Starting Over at Acorn Cottage

by Kate Forster

  When the curry was slow-cooking, he went to the front of the house, pulled a chair from the van and sat on the lawn, looking around him, feeling content. He was happy. It was a truly remarkable feeling, like remembering a name for something that you thought you’d forgotten, or having a drink of water when your mouth was so dry you couldn’t feel your tongue.

  The sound of a car coming up the unmade road made him jump up. He couldn’t wait to see them but it wasn’t Clara’s red Mini that came into view.

  It was a green car and it had a man at the wheel.

  Insurance company, he thought with a wave.

  The car stopped and the man alighted.

  ‘Hi, thanks for coming out this far,’ said Henry.

  ‘Sorry?’ said the man. Henry noticed he didn’t have much of a chin, and he was wearing a business shirt with a woollen vest, even though it was warm.

  ‘Aren’t you from the insurance company?’ asked Henry.

  ‘No, I’m looking for Clara Maxwell.’

  ‘Oh, she’s not here. Can I take a message?’ asked Henry with a sinking feeling in his stomach.

  ‘I’ll wait,’ said the man and he went to the car and sat inside it, the air conditioner on and the windows up.

  Henry went back to the cottage and tried to call Clara but she didn’t answer. He didn’t want to text her as he knew she was driving, so he sat in the kitchen with his phone in his hand and his heart in his mouth. Please let it not be Giles wanting her back. He had never wanted Clara more than now he knew he might lose her. He ran through scenarios in his head. Would she go, stay, kick Henry and Pansy out?

  He called Clara again and this time he left a message.

  ‘Clara, it’s Henry. Hurry home. You have someone to see you.’

  That’s all he could do right now, other than wait for Clara to make her decision.

  33

  Tassie returned home from her trip with Clara and Pansy a happy woman. She’d had lunch at a pub where she ate a proper roast pork meal with crackling and apple sauce and had shared a lovely crème brûlée with Pansy. They took much joy in cracking the top together and sharing the toffee shards and creamy filling. Tassie chose not to read the leaves in her teacup at the pub, because the same symbol kept appearing and she wanted a day to not think about it, but she knew that she was buying time. The cup was never wrong. The first time she saw it was when she turned the cups with Clara. She was handing over to Clara, even if she didn’t know it yet.

  Her whole life she had worked to help others and she had with her care for all the children in the village and beyond over the years. The countless times she had stepped in to help a child when Mum or Dad couldn’t, taking over a dinner or bread and milk, washing little one’s clothes or calling the doctor or the police in Salisbury to step in when a child’s safety was in danger at home.

  Life was simpler now but there was still work to be done in the village and Clara would take care of it because she was the most capable person Tassie had met in her eighty-nine years. Clara didn’t even know how brilliant she was, but Tassie did. She had taught children for so long she could see what they were capable of before they could even read.

  Clara was creative and she could turn Merryknowe around. Tassie wanted to be around to see it come to fruition. Not yet, she thought as she looked out the window over her neat back garden. I still have work to do.

  Merryknowe could be a wonderful little village again if people came to see it and then stayed. They could have a lovely life away from the city, perhaps the school might open again one day? They just needed something to bring them to the village or it would die slowly and painfully and Tassie knew there was nothing worse than driving through a once thriving place to see the shops closed and the churchyard overgrown.

  Tassie pushed away the grim thoughts and remembered Pansy’s smile and copper curls, entirely enchanting, who was also capable of so much if she could harness her spirit and sit still for a minute.

  Tassie was filled with a sense of purpose she had forgotten existed.

  It felt strange to have this after so many years of waiting for death. Now she didn’t want to die, she wanted to help Clara find her path to her own truth and Rachel to believe in her own magic abilities but more than anything else, she wanted to teach Pansy to read.

  Clara had said she was starting school but she was already a year behind and the little one probably didn’t know her A’s from her T’s.

  When Pansy had slept in the car on the way home, Tassie had asked Clara about the child.

  ‘She’s bright but I don’t think Dad has really let her out of his sight since Mum died. This is the first time he’s had a day without her, he said.’

