Further along there was now a large Ferris wheel like the London Eye dwarfing the beach, the outside of the old arcade more neon than she remembered, more stalls selling ice cream, coffees. The familiar sickly smell of sugared batter and warm dough hit her nostrils. Rosie had loved those bags of warm donuts, had struck up a friendship with the boy in the stall next to the arcade, who always added a few more for her. Everyone had loved her, drawn to her energy, her laughter, her confidence. She had been so impossibly full of life, forever trapped in Maria’s memory as that bouncy schoolgirl who never grew old.
Maria felt her stomach swirl as she took the first step across the road to the wide promenade that ran along the beach. Someone passed on a skateboard, the sound of the wheels making her jump, and someone shouted for their toddler further up ahead. She made her way slowly to the pier, her shoulder suddenly shoved backwards as a man, not looking, bumped into her.
‘You alright?’ a young girl with long strawberry-blonde hair asked her.
Maria nodded, staring at her as if it was thirty-six years ago and nothing had changed, as if she might have been one of Rosie’s many friends.
The wooden boards of the pier were dusted with a thin layer of sand and Maria stepped forward, noticing the cracks between them showing dark flashes of sand and water rolling in. Benches lined the middle of the pier with couples sitting and elderly people watching as she made her way down. Her legs felt wobbly as she moved, the larger bag knocking against her thigh, her heart hammering. Rosie had walked here, she thought, as people passed by, teenagers grinning into phones as they took selfies, the sea behind them.
She wondered whether Rosie had taken her camera that night, whether she had dangled over the side trying to get the perfect shot, the flash surprising her. Was that how it had happened? They didn’t find a camera, they didn’t find a bag. They had only found her, washed up the next morning further along the beach, her dark brown hair haloed around her pale face. The coroner had reported: misadventure.
This wasn’t about Rosie and what happened, Maria reminded herself: she was here for another reason, here to lay the ghosts to rest once and for all, to embrace the future.
She found a quiet spot overlooking the sea, the many shades of blue and green shifting in front of her. She had missed this: missed watching the colours blend and merge, the clouds skittering overhead, the elegant sweep of a seagull, the smell of salt, the long stretch of sea to the horizon. She closed her eyes, the sun on her face as she thought of those happy days on the beach, swimming in the sea, squealing at the shock of it, of lazy walks along the pier, ice creams dripping from chins, strands of hair whipped across their faces, laughter snatched away in the wind.
Placing the heavier bag on the boards, she drew out the urn. She had finally picked up the ashes from the funeral directors, encased in a smooth cream tube. ‘Biodegradable,’ the director had told her, ‘that’s what he wanted. Said you’d be along to pick him up and scatter him somewhere beautiful.’
Holding Albie in her arms, she stared out at the ocean: this was a beautiful place, this was a place he would have wanted her to come. Timothy had reminded her that Albie loved the sea and this seemed like the perfect place to say goodbye. Unscrewing the lid, she took a slow breath out and then, tears stinging her eyes, she said her goodbye in the wind and watched him billow and fall into the water beneath them.
It was a goodbye to Albie, but also to her fears and the pain that had haunted her for so many years.
Then she opened the other, smaller bag and drew out the precious box, carefully sliding the ring onto her finger. She pictured him there, laughing as he grumbled about getting on one knee, the twinkle in his eye that always told her he was joking. The perfect gentleman, he would have got on one knee, she thought, turning to the space next to her. He would have looked up at her, his blue eyes serious for a moment as he used her full name. ‘Maria Birch,’ she imagined him saying, ‘will you do me the honour of becoming my wife?’
She blinked, certain for a moment that she had heard those words, spoken with a West Country lilt, low and steady. She would have said yes, of course, she would have held his hand as he creaked back up to a standing position, one hand on his lower back. She would have watched in thrilled amazement as he pushed this very ring onto her finger. She would have felt her heart lift with the sure knowledge that she wasn’t alone anymore. That someone loved her and she loved them. She hadn’t believed her heart would ever mend and yet, standing on this pier, she could feel it healing, the cracks disappearing, filled with memories, warmth, laughter.
