When We Are Old (If We Were... Book 2)

by Anna Bloom

  Matthew sighed and pressed his forehead down onto mine. “I can’t think further than a week.”

  “It’s going to hurt.” I wanted to say more. Not that I knew the words to say, but Lynn bustled out of the kitchen, double taking us in when finding her son pressing his new girlfriend up against the wall of her hallway.

  “Oh my.”

  Matthew grinned and kissed me swiftly. “Sorry, Mam.”

  She fanned her face. “Matthew Carling. If you don’t mind.”

  “I really don’t mind at all.” He winked at her and she pulled a tea towel from her apron, winding it for a flick.

  “Don’t make me, Matthew.” He chuckled but didn’t let me go.

  “I’ll guard you with my life.” He spread his arms either side of me, shielding me with his enormous tall frame.

  “Oh, get out of here. Go and get that bloody hound. I thought I’d take Ronnie to the shop while they are all screaming the place down in there. She looks like she has as much interest in football as I have in cricket.”

  She wasn’t wrong and I gave a sheepish nod of my head to Matthew. “Sorry. I didn’t want you to find out for at least five years.”

  He laughed and pressed his nose into my neck, uncaring of his mother acting as a front seat spectator. “You really think I didn’t know? Believe me it’s one of the first things I ever learned about you.”

  I met his gaze, the heat of my heart almost burning my chest. “You did?”

  “You’re the love of my life, Veronica Childs.”

  Lynn made a strange choking noise. I blinked back saltwater and said, “Go get the dog and then let’s go home.”

  His face shone with angelic brilliance. “I’ll be half an hour.”

  “Matt,” Lynn warned. “Don’t rush. We are going to be at the shop.”

  He broke away from me and saluted his mother. “Yes, boss.”

  I didn’t want to let go of his hand. I clung on tight as I walked to the door. Matthew nodded his head from the doorway to the lounge where most of his family watched. “Enjoying the show?” he asked.

  “Yepppp.” They all chorused at once.

  Once he’d grabbed his keys out of the small bowl on a table in the hallway and shut the door behind him, I turned to Lynn. “Oh, wait, he didn’t say goodbye to the kids.”

  “Wait…” She held up her head and counted to three using her fingers. The door reopened and I held my breath as he ducked back through. His grin could steal the oxygen from the entire universe.

  “My bad.” He winked at me as he scooted past and shot into the lounge where I could hear him telling Ewan and Jack he was off to get Hugo. One of them, I placed the voice as Jack’s, wanted to go with him, but Matthew lowered his voice and said he needed him to look after me, because I didn’t know anyone.

  Tears stung my eyes as sharp as diamonds.

  He came back shaking his keys. “Definitely going now.”

  “Bye.” I waved, my heart thumping in my throat. Jack came to the lounge door after the front door had shut again.

  “Do you need anything, Ronnie?” Oh my heart.

  “No, Jacky.” Ooh I didn’t mean to personalise his name like that. “Sorry.”

  “No, it’s okay. I like it. I’m going to be Jacky Carling, the greatest Scottish footballer of all time.”

  “Get ya scrawny arse in here.” Liam bellowed. “I’m the greatest Scottish footballer of all time.”

  Lynn went to the bowl Matthew’s keys had been carelessly tossed into and grabbed out a set of brass keys. “Shall we stroll down to the shop? He hasn’t shown you what he’s been up to the last couple of weeks has he?”

  “No.” I shook my head, disbelieving time passed at such a pace. Okay, we hadn’t spoken much this week due to his theatrics but... “I’d love to see it though. Are you happy with the suggestions I made with the branding?” I pulled at my jumper.

  “Happy? I’m ecstatic.”

  “Really?”

  Lynn shook her head at me. “Of course, but, honestly, do I think that Matthew should be doing it?” She shrugged.

  “Why?” I lowered my voice to a whisper, and she smiled.

  “It’s okay. It’s nothing none of them haven’t heard before. I just.” She shrugged again. “I always thought Matthew was meant for more.”

