12. Ellie
12
ELLIE
‘ I can’t believe I’ve been back for Cornwall for two weeks,’ Ellie said as she waited for her gran to unlock the door to the café.
‘It has certainly flown.’ Her gran entered the café and turned the lights on. ‘I am enjoying having you home, though, darling.’
‘I’m enjoying being home.’ Ellie placed the bags she’d carried on one table and grabbed hold of her gran and hugged her. ‘I love you so much.’
Her gran chuckled. ‘And I love you.’
‘I’m sorry I didn’t come home more often.’
Her gran patted her shoulder. ‘Don’t be daft, darling. You were living your life, and I didn’t expect you to keep coming back to check on me.’
‘I feel terrible that I didn’t come back to see you. Like I neglected you.’
And Ellie did. She’d been so wrapped up in her life in London, in trying to please Jasper and his parents, in working at the bar and in trying to secure an acting job that she’d put her gran out of her mind. She’d just assumed that she’d be fine. And Pearl had been fine, but now that she’d been home for a while, Ellie could see the signs that her gran was getting older. She was still fit and healthy, in better shape than many people her age, but she was ageing and nothing could turn back the hands of time. If anything had happened to her gran while she’d been away, she’d never have forgiven herself. Her gran had been there for her when her parents had not; she was Ellie’s family.
‘I wasn’t feeling neglected, Ellie.’
‘But I did neglect you and you gave me everything.’ Tears welled in Ellie’s eyes, blurring her vision and threatening to spill over. Then they did and the salty droplets stung as they cascaded down her cheeks, leaving a trail of dampness in their wake.
‘Only my heart, sweeting. I gave you my heart.’ Her gran leant back and met her gaze, then stroked Ellie’s hair back from her face. ‘And I would do it again and again.’
‘Oh Gran.’ Ellie swallowed against the lump in her throat. ‘You’re just so wonderful, even after everything you’ve been through.’
Her gran laughed as she let go of Ellie and unzipped her jacket. ‘I don’t know about that.’
‘But my dad left. You lost Grampa, then Mum ran away to Scotland, and you raised me alone.’
‘And that is something I never saw as a problem, Ellie. It has been an honour.’ Her gran gestured at the kitchen. ‘Let’s get the chickens sorted, then we can have a cuppa. They’ll all be wanting their breakfast.’
Ellie followed her gran through to the kitchen and the utility room, where she filled a bucket with water while her gran got the chicken feed out of a cupboard.
‘Do you ever feel angry with Mum?’ Ellie asked as they crossed the grass to the chicken run.
‘About what?’ Her gran put the food container down, unlocked the gate to the enclosure, then closed it behind them.
‘For leaving you after you’d lost your husband.’
‘Your mum needed to go. She’d been through a lot. Don’t forget, she lost your dad to another woman and that broke her heart and then two years later she lost her dad. A switch flipped in her mind, and she couldn’t cope with staying here anymore.’
‘So she ran away.’ Ellie sighed. She didn’t feel bitter or even angry towards her mum for leaving her, but sometimes she wished her mum had been there for her gran.
‘Sometimes people need to run away. It’s the only way they can cope, and that’s what happened with your mum. She needed a change of scenery and to start over. Do I wish she’d done things differently? Sometimes.’ Her gran opened the chicken coop, and the rooster emerged, then strutted across the run and stretched his wings. Even in the early morning light, his feathers looked as glossy as if they’d been painted with oil. ‘Sometimes, I wish she’d thought more about the impact of her decisions upon you .’
‘But I turned out fine.’ Ellie nudged her gran, and they both laughed.
‘It’s true. But my wish for you when you were small was that you’d have your mum around. Even a bit closer, perhaps. Scotland is quite a trek from here.’
‘It’s one hell of a trek.’ Ellie shuddered at the thought of the journey to Perth in Scotland that felt like weeks whenever she’d travelled to see her mum. ‘No wonder she never came back to see us very often.’
