Chapter 8
‘I can’t believe it! Our Jenna?’
‘All right, keep it down!’ Alison cast a furtive glance around The Driftwood Hub to make sure no one was listening.
Not that there were many people who’d have heard her conversation with Rosie anyway.
Apart from the two of them and Emmy, who had disappeared into the kitchen, the cafe/shop/information centre was empty.
‘Are you sure? I mean, it just doesn’t sound like her, does it?’ Rosie frowned and shook her head before taking a sip of tea. ‘She’s not the type.’
‘Clearly she is.’ Alison was still smarting from the fact that her daughter had not only pulled the wool over her eyes, who knew how many times, but that she’d jeopardised her marriage and her children’s happiness for what might well have been some cheap and meaningless fling.
Judging by what Jenna had been wearing, Alison would put money on it being purely based on lust. ‘I’m just grateful I made Hallie and Ada stay in the car.
Imagine if they’d walked in on their mother looking like that? ’
‘Bloody hell, it doesn’t bear thinking about.’ Rosie sighed. ‘I thought her and Joel were set for life. It’s disappointing really, isn’t it?’
‘That’s one word for it,’ Alison said grimly.
‘So what did you do? That was what? Ten days ago. Have you seen her since?’
Alison cradled her mug of tea, still seething.
‘No. I dropped the twins at school the following morning and sent Jenna a text message telling her not to forget to collect them when they’d finished because I wouldn’t be doing it again for the foreseeable.
I also told her she’d better make some alternative childcare arrangements because I had a life to live and would no longer be available. ’
Rosie gasped. ‘You never did!’
‘Do you blame me?’ Alison demanded.
‘No, of course not. I just never thought you’d actually do it. You’ve been threatening to tell her for long enough, but you always find a reason to back down.’
‘Well, not this time. Like you said, it’s been ten days now and she hasn’t bothered to reply, so it looks as if I’m free at last.’ Alison massaged the bridge of her nose, feeling far less happy about her new freedom than she’d expected to.
‘This has really upset me, Rosie,’ she admitted.
‘I can’t believe any daughter of mine would behave like that.
I don’t understand her, I really don’t.’
Her sweet little girl. She’d always been so steady and responsible. Solemn even. Alison couldn’t believe what had happened.
‘Maybe she and Joel aren’t as happy as we thought they were,’ Rosie said thoughtfully. ‘What a shame.’
‘Perhaps if they spent more time together, they’d have a chance of making it work,’ Alison said. ‘Honestly, Jenna’s always saying that she hasn’t got time for Joel or for the girls, yet she’s got time to seduce some creep from work.’
‘You think he’s a teacher?’ Rosie asked, surprised.
‘Well, she never goes anywhere to meet anyone else, does she?’ Alison frowned suddenly.
‘At least, I don’t think she does, but what do I know?
This proves that, actually, she could be going anywhere and doing anything while I’m looking after her children.
And I’ve only got her word for it that this is the first time.
She could have been having a torrid affair for months for all I know. Or a whole string of lovers!’
‘Lucky bugger,’ Rosie said, her eyes twinkling. ‘Aw, don’t look like that, Ali. You know I’m only messing. I wonder who’s got the kids today then? Or is Jenna actually going to spend her Sunday with them for once?’
‘Not my concern,’ Alison said. Yeah, keep telling yourself that, Ali.
God, she hoped they’d be okay without her.
She blinked away tears at the thought. I’m doing this for them, too, she told herself fiercely.
They need their mum and dad to spend time with them.
What else can I do? She took a long swig of her tea and looked towards the counter.
‘Might get Mam and Dad some of those blueberry muffins. They deserve a treat.’ She smiled at her cousin.
‘I’ll get you one, too, as a thank you for listening to me ranting. ’
‘It’s always a pleasure.’ Rosie reached over and squeezed her hand. ‘Aw, it’s great to see you. You’ve missed that many weekends lately I’d nearly given up on you. Apart from that Sunday dinner in The North Star you’ve hardly been here.’
‘I know. Don’t make me feel more guilty than I already do.’
‘I’m not trying to make you feel guilty. You mean about your mam? Honest to God, there’s no need. It’s like I told you, we’ve all kept an eye out and Seb’s lad Sam has been smashing.’
‘He’s a nice lad,’ Alison agreed. ‘I never thought he’d stay here, did you? I mean, he seemed quite happy working for that builder in Weltringham and living in the flat in Millensea. Fancy giving all that up to take over the pub cos his dad’s retired.’
‘I’m still surprised about that,’ Rosie admitted. ‘Seb retiring, I mean. I thought, after what happened, he’d find work a comfort.’
