Chapter 8
CHAPTER EIGHT
MAISIE
That Sunday morning, twenty-four hours after she’d viewed the flat in the middle of town, Maisie was moving out of Vera’s house. The ultra-fast turnaround had given her whiplash, but the letting agent was keen to get somebody into the flat immediately and Maisie agreed with everything that’d been asked. The rent was half the price of what she’d paid in London and the flat itself was comfortable, so with the fact that her income hadn’t changed, taking the lease had been a no-brainer.
The middle-aged woman had clearly seen that she was enthusiastic and accepted her as the tenant straight away on a three-month probation, which gave Maisie enough time to keep an eye on Vera and find out what exactly she was keeping from the family before she could think about moving back to London.
She missed her friends, her parents, being in the big city where everything she could ever want was within her reach. Don’t get her wrong, the variety of cuisine available to order here in the evening was far greater than she’d anticipated for a seaside town, and there were shops along the high street where she could get her craft supplies, but things just didn’t feel the same as back home.
Maybe she hadn’t ventured out enough? She spent all day working on websites and then her evenings and weekends (bar one fateful Saturday morning) on her own business. She’d barely passed a glance at the seafront or walked along the length of the bay to the old ruins of Aberystwyth Castle like she used to as a child.
The good thing though, was that she hadn’t taken all of her belongings out of their cardboard boxes completely, which made moving out again a lot easier.
Hands on hips, Maisie surveyed the stacks of boxes filling up Vera’s living room. “We’re not going to fit all of this into your car, Nain . It’s going to take a few trips.”
“No need to worry about that. We’ll manage.” Vera waved her uninjured hand, wandering through from the kitchen with a fresh cup of tea.
The boxes so far contained decorations, books, and personal care like toiletries and her make up. Clothes that she’d unpacked still hung in the wardrobe she’d claimed upstairs, and everything that she needed for her two jobs still covered the dining table.
It’d be really great right about now to have a boyfriend to help cut the workload in half, or those two removal men who’d driven everything up to Wales. Maisie was capable of doing things on her own – she packed up her London flat by herself after all – she just wasn’t so good at lifting those heavier boxes when her lower back ached as it had done all morning. Alas, without Ronnie who visited his brother’s care home on Sunday mornings, it was just the two of them.
Maisie was all for feminism, but she also knew when to give in and spare her body the strain when it already ached most days. If she thought hard enough and rubbed the lamp on the sideboard, then maybe a strong gentleman who could lift these boxes without knackering his back or trapping a boob would appear right in front of her.
She squeezed her eyes shut and opened them again, but all she found was her nain’s cherub face taking a sip of tea. “Hm … I forgot the sugar.” Vera spun and bustled back into the kitchen right as the doorbell chimed, followed by a knock.
They weren’t expecting company, so maybe Ronnie had come to help her move after all? It’s he who Maisie expected to find when she opened the door.
“Hi Ro— Iain ?”
“ Bore da, Maisie.? * ”
He was the last person who she’d expected to see stood on the doorstep in the light mizzle of rain, wearing the same waxed jacket he’d hiked in last week and a pair of faded blue jeans.
“Hi. Um … What are you?—”
“Iain?” Vera bustled in with perfect timing. “Oh, there you are sweetie! So good of you to come.”
Sweetie? Iain? She must be mistaken.
“Come?” Maisie muttered.
Iain didn’t smile, but he sounded cheerier. “ Bore da , Mrs Moss.”
“It’s Vera, honey. Do step in.”
Honey? Maisie had to remind herself that her nain and Iain actually knew each other outside of the one time where she’d experienced them both together. But he didn’t move.
The silence was expectant, and her hand on the door tingled as if to remind Maisie she was in the way as Iain stared at her. She blinked, then stepped back.
Hands in the pockets of his jeans, Iain moved past her, a hint of fresh saltiness in the air around him as if he’d walked along the beachfront before coming here.
Vera strode towards the kitchen with a held-up gesture of her cup. “Would you like a panad ? * , dear? Freshly brewed.”
“That’d be grand, thank you.” Iain stood himself in the middle of the living room amongst the mass of half-open packing boxes, looking out of place amongst Vera’s delicate ornaments and floral walls.
Maisie smiled politely when their eyes connected, then followed her grandmother into the kitchen with a question burning on her tongue. “So … why is Iain here?” She scratched at her head, hoping the living room radio stuck on eighties power ballads drowned out her voice.
“He’s come to help us move your things.”
Help her move? Had she manifested him?
Maisie’s palm slid to her forehead as she realised Vera had asked him to come, on a Sunday when there were thirty other things he could probably be doing, and he’d actually turned up. The poor man! He didn’t need to be here. They could take her belongings to the new flat by herself.
