
‘Why?’
She shrugged. ‘Don’t know. It just seems to suit you and you seem very at home. With your dog and your fishing and your steps.’
‘I’ve always been at home here. Gael Ffydd Cottage was my grandmother’s home, where my mum grew up, so I spent all my childhood holidays here.’
‘Lucky you.’
‘Yes, again, lucky me.’ He kept his eyes on the road.
‘It must be a lovely life,’ she mused.
‘It’s the life we want.’ He smiled.
‘Does your wife work?’ She couldn’t imagine having to get into work everyday from there; it made her own semi-rural commute seem like a doddle.
‘No. She doesn’t.’ His voice was flat.
Grace decided to remain quiet and enjoy the view. It was fifteen minutes later that Huw turned into Gael Ffydd Cottage.
Grace jumped down from the cab. ‘Thanks for the lift.’
Huw disappeared round the back of the Land Rover. ‘We’re cooking these up on the bonfire tonight, if you want to join us.’
Grace was unsure if she wanted company and stared at him, rather lost for an answer.
‘Tell you what…’ He eased the awkward silence. ‘You’ll know when they’re cooked because you’ll smell them. So if you want to come over, great. If not, more for us!’ With that he clicked his tongue, tapped his thigh and walked across the apron towards the cottage with his dog trotting faithfully by his side.
After her second hot shower of the day, Grace sank down onto the duvet, feeling the ache in muscles that had been underused in the past weeks. It had felt good to get her body moving again.
It was late evening when the smell of the barbecue wafted over to The Old Sheep Shed. Grace inhaled the scent of the trout roasting on the open fire and began to salivate. She’d had little appetite of late and to want food was a new and welcome sensation.
Looking into the mirror above the sink, she was surprised by what she saw. Old mascara sat caked beneath her eyes and her hair was unbrushed, ratty at the back. She pulled her fingers through her bob and pushed it behind her ears before giving her face a good scrub with soap and water. It looked clean at least, if a little flushed. Throwing on a cardigan under her ski jacket, she tied her pashmina around her neck and headed into the encroaching darkness, across the field towards the back of the cottage, where the orange flames of the bonfire flickered up into the night sky.
‘Hi,’ she called as she approached.
Huw was sitting on a fishing stool a little way back from the fire, in the middle of which was a metal brazier with the fish on a pole dangling over the flames. He looked up and waved, then indicated an empty stool by his side. A lantern on a hooked stick stood behind him, throwing out a dim arc of light.
‘That’s a great fire.’ She sat down, holding her palms up towards the heat, instantly mesmerised by the dancing licks of flame and the embers that crackled, spat and glowed against the dark sky.
‘I’ve had a bit of practice.’ He smiled. ‘I’m renovating the old cowshed.’ With his thumb he pointed over his head, behind the cottage. ‘And when the work gets tough or I’m tired, I remind myself that this will be my reward: a bonfire with the old timber and rubbish from the site. It’s something I love to do.’
‘I can see why. It’s hypnotic, isn’t it?’ She stared at the flames, watching as tiny ash fairies flew from the pyre and danced up into the blackness. Spiralling upwards one by one, elegant in their grand ascension.
‘Yep. It’s the thing I remember most about my holidays here – great fires and that smoky smell in all my clothes. They always seemed to smell more smoky the closer I got to Winchester. I hated it when my mum washed my jumpers and the smoke was gone. I knew it meant I was going back to school and that my fun was over.’
‘Where’s your wife? I’m sorry, I don’t know her name.’ Grace picked up a stick and snapped off the end, hurling it into the centre where the colour glowed amber.
Huw hesitated. ‘Her name is Leanne. And she died.’ He prodded the logs and lumps of cardboard in the fire with an old railing spike that was perfect for the job.
There was a respectful silence while both adjusted to this new level of openness.
‘Oh. I didn’t know.’ She swallowed. ‘When you spoke about “us”, I assumed…’
‘I meant Monty and me,’ he explained. ‘Although I do still think of her here, of course, think of her with me.’
‘I feel terrible. I didn’t know. I’m sorry,’ she repeated, pulling the sleeves of her cardigan over her hands, watching his face, which was lit by the orange firelight.
