Book People

Chapter Twenty-eight

Did you get my last note? You returned the book, but you didn’t answer. Is there something wrong, C? Please respond.

H

SEBASTIAN

It’s the cosplay cocktail evening, the last event of All the World’s a Page festival, and the pub is full of people in costume.

I was not a fan of the event and made no bones about it to Kate, but she insisted, so here I am, in a roomful of people in stupid costumes apparently having the time of their lives.

There are even literary-themed cocktails. A Virginia Woolf. A William Faulkner. A Nora Roberts and, of course, a Lisa Underwood.

I’m standing by the bar and not sipping a themed cocktail. I have a tumbler of single malt, because while I am participating to a certain extent, I draw the line at drinking a cocktail called Nora Roberts.

By the fireplace, Lisa is being mobbed, a shifting mass of costumed festival-goers and locals surrounding her. I can’t help scanning the crowd for Fuckface, because, if he’s here, I’m going to have a word. Luckily he must have realised what’s good for him, because he’s not. Good fucking riddance.

I don’t stop scanning the crowd, though, because naturally it’s not Fuckface I’m actually looking for.

I’m looking for Miss Jones, and she’s not here either, and I feel her absence like a missing limb, phantom pain and all.

I don’t know why I’m looking for her. I made my stance clear last night, and now I have, I should be living my life as if nothing has happened.

I can’t, though. I’m still achingly conscious of her presence in the village, even when I can’t physically see her, and if this goes on, I might have to do something.

Maybe I might have to leave Wychtree entirely.

‘Who are you supposed to be?’ someone says from beside me.

I don’t turn because I know who it is. Dan.

‘An independent bookseller,’ I say, my attention restless as I look in vain for golden hair.

‘Wow,’ Dan mutters. ‘The likeness is uncanny.’

I glance at him.

He’s dressed in some kind of floppy white shirt and tight trousers, with a scarf that I think is supposed to be a cravat. It’s not so much a concerted attempt at period costume as a half-hearted, casual nod in the direction of something that might, if you squint hard, be period costume.

He looks ridiculous, and I tell him so.

Unbothered, he produces a lacy white handkerchief from somewhere and flourishes it at me. ‘The Scarlet Pimpernel, at your service.’

That doesn’t deserve a reply, so I don’t give him one. I go back to restlessly scanning the room instead.

‘Did you tell her?’ Dan asks, not picking up on the ‘Fuck off’ I’m putting out.

‘Tell who what?’

‘Don’t be dense,’ he says, exasperated. ‘Kate. Did you tell Kate you have feelings for her?’

‘No,’ I snap. ‘Can we have this discussion later?’

‘Why didn’t you?’

‘Oh, for fuck’s sake.’ I turn to him yet again. ‘She told me she’s in love with me.’

‘She did? Oh, mate, that’s fantastic!’ Dan looks delighted at first, but then he picks up on my expression. ‘That’s not fantastic?’

‘No.’ I bite the word out. ‘I don’t want anyone to love me, Daniel. I never did. Especially when I can’t love them back.’

‘What absolute bullshit.’ He looks annoyed now. ‘You’re an idiot, Bas. You’ve got this amazing woman in love with you and you told her what? That you didn’t want her?’

‘That’s the problem,’ I force out through gritted teeth. ‘She is amazing. And I am not. And I can’t give her what she wants, and I never will.’ I pick up my scotch, drain the contents, slap it back down.

Dan stares at me like I’m a fool. ‘Sebastian, I knew you were a stupid bastard, but I didn’t think you were that stupid.’

He’s going to give me some kind of psychoanalysing lecture, I just know it, and I’m not in the mood. I’m not in the mood for this wretched party either, especially if Miss Jones isn’t here. Not that I want her to be here.

Christ. I don’t know. I don’t know anything.

I don’t give Dan a reply. I turn and thread my way through the crowds to the exit, then head out of the pub, stalking down the high street, back to Blackwood Books and home.

I should stay and thank people. Raise a glass to next year’s festival and say a few words. But I’ve got no stomach for it, not tonight.

Things feel . . . grey. Dismal. And I wish I could tell myself I don’t know why I feel this way, but I do. I know.

It’s her and what I said to her. It’s her and the hurt that flashed across her face when I told her I couldn’t love her, the lie I told her.

It’s the feeling I’m missing something vital to my wellbeing and that, without it, I’m slowly dying.

There’s no other choice, though, not for me.