She stared across the water once more, rays of sunlight beaming onto the surface, pushing the clouds apart. She exhaled slowly, felt the ring on her finger and imagined him there, wrapping one arm around her shoulder and pulling her close. She had been so lucky to have been loved.
Thirty-Seven
My dear Maria,
If you’re reading this then it means I am gone. I am sorry if this is the way we say goodbye. There was so much I had planned for us.
I always wanted a little longer, was greedy, but the doctors were pretty grim from the start. I’ve been glad of their honesty, insisted on it. And so I started to get my affairs in order. Was it a terrible surprise to discover the man you’d sat opposite every week had so many secrets? I so nearly told you, so many times, but I couldn’t stomach saying the words aloud, I didn’t want your face to cloud with pity and to have the endless questions about treatments and more. They told me my heart would simply give out. I wanted you to remember me full of life.
And maybe you didn’t feel the same way, I was never quite sure how you felt about me. I didn’t want to rush you, but I need you to know now that I was in love with you: hopelessly, horribly and endlessly in love with you.
I wasn’t deserving of you, Maria. I had spent years focusing on all the wrong things, my savings account was full and for what? I had no one to share all that money with and I realised I was completely alone. I needed to be sure that I was worthy of you and so I started a project, a list that has brought me unimaginable joy – and peace. And my greatest wish for the list was to complete it, to finally feel worthy and lay myself out for you to see: to hear then what the most genuine, kind woman I know thinks of me in her heart.
I am not that man yet and I worry that I can never atone for the person I used to be. I was such a selfish ass, Maria, so wrapped up in my own brilliance, my own job, friends, life. I didn’t think of others, didn’t walk a mile in their shoes. Too busy chasing things that, I realise now, didn’t matter a jot: money, success in business, connections to important people. As I got older, I looked around, realised it had done nothing to make me happy. I had started to make piecemeal changes, and then I sat down opposite you on that fateful Thursday and knew I had to do more.
I didn’t see my own mother slowly dwindling in front of me and I let my little sister Cathie take on the burden of caring for her. I would be out at another meeting, another event or weekend with friends: always something, always someone else, and then it was too late and I was standing at my own mother’s funeral, angry at her for leaving, angry at the world and at anyone else but myself. I lashed out, alienated myself from my own sister, my last real family and the one person who saw the real me. I didn’t want the mirror held up to my face.
My mother was the most wonderful, caring woman, Maria, much like you: gentle, humorous, interested. You are always so alive with thoughts, devouring books, films and television programmes, challenging me, laughing with me. I have adored seeing things from your perspective.
I saw you still painfully reliving your own past, not allowing yourself to embrace the present or the future, and it made me want to forgive myself.
The first day I saw you sat in the café, this beautiful woman in a pale pink scarf and soft grey cashmere jumper, looking about twenty years younger than me, I felt drawn to you. Translucent skin, a rare but wide smile, cerulean blue eyes that slid away from my face when I found myself
pulling out the chair opposite you – and every time after that if I paid you a compliment.
You would place one hand over the other, again and again, a nervous gesture that always made me want to reach across and still them with my own hand. I would think about it, waver, hover ready to do it, but I was too frightened that I would ruin things, that it would change everything and that this delicate friendship we had would be over.
It always seemed that you were on the verge of leaving, flighty and hard to pin down. At first, I thought you were a social butterfly – of course people would want to be in your orbit, you had places to go, people to see. Over time I came to realise that you had created a cage around yourself: a timetable of events, a small world in that apartment of yours which you so rarely seemed to leave and to which you never invited me.
What had happened to you? I wondered about it for that first year as we got to know each other, as we talked about everything and nothing, skirting the important things, both quick to make excuses if we strayed too close.
