30. Stella
Chapter 30
Stella
‘ N o!’ he said warmly. ‘No, of course it’s not you. And it’s not really Diane either, though she doesn’t help. I’ve had a lot on my mind recently.’ The lights of the cottage twinkled in the distance.
‘If it’s not me and it’s not Diane, can you tell me what it is? Please don’t shut me out.’ It was getting harder and harder to read the expression on his face as the night drew in. ‘No secrets.’
‘I didn’t realise it was that obvious. I wanted this to be the perfect Christmas and … well, this isn’t perfect, is it?’ He shrugged, miserably.
‘The boys had a wonderful Christmas day, and that’s what’s important. There’s no such thing as perfect anyway. You shouldn’t beat yourself up about it and you can’t help things being weird. That’s all down to her.’ Amy looked accusingly in the direction of the cottage.
‘It was never supposed to be just about the boys, though. This was meant to be all about you and me from the first moment I thought of coming here. And in the end none of it’s about us,’ Matt said. ‘I’d planned so many things, and instead, here we are sleeping in different bedrooms and barely able to speak to each other because it might upset Diane, walking on eggshells, hoping the boys don’t say the wrong thing.’
Amy tried not to think what Matt might’ve been planning, now all those plans had been put on ice. ‘But in the end you and me, we’re grown-ups,’ she said. ‘We can cope as long as the boys are happy, right?’
‘Right.’ He nodded but didn’t look convinced. ‘Come on, we’d better keep going.’
Her hands ached with the cold. Her gloves were soaked through with melted snow and offered her fingers no respite from the cold air as they started to walk down the hill again.
‘I did wonder if Diane constantly talking about Stella might’ve been part of the problem. Might have made you … you know .. miss her that bit more. You and me never really talked about her.’
‘I didn’t think you’d want me to talk about her.’
‘But I don’t want you to feel you can’t. We need to be able to talk openly about things that matter. I’d like you to talk to me about Stella, really, I would.’ It would help her to know what she was really up against. Until Diane came along she hadn’t given much thought to Stella in any role other than Oliver’s mother - but she had been so much more than that. Maybe she still was. ‘Do you … think about her a lot?’ She shoved her hands into her pockets but it wasn’t much warmer and she felt ill at ease without her hands free for balance as they walked through the slippery snow.
‘Of course,’ Matt said, after a slight pause, ‘but not as much as Diane wants me to.’
‘Sometimes I worry I’m not enough like her.’ Amy spoke before she had time to ask herself if she was saying the right thing. The adrenaline that had kept her going since they found Mr Thompson had worn away and she was exhausted, cold and utterly miserable. It was becoming hard to focus on anything beyond the sharp ache in her fingers and putting one foot in front of the other. Perhaps it wasn’t the ideal time to try and have a sensible conversation with Matt, but it was the only opportunity they were likely to get today.
‘I don’t want you to be anything like Diane.’
‘Not Diane,’ she said. ‘Stella. Diane’s made it clear enough that I don’t compare.’
‘You’re nothing like Stella.’ Matt took one of her hands in his. ‘Nothing like her and I don’t want you to be. Stella was … I don’t know how to explain … this beautiful, exotic thing, but distant. Always slightly out of reach. I never felt I knew her properly, even after nearly ten years of marriage. I was dazzled by her, but underneath all that sparkle, there was something missing. And Diane never knew the half of it.’
‘What do you mean?’
He squeezed her hand. ‘Your gloves are soaked through. Here, have mine.’ They paused while he took off his skiing gloves. Her fingers were so stiff that she needed his help to remove her wet, woollen ones.
‘What didn’t Diane know about Stella?’ She put his gloves on her frozen hands. They were still comfortingly warm inside.
‘Plenty.’ Matt shoved his hands into his pockets as they walked on. ‘She never knew about the club nights out with the girls. Always some drama. Whispered confidences on the phone about who had done what in the club the night before. Gin o’clock got earlier every day. Vodka bottles that magically appeared in the recycling. Stella was beautiful and bright, but she was never cut out to be a mother. All I wanted was quiet evenings at home with her and Oliver, and it felt like all she wanted to do was get out of the house, away from us.’
‘She sounds like James. It was work with James, not clubs, but that’s where he came alive. At home with us he seemed … I don’t know … less of himself, somehow. And that’s when I knew we couldn’t go on.’
‘Stella wasn’t happy with me, and I wasn’t happy with her.’
‘But Diane doesn’t know any of that?’
They had reached the bottom of the field and, noticing her flagging pace, he helped her climb over the stile and into the little lane that led back to the cottage.
‘When Stella was dying, she made me promise two things. First, she wanted me to look after Diane. When she fell out with Veronica we were the only family Diane had left. And she made me promise not to tell her mum about us. That’s what makes all this even harder. If I tell her that Stella and me had problems, I’ll be breaking that dying promise, and I won’t exactly be looking out for Diane either.’ He spoke quickly and exhaled heavily as if it had taken a great effort.
Amy knew Matt took promises seriously. He didn’t make them if he didn’t think he would be able to keep them. ‘I see,’ Amy said. ‘No wonder you find it difficult to talk to Diane. But I wish you’d talked to me.’
They had reached the lane outside the cottage. The shutters had been closed over the downstairs windows.
‘Before we go back in, there is something else I need to talk to you about,’ he said, and her heart sank. ‘Can we stay out here another couple of minutes?’
‘Let’s go into the orchard.’ She opened the rickety wooden gate into the ancient orchard on the opposite side of the lane to the cottage. The branches of the trees were gnarled and twisted but, heavy with snow, it was as if they were full of white blossom, luminous in the first light of the moon behind Scansfell. The moon was larger than it had been the previous night, and gave them plenty of light. The orchard gate would only open halfway, with the weight of the snow behind it, but it was enough for them both to get through, one after the other, walking in each other’s footsteps until they were hidden amongst the snow-laden apple trees in the dark.
Matt shifted his feet and Amy knew it wasn’t just the cold.
‘I’m really sorry Amy. There’s something I should have told you before, but I didn’t want to spoil your Christmas.’