Chapter Twenty-Nine Daisy
Chapter Twenty-Nine
Daisy
“Aaaaah,” Clara said, letting out a sigh. “This is the life.”
They were side by side on sun loungers and Daisy reached across to the table between them, lifting a glass to sip on one of
the cocktails they’d ordered the moment the bar at Bowood House Spa had opened at 11:00 a.m.
Two nights in a fancy hotel with her best friend was a trip Daisy never thought she’d ever take, hen do or no hen do.
“I can’t believe you agreed to this,” Clara said, as if reading her mind.
“You told me it was not optional,” Daisy replied, laughing.
“It wasn’t, but I still can’t believe you came.”
“I’m happy I did.” Daisy meant it. Not only did it feel like a huge step to be there but it was a relief to be out of the
house, where she felt like the walls were closing in on her. After Zack’s initial outburst, he’d disappeared to play padel
and returned as though nothing had happened. He’d been all loving and warm, a bunch of chrysanthemums in his hands as he asked
to go through all the wedding plans one final time. Chrysanthemums. They meant something too, Daisy knew. They meant goodbye.
“An actual annual leave day used for holiday! Soon there’ll be nothing holding you back, just like Carol said!” Daisy had filled Clara in about her therapy session briefly at work, but without many details as to how it related to Zack. She was still processing that part herself.
“I think I need to apologize to Tom,” Daisy blurted out, looking toward the pool.
Clara sat up, rubbing her hands together. “Tom chat. Perfect for your hen do!” She winked at Daisy, who grimaced.
“I thought he was being so unkind with everything he said, but now I think maybe it was the opposite.” She gazed at the pool.
“He was trying to help me, in the same way you were. And then I kicked off at him, and now I’m not even sure if he’s coming
to the wedding.”
“He’ll be there,” Clara said firmly, but she hadn’t been on the bus that morning. She hadn’t seen how it had all ended. He
had every right to have decided between then and now that he was done with her and he’d rather focus on a new life, he and
Sophie, without her.
“Question,” Clara continued. “Why do you keep staring at the pool?” She lifted her sunglasses onto the top of her head. Sunglasses
she insisted on wearing to feel as though they were away on some tropical island, as opposed to indoors, in the UK, in January.
Daisy pulled her eyes away from the glistening water and thought about Clara’s question.
“Because I think I want to get in it,” Daisy answered honestly.
“You’ve been staring at it for, like, half an hour.”
“I know.”
Clara pulled herself up slightly, frowning. “Babe. Just get in the pool if you want to get in it. It is honestly that simple.
Life is honestly that simple.” She fixed her eyes on Daisy, watching in amusement as realization must have washed across Daisy’s
face.
Why did she find it so difficult to act on things she wanted? Wasn’t that the whole point of this weekend? To take the first step out of her comfort zone, even if that was to somewhere literally more comfortable than she was used to?
“You’re right,” Daisy said, jumping off her sun lounger.
“Yeah, girl!” Clara shouted as Daisy walked slowly to the edge of the pool and rolled her shoulders back, staring at the ripples
one more time before she took the deepest breath she could and dived in, breaking the surface of the water and sinking beneath
it, feeling the hit of cold against her face. She stayed under as long as she could, taking in how the world felt from beneath
the surface. Out of nowhere a rush filled her body, reaching her lungs. It was anger, Daisy realized. Anger at herself and
her life and everything she was putting up with. Frustration that she wasn’t even able to recognize what she wanted because
her own voice inside her own brain was so unfamiliar to her. She was so used to hearing someone else’s. She was so used to
hearing Zack’s.
Daisy opened her mouth and the scream came out, filling the ripples around her. It felt different, under there. Almost as
though it was barely happening at all, but she could feel it tearing through her, clutching at the muscles in her neck. It
was coming from the very depths of her, and she just let it keep coming until she was completely out of breath.
When she burst out at the other end, her heart was pounding with how alive she felt. It was nearly addictive, that rush that
filled her from moving in water. She let out a laugh, throwing her head back, grateful that there was no one around but Clara
to witness her moment of . . . madness? Or sanity? Maybe the two were more closely linked than she’d first thought.
Daisy swam back and forth, first on her front and then on her back, soaking up the feeling of calm that now filled her.
For one moment it was as though she recognized her own voice, her own wants and needs.
What if she never recognized that voice again?
If she wouldn’t know it when it spoke to her?
But somehow, out of nowhere, Virginia Woolf assured her that she would.
From all the times she had read Orlando, she hadn’t realized how many of the quotes had stuck in her head, and she heard one now, inside her.
“For it is in our idleness, in our dreams, that the submerged truth sometimes comes to the top.”
“Feels good, right?” Clara shouted, and Daisy turned to see her standing at the edge of the pool. She jumped in rather than
diving, creating a huge eruption of water around her.
“Yes, but I don’t quite get why,” Daisy said once Clara had reached her, lying on her back and floating in the water.
“Because, my friend, you just acted on something you wanted. It starts with something small, like jumping in a pool, but one
day, maybe, you’ll learn to do it for all sorts of things.”
