Chapter 21 #2
‘When will you do that?’ Zoe asked.
‘Victor’s going to take them tomorrow.’
‘You’re not going?’
Alex shook his head. ‘They’re Victor’s find. Besides, I’ve got to take Billie shopping.’
‘What are you going to buy?’
‘A cot, actually.’ He paused, as if uncertain whether to ask his next question, and as soon as he did, he seemed to wonder if it had been the wrong call. ‘You could come with us. If you’re not busy. If anyone knows about what cot to buy, it would be you, right?’
‘I’d love to say yes, but I’ve got to work, sorry.’
‘After work? The shop will be open late.’
‘I doubt Billie will want me there?—’
‘I bet she will. I won’t have a clue – I’m just the wallet. I think she’d appreciate your advice.’
Zoe smiled. While she was warmed by his insistence, she didn’t think that would be the case at all. She didn’t think Billie would want her there. ‘The shop will give her great advice. They’ll know all about the products they sell, more than I would.’
‘ I’d appreciate your advice,’ he said. ‘Billie looks to me for help, and I do my best, but my best isn’t always that useful. Sometimes it’s downright useless.’
‘Why don’t you ask Billie what she wants?’ Zoe said. ‘If she wants my help, of course I’ll come, but she might be happier if it’s just you and her. But let me know and I’ll make time if she does want me.’
‘There you go…’ Corrine put a plate down in front of Zoe. On it was a large slab of golden-crusted, almond-topped cake, with a generous seam of jam running through it. And then a jug of cream.
‘Wow!’ Zoe picked up the plate and marvelled at the cake on it. ‘You’ve outdone yourself – this looks amazing!’
‘It is,’ Alex said. ‘I’ve already had some.’
‘You can have another slice if you like,’ Corrine said. ‘There’s plenty.’
‘I would, but I don’t think I’d ever want to eat again they’re so big.’
‘I can make it a smaller one.’
Alex smiled. ‘Go on then. Just a small one. Nobody tell Billie because she says I eat too much as it is!’
Corrine laughed. ‘Strapping lad like you? I don’t know how you could eat too much!’
The sun had slipped below the horizon, but as yet, there were no stars in the sky, only the moon, low and huge peeking from behind the distant hills, and a bank of ochre cloud spanning their length as Zoe and Alex left the kitchen of Daffodil farmhouse.
‘I’ll walk with you,’ he said.
‘OK. I’d like the company. I know it’s safe and everything out here, but sometimes it still spooks me in the dark. Like you don’t know what’s out there. Rabbits, I suppose. The odd sparrow.’
‘Or the ghost of a Bronze Age chieftain, come to take revenge on the people trespassing on his land,’ he said in a mysterious voice, and she laughed.
‘Or ghosts who want revenge on me for living here. Thanks – that made me feel better.’
‘Sorry. Let’s go with rabbits then.’
‘Let’s. Did you want me to regret letting you walk me home?’
‘I’d never want that.’ He sank his hands into his pockets as they began to follow the path. ‘Corrine and Victor are great, aren’t they?’
‘I love them both already. I’m so lucky to have them as landlords.’
‘So the house you’re in…it was their daughter’s, wasn’t it? Victor gifted her and her husband the land? I heard something about it. He had an affair with some girl who was staying in the village and they both ended up leaving. Do I have that right?’
‘Pretty much, apart from Melanie – their daughter – had an affair first, and the marriage was on the rocks before Fion arrived.’
He threw her a sideways glance. ‘You seem to know a lot about it. Is that what Corrine told you?’
‘Ottilie…I work with her at the surgery. Fion’s her sister.
Well, half-sister. In the end, it was all amicable.
Victor and Corrine didn’t blame Melanie’s husband.
I think they’re sad she moved away, but they get that she needed a fresh start, and living in Kestrel Cottage had too many memories for her. Lucky for me, eh?’
‘Lucky for me too,’ he said, and it was her turn to throw him a puzzled look, one that he didn’t see in the gloom. ‘I mean,’ he added quickly, ‘you’re a perfect neighbour for someone who has a very pregnant daughter who worries him to death all the time.’
‘You really worry that much?’
