Chapter 19
19
Jess woke with a start, casting her eyes frantically around the strange room. Where the hell was she and – she glanced quickly under the heavy covers – why was she naked? She spied a glimmer of sunlight peeping through the crack in the curtains, and as she remembered, her body relaxed again. Gosh, this was such a comfy bed; she didn’t want to get out of it but knew she must. I’ll just stay here a minute longer , she decided, stretching languorously and enjoying the feel of the warm linen under her toes as she reflected on what a surprisingly enjoyable time she’d had the previous night.
They’d come back inside after settling Wilbur down for the night and done the dishes, chatting about inconsequential things as she’d washed and he’d dried. Neither had mentioned the dishwasher standing empty beside the sink. Once they’d finished clearing up, Owen had made them both a nightcap, which they’d taken through to the lounge to enjoy in front of the comfort of a blazing fire.
They’d sat in an easy silence, both lost in thought as they’d stared at the flickering flames. Owen’s face had been inscrutable, but the frown that had marred his forehead during the day had softened. This was the sort of cosy companionship married people must experience on a nightly basis, Jess had realised, and for the first time ever, she’d felt truly envious of the life Brianna shared with Pete. Imagine having someone to cook with every night, talk to every night and someone to have sex with every night – well, initially anyway. Jess liked to think she was a realist.
It was with these spinning thoughts that she’d become acutely aware of the intimacy of the situation she’d found herself in, and suddenly she’d no longer been able to relax. Her face had flushed at the direction in which her mind had taken her and, terrified Owen would be able to read her expression, she’d drained her glass and announced she was bushed.
Owen had muttered something along the same lines as she’d said goodnight and beaten a hasty retreat to her room. After shutting her bedroom door firmly behind her, she’d sat until she’d grown chilled on the end of the bed, telling herself off for being so childish as to be unable to simply enjoy a man’s presence without reading more into it.
She’d stripped off and climbed under the covers then, convinced she’d be awake half the night due to the strangeness of finding herself in a pig farmer’s cottage in a wild corner of Northern Ireland for the night. Her mind had started ticking over what Owen had told her about Amy’s short life, but she’d known she’d have to stop mulling it over or she really would get no sleep.
I’ll think about Nick and what I should wear for the wine bar opening , she’d decided, surprised to find it was the first time she’d thought about him all day. Her last conscious thoughts had been that – heaven forbid! – her mother was probably right. Wool wouldn’t send the right signals out to Nick; she would raid Nora’s wardrobe. Then, the next thing she knew, she was waking up. It must have been all that fresh air , she thought, having one more starfish stretch before reluctantly pushing the covers aside and getting up.
Having made herself as presentable as she could with her limited resources, Jess opened the door and wandered into the hall, where her nostrils were assaulted by the smell of toast. Owen was up and about then, she concluded, hoping he wasn’t cooking up a full Irish breakfast with lashings of bacon.
‘Good morning,’ she said, entering the warmth of the kitchen.
‘Morning. How did you sleep?’ he asked, turning away from the pan of eggs he was in the process of scrambling.
‘Really, really well, thanks. I haven’t slept like that in ages – well, years, actually.’
‘Aye, it’s being in the country – you know, the absolute darkness you get without streetlights and the quietness. When my friends come over from London to stay, they say the same thing.’
‘You should bottle it and sell it; you’d make a fortune.’
He didn’t raise a smile, and Jess sensed she was back where she’d started – that wall she’d encountered the first time she’d spoken to him on the phone and that he’d put up between them for most of yesterday was firmly back in place. She felt let down after having managed to knock it down last night, only for it to have been rebuilt overnight. By the set of his shoulders as he hunched over the stove, she knew she could forget about the easy, relaxed banter they’d shared doing the dishes.
‘The eggs are nearly done. Sit down – there’s a pot of coffee on the table. I’ll drop you to the bus stop after breakfast.’
‘Oh, OK, thanks,’ she mumbled, doing as she was told. ‘Have I got time to pop down to see Wilbur before we have to go?’
‘Aye.’
