by Kate Hewitt
For a single second, like a time warp, Emily was a child again, her mother’s arm warm and solid around her shoulders. They were sitting on a chair—had it been a rocking chair? Or had it just been in the story? And a quiet old lady who was whispering “hush.” And Emily had felt warm and safe and happy.
“Emily?” Jace’s voice, a low murmur, had her blinking. She had one hand resting on the rocking chair, mindless of the dust for once.
“Sorry. I was away with the fairies there for a second, I think.”
“So I’ll bring the chair?” Jace was already reaching for it. The memory had gone, dissolved like morning mist, and all Emily saw was a dusty old chair that needed some serious cleaning.
“Oh, I don’t know…”
“I’ll bring it,” Jace said decisively, and with one expert tug he’d released it from the tottering pile of furniture without dislodging anything else and was carrying it out to the truck. Emily followed him hesitantly. The chair really was very dirty. She’d clean it, of course, but still…
She’d just reached the door of the barn, Jace ahead of her, when a small, pathetic meow stopped her in her tracks.
“Oh…” A tiny kitten, black with marmalade stripes, was crouching at the bottom of a stack of furniture, its ears pricked, its expression wary. “Jace,” she called as she bent down to it. “Did you know there’s a kitten in here?”
Andromeda aside, she’d never been much of an animal lover, but the kitten looked so small and helpless. She wasn’t going to touch it, of course, although its fur did look rather soft.
“That must be one of Trixie’s.” Jace propped one arm against the doorframe. “She’s Willoughby’s barn cat, completely feral but likes to make her home out here. I knew she’d had kittens but I didn’t realise she’d put them in here.”
“What’s going to happen to them?”
Jace shrugged. “They’ll be all right, feral like her. She’ll abandon them, most likely, when they’re a bit older, to fend for themselves.”
“Abandon them!” Emily couldn’t keep a note of horrified dismay from her voice. “But they’re so little. Surely you can do something?”
Jace shrugged again. “What can I do? They’re not tame. They won’t be caught or trained. Most likely they’ll fend for themselves…or not.”
“But they’re only small.” Emily heard the tremble of emotion in her voice and wondered at it. She was just talking about a kitten, right? She had to be. “They need care.”
“They’re pretty adept at taking care of themselves. But feel free to help yourself to one, if you like. Try to tame it, if you can.”
A pet of her own? Emily drew back. “Oh, I couldn’t.”
Jace nodded. “I wouldn’t worry too much about them, at any rate. They’ll do all right.”
“So…you just have cats wandering around the property?”
“Well, we’re not flooded with the creatures, if that’s your worry,” he answered with a laugh. “Truth be told, if Ava gets wind of the kittens, she’ll probably want one herself. Olivia too, maybe, and Alice, as well. Although I reckon it won’t be easy to catch the little blighters.” He nodded towards the spot where Emily had spied the kitten. “He’s gone back into hiding already.”
The kitten was nowhere to be seen, and Emily struggled to suppress the little pang of loss that caused. “I suppose we should get back,” she said slowly, and Jace started to pull the door shut. Emily ducked out before he’d closed it, giving one last glance to the shadowy piles of furniture. “Can the cats get out of the barn if you lock it?” she asked a bit anxiously, and Jace gave her one of his slow, sure smiles.
“Don’t you worry. They can get in and out of just about anywhere.”
Back at Willoughby Close, Jace brought the rocking chair, dust and all, into Emily’s cottage, making her wince. She needed to clean it immediately.
“While I’m here,” he said as he was about to leave, “Ava wanted to invite you to dinner next weekend. We’re having a few locals over—Olivia and Simon, maybe one or two others. Seven o’clock, Sunday night.”
“Oh…” There was no way, Emily realised, she could make an excuse. Jace wasn’t even waiting for a reply; he’d just assumed she’d show up.
“We live in the caretaker’s cottage, through the woods on the right, off the main drive up to the manor. Follow the path till it ends. Bring a torch. And you might want to wear wellies. It’s rained a fair bit.”
