Chapter 27
Chapter Twenty-Seven
TOM
The invitation arrives on a Thursday.
I find it in my pigeonhole at the surgery, tucked between a pharmaceutical catalogue and a reminder about the practice’s Christmas party. Thick cream card. Embossed lettering. A small anchor stamped in the corner.
You are invited to the christening of Peter William Harding. St Michael’s Church, Pencross. Saturday, 15 September at 2 pm. Godparents: Nina Ellis & Tom Darcy.
I read it standing in the corridor, staff and clients moving past me, the everyday noise of the practice fading to static.
Godfather. They want me to be godfather.
And there’s Nina’s name, printed right next to mine on thick cream card. As if we’re a pair. As if it’s that simple.
I tuck the invitation into my jacket pocket and get on with my day. There’s a Labrador with an ear infection. A cat that’s swallowed something it shouldn’t have. A farm call that will take three hours and leave me smelling of sheep.
Normal. Routine. The life I’m supposed to be building.
The invitation sits against my chest like a heartbeat that isn’t mine.
When Isla calls I’m between appointments.
‘Tom!’ Her voice is bright but frayed around the edges. The permanent state of new motherhood. ‘Did you get it? The invitation?’
‘Got it today.’
‘And? You’re coming, right? Please tell me you’re coming.’
‘Isla—’
‘Don’t you dare say no.’ A shuffling sound, a small cry in the background. ‘Hang on. Kit! Kit, can you take him for a minute? I’m on the phone.’
Muffled voices. More shuffling. Then Isla’s back.
‘Sorry. He’s been cluster feeding all day. I haven’t showered since Tuesday. I’ve forgotten what sleep feels like.’ A pause. ‘None of that is relevant. What’s relevant is that you’re coming to my son’s christening.’
‘I’m coming.’
‘Oh, thank God.’ The relief in her voice is palpable. ‘Kit said you’d make an excuse. Something about work, or the drive being too long—’
‘I’m coming, Isla. I said I would.’
‘I know. I know you did. I just…’ She sighs. ‘It wouldn’t be the same without you, Tom. You’re family. Even when you’re seven hundred miles away pretending to be Scottish.’
‘I’m not pretending to be Scottish.’
‘You know what I mean.’ Another pause. The baby cries again, further away this time. ‘How are you? Really? And don’t say fine. I’m too tired for fine.’
‘I’m…’ I search for a word that isn’t fine. ‘Adjusting.’
‘That’s not better than fine. That’s worse than fine. Adjusting is what people say when they’re miserable but don’t want to admit it.’
‘I’m not miserable.’
‘Tom.’
‘I’m not. The practice is good. Cara’s good. Everything’s—’
‘If you say good, I’m hanging up.’
I almost laugh. ‘It’s an adjustment. That’s all. New place, new people. Takes time.’
‘Mm.’ She doesn’t sound convinced. ‘And how’s Cara? Are you two…?’
‘We’re colleagues.’
‘Just colleagues?’
‘Just colleagues.’
‘Hm.’ There’s a weight to that syllable. A question she’s not asking. ‘Well. You’re coming to the christening. That’s the important thing. We’ll catch up properly then.’
‘Looking forward to it.’
‘Liar.’ But she says it fondly. ‘See you in three weeks, Tom. And for God’s sake, try to look less like someone’s kicked your puppy. It’s a christening, not a funeral.’
She hangs up before I can respond.
I set the phone down and look at the invitation, propped against the salt shaker on the tiny kitchen table.
Godparents: Nina Ellis & Tom Darcy.
Three weeks. In three weeks, I’ll be standing at a font with Nina. Making vows about a child named Peter. Promising to be there, to guide, to support.
I haven’t spoken to her since I left. Haven’t texted. Haven’t called. The silence between us has calcified – two months of it, hardening into a wall I don’t know how to take down and she hasn’t tried to.
But I’ll be there. At the christening. Standing beside her.
And I have no idea what I’m going to say.
Cara finds me in the staff room after the last appointment.
I’m pretending to do paperwork. She’s not pretending anything – just sits down across from me and waits, the way she does. Patient. Steady. Giving me space to speak first.
I don’t take it.
‘Okay,’ she says eventually. ‘I’ll start.’ She leans back in her chair, but her hands are wrapped around her coffee mug and her knuckles are white. ‘I’ve been watching you, Tom. These past weeks. Watching you try to make this work.’
‘And?’
‘And you’re miserable.’
‘I’m not—’
‘You are. You’re doing everything right – showing up, working hard, meeting people, charming all the clients and their pets. But you’re not here.’ She taps her chest. ‘Not where it counts. You’re seven hundred miles away, in a village by the sea, with a woman who…’
She stops. Takes a breath. The mug turns in her hands.