Her gran was filling the feeders, so Ellie got the bucket and changed the water. The chickens gathered around them as if to welcome them. Meanwhile, Chris Hensworth emitted a few loud crows and looked very pleased with himself.
‘And what of my dad?’ Ellie asked when they’d made a fuss of the birds and were on their way back to the café. ‘Do you blame him?’
Her gran stopped walking and turned to Ellie. Behind the café, the sky glowed pink and apricot with the sunrise, and the glow touched her gran’s face making her skin look peachy and youthful. For a moment, Ellie could see how her gran would have looked when she was younger, and it tugged at her heart. Once upon a time, her gran had been young with her whole life stretching out ahead of her. She’d fallen in love, had a child and a future with her family to look forward to. But time had passed, and her life had changed beyond recognition, yet here she was, still smiling, still kind and resilient, positive and loving. There was nothing Pearl Draper wouldn’t do for anyone because she had the kindest, biggest heart.
‘Your dad was a funny one.’ Her gran chewed at her bottom lip thoughtfully. ‘I liked him. We met when he came here one year on holiday with some friends and he and your mum fell madly in love. They were just sixteen, and it was all very intense. For months, they corresponded, then the following summer he came back and never returned home. They couldn’t bear to be apart and I thought they’d be together forever and so did your grampa. Eventually, they got their own place and then your mum got pregnant with you and I guess life just got in the way. They didn’t have much money, and we tried to help out but your dad … well, he liked a drink and the horses and so their financial situation got worse and then one day … He upped and left.’
‘With another woman.’ It wasn’t a question because Ellie knew the truth about her dad’s infidelity. For years she’d felt betrayed by him because he hadn’t just left her mum, he’d left her too. He’d never got in touch, not even on her birthday. It was, she thought, quite clear to her that he had never loved her. But she’d had her gran and her grampa and so she’d never felt like she lacked love. She’d been lucky, she thought, and perhaps that attitude was also something she’d inherited from her gran because her gran was a glass half full kind of person.
‘There was another woman … not from here, but she worked at the betting shop he frequented. He took a liking to her and then decided that she would make him happier than your mum did and off he went. Such a shame that he didn’t stay in touch. Your mum could have tried to track him down and asked for child support, but she was too proud and wanted nothing to do with him afterwards. We felt so bad for her. But we couldn’t push her to pursue him and so we did what we could to support her and you, which was why you moved back in with us. That was a pleasure though, because having you around was, and always has been, an absolute delight.’
‘And then Mum fell in love again.’
‘Hmmm.’ Her gran raised her brows slowly. ‘OK, it wasn’t an overnight romance, but I still think she was vulnerable. She went on a few dates after joining that dating app and then, when she met Bryce, it was all she talked about for months.’
‘Bryce.’ Ellie smiled. He was a giant of a man with a bushy grey beard and hair like wire wool. He owned a farm in Perth and always smelt like manure. Her mum adored him and his eyes followed her around whatever room they were in, as besotted as a teenager. And so, even though Ellie had occasionally wished her mum could be around more, she’d also known that her mum had found her happy ever after and there was no way anyone could begrudge her that.
‘Good old Bryce.’ Her gran laughed. ‘Come on, let’s get that kettle on.’
They went back inside the café and washed their hands, then her gran filled the kettle and made tea while Ellie hung up their coats.
It wasn’t like they hadn’t spoken about these things before, but sometimes conversations needed to be had more than once to work things through. Perspectives could change with age and experience and sometimes human beings simply needed to get the words out in order to set them free.
‘I am happy that Mum’s happy,’ Ellie said, perched on a stool at the stainless steel island at the centre of the café kitchen.
‘Me too. She took your grampa’s death very badly. With it coming after your dad had left too, she was even more vulnerable. We’re all just trying to get through, Ellie, and have to do what we have to do.’
‘I needed to leave London.’ Ellie accepted a mug of tea from her gran.
‘And you did it at the right time for you.’
Ellie blew on her tea. ‘You don’t think I should have come home before?’
