‘Are you OK?’ he asked softly.
When she’d stared into space for a few moments and his heart had sunk for the same length of time she responded, absently, ‘Fine, thanks.’
Obviously, whatever messages she’d received had not contained joyful news.
On the walk back to Thornham village Clancy knew she wasn’t behaving normally. Aaron was sending her wary glances. He was the first man for several years, apart from Will, who’d kissed her. She’d kissed him back, welcoming the heat that had flooded through her, the kind that had nothing to do with the bright sunshine. It had made her feel like herself again: alive and capable of feeling desire.
But the texts she’d just received seemed to have paralysed her vocal cords. They’d been from Will. The first had said: I’m so excited! Do the second pregnancy test tonight so I can see it turn positive for myself!!! xxxxxxxxxx Then a row of emoticons from smiles to excitement and hearts.
Almost instantly had followed: Shit! Clancy, I am so fucking sorry. Msg wasn’t meant for you. I am so, so, so sorry you would find out like this. Renée and I are having a baby. I am so sorry.
She felt as if he’d picked her up and hurled her against a wall. Will was going to be a dad. With Renée. Kisses and smileys for Renée; so fucking sorry for Clancy.
Said it all really.
The walk back to the pub felt as if it took hours, not thirty minutes. Finally, they reached Aaron’s silver truck, standing out amongst all the cars in the car park, and got in.
Aaron said something about his niece Daisy loving the marshes. He held the ignition key as if he could start a conversation with it.
Clancy made an effort to reply, her tongue feeling as if it were some new device she had to gain control of. ‘I’m sure she does.’ She took a breath and turned to face him. ‘Sorry I went weird on you. The texts were from Will.’ Her throat felt so stiff and tight she was surprised the words could find a way through. She fumbled for her phone again and pulled up the texts so he could read them for himself.
His eyebrows shot up into his hair. ‘That was a shitty way for you to find out.’ He put a comforting hand on her leg.
Her voice, when it emerged, was husky. ‘It was unexpectedly emotional.’
Aaron gave a humourless laugh. ‘Traumatic, I should think. You found out about Will’s infidelity in a particularly horrible and humiliating way, he told you about his marriage in case it escaped onto Instagram, and now—’
‘I doubt if any of it was deliberate,’ she cut in.
He said nothing, his thumb circling on her leg.
She turned to look at him. His skin had the healthy colour of an outdoorsman, his shoulders and chest naturally sculpted and, she knew from having been pressed against them, firm. ‘You think he let me find out like this on purpose?’ Her voice squeaked on the last two words.
Aaron shrugged. ‘Or he’s incredibly careless.’
‘Will’s a nice guy.’ She put her hand over his where it lay on her thigh, because Aaron was a nice guy too and she was sorry about her shocked retreat into silence. They’d been having a lovely day till then.
‘Does a nice guy cheat?’ he murmured, as if to himself. ‘Get caught with his pants down? Mix up his ex-fiancée and new wife in the middle of a conversation about pregnancy?’
Clancy thought hard, watching cars pass on the road. She felt slightly sick, as if there was an oil slick in her stomach. ‘That day … he told me the relationship with Renée was like riding on the back of an enchanted dragon,’ she said. ‘Out of control but loving every moment. I said could he not have hopped off the dragon ride just long enough to tell me the wedding was off? He told me I wasn’t romantic. You’d think, under the circumstances, that that would be the least of my worries but I was surprisingly hurt. I’d thought our relationship enduring because it was well nurtured and mature.’
‘Like a plant you give exactly the right conditions to.’ Aaron wasn’t smiling but neither was he looking sour. He was just looking at her.
She tilted her head. ‘But plants given perfect conditions still get blight?’
‘Afraid so.’ He gave her hand a squeeze. ‘I can see what motivated you to tie Will in a financial knot. And your friends too.’ He hesitated, obviously picking his words. ‘If you don’t mind me asking – what happens if your old company goes bust?’
Her anxiety turned to snakes in her stomach. ‘Because of the financial knot?’
He shrugged. ‘For any reason. But the financial knot seems a contender.’
