Chapter 2
FRAN
The sound of Carly and Jude running down the stairs takes me back to the days when I’d work in my study while the two of them cavorted about the house: building dens in the living room, playing dress-up in Carly’s room, or using the staircase from top to bottom as their very own helter-skelter.
It catches me by surprise when the two of them appear in the kitchen as fully-fledged adults and not primary-aged children.
‘Morning, Mrs H,’ says Jude, looking almost as cherubic as she did when she was three.
Their contrasting beauty has never been lost on me – Carly dark and angular, Jude effortlessly blond and soft.
I laugh at her greeting, still after all these years unable to call me Fran.
Jude surveys the kitchen, every oak cabinet open, the contents spread all over the granite work surface. ‘What happened in here?’
‘Mum’s got writer’s block,’ explains Carly, words that seem unconnected to me, since I’ve never experienced this in over twenty-five years of writing contemporary romance.
My literary agent keeps telling me that something will come when I least expect it, but so far I’ve only had a few scrappy ideas, nothing that will help pay the bills.
When Carly was little, my advances were enough to keep the whole family for a year, and the royalties covered holidays, birthdays and Christmas.
The bookshop ticked along nicely, easily enough to cover unexpected costs.
But over the last decade my sales have gone down, having become lost in the myriad of books online, and so too have my advances.
Consequently, Robin’s income has become more critical at a time when independent bookshops are struggling to keep their doors open.
Any savings we had were used up long ago.
‘Are you hoping you might find an idea at the back of a cupboard?’ Jude jokes.
Jude’s gentle humour casts a different light on my frantic cleaning and I laugh, some of the tension loosening in my back.
‘You need to relax, Mrs H – go for a swim, read a magazine, get out of the house.’
‘She’s right, Mum. You told me once that ideas come from the everyday: a magazine article, a current interest, a place you’d like to visit. Take some me-time, see what comes.’
Carly isn’t wrong, I did give her that advice when she was doing a creative writing module at university.
The difference is, she was a student who had to write a short story over the space of a term, whereas I was a best-selling author.
Now I’m just a writer without a book deal and no significant earnings due any time soon.
‘I need to come up with something fast. I haven’t time for sitting around hoping the next idea will just land in my lap.’
‘But you have got time for gutting the kitchen,’ Carly rebuts.
‘Carly,’ I start, about to let off a tirade about the state of our finances, and the cost of upkeep on an ancient five-storey house that’s never really had the attention it needs.
I stop myself, if I’m honest, only because Jude is present.
Too often, Carly is the butt of my temper.
‘Shouldn’t you be looking for a job, or helping Dad in the shop?
’ I breathe, the tension returning to my back.
‘You’re right, I should be helping Dad,’ she says, casting Jude a ‘let’s get out of here’ look.
‘Good luck with it all,’ Jude says kindly, causing a wave of guilt to pass through me.
‘Kitchen looks clean,’ says Robin when he appears for his mid-morning coffee break.
Same can’t be said for you, I think, giving him the once-over. He looks as if he hasn’t showered in days. His wavy salt-and-pepper hair is lank and in need of a cut, and he’s sporting several days of growth.
‘What have you been up to this morning?’ I ask.
‘Accounts,’ he mutters.
‘You should let Carly make some changes,’ I say as he reaches past me at the sink to fill the kettle. ‘You know she likes to help, and now that she’s temping, she has more time.’
‘Haven’t got the money for changes.’
‘It doesn’t cost anything to send a weekly email.’
‘There’s no point. Anyone who’s buying in person is going to the chains,’ he says, pushing the kettle switch with more force than necessary.
‘It doesn’t hurt to remind people that we’re here,’ I say as we both reach into the mug cupboard at the same time. I step back, gesturing for him to go ahead. ‘Or I could do an author talk; it might help sell a few copies of the last book.’
Robin doesn’t reply, something increasingly common between us these days. He spoke more to our lodger than he did to me. Now that the lodger has gone, he seems more withdrawn than ever, despite Carly being home.
