6
Max and Daniel are gone, Annemarie has left for the night, and Mila’s in bed. I lean back into the lumpy green-and-orange couch and twirl my glass of wine. watching the ruby-red color catch sparks of light.
My mum sits cross-legged on the couch next to me, her yellow dress flowing around her.
The ruined lemon chiffon was cleaned away, and the coffee table holds the remains of the Victoria sponge and our empty mugs of hot chocolate. Orange-and-white foil Kinder wrappers are crumpled and littered around the table. Plastic Kinder toys, as misshapen as ever, clump around the near empty cake platter.
I swipe my finger across my plate and gather up the rich double cream, the almond sponge crumbs, and a bit of raspberry jam. Then I pop my finger in my mouth. The sweetness and the tartness blend perfectly.
I sigh and smile at my mum.
“I’ll leave tomorrow morning,” she says, reaching for her cup of tea.
I nod. I didn’t expect her to even stay the night.
I curl my legs under me. My dress stretches over my knees, the light summer wool scratching my skin. It feels a bit like the emotions dragging over me. My mum always brings up a stewpot of emotions. Happiness, the desire of a little girl wanting her to stay, annoyance, discomfort at her unpredictability, fear that she’ll leave again, and then relief when she does.
“Where will you go?” I ask.
“Mmm. Chamonix, for a minute. I love the Alps in summer. Then I think I’ll drive down to Greece for a bit. I’ve been meaning to visit the Temple of Delphi.”
I think about her driving her old car through multiple countries and my stomach dips. “Do you need money for a new car?”
My mum sets down her teacup with a hard snick. Then she turns her censorious gaze on me. “You know how I feel about money. About material possessions. When old Henriette finally passes on to the great car afterlife, the universe will provide me another mode of transportation.”
“Yes, but the universe could provide you a new car right now. Through me.”
My mum ignores my suggestion. She’s always been this way. It’s why she refused alimony when she divorced my dad. Why she didn’t accept any child support. It’s why out of all of Dad’s ex-wives she was the only one who didn’t contest the miserly sum handed out to the exes in his will.
“You’ve done well with Mila. She’s a good girl. Very bright.”
I let my mum change the topic. “Thank you. I think so too.”
She catches the love in my tone and the smile on my face. “My spiritual advisor in Laos said you’re still angry with me for leaving you.”
My lungs pinch, and for a moment I’m robbed of breath. I sit still. Take a breath. Then, carefully, I set my wineglass on the table.
I turn to my mum. She is who she is—I accepted that a long time ago.
“Perhaps,” I say.
She takes another sip from her cup. “I do wish you’d buy proper tea for my visits.”
“Right.”
“Fiona.”
I wrap my arms around my middle and nod. This must be important since she’s using my name.
“I had to leave you.”
“I know.” My throat is dry and achy. I stare at the ruby-red color of my wine.
“I wasn’t good for you. I wasn’t. You needed a home. You’re not like me. Even at six you wanted to stay put and settle in. Every time we moved to a new place you cried. It broke my heart. But I couldn’t give you what you needed. Not me. But your dad could. He could give you a home. A brother. School. Stability.”
“I know, Mum. I understand.”
“It’s only . . .” She reaches for me, touches my hand. “You were the one thing I’ve always regretted leaving behind. I wish . . .”
Mum stops, pulling her hand from mine.
“It’s fine, Mum. You were right. I love it here. I loved Dad. And Daniel. I have Abry now. My life. My daughter. I wouldn’t have all that if not for you. You made the right choice.”
“Did I?”
I lift a shoulder.
“Seeing you, I’m not sure I did.”
“Mum. I’m happy.”
“What about your dreams? You used to dream as a little girl.”
I look away from her. I remember those dreams. A decade ago I thought I’d found them. I hadn’t, so I let them die the death they should have done a long time ago.
“I can tell, you know. I can tell you don’t have dreams anymore. I worry I’m the reason you don’t.”
I shake my head. “Don’t be conceited. I’m the reason I don’t.”
She smiles at that.
Then she pulls a small gift wrapped in brown paper from the pocket of her dress. “I brought you a birthday gift.”
“It’s not my birthday.”
“Summer solstice gift then.”
I let out a huff of air. My mum presses the rectangular box into my hands. The wrapping is thick butcher paper and the box is tied with twine. The paper is torn and stained and looks as if it’s been shoved under the front seat of her Vauxhall for a few years.
I smile. “Thank you.”
The rough twine slips through my fingers and the paper crumples free, revealing a long wooden box. I’m intrigued.
I look back at my mum. The wood is warm in my hands and heavy. “What is it?”
She flashes a bright smile. “Open it.”
I fold up the little gold latch and lift the lid of the box. The scent of musty velvet and dry wood fans toward me. Light catches on the object inside and I suck in a shocked breath.
“Where did you get this?”
“Do you like it?”
“Where did you get it?”
It’s the watch.
The watch.
The watch that I joked with Max about after he asked what I’d want to inherit. The first watch Adolphus Abry ever made.
It’s been missing for nearly eighty years. Stolen, misplaced—no one ever knew exactly what happened to it. I’ve only ever seen black-and-white photos and drawings.
But it’s easy to recognize.
It’s a work of art.
In old Geneva there were many goldsmiths. When the protestant revolution arrived, wearing adornments and jewelry was made illegal. What were hardworking goldsmiths to do? They turned to watchmaking.
The goldsmiths, the Huguenots fleeing France—all of this melded to make Geneva the pinnacle of the world’s watchmaking empire. In 1838 Adolphus Abry was an apprentice watchmaker. Family legend says the first watch he crafted on his own held all his dreams. He poured his dreams into the gold, into the enamel powder, into the perfectly ticking second hand.
