10. Faye
10
FAYE
They hadn’t mentioned the morning glory incident since it happened. Not in their texts to arrange this morning of travel, nor since Bash turned up on Faye’s street two minutes ago.
Out of the two of them, he was the only one with a car that would last for longer than five minutes up the motorway, so it was that hatchback that Bash hurled her weekend bag into the boot of alongside his own, lining the tops with their heavy duty coats.
Faye’d also made sure to pack the seldom used walking boots she’d been instructed to bring. As impulsive as he was, Bash wasn’t ever really firm with insisting upon anything, but suitable footwear wasn’t apparently optional on this trip.
The warmth of the air conditioning engulfed her as she slid into the passenger side.
“Everything locked up?” Bash’s gaze flowed over her like he checked if she’d forgotten anything himself.
Keys? Check. Purse? Check. Phone? Check. Brain? … Debatable.
“Yep.” Faye smiled. “Ready to go.”
Four hours plus one stop at motorway services later, and they were where they needed to be, peeling out of main traffic onto roads which branched narrower and narrower, surrounded by more fields and hedgerows as they went.
It’d been a while since they’d driven anywhere together for so long. In last year’s summer, they’d taken a long weekend with Maisie, Freddy, and Sienna and crossed the Channel for the south of France where relatives of Bash’s owned a holiday home they’d borrowed for cheap. Still, one car with five of them crammed together had been something Faye didn’t particularly plan on doing again soon, and a small price to pay for a delicious few days of basking like a lizard by a pool.
It was early afternoon. Bash hadn’t needed a map and so Faye didn’t know they were only five minutes away from his parents’ house until they passed through a village twisted into the grey, wintry landscape and he said, “We’re nearly there.”
She’d been fine until that moment, and then a ball of anxiety bounced around inside Faye’s stomach as though its walls were the pins of a pinball machine. There was no backing out now. She couldn’t ask Bash to turn the car around and abandon these plans.
She tapped her phone in her palm in her lap over and over.
This was the first day off where Baked was still open for business that she’d taken all year. Ellie had strong-willed her into taking the early leave, and Chandra had chomped at the bit to get her to go (on accompaniment of a promise of a cushiony new year’s bonus).
Unable to switch it off, Faye’s mind drifted to the bakery every five minutes between singing – a term used loosely – along to Bash’s driving playlist on the aux. He didn’t say anything about her fidgeting or her wandering mind, distracting her with filling in the gaps of recent family events she hadn’t heard about.
The new desserts they’d sold at the Christmas market had all sold out, which only left Faye with the dilemma of deciding to let them stay as a one-off, or to make a plan to integrate them into Baked ’s menu along with the move to Manchester.
Maybe Baked By The Dozen didn’t just need to only sell doughnuts anymore? Maybe she could turn the brand into something bigger? Knowing that her additional creations had been a hit gave her the confidence to consider the idea more seriously, but it was her own fault that she couldn’t ask the opinion of the one person she wanted it from most.
The car crawled through an even smaller village and similarly down a lane shaded by overhanging trees. Faye expected for the houses they passed to be on the larger side – she wasn’t oblivious to the lives that Bash’s parents had worked commendably hard for. Nor was she intimidated by these mis-matched, brown-brick properties at the ends of long driveways.
She was proud of her bakery and her business. No one could take that away from her or make her wish she’d had a more luxurious life growing up, instead of hopping from one house to another every Friday night, never quite certain of where she was supposed to be or what was happening.
Her heartbeat rose as Bash edged them through the open gates of a driveway, with two four-by-fours parked along one long length of hedging.
The house that welcomed them was indeed huge, neither old nor modern; brown brick, oddly cubed in shape with cute, white detailing around the windows and the cornice by the roof. The main building stood to the left with an annexe extending into the driveway that crunched underneath them.
The front door swung open beneath an arched porch and Faye looked over her shoulder as Michèle burst from the house, dodging around potted greenery and the edge of a hibernating flowerbed.
Bash parked and looked across his car at her. “Are you sure that you’re ready for this?”