‘It would give us an incentive to do a tidy-up,’ I continue, aware that I sound like a cheerleader, hopeful that I might hit on something that will reignite the passion he once had for the bookshop and turn things around. ‘Carly’s down there now putting things in order.’
Again he ignores me, reaching for the biscuit barrel, something he could do without.
I can’t remember the last time he went for a walk or a bike ride, with or without me, nor when his trousers fitted properly.
For months he’s been roaming around the place in sweatpants and an old shirt, a far cry from the well-turned-out Robin of old, who could command the attention of any room he stepped into.
‘How’s the hunt for your next book idea going?’ he asks.
‘Still nothing,’ I reply, and we sit down opposite each other at the kitchen table.
He nods almost imperceptibly; a silent touché, neither one of us capable of providing.
I sit for a moment trying to find a neutral topic of conversation, something that isn’t about work or finances or the state of the house, something that won’t give rise to vexation.
‘Jude’s looking well,’ I offer.
He nods.
‘Marriage seems to suit her,’ I continue.
‘Time will tell.’
‘What does that mean?’ I ask, wishing immediately that I hadn’t, seeing Robin’s hackles rising.
He shrugs and I, not wanting a fight, stand to empty my cup at the sink, my back turned to him.
‘You used to look at me the way Jude looks at Adam,’ he says quietly.
I turn to him, drying the cup. ‘They’re young, and in love.’
‘Aren’t we?’
My brow furrows, confused by his question. ‘We’re middle-aged and in the thick of life. “In love” is what happens at the start,’ I say, hoping to sound breezy, to stop him burrowing deeper.
He stares into the bottom of his cup. ‘Love. Life. It’s all one big trap.’
I stand for a moment, frozen by his remark, stunned that he could ever consider our family and life together a trap.
‘What does that mean?’ I ask, aware that he’s struggling with work, but hoping, perhaps against my better judgement, that we, I, am not part of the problem.
‘It means I have nothing beyond this basic existence. Whatever happened to travelling, to seeing something of the world?’
‘It’ll happen. Finances just aren’t in our favour at the moment,’ I console, as keen as he is to strap on a backpack and leave our ties behind.
‘Because of this house!’ he snaps.
I stop, take a breath, guilt rising inside me that the house and business I inherited is a weight round our necks, far too big and old and tired for two impoverished creatives.
‘We’ve gone over this countless times. We can’t let go of the house; it has too much history, too many memories, and we’ve always agreed we want to keep it for Carly.
You know how much she loves this place, far more than I ever have.
We just have to ride it out; money will come in again.
’ I hope I sound more convincing than I feel.
I’m not sure if I’ll ever get over this block, or if Robin will find his vigour.
He shakes his head. ‘Life could have been so much better if I hadn’t given up my career for yours.’
It takes me a moment to compute what he’s just said, a momentary calm before the storm, and then it hits me, full force, the thing I’ve feared most – that Robin would one day grow to resent his decision to give up his life in London for mine in Edinburgh.
‘I’m sorry you feel that way,’ I whisper, the hairs on my arms standing on end, my whole body cold.
‘Me too,’ he says emotionlessly. He lifts his head, looks me straight in the eye and says, ‘Something needs to change around here, or else this could be the end.’
Shock tears through me like the crack of a whip and I am at once winded and astutely alert.
Robin is deeply unhappy, and I am to blame for trapping him here.
My brain can’t make the connections. I scramble for the words to respond but before I find them, Robin gets up, pushes his chair in with a screech and disappears out of the room.
After a time standing clutching the sink, my mind fizzing with questions – The end of the shop? Or the end of us? Where did this come from? What did I do? Does he want out? Does he love me? – I run from the kitchen and down to the basement.
‘Elsa?’ I call, my heart racing.
‘Whatever has happened?’ she asks in her faint Dutch accent, quietly closing the door to the bedroom where Bill is napping.
She places a calm hand on my back. Her wooden bangles jangle as she gestures for me to join her in the living area.
It’s only when I sit down that I notice the tears streaming down my face.
I retreat into her orange corner sofa and look up at the legs of strangers passing by outside. She offers me a box of tissues, sits beside me, and waits.
