Chapter 43
ELIZA
Eliza and Jez both managed to sleep on the aeroplane.
They’d hardly slept at the hotel. Jez had held Eliza tight in his arms all night.
They’d talked, nothing more, yet it felt like so much, his closeness, his support, his strong arms holding her together.
Jez told her not to worry about her shift at The Niterie, it was already covered, as he thought they’d still be in Greece.
As they pulled up by the kerb in Reddish, he got out of the Uber and took her in his arms.
‘Dynamite. Don’t you forget it,’ he said.
To her annoyance a tear rolled down her face. Jez held up five fingers to the driver, who nodded. Jez picked up Eliza’s bag, took her hand, and led her to the front door. They went in and he led her into the lounge, took out his phone, went on Spotify.
‘You like Jung Kook?’
She nodded.
‘Since meeting you I’ve dived into K-pop.’ He smiled. ‘I reckon George Michael would have approved of the song “Still With You”.’ He pressed play and his hips swayed to the jazzy ballad.
He took Eliza’s hands and looked deep into her eyes as the romantic lyrics and instruments unfurled slowly, with intention, building, absorbing her totally into the moment.
‘I’m still with you, Eliza,’ he murmured.
‘I’m with you for as long as you want.’ He leant down and their lips touched.
Like a teenager again as the husky, soft, sexy music swelled, along with her chest, Eliza felt she’d never catch her breath.
She closed her eyes and sparks of joy lit up the darkness, like tiny meteors, falling, falling.
As the song came to an end, Jez stepped back and ran a thumb tenderly across one of her blushed cheeks.
He gave a shy smile as she gently took hold of the top of his ‘Choose Life’ T-shirt and pulled him close again.
The song was on repeat and both their bodies swayed as her pulse went into overdrive in a way it never had before.
Finally she broke away and held his hand tightly, their fingers interlocking, and then he went into the hallway and out the front door.
Heart pounding, heat pooling, Eliza needed a minute to recover. As the taxi drove away, she already missed the man who gave her hope that maybe she could take a chance on love again.
After a glass of water, she put the kettle on and stared out into Carrie’s garden.
It wasn’t her home and never would be. But she’d miss Billy next door’s cheerful grin and had grown accustomed to the house’s flowery wallpaper, the patterned carpet, and the burnt-orange kitchen.
Perhaps she’d make some adjustments back at her bungalow which wasn’t as vibrant, apart from the vases of flowers.
‘What do you think, Boo?’ she asked as they sat together on the sofa, Eliza drinking a cup of tea and feeding him a couple of cat treats – against all usual rules to allow that in the lounge, but she’d miss the little pirate, miss that purr, and the mischievous swipe of his paw if she leant forwards to bop his nose with hers.
She turned her attention to the white lilies in the vase, on the windowsill.
White, the colour to take to funerals; the colour that marked the end of a relationship.
She turned away, vowing that when she moved back to her bungalow, the flowers she displayed, at least, would always reflect the colours of the rainbow.
After another nap, she showered, changed, and made herself a sandwich.
Then she grabbed a roll of black dustbin bags from the kitchen and made her way up to the bedroom and over to the tallboy.
She pulled open the top drawer first. Eliza would pack up Carrie’s belongings and store them in her loft, back in Bramhall, until she’d decided what to do with them.
She had to assume Carrie wouldn’t want them back, so would ask Ariana and Rae if they wanted to sift through.
Anything left over could go to a charity shop.
As she knew from exploring the house when she first moved in, the first drawer was full of socks that were too tight for Eliza.
She checked them all; they were in good condition with no holes.
The next drawer contained T-shirts. She’d worn one of them whilst doing the housework the other day; it had a cat on it.
Next to them was a small hand fan, a handheld mirror, a charging cable, an empty leather purse and a couple of linen tote bags.
She emptied everything into one of the dustbin liners.
Eliza reached to the back of the drawer to check she hadn’t missed anything and came across a notebook.
She pulled it out. On the front were the words ‘Things to be grateful for’.
Eliza had written a gratitude journal shortly after Howard’s funeral.