I survived well enough before her. I can survive well enough after her.

I stop outside Blackwood Books and I tell myself I won’t turn and look at Portable Magic as I unlock my own door. And I’m strong. I don’t, which is excellent. That’s the first step out of this hell I’ve made for myself.

I open the door and walk into the shop.

And come to a sudden stop.

Someone is standing near the counter, doing exactly what I was strong enough not to do, which is stare at the bookshop across the road.

Someone tall, in a ratty black coat. His hair is grey and swept back from his forehead, and he glances at me as I enter.

For a minute I’m rooted to the spot with shock.

‘Hello, Sebastian,’ my father says, and smiles.

I do not smile back. ‘What the bloody hell are you doing here?’ I demand, because he is the very last person I need, or want, to see in the entire world.

‘Well,’ he says. ‘I let myself in. Obviously I still have a key.’

‘Obviously,’ I bite out. ‘But that doesn’t answer my question.’

He glances out of the front window to Portable Magic again. ‘I saw an ad for the festival. Thought I’d come along to see it.’

‘You’re a bit bloody late, aren’t you?’ I growl. ‘You weren’t even at the cosplay cocktail night.’

He ignores this. ‘Your great-grandfather would have been proud of you.’

A curious feeling that I can’t pinpoint winds through me. I shove it away. ‘I didn’t do it for him,’ I say acidly. ‘I did it because you left me a lot of debt to pay back.’

Dad sighs. ‘I know. Neither I nor your grandfather were any good at managing this place.’

I don’t expect the admission and it interrupts the anger building in my gut. Still, I’m not willing to let him off the hook. ‘No,’ I say, not bothering to hide the belligerence in my voice. ‘You weren’t.’

He doesn’t respond for a long moment, still staring across the road at the pretty little bookshop sitting there, owned by the pretty little bookseller I gave my heart away to, and who doesn’t even know it, because I’m a fucking coward. Like all the Blackwood men.

A silence falls, a lead curtain of quiet.

‘I’m staying with Jean Abbot,’ Dad says eventually, not looking at me. ‘I didn’t think you’d want me here.’

‘Jean? Are you—’

‘You probably don’t want the answer to that question,’ Dad interrupts. ‘But yes, it’s exactly what you think it is.’

I don’t know what to say. I haven’t spoken to him for months, possibly years, but apparently he’s been having a life, all while I’ve stayed here, cleaning up the mess he left me.

The thought makes me even angrier than I am already. I open my mouth to say something pithy and cutting, but then he says, ‘She told me you’re seeing the great-granddaughter of the original Kate Jones.’

I feel as if I’ve been punched hard in the gut.

Fucking village telegraph.

‘I was,’ I force out. ‘But I’m not now.’

‘That’s a shame. I thought history might repeat itself.’

‘What history? You mean like Mum nearly leaving you? Like Grandma left Granddad? Hardly. Thought I’d skip all that nonsense and go straight to—’

‘Cutting yourself off from everyone?’ Dad says calmly.

The words slice through me, sharper than a scalpel.

‘We all thought we weren’t good enough for the women we loved,’ Dad goes on. ‘And that, I’ve now learned, made us self-fulfilling prophecies.’ He sighs. ‘The only one of us who ever had guts was your great-grandfather.’

‘Guts? Him? I read the letters in that box, Dad. He left the first Kate in a violent marriage and then he killed himself. No fucking guts there.’

‘Hmm.’ Dad nods, still looking out the front window. ‘That’s one ending, certainly. But there is another.’

‘What are you talking about?’

‘Your great-grandfather didn’t kill himself.’

Shock pulses down my spine. ‘But there was an inquest and his body was never found. There were clothes by the side of the river . . .’

‘Yes, that’s what it looked like. But that’s not what happened.’

I stare. ‘What happened, then?’

‘If you read the letters, then you’ll know that he had a secret love affair,’ Dad says. ‘With a woman who was married. Her husband was abusive, and she was afraid to leave. When your great-grandfather came back from the war and saw that her shop had closed, he tried to get in contact with her, but she never replied. She had a child by then, and he thought that’s why she stayed.’

I’m very still as he tells me all about H and C. But I know all this already. ‘Yes, yes,’ I say, impatient. ‘And then she disappeared a few years after her husband died.’

‘Her husband’s car went off the road,’ Dad murmurs. ‘And into the river. He drowned.’

I blink. ‘Went off the road?’