Daisy kicked her legs and swam towards the edge. “How do you know this stuff?” she asked.
“I think the question we should be asking,” Clara said. “Is how do you not know this stuff?”
Clara had taken it as a personal challenge for the rest of the weekend. She would notice when Daisy went along with what she
wanted and would call her out on it, again and again.
“Wait,” she’d say. “Do you want to share an antipasti board, or are you just saying that because I want to?”
Daisy would frown. “I don’t think I do want an antipasti board,” she’d say and Clara would high-five her, laughing.
“I think I might go for a walk in the woods,” Daisy said the next day and Clara started doing that stupid shake of hers where
she pumped both fists in a sort of celebratory dance, popping her hips out from side to side.
“She’s going for a waaaaaalk,” she started chanting. “On her ooooown.”
Daisy went right up to the edge of the gardens and on into the forest that circled the golf course. She nodded to the occasional dog walker, all while marveling at herself. If Tom could see me now, she thought at one point, shaking it away.
As she turned back toward the spa, she stumbled across a sign for a bar sitting within the golf club. Before she could really
question it, she turned away from the woodlands and walked in that direction instead.
The waiter greeted her and led her to a table that looked out over the grounds of the house and held her chair out for her.
“A glass of wine to start, perhaps?” he asked, smiling warmly.
Daisy opened her mouth to say “yes please” even though her brain had immediately said, “No thank you.” She paused.
“No, thank you,” she said, a moment of déjà vu looping through her. “I’ll go for a glass of champagne.”
“An excellent choice,” he said, nodding and walking away.
All of the feelings she was having were so familiar, and for a moment she couldn’t think why. Daisy stared out ahead of her
and watched as the sun shone through the gaps of the trees. It was the same way her ring had caught the light in their back
garden when Zack had proposed to her. When Zack had proposed and Daisy’s mouth had said, “Yes,” while her brain had said,
“No thank you.” How different might her life have looked all these months later if she’d acted on her thoughts instead of
just saying what she thought she was supposed to? She wondered, now, whether it had been her heart speaking instead of her
brain. Whether it had known something she hadn’t realized yet.
The view was beautiful and Daisy thought about how Tom might frame it through his lens, if he were there; which part he would pick out to focus on.
The dappled light, or the way some of the branches cast shadows against the grass.
Maybe he would capture her in the center of it, the trees her backdrop.
And maybe, just like last time, he would capture the light in Daisy’s eyes the way only he was able to.
The waiter brought her the glass of champagne and Daisy thanked him, drinking some down. It was exactly what she wanted. Picking
up the menu, she looked through it, and when he reappeared, she ordered more. Some focaccia, some crispy chicken wings and
some Padrón peppers. To hell with the lunch budget. God, how simple life was when you started acknowledging your own desires.
When you finally started listening to what your mind and body were telling you.
“Is there anything else I can get for you?” the waiter asked as he cleared Daisy’s plates away, and she paused, silently asking
herself the question.
“Nothing,” she said, meaning it.
She picked up her phone and automatically opened up her work email, heart jumping as she took in the subject of one. A new
job had gone live on the intranet due to the previous employee not passing their probation. An investigative journalist role
on the News Now! Team.
Daisy watched the sun disappear completely, the trees fading into darkness and it felt important to her, for some reason,
that she had watched that day, of all days, come to an end.
Dan picked Daisy and Clara up from Paddington, laughing at Clara’s description of Daisy diving into the swimming pool and
the journey she’d gone on since. He was in London now until after the wedding.
“What do you mean you didn’t even know if you wanted to swim?” he asked. “That is truly wild, Daise. Has Mum spoken to you?”
he added, turning to her.
“About what?”
Dan’s face lit up. “She wants a plus-one,” he said, raising his eyebrows.
“I know,” Daisy said. “I cannot tell you how much it grosses me out that her plus-one is you.”
“It’s not me,” Dan said, turning on the indicator. “It’s Silly Billy.”
“What?” Daisy said as Clara let out a whistle from the back.
“Yup,” he said. “Something about her feeling ready to move on after the Christmas debacle.”
“Is that what you call ruining my wall with a bowl of potatoes?” Daisy asked, but she was teasing. She actually loved the
permanent reminder of the breakdown and therefore rebuilding of her family. Huge rebuilding, it would seem, if her mum wanted
to bring Billy.
“Wait. Billy? Are you sure?”
Dan shrugged, turning off the motorway. “That’s what she said.”
“Classic Mum to think she can add a fucking plus-one a week before the wedding,” Daisy said, and the three of them started
laughing. “God, I’m so happy for her,” she added, thinking about what this might mean. That perhaps, after years, she was
freeing herself from their dad.
“Same,” Dan said. “And happy for me too.”
“Well yes, definitely. No one wants to feel like their mum’s boyfriend.”
“No one.”
Daisy looked out the window. “I’m so glad you went away,” she said, reaching across and patting his hand. “I know how important
it was for you, but I think it might have saved all of us.”
“I don’t know,” Dan said, staring ahead. “I’m not sure it’s saved you yet.”
It wasn’t until later that Daisy really understood what he meant.