Chapter 26
BARDY
What’s done cannot be undone.
His namesake has never let him down before. It had come to him. Twelfth Night. It had sounded like a Klaxon in his head. Love triangle, he had thought. A common enough theme in Shakespeare. A Midsummer Night’s Dream was another. He had joined the dots.
I liked Pia.
Pia likes Kate.
Which means . . . Kate likes . . .
So he’d spewed out that invitation. How many “outs” had he peppered her with? Tried to make a triangle. Except he was no Pythagoras—never really got math—and she’d said no. Thanks, but no thanks.
Bardy struggles up the shingle bank. Good word, “shingle.” Just like the sound his feet are making now.
He is early for his meeting with Hana, having walked the seven miles out of town along the coastal path.
Made good time. He detoured onto the shingle before heading to the pub on the green.
When he is at the top of the bank, he turns and looks out to sea.
It looks cold and gray. Miserable. A bit like his mood.
Aah. He breathes out.
A seal is swimming parallel to the beach, watching him.
He never tires of spotting seals. This one looks smart, perky.
Intelligent eyes. This seal wouldn’t have mistaken friendship for a love triangle.
Bet his wife didn’t just swim off one day, and he was left paddling around in circles in the gray ocean, wondering what had happened.
Now Hana has paddled back to see him.
What does she want? Well, only one way to find out.
Bardy makes his way down the puddled path to the road.
It has been a subdued day of drizzle and showers.
Impossible to believe it is nearly May. Although this is North Norfolk—at times, with weather all of its own.
Despite the dreary day, it comes to him—how could he ever have thought he would leave this?
The path he is on crosses over a dike, and his eye follows the line cutting between the reeds.
In the water is the reflection of a troubled sky mixed in with terra-cotta.
He spots some scurvy grass growing in clumps.
On one trip away to Birmingham, he couldn’t recall what he was doing, but on the median of the highway, he had seen scurvy grass.
Later, he had Googled it. It grew there because of the salt they spread on the roads in the winter.
He remembers finding it comforting, like a piece of home.
And you thought you could leave all this?
Hana is waiting at a table, a glass of white wine in front of her.
The flood of color threatens to wash him out the door.
And yet there is comfort in the familiarity, mixed in with the pain.
But there is a change too. A deeper yellow.
More of the earth about it. They kiss. On the cheek.
How strange that feels. She looks well. Tanned.
Clear-eyed. A new tattoo snaking down the finger where his ring had once been.
“Hi Bardy. You look well.”
He’s sure he doesn’t.
Better than Lou, though, with his bandaged hand and patched face. This brings immeasurable comfort. Not his accident-prone friend’s discomfort, but the thought of them sitting on ancient beach chairs by a pool listening to a rat they want to be an otter.
Tina thought I could do better.
He looks at his ex-wife and thinks Tina must have been mad.
“How are things? You off soon?” he asks.
Is he trying to get rid of her already?
“You trying to get rid of me already?” She smiles.
Thirty years of marriage will make its mark.
“No, of course not.” He returns her smile. “I’ll get some menus and then we can talk as we decide what to eat.”
When he returns with a pint and the menus, she says quietly, “This is harder than I thought.”
For a moment, he thinks she’s going to deliver some news, like I’m getting remarried.
But this just flits through. It doesn’t stop.
The next thought does. Meeting up after so long—so long together and now, so long apart—was never going to be easy.
He sits down. “Were you always unhappy living here? Living with me?” His words surprise him.
Then he wonders why. Isn’t it pretty much all he has been thinking of?
“Oh, Bardy. No, of course not. I really loved you . . .”
You don’t have to be an English teacher to recognize the past tense.
“. . . and this place is beautiful. Coming here with you, bringing up the boys in such an amazing spot, oh, and so much more. But then yes, Bardy, I did want more.”
“Did you tell me? Wasn’t I listening? I would have changed.”
Hana doesn’t have to answer his rapid-fire questions.
Yes. No. And no, you wouldn’t have.
He is relieved when the waitress comes for their orders.
“Have you lost weight?” Hana says, studying him.
She flicks her hair back off her shoulder.
The gesture is so familiar that even after all this time apart, the divorce, the realization that they are different people wanting different things—he still wants to wake up and find this has all been a bad dream. He thinks of Tay to try to refocus.
Mistake. Worry is heaped on his distress.
“Has Tay told you about her work stuff?” he asks. Maybe Hana will have some ideas. They were always a good double act when it came to the kids.