She was quiet for a long time then, wrestling not just with her answer but why she hadn’t thought of it before, her, the so-called pragmatist. The business world was harsh and she’d left IsVid in a situation.
‘Sometimes,’ he said, giving her hand a pat, ‘business can be emotional. Take me and my share of Roundhouse Row. It would have been a sound business decision to let the Roundhouse out and pay someone to do the part-time caretaker’s job.’
He smiled and she found herself grinning unwillingly back. ‘But you only have fifty per cent of the vote as to what happens to Roundhouse Row.’
‘Ah,’ he replied, taking back his hand and starting up the truck. ‘But I had one hundred per cent of the ability to change the locks before anyone turned up with a key. I’m glad I didn’t because when the new caretaker turned up, I realised she needed someone on her side.’
Chapter Thirteen
For the rest of June, Clancy worked at settling further into the routine of Nelson’s Bar.
With extra business brought in since she’d posted the new advertising copy, the holiday cottages were booked almost entirely until the end of September. Changeover day became a challenge, all three cottages needing service. If guests stayed until the last possible minute before check-out she could have as little as four hours. At least weekend or midweek bookings were fewer, which meant one changeover a week rather than two, and she continued to cut lawns and weed borders while holidaymakers were out during the week.
Guests turning up at the Roundhouse door became a frequent occurrence. Sometimes it was to report a maintenance issue but most often it was to request clean sheets when children wet the bed – in which case Clancy made sure they could work the washing machine in their cottage too.
She dog-sat Nelson a couple of times, depending on whether Aaron could take him to work. Lee, along with his daughter Daisy, called one day to see if Nelson wanted to go with them to Zig-zag Beach. Daisy, who was an absolute poppet with a melting gaze, peeped at Clancy from beneath her fringe of baby-soft curls and said, ‘Please would you come too?’
At least it made Lee, who had been looking uncomfortable about knocking on the door of a place that was once his home, laugh, and say, ‘Blimey, Daise, she’s only just met you!’
Seeing the little girl’s face fall, Clancy said, ‘How about if I just come for ten minutes? Because then I’ll have jobs to get back to.’ It seemed to work for Daisy, who asked if she could be ‘Nelson’s lead person’ and trotted happily at the big dog’s side, her head just level with his good eye. Though Lee was careful of Daisy as they passed beneath the colourful gardens of Marshview Road, scrunching up their eyes against the sun, once they got to the footpath to the clifftops he allowed her to go a few steps ahead, though well away from the cliff edge.
Lee was a lovely dad, Clancy decided. He always had a smile for Daisy, even when she sulked because Clancy left them on the beach to go home.
In the past two weeks, Clancy had seen Aaron only when they talked about the cottages or the dog. He’d withdrawn since the day she’d received the texts about Will and Renée’s baby. Oh, he’d remained perfectly pleasant and polite as he drove her home but he hadn’t suggested they stay out for dinner or tried to kiss her again. Well, OK, he did give her a peck on the cheek as he left her at her door but no red-blooded woman would consider that a kiss.
As she’d thanked him for the lovely day and stepped into the silence of the Roundhouse, she cursed Will’s text
and her reaction to it. She’d been enjoying the day, feeling a little like Sleeping Beauty because when Aaron had kissed her she had certainly woken up. And then she’d retreated into herself; Aaron had backed off, and she couldn’t blame him. He’d taken her out for the day and then she’d turned moody over another man. And, deep inside, she hadn’t really needed him to point out that Will’s treatment of her was going from bad to worse. It was making her question even the years they’d supposedly been happy, before Renée launched herself back into his heart. It felt uncomfortably as if he’d settled for Clancy once he’d thought the love of his life was gone.
Last Sunday, while in Hunstanton with Dilys, she’d finally replied to Will’s texts.
Congratulations to you and Renée. I very much hope you’re enjoying your life as much as I’m enjoying mine. She could imagine him reading that last sentence and wondering whether she was having a lovely time or a horrible one, for her to wish him the same.
Alice hadn’t emailed this week so Clancy left a chatty email for whenever her parents touched civilisation again, and then she did her shopping.