  ‘Goodness, that’s not right for either of them.’

  Clara had shrugged. ‘I guess but I don’t know what I would be like in the same situation and he’s a good man; he just needs to see he and Pansy can be happy again.’

  Tassie had sat, trying to think of the best way for Pansy to learn to read.

  ‘If you bring her to me in the mornings, I can get her started for school,’ she’d said. ‘I still have some books and things that might help.’

  ‘Oh wow, I will ask Henry, but it sounds wonderful.’

  When they dropped Tassie off, Pansy had woken up and come inside to use the bathroom and then had come out and sat on Tassie’s lounge.

  ‘I like your house – it feels like Christmas.’

  Tassie had looked around for any signs of last year’s decorations but couldn’t find any.

  ‘Why does it feel like Christmas?’ asked Clara.

  ‘It feels like magic,’ was all Pansy said and played with a small bowl of shells on a side table.

  Later, ignoring the ache in her old bones, Tassie went to the room where she kept her old books and, searching through boxes on the shelves of the cupboard, she found the box she had wanted.

  Lifting the lid, she hoped nothing had eaten the old pages or notes but time had been kind to her and the box, and inside were the old school books she had kept for the past sixty years. The books were out of date but the card with the pictures and words never went out of date. She shuffled through the well-worn cards. Flashcards, teachers called them now, but to Tassie they were her magical deck of cards that helped children to open the gates to a world of words and stories.

  Moving back to the kitchen, she sat at the table and wrote the lesson plan out carefully.

  Sounds. Letters. She would get some butterfly cakes from Rachel’s bakery and she would make some homemade lemonade. Coloured pencils and a scrapbook of paper would be needed for writing the letters also.

  Oh, there was so much to do, and for the first time since George McIver died, Tassie went to bed excited to wake up in the morning.

  34

  Clara was excited to see Henry as she pulled into the laneway and drove down to the cottage. She turned to park her car to find an unfamiliar car in the place her red Mini should be.

  She turned off the car, opened the door and walked around to let Pansy out, who ran inside the cottage with her fairy doll and dinosaur egg toy that she had insisted to Clara she had needed above anything else in the world.

  The green car’s door opened and Giles stepped out.

  ‘Hi, Clara,’ he said, and she felt such blind rage it was all she could do to not walk over and slap his face.

  ‘Why are you here?’ She crossed her arms. ‘I hope you didn’t bring Judy with you.’

  She stood very straight wondering where Henry was. This was terrible, she thought. Why would Giles come here? How did he know where she was?

  ‘No, Judy is at home,’ he said, looking down at his feet. He was wearing those stupid orange suede loafers that he bought in Spain with no socks. God, she hated that look – his attempt at Euro fabulous, she had teased at the time when he bought them. He hadn’t laughed. She should have known then he wasn’t a keeper.

  Giles put his hands in his pockets of his trousers. ‘I tried to call yo
u but you blocked me.’

  ‘Yes, I tend to do that to people who cheat on me.’

  They stood in silence staring at each other.

  ‘I’m sorry, Clara, it was really badly done on my behalf and Judy’s.’

  ‘Do not speak for her. You don’t get to speak for her.’

  Giles went to speak but she interrupted him.

  ‘I don’t want you back, Giles, so I have no idea why you’re here. We are done. Over. You made your choice and if you’re back to try and tell me now you miss me and you’re sorry, well, I am sorry you feel that way, but I have moved on and if things didn’t work out with you and Judas, that’s on you, nothing to do with me.’ Clara felt very proud of herself as she spoke.

  ‘Judas?’ asked Giles, looking confused.

  Clara shrugged. ‘Freudian slip.’

  Giles cleared his throat. ‘Actually, I am not here to ask you to take me back; I’m here to tell you in person that Judy is pregnant. We’re engaged.’

  Clara swallowed and bit the inside of her lip until she tasted blood and then she spoke. ‘Why the hell did you think I needed to know that? Why did you think you needed to drive all the way here and stalk my new house and tell me that? What was your intention? To make me feel bad? To see my reaction so you and Judas can laugh about it later? Why?’