Hana nods.
Of course she has. He thinks of Tay walking toward Hana. Hana’s arms held wide. Tay walking into that hug. It isn’t jealousy he feels, just the weariness of always finding it so hard. The weight of the worry.
“Tay’s going to be fine. She’s tougher than you think . . .”
“I doubt that.”
“What do you mean? That she’s not tough? Or that she couldn’t be any tougher?” Hana had always liked to get to the bottom of things.
He wants to say “both,” but dismisses this with a slight shake of the head—a “move on” gesture.
“Well, it’s not like she’s going to end her days working in insurance. I’m still amazed she took the job. It’s not really her, is it?”
“She’s doing well, though,” Bardy insists—and what options had there been for a sixteen-year-old caregiver with few qualifications?
Hana says, derisively, “Yeah, working with a bunch of bitchy middle-aged women.”
Bardy wonders if Hana didn’t have girlfriends because she was always so busy. Or was that another legacy of living your life in the wrong place?
Or maybe Tina had been right.
He wants to look at Hana and feel like a man who has moved on. He can’t even see an outline of a door. No exit sign. No way out.
So instead, he asks about her family, and then they talk about the boys. Safe ground. A place to meet.
The meal is drawing to a close, and Bardy has been telling her about the creative group. His description of Bazza brought easy laughter that felt good.
“I think I remember him from the post office,” Hana says, grinning.
He is just embarking on Kate’s struggles with color, and Hana is leaning forward, interested, and nodding when it dawns on Bardy that he doesn’t know why she wants to see him. So he asks.
“I think I wanted to say goodbye. To just check—”
“Can I get you two coffees?” a waitress asks.
They head down the alleyway of cafetières, and would they like something with that? All the time Bardy is wondering—check what?
“You said check,” he queries as soon as the waitress has cleared the pudding bowls and disappeared back to the kitchen. It took a lot of time. It didn’t help that he had taught the waitress.
He is not really surprised when Hana says, “Did I? I can’t remember what I was going to say.”
She was never a very good liar. Hid stuff—he now knows—but not a liar.
He leaves it.
“I wanted to see you before I left for New Zealand. Say goodbye properly.”
It flashes into his head that maybe she will sleep with him one more time.
Nonsense, of course. And it would finish him off.
He thinks he’s been holding up okay, not looking like a total loser without her.
Able to talk about the creative group like he’s got his shit together.
He is so glad he is going with Tay to her meeting tomorrow afternoon. Some payback.
“How long are you around for?”
“Not sure.”
“I wondered, if you’re going to be here, whether you would come to the group and do one of your sessions on color, like you used to do at the college?”
Hana hesitates. “I’m not sure, Bardy.” She looks at him. “Look, if it would help, I could meet this Kate of yours for a coffee, chat some stuff through with her.”
Kate of yours. Got that wrong, but he nods.
They leave it there, and as they move outside, they manage a hug that is okay. At least he pulls away before he has fastened himself onto her like a limpet.
He stands on the edge of the parking lot, long after Hana’s taxi has gone.
He is roused by his text alert. Leonard is on the group chat.
Good luck tomorrow Tay. I’m sure it will go well. I did try to call Ray, but sadly, he passed away six months ago. Pancreatic cancer. Very sad.
Bardy wonders how he knows about the timing of the meeting.
Maybe Leonard contacted Tay? He looks at his phone and waits.
No one else responds. He thinks of Pia, who is seeing Tay tonight to talk through her meeting.
It had made him feel warmer toward her. Guilty because he had thought she wasn’t taking it seriously. Couldn’t be bothered.
He wonders what Linda thought of Leonard trying to get in touch with Ray. Bloody irritated, he suspects. But you can’t deny the man has his heart in the right place.
You’ve got this, Tay.
To thine own self be true.
A text from Kate.
Nice. The Bard. He didn’t often let you down.
Good luck texts come thick and fast from the others.
No response from Tay, but he hopes she sees them.
His phone sounds again.
A text just for him from Lou.
Leonard! Bloody hell, doesn’t the man ever listen?!!
There follows a GIF of a man with a trumpet hearing device saying—What? What? What?
Before Bardy can reply, Lou types some more.
We should take him out for a drink, try and give the poor bugger some pointers before Linda really does run him over.
Bardy sends a thumbs-up emoji.
He thinks Leonard isn’t the only one with his heart in the right place.