“Oh. Right.” He nodded and turned to leave, and belatedly Emily blurted, “Thank you. For everything.”
“No trouble.”
And then he was gone, and Emily was alone again, but this time with a dusty, dirty rocking chair. She glanced at it, wondering why she’d been so taken with it, and why she’d allowed Jace to bring it back for her. It really wasn’t her style at all, and the dust and dirt alone would normally have her shuddering. And yet…
Goodnight mittens. And goodnight kittens…
That little marmalade-striped kitten had been cute. She hoped it would be okay on its own. It was so little to have to fend for itself, its mother obviously not interested…
She was making this way too personal, Emily realised. It was a kitten. And she needed to clean up this chair.
She dusted it first, wiping it down with damp paper towel, admiring the gleam of wood revealed once the dust had been removed. What the chair really needed was a good polish, maybe with some beeswax… The prospect of restoring the chair to its former glory made her smile. She could put it upstairs, by her bedroom window. She pictured herself sitting in it in the evening, watching the stars come out like diamond pinpricks, and was cheered, even as the image filled her with a restless melancholy.
Goodnight mush…
Emily bundled all the dirty paper towels into the bin, and then washed her hands and arms up to the elbows before she decided to ring her mother, just to check in. But when she called Fiona’s number, it rang on and on, as it often did, and Emily tried not to let it feed her anxiety. They were most likely just out…
Outside the sky was a dank grey, a few raindrops spattering indifferently against the window. Impulsively in a way she normally wasn’t, Emily dialled her father’s number.
“Em? Everything all right?” He sounded worried, which was understandable, since she normally only called him when something had happened with her mum.
“Yes, everything’s fine. I think. Mum’s still living in Camden Town, with Fiona.”
“Oh, right…” This was said vaguely, because her father did not keep tabs on his ex-wife the way Emily did, something else that was understandable since they’d been divorced for nineteen years. Yet it still made Emily feel a stirring of resentment, a kernel of bitterness that had rooted right down in her soul nearly twenty years ago and kept growing, little by little, with every tired sigh or disinterested remark.
“I am concerned that she’s not taking her medication, though, Dad.”
Her father sighed, predictably. “It’s up to her whether to take it or not, Emily. You know that. She’s a grown woman.”
“Yes, I do know that, of course.” They’d had this conversation, or one like it, too many times. “But she doesn’t do well off her medication. You know that.” Although perhaps he didn’t—not really. Her father had been almost completely uninvolved three years ago, when Naomi had gone off her medication, had a psychotic episode, and been sectioned for eight weeks. Geoff David hadn’t even rung Emily once, to check how she was coping, never mind Naomi. She’d left him a voicemail and he’d texted back “hope you’re okay.”
Emily decided to try a different tack. “You know I’ve moved…?” she said, and Geoff made a noncommittal noise.
“Have you? A new flat…?”
She realised she hadn’t even told him about her job, or her move to the Cotswolds, which was telling, really. She didn’t tell her father much, but then there usually wasn’t much to tell. “No, I’ve moved to a village about an hour outside of London. Wychwood-on-Lea
. I’m working for Henry Trent’s new charitable foundation.”
“Henry Trent…?”
Her father didn’t even remember the name of her boss. It wasn’t his fault—not really. They’d just never had that sort of relationship even though they’d both tried, at least a little bit, at the beginning, after her parents had divorced and her father had seemed, briefly, as if he wanted to keep in touch with his only child. Before he’d got new ones.
“My boss,” Emily said tiredly. “Why don’t I give you my new contact details?” Not that her father ever wrote or rang.
“That’s a good idea,” he said with the first hint of enthusiasm. Her father, like her, was a man of details and order. Why he’d married Naomi, who had to be one of the most chaotic people alive, Emily had never understood.
“You could visit,” she suggested suddenly, once she’d given him her new address. “Bring Amy and Jasper even, if you liked.”