Grumpy bugger with his friggin’ ayeing, she thought, pouring herself a mug of the strong brew from the percolator in front of her. It was Yorkshire slang, so far as she knew, but then Owen was proving to be one out of the box. Owen joined her a few minutes later, placing a heaped plate of the yellowest-looking scrambled eggs she’d ever seen in front of her. They were obviously laid by happy hens, she thought, noticing the fresh parsley he’d sprinkled on top as a garnish – ever the gourmet and ever the grump.
Despite the awkward silence, Jess couldn’t help but eat with relish – she was starving. It really must be all that fresh country air, she decided, scraping up the last little bit of egg before getting up to stack her plate in the dishwasher. ‘That was great, thanks. I’ll head out to say goodbye to Wilbur, shall I?’
‘Aye, all right, but don’t be long.’
She stomped across the dewy grass, oblivious of the beauty of the morning sun warming the surrounding fields in her annoyance at her host’s moodiness.
Her foul temper evaporated a moment later, though, as she stroked Wilbur’s warm, trembling body, and her eyes grew hot and gritty as she said her goodbyes.
‘Look after yourself, my little mate. I know we’ve only just met, but I’m really going to miss you, and I just know that you’ll grow up to be big and strong just like your brothers and sisters next door. Keep drinking that milk and you’ll catch up to them in no time.’
Wilbur let out a little whimper, and, assured it wasn’t just a one-sided conversation she was having, Jess kissed her fingers and pressed them against him. ‘Don’t you let any of the big pigs push you around…’
She was about to start giving him a few more life lessons as to what he could expect when he finally got out into the big wide world when she heard a cough behind her.
She whirled round, embarrassed to find Owen standing there, and wondered just how much of her piggy pep talk he’d overheard, but his face was, as usual, unreadable.
‘We’d better get going if you’re to get on that bus,’ he muttered, turning and walking away abruptly.
She said one last goodbye to Wilbur and followed him out.
The journey back to Ballymcguinness wasn’t a long one, but in the rattling silence of the Land Rover, it felt interminable. Jess stole a surreptitious sideways glance at Owen, but his face was a mask of concentration as he tried to avoid the many potholes, so she turned away, folding her arms firmly across her breasts, and stared instead at the lush, patchwork fields. If that was the way he wanted to play it, she told herself, then that was fine; she’d be Ms Professional, too. After all, it wasn’t as though she’d come to the North to make a new friend. She’d come as a journalist to hear a story, which she’d now done. Mission complete. It was time to go home and write that story.
Owen screeched to a halt outside the school, and the children on their morning break all stopped playing to stare over at them. Then, realising there was nothing more to see than a grumpy-looking farmer and an equally grumpy-looking woman, they returned to their games. The bus’s timely arrival spared them from having to hang around awkwardly, and Jess turned toward him as it pulled up beside them. ‘Well, er, thank you for everything.’
‘No problem.’
God, it was like getting blood out of stone, she thought. ‘Right, well, I best be going then. I’ll email you through a copy of the draft article when it’s finished.’
‘Aye, that would be good.’
‘OK, well… goodbye then.’
As she climbed aboard, she didn’t see Owen turn on his heel and walk away; she was too busy breathing a sigh of relief. It wasn’t Leery Len sitting in the driving seat but rather a woman who took her ticket with a cheery smile. Just as well, she thought, otherwise she wouldn’t have been responsible for her own actions with the mood she was in.
As she sat down heavily in her seat, she glanced out the window and caught a glimpse of a girl with long dark hair standing on the pavement where she herself had stood a moment ago with Owen saying their awkward goodbye, but as she blinked, the girl vanished.
She looked around for Owen’s jeep; perhaps he was still there. Maybe he’d seen her, too? But all she could see was a cloud of exhaust fumes in the far distance. It had been nothing, nothing at all, she told herself. She was overwrought from all she’d learned about Amy yesterday; that was all.
The bus juddered into life, and Jess sat back in her seat, determined not to think about what she’d just seen, and to her surprise, as the bus rolled through the little village and out onto the open road, she found herself feeling a little sad to be leaving Ballymcguinness behind.