In the car on the way home, after they’d found a way to cram their bags in the boot of her Beemer, Ernie, as usual converting his thoughts into words uncensored, had said, ‘I like you now, Clancy,’ which had made her laugh even as a tear came to her eye.
The first half of July was quiet. Aaron phoned to say he was working at a house where the owners had two labradors and every day had become a playdate for Nelson. Aunt Norma was much steadier on her crutches now and he probably wouldn’t have to call on Clancy to dog-sit much in the future.
Although she’d never become sick of her own company before, increasingly Clancy found herself wandering next door to Dilys’s house with a book of cryptic crosswords. Dilys would work on one of her crafting projects and Clancy would read out a clue like, ‘Five letters – fish in a corner.’
Dilys would cry, ‘Angle!’ triumphantly, and Clancy would write it in. Luckily, she was faster than Dilys at Sudoku or her self-respect would have been completely shot.
She still enjoyed her solitary wanders along the clifftops – spangled with daisies and dandelions now – especially when she wanted to think, which she was doing a lot. On the last Friday in July she was just wondering if she’d ever get up the courage to actually jump from The Leap when she came upon Harry and Rory sprawled on the grass. Fully dressed rather than in their swim things, they were talking, their forearms over their eyes against the sun, which was beating down gloriously.
As she drew close she heard Harry say gloomily, ‘You know what my dad’s like. I just don’t think I can.’
Not wanting to overhear anything she wasn’t meant to, she called out to them. ‘Not jumping today, guys?’
They sat up abruptly, blinking as the sunlight hit their eyes. Harry shrugged. ‘Don’t feel like it.’
Rory didn’t even smile. Till now, Clancy hadn’t taken as much notice of Rory as she had of Harry, probably because most of the time Harry spoke for them both. Now she saw that Rory’s eyes were pink. She wondered whether she should just walk on, but a tiny spark of doubt made her pause. What if the boys were in trouble? They didn’t strike her as the kind to always make low-risk decisions.
‘Mind if I join you?’ she asked.
After shooting a look at Rory, Harry said, ‘Sure.’
Clancy tried to start a conversation but the boys weren’t chatty. Finally, prompted by Rory’s woebegone expression, she felt she had to say, ‘I know it’s nothing to do with me, but is something wrong? I’m quite good at puzzles and I might be able to help you figure it out.’
The lads gave matching shrugs. Then Harry looked at Rory, as if for permission, and muttered, ‘My dad’s pressuring me about uni.’
‘And you don’t want to go?’ Clancy asked sympathetically, wriggling into a more comfortable spot because the dry grass was prickling through her cut-offs. ‘I suppose loads of teenagers go through that kind of worry.’
Harry switched his gaze to the distant horizon where sea met sky. ‘Yeah, that’s it. Trouble is, I’m good at everything. I got ten GCSEs all A and A-star and four A levels, three As and a B. It’s like ten people all shouting different instructions at once. It’s paralysing. I can’t think through all the noise to pick a subject.’
Rory lifted his head. ‘You do know what you want to do. You want to do design. Conceptualise. I could never come up with ideas out of nowhere like you do.’
Harry flicked him a frowning glance.
Staring at Harry, Rory said, ‘Tell her. She’s not your dad. Tell her.’
Harry sat perfectly still.
Clancy knew she was missing something vital. ‘You can tell me anything you like,’ she said carefully, hoping she was right.
‘Rory can’t go to uni, he hasn’t got the UCAS points,’ Harry burst out. ‘And I don’t want to go without Rory.’
Rory gave Clancy a sad smile. ‘I’m not clever. I went to college for bricklaying but I got stuck in this cycle of resits for GCSEs in maths and English ’cos I couldn’t get the grade. They give you a scribe but I just get muddled. I got some BTECs though.’
‘You’re dyslexic and you like to work with your hands,’ Harry snapped. ‘It’s different to being not clever.’