‘Oh, my family,’ I would say with a dismissive wave of my hand, my heart beating wildly in my chest. ‘Nothing to speak of there.’ How could I tell you what I had done? How I had behaved? That I had cut my own sister out of my life after she failed to show up to our mother’s funeral, that I had used that against her to stay away, not wanting to confront my own guilt, and that I had failed them both by being such an absent son and brother? That I had put off making my peace with her out of my own stubborn pride. You would have looked at me differently and I couldn’t stand that thought.
How proud I still am, wanting to fool you with my own worthiness.
I did ask you about family once and you had told me that you had had a daughter, Rosie, who was buried here in Brighton, and that you hadn’t been back to the grave. You had covered your mouth with a hand at that admission and the surprise I’d felt that you had a daughter silenced my own tongue when I should have comforted you and made you feel less alone. What an idiot I was to let it go that day, to not dig deeper then. Worse still, for a second I had been jealous at the look when you spoke about her, the pain of your love, jealous you were talking about someone else in that fierce way. How horrible, to think that in that moment. So, you see, I am not so changed after all.
I would look forward to Thursday above anything else, especially to that easy way you would be sat at one of those tables with those disgusting red cloths, a slice of marble cake and a pot of tea waiting for me, with a triumphant look that you had beaten me to it and paid. How I hated it and loved it when you did that, but mainly it would make me smile on the way home, chuckle with a promise I would be early the following week.
Thursdays, when I would think of all the things I wanted to tell you and when really, I just loved looking at you, watching your rosebud mouth as you told me about a documentary, a radio play, a book that had touched you or listening to your soft laugh as Pauline chatted. You glowed bright in that dowdy space: elegant, timeless. What were you doing with a boy from the West Country who’d spent most of his life wrapped up in himself? You had the biggest heart, always thinking of others, wanting to please. But you also wanted to disappear, to not cause trouble, to not take up space. I wanted to shake you at times, force you to realise that you deserved all the kindness, that you deserved to take up room in this world.
You mentioned what had happened to her once – and how it hurt you. Do you remember?
You told me, in the simplest terms, how she had fallen, how her friends had run away, frightened, how a passer-by had tried to help her, how she couldn’t be saved. You blamed yourself: she shouldn’t have been out, it was late, you’d rowed that night about her curfew, you shouldn’t have let her go, you should have known where she was, you should have paid more attention. The grief was etched on your face as you spoke. My heart broke for you then.
I knew you needed to forgive yourself, that this awful thing had destroyed you. I needed you to realise that it wasn’t your fault, Maria, and that you were a brilliant, caring mother. Rosie would have been in no doubt that she was loved. But I could never find the words – I would buy that slice of marble cake and try to force myself to raise it. You would avoid talking about the past and I let you, because that look on your face, that awful sadness was heart-breaking. So many years, Maria, and still the pain was obvious. All I wanted was to make your eyes crease, to make you smile.
You always commented on tulips in the café – they seemed to make you smile for the briefest second before melancholy set in. You had planted them with her when she was young: yellow tulips, you’d mentioned briefly, and I wanted you to plant them for her, with me there by your side, supporting you.
I am working my way through the list in the hope that through it, I might come to reach myself, and to reach you, to reach my dream: to see if I can win your hand. By the time you read this letter, I hope I have managed it, that I have changed and become worthy of you. I hope that we are together. I know that is all I could want.
I love you, Maria Birch, plain and simple. You are my everything.
Your Albie x
Thirty-Eight
She stepped off the pier and took her time walking along the promenade, an old familiar route, imagining for a moment a small hand in hers, a little girl hopscotching on the stones ahead, an older girl wobbling past on her first roller skates. She had loved the beach and Brighton with her girl: a team of two in this wonderful town. She breathed out, taking a last long glance at the sea glittering in the evening light. A cruise ship passed on the horizon, the only blemish as the sun sank lower in the sky, stretching her shadow on the ground in front of her.
