Chapter 50
50
The front door of the cottage was locked, so Jess wandered around to the side of the house. Peering through the French doors, she spied Owen looking like he meant business as he chopped something at the kitchen bench. There was a glass of half-drunk red wine next to him, and even from her vantage point outside, she could smell the unmistakable aroma of browning onions. Typical male, she thought; food was the last thing on her mind. She watched him for a moment, trying to summon the courage to tap on the door until, feeling like a peeping Tom, she at last knocked.
Owen swung round, nearly tipping the contents of the pot he had in his hand all over himself. She heard him swear, and then he grabbed a tea towel, wiping at the stain spreading down his pants and gesturing at her to come in with his free hand.
‘Jaysus, Jess! You scared the crap out of me! I nearly wore all the bloody stock!’
‘Sorry, I didn’t mean to startle you.’ She shifted from foot to foot, unsure of the reception she’d get. ‘What are you making?’
‘A beef and mushroom in red wine casserole.’
‘Oh, that sounds nice – very, er, hearty.’
He stopped wiping and looked at her. ‘It is, but that’s not why you came back, is it? To see what I’m cooking for dinner?’
‘Um, no, I came back to apologise, if you’ll let me.’
Jess took his silence for acquiescence and so she told him all that had transpired between her and her mother after they’d left.
‘You were right in what you said. It was me with the problem. I was trying to impress my mum, who didn’t want me to impress her at all. Even though she was impressed because she thinks you’re lovely, by the way. And as it turns out, that’s all she’s wanted for me all along – to be happy. Does that make sense?’
‘Aye, in a roundabout way, it does.’
‘The thing is, Owen, I don’t think I can be happy without you. You’re everything I’ve ever wanted, and it took me so long to find you that I’m absolutely terrified of losing you.’ Jess felt her face flush with the sentiment and her hands grow clammy at the fear he would reject her apology as being too little too late.
‘Where is Marian, by the way?’
Jess frowned; she’d just laid her heart on the line for him and he wanted to know where her mother was? ‘She’s waiting in the car, and she said I’m not allowed to come back out until we’ve kissed and made up.’
‘Well, then, we better not keep her waiting.’
Owen took her in his arms, and in that fleeting second before Jess closed her eyes, guiding her mouth to meet his, she saw the shadow of a young dark-haired girl smiling at her before, with a wave that Jess instinctively knew was goodbye, she faded away.
Then they kissed and made up.