Deep down, she’d felt relief that such a challenging part of her life was over.
But along with that came a sense of guilt.
She’d loved Howard in the beginning, she had, and despite everything, would never have wished him dead.
She also grieved for the decades she’d wasted, under his spell.
Then, always lurking in the shadows, was the loss of her daughter.
Eliza got therapy and was advised to focus on the positives.
At the beginning, some days all she managed to write was ‘grateful for that nice coffee’.
It would be wrong to read this private journal. She’d just speed flip through the pages to see if it was empty and could be donated. Eliza sat on the bed. Every page was blank.
Eliza understood. Being grateful took practice and required the worst of the hurt to pass first.
She put the journal to one side and unpacked the bottom drawer, the trousers and jeans, the long-sleeved tops in bland colours.
The black dustbin liner was almost full and she did a last check of that final drawer, reaching right to the back where she found an old deodorant, a tube of safety pins and… a book?
An old-fashioned photo album demonstrating the love Mel had for disposable cameras. Perhaps she had no money for a smartphone either.
Eliza sat on the bed and, tentatively, she opened it.
On the first page was a photo of Mel holding a baby, undeniably Carrie with wisps of blonde hair and Fletcher…
Woods almond-shaped eyes. Mel’s eyes were dark underneath.
She was standing on a lawn wearing threadbare jeans, hair straggly at the ends, old trainers scuffed.
Eliza lifted her hand to her mouth and bit the skin.
The following pages were like a flip book animation, as Carrie grew from a baby into a toddler and then a small schoolchild.
Wisps of hair became a cropped bob which morphed into pigtails and then a long ponytail.
Mel didn’t change much – the same slim frame possibly became even thinner, the hair was cut into a short style, the clothes remained practical.
Eliza wondered how many nights out she’d had, how many coffees with friends…
Every penny must have counted, leaving none left over for babysitters and fancy lattes.
Lunchtime passed to late afternoon as Eliza sat on the bed, turning through her daughter and granddaughter’s lives.
Days at the seaside, few and far between, baking they’d done, school sports days.
Also, several of Carrie playing the guitar, from a young age.
In the last few pages, Boo featured and as Carrie got older, the worry lines in Mel’s face eased.
Eliza flicked through the pages again. And again.
It was like reading a book you couldn’t put down, except Eliza already knew the ending to this story.
Or at least she thought she did. As she turned the last page for the final time, an envelope fell to the ground.
She took out a handful of photos, random shots of local scenes with Mel’s handwriting on the back showing the date followed by a small cross – a kiss?
She was about to put them back in the envelope, but something flexed in her brain, a sense of familiarity.
She flicked through the loose shots once more and then sat very still.
Local scenes, yes, but to her, not Mel. One was a general snap of Bramhall, yet the lens had been tilted to very much include Flowers for One.
Another had looked like a random photo of an estate, but on closer inspection it was Eliza’s road, taken from the end that she never drove down.
The next was taken in Bramhall Park car park and that was definitely Eliza’s red Audi parked up.
Hands shaking, she inspected the one of her road again.
If you squinted really hard… yes, there was Eliza in the front garden, weeding.
She got up and paced the room. The crosses on the back.
Had her little girl died still loving her mum, unable to forgive her enough to reach out?
Were these photos proof that Mel had missed her in some way, and wanted contact at a distance, if nothing else?
Carrie wouldn’t have understood their significance.
Boo strutted in and meowed loudly. On automatic, Eliza went downstairs and filled his food bowl. She made herself another cup of tea and went back upstairs. Carefully, she picked up the photo album again, as if it were made of gemstones.
‘I’m sorry, Mel. For everything,’ she said and ran a hand over the album. ‘I loved you so very much. Always will.’
She wiped away a tear and glanced at the floor.
A photo had fallen out that she hadn’t seen yet.
It had a date and cross on the back. It was taken on a shelf in what looked like a charity shop.
Sitting amongst a bundle of toys was a Barbie doll and Ken, both wearing football kit, looking exactly like the ones Eliza and a young Mel used to play with together.