“Not at all. And it’s all your fault,” she teased.
“I’ll make it up to you,” he said with a wink that made her glad to already be seated, then hopped out of the car to meet his mother.
The kind of silence that only the countryside could boast enveloped her as Faye closed the passenger door behind her, followed by the abrupt trail of cold across her skin. If the middle of nowhere truly existed, this was it. For once, she couldn’t hear cars or sirens or people yelling on street corners.
Michèle’s arms flew out wide as she beamed a direct line for Bash. “ Sebby! Enfin, tu es là! ? * ”
“ Maman .” Bash met her and Faye found herself smiling as they wrapped one another in the tightest of hugs, knowing how much he’d wanted to visit his parents but hadn’t had the time between work recently.
When they parted, Michèle’s eyes sparkled as she patted her son’s cheeks. Her dark hair cut off above her shoulders was streaked with more wisps of grey than the last time Faye’d seen her, but her excited smile wiped away as her focus drifted to the remnants of Bash’s graze.
“ Mon Dieu, qu’est-ce qui est arrivé à ton visage? ? * ”
Faye guessed by Michèle’s worry and the swipe of her thumb across his cheek what the expletive had meant.
Bash sneaked a glance her way and began to smirk – a look that made Faye’s insides feel as though they burned. “Got into a fight defending Faye’s honour.”
His mother gasped like an old cartoon.
Do not roll your eyes, Faye’s inner voice warned. Not in front of his mother.
“He was hit with a tennis ball during practice,” she countered.
Bash widened his eyes at her. “You couldn’t let me be a hero for one minute – A?e! ? * ”
Michèle whacked him playfully on the arm – Faye loved her already – and turned to her next. “It is lovely to see you again, Faye,” she said in a broadly French accent. Her hands reached out and took hold of Faye’s, pale blue eyes gently appraising .
“You too.” Faye smiled, and finally she turned to Bash’s father who’d crept up behind them. “Hi, Doctor Phillips.”
“Hello dear.” Bundled beneath a heavily knitted cream jumper, his smile was sweet. “Please just call me Arthur. Seb, did you not tell Faye to call me Arthur?”
Bash chuffed. “You know Faye, Dad, she never listens to me.”
“I do! I do, Arthur,” Faye protested. “I promise.”
Arthur smiled, and after greeting Bash similarly to Michèle with a long-held hug, turned to Bash’s car. “Let’s get your bags, shall we?” His refined accent made him sound as though he was a butler transported to the wrong decade. Wrong century , even. Faye loved to hear such gentle tones reminding her of her own father.
They lugged their two bags inside of the house, handing over the winter coats for Arthur to stow away in a cupboard further along the spacious hall. Despite knowing Bash for a decade, this was the first time Faye had ever been to his family home, which meant she soaked it all in like a Victoria sponge.
The off-white walls were warmly lit by a lamp upon a sideboard and a string of yellow lights winding around a thin Christmas tree. Her gaze snagged on two wall-mounted family portraits; both professional with the same backdrop of mottled blue. Only, one had clearly been taken at Bash’s university graduation day, and the other at Matt’s. She could see the difference in Bash’s maturing face even with only a few years between the pictures. He had the same slight European warmth to his complexion as Michèle, but his plump cheeks and strong jaw were entirely Arthur.
Both of Bash’s parents had been surgeons. After retiring from practice a few years ago, they now toured the UK’s universities and hospitals giving lectures. Sometimes they travelled abroad for conferences that lasted for days on end. Faye knew Bash’s older brother in passing, only meeting once or twice at birthday parties and the one time that he stayed with Bash for a week. Matt, she vaguely remembered, worked part time between a general practice and teaching at a university.
But the medical gene had stopped there.
Bash had said before that he’d never felt pressured into following in his family’s footsteps. Never in the years they’d known one another had he mentioned feeling anything less than supported.
“Where’s Matt? His car’s not outside.” Bash still had the strap of his hold-all weighing down one shoulder as he looked between his parents.
“Your brother’s arriving later,” Arthur answered.
