Chapter 22
22
By the time we’d seen nearly the whole of the house, I decided to show them both my favourite place of all, which I’d recently discovered underneath a load of weeds, which, once I started pulling, uncovered a heavenly little area. To the left of the cottage, the French doors led out to a wonderful patio area, around a garden pond. It was probably ahead of its time, because you could almost call it an infinity pond, with a cascading waterfall. When I first discovered it, the water didn’t flow, but I filled it up using an old hosepipe and cleared out all the blockages, and the water now cascaded over the slate levels. The patio area was still overgrown with weeds, and would need a lot of hard work; old broken plant pots with bits of crumbled terracotta strewn around. There was all sorts of rubbish from old bin bags, holding God knows what as I hadn’t been brave enough to open them, to broken furniture, and it looked like it had just been used as a dumping ground.
‘Christ, Jo,’ Seamus whispered from behind me as I led them both out and he made to step ahead of me.
‘Tread carefully.’ Instinctively, I reached out to touch his arm to stop him going further. ‘I honestly have no idea how safe this is.’
‘Not bloody very, I reckon. Specially with all this shite up here.’
‘Who cares though? When you have a view like that.’ Emma put her hands above her eyes and looked out to the horizon.
The most amazing thing about the whole house was that it was higher than the sand dunes and looked out over the whole bay. It was as I imagined it would be if you were in heaven, looking down.
‘Wow. That is stunning. Do you know how amazing this could be?’
‘Yeah, I know. But I think this has to be the lowest of priorities really. However, if you thought the view from the decking below couldn’t get any better, this beats it hands down.’
‘Oh, Jo, you are so lucky. This is like my dream home. Sell it to me.’
I laughed. ‘I might have to. Don’t joke about it just yet.’
‘OK, here’s a suggestion for you. Don’t sell it to me. But let me live here.’
I turned to Emma and laughed again, but her face was deadly serious.
‘I’m not kidding. I would move here in a heartbeat.’
My brain was starting to tick over. I looked at Seamus and he raised an eyebrow at me.
‘How would that be possible though?’
‘Well,’ he said, ‘there’s such a lot of work that would need doing but it’s doable.’
‘I’m not sure I have enough money to do all of that.’
‘Well, we could start with one building and get someone living in that and then start on the other. It would be doable as long as you are not in any rush.’
I sat down on a broken bit of wall and steadied myself.
‘I just don’t know.’
‘Think about it, Jo, it could be the perfect answer. And just think about the fun we could have.’
I looked across at Seamus and he shrugged.
‘Your decision, Jo Jenkins. No pressure from me at all.’
‘Me neither,’ laughed Emma, ‘but when can I move in?’
Seamus laughed. ‘I know it’s probably blowing your mind right now but we could probably sit down and map it all out. Do some brainstorming. Even just thinking about it might make you decide whether you want to do it or not. What I do know though is that you’re going to have some upheaval whatever happens. We could do this, Jo. You could make this happen.’
I stared into his big brown eyes. He seemed so trustworthy. So nice. He was so different to Michael. Michael was all talk and no action and got other people to do things for him, never getting his hands dirty. Seamus was considering getting stuck in and helping me. I just didn’t know how I could pay him. A tradesperson wasn’t cheap these days.
‘Don’t overthink it,’ he urged. ‘Just consider it.’
‘Much as I’d love to stand here admiring that view all day,’ Emma declared, breaking the tension, ‘I’ve got to get off to the auction house via my house for a quick shower. I smell like a badger’s arse.’
My head was swimming with ideas. I’d even got an image of Seamus and me drinking wine here while watching the sun set over Sandpiper Shore. There was almost a 360 view from this area and I reckoned that you might even get a sunrise here too. Imagine watching the sun rise every morning, sitting on a chair snuggled in a huge warm blanket, hands around a steaming cup of coffee.
‘Hello. Jo. Did you hear me, love? I’m going to have to get off.’ I turned towards her voice. ‘I’ve got loads of photos so I’ll let you know what the auction house says. That OK?’
‘That would be great, thanks so much.’
She leaned across and kissed my cheek.
‘Thanks so much for having me, love. I haven’t enjoyed a night so much in ages. Just what I needed. I’ll call you later.’
‘You’re welcome any time, Emma. Now you know where I am, feel free to pop by.’
‘You may regret saying that, my friend.’ She tittered as she tottered off on her high heels down the hallway.
‘Fancy another cuppa, Seamus?’
‘Ooh, you know the way to a man’s heart, Jo Jenkins.’ There was that eye contact again and that little skip in my tummy.
The trill of the phone ringing brought us both back to life and I answered it before even checking who it was.
‘Jo darling. Good morning!’ The feeling in my tummy turned into one of gloom.
‘Michael. What can I do for you?’
‘We need to finalise details about the wedding.’
My heart sank. I knew this day was coming and was dreading it. My stomach felt like lead and nausea swept through my body.
