Alex let another pebble go over the water. It broke the surface somewhere near the middle of the Old Girl. Her dad used to say she had an aim that would make Eric Bristow weak at the knees. Was that the reason her mum had agreed for Alex and Finn to take Dill practising, instead of waiting for their dad to get back? Maybe if she hadn’t been such a show off. Maybe it was just fate like her mum thought. ‘Some things are just fated to be, darling. Everything comes back full circle.’ Fate. It wasn’t a big enough word.
Alex’s head began to spin. Would any one thing in isolation have made the difference? If Alex hadn’t been a crack shot, would they have even bothered taking the bow and arrows? If Dill’s nerves hadn’t been so damaged at birth, would he have held on better in the tree? If he hadn’t been fighting with Jem, if their mum hadn’t wanted him out of the house for a while, if their dad hadn’t gone to help that lady on the emergency call out. Even the nettles. A series of inconspicuous events. All coming together.
Something else broke the surface of the water. Alex looked briefly at the new series of ripples just a few feet from where she sat on the embankment. She looked for a fish.
‘You’re losing your touch, Foster.’
He was standing on the river bridge behind her, earphones hanging from either side of his head, the evening sun making its dying statement across his skin. Alex exhaled slowly before her breath could catch. He strolled down towards the grassy embankment and along the footpath towards her. Finn tripped on something but turned his stumble into a little self-conscious jog before regaining his poise. It made Alex smile. Her head was throbbing and still he’d managed to affect her that way.
‘Penny for your thoughts?’
He’d been robust yesterday. Formidable. Now he was just Finn, softly spoken, clumsy. Ready to be an ear, a shoulder, a best friend.
Alex rubbed against the chill starting over her bare legs. She huddled them under her chin as if she was five years old snuggling up for story time in Millie’s reception class. ‘You would get a lot for your money, Finn.’
She hadn’t wanted it to be Finn that would help untangle it all for her, her mother’s wobbly recovery, her sister’s secrecy, her father’s mood swings. But it was always just so easy with him.
‘Mind if I join you?’ Finn waited politely for permission to sit in the grass with her. Norma had no doubts and was investigating his running shoes with gusto. ‘Hello, beautiful,’ he laughed. Finn reached down to reward Norma’s affection. That laugh used to be the backdrop to their summers. Now it made the hairs rise on the back of Alex’s neck like a drug. Something she’d already done cold turkey for.
‘Sure.’
Alex waited for the inevitable doubt to sink home as Finn sloped into the grass beside her, but it didn’t come. The anxiety of disappointing her father, the guilt for wanting to be this close to Finn for just a few innocent minutes, it didn’t come. It was as if Finn kept it all away. Alex took a steady breath and let it out slow. The sunlight had found itself low enough now to touch the river, the Old Girl pretty in gilt.
‘I owe you an apology, Finn.’ It was something of an understatement. She should start in reverse chronological order, she might be done by Christmas. ‘I’m sorry I put you in that situation yesterday. That horrible thug, he could’ve had a knife or …’
‘A nifty karate chop?’
‘Or anything,’ Alex continued. ‘I should’ve … been more considerate.’
Finn finished fussing Norma and sat her on the grass in front of him. Norma rolled over and yielded wholeheartedly to him. Finn began rubbing the pink of her belly. ‘The guy was about to eat your cupcake, Foster. I know how girls get about cupcakes.’
Alex lolled her head over her shoulder. He needed to know that she was being serious. Finn returned Alex’s look with a conceding nod of the head before he turned to the water too. Something flexed over his jaw. ‘No need to apologise, Alex. It’s been a long time since I saw you like that. It was good.’
‘Like what?’
Finn lifted his chin and breathed easy. ‘Like the Alex I used to know. Before you started tripping over your own feet trying to be so … considerate.’
‘Oh yeah, I’ve really nailed that one to the board.’ Because picking Finn up and setting him down again when she felt like it was so considerate wasn’t it? About as considerate as sitting here with Finn now would be to her father. ‘You could’ve been hurt, Finn. Because of me.’ Finn had his elbows set on his knees. He looked over his shoulder at her, eyes narrowed in thought behind hair damp from his run. ‘There are different ways of being hurt, Foster. Anything that monkey had to offer yesterday could’ve been patched up using a cotton bud. I’m a big boy, I can take a few bumps and grazes.’
