Chapter 3
THREE
I decide the best course of action is to leave them to it. I have my own family dramas to attend to, and getting sucked into his isn’t part of the plan. I scribble my number down on a napkin, and slip it into his shirt pocket before making a sharp exit.
‘Good luck,’ I whisper, not even waiting for my fizzy water. ‘Call me later if you like.’
I have a vague idea that Jake is the guy who bought the inn from my dad, but I have no clue who the young woman is at all.
Other than, apparently, daughter of my new friend, Guy.
She looked so shocked to see him, and he looked nervous as hell too.
Damn. Families, man – they really are complicated.
No wonder he was hiding. I should have just invited him to join me in the tree and we could both have stayed there.
My feet take me on autopilot from the Starshine Inn along the edge of the green, which is looking even more lush and pretty than I remember.
Someone is doing a magical job on the gardening around here, and all of the cottages are adorned with spectacular hanging baskets and trailing planters of lobelia and fuchsia.
The green is edged by gorgeous bedding plants, and one small section has been filled entirely with spectacular sunflowers.
A chunky black Lab is currently peeing on them, and I can’t help but laugh at the look on his face – like he’s knows he’s being naughty but he just can’t help himself.
He finishes up his business and gallops away back to his owner.
Seeing the dog makes me think about Lottie, my dad’s Golden Retriever.
She was a puppy last time I was home, for my sister Sandy’s wedding.
That was fourteen years ago, though, and I guess it’s unlikely Lottie is still around.
For some reason it’s the thought of the dog that brings tears to my eyes, which is possibly the most English thing I’ve ever heard.
My mum is gone, my sister Sandy is gone, my brother Simon too – but it’s a Golden Retriever I never knew very well that makes me cry.
I lurk outside the shop – Trevor’s Emporium – and wipe my eyes with my misleading Capricorn Girl T-shirt.
I need to stop that nonsense right now. I’m already feeling chaotic and emotional and all kinds of messed up.
If I start crying I might never stop. I’ll end up dehydrated and on a drip in a hospital in Mumbai.
Or possibly Dorchester, which is slightly closer.
I feel eyes on me and pretend I’m looking at postcards on the revolving rack outside the shop.
I spot Trevor behind the counter and turn away.
Trevor the Druid we used to call him, which I realise is still an appropriate nickname as I browse the cards and see that several of them are pictures of local stone circles.
I find it amazing that he never left, never seemed to want more of the world than this little corner, and his place behind the till.
I realise that sounds judgemental and remind myself again that we are all different.
That we all find happiness and contentment in different ways – my so-dull-I’d-want-to-kill-myself is someone else’s version of paradise.
When I was younger, living here, I was out of the ordinary for wanting to leave – but over the years, mixing with the kinds of people I’ve known, living in the communities I’ve called home, I was pretty standard.
We all had a rucksack full of Rough Guides and a million stamps on our passport and could order beer in fifteen different languages.
That became my normal, but I have no right to judge those who found their freedom much closer to home. I’m probably just jealous.
Trevor is staring at me with narrowed eyes.
He always had a wizard-like beard, but now it’s grey.
I guess I look different too, but I can tell he remembers me.
I move along swiftly. I know what this place is like – if one person recognises me the smoke signals will go up, and by the time I knock on my dad’s door, he’ll already have the kettle on for me.
I pass the community centre, an old Victorian school house, and smile as I hear children’s laughter coming from the open windows.
It’s the summer holidays here, and there seems to be an event being held for the little ones.
I pause, enjoy the sound – I’ve travelled all over the world, and the sound of children giggling is absolutely as close to a universal measure of joy that I’ve ever been able to come up with.
I spot more fairies as I walk, hidden in trees, peering up from flower beds, all slightly different.
I imagine they’re a huge hit with the children of the village.
A few more cottages, the bakery, and then suddenly I’m there.
I’m standing in front of my childhood home, a place I haven’t been inside since we said goodbye to my mother.
Even when I made a flying visit for Sandy’s wedding, I didn’t stay here – I just couldn’t.