‘We’ll both be there and of course you will too. We’ve been waiting for this day for years. Claudia and I are so excited.’
‘Right. Yes.’ I needed to get off the phone as soon as possible. I needed time to seriously think about how this was going to work. I couldn’t put it off any longer. There had been a little part of me that thought Michael would never be so insensitive as to bring Claudia with him. ‘Sorry, Michael, but there’s someone at the door, I have to go.’
I disconnected the call before he had a chance to say anything else.
I carried on making the tea, aware that Seamus was standing behind me, watching my every move. My hands began to shake, which he must have seen because he came over and lifted the spoon from my hand and took over.
I went over to the window at the edge of the kitchen and gazed out into the distance. How could I possibly go to that wedding? How could I be in the same room as my ex-husband and that floozy that he went off with? They’d already taken my future from me, then my holiday home. And now I was expected to go and be part of these celebrations and be civil to them both. I simply could not do it. I had been putting it off for so long, hoping it would go away, but now realisation was setting in. I’d never felt so sick. Well, apart from when Michael and Claudia sat me down in our house and told me that they were in love and that he was leaving me. That was horrendous.
A cough behind me alerted me to the fact that I was no longer alone with my thoughts.
After placing the mugs down on the coffee table, Seamus put his hands on my shoulders and guided me to a chair where he practically forced me to sit down.
‘So, Jo Jenkins. Are you going to tell me what that was all about then?’
‘N… nothing.’
‘Doesn’t look like nothing from where I’m standing. A problem shared is a problem halved. Or something like that.’
I sighed loudly.
‘My daughter is getting married. Well, our daughter. And I’m dreading the whole day because we’ll all be together for the first time.’
‘So you, your daughters and your ex-husband, you mean?’
I nodded. ‘His girlfriend too.’
‘Do you want to go?’
I chewed the inside of my cheek.
‘If he wasn’t going, I’d be there in a heartbeat. My children are my everything. It will be a fabulously lavish affair. I should know. I’ve paid for most of it. I know it will be a wonderful day. But I honestly don’t know how I can go through with it.’
‘Is there any chance that he’d go alone? Maybe he’ll be tactful and leave his girlfriend behind.’
‘That’ll never happen. He’s already said that she’s looking forward to it. She’s like a limpet and won’t let him go anywhere without him. But that’s half the problem. If she knows I’m there, I’m a bit concerned that she’ll try to be friends with me. It’ll feel like they’ll just be rubbing my nose in it.’
‘Maybe if you told him how you felt, and asked him to leave her behind, he might?’
I scoffed.
‘Absolutely not. He’d tell me I was being ridiculous. I’ve been married to him for long enough to know exactly what he was thinking.’ I was aware of how ironic this might be, considering the shock I’d had when he and Claudia had confessed all.
Seamus leaned forward in his chair, slurped at his tea and ruffled Theo’s ears.
‘There is one thing you could do.’
I looked at him and raised an eyebrow. I couldn’t think of anything that would make the situation any better.
‘Hear me out before you say no!’
I stared at him, my second eyebrow meeting my first, inviting him to continue.
‘Go with someone else and make him feel jealous.’
‘Ha!’
‘Would it work?’ he asked.
‘I honestly don’t know. And even if it did, I’d have to find someone first to come with me.’
‘Maybe you could try an escort agency?’
I laughed.
‘Do they still have those? I know they used to be all the rage, but I’ve not heard of that expression for ages.’
Seamus grinned. ‘It’s probably been replaced by Tinder or Bumble.’
‘Bumble? What the hell is Bumble?’ I asked.
‘Another dating app.’ This time it was his turn to raise his eyebrows. ‘Apparently.’
We both grinned. My heartbeat had started to slow down again and I felt a little calmer.
‘I don’t want to join a dating app though. The thought of doing something like that scares the living daylights out of me. Have you ever done anything like that?’ I realised as soon as the words were out of my mouth that it was a much too personal question to ask someone I hardly knew. ‘Sorry, I don’t mean to pry. Wipe that.’
‘I don’t mind telling you that I have. When my last partner Al dumped me, I was a bit down in the dumps and one of the lads on the building site signed me up and made me a profile. Al was a Sky engineer and was working away a lot, or so I thought. I didn’t realise working actually meant having an affair behind my back. I was gutted and felt a bit of a fool. And with the dating app, to be honest, my heart wasn’t in it. I met a few people who I thought might be suitable for me to get to know a bit better, but then I got ghosted a couple of times so I didn’t bother again.’
I had never felt more foolish in my life and recently there had been many occasions which could have competed. I didn’t realise how much what he’d said would affect me. He’d been flirty with me, yet what he was saying now made me realise that it wasn’t even flirting to him because I wasn’t sure any longer that he was even into women. I’d started to think that maybe there was something more than friends between us. I was shocked. How could my self-esteem have been so low that just because someone was being nice to me meant that they were thinking of me romantically? How had I managed to get it so wrong? I was such an idiot.