“Oh, well.” Her father sounded surprised; she’d never suggested such a thing before. She’d only met Amy and Jasper a couple of times, awkward encounters with her father’s second family, the children he’d chosen to keep. “Maybe during the May half-term…” It was so half-hearted it hurt. Of course he wouldn’t bring Amy or Jasper. They had to be teenagers now, fourteen and sixteen perhaps, and Emily barely knew them. Her half siblings, and yet strangers, because that’s how everyone had preferred it.
“Just a thought,” she said, the words an apology. She didn’t know why she’d suggested it. She certainly never had before, had never wanted to before.
“No, no, it’s a good one.” To make up for his lack of enthusiasm, he now sounded cringingly jolly. “I’ll ask Amanda. We’ll look at our calendars.”
“Right.” Amanda, her father’s second wife, was someone else Emily barely knew. Her father had married her several years after their own relationship had fallen apart, when his weekend visits had trailed to monthly, and then to next to nothing, and Naomi had been well enough, or rather Emily had been old enough, not to need to be dumped at her father’s flat.
To give her credit, Amanda had tried, buying Emily a set of bath bombs and nail varnish that had been a thoughtful present for a ten-year-old girl, but Emily had hated them on principle. Amanda still always managed to remember her birthday with a card, signing both her name and Geoff’s in her loopy scrawl. Yet even she didn’t make any more overtures than that, and neither did Emily.
“I’d better go,” her father said. “I’m going to the footy with Jasper…”
“All right.” That little remark should not have hurt. She’d trained herself long ago not to let those thoughtless comments sting, and besides she didn’t even like football.
And yet, somehow since coming to Wychwood-on-Lea, Emily had felt just that little bit rawer. The tiniest bit more vulnerable than she’d ever let herself feel before, and it scared her. Where was her armour? Her strength?
And why, after years alone, a lifetime even, was she letting these kinds of things hurt? Why was she starting to feel so lonely?
Chapter Eight
Rain spattered the tall windows as Emily pulled her laptop towards her. Despite the gloomy weather, she was feeling positive—the office was now completely organised, all the new furniture had been delivered, and she’d done the hard bit of lining up all the local businesses to participate in the fundraiser, so there was only admin, organisation, and publicity left to do, which she could complete in the comforting solace of her office.
She’d also managed to avoid Olivia, Ava, and most importantly, Owen for the whole week, limiting her interactions to coffee with Alice and brief check-ins with Henry. Order had been firmly established, thank goodness, and she felt as if her life was back on its necessary even keel.
Nearly a week on, Emily was able to look at the events of that night at the pub as a mere blip on her radar, just as she’d been sure it was for Owen. She’d been feeling vulnerable, yes, because of how new everything was and how friendly everyone seemed. It had knocked her off-balance, but she was fine now. Absolutely fine.
It felt immensely reassuring to realise that—to come home from a productive day of work and have everything just as she needed and wanted it to be; to eat her meal-for-one while reading a book and have that be enough. It was all completely fine.
If she had to convince herself a bit too much of that truth, well, that was simply because she’d been so discomfited by the move to Wychwood-on-Lea, and having everything shaken up, but it really was all just…fine.
She’d even rung her mother on Wednesday, to check in, and Naomi had assured her, albeit a bit breathlessly, that she was back on her medication and not to worry about her at all—she wasn’t going to do something silly.
She’d even suggested visiting Emily one weekend, which had made her spirits lift. As challenging as her mum could be, Emily loved her and missed her when she wasn’t there. Visits were stressful, yes, but they could also be fun, and it felt, well, good to be with someone who knew her. Who loved her, in her own, odd way.
So that was good, and work was good, and really, it was all just…good. She frowned at the laptop as she scanned the spreadsheet of donors who needed thank-you letter follow-ups. Working for Willoughby Holidays was, in many ways, similar to working for Ellis Investments, although for a more meaningful cause.
“Emily? Do you have a moment?”
Emily looked up from her laptop to see Alice standing in the doorway, smiling uncertainly. It was mid-afternoon and they’d already had their morning coffee. This was definitely not part of their routine.
