The Three Day Rule

by Emlyn Rees

  She’d listened intently in the darkness, waiting for him to fall asleep, but Ben had wriggled around on the small creaky sofa downstairs and she’d known he was awake too. She’d felt scared of moving in case he’d have interpreted it as some sort of invitation from her, and scared of the conversation she didn’t want to have with him, scared of the answers she’d have to give to all the questions she knew he had.

  Now, as she kissed Elliot again, she was glad that she’d trusted her instinct. In the cold light of day, she was very glad she hadn’t had a late night truth session with Ben. She shivered and Elliot rubbed her arms.

  ‘I wish we could stay here all day,’ Elliot said. He didn’t add it, but Kellie knew he meant but we can’t. She looked down at their hands and how their fingers had instinctively intertwined.

  ‘I do too, but it’s a bit draughty in here, isn’t it?’

  Elliot laughed. ‘I know. What are we going to do?’

  His eyes were tender. He stroked her cheek again.

  ‘It’s so bloody freezing out there. There’s no way to get between here and St John’s. It looks I’m staying for Christmas.’

  ‘Will you be OK?’

  ‘I suppose so, but I’m so worried. This is such a tiny island, isn’t it? I mean, what if someone sees me? What if I bump into your dad, or you and Isabelle together? What am I supposed to say then?’

  ‘Say nothing. They don’t know you. Nobody has the faintest idea about us. Nobody has even seen us together.’

  ‘But –’

  ‘Everything will be fine, darling. We’re having a big Christmas lunch, so everyone will be inside. All you have to do is keep a low profile. Just sit it out and get on a boat first thing in the morning. I’ll be with you by lunchtime tomorrow. Nobody in the family will ever know that you were here.’

  Kellie knew he was right, but she didn’t like it. ‘This is so bloody ridiculous, isn’t it? All this skulking about? I wish it could be different.’

  And it could, she thought. If you’d told Isabelle about us before Christmas, then we wouldn’t even be here.

  ‘So do I,’ he said.

  ‘I hate having to lie to people. Sally and Roddy, they’ve been so kind. I feel like a fraud.’

  ‘Forget about them. Why do you even care about what they think?’

  She didn’t answer. She did care. She pictured herself coming back here a year from now, with Elliot, to visit his father. All the people she’d met last night would recognise her, know her for the liar she was and treat her accordingly. And what about Elliot’s father? What would he think of her for having deceived his neighbours and friends?

  But perhaps Elliot was right. Perhaps she shouldn’t give a damn who judged her. What would it matter what anyone else thought, once she and Elliot were together?

  She stepped away from him.

  ‘So what is this place, anyway?’ she asked.

  ‘Dad’s boatshed.’

  It was the first time she’d ever been somewhere directly connected to Elliot’s family. A set of wooden doors at the end were in bad repair and thin strips of white winter light crept through. On the wall, there were various hooks, housing an odd assortment of coats, as well as worn-looking lifejackets. There were adult sizes and child sizes too. The boom of a windsurfer and a board were strapped to the ceiling with bungee straps.

  In the middle of the shed was a white sailing dingy, its mast collapsed and the sails rolled up.

  She walked towards it. ‘So is this where you come in the summer?’ She looked again at the small lifejackets. One of them must have been worn by Taylor. She was suddenly aware of all the history that the Thorne family shared, all of Elliot’s memories that she’d never be a part of.

  Elliot nodded. ‘We used to. I bought Dad this boat when he retired, but I don’t think he uses it that much any more.’

  Kellie ran her hand along the fibreglass side of the boat, walking away from Elliot.

  And then she saw it. She stopped, her hand moving away from the boat as if she’d been scorched. In looping blue letters was the name: Isabelle.

  Elliot had bought his father a boat and it was called Isabelle?

  ‘What is it?’ Elliot asked.

  She turned round, forcing a smile, forcing herself to hide the jealousy she felt. Had Elliot named it, or his father? She didn’t know which was worse. Or – the thought made her feel so sick that she instantly dismissed it – or had Elliot not bought it for his father, but for Isabelle? Could he be lying to her?