‘Well, no, why would you? No harm done. I like talking about her.’ He forced a smile.
‘You do?’ This surprised her; she was still unable to mention Chloe without feeling her insides fold in on themselves in grief.
‘Yes. She’s my wife, it would feel odd not to mention her.’ He blinked.
‘When did she die?’ she whispered, wondering if this was prying or taking an interest.
‘Six years ago. Hence the move.’
‘I’m sorry, Huw.’
‘Thanks.’ He nodded. ‘You don’t have to keep saying sorry, you know.’ He paused. ‘She was killed by a car. It mounted the pavement as she walked home. It was quite a rainy day and the driver was old. He fumbled with the windscreen wipers, couldn’t really see in the downpour, got confused, lost control, panicked and that was that. She was thirty-four.’
Grace steeled herself. ‘I lost my little girl. She died too.’ It was the first time she’d said the words, the first time she’d been able to. The phrases sat like slivers of glass on her tongue; once she’d launched them from her lips, she stared at the ground where they’d fallen, shiny among the dust and cinders.
There was silence while she recovered from the shock of having said the words out loud and he recovered from having heard them.
‘When was that?’ Huw looked up from the fire.
‘Three months ago. She was three.’
‘Oh God.’ Huw sighed. ‘I’m so sorry.’
Grace nodded. ‘She was killed by sepsis.’
‘Is that septicaemia? Sorry, I don’t know.’ He shook his head.
‘No, that’s okay, not everyone does know. I didn’t. I had to look it up. When they told me about it, I wasn’t really listening, I couldn’t take anything in.’
‘I remember that.’ He sighed again.
‘I’ve been looking up facts and bits and pieces and writing them down in my notebook.’
‘What kind of thing?’
Grace pictured her first entry. ‘Things like “People suffering from sepsis might have slurred speech, just as people do when they have a stroke.” It helps me to understand what happened. It used to be called septicaemia, but apparently that term’s not accurate for what happens, so now it’s sepsis. It’s when the body responds badly to an infection. So, bacteria – an infection – makes the immune system react, but, instead of just controlling the infection to make you better, the body goes into overdrive and creates a storm of reactions that damages its own organs. And they can shut down. That’s what happened to Chloe. Her organs shut down and she died.’
‘Chloe.’ He repeated the name. ‘I could tell you were grieving when you arrived; you have that look, like you died but are still here. I can spot it.’
‘That’s exactly what it’s like. Part of me did die,’ she admitted for the first time.
He nodded and raised his eyebrows in acknowledgement.
‘Does it get any easier?’ she asked hopefully, conscious that he had a six-year advance on her.
His response was slow in coming. ‘Truthfully? No it doesn’t, not really. It will always be hard, no matter how much time has passed. It will always hurt you, shock you, take your breath away when you wake in the middle of the night and realise it’s not some horrible nightmare. Even now there are days when I don’t want to get out of bed, don’t want to see anyone and so I don’t, I just stay there and let the day roll over me. That’s a freedom I have here.’
She was grateful for his honesty. ‘What did you do before you came here to burn things?’
‘I was an English teacher.’
‘Oh, lucky you. I toyed with that as a career. I studied English and I love books, reading and writing… But I didn’t want to be a student any longer. I think I was impatient to start earning and I kind of fell into my job.’ She inhaled the smoky fumes, trying to think back to the time when she’d made that decision. ‘And you resigned to come here?’
‘No, they sacked me. I lost the plot on more than one occasion and the final straw was when a colleague and supposed friend took me to one side and reminded me that it had been six months. As if I needed reminding!’
Three months, one week, four days.
She saw the calendar in her head.
Huw coughed to clear his throat. ‘He suggested that I try and pull myself together because it was bad for morale and made other people feel uncomfortable. I already knew it made him feel uncomfortable – he hadn’t talked to me properly, couldn’t look me in the eye, as if what I was going through was infectious. He hadn’t said a word about Leanne until that point, not one, nothing, like she’d never existed, like he hadn’t been to our house and she hadn’t made him cups of coffee.’ He sucked his teeth and jabbed the pole at the fire.