58. Ursula Moller’s list of regrets
URSULA MOLLER’S LIST OF REGRETS
Ursula sat at the dining table with a notepad, a cafetiere, and a slice of chocolate cake. She’d been shopping that morning and had treated herself. She took a photo of the cake and sent it to Andi: ‘I’m on my second slice.’ That would please her.
While she’d been in Bala, Don had shown her how to get music on something called Spotify.
It was amazing. You could play whatever you wanted on your phone.
She selected some tunes that she and Andi used to love and turned them up loud.
She could do that now Anton had disappeared.
He wasn’t at the window when she’d returned from her stay in Eastbourne and he hadn’t been back.
She’d been thinking about Anton a lot since talking to Cass.
Reassessing their life together, now that she’d seen a different side to him.
And she’d come to understand that they had loved each other, just not enough.
In choosing one another, they’d settled for something or someone second best. Anton probably knew he’d done that but he must have seen it in Ursula the night he saw her with Samuel. That was why he took it so badly.
It didn’t hurt to think of herself as his second best, but it hurt to think of all those wasted years of longing.
She’d longed for a child, and she’d longed for Samuel, but before that, even before Anton, there had always been something.
A father. A friend. Acceptance. Love. Anton could never have filled all those gaps.
No one person could, or should. But perhaps if they hadn’t ruined things by marrying, they’d have been friends.
Perhaps he would have been a much-loved uncle.
Because she had liked him back then, that funny, odd man with his old fashioned, not quite British, not quite foreign ways.
She had liked him very much. Yes, they would have made great friends.
She looked all the way up to the high ceiling. This house was beautiful but it wasn’t right for her. Tomorrow, she’d be stopping off at that estate agents by the allotments. ‘I’m sorry, Anton, but I’ve been here too long. It’s time for me to leave.’
From her seat, she could see the carnage that she’d brought down from his office and dumped in the garden, ready for the other thing she’d purchased this morning, an incinerator bin.
She was intending to have a bonfire later.
But first she had a list to write. It had been a long time coming but she was finally ready to write it, and it would be the last list she was ever going to need.
It seemed only right that such an important list should have a heading so she gave it one:
‘Ursula Moller’s List of Regrets.’
She tapped the pen against her chin while trying to decide where to start. And then she realised the best place to start was the beginning. 1978. If only she hadn’t stopped…
Three hours had passed by the time she reached the final regret.
It was quite a big one. She wished, she hadn’t let her life be ruled by guilt and fear after Anton died.
Because doing that had led to so many more regrets for the way the last six years had turned out.
If she had only faced those two things at the time, she might have found the courage to tell Andi about Pablo.
She might have reported him to the police too.
It was all speculation but, if nothing else, she liked to think she’d have cleared out Anton’s office and found his secret a lot sooner.
That was what he’d wanted. She was convinced of it now.
The reason he’d been haunting her all this time was not because she’d told him to go to hell.
It was because he wanted her to understand the things he couldn’t bring himself to say.
And maybe, just maybe, he wanted to say sorry.
So that was it. She was finished. It was the longest list she’d ever had to deal with, but it was complete.
Nothing had been left out. She was all done with her regrets.
There would be no more. She slipped the list into her pocket and went out the garden to fill the incinerator bin with the remains of Anton’s passion project.
Next came the tattered pieces of his books, his diary, his red scarf and the christening gown.
A cool breeze ruffled her dress as she lit the fire.
She felt it prick into goosebumps on her bare arms and legs.
She knew it wasn’t Anton but she blew him a kiss, just in case. ‘Goodbye, Anton. Rest in peace.’
The sun was just sliding down behind the trees. It was going to be a lovely sunset. Maybe if she’d been at the allotment she’d have watched it from Samuel’s plot, but she’d been going there a bit less lately. It was another habit, another crutch she was trying to break her dependency on.
When there was nothing left to burn, she took the list from her pocket and threw it in.
She watched it being eaten up by the flames knowing she would never let herself be ruled by another list again.
From now on she would live the way she wanted to.
No more habits. No more routines. No more regrets.
The first few beats of the next song she’d selected started up on her phone.
Its timing was perfect. Straight away, her feet began to move.
And maybe it was because ‘Supernature’, the song she could never ever stop dancing to, was playing.
Or maybe it was because these were her first steps towards freedom, but Ursula had the feeling this day was going to be special and everything she did for the rest of her life was going to be big.