Bash’s thumb came up. “Great.”
His mother said something to him then, and it was moments like this where Faye wished she’d paid more attention in her secondary school’s French class. The part about assigning genders to inanimate objects had been the clincher and she’d given up. The few phrases she knew were from what she’d picked up around Bash.
Michèle wasn’t subtle at all with how she glanced in her direction as she spoke, and the otherwise healthy tint of pink on Bash’s cheeks blotted a shade darker. Awkward as ever, Faye turned down her eyes and studied the biscuity brown and gold pattern on the hallway runner as Bash spoke a clipped French in return. She wasn’t physically prepared for how much of that gravelly accent she would hear from him whilst they were here.
“It’s alright, Faye. I don’t understand them either.” Arthur’s kind-hearted smile was the same as Bash’s, and Faye knew exactly where he’d inherited it from. She wouldn’t know it now, with how Arthur’s hair neatly parted down one side had aged to various shades of grey, but those graduation photos reminded her he’d been a fiery redhead in his youth.
Her lips curved in a pleasant, amused smile in return.
French interaction over, Michèle said to them both, “I have snacks prepared in the kitchen for you. Why don’t you take Faye’s things upstairs” – she directed that to Bash – “and I will warm up the croissants.”
Only her things? Faye’s gaze fell on Bash’s hand wrapped around the strap of his bag.
“Homemade?” He preened, cheeks still blushed from whatever his mother had said to him.
Michèle gawked like it was a scandal to ask. “ Bien s?r! ”
Of course. Faye recognised that at least, if not from just Michèle’s tone, before she slipped off to the kitchen.
Bash nudged her arm when his mother was out of sight. “I’ll show you where your room is.”
“Take your time,” Arthur said kindly from behind them.
Faye let herself be led to the staircase where Bash left his bag tucked against the wall.
“So the main house has four bedrooms,” he said. “My parents’ room, obviously. And three guests. Everything’s really spacious so I reckon you’ll be comfy.”
The spacious part Faye already knew, but Bash said it so humbly that it passed her by. She didn’t distract herself by looking at the pictures and paintings on the walls, or the view from the window which may as well have been as tall as her on the upstairs landing, when she had plenty of time to explore over the next few days.
Turning down one of two hallways, Bash continued, “ Maman ’s already told me that I’m staying in the annexe so the girls can have a room for themselves.” His nieces. Which explained to Faye why he’d left his bag downstairs. “ But , you get the en-suite.” He winked and grinned over his shoulder as if the en-suite was a luxury. Though having a bathroom to herself was considerate of his parents, given that she’d be sharing one with strangers otherwise.
“Will you be alright all the way down in the annexe?”
“Yeah, yeah. I’ll be fine.” Bash shrugged it off like everything else. No worry ever seemed to stick to him. Not in this sense, anyway, or maybe just in this house .
“Did you design any of this?” Faye twirled her finger in a general gesture after they moved past one open door and stopped at another.
“Only the kitchen and dining room in the main house, but all of the annexe is my design. Maman wasn’t too fussed about having control over that since it’s for guests to enjoy.” Beneath Bash’s casual veneer, Faye knew he’d be proud of his work. He would’ve pulled out all of the stops and done his best designs for what his parents would’ve wanted.
It was rare that she ever got to experience any of his sketches come to life in person – not in the way he was able to see hers. Most of the clients he worked with wanted their personal properties designed, meaning only those who needed to know were privy, and it was more than just “decoration”. Some of these homes were living, breathing works of art composed of hand-picked finishes to reflect natural light just right, with precisely arranged furniture to create flow. Even Bash’s most minimalist interiors that she’d only ever seen through photographs in architectural magazines had hidden gems which were truly unique.
Faye knew without having explored yet that– “You did good, Bash. It’s lovely.”
She didn’t miss the quick tug in the corner of his mouth at the compliment.
“We’ll let you snoop later.” He knew her so well, it was almost annoying. “But for now … ”
Bash widened the door they’d stood at for half a minute, and Faye wasn’t able to hold in her gasp.