Alex knew he could take them, she’d seen him take them from a father burning with drunken, broken-hearted fury. ‘Anyway. When he touched you … he shouldn’t have done. I didn’t like it.’ Alex felt a small rush of adrenalin, as if Finn had just said something dangerous. They should talk about something else.
‘Do you think Emma and the girls will be all right?’ Alex blathered. ‘I don’t think I’d have been able to sleep last night if your mum wasn’t putting them up.’
Finn squinted at the view. It was the same heavy serious look he had when he was sketching or painting, working out the fine details of what was holding his interest.
‘He was a loan shark. Loan sharks, bailiffs … all I know is, if they think you owe them, they’ll keep coming back until they’ve decided you don’t.’
Alex shuddered at the thought of that man coming back anywhere near those little girls. ‘Did Emma make a statement?’
‘My mum called the station. Mal came down to the Longhouse but Emma wasn’t really ready for talking much about it, yet anyway.’
‘Oh.’ Alex had given the brief version to her dad last night in passing. Ted had said something about him considering toxic debt like that once, when the garage was struggling. Only Blythe had insisted she’d go out and get work herself. Cleaning up at the Sinclairs had been one of many jobs Alex remembered her mother leaving the house for.
Alfred Sinclair is a spineless bastard. That’s what your father thinks.
Alex’s head began to swim again. Maybe there had been some long forgotten argument with Mayor Sinclair back then? Something trivial and buried until Blythe’s stroke had short-wired everything so she could finally blurt it all out now.
Alex realised a silence was growing between them.
‘It was a breakfast muffin,’ she said casually. ‘Not a cupcake.’
Finn smiled and went along with the change in tracks. ‘A breakfast muffin?’
‘Bacon and egg.’
‘In a muffin? Little paper case and everything? Genius.’
Alex allowed herself a small stealth smile. ‘I thought you’d appreciate that.’
Finn was a connoisseur of breakfasts, sort of. Back when the Longhouse was just a lowly bed and breakfast, Susannah had got up at first light and made a welcome breakfast for a party of five who never showed. Susannah didn’t usually get upset, but after all that time and expense baking fresh drop scones and blueberry muffins and every item necessary for a B&B standard Full English breakfast, she was livid. It was all the waste that did it, she said. They’d only just had the Harvest festival down at the church and they’d been collecting for Malawi and something about seeing all that food go in the bin while children starved in the world had tipped Susannah over the edge. Alex and Finn were supposed to be going for a mooch around the Falls, but Finn had eaten his way through the majority of his mum’s breakfast spread to cheer her up. They hadn’t made it further than Godric’s gorge before he’d turned a funny pink colour and his digestive system needed a long sit down. Finn thought he’d invented the all-in-one breakfast muffin then, lying on the granite shelf behind the second waterfall up the gorge, while Alex tried to think up new destinations to add to their Great Adventure list.
Finn jostled beside her. ‘You
know I thought of it first. The mighty breakfast muffin. Worth a scuffle for any day, I’d say.’ Finn’s smile broke first. His eyes warmed with it and for a few seconds all seriousness from his face was lost. When it returned, he was looking straight at Alex over the top of his shoulder, his body still facing the water shielding himself, not giving her too much. ‘God damn.’ He shook his head almost imperceptibly.
‘What?’ Alex asked, her back straightening just a little in case she’d done something wrong.
‘I’d almost forgotten that smile.’ Norma tried to waddle off. Finn cleared his throat. ‘So how long before you disappear again?’ His voice had reverted back to light hearted, his words heavy all the same.
‘Once Mum’s home,’ Alex said, suddenly hit by the diminishing likelihood of that being any time soon. If they could just get her home, it just felt as if everything would click back into a bearable rhythm with Blythe back to steer them all to calmer waters. Finn didn’t ask. He knew everything he needed to from his mum probably.