Seb, forever known as Seb from the pub, had run The North Star for decades, along with his wife, Donna.
But when Donna passed away Seb had fallen into a serious depression, refusing to have anything to do with the pub.
He’d even threatened to sell it. To everyone’s surprise, Sam had given up his job and flat and moved back to Kelsea Sands, where he’d been acting as the landlord ever since, even though it was still Seb’s name over the door.
‘You were at school with Seb, weren’t you?’ Rosie asked. ‘Funny, he always seems so much older than you when I see him now. Not that I see him much. He’s practically a recluse.’
‘Well, we all handle our grief in different ways, I suppose,’ Alison said.
She remembered the cheeky, lively little lad she’d been at primary school with and felt a sudden sadness for how life had treated Seb.
She understood his grief. Thinking about it, she supposed she’d been lucky that Jenna and Joel had refused to let her wallow after Drew’s death, even though they were grieving, too.
And then when the twins came along, she’d been far too busy to let herself sink into the pit of depression that Seb had clearly found himself in.
Rosie’s eyes lit up. ‘Hey, guess who I saw yesterday?’ Sometimes, her rapid change of subject was quite startling.
‘Everyone you looked at?’
‘Very funny.’ Rosie stuck her tongue out. ‘Your childhood nemesis. What’s his name? Ian thingy.’
‘Oh, Ian thingy. Yes, I remember him well.’ Alison grinned. ‘It’s not surprising really, is it? Not if he’s living at Watersmeet. Kelsea Sands is so tiny it’s a wonder you don’t see every single villager every single day.’
‘I was walking down the road – on the way to your mam and dad’s as a matter of fact – and he came out of St Helen’s and nearly collided with me. Funny place to be, eh?’
‘Not really. I often used to sit in the churchyard and think. It’s a nice place to gather your thoughts.’
Rosie wrinkled her nose. ‘Are you joking? It’s creepy. Well, at this time of year especially.’
Alison couldn’t see why. St Helen’s was the village church – sadly redundant since the early 1990s, due to its dwindling congregation.
Built in the mid nineteenth century, it had replaced the much grander fourteenth-century church of the same name that had fallen into the sea due to coastal erosion some thirty years before the new church’s construction.
A compact red-brick building, it sat in a small graveyard that was gradually being reclaimed by nature.
A bench was situated just to the side of the church porch, where visitors could sit and relax surrounded by bushes, shrubs and wild flowers.
Most of the gravestones were so worn and weather-beaten they were illegible, but it was worth trying to read the inscriptions if you could manage it.
In the middle of the churchyard was a large stone cross which had belonged to the original church. It had been saved from the sea and stored safely away at a stately home near Hull, until the new village of Kelsea Sands took form and its brand-new church was built.
To the rear of the churchyard was a thick boundary of trees, and beyond it open fields that eventually adjoined the wetlands. Its location made St Helen’s seem somehow even more wild and beautiful.
‘Maybe he’s going to buy it,’ Rosie mused.
Alison looked at her, startled. ‘The church? Why would he, when he’s just been given Watersmeet?’
‘Dad reckons it could be a lovely home, although I wouldn’t fancy it myself. Not with all them graves around. And it’s been up for sale for donkey’s years, hasn’t it? Cheap as chips. He says if things were different, he’d buy it himself.’
‘By, “if things were different”, I take it he means if this whole village wasn’t about to fall into the sea?’ Alison said glumly. Not that she was sure Kelsea Sands was even a village any longer. Was it, she wondered, a hamlet now, since there were no longer church services?
‘Blimey, look on the bright side, why don’t you? We’re not done yet. Bet it will still be here when we’re long gone.’
‘It will probably outlast me,’ Alison agreed. ‘I’m falling to bits.’
‘Oh, how did you get on at the doctor’s?’ Rosie said, with another of her sudden changes of subject. ‘Did they alter your BP meds?’
Alison squirmed, wishing she’d been more careful with her choice of words.
‘I’m, er, seeing the nurse tomorrow.’
‘Tomorrow? But you said they’d messaged you to come in as soon as possible! That was ten days ago!’
‘I know, but I’ve sort of had my mind on other things,’ Alison pointed out. ‘Don’t look at me like that. I have made an appointment. I had to or they wouldn’t give me my prescription.’
‘Did you have those other tests?’ Rosie asked suddenly.
‘What other tests?’
‘You said you got a cervical smear reminder and a bowel testing kit in the post. Did you sort them out?’
Alison sighed. ‘No. I’m not going to bother.’