  “More than working for McStandish?” I hated the thought of him unhappy in a suit, and the glorious image of the man I used to know, the memory I’d held onto for so long— tall and paint stained with his shock of dark hair standing on end—came to mind.

  “Definitely more than that. Come on, I’ll show you.”

  “I should tell Hannah where I’m going.” I pulled back towards the kitchen.

  “No need. She’s playing cards with Ruth and Lennie.”

  I almost fell over my feet. “She’s doing what?”

  “Playing cards. You don’t do that at home?”

  Obviously I didn’t want to sound like the shittiest mother ever, but I had to be honest. “Nope.” Let’s not dress it up.

  “You don’t play shithead?”

  “You’ve got my daughter playing a game called shithead?” I snorted a laugh. Poor Ma. What would I be taking her back to Kingston?

  “Listen.” She pointed her finger towards the kitchen and cocked her head. True enough, from behind the door came a sound that I remembered my baby girl having—a laugh.

  “Come, grab your coat, you southerners always moan it’s too cold.”

  Couldn’t even argue with the woman. A bitter wind swept through Scotland that I wasn’t entirely sure was right.

  Where were the blossoms and the tulips?

  Lynn laughed as she watched my disgruntled face. “Spring’s coming. I can smell it in the air.”

  “You can smell it? Are you a witch?”

  “No! The air is warmer.”

  We were out in the street and I shrank down into my coat. The woman was made of tougher stuff than me.

  “The shop is walking distance, is it?” I glanced up and down the road. I didn’t have any bearings at all. Earlier we’d been at a rugby field; then we were in the city, the boys getting their haircuts and all of us burning our mouths on some hot pastries Matthew insisted were the best, where he’d then sparked up a conversation with the owner of the bakery about footfall, sales, and positioning. Hannah and I had zoned out at that point and stared longingly at the cakes under the glass counter. Now, I had no idea where I was.

  “Just down the road, around the corner, and then over at the lights.”

  What? And she hadn’t even put a coat on?

  With a march that made my calves ache, she led me far longer than her suggested route. “This is a workout. Can we get a taxi back?”

  “Oh, I’m sure Matthew will come and pick us up.”

  I smiled, unable to keep it off my face.

  “Aye you two have got it bad.” She eyed me with speculation.

  “What was he like last week?” I knew she’d keep it straight with me. I guessed this woman shot straight from the hip on every subject.

  “Low.” She sighed; her focus some place other than the road we were walking. “I don’t know why, but since he was little, Matthew has always needed to please everyone.” She laughed. “I mean, Ryan and Liam couldn’t give a shit, ye know? Of course they wanted to do well, but their competitive nature comes from within. They want to beat themselves. Matthew.” She shook her head. “He’s a dreamer. He’s never tried to best himself at anything, he just dreams big. But those dreams get shaped by the people around him.”

  “But his dad didn’t get that?”

  Lynn glanced at me, sharp enough I felt wounded. “Aye, he got it. He was exactly the same, of course, until his own father beat it out of him too.”

  “Oh, I see.”

  “I just hope Matthew is stronger than that. He’s only thirty-five. He could do anything and everything still.”

  “But he’s doing the shop?”

  We stopped and she pu
lled the keys out of her cardigan pocket. I leaned over to get some air into my lungs. Wow that woman could walk.

  Not much had changed on the outside since I’d seen it a few weeks before. It still had the ghost of the chain store name across the sign board above. It no longer said, Supersaver Foods, but the lettering had left behind a ring that shadowed the letters onto the backboard so they could still be seen. The plain glass frontage was still the same. At least, at first I thought it was, until I looked closer and could see that they’d been spray painted with green so you couldn’t see inside the shop. “That’s going to be a bugger to clean.” I nodded at the screening.

  “He’s not going to, I think. He’s going to have new glass put in.” Lynn pushed open the door and a reassuring jingle rang above our heads. I lifted my brow but didn’t say anything. “I had it in the loft in a box full of stuff. Matthew put it up when he started the clean out.”

  Above us hung an old-fashioned brass bell.

