He returned with a small bowl of halved plum tomatoes, their glossy skins sprinkled with sea salt and black pepper.
‘Have a seat,’ he said, before she could come up with
anything.
She looked at him, and the tomatoes, and the wine glasses he was setting out and shook her head.
‘I .
.
.
I don’t understand,’ she confessed.
‘Well, I thought I’d cut to the chase,’ he said.
‘Yes.
Great idea – I’d love to go out with you.’
He grinned at her and a dimple flashed in his left
cheek.
‘Now, I hope it’s not outrageously presumptuous of me, but I thought I’d go ahead and sort out our first date.
This is it, by the way.
You’re not vegetarian, are
you?’
‘N-no,’ she stammered.
‘No, I’m not vegetarian.
But how did you .
.
.
?’
And then the answer became clear.
Of course.
‘This is Gemma, isn’t it, sticking
her oar in?’
She should have guessed from the start.
Had they planned this whole thing together?
He uncorked a bottle of Pinot Grigio.
‘Yes and no.
I was all set to declare my hand a few weeks ago – until Jade went and mucked that up, with her imaginary pregnancy.’
His
eyes darkened at the memory.
‘Then I bumped into Gemma on Saturday morning as she was posting a letter off to Spencer.
The most romantic letter ever written, she reckons.
She just gave me a
bit of a nudge to do something romantic about you, that’s all.’
Caitlin remembered then how Gemma and Saffron had gone off to the kitchen together earlier that morning and taken a suspiciously long time to return again.
She’d thought at the time they
must be talking mum-stuff, but maybe not.
Maybe all three of them were in on it.
‘Yeah, Gemma gave me a nudge, too,’ she said.
‘A nudge right out of the door of my own
house!’
He sploshed wine into their glasses and passed one to her.
‘You’re not mad, are you?
That we hatched a plot?
I couldn’t resist giving it a go.
I swear I’m not a tosser,
like your ex.
I don’t have any huge portraits of me around the house, either.’
He had such blue eyes, Harry.
But they were a steady warm blue, rather than the cool, emotionless eyes of Flynn.
‘No, I’m not mad,’ she said, feeling her heart give a happy bounce.
He had freckles, she noticed, a light sandy sprinkling across his nose.
She felt like leaning over and
kissing every single one of them all of a sudden.
Then she laughed.
‘The only thing I’m wondering is, does the Ten-Date Rule still apply?’
‘The what?
Oh, shit.
I’d forgotten all about that.’
He grinned at her.
‘I might have to amend it to a Five-Date Rule.
Don’t tell my sister.’
‘I wouldn’t dare.’
‘Or maybe even a Three-Date Rule .
.
.
’ He held her gaze and she felt as if she was melting inside.
Three whole dates?
She wasn’t sure she’d be able to wait that long,
personally.
‘I couldn’t possibly comment,’ she said demurely.
‘But thank you.
This looks lovely.’
She held her glass in the air.
‘Here’s to first dates.’
‘First dates,’ he echoed, clinking her glass.
First dates, interfering mates and lunchtime drinking.
Put them all together and it was a pretty irresistible combination.
Caitlin leaned across the table, feeling heady after a single mouthful
of wine.
She had a good feeling about this.
A good, sweet, happy feeling.
‘Do you know what?
I think I’m going to have to kiss you,’ she said before she could stop herself
His eyes crinkled as he smiled back at her.
‘Do you know what?
I think I’m going to have to let you,’ he murmured.
And then her lips were on his, and his mouth was soft and sweet, and all of a sudden lunch was entirely forgotten.
Will was given detention for getting into a fight and leaving school unauthorized, and Gemma was called in to discuss the issue the following week with his head of year, Mr
Shaw.
Mr Shaw was tall, affable and tracksuited; a PE teacher who had always got on well with Will in the past.
‘Between you and me,’ he said confidentially to Gemma, perched on the
edge of his desk, ‘he had it coming to him.
Sam West, I mean – the lad your Will punched.
One of those kids who’s always got it in for someone or other, can’t keep his gob
shut.
Just so happened to be Will who was his target this year.’
‘Oh,’ said Gemma uncertainly.
‘Obviously the school has to take a hard line on this sort of thing.
We don’t condone any kind of violence or fighting, self-defence or not.’
He folded his arms, looking stern
for a moment, then winked.
‘But let’s just say there were a few smiles in the staffroom when word got out that Sam West had taken a bit of a slapping.’
Gemma goggled.
‘Right.’
‘You didn’t hear me say that, though, did you?’
‘Didn’t hear a thing.’