‘How are things going up at the house?’ He knew not to ask that too, but he had done anyway. Alex felt ashamed. She could lie, tell him that they were all pulling together, smile for the camera! But Finn knew, he’d seen the carnage himself so there really was no point.
‘Jem’s being off. I just have this feeling, I should be worried for her or something. It’s throwing me a bit.’
‘Doesn’t sound like Jem.’
‘I know. First she couldn’t keep away from the hospital, now she won’t go near the place.’
‘Maybe she just wants to keep an eye on you guys at home?’
‘That’s the other thing. When Jem’s home, she’s not around much then either. She’s either in her room, on the phone. Or she’s nipping out for milk or bread or some other reason that takes her away for an hour or more.’
I think my sister might be in love with Mal Sinclair. There’s an odd tension between them and my mother saw them kissing outside Frobisher’s Tea Rooms when they were teenagers once, Alex wanted to say. But even in her head it sounded preposterous.
‘How’s … everyone else?’ Finn. Ever the diplomat.
‘He’s, kind of lost.’
‘Of course he is, Foster. She’s his wife. Your mum is everything to him. I get that.’ Finn got that. Alex’s dad had only shown Finn anger and hostility but Finn still got that Ted Foster was driven just as vehemently by love. It would take a hell of a lot more than that to bridge the gap between them though.
‘I don’t know how to help him.’
‘You’re here, Foster. That’s how you’re helping.’
‘I think my dad would find it easier if I wasn’t under his feet. He’s hardly home either, I feel like I’m chasing them all out. I don’t know, maybe I should just go home for a few days, let him and Jem regroup or something.’ Become the visiting guest again.
‘It won’t make a difference, Alex.’
‘What won’t?’
‘You going anywhere. Trust me, I tried it. It just geography. Miles don’t separate people. Thoughts do.’
‘Thoughts?’
‘Yeah. Thoughts, feelings … whatever you want to call it.’ Alex wanted to look away but was held by intense green eyes. ‘I stayed in the Falls for eight years thinking you’d come back, Foster. When you didn’t, I thought maybe I’d try somewhere else in the world for a while.’ Alex felt a sharp pain in her chest. Like she needed to breathe more deeply but couldn’t. ‘I tried lots of places, Alex. I was away for nearly two years trying to find somewhere. But it didn’t make any difference. You were with me the whole time.’
CHAPTER 36
‘Hey,’ Jem said softly. Alex was propped in the doorway to Dill’s room, the backs of her shoulders pink from a too-hot bath, her dark hair bundled up inside a damp towel.
‘Hey,’ Alex replied. She looked how Jem felt. Tired resignation in the set of her shoulders. Jem let her eyes trail off into Dill’s bedroom. The door she’d chased Dill behind and kicked in anger the last time they’d been in this house together.
Jem felt a familiar ache inside. ‘Do you know the last thing I ever said to Dill?’
Alex looked into Dill’s room again, as if the answer might lie inside. She shook her head.
‘I said that I hated him. That Mum and Dad never wanted him, he was just a mistake that came along later.’ Jem chewed on the edge of her lip. ‘He’d seen me trying to put your makeup on that morning, said I looked like a clown.’ Jem laughed emptily. ‘Not just trying on makeup though, he saw me messing around.’ Jem rolled her eyes. ‘Practising how to kiss … on the bathroom mirror.’
Alex smiled. Jem knew she didn’t need to explain the calibre of ammunition that would’ve given to their brother at the time. Jem felt that ache again.
‘I got so mad at him, he said that I’d scare all the boys away and the girls would laugh at me. He just flipped my switch. So I chased him into that bedroom screaming at him like a lunatic until you and Finn came back to the house, remember? Mum talked you into taking Dill out with you guys.’
The makeup hadn’t even been for the boys. Jem had only been trying it on to please the girls before the new term started back at Eilidh High. Carrie Logan, mainly, because Carrie’s take on Jem’s appearance had been much the same as Dill’s at the time, only Carrie liked to deliver her critiques with more venom.
You aren’t seriously wearing those shoes are you, Jem? They look like men’s shoes.
Jem, do you ever use conditioner? Your hair is so wiry, like my horse’s tail.