  Inside the air blasted with an artic chill and I shivered. All the freezers had gone though, leaving behind a largely empty space. The floor showed the marks of the former shop furniture. One till counter still stood, holding pots of paints and some folded dust sheets.

  “What’s he planning to do?” I kind of wished Matthew was showing me all this. “My branding was only really a concept.”

  Lynn nodded to where three A-frame stands held large sketch pads. Torn between looking and not being nosey until Matthew showed me himself, I hesitated. Until Lynn grabbed my arm and towed me over, tutting under her breath.

  I flicked through the nearest; finding sketches of the inside of a shop that looked unlike anything I’d seen except in the furthest distant point of my memory. Probably not even then. Maybe in films: idealised brass and dark wood.

  “Keep turning,” Lynn urged.

  “These are amazing.”

  Not just the concept: a nineteen thirties shiny and smooth shop with all the glass cabinets and a floor so beautiful Fred Astaire could have waltzed down it, but the detail in the pictures made everything almost real.

  “He’s so talented. You know he was the best in our class at uni, without any doubt.”

  “Funny, he always said that about you.”

  I shook my head, my cheeks warming. “No. I’m conceptual. I can see an idea and how it would work. Matthew is a font, or was a font, of unlimited ideas.”

  I turned for the gutted space. “You see. I look at this.” I flicked back to one of the earlier sketches “And I know that the pillar he’s put in here.” I jabbed at the paper. “Would be better about two foot back from the door, because you need to allow space for people to move in and out of the shop, buggies etc.” I sighed. “I see the technicalities; he sees the beauty.”

  Lynn nodded. “Look at this.” She turned to the next pad and flicked a few pages. “He doesn’t know I’ve looked at these but see here.” A sketch of an old man in soft pencil on the paper smiled from behind the glossy counter. His apron was striped and despite it being black and white I could see it being green and gold. Across the apron the words were written, “Carling’s Green Savers.” Along with the emblem I’d created for him.

  “Is that Matthew’s dad?”

  Lynn shrugged. “Or him?”

  I stared at the older man, looking for my Matthew in the shadows and lines on the man’s face. I couldn’t see him, but then I’d only just managed to realign the grown-up Matthew with the teenager of my memories. There was little chance I’d see him as an old man for at least a decade.

  A flicker of satisfaction bloomed in the pit of my stomach that he was mine and that a decade would have nothing on us.

  I turned a few more pages. “I can’t believe how sharp his skills are considering he hasn’t drawn in so long. It’s a shame he’s not in the market for a job; I think he would challenge my head designer.”

  “Ah the infamous Fred.”

  I groaned but laughed. “You know about Fred?”

  “Oh, Ronnie, love, we all know about Fred.”

  “From this week, when Matthew saw Fred trying to hold my hand?”

  Lynn howled. “Oh, that explains the two-day sulk.” She chuckled and shook her head. “No. When he first went back to London to find you, to ‘get the branding done’." She air quoted the words. “He was in a foul mood that the head designer seemed like a prick.”

  “He said that?” I snorted a laugh.

  “Amongst other observations.”

  Lynn backed away from the pictures leaving me to leaf through them. It felt a bit like rifling through someone’s hopes and dreams. I wish Matthew had brought me here earlier and shown me them himself. Still, I guess he knew we had a whole week together.

  “You know it’s funny, Jack and Ewan have hardly mentioned their mother at all today.”

  “Well, they’ve been with Matthew all week, and they really don’t like Julie’s parents. McStandish is an oaf. He thinks that throwing money at a situation will fix it, but those boys have got their heads screwed on. They can tell when they are being palmed off.”

  “Do you wish he hadn’t married her, even if it meant that you didn’t get to keep this shop?”

  Lynn laughed, but it rang hollow in the empty space. “I told you before, Ronnie. This shop has been nothing but a curse.”

  “But look at what he wants to achieve.”

  “But why? And at what price?” She glanced at her watch. “Right, he hasn’t come to pick us up; let’s start walking back and maybe he will find us on the way. I can’t leave them all unattended for too long, they tend to break my furniture.”