She walked slowly and determinedly to the café, which was coming to the end of a busy day: some tables dirty with crumbs and plates, others newly scrubbed down, and only a couple of customers left. Amrit was sweeping in one corner and gave her a small wave as she arrived.
‘Hold on, Maria, I’ll be with you in two minutes…’
The table Maria wanted was free and scrubbed clean. She made her way over to it. Even though the scene was different, she still pictured the spot: the place she had been sat when he first moved across to introduce himself. She pulled out the chair and sat down.
Amrit appeared, vivid green streaked through her hair today, a pencil poised. ‘Keith’s got some good specials going today. There’s probably some of his cherry Bakewell tart left, if I ask?’
‘A slice of marble cake and a pot of tea, please,’ Maria said, interrupting her.
Amrit blinked, didn’t say anything, just a short nod and moved across to the counter to get things ready.
Keith must have heard her voice in the largely empty café and he emerged, an eager look on his face. ‘Hey, Maria. I’m glad you came in, I’ve been wanting to see you. So, hey, you see… just thought I’d say you can tick me off,’ he said, a hand through his hair.
Maria frowned up at him, his hands rubbing on his dirty apron.
‘The list,’ he added at her blank expression, his voice lowered. ‘You helped me reconnect with my family.’ He bit his lip and stared at the ground as he waited for her reaction.
‘You got in touch with your son,’ she said with a warm smile.
Keith nodded, the information bursting out of him, pride thick in his voice. ‘He lives in Portsmouth, he’s asked to see me. I’m… I’m going to be a grandad, Maria.’ When he looked up at her she saw fresh tears in his eyes.
‘That’s… that’s amazing.’ Maria felt her heart lurch for him.
‘Mandy’s going to come along,’ he added, chin up, swallowing. ‘For support, you know.’
‘Support, eh? That’s what you youngsters call it, is it? How nice of her,’ Maria said with an expression of feigned innocence.
Keith nudged her, laughing. ‘Alright, I just wanted to say thank you, again, for everything. I feel like I’ve been given a second chance,’ he said, his voice full of emotion, a short squeeze of her shoulder.
‘I’m so glad
, you deserve it,’ Maria said, taking a breath as Amrit returned with the tray of tea and cake.
A large group of customers arrived so Keith disappeared back to the kitchen with a quick goodbye and Amrit set to taking orders, clearing the last of the tables, pushing a pair together to accommodate the group.
Maria stared at the slice of marble cake, the pot. She poured the tea carefully, stirred in the milk. Then raising the fork, she took the first mouthful of marble cake. It tasted sweet, of so many wonderful days with the best person she had ever known rolled into one bite. She closed her eyes, savouring the taste. She finished the tea and she finished the cake and then she left quietly, just a tip on the table, no more words.
She walked back to her apartment slowly and enjoyed weaving between the streets of Brighton: relishing others’ joy as they passed her.
She felt bone-tired when she finally made it back, drained from the emotion of the day, from the relief of releasing all the grief, all the regrets that she had stored up over a lifetime. Pushing open the door, the engagement ring flashing, she dropped her bag and moved inside.
Entering the bathroom, she poured the last of her lavender oil into the warm running water. She fetched a large glass of cool wine and her book, removed her clothes and sank beneath the water, her skin warmed, soft. Her wine tasted like raspberries and a summer’s day. She read, topping up the bathwater until she had finished the final chapter: a wonderful read, an Albie recommendation, so much came back to him.
She wrapped herself in her dressing gown and padded through to the kitchen, enjoying the slow process of cooking dinner. Filling her glass, she listened to the sizzle of the pan, smelt the charred meat. The memory struck her in that moment: a last meal, he had asked her once. She had said a Sunday roast, but perhaps it was this, she thought as she took the first bite – a thin steak that was perfectly done, pink in the middle, with homemade chips and peas.
The Wish List of Albie Young (ARC) Page 29