Every room was still full of her, every smell still carried her memory, every nook and cranny reminded me of what I’d lost. Now, all these years later, I still hover uncertainly by the garden gate, as though I’m a vampire in a horror movie waiting to be invited in.
It looks the same but different, just like the Starshine Inn.
One of the bigger cottages here, it has a thatched roof and is set back from the street, a winding little path leading up to the still shiny red front door.
I glance up, see the window that was in my room, and the one next to it that was Sandy’s.
Simon was up in the attic, and Mum and Dad’s view was of the rolling hills and fields that surround the village.
Dad always looked after the place and enjoyed his garden when he retired from teaching – but now it’s gone to the next level.
It’s easily the prettiest garden I’ve seen so far, which is saying something as they’re all gorgeous.
There are roses of every shade, swaying stalks of blue irises and delphiniums, big flashy hydrangeas in shades of pink and purple, and multi-coloured rows of lupins.
It’s like a classic English country cottage garden on steroids, especially when the fairies are added in to the mix.
They’re everywhere here, tucked into plant pots, having tea parties beneath the bird bath, perched on window ledges.
This is definitely Fairyland HQ. I push open the gate and pick one of them up, smiling as I see how lovely they are up close.
Obviously hand-made, with delicate iridescent wings that catch shades of purple and blue in the sunlight.
I don’t hear any woofing from inside the house as I make my way up the path and fear I might be right about Lottie.
I take a deep breath, and smooth down my hair with my palms. I have no idea why – my father has seen my unruly hair before, exactly the same as Mum’s.
Sandy was more of a classic ginger, mine is a deeper shade of auburn.
It never does what I tell it to do, and long ago I stopped hating it for that. I got the hair that I deserved.
I realise that I need to knock on the door, that I don’t still have a key.
Even if I did, it wouldn’t feel right to simply let myself in.
This hasn’t been my home for a long time.
I turned my back on it. I let people down, and I wasn’t there when they needed me.
There were reasons for that other than me being an awful human being, but still – it’s been too long. I should have been here.
My hand is shaking as I lift it to the brass door knocker, and my insides feel like they’re suddenly made of milkshake.
What if he doesn’t want to see me? What if he’s made himself forget?
How will I feel if he looks at me and I see what I dread the most in his eyes?
Disappointment that it is me standing here in front of him?
Regret that I am the child that survived?
The one who abandoned him. I wouldn’t blame him at all.
The door opens, and a flurry of words rises up in my throat – apologies, explanations, pleas for forgiveness.
Except none of them make their way out of my mouth, because the person who opens that door to me is not my father.
It is a complete stranger. I gape at her, a curvy woman with pretty dark hair and a confused smile.
She’s not my dad. But this is my dad’s house.
Where is he? Have things become this bad – that my own father is gone and I didn’t even know?
He is ninety soon, but as of last month I know he was alive and well.
I started to sneakily stalk him online once I arrived back in Europe, just needing proof that he was okay before I made my pilgrimage back here.
He doesn’t have much of a presence, but I saw his face on an Instagram post on the Cove Café feed. There’d been an event called the Summer Fling, and I saw him there, still full of life, full of energy. Bright blue eyes still shining. He was fine!
‘Are you all right, love?’ the lady at the door asks. She has an accent – Liverpool, I think – and looks concerned as she stares at me.
‘I-I’m here to see George,’ I manage to mutter, holding on to the door frame for support. ‘Am I too late? Is he gone?’
Her eyes pop wide open when she realises what I’m implying, and she immediately says: ‘Oh goodness, no, nothing like that! He just moved house is all!’
I close my eyes and breathe. My lips are trembling, my throat is dry and I suddenly feel like I might fall over.
It’s been a difficult day, and that was a terrible moment, and I also never even got the chance to hydrate.
She takes one look at me, and ushers me inside. Inside the house I know so well.
‘Come on,’ she announces briskly, with that I-take-no-shit tone that tells me she is a mum. ‘Sit down in the kitchen. Cup of tea and a chocolate digestive. Not much in the world isn’t improved by that, I’ve always found.’