  I stole a last glance at the old man on the sketch pad and then flipped the cover closed. I’d have to tell Matthew his mum had shown me it all. Damn it. I kind of wished we’d waited. I felt like I’d seen secrets I wasn’t meant to know yet.

  A knock on the window made me jump out of my skin. Lynn laughed and grabbed the keys. “I think that means he’s waiting.”

  My heart rate picked up, even knowing he was the other side of a pane of glass made me warm and tingly all over.

  “Why doesn’t he come in?” I stared back at the big sketch pad, my brain ticking over with ideas and prospects—what could be, what had been hidden—Matthew’s talent hadn’t diminished over the last fifteen years. Why hadn’t he used it?

  “Hugo would wreck the place.”

  “What? Why?”

  Lynn laughed and pointed to the door. “Good luck this week with that thing in the house.”

  Unsure what she meant, I followed the sound of barking outside.

  Belnded

  Matthew

  “Daaaaad!”

  I ran from the kitchen all the way up the stairs. It only took two bounds and I was clear on the landing, but shit, the air pushed from my lungs telling me I was far too old for athletics before eight in the morning.

  “What’s up, Ewan?” I asked. But he clutched his willy through his pyjama bottoms which answered for itself.

  “I need to pee, and Hannah won’t come out,” he groaned.

  “Have you knocked?”

  Downstairs, Ronnie shouted followed by a large crash. “You okay?” I hollered.

  “Ugh. Maybe.”

  I knocked gently on the door. “Hannah, love.” I smiled at how much I sounded like my mam. “Are you going to be long? Ewan needs a wee.”

  “Don’t come in! I’m naked.”

  “What? I wasn’t coming in.” Heat flared up my cheeks. I stepped back for the door, just in case I was crossing boundaries by having my hand on the white wood. Ewan jumped on the spot and then bent low at the waist. “You’ll have to pee in the garden, mate. Okay?”

  “What? Dad, it’s freezing.”

  “Come on, it's fun. Me and your Uncle Ryan used to do it all the time when Liam was spending hours doing his hair.”

  Ewan looked like he wanted to know more, but his need to pee overrode all interest in conversation. “I’m not going to make it.”

 
Sighing I picked him up. “Pee on me and you’ll lose your Xbox for a week.”

  “That’s not fair. Hannah should lose something.”

  “Maybe.” I cringed at the thought of Hannah. She was a good kid as far as I could tell, but her mood swings were revolutionary. Ronnie and her had only been here two days and even Jack knew to check her facial expressions before talking, laughing, and sometimes even breathing within her vicinity, and that was to say nothing about the amount of time she spent on the phone.

  I rushed Ewan back down the stairs and through the kitchen where Ronnie was bent over sweeping up what looked like a broken mug. I didn’t look at the mess, merely paused to take in the glorious sight of her arse up in the air; what a picture. Outside the back door, I plopped Ewan down on his Crocs—what I liked to call his ‘loser clogs’ and then turned back to Ronnie.

  “What happened?”

  “Hugo.”

  “Ah.” I sighed and shifted over to her, pulling her into my arms and enjoying the brief moment of alone time we’d been blessed with. “I really had no idea you’d never had a pet. I just didn’t consider it to be such an adjustment.” I kissed under her ear, enjoying the little shiver she gave in return as she tilted her neck so I could explore further. I’d realised in the last two days that when I was with Ronnie, I forgot to ask questions, but rather gave into endless kissing and as much sneaky groping as I could get in. “Why didn’t you and Paul have pets?” I turned her in my arms, combining my question with a kiss along her throat, the perfect compromise.

  She moaned under her breath and I slipped a hand under the hem of her cotton pyjama top. Her eyes met mine as I brushed my thumb over her pebbled nipple. Ewan would be back at any moment, but I couldn’t help myself. My need for her grew more every day I was with her—if such a thing was possible. How could you be with someone but crave them so much? The 'Ronnie phenomenon' I’d decided it should be called.

  “Paul just said it would make more mess.”

  I pulled back a bit. “Did you basically manage to marry a male equivalent of your mother?”