‘Good.’
He fiddled with the silver PE whistle around his neck on a cord.
‘Otherwise, Will’s been doing really well.
Working hard, well liked, getting on with the job.
And
don’t worry, Mrs Bailey, we’ll come down on Sam West like a ton of bricks if there’s any more trouble.’
He stood up and stretched his long legs.
‘Not that I think
it’s likely, mind.
Kids like Sam are cowards at heart.
Nothing like a smack in the chops to shut them up.’
Gemma was still mulling over this rather unexpected slant to the conversation as she drove back from the school.
She hoped Mr Shaw was right, and that there’d be no more aggro with Sam.
Poor Will.
It was hard being a teenager, she remembered – but even harder to be the mother of one sometimes.
It had been so much more straightforward when the children were tiny and her job
was to keep them safe from sharp corners or tumbles, to feed and clean them, to lower them into their cots to sleep at night, with a soft rendition of ‘Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star’.
These days they talked back and asked awkward questions, they had strong feelings and railed against perceived injustices or sank into silent, seething furies.
Worst of all, they went around
punching people when they couldn’t control their emotions.
That said, after talking the other night, she felt as if she and Will had a new understanding now – and, more importantly, he knew she was on his side.
With a bit of luck, she’d have
this teenager malarkey nailed by the time it was Darcey’s turn.
God forbid.
Coming back into Larkmead, she had to brake behind the village bus, an endangered species around these parts and therefore to be respected.
She drummed her fingers as she waited for it to
disgorge its clutch of passengers, already thinking ahead to the new dress she was working on: a gorgeous evening gown of cranberry-coloured silk with a daring criss-crossing ribbon back.
A million
times more satisfying than making curtains or altering bridesmaid dresses, she thought with a little smile.
She definitely wasn’t ‘just a mum’ any more, either.
In the street two elderly ladies were being helped down from the bus by a dark-haired man – what a gent, she thought approvingly.
Then she nearly stopped breathing in shock as she realized
that the dark-haired man was actually Spencer, leaning on a stick as he took the first lady by her pastel-clad arm, and then the second.
He had come back!
A million feelings tore through her as she watched him saying something to the old ladies that made them smile, then helped a young mum bump her buggy down from the bus – not a small
undertaking, when you needed a stick for support yourself.
Old feelings of fondness slowly unfurled inside her.
He was a good person, really.
Just like his son.
But where would they go from here?
Would anything have changed?
The bus drove away with a belch of smoke from the exhaust, and she crawled the car along after it, pulling up beside Spencer and unrolling the passenger window.
She leaned over and caught his
eye.
‘Hey.’
A whole rush of feelings flickered across his face as he saw her – surprise, happiness, nerves.
‘Hey,’ he said quietly.
She swallowed, unable to tell much from his expression.
‘Want a lift?’
He held her gaze and she remembered for a fleeting moment how she’d looked at him on their wedding day.
For richer, for poorer, in sickness and in health.
I do.
I do.
I still do,
she thought.
I want this to work.
But he’s got to want that too.
We can’t go on as we were.
‘Great,’ he said.
‘Thanks.’
She put the handbrake on instinctively, about to jump out and help him then stopped herself, remembering his pride.
He’d made it all the way to Newcastle and back under his own steam,
after all.
If he wanted to stop being treated as an invalid, then that was progress at least.
He winced as he lowered himself into the seat, hauling the stick and a small rucksack in after him.
There were dark shadows under his eyes, and he looked crumpled and tired after the long
journey, but she thought she could detect a new determination about him, too, an energy that she hadn’t seen in a long while.
‘So,’ she said, a lump in her throat.
Now that he was here, she wasn’t sure what to say any more.
She wanted to lean against him and breathe in the scent of his skin again, to
hold him and be held right back.
But did he feel the same?
‘You came back,’ she said after a moment.
‘I did.’
He cleared his throat, not looking at her.
‘Thanks for the letter .
.
.
’ He broke off and stared out of the window.
‘It was the most beautiful thing I
have ever read in my life.’
‘Oh, Spencer.’
She could have cried with relief.
Had she actually got through to him at last?
‘I’m serious.
It made me realize exactly what I stood to lose.’
He folded his hands in his lap.
‘I’m sorry, Gem.
I’ve been such a dick recently, I kind of
lost the plot for a while.
I just felt so angry all the time.
So bloody useless.
I couldn’t bear it.’
She twisted her wedding ring around her finger, unsure how to reply.
‘I know I took it out on you and the kids – the people I care about most in the world.’
He shook his head.