He wanted to create beautiful art. To build a business that rivaled the best. To earn enough so he could marry the girl he’d been in love with all his life. That watch made his dreams come true. With it he received enough commissions to build Abry.
The pocket watch is nestled in black velvet.
The light catches the watch’s gold case. It glistens under the lamplight as if it were just polished this morning. The buttery yellow gold gleams, and the gold chain circles the round case. There aren’t any gems, no hand-cut sapphires or diamonds. There’s only the smooth, rounded yellow gold and the lustrous, gleaming enamel the color of vibrant lapis lazuli gently flowing into the soft, creamy white of sea-foam.
I can see now why everyone who’s ever seen this watch says it holds Adolphus Abry’s dreams. Staring into the deep blue of the dial is like staring into an ocean of dreams. You can almost see them set there in the watch face, mirrored back to you on the surface.
I hesitate, then I reach forward and touch the edge of the watch case. The gold is warm, not cold, as if it’s recently been held in someone’s hands.
There’s a spark there, a feeling like the one you get when you sit at the top of the Tor in Glastonbury or when you walk into the seven-hundred-year-old Salisbury Cathedral and all the stained-glass windows are lit and glowing from the sunrise.
“Magical, isn’t it?”
I smooth my finger over the edge of the gold and nod. “How did you find it?”
The watch is still, the gold hands unmoving. It’s manually wound mechanical movement. The last I heard, it still keeps time perfectly.
I wonder what will happen when I wind it.
“Six months ago, after you were shot?—”
I flinch, though my mum continues unaware.
“—I decided to visit Carl, the goat herder. Great hands. Remember him?”
“No.” I wonder if my mum finds it odd that after her daughter was shot she decided to visit a goat herder rather than her only child laid up in hospital.
“You know, Carl. Harry’s brother. From Wiltshire. Marjorie’s son.”
I have no idea who any of these people are.
“Anyway, on my way to see Carl—he’s in Croatia now—I was thinking about the woman shooting you on Christmas Eve and I remembered your father’s great-uncle Leopold.”
I raise my eyebrows in question.
“It was the strangest thing. Every time I thought about you being shot, I thought, ‘Buttercup, you must visit Leopold.’ He came to the wedding and gave your father and me a silver tea service. Everyone at the wedding refused to acknowledge him. But I liked his shoes. They were shaped like crocodiles.”
“Sorry, what?” Uncle Leopold? I narrow my eyes and concentrate on remembering the many branches of our family tree. “I don’t remember an Uncle Leopold.”
Some people might think it’s terrible that after I was shot my mum could only think about visiting a goat herder and an elderly relative she hadn’t seen in years, but I’m inured to this sort of thing.
“You wouldn’t,” she says, “He must be ninety-eight years old—no, ninety-nine. He fell out with the Abrys on account that he despised time.”
“And he gave you the watch?”
“Oh no.” My mum beams at me. “I stole it from him.”
I blink. “You stole Adolphus Abry’s watch from a centenarian?”
My mum laughs. “It was easy. He served me weak tea in his library and told me a story about how this watch can make your dreams come true. He said if you wind it then fall asleep with it in your hand, it will show you your heart’s desire. And then once you’ve dreamed it, you can grasp it. I took it for you so that you can dream again. This watch will make it happen.”
I shake my head. “That’s just a story.”
She tsks at my denial. “He claimed it’s what made him leave Switzerland. He said in the summer of 1940 he left Abry and went to Poland to find his lady love. All because of this watch.”
I pause. “Did he find her?”
“No. She died during the invasion. It’s why he hates time. He was too late.” My mum waves this away.
“Then I think maybe this watch doesn’t work like he said.”
“No. It does. He was very clear that it lets you live your dreams.”
I study the face of the pocket watch, catching sight of myself in the dark, glistening surface.
“It’s why I stole it. The watch was practically begging me to bring it back to you. I could feel it asking me to take it. That was, hmmm, right after last Christmas. I remember he served plum pudding from a tin.”
I glance quickly at my mum and she shrugs.
“You shouldn’t have stolen it?—”
“He stole it first. I’m merely returning it to the Abry Watch Company.”
“Hmm.”
She reaches over and clutches my hand. Her fingers are cold on mine.
“Fiona. Tell me. Tell me you’re living the life you’ve always dreamed of. Tell me you’re happy, and I’ll admit I was wrong and throw this watch in the lake?—”
“Don’t do that. This is a historic piece of horology and my family history?—”
“See. I knew you’d like it.”
I pause. My eyes are drawn again to the gleaming gold and the smooth lapis face.
Lately I’ve been run-down. Tired. The nightmares keep me awake.
I might not want my dreams to come true, but I’d like the nightmares to stop.
“It could show you your heart’s desire.”
“I have Mila. I have Daniel. I have Abry. I already have my heart’s desire.”
My mum gives me a flat stare. For a woman who only raised me until age six, she knows me quite well.
“But if you could ask for one more thing? Just one dream that you never let your waking mind linger on. What would it be? Wouldn’t you want it?”
I don’t answer.
Instead I close the wooden box, shutting the gleaming watch away in the dark.
The sound of the box closing is loud between us.
“I think”—my mum tilts her head and stares at the last slice of the Victoria sponge sitting alone on the platter—“I’ll slip out before you and Mila wake. I don’t care for goodbyes.”
I scoot across the couch and give my mum a tight hug. “Thank you for the watch.”
She pats my back. “You’re welcome. Sleep well.”