‘Yes.’ Dad’s voice is very level. ‘You’ll also note that your great-granddad disappeared not long after her husband died. Then she disappeared too.’

My brain won’t work. ‘Spell it out, Dad.’

‘Tell me, is there a postcard upstairs in that box? A postcard from Sicily? There’s nothing written on it, except an H and a C.’

An old postcard that I put to the side because I didn’t think it was relevant.

I stare at him, unable to speak.

‘Your grandfather received that a year after Kate disappeared. He knew already about the letters, because he found them in Sebastian’s personal effects after he supposedly drowned. He told me that he thought your great-grandfather might have had something to do with Kate’s husband’s death, though he couldn’t be sure. And then maybe, to avoid repercussions, he faked his own death. Dad suspected he spent a couple of years establishing himself abroad, making sure the authorities weren’t able to track him down, then he got Kate to join him. Dad thought your great-grandfather, Sebastian, wanted him to know he and Kate were still alive, hence the postcard.’

I can’t believe it. I don’t believe it. It’s impossible. ‘They . . . were together? In the end?’

Dad nods slowly. ‘Your grandfather thought they were. He was positive. He still never forgave his father for leaving him with the bookshop, I think, or for letting him think he was dead, but, yes, he believed Sebastian and Kate were together.’

I struggle to process what he’s just said. ‘How did you know C was Kate?’ I ask, the first question that comes into my head.

‘Rose, Kate’s daughter, had some unsent letters that she found in her mother’s effects. She spoke to Dad about it and he showed her the ones Sebastian had kept. She got a postcard too. They both decided no one should ever know about it. Dad only told me just before he died.’

It makes sense, at least that part makes sense. The secrecy of it. The scandal of a married woman, the abuse, and then running away together . . .

I still can’t get my head around it. ‘So, what? That’s why you’re here? To clear up some old family mystery that doesn’t matter?’

Finally, he looks straight at me. ‘Among other things. There’s too much unsaid in our family. Too much that’s hidden. So many stories that haven’t been told, because people have gone to their graves with too many secrets and too many lies.’ His blue eyes, so like mine, glitter in the light. ‘The stories do matter, Sebastian, that’s why I’m here. You need to know them. They’re where you came from and they’re part of who you are. You’re part of me, and you’re all I have left of your mother, and . . .’ He lets out a breath. ‘My story isn’t over yet and I want a happy ending. An ending that includes a reconciliation with my son.’

‘What is this?’ My whole body is rigid with tension and shock and anger. ‘One of the steps in your twelve-step programme?’

Dad moves slowly over to where I’m standing. Once, I used to think he was a tree or a giant, he was so tall. Now, I’m taller.

He searches my face. ‘I’m sorry, son. I am so sorry for what happened, especially after your mother died.’

I’m not ready for his words; my hands clench into fists.

‘It wasn’t you,’ Dad continues. ‘The drinking. It was the grief, and I didn’t handle it well, and I regret it. I regret not being there for you.’

He means it, I can see, and yet I don’t know what to do. I don’t know what to do with this feeling inside me, a growing pressure. Anger, shock, pain, grief . . . everything. Then again, I’ve never known what to do with any of my feelings other than to force them away.

‘Mum was going to leave you,’ I tell him, again saying the first thing that comes into my head. Perhaps to hurt him. Perhaps to push him away. ‘She told me she wanted to.’

He doesn’t look hurt and remains unpushed. ‘She wanted to stay in the village and I wanted to go, and we had some difficulties with that, not to mention my drinking. But we were in the process of working our issues out.’

I don’t want to accept that; it puts everything I thought about my childhood into doubt. My mother, the wronged woman who died too young, and my father, the drunk who nearly drove his wife away. That’s the story I told myself, and now he’s telling me it was wrong?

‘She wouldn’t have,’ I say. ‘None of the Blackwood men can keep a woman. They always let them down, always.’

Dad is silent, eyeing me. ‘Is that something that’s actually true?’ he asks. ‘Or something you just want to be true?’

It’s an excellent question and I hate it.

‘It is true,’ I say. ‘Sebastian and Kate—’

‘Found happiness in the end. Me and your mother would have got there in the end too.’

‘What about Granddad, then?’ I demand, furious for reasons I can’t articulate. ‘Grandma left him.’