‘I don’t know how you put up with me.
I wouldn’t
have blamed you if you’d chucked me out the house.’
Karen would have chucked him out, Gemma thought to herself.
She’d have shown him the door – injury or no injury.
But Gemma was not her mother.
Her love went deeper.
She reached over
and took Spencer’s hand in hers.
‘How’s your back?’
she asked.
‘Have you been okay?
You didn’t take your painkillers with you.’
He shifted in the passenger seat and she could see his discomfort and exhaustion.
‘It’s all right.
I went along to see Jonny’s doctor, had a good chat.
She gave me some
painkillers and sorted me out.
I’m just a bit stiff, after sitting down for so long.’
There was a time when one or both of them might have made a joke about him being ‘a bit stiff’, but the atmosphere was too fraught for jokes.
‘Right,’ she said.
Neither of them spoke for a few seconds.
‘Are the kids okay?’
he asked eventually.
Good question.
‘They’re fine,’ she replied.
It wasn’t the right moment to start telling him about Will’s fight and Darcey’s tears and her mum’s surprise
visit.
‘They’re great,’ she added with more conviction.
‘Dying to seeing you again.
Darcey’s going to absolutely shriek with joy, she’s missed you so much.
We
all have.’
She took a deep breath.
‘Why did you go, Spencer?
Why did you just take off like that?’
He stared down at his lap.
‘Everything seemed so bleak,’ he said after a moment.
‘I was this useless fucking cripple .
.
.
and all of a sudden you were this businesswoman
flying high.
I couldn’t handle it any more.’
‘But .
.
.’
‘I don’t want to sound melodramatic, but I just couldn’t see the point of going on.
I thought: I’ll get in the car, drive to the middle of nowhere and gas myself.
You
know, pipe on the exhaust – job done.’
He shook his head, eyes far away.
‘But then I thought of the kids, and you, and I couldn’t bring myself to do it.’
‘Oh, Spencer,’ she said again helplessly, not able to bear the haunted expression on his face.
‘I went a bit mad, Gem.
Didn’t know what to do with myself.
Drove and drove, unable to think straight.
Didn’t know where I was going.
For the first time in my life it was like
I had no future, no clear road ahead.’
Gemma squeezed his hand, not trusting herself to speak.
‘I was so sick of it,’ he went on.
‘I didn’t feel like a man any more.
My body wasn’t working the way it used to, my head was killing me the whole time.
I just .
.
.
didn’t know how to go on.’
‘I wish you’d talked to me,’ she said in a small voice.
‘I wish you’d told me you were feeling like this.’
He nodded, his head still bowed.
‘I know.
And I really am sorry.
I know I haven’t been easy to live with.
When I think of what I said to you .
.
.
’
She could tell the memory genuinely pained him.
‘It doesn’t matter,’ she said.
‘It does matter!
If anyone else dared speak to you like that, I’d bloody swing for them.
I’m ashamed of myself,’ he said gruffly.
‘I let you down.
And when I read
your letter and remembered just how lovely and kind and gorgeous you are .
.
.
’ He shook his head.
‘I couldn’t believe I’d nearly let you go.
‘It’s fine.’
‘It’s not fine, Gemma.
I’ve been an arsehole.
But talking to the doctor helped.
She reckoned it might be this Concussion Syndrome thing, too, and gave me some antidepressants
to see if they help.
I won’t be like this forever.’
‘Of course you won’t,’ she said.
‘I do feel a bit better already, you know.
Jonny forced me out to get some fresh air .
.
.
‘
‘Yes, I heard.
Playing golf, wasn’t it?’
He had the grace to look sheepish.
‘Yeah.
Quite enjoyed it actually.
So that was good.
And then Jonny kept banging on at me to man up and go home to my amazing wife and children, before I
blew it all.’
Gemma had to hide her smirk on hearing this.
Thank you, Jonny.
‘The man’s got a point,’ she replied.
‘And then your letter just confirmed everything,’ he said.
‘So here I am.’
He twisted awkwardly to face her.
‘And I’ll make it up to you, I swear.
I’ll
go to physio and stay on the antidepressants to stop me being such a miserable bastard.
I’ve sold the car to tide us over with money, and I’ll help more around the house while
you’re out being Super-Businesswoman.
Seriously!
What?
Why are you doing that?’
Gemma was leaning forward, squinting through the windscreen.
‘Just searching for a pig flying through the air,’ she teased, then turned and kissed him.
It was one of the best and
sweetest kisses of her entire life.
‘Thank you,’ she said, then put the car into first gear.
‘Let’s go home.’