  As Clara spoke, she felt tears fall but she knew they were tears of rage not sadness. Of sheer frustration and anger that he dared to enter her world. Her perfect little world in Merryknowe that she was creating.

  ‘You cheated on me, you hid your relationship with my best friend for God knows how long and now you think I need to know your lovely plans with chinless babies and tacky weddings? What is actually wrong with you? You’re a sad, pathetic man who is here to try and hurt me. Well, guess what? I don’t love you. I don’t think I ever did. I chose you because you seemed safe and non-threatening. I chose you because I didn’t want to have sex with you and you didn’t want to have sex with me either. I was sad and pathetic also, so don’t think I don’t know I settled with you for something less than I deserved. We are better off apart and you and Judas can have a lovely life together but please go now. I don’t care about you. I don’t think about you. It was as though my life before here never happened. Everything I want is here and I’m happy.’

  Giles stepped back from Clara as though she had slapped him.

  ‘Do you mean that man I met earlier, the bearded meathead drinking beer on your lawn? Your tastes have gone down. You like them burly and stupid, I see.’

  ‘Why do you care what I want?’ she asked, genuinely confused. ‘You didn’t want me, so why do you care what I want now?’

  Giles shrugged and gestured to the cottage. ‘Well, I am surprised you want this and him – it’s all a bit of a step backwards, isn’t it?’

  Clara took a deep breath and then blew out the air slowly, trying to maintain her cool.

  ‘He is one thousand of you, Giles. Maybe a million. He can do anything and he does it for me. And I love him. I think of him every minute of every day in a way I never thought about you. I want to make him happy but with you, I existed to try and please you but failed over and over again. The smallest thing I do for him, he is happy. I want that. I deserve that. I used to exist off the scraps of your love that you breadcrumbed through our relationship to keep me on the trail but this man, this man and his child have my heart in a way you never could. So please leave now or I will have my bearded meathead of a man throw you off my land.’

  Shaking, Clara went to her car and picked up her bag and papers and the shopping bags then walked into the cottage, where she saw Henry and Pansy standing in the hallway. She knew they had heard every word.

  ‘Something smells delicious. What’s for dinner?’ she asked cheerfully, putting down her things.

  But she was still shaking. She felt Henry’s arms around her and Pansy’s arms around her legs.

  ‘I love you,’ she heard Henry say and Pansy mumbled into her bottom, ‘I love you, Clara.’

  Clara waited until the sound of Giles’s car had disappeared before she burst into loud, noisy sobs, with Henry rubbing her back, and Pansy patting her bottom like she was a baby.

  Finally, she finished crying and she pulled away and wiped her eyes with the sleeve of her top and Pansy handed her some toilet paper to blow her nose on.

  ‘Thank you, sweet pea,’ she said to Pansy, who nodded, her face very serious.

  ‘I cry like that when I miss Mummy. It’s good to cry, Daddy says.’

  Clara bit her lip to stop from crying again and looked up at Henry.

  ‘That was intense, sorry.’

  ‘Don’t say sorry for speaking the truth, my love.’ His eyes were so kind, she felt dizzy with love.

  ‘I have something to show you. I know it’s probably not an ideal time, as emotions are high, but you will hear it later and wonder what on earth is going on.’

  Clara looked up at him.

  ‘I could do with something nice right now to take my mind off the murder I’ve been planning.’

  She put her hand out to Pansy who took it, while Henry took her other one and he led them out the back door.

  Clara’s eyes adjusted to the light and then she saw the chicken coop.

  ‘You didn’t?’ she yelled, jumping up and down.

  ‘I did,’ said Henry, looking worried. ‘Should I not have?’

  She and Pansy ran towards the coop and Clara burst into laughter at the door.

  ‘What does it say?’ asked Pansy, excited like Clara.

  ‘It reads, Clara’s Clucking Castle.’ She turned to Henry who was standing with his hands in his pockets, looking both pleased and embarrassed.