‘Of course I do! I don’t know what to do for her from one minute to the next. I thought we were doing all right until you pointed out that we don’t talk, and then I realised that I’m actually hopeless. It’s at times like these I miss Jennifer. Billie needs her mum.’
‘For what it’s worth, I think you’re doing a pretty decent job. The main thing is you’re trying. You want to be there for her, and you’re doing your best. Nobody can ask anything more than that.’
‘It doesn’t ever feel like enough.’
‘Trust me, if you asked Billie, I’m sure she’d say it is.’
‘You seem to be able to get through to her.’
‘I doubt that. As a midwife, perhaps. I’m not sure about anything else.’
‘I know you said it would be better for us to go shopping tomorrow without you, but I could really do with your help. It’s not about the cot, not really.
I wish she’d open up. I’m a bloke, I get that, and she probably thinks I can’t handle pregnancy stuff, but I think she needs someone.
She’d talk to you. She already does, more than she’s ever opened up to me, about Luis and about bringing up the baby by herself. ’
Zoe let out a sigh. ‘Right, I’ll come then. But please mention it to Billie, and if she doesn’t seem keen, tell me. I’d rather not be there if she doesn’t want me to be.’
‘I will. Thanks. I won’t forget I owe you. I owe you about fifty favours, in fact, for all the times you’ve had my back since I got here.’ He paused before beginning again. ‘When I came over to your house and your ex was there…I didn’t make it awkward, did I?’
‘Why would you think that?’
‘I don’t know… a feeling. I got a weird vibe from him.’
‘That’s not unique to you – he gives that vibe to everyone.’ Zoe affected a careless laugh for him that she didn’t quite feel.
‘But I didn’t cause you any trouble?’
‘Of course you didn’t. We’re not together now, so who visits me has nothing to do with him.’
‘It’s not my place to say so, but I’m not sure he got that memo.’
‘It’s not,’ she said and then immediately regretted it. ‘Sorry, I didn’t mean that. It’s just…with Ritchie it’s complicated. We have a lot of history that sort of keeps us together. Not as a couple, but we…we’re kind of bound together.’
She paused. As well as she felt she was beginning to know Alex now, there was no doubt of his reaction to her next sentence. She already trusted him, but she felt the enormity of saying it out loud to someone new, someone who was beginning to mean a great deal to her.
‘We lost our baby earlier this year, and after that things fell apart. I didn’t deal with it well, he couldn’t work out how to handle me and… here we are. I still care about him. It wasn’t so much a case of falling out of love, more like we stopped understanding each other.’
‘I’m so sorry to hear that. God, it must take every ounce of what you have to carry on caring for other pregnant women having lost your own baby. I have so much respect for you right now.’
‘I don’t see it that way. If I can help one other woman so she doesn’t have to go through what I went through, then I have to do that. It’s not a choice; it’s… I’m not sure what it is, but it’s why I signed up to be a midwife in the first place.’
‘I bet you don’t even know how amazing that is.’
‘That’s because it’s not.’
‘No, but it is. You are…’
‘There’s the gate,’ she cut in, half thankful, half disappointed that they’d reached her house, desperate to hear what he might have been about to say but scared of it at the same time.
She wanted to invite him in, but there was something brewing in the air between them, something that had escalated over the past fifteen minutes, and she was afraid of what might happen, what she might do, if he came inside. ‘Thanks for walking me home.’
‘It was my pleasure,’ he said, leaving her feeling as if there had never been a truer phrase spoken. ‘So I hope to see you tomorrow.’
‘Don’t forget to check with Billie, please.’
‘I will, but I’m sure she’ll be happy to have you along.’
They paused, the lanterns along her path and the pearly moon the only lights illuminating his face.
Even then, she could see the affection in it.
Not only affection, something so much more.
Hope? Longing? She knew it because she felt it too.
Amidst the chaos of the emotions that whirled around inside her at that moment, those shone bright.
She didn’t know how it could happen, but she was certain that if it did, it could be wonderful.
And as he gazed at her, she almost wondered if he’d ask the question. And if he did, she knew she’d say yes.
But after a pause and a small smile, he took a pace back. ‘I’ll watch you in. Goodnight, Zoe.’
‘Goodnight,’ she said, barely able to keep the disappointment from her voice.
True to his word, he watched until she’d unlocked the front door and pushed it open, and then he turned and went.