‘With a woman who isn’t me,’ she finishes.
The words settle between us. I open my mouth to argue, but nothing comes out. There’s nothing to argue with. She’s right, and we both know it, and the kindest thing I can do is stop pretending otherwise.
‘I’m not angry,’ she says. ‘I’m not even surprised, really.
I think I knew when I came to Sea Salt Bay.
The way you looked at her.’ A pause. ‘The way you didn’t look at me.
’ She holds up a hand before I can speak.
‘I’m not saying that for sympathy. I’m saying it because it’s true and one of us needs to be honest.’
‘Cara—’
‘I hoped it would fade. Or that I’d be enough to make you forget. But I’m not.’ She meets my eyes. Hers are bright but steady – holding. ‘And that’s okay. It hurts, but it’s okay.’
‘It’s not okay. You’ve been—’
‘Patient. Too patient, probably.’ Her voice wavers – just once, just slightly, a hairline crack in the steadiness – and then she has it back. ‘What’s not okay is you staying here out of obligation. Out of guilt. Out of some idea that you owe me.’
‘I do owe you—’
‘You don’t owe me your life, Tom.’ She leans forward. ‘Go to the christening. See Nina. Figure out what’s actually there. And then make a decision. A real one. Not this halfway thing where you’re here but not here.’
‘And if there’s nothing to figure out? If she doesn’t—’
‘Then you’ll know. And you can come back and we can try properly. Or you can go somewhere else entirely. Or whatever you need to do.’ She sets down the mug. ‘But right now, you’re stuck. And I’m stuck with you. And neither of us is happy.’
I look at her – this woman who’s been nothing but kind, nothing but present. Who came to Sea Salt Bay knowing what she was walking into and came anyway. Who deserves so much more than what I’ve been able to give.
‘I’m sorry,’ I say. ‘I thought I could decide to feel it. Make it happen through sheer force of will.’
‘I know. I’ve tried that too.’ A small, sad smile. The first real crack, and she lets me see it. ‘It doesn’t work.’
‘You deserve better.’
‘I do.’ No argument. No deflection. Just the clean, quiet truth of it. ‘And so do you.’ She reaches across the table. Takes my hand. Squeezes once. ‘Go figure it out, Tom. Whatever happens, at least you’ll know.’
Three weeks pass slowly. Then all at once.
I pack a bag. Just a weekend’s worth – I’m not leaving permanently, whatever Cara says. I’m going for the christening. I’m being a godfather. That’s all.
But I pack more than I need. Shirts I won’t wear. Books I won’t read. A jumper that smells faintly of the surgery in Sea Salt Bay, even though I’ve washed it three times.
The drive south starts in darkness. Five am, the roads empty, the first light of dawn bleeding across the horizon as I cross the border into England. Eleven hours ahead of me. Eleven hours of motorways and service stations and radio stations that fade in and out.
I’ve done this drive before. Two months ago, going the other way. But this doesn’t feel like running. It feels like the opposite of running, though I don’t have a word for what that is.
The landscape shifts as I travel. Scotland’s open hills give way to Yorkshire greenery, breathtaking really, followed by peaks and valleys, expanses of space that then leach into the Midlands’ flat sprawl with its industrial buildings and the carnage that is the Birmingham motorway system.
I stop for coffee near Birmingham – proper coffee this time, from an actual café inside the services, not the machine that tried to poison me on the way up.
It’s still not good. But it’s warm, and the woman behind the counter calls me ‘love’, and the accent is closer to home than anything I’ve heard in two months.
Then the slow curve into the southwest. The A-roads narrowing. The hedgerows rising on either side, thick and tangled and impossibly green. And somewhere around Exeter, the tightness in my chest – which I’ve been carrying like a fist behind my sternum since the day I left – starts to ease.
I don’t notice it at first. I’m focused on the road, on the lorry that’s been tailgating me for the last fifteen miles.
But then I crest a hill and catch a glimpse of the sea – just a sliver, silver against the grey sky – and my lungs open.
Actually, physically, open, drawing in a breath so deep it makes my ribs ache.
The miles fall away. Okehampton. Launceston. The roundabout at Camelford where Dad always takes the wrong exit and blames the signage.
And then the turn. The narrow lane that winds down to the coast. The hedgerows giving way to stone walls. The first glimpse of the village below, spread out around the harbour like a cupped hand holding water.
Sea Salt Bay.
The smell hits me before the view does. Salt and seaweed and fish and the sharp green of the coast path after rain. The smell of my entire life. The one I didn’t realise I was missing until it fills my lungs and I’m gripping the steering wheel because my hands have started shaking.
I roll down the window. The air comes in – cold, salt-edged, alive. And from somewhere below, the gulls, the waves, the distant shouts from the harbour. Every sound landing in me like a tuning fork struck against bone.