“You didn’t need to rope Iain into this, Nain , we could’ve managed.”
“Ridiculous!” A little wobbly with her left hand, Vera poured out another cupful from the teapot. “Another strong pair of legs to lift these heavy boxes is no bad thing.”
“But why him ?” It occurred to Maisie too late that she’d whined. “What about Ronnie?”
“Ronald is seventy-three, petal. He cannot lift anything.”
Can’t lift!? The man hiked up an entire cliffside last weekend, but she wouldn’t say that out loud.
“And with my wrist …” Vera added with a downturned look at her purple cast. As if the thing had stopped her at all from doing whatever she wanted in the last weeks.
Maisie poked her tongue against her cheek, trying to figure out what the game was, here. It might’ve taken them a little longer, but they didn’t need help.
“Fine.”
She waved her white flag after a minute – there was no point in arguing, and the radio had gone suspiciously quiet. Iain had probably heard every word of this conversation; the walls were thin in this house, as Maisie learned when Ronnie had been over the other evening. She was sure that a few of the noises coming from the living room that night had had absolutely nothing to do with the film Vera and her boyfriend were supposedly watching.
Perhaps there was an opportunity in this. Iain was attractive in a way that hadn’t intrigued her before, and Maisie was … well, her garden hadn’t been tended to in a while, so to speak. Her hormones were all over the place, and the one that told her to seek comfort in the arms of a man was rather loud these days.
She didn’t know about Iain’s arms, but his broad chest might make a good pillow, though she could never get to that point if she didn’t spend any time with him. Sure he might be a little gruff and brawny and slightly standoffish, but there was a softness there beneath that tough exterior – she knew it.
Why else would he have agreed to help her – a stranger – today if he was solid stone to the core?
What was she thinking? She wasn’t here in Wales to flirt and date. She was here to keep an eye on Vera and only that.
When Maisie stepped back into the living room, Mister Roberts was rubbing himself against Iain’s leg, and Iain was bent over, stroking him.
Him turning up to help her move house she could just about believe. But this? Nope . A rip in time must have happened somewhere in the universe because that demon-sent test of a cat never purred up against anyone like that.
“Here’s your tea, love.” Vera emerged from behind Maisie’s frozen body.
“Thanks, Vera.” The delicate china was tiny in Iain’s hand. Only one of his fingers fitted through the loop of the handle. Maisie did not need that image or any associated thoughts of big hands lingering in her mind.
“You drink up, pet. Now where shall we get started?”
Vera started delegating orders as if she were back in the old schoolroom she’d taught in for forty years. That primary school classroom was the reason why everyone born and bred in Aber knew Ms Vera’s face. Maisie couldn’t imagine having that many people recognising her when she was out simply grocery shopping, but her nain always had a smile for everyone who came up to her to reminisce.
Maisie sidled up to Iain while Vera wiggled her hips to the tune on the radio. “You don’t have to do this,” she whispered.
“Surprised to see me?” he said.
“A little.” She wasn’t so rude as to ask why he was here helping a woman he’d met only once to move house.
Holding his teacup against his stomach, he dipped his chin to his shoulder. “I got cornered on the walk yesterday.”
Oh my days. So Maisie had been right: the woman who pushed packed boxes with her feet in front of them had orchestrated this.
She exhaled her irritation, fingers scrunching up her denim overalls. “I’m so sorry. You can go if you want to. I’m sure that you have other plans.”
“I’m here. Might as well help.”
That wasn’t the point. The point was that her grandma had guilt-tripped him, and Maisie had to follow her trail apologising.
Iain mistook her annoyance for being directed at him. “I can go if you’d rather?—”
“No, it’s just I?—”
“Come on you two!” Vera clicked her fingers. “You can chopse later.”
“Chopse?” Maisie muttered.
Without question, Iain chugged his tea and set the empty cup down before getting to work.
Half an hour later, Iain had proven himself to be incredibly helpful. If not just for his physical strength – Maisie hadn’t ogled his giant thighs of solid muscle under the looseness of his jeans once, ppft , not at all – but for how he’d offered up the use of his car with a considerably larger boot space than Vera’s eldermobile . Iain folded down the back seats for extra space, and the boxes loaded up easily. The ones containing her clothes tallied to a ridiculous number, since outfits that matched her style and came in her size were difficult to find in good quality on the regular. Nothing had been thrown out before her first move, her entire wardrobe had travelled with her, which meant at least six boxes were just full of long skirts and colourful blouses.