I let her shepherd me through, even though I’d know the way blindfolded, and allow myself to be cosseted for a few moments.
I am a mess right now, and I need to get a grip – I need to look after myself a lot better than this.
I need to grow up and stop living in chaos.
Inner calm needs to be more than just a phrase.
‘I’m Cally,’ she says, sitting opposite me with her own tea. She’s put a load of sugar in mine, obviously worried I’m in some kind of shock. ‘I live here with Archie. Do you know Archie?’
I nod, letting the relief and the tea and the sugar all work their magic. I am made of questions right now, but the only one that seems to make it out is: ‘Are you from Liverpool?’
‘I am!’ she tells me proudly. ‘I bet you know people from there, don’t you? Wherever you go in the world, there’s always a Scouser!’
She’s absolutely right. I think back over some of the places I’ve either called home or visited over the years, and in pretty much all of them, I encountered at least one person from Liverpool.
How very strange. And now here I am, sitting in my old family kitchen, talking to another one without even really understanding what she’s doing here, or where my dad is – I can’t imagine a world where he would voluntarily leave this cottage.
I glance around the familiar kitchen, seeing it through fresh eyes.
Young people live here, it’s obvious – there are childish paintings in bright primary colours held up against the fridge door by magnets, and the table is scattered with school reading books and crayons.
The room smells sweet and fruity; Cally obviously has something delicious in the oven.
A framed photo is on top of the mantelpiece, one that shows Cally with a man I recognise as Archie, even though I only met him once, on his wedding day.
They’re with a stylish looking young gent, and two little girls.
Little girls with bright red hair. I realise who they are, and my heart takes on a life of its own, palpitations thundering in my chest.
Why am I here? Why did I think this was a good idea, for anybody? I should have just stayed away…
Cally follows my eyes and sees my reaction.
She lays a hand over mine, squeezing my fingers tight enough to distract me.
‘That’s my son Sam with us,’ she explains.
‘And the girls are Lilly and Meg. Though I think you know that, don’t you?
Look, sorry if I’m adding two plus two and coming up with ninety, but…
Are you Suzie? Are you George’s daughter? ’
I manage to nod, and wonder how she knows.
‘George showed me photos,’ she explains.
‘Plus, well… The hair. Though yours is darker, isn’t it?
More of an auburn than a copper… and you have a tan!
I never thought redheads could tan! He said he got a postcard a while back, from Zanzibar of all places.
I mean, to be fair, I don’t really know where that is, but it sounds very exotic…
I’m sorry. I’m wittering, I know. He’s going to be so excited to see you. He’ll be here any minute!’
I look up abruptly at that last sentence. I came here to see him – so why do I suddenly feel like running upstairs and hiding in the wardrobe, like I always used to when I was little?
Cally takes in my expression, and smiles at me kindly. ‘Families are weird, aren’t they? But I promise you, he’s going to be thrilled. Don’t overthink it. Do you want some whisky in your tea?’
I’m sorely tempted but manage to decline. I hear the front door open at the same time as her, and we share a look. She whispers something reassuring, the words lost to me as I hear my dad’s voice.
‘Cally! I’m here – get the kettle on, I’ve a raging thirst!’
Despite my tension, despite my fears, that makes me grin. He always did love his cuppa, my dad – and he often had a raging thirst as well. Maybe he was the root of all my hydration obsessions.
Cally jumps to her feet, and I follow suit. I haven’t seen my father for fourteen years, and I have no idea how this will go. I should probably have called, or written, or sent a carrier pigeon. I should have warned him – what if he has a heart attack?
The door to the kitchen opens, and he strides through, accompanied by the fat black Labrador I was admiring earlier. ‘Zack’s off to London for an appointment,’ he says, ‘so I’ve got Bear for the night. We have grand plans, the two of us. We’re going to—
He freezes on the spot when he notices me, confused as he stares from Cally to me and back again. The dog ambles right over and sticks his big head into my hands, and I oblige by giving him a scratch on the velvety ears.
‘Hi, Dad,’ I say quietly. ‘Surprise!’