Chapter 35
God, it’s only been a week. How is that even possible?
I miss him so much, but I know I did the right thing.
I just hope Rosie understands. I’m so glad I got my bags into the boot before she came home.
I’ll text her when I finish work, let her know not to expect me.
She’s at the chippy tonight so she won’t come looking for me.
I just need to go home and start my life over.
Figure out what’s next. Make it up with Jenna if I can. What a bloody mess.
Alison had just arrived at her house from a shift at work. Not the caravan. Not home. Flicking on the light switch in the hall, she went from room to room, drawing curtains and switching on lamps, trying to make the place look cosy and lived-in again.
She put the carrier bag on the kitchen table. Teabags. Coffee. A ready meal that was the healthiest she could find in the fridge at the petrol station. No milk because she no longer took milk in tea or coffee. Definitely no sugar. No bread or butter.
Tomorrow she’d do a proper shop in Maister’s and fill the fridge with healthy food. She’d order a copy of that cookbook for herself, because she had no intention of letting things slide. Not after she’d come this far.
Maybe she’d buy Jenna a bunch of flowers and take them round to hers. It was the Easter holidays after all. She’d posted the twins’ Easter eggs and Easter cards to them last week. It had cost her a fortune. She could have saved her money and delivered them in person.
She was supposed to be having the girls this weekend at the caravan. She’d promised they could have the twin room again, and she’d sleep on the sofa. They were so excited and now she was about to let them down.
Maybe she could make it up to them somehow. Take them to the cinema to watch a film. Treat them to popcorn.
She remembered suddenly that she still hadn’t used the handmade voucher that Rosie had written for her as a birthday present. She should have held her to it. Oh well, maybe next year.
Tears pricked her eyes, and she sank into the chair and put her head in her hands. She missed Rosie already, and she missed her mam and dad.
‘Don’t be so stupid!’ she told herself. ‘They’re only twenty-four miles away, not on the dark side of the moon. You can visit them any time you like.’
But how could she, without the risk of bumping into Mac? She didn’t think she could face him. It was too painful. Did that mean she’d lost Kelsea Sands, as well as everything else?
When her phone rang, she barely had the energy to take it out of her bag. Only the thought that it might be about the twins or her parents made her look at it.
Rosie.
Alison closed her eyes. The last thing she needed was her cousin firing questions at her. Then again, she owed Rosie so much. The least of which was an apology and an explanation.
‘Hello.’
‘You don’t have to say anything,’ Rosie said immediately. ‘I checked your wardrobe and your drawers. You’ve gone back to Hull, haven’t you?’
‘I’m so sorry, Rosie. I just…’
‘Yeah. I get it. You miss Mac and I don’t blame you. Are you okay?’
‘Not really,’ Alison said with a sniff.
‘Do you want me to come round? I’m supposed to be at the chippy in half an hour, but I can call in sick. Some things are more important.’
‘No! You can’t do that. Besides, you can’t afford to. I’ll be okay, honestly. I just need a break.’
‘Funny that, isn’t it?’ Rosie said wistfully. ‘You only needed a break from Hull so you came to Kelsea Sands. Now it’s Kelsea Sands you’re running away from.’
Put like that, Alison sounded like a total wimp. ‘I’m not running away,’ she said. ‘Not really.’
‘Oh. My mistake. Sorry.’
There was a short silence, then Rosie said, ‘Oh, come on, Ali, don’t be so daft. Get yourself back here and sort this out. Not tonight maybe, but tomorrow when you’ve slept and you’re feeling refreshed.’
‘What would be the point?’ Alison asked.
‘You love Mac. You know him!’
‘But I don’t, do I? That’s the trouble. He’s not what I thought at all.’
‘Yes, he is. You just have to believe in him.’
‘And what if I do believe in him and then he lets me down? What if it all goes wrong? How would I deal with the fallout then? I can’t go through what Lynne went through. It would break me.’
‘But that might never happen!’
‘Things go wrong,’ Alison cried. ‘Look at you and Craig. Twenty years you were with him. You gave up everything for him to move to Sheffield, away from your home and your family, and in the end it finished, and you had to come home and start again.’
‘So what?’ Rosie asked.
‘So what? Twenty years! You never married, never had children. All those years wasted.’
‘Not wasted. I loved him. He loved me. Why is it a waste when I have twenty years of happy memories to look back on?’
‘But… it ended. Don’t you regret it?’
Rosie was quiet for a moment, then she said, ‘Your marriage ended. Do you regret that? All those years wasted?’
Alison gasped. ‘How can you say that? Drew didn’t leave me! He, he…’
‘Died, Ali. Drew died. Because life’s a risk, and you two gambled and eventually you lost. But, oh my God, while you were winning, wasn’t it perfect? Wasn’t it bloody lovely and happy and wonderful? If you’d known he was going to die in his fifties, would you have said no to marrying him?’
Alison’s eyes were blurry with tears. ‘It’s not the same.’
‘It is, though. None of us have any idea what’s ahead.
You didn’t know the Mac of yesterday. What he did then is none of your business.
But who he is now, that’s the Mac you know and love, and you’re throwing him away – why?
Because at some point in some mythical future he might let you down?
He might get run over by a bus, too. So might you.
Not in bloody Kelsea Sands because the buggers cancelled our service, but you know what I mean.
You were so happy, Ali. Don’t let go of that happiness for what if.
Grab hold of it. Hold on to it. Live it.
Enjoy every bloody moment cos you never know when it will be over. ’
‘I’ve got to go,’ Alison said weakly. ‘I need to get something to eat and then get an early night. I’m on the bakery shift tomorrow. At least I won’t have that awful commute.’
‘No, well, I’m sure that makes everything worthwhile then.’
‘I’m sorry, Rosie.’
There was a loud sigh. ‘No, love. I’m sorry. Sorry for you. I’ll leave you to it. I need to get ready for work anyway. Take care of yourself, won’t you?’
‘I will.’
‘And Ali?’
‘Yes?’
There was a pause, then Rosie said, ‘Me and Craig? I wouldn’t have missed it for the world.’