‘Right.’ Clancy felt sorry for them and didn’t ask Rory why he hadn’t got a job yet. They’d obviously been brought up so closely in this tiny community that they were like twins, reluctant to break away and face the world each on their own. ‘Most people make new friends at uni—’
‘I want to live with Rory,’ Harry spat, flushing furiously. ‘But Dad says it’s no good Rory getting a job wherever I go to uni because they can’t afford me to live out. It’s more expensive. I’d have to live in halls, not with him.’
Clancy shut her mouth on what she was about to say next because she suddenly had an idea of what she’d been missing.
Rory looked at Harry but it was to Clancy he spoke, defiantly. ‘We’re a couple.’
Aaron sat on the bench on his patio alternately gazing out to sea and rubbing teak oil into the mahogany body of the guitar across his lap. Nelson lay full-length on the paving in the hot sun and twitched in his sleep. It was Sunday afternoon and, though it was a sight Aaron had seen a thousand times, he was fascinated by the white, curvy clouds that bounced over the sky, the sun dancing on the restless sea. It was windy – what a shock – and he wore a baseball cap back to front to keep his hair from his eyes.
Clancy was coming to see him. She’d left him a message on his answering machine. He wished that expecting her didn’t make him feel like his insides were fizzing. He’d stayed away from her as much as he could since he’d realised just how not over her ex she was, despite the receptive way she’d greeted his kisses. He knew a little about rebound relationships from watching Lee. They sucked. Nobody got what they needed.
Aaron wasn’t going to be Clancy’s rebound. He refused.
One day, Clancy would do the disappearing thing, like Alice. What was there to keep her in Nelson’s Bar? After the summer, when the sea breeze became a gale and sunshine became horizontal rain, what would she do then?
Obvious answer? Leave.
Aaron hadn’t always been averse to summer romances. In his late teens, tourists coming and going from Hunstanton every week or two, he’d even squeezed several romances into one summer. But now that he was thirty-six, the appeal had gone from being able to see the end of the relationship right from the beginning.
He tipped a little more teak oil onto his cloth and returned to the long, uniform strokes that produced even coverage on the wood.
Being single didn’t bother him. Sexual desire could be slaked in an evening or two around the clubs of Hunstanton, King’s Lynn or Norwich. It was a whole hell of a lot safer than trying to move things on with Clancy.
Clancy, who, gazing at him with bright green eyes from beneath a poker-straight chestnut fringe, had looked amazing in her summer dres
s, laughing in the knot garden at Keelmarsh House, fairly skipping with enthusiasm as she taught him about videos and fanciful shots.
That Clancy he’d wanted so fiercely it had been all he could do to concentrate.
But London Clancy, leaving Clancy, still-in-love-with-her-ex Clancy … from her he had to protect himself.
Suddenly, Nelson launched himself out of a peaceful snooze and into a flurry of barking, tail lashing as he welcomed a figure rounding the corner of the building.
It was flesh-and-blood Clancy.
She paused to fuss Nelson, who obligingly stood up on his hind legs so she didn’t have to bend down, and smiled tentatively at Aaron. She was wearing jeans today, with a white hoodie that made her hair look especially bright.
His heart turned over and his lips took on a will of their own and smiled back.
‘Is now a good time to chat?’ She hovered closer and he invited her to join him with a nod in the direction of the vacant half of the patio bench.
He kept on working on the guitar because having it across his lap provided a buffer zone so she couldn’t get close enough to brush against him. ‘What can I help you with?’ he asked easily.
She let herself down gracefully on the bench, stowing her bag at her feet. ‘Gorgeous guitar.’
‘It’s a Telecaster-style hollow body,’ he said, although he was pretty certain she hadn’t come to talk about guitars.
Her shoulders lifted and sank on a big sigh. Then she turned to look at him. No fringe today, he noted absently, because she’d clipped it back. ‘I feel as if I should have sent you an agenda before this meeting, so you had the chance to object,’ she began. ‘One subject’s a bit tricky and could also be considered not my business.’
‘Sounds intriguing.’ Wary over her air of tension more than her joking mention of objections, he let his hands rest loosely on the guitar body, aware of the chunky shape beneath his fingers even when they were still.
A Summer to Remember Page 13