‘Nothing is right any more,’ I sob, blowing into a tissue and tossing it into the wicker bin.
‘How do you mean?’ Despite my distress I can still make out the look of puzzlement in Elsa’s hazy blue eyes, and the soft crinkle of her brow below her grey-blond fringe.
‘I haven’t got a book deal, the house is falling to bits and is completely unaffordable, and now it seems my marriage is falling apart too.’
Nodding along gently, she offers me a compassionate if confused look.
‘Shall we unpack the book deal part first?’ she asks.
‘What’s to say? I’m out of contract, I haven’t any ideas worth pitching. I’m not sure I can write any more, or if I want to.’
‘Uh-huh,’ nods Elsa, looking for more.
‘It used to make sense,’ I continue. ‘In writing for hundreds of thousands of readers I knew I was touching lives in some way – if only enabling escape for a half-hour in someone’s day.
I felt I had a purpose. Now . . .’ I pause, uncertain what it is that’s really troubling me. ‘What’s the point of it all?’
Elsa sits contemplatively as I dab my eyes and blow my nose, regaining some sense of composure.
‘Tell me about the house,’ she says.
‘Isn’t it obvious?’ I ask, expecting her to agree but she doesn’t.
‘The roof leaks, the chimneys are blocked, the windows need repairing. The bookshop needs to be gutted, our apartment looks as if it’s been ransacked, and Carly’s space is filled with furniture older than I am.
’ I glance around Elsa’s living area, her yellow and white kitchen shining like a pin towards the back of the L-shaped space.
‘It’s only your flat that’s in good condition, and that’s because you’ve shouldered the cost of repairs. ’
‘The garden needs an overhaul,’ she says then adds, realising she’s just added another thing to my mental list, ‘but that’s not important; vegetation is good for the wildlife. I can contribute more to the upkeep of the house, it’s not a problem.’
‘No,’ I say instantly, the part of my brain that isn’t in overdrive working clearly enough to know that Elsa needs all of her pension and inheritance to help with Bill’s care.
‘We’ll manage. I’m just overwhelmed with the worry of work, and the house, and then Robin came in this morning making some claim about how love and life are both traps and that if something doesn’t change it will be the end.
I don’t know if he meant the end of the business, or of our marriage, or both.
’ I pause, still unable to process it, panicking about how we’d cope without the business or each other.
She offers me a look that asks me to elaborate and I recount how the conversation played out.
‘Hmm,’ she says, by way of a full stop, then gathers up her long gypsy skirt and goes to the kitchen.
‘What you need is tea,’ she declares, gathering the necessary items from the cupboards.
‘I just had one,’ I say, slightly irked that Elsa hasn’t understood the gravity of the situation.
‘Did you?’ she asks, and I wonder how she knows that I threw most of it down the sink.
She returns with a tray set with a simple earthenware teapot, which I recognise immediately as having been made by her husband, Bill. Carefully she fills the handle-less cups and hands one to me with a homemade Speculaas biscuit.
‘Let us sit a while and simply hold our cup,’ she says.
I do as she asks, my mind abuzz with all Robin said. After a while, when I can take the silence no more, I ask what she’s thinking.
‘I am calming my thoughts by focusing on the cup.’
For a moment I think Elsa has lost her mind, but as I focus on mine, its warmth radiating out over my skin and its smooth, blemish-free glaze, I begin to notice my thoughts subsiding, my heart rate reducing.
‘Now notice the colour of the tea without labelling it. Just see. And then, when you are ready, lift the cup higher and absorb the aroma. Only once you have observed both those things should you take a small sip and hold it in your mouth.
‘Good, Frances,’ she says after a while, and although I should be focusing on the taste, my mind flits to my mother, the only other person who called me by my full name. ‘When it feels as if the world is out of control, it is good to come back to your senses.’
‘Thank you, Elsa,’ I say, not exactly sure how a cup of tea is going to find me my next book idea, repair the house and business, or my marriage, but Elsa seems so composed, despite all her own troubles, that I’m prepared to lean into the moment.