The pine scented room at the back of the house overlooked acres of lawn and the trees and hedges that penned it in through two old-style paned windows. Beyond, the postcard worthy Shropshire landscape stretched for miles.
Faye moved straight past the queen sized bed, depositing her bag on the cream carpeted floor along the way, and stared out. She knew then that she’d been in London for far too long. She hardly ever left.
Her father and step-mother lived in Oxford, which was as far as she ever left the general area of London when running Baked allowed for it. Her mother and El’s father who she saw more often were based on the outskirts of Sevenoaks, which hardly constituted leaving greater London at all.
“This view is incredible,” she gawked.
“It is.” Behind her, Bash’s voice turned misty and wistful. “I wish Matt and I had grown up here to get to see this every day. I hope my kids one day can have this too.”
Faye wasn’t prepared for Bash to talk about wanting children. His voice repeating those words swirled around and around in her chest and tugged her strings like a marionette.
“The view from one of my childhood bedroom windows was of the house next door,” she said, pulling herself out of those thoughts of how much she could picture the family Bash dreamed of as being hers. “So I hope you can one day give them this.”
Bash’s voice held so much uncertainty. “Is that … what you want as well?”
The answer wasn’t simple. It never had been.
“With the right person … eventually. And if I never meet that man then I’ll do it by myself.” Thoughts of her childhood spent constantly moving back and forth between two homes came to dampen Faye’s hope. If she was going to marry, then she had to be certain her own children wouldn’t end up that way too. “Anything is better than watching your parents fall out of love.”
She didn’t realise Bash was behind her until his fingers brushed up and down her spine. She let herself lean into his comforting touch, and he let her sit with her thoughts without asking her to explain. Her feelings on marriage and starting a family in general weren’t unknown to him, but they were a sore spot in her heart that he inherently knew to only gently press upon .
They were quiet for a moment, watching the early sunset descending.
“Well,” Bash eventually cleared his throat, fairly quietly, “if you don’t find him, then there’s always our pact.”
“Our pact?”
“You offered to marry me not long ago.”
“Oh, that … ” Crap, she’d forgotten. Her tongue usually loosened when she was tipsy. Had she been tipsy that night after Samuel’s ? Faye didn’t think so, but it would explain why she felt an unpleasant urge to backpedal on what she’d said.
“That was an offer of companionship, Bash. If you want kids then … Well, you know … ” Her cheeks heated up at the thought of how those kids might come about. That they would have to …
The touch of his hand on the middle of her back became so powerful in overruling all logical thoughts.
“Faye Whittaker,” Bash intoned, “are you offering me sex, too?”
“Bash!” Faye all but squealed as she whacked his arm.
He twisted away out of her reach, laughing and smirking and looking too handsome with a devilish grin for his own good.
“You said it,” he argued.
“I’m not thinking about this and neither are you.” Faye shooed him.
She absolutely would not talk about any kind of intimacy with Bash . She wouldn’t even think about it. How would she be able to go downstairs and be in the same room as his parents if she let those visions run away in her mind?
“Go on, leave me in peace. I want to wash the smell of the motorway off of my skin.”
Bash conceded gracefully, if not still smug. “The en-suite is there.” He gestured at a thin door she hadn’t noticed before then. “Towels and such are in a cupboard down the hall but everything should already be in there for you.”
“Thank you, Michèle. ”
He tugged on his ear. “It was probably Dad, actually.”
“Thank you, Arthur.”
Bash backed up to leave. “Come down when you’re ready. I’m sure Maman’s already got the family photo albums out waiting for you with the croissants.”
“I wouldn’t want to miss those.” Faye already smelled the warmth of the pastry distantly floating up the stairs, and the chance to see baby Bash was exciting too.
Bash smiled lightly, a real smile, and closed the door as he went.
Faye turned to the bed which was practically palatial and folded herself down forwards, groaning as her body stretched out on the mattress.
“I could get used to this,” she said to herself and the view.
* ? Sebby! Finally, you are here!
* ? My god, what happened to your face?
* ? Ouch!