  ‘You are hilarious,’ she said. Her eyes caught his and she smiled at him, seeing him flushed with pride at the reception to his gift.

  She opened the door carefully and let Pansy in then she followed. They went to the nesting box and Clara lifted the lid. A single egg sat on the straw.

  ‘There’s an egg,’ squealed Pansy. She picked it up carefully and held it close. ‘I will love this egg forever and ever,’ she exclaimed.

  ‘Or you can have it for breakfast tomorrow,’ offered Clara.

  ‘Can I, Daddy?’ Pansy called and Henry nodded.

  Pansy opened the door to the coop to run inside and Clara quickly closed it as Henry came to watch the chickens scratching about the ground.

  ‘You did this for me,’ she said. It wasn’t a question but a statement, as though she had to say it aloud to be sure it was true.

  ‘I did,’ said Henry.

  ‘Do they have names?’ she asked, as the birds pecked around her.

  ‘Not yet.’

  She walked to the wire fence and put her fingers through the wire, and he touched them with his hands.

  ‘This is perfect – you know that, yes?’

  He gave a shy smile, and she realised he had been unsure.

  ‘You said you wanted chickens,’ he said. ‘I took a chance.’

  ‘I did, and this is generous and thoughtful and honestly, just perfect.’

  ‘I want to kiss you.’

  ‘Then come into my coop and kiss me,’ she said.

  ‘There’s an offer I can’t refuse.’

  And he did. He kissed her in a way that she had never been kissed, with happy chickens pecking and clucking around their feet.

  ‘Stay with me tonight,’ Clara said when they pulled apart.

  ‘Stay with me always,’ he said and she kissed her answer back.

  35

  Clara stood in her bedroom, trying to work out if she would dress in her sexy underwear, still unworn from when she was with Giles, or if she should just wear her PJs and act as though there were no expectations.

  When she asked Henry to stay with her in her room, she wasn’t even sure she meant it as a request for sex. All she knew was that she wanted to be with him every moment.

  She could hear him reading Pansy a story and him pati
ently answering all her questions about the characters and why Moon-Face had a slide in his tree and if they could put a slide in the tree outside.

  Clara brushed her hair again, and then ate a breath mint, even though she had cleaned her teeth.

  She got into bed, and then out again and then swapped her pyjama pants for tracksuit pants and pulled a sweater over the pyjama top.

  Then she heard the door to Pansy’s room close and Henry enter the bathroom.

  The nerves felt like Bolshoi dancers in her belly, and she wondered if she should be casual and lie on the bed reading a book – except she didn’t have any books in the room.

  Before she could decide, Henry walked into the room and smiled at her and she laughed.

  ‘I have been trying to work out the best way for you to find me. Should I be casual, or sexy, or chilled or indifferent? It’s been a whole thing,’ she admitted.

  ‘Be yourself,’ said Henry as he came and sat on the bed, kicked his shoes off and adjusted the pillow so he was sitting up.

  Clara did the same and they sat side by side in silence.

  ‘I haven’t been with anyone else since Naomi.’

  ‘Me neither,’ said Clara. ‘I mean, not that I was with Naomi but since Giles.’

  God, why was she so awkward. Stop talking, Clara.

  ‘We don’t even have to do anything. We can just lie here and talk,’ she said, and she meant it.

  Henry moved his pillow so he was lying down and facing Clara and she did the same.

  They looked at each other and smiled.

  ‘We’re a fine pair, aren’t we?’ he said.

  ‘How do you mean?’

  His feet found hers and they touched and she felt a shiver of pleasure run through her body as they rubbed each other’s feet.

  ‘I mean, we have both declared our love to each other. The first gift I have given you was chickens and a hen house, and we are living in a house with a hole in the roof and we have done nothing but a few chaste kisses.’

  ‘It’s very Jane Austen meets Milly-Molly-Mandy.’ She laughed then shivered as his foot ran over her ankle bone.

  ‘You’re cold – get in, under the covers,’ he said, and they both hopped out and back in under the duvet.