Chapter 7
Constantly checking her phone to see if an email had come through was beginning to drive Bex mad.
She kept telling herself not to look all the time, because the disappointment when she checked her inbox and there was no response was crushing, and a little bit more of the hope she’d been clinging on to so tightly evaporated each time.
She tried setting herself a limit to only check three times a day.
Once in the morning, once at lunchtime and once before she went to bed.
That had turned out to be a very bad idea, because getting to sleep after yet another disappointment proved impossible.
She needed to do something else to make it feel like sand wasn’t just slipping through the egg timer and taking them all closer and closer to the point where nothing would be able to help her mum.
She just didn’t know what she could do and she needed a sounding board.
Texting Rowan, she just hoped her friend might be available for a catch up, but as a headteacher of the local primary school, free time during the week was hard to come by.
Bex
I don’t suppose you’re free to meet up for a cuppa and a chat after school, are you? xx
The response came back almost instantly.
Rowan
I’d love to, but I’m in St Piran’s with Nathan for our twenty-week scan. It would be great to meet up with you afterwards though and I can tell you the news. I can get Nath to drop me over on the way home? xx
Guilt twisted in Bex’s stomach as she read the message.
She should have remembered it was the scan today.
Rowan was forty-one and Bex knew how nervous she’d been about this scan, which would screen for eleven different conditions, some of which were more likely to affect a baby born to a woman who was, what the medical profession referred to as, of ‘advanced maternal age.’
‘Bloody cheek!’ Bex had responded when Rowan had told her what the midwife had said at her first appointment.
‘It could have been worse. Toni told me that until recently they used to call women like me geriatric mothers.’ Rowan had grimaced. ‘Although to be fair, both my back and bladder are reminding me I’m no spring chicken any more.’
Despite her minor grumbles, it was obvious how excited Rowan was about the baby, and Nathan couldn’t have been more thrilled at the prospect of becoming a father, after thinking that the opportunity might have passed him by.
She shouldn’t gatecrash their moment, so as much as she wanted to talk to Rowan about the lack of progress in finding Briony, she wasn’t going to derail such a special moment for them.
Bex
It’s such an exciting time for you both and I can’t wait to see the pictures! Maybe we can catch up tomorrow or later in the week xx
She set her phone down on the table and refilled the water bowl for the dogs almost robotically, trying to work out what else she could try in order to track Briony down, when everything she’d done so far had just been met with another dead end.
Just as she picked her phone up again, another text pinged through from Rowan.
Rowan
How could I have forgotten how difficult it is not to wet yourself when you’ve got a full bladder and you’re twenty-five minutes late going in for the scan?
Thank God for your texts to distract me!
Nathan is going straight from here to the station, so he can go to London with Will and Leo and it’s going to be really tight now.
So you’d be doing me a massive favour if you met me here xx
Will was Nathan’s brother, and Leo was his nephew, who’d been diagnosed with muscular dystrophy as a toddler.
Bex knew that a trip to London usually meant an appointment with Leo’s consultant, so Nathan couldn’t afford to miss that train.
Glancing at her watch, she checked the time.
She’d planned to pick Ollie and Tom up from school before she met Rowan, but if she went to the hospital now, she wouldn’t make it back in time for the school run.
Matt was due to be in a meeting with their accountant at pick-up time and she didn’t feel comfortable about the boys making their way home alone, even though Ollie would have to make the transition when he started secondary school.
She still worried about Henry travelling back from Three Ports High on his own, after more than two years.
Tristan had said he would be taking Holly into the village to show her around, so maybe he could bring the boys home.
It probably wasn’t ideal if he was trying to impress Holly, but a good review for the campsite was still right at the bottom of her list of priorities, so she decided to text him anyway.
Bex
Sorry Triss, can I ask a big favour? I need to speak to Rowan about the situation with Mum and she wants me to meet her at the hospital.
I won’t get back in time to meet the boys from school.
Is there any chance you could grab them for me please?
Matt will be home from the accountants by four at the latest xx
She’d barely had time to set her phone down on the table again before a reply came through.
Tristan
Of course I can. You know I aways welcome the opportunity to work on winning my uncle of the year award by taking those two for ice cream! Xx
He wasn’t technically the boys’ uncle, but they’d always called him Uncle Triss, and he couldn’t have been a better one even if he had been Matt’s brother.
Bex was grateful her sons had him in their lives, otherwise they’d have had no aunts or uncles on either side, with Matt being an only child and her being…
well, she might as well have been an only child too.
Bex
Thank you so much, you’re a star and they’ll love that xx
Having sent the response to Tristan, she texted Rowan back to let her know she’d meet her at one of the tables outside the Friends of St Piran’s Hospital Shop, where they could catch up for a coffee and news about the baby.
Maybe Rowan might even be able to come up with a new idea for contacting Briony that Bex hadn’t thought of yet. In fact, she was counting on it.
‘Oh my God, these pasties are every bit as good as you said they’d be.’ Holly had been certain that she wouldn’t be able to eat the whole pasty, which had been as huge as it was delicious, but once she’d started, she didn’t seem able to stop.
‘Mehenick’s pasties are the one guarantee I’ve got not to disappoint when I promise to show a girl a good time.
’ Tristan laughed, the gentle flirting still evident in his tone, but it was probably just the way he was.
He’d paused while they’d been eating to reply to texts from someone who he clearly didn’t want to make wait, so she’d have been very surprised if there wasn’t someone on the scene.
Although what he said next made her wonder if he could read minds.
‘Sorry about all the texting by the way.’
‘It’s no problem at all.’ Holly was desperate to ask what was so urgent, but she didn’t want him to know quite how interested she was. Instead, she left enough space in the conversation hoping he’d elaborate.
‘I hate it when people are texting while they’re with someone else, especially when they’re eating together.’
‘Honestly, don’t worry. It’s not like we were having a formal sit-down meal, and in my job I probably look at my phone far more often than you’d consider polite.’
‘Ah but work is different. I’m talking about people doomscrolling instead of actually having a conversation, and I like talking to you, so it definitely wasn’t anything to do with not enjoying your company.
’ She still couldn’t tell if he was flirting or just being nice.
‘A bit of a family emergency has come up, that’s all, and I’m going to have to pop up to the primary school to pick up my nephews. ’
‘Your nephews?’ She knew Tristan ran the farm with his cousin, but he hadn’t mentioned having any siblings, but then again why would he.
It wasn’t like she ever mentioned her sibling.
Not to anyone. She didn’t talk about family online at all; as far as her followers were concerned Merlin was the only family she had.
It was easier that way and a lot of people found van life appealing because they were looking to escape from something.
Whether that was a financial burden, the treadmill of working just to live, or the breakdown of a relationship.
Taking on the kind of nomadic lifestyle she’d become known for was an alternative to the norm, and so was not having the kind of family relationships most people took for granted.
‘Yes, Ollie and Tom.’ Tristan beamed at the mention of their names and Holly’s stomach tightened in recognition.
The chances of anyone else having boys with the same names as her sister’s children in a place the size of this was almost impossible.
Especially given how close the links between Tristan and her sister’s family were.
She’d been glad that her parents hadn’t been able to stop themselves from mentioning the boys and had seized on those snippets of information like they were diamonds in the dirt.
It meant Holly knew the boys were the children of his cousin, not his sibling, but she couldn’t tell him that, otherwise he’d want to know how she knew so much about them and then everything would be out in the open.
‘They’re brilliant, you’re going to love them and they’ll definitely love you.
I might even get some cool uncle points when they hear how many followers you’ve got. ’