  ‘Nothing,’ she said.

  She would have to be strong. She remembered how ridiculous Elliot had seemed last night when he’d become jealous and she was determined not to make the same mistake herself. Besides, she reminded herself, if she was going to be with Elliot, then there would be hundreds of reminders of Isabelle. She couldn’t react like this to each one. Once Elliot was hers, there’d be nothing to be jealous of.

  ‘I just wish we were back home,’ she said, meaning it more than ever. She could hardly compute in her head that they’d moved from their flat in London, to the comfort of a double bed in a hotel, to whispering in a cold boatshed like fugitives, all in less than forty-eight hours.

  How could she tell him that this place gave her the creeps? That all of this stuff, clearly so familiar to him, was totally alien to her. Perhaps if she’d come here, as she’d always imagined she would, as a guest of his father’s, once Elliot had made her official, then she’d have felt differently. Then she would have been able to explore the boatshed and ask about Elliot’s memories without feeling so horribly insecure. Instead, she was here in secret and it just made the life she shared with him in London further away than ever.

  ‘Come here,’ he said, his familiar wicked grin on his face. ‘I know a good way to make you feel better.’

  ‘Elliot,’ she said, not moving, ‘it’s freezing.’

  ‘That’s never stopped you before. What about that time on the Moors?’

  They’d been for a weekend away when they’d had a case up in Yorkshire only a few months ago.

  ‘You really want to do it here? Now?’

  ‘Why not? It’s Christmas.’

  Elliot tried to kiss her, but this wasn’t a game to her and she wasn’t in the mood to play.

  ‘What’s wrong?’ he asked.

  She wiped her mouth on the back of her hand. ‘I can’t.’

  ‘Why not?’ He looked at her, his expression confused and hurt.

  ‘Because . . . because this is your father’s boatshed. It just feels all wrong.’

  ‘Nobody’s going to catch us,’ Elliot said.

  ‘It’s not about being caught.’

  She looked at him, willing him to understand, willing him to make it all better. She knew that rejecting him like this was breaking some sort of unspoken code in their relationship, but she couldn’t take it back now

  ‘I want it all to be . . . proper,’ she said. ‘I want to be with you properly. Not like this.’

  ‘We will be. You know we will be.’

  ‘Because you ought to know that this is not my ideal Christmas Day,’ she said, feeling close to tears. ‘In fact it’s a complete and utter fuck-up.’

  Utterlyfuckedup, she suddenly thought, remembering Ben making her laugh on the RIB. She thought of the sky and the sea and all that light – but now she was in a dingy boatshed. It was nothing less than totallyutterlyfuckedup, in fact.

  Elliot sighed a heavy sigh, then pulled her into a gentle hug. ‘Don’t get upset. Come on . . .’

  ‘You’re going to have to go back,’ she said. ‘They’ll be missing you, won’t they?’

  She waited for him to protest, to come up with an ingenious excuse that would mean they could spend more time together, but instead Elliot kissed the top of her head.

  ‘OK,’ he said, before putting his finger under her chin, so that she was looking up at him. ‘I suppose you’re right, but just give me one last smile for me to remember.’

  She did m
anage a smile of a sort, but it wasn’t the kind she’d ever felt herself give him before.

  ‘That’s my girl,’ he said.

  It was a phrase she kept coming back to, long after he’d gone and left her behind on her own in the gloom.

  As Kellie walked from the boatsheds back up to the main road, she stuffed her hands in her pockets. There was a cold wind blowing and the snow still lay thick on the ground. The sky was a pale mauve and yet the sun was shining. The red and green doors of the stone houses stood out against the whiteness.

  She thought she’d be happy after seeing Elliot, but now she was more anxious than ever. Only a few days ago, their secret had made her feel buoyant, as if the knowledge that they loved each other was a light shining inside her. Now it felt more like a worm chewing her up.

  As she reached