Dad nods. ‘Yes, she did. Your granddad was very angry about his father’s disappearance. He didn’t want to run the bookshop. He wanted to do other things, and was looking for buyers, but . . . then he met my mother and things were good for a while. Mum was a restless spirit, though, and she didn’t want to stay in one place so . . . she left. Dad didn’t want to leave me or sell the bookshop then, because he wanted to hand it on to me, so he stayed.’

‘That doesn’t sound like a happy ending to me,’ I say. ‘Not if Grandma left him.’

Dad sighs. ‘Like I said, he was very angry about his father’s disappearance, and I don’t think he ever got over it, not even after I was born. He didn’t have a head for business, which didn’t help, and he played the horses far too much for his own good. But it wasn’t as if he never saw Mum again. She didn’t like being married, I don’t think, but she did enjoy coming to visit, which she did quite a bit.’

I don’t know what to say now. I don’t know what to think. The Blackwood men can never hold on to the women they love, that’s my family’s history, and yet . . .

‘They stayed together, then?’ I ask stupidly.

‘They never divorced, if that’s what you mean,’ Dad says. ‘That was their version of a happy ending. And your mother and I would have had ours if she hadn’t been ill.’

‘So, it’s all wrong, then.’ My voice is hoarse. ‘What they say about the Blackwood men?’

Dad rolls his eyes. ‘“They”? Who’s “they”? I suppose, if you’re talking about the village, then, yes, it’s wrong. That’s just the story they made up about us. But the reality is always much more complicated than that.’

I run a bookshop; I know all about stories, and I should know that too. Yet, somehow, I missed this lesson, and now all I can think is that everything I’ve been telling myself is wrong. Even my own story is a lie.

A strange electricity runs through me and I turn away, staring out through the front window to the bookshop across the road.

Where Kate is.

If my story is a lie, then what is the truth?

But I know the answer to that question. The truth is the same. That I’m a coward who can’t handle the feeling in my heart, and I’ve been using this lie to protect myself. The Blackwood history is a castle I’ve built, with guards on the parapets and a drawbridge I can pull up to close myself off, because . . .

I’m afraid.

I’m afraid I’m not the man Kate thinks I am, that I’m not enough for her. And I’m afraid to even try.

‘I know,’ Dad says after a moment. ‘It’s a lot to take in, but I—’

‘I’m in love with her,’ I say hoarsely, the words a pressure I can’t keep inside any more. ‘I’m in love with Kate Jones. She owns the bookshop across the road.’

‘Ah,’ says Dad. ‘Jean was right, then.’

I turn to look at him. ‘I told her it was over.’

‘Why did you do that?’

‘Because I’m a fucking coward.’ I can feel the muscle in my jaw leap with the tension screaming inside me. ‘Because love fucking hurts and I hate it.’

Dad looks at me a long moment, and then, strangely, he smiles. ‘Yes,’ he says. ‘Yes, it does.’

‘Why are you smiling?’ I demand. ‘I fucked it up. She told me she loved me and I told her that loving me was a mistake and I walked away. I ended it.’

‘That doesn’t mean you can’t begin again, Sebastian. It’s not over unless you want it to be over.’ He raises a brow. ‘So . . . do you want it to be over?’

‘No.’ The word comes out immediately and without my conscious thought, every cell of my being joining in. ‘No, that’s the last thing I want.’

Dad’s smile turns wistful. ‘Ah, son. You always did feel things so very deeply. But that’s not a bad thing – you know that, don’t you?’

‘No,’ I repeat, the only word I seem able to say. ‘No, I don’t.’

‘It hurts, of course, and no one wants to be hurt. But the pain is how you know it’s important. It’s how you know it matters.’

‘But I don’t want it to matter, Dad,’ I say, sounding like a child as the truth hits me like an atom bomb, destroying everything inside me.

I don’t want it to matter, but it does. She does.

And it hurts to love her, but she’s important.

My father takes another step towards me and puts a hand on my shoulder. ‘You can’t fight love, Sebastian. Believe me, I tried. But the happiness that comes with flinging yourself bodily into it . . .’ His smile turns warm with memories. Good memories. ‘It’s worth any price.’

I want to tell myself that I don’t need my father to tell me about love, that I don’t need his pep talk, but I don’t pull away. ‘I’m afraid,’ I say, with an honesty I wasn’t anticipating. ‘I’m fucking terrified.’

Dad squeezes my shoulder and the ghost of the boy I used to be feels better. ‘We all are, son,’ he says. ‘Remember, though. Your story isn’t over. And the only person who gets to write your happy ending is you.’