Jem, every girl in the school knows how to shape their eyebrows by now. Everyone except you.
Why wouldn’t you kiss Jackson at the disco? He says you’re frigid. You’re not a fridge, are you, Jem?
Jem looked at her sister. Alex had gone quite still. Jem hesitated. There was always a sadness about Alex when anyone talked about Dill or Finn, as if she couldn’t permit herself to enjoy the memories of either of them.
‘That’s what nine year old brothers do, Jem. Annoy big sisters,’ Alex tried. ‘He didn’t mean any of it.’
‘I know.’ Of course Jem realised that. She understood the difference between silly mudslinging and real, palpable, spite. But Dill hadn’t made it to adulthood. Dill didn’t know that Jem hadn’t really hated him like she’d said, did he? ‘I never got the chance to put him right again before …’ Before they’d brought Alex back to the house wrapped in blankets and their mother had fallen to her knees on the front lawn, crippled with anguish.
Jem saw Alex stiffen. ‘It was just a silly thing between siblings, Jem,’ Alex said.
Jem nodded. She knew that. But that Dill might’ve died thinking that she didn’t love him had haunted her.
Alex looked pained again. Like she was in a constant state of treading on eggshells. ‘Are you hungry? I didn’t know where you were or anything, Jem, I haven’t made anything to eat,’ Alex said apologetically.
‘No, that’s OK. I should’ve let you know, I’ve got to go out in a while anyway.’
Alex had again? written all over her face.
‘Work?’ Jem saw the doubt flash over Alex’s eyes and then something else. ‘Jem, I’m so sorry! I’d forgotten about your “big unveiling”. How’s all that going?’
Jem fidgeted. ‘Not great, actually. George has decided to push things on.’ No kidding. George turning up in the Falls? Jem hadn’t seen that one coming. Maybe George was right and Jem did need a push, but just thinking about it was enough to put a fine film of sweat above her lip.
‘Still gently nudging you, is he?’ Alex asked.
‘Something like that.’
Alex nodded without giving Jem a hard time about it. Jem felt a surge of deceitfulness. She was wronging Alex. Alex was busting a gut to close the distance between everyone and here Jem was, doing her best to widen it. It was all starting to wear Alex down, Jem could see it right there in front of her. She shouldn’t have snapped at Alex outside Carrie’s florist yesterday.
Alex held her hands in front of herself, one rubbing over the other. ‘Sure. I have something I need to speak to you about too. I was just going to get dressed. Want to come in my room?’
Jem stepped out of Alex’s way and followed her across the landing into the guest room. ‘Alex? Did you wear your pumps in the bath? I saw them at the bottom of the stairs, soaking.’
‘Norma got a bit carried away up near the old town bridge. That collar you adjusted doesn’t fit her properly.’
‘Norma?’
‘You said she needed a name.’
‘The crazy priestess, right?’ Jem had been bombarded with opera at weekends too.
‘It suits her.’ Alex smiled, closing the bedroom door behind Jem.
Jem wandered over to the window and checked the view outside hadn’t changed. ‘I like it.’
‘Hopefully Mum will too when she comes home.’
Jem buried her hands into her jean pockets and turned to lean against the wall. Alex sat on the end of her bed.
‘How is she?’ Jem asked weakly. She shouldn’t have abandoned her station at her mum’s bedside, it was just, how could she go to the hospital? Blythe knew just by first glance when Jem was holding on to a secret. Bar the big one. Blythe had never cornered her on that one. That’s your second biggest secret, now, Jem reminded herself.
Alex pulled the towel from her head, a wet mess of chestnut hair slumped around her delicate face.
‘Ancient Minoan Ceramics, yours I take it?’ Jem picked up the book from the chest of drawers beside her and flicked through a few of the pages. Something flittered to the floor. ‘Shoot, sorry. I lost your page’
Alex stopped towelling her hair while Jem picked up the scrap of paper.
‘Sorry, was this your bookmark?’ She held out the little scrap of paper to Alex. ‘Do you know which page you were on? Huh, look at that, it’s a heart.’ Jem turned over the torn shape in her hand.
Letting You Go Page 20