Moving On

Sorrow

Sorrow

WAITING FOR SOMETHING TERRIBLE TO HAPPEN, SHE discovered, was every bit as hard as dealing with its aftermath. Struggling through Ben’s last two days in the shop, she was reminded of her devastation in the wake of her father’s departure. The mammoth effort it required to appear cheerful at work left her drained. She wanted and didn’t want to see him, to be around him, knowing that every minute was bringing their parting closer. They kept up their normal banter in front of the others, but underneath she was in pieces. She avoided the staffroom during her breaks, inventing errands that kept away the danger of being alone with him.

She caught Edwin studying her now and again. Sensing something, she was sure, but nice enough not to pry. Jasper seemed oblivious during his brief appearances on the shop floor.

On his last day Ben closed the shop for an hour in the middle of the day and took the three of them to lunch in the pub, and they presented him with the pen they’d clubbed together to buy. Safe travels , they’d had engraved on it, Jasper’s idea. Ellen forced herself to eat, to smile, all the time wishing to be anywhere else.

At closing time she hung back as Edwin and Jasper shook his hand and wished him well and left. When they were gone, Ben turned to her. It was the first time they’d been alone since his announcement.

They regarded one another wordlessly for what felt like an eternity. Her heart was beating so hard it hurt. ‘I want . . .’ she said, and stopped.

‘Ellen,’ he said, and broke off too. She crossed on trembling legs to where he stood by the door and locked it, and turned the sign to Closed . She switched off the lights, and the narrow low-ceilinged space dimmed, lit now only by what daylight came through the small window. She reached for his hand and he gave it.

‘I want to be with you,’ she whispered, and in response he pulled her away from the doorway and took her in his arms and kissed her, a kiss that started softly and grew in fervour until she drowned in it. They clung to each other, mouths exploring hungrily, bodies pressed together. Her blood pounded, desire rising until she could bear it no longer. She drew back, her breathing ragged, and saw the same hunger in him.

‘Are you sure?’ he whispered, and she said yes, and he brought her upstairs, and up the next stairs, and into his small bedroom, where they undressed and climbed beneath the covers of his bed.

‘Your first time?’ he asked and she nodded, and he was gentle and loving, and it wasn’t his first time, and they murmured the words of all lovers, and she cried, and she thought he did too. And it didn’t hurt as much as she’d been expecting, and the wonder of skin on skin, the touch of him, the scent of him, filled her and left room for nothing else. There was nothing else in the world but them.

‘I’ll write,’ he said afterwards, but she said no, she didn’t want that. She couldn’t be the chain that kept him tied to Ireland. She couldn’t spend the next year or more clinging to hope, waiting for something that might never happen. She’d done that with her father; she couldn’t do it again.

‘Let’s leave it open,’ she said. ‘If we meet again, so be it. If not . . .’ she found a smile from somewhere ‘. . . we were never meant to be.’

He squeezed her hand. ‘No letters?’

‘No letters.’

It had to be this way. It nearly killed her, but it was the only way she could survive.

She got dressed. He pulled on jeans and a T-shirt. Downstairs they left the shop lights off so passers-by wouldn’t see. ‘Wait,’ he said, rummaging behind the cash desk for something that he slipped into her pocket. ‘Open it when you get home.’

He unlocked the door. He squeezed her hand, put his other palm to her cheek. ‘Don’t forget me,’ he said, and she wanted to wail aloud. She pulled away and rushed out and didn’t look back.

She was late for dinner. Frances had already started. Ellen walked into the kitchen and sat across from her at the table and burst into tears, and Frances listened as Ellen sobbed out her heartbreak, leaving unsaid the final scene in his bedroom. When she’d run out of words and run out of tears, she propped her elbows on the table and held her hot, damp face in her hands.

‘Sorry,’ she said, ‘your dinner’s getting cold.’

In response, Frances rose and crossed to the cooker. She took a tea towel and drew from the oven a plate and set it in front of Ellen. ‘Careful, it’s hot.’ She lifted the saucepan lid that covered it, and the rich smell of shepherd’s pie wafted up.

‘Eat,’ Frances ordered, and Ellen picked up cutlery and ate what she could as Frances resumed her own meal. When they had finished, Frances took their plates and set them on the draining board and returned to the table.

‘Heartbreak is horrible,’ she said, ‘but everyone goes through it, and the world keeps on turning, and in time it becomes less hard to bear. You don’t believe me now, but you’ll see I’m right. I wish I could stop it hurting for you, but I can’t. Only time can do that.’ She got to her feet. ‘Come on, let’s wash up.’

‘Can I make a phone call? Just a quick one.’ Her first time to ask.

‘Of course you can.’

She dialled the number of the pub. It wasn’t yet eight, it wouldn’t be crowded.

‘I’ll go to London,’ she said when Claire answered. ‘Let me know when I need to give notice.’

Later, in her room, she opened what he had given her. It was a little hardback notebook, its cover dark green with a flowery print. To Ellen, for the book ideas , he’d written in blue ink on the flyleaf – and below it, All my love, B xxx

She put it under her pillow. She waited for sleep, and eventually it came.