Her gran shook her head. ‘You’d always have wondered if you hadn’t given it enough time and that could have led to regrets. Nothing worse than regretting not giving something enough of a chance. That applies to acting and to Barnaby. I think you could return to acting though if your heart still yearns to go in that direction.’
Ellie sipped her tea. ‘I’m just not sure. But I don’t think it does now. I gave it a shot, and it didn’t work out.’
‘Yes but that agent of yours wasn’t helping. If you got a different agent, it might work out.’
‘It could and I’ll see how it goes. But right now, I’m enjoying being away from all that pressure. I like working here.’ She smiled, thinking about how the last two weeks had been. Working at the café with her gran, was very rewarding. She’d helped out there before, but that was back when she had dreams of being a famous actor and making it big. The idea of working at a Cornish café for life had seemed beneath what she was aiming for and no way near exciting enough. But now that she’d experienced life away from the village and how harsh the world could be, she felt differently. During the past two weeks, she’d enjoyed the lack of pressure on her days, the lack of focus on her appearance and performances, the time to catch up with people from the village and to meet new ones. Despite not wanting to admit it to herself (lest her grandmother guess her thoughts), she enjoyed seeing Jasper Holmes and his children. Had actually looked forward to seeing him come into the café — sometimes with his children and sometimes alone — and anticipated speaking to him again. Their exchanges had been brief, limited to what he wanted to order and to the weather, but still … he was very handsome with a lovely deep voice. She liked how respectful he was towards others, especially her gran. Barnaby hadn’t even wanted to speak to her gran over video calls, but Jasper made eye contact with Pearl and really listened to her, asked about her and offered to help with anything she needed. One day when he’d been there, a delivery had arrived and Ellie and Pearl had tried to get it inside, but it had been too heavy. Jasper had been working on his laptop at the table near the window (the one he always chose if it was free) and when he’d seen them struggling, he’d gone out to help. He lifted the boxes as easily as if they were polystyrene. The delivery driver was new and in a hurry, so he hadn’t brought the delivery inside. Ellie had tried not to notice the way the muscles in Jasper’s arms had rippled as he’d brought the boxes through the café and into the kitchen, but it was hard not to see how strong he was. She’d caught her gran watching her watching Jasper and had blushed crimson. As a result, she tried not to look at him again, but that proved difficult when he came to the counter to order something. Not looking at him and making eye contact then would seem very rude indeed.
‘Well, one day this place will be yours.’ Her gran gazed at her over her mug and Ellie shook her head.
‘Gran! Don’t say things like that.’
‘It’s true. I’ve told your mum, and she’s fine about it. After all, she had acres and acres in Scotland and doesn’t want this place, anyway. Besides, I told her it should go to you to keep or to sell. Whatever you want.’
‘Please don’t talk about such horrible things.’
‘What? Acres in Scotland?’
‘No! About … you know… something happening to you.’
‘Ellie, darling, we have to face facts that my time will come and then you need to know that this café will be yours. And the cottage, too.’
‘Gran!’ Ellie took a gulp of tea to ease her aching throat. The thought of a world without Pearl Draper around was far too awful to contemplate.
‘Your mum knows that you’re my sole beneficiary and she’s happy with that. Should you wish to stay on in Cornwall, you’ll have this place and the cottage to call home. Or to sell, but that will be your choice.’
‘I’d rather keep you forever.’
Her gran laughed. ‘Well, you have me for now. And we need to get some baking done for the day ahead and to get planning because there are spring events to organise.’
‘Yes, Gran!’ Ellie slid off the stool and took their mugs to the sink.
Outside the window, the shadows were moving across the garden as the sun rose in the sky and she could see the chickens and the rooster trotting around in the run. She’d go out and check for fresh eggs in a bit and then help her gran with the baking and other food preparation. With it being Saturday, it would be busy and she was looking forward to another day of serving the villagers. She hoped that Jasper would also come to the café that day; if she had the chance, she would try to think of something interesting to say to him so he wouldn’t think her conversation was limited to food, coffee, and the weather.
She could do that, couldn’t she?