“Umm…yes, I suppose.” Emily closed her laptop and scooted away from the desk. “What is it?”
“I wondered if you’d mind giving your opinion about something upstairs?”
“Upstairs?” Emily had never actually been upstairs. She’d heard the occasional clatter or rumble from another part of the house, and generally tuned it out. She knew they were renovating the manor to get it ready for the holidays they hoped to offer that summer, but she hadn’t given it much consideration beyond that.
“Okay. Although I don’t know how much help I’ll be.”
“I just want a second opinion, really. I don’t know if I’ve got the tone right.”
“The tone?”
“Of one of the bedrooms. Come see.”
Dutifully Emily followed Alice up the sweeping staircase, past a life-sized portrait of an austere-looking woman—Henry’s great-grandmother, apparently—and around the corner onto the first floor gallery, a wide hallway that had been stripped of its formal paintings, the walls now painted a cheerful light green. Alice opened the first door on the left, and then beckoned Emily inside.
“What do you think?” she asked, as Emily took in the renovated room.
It was lovely, airy and bright, with no hint of moth-eaten wall hangings or fusty old furniture. The walls were a light blue, with white, puffy clouds stencilled along the ceiling. Matching curtains framed the view of the gardens outside, and there was a set of twin beds with matching tables and bureaus, along with a bookcase along one wall filled with children’s books of varying ages and descriptions.
“It’s lovely,” Emily said sincerely. “Truly lovely.”
“It isn’t too…bland?” Alice asked anxiously. She perched on the edge of one of the beds, reaching for a cloud-shaped pillow that she clutched to her chest. “It doesn’t look too institutional?”
“Not institutional,” Emily said after a moment’s consideration. “Not at all. But I might not be the right person to ask. I sort of like institutional.”
“Do you?” Alice let out a huff of laughter. “I hate it. After growing up in it, I want everything to be wonderfully messy and cluttered and real. Henry says I’ll turn into a hoarder, but at least we have the space.”
Which made Emily want to shudder, even as she understood it. Perhaps everyone was a result of their upbringing, whether they wanted to be or not.
“Was it very hard?” she
asked after a moment. “Growing up in care?”
Alice sighed and clutched the pillow more tightly. “It could have been worse. I’ve always known that.”
“That doesn’t sound very promising.”
“No, it was…well, it was lonely, really.” She managed a slightly wobbly smile. “Even when my foster parents were nice. And then I was transferred to a care home—teens usually don’t get fostered, because of their age. No one wants them and it’s just easier to lump them all together in a home. That was easier, in a way, but lonelier, too.”
“I’m sorry,” Emily said, because she didn’t know what else to say. It sounded awful, worse than anything she’d experienced, certainly, and she felt guilty for feeling sorry for herself even once.
“I don’t talk about it all that much,” Alice confessed. “It’s in the past, and I really am so happy now. I don’t want to dwell on it.”
“I can understand that.”
“Can you?” Alice looked at her rather keenly, and Emily knew it was a perfect opportunity to share a bit about her own past. It was an opportunity she chose not to take. “Anyway,” Alice said, brushing at her eyes, “I think redoing these rooms is bringing it all back a bit. Reminding me of my own childhood, the rooms I lived in. And I want them to be so much more than that.”
“But they will be, because you and Henry will be here,” Emily pointed out. “And you’ll be lovely and welcoming to all the kids who come—I’m sure you will be. And that’s what will make the difference, not what colour the walls are, or what the curtains look like.”
“I hope so.” Alice let out a sigh. “If we even get approved. Henry’s had umpteen meetings with local councils, and we’ve got to have even more checks because of safeguarding and all that. I just hope this whole thing actually works.”
“It will,” Emily said firmly. “If Henry has anything to do with it.”
Alice laughed at that. “True. He can be scarily determined.” She smiled as she replaced the pillow. “Thanks, Emily. I brought you up here for your opinion on the room. I didn’t expect to have a mini meltdown on you.”