Maisie rummaged through the living room trying to decide what else could fit in the car before they made the first trip to her new flat. Most of her work items were all stacked on the dining table she’d been using for a desk, but the box of pre-packaged jewellery was yet to be taped shut.
Iain dipped his hand in then held up a packet of capybara-shaped stud earrings. “Did you make these?”
Ah. What was he going to think of her whimsical side-business? “Yes. I sell them online.”
“You’re talented.”
It was a stunted compliment, but she’d take it. “Thank you.”
“This box might be the last we can fit in the car. We’ll have to do another round for the mattress, drawers, and your computer,” Iain said as they stared at what was left.
Maisie glanced at the mantle clock. It was only midday so there was plenty of time for driving back and forth. She secured the boxes of her ready-made products and noticed how careful Iain was to load the car up with those particular ones.
He shut the boot with purpose. “Hop in.”
Out on the street, Maisie looked back at her nain in the doorway.
“You two go on,” Vera called. “I’ll wait here and pack up what’s left in your bedroom.”
Thank god Maisie had emptied out her nightstand drawer before her grandma could get her hands on it, more so the items she’d kept inside. Some things a grandma should just not know. Like what methods Maisie resulted to because of her dating life’s ineptitude.
“We’ll be back soon,” she called as she rounded Iain’s car in the mizzling rain.
“Take your time.” Maisie could’ve sworn that there was a glint in Vera’s eye.
Iain’s car was … nice . Maisie didn’t know much about cars at all, but it looked like the type of vehicle you’d expect to see a young family of five stepping out of at the supermarket. She sat herself down on the plush leather seat and buckled herself in.
“Sorry to have ruined your Sunday plans.” She looked over at Iain, appreciating the angle of her view.
He glanced at her between checking his mirrors to pull out into the residential road. “Didn’t have any. Only walking Ted.”
“I owe you for helping me with this.”
“It’s fine.” His hands settled on the steering wheel, making it look tiny in his grasp, and Maisie’s gaze shamefully roamed over the tendons and knuckles. Ugh. He just had to have big hands, didn’t he? A woman like her – when there was so much she craved to be held – couldn’t settle with anything less.
“It’s not ‘fine’,” she rebuffed. “People don’t just do favours like this where I’m from.”
“Well you’re not there anymore, are you?”
She pursed her lips but couldn’t stop herself from smiling and shying her face away towards her window.
Iain manoeuvred the couple of bends towards the busier road that split Aberystwyth in two, navigating the system of one-way streets better than she could. It didn’t phase Maisie that she’d be living along a main drag, surrounded by all kinds of shops and cafés. If she needed milk at eight in the morning, then all she’d have to do was cross the street. And the constant noise would remind her of home.
It’d been too silent in Vera’s house, especially when she’d been all alone in the evenings.
Maisie couldn’t help herself any longer – she’d been itching to ask, “Did you really text Nain the other day asking if I was okay after the nettle thing?”
Iain’s silence spoke louder than the grim twitch in his lips. “She told you …”
“Have you ever known Vera not to gossip?”
“I just didn’t want you to have hurt yourself.”
“Well, I’m all good. My blisters have healed, and my arse is no longer itchy.” Maisie’s brain caught up to her tongue and she turned into a human-shaped ball of flame. “I just said that out loud, didn’t I?”
“Ydw. ? * ”
“Forget I said that?”
Iain’s mouth curled on one side like a devil in a grin. “Too late.”
Two hours later and Maisie could finally say that she’d moved in. She’d paid the first month’s rent upfront yesterday, and the letting agent had left the key in the lock box by the door. Everything was ready to go, and Vera provided them with BLT baguettes that were to die for before the anarchy of dismantling boxes began.
Shoppers bustled in and out of the bookstore below her, and by the sounds of it she definitely had neighbours upstairs, but at least she had her own home again.
There wasn’t much that Maisie could do to make the space completely hers ; she couldn’t change the muted sage walls or the dark-brown carpets. A few houseplants and art prints and things would look nice enough. Vera’s friend’s granddaughter had left behind a baby-pink sofa – the only seating to fit between the TV unit, coffee table, and where Iain assembled a desk she’d ordered on next-day delivery. If she couldn’t have space to work from home, then she couldn’t live here, not even temporarily.
The man had driven his car home, since the on-street parking situation made Maisie glad not to own her own car, and casually came back with a box of tools, basic cleaning supplies, and teabags. Then he’d stayed to help even when he didn’t have to.
Maisie hadn’t gotten far into unpacking, yet again, when Vera stopped cleaning and emerged from the modest kitchen with her coat in one hand and purse in the other. “I’m just going to pop up the road, love, and get you some groceries before the shops shut,” she said. “It’ll tide you over until morning.”
“Thank you, Nain .”
Vera zipped up her coat and strode out of the door on a mission, which left Maisie alone with Iain once more. He’d be sick of the sight of her by the end of the day, even though she’d told him over and over that he could go whenever he liked. The level at which he dusted that offer off repetitively made butterflies flutter out of their cocoons in her stomach.
Moving to the window that needed a go around with a duster, Maisie peeked to make sure Vera made it down the steep steps in one piece. “I didn’t expect her to be so eager for me to move out.” She didn’t know if Iain was listening, but she thought aloud anyway. “I thought she’d want me to stay.”
Laid on his back, Iain tightened up the bolts on the underside of her new desk. “What if she didn’t want you to feel like you were tethered to her?”
“But I am.” Though he didn’t know the real reason why.
“You’re doing a good thing by being here when the rest of your family is so far away,” he said, his voice a little strained. “But you’re not stuck . You have the choice to leave.”
The corners of Maisie’s pinched features softened as she read the scrunch in Iain’s brow. Maybe he didn’t realise it, or perhaps she was too adept at tuning in to what it was that people didn’t say, but he’d given away a detail of his life there. One that wasn’t trivial.
Feet pressed into the carpet so his legs were bent, Iain exhaled, looking pained as he filled her silence. “I was trapped,” he said. “For a long time. And when I thought life was finally turning around, it fell to shit.”
“Is that why you moved here?” Maisie had asked him before, but maybe she’d get more of an answer now.
She’d hoped for too much. He reached under the desk and stretched his long frame to check another bolt, and Maisie received one of his usual grunts that dismissed her question entirely. Iain’s life wasn’t her business, and she wouldn’t be staying in Wales long enough to make it so.
Idleness wasn’t going to help her get things done, so she took the scissors from her overall pocket and cut into a box of blankets and bedding.
Iain rolled up onto his feet with groans that gave away his age – sounds that Maisie hadn’t heard in the context she’d prefer to for months.
Attempting to ignore the pull she felt coercing her to turn and watch his every single movement, she folded a blanket over the sofa’s back, using the distraction to say, “So, I had something that I wanted to ask you.” She received a sort of ‘go ahead’ grunt and a nod. “What’s your last name?”
Iain looked at her sideways before shoving the completed desk up to the wall. “Howell. Why?”
It was better than Faye’s method of online stalking. “It just feels odd not knowing somebody’s last name. You knew mine before you even knew my first name.”
“I remember, Moo Moo.”
Internally, Maisie groaned. “I wish you’d never heard that.”
“Why?”
“Because it’s childish.”
“Which is exactly why you should hold onto it.” Iain’s brows jumped as he moved to find his next task. “Trust me.”
Why did everything he say add another layer to his mysteriousness instead of take one off? It must be stifling.
“Are your family from here?” she asked.
“No. Where do you want this?” Iain diverted from that question expertly, as usual.
Maisie passed a glance at the box he began to lift. It looked like clothing, maybe. The writing on the side had been crossed out and written over so many times.
“Bedroom. Ooo —the tape doesn’t look too great on the bottom,” she said as her hand shot out in warning.
“I’ll be careful.” Iain hiked the box up into his grip and – it ripped.
The whole thing.
Just ripped.
It was clothes, thankfully, but not so lucky that approximately twenty sets of underwear covered Iain’s feet.
“ Ohmygod —” Maisie scrambled more than she’d ever scrambled before. Tits first to the floor. Mortified.
“Should I close my eyes?” By the two red dots emerging on Iain’s cheeks, it was too late.
“If you would be so kind—and would you stand still! Don’t tread on anything.” Maisie swept her knickers off of his boots and into her arms like they would slip away.
“Nothing’s breakable?—”
“I don’t want your giant feet bending any wires or ripping any of the—” Lace . She was going to say lace . “These are expensive!”
“Closing eyes and standing still.”
“Really, Moo Moo?” Vera waddled through the stairwell door, bag of groceries in hand. “In my day we took them out to dinner first before showing them our knickers.”
Fucking hell.
“Nain!” Maisie wanted the floor to open up and the bookshop beneath them to swallow her whole. Maybe she could fall into one of the books and be transplanted into a world that was less embarrassing.
She grabbed every bra and unhooked the straps from Iain’s feet, clips getting snagged in his laces.
Then it happened – the sound that Maisie would forever remember.
He chuckled. A full, beautiful, belly laugh with her fanciful panties wrapped around his ankles.
* ? Good day, Maisie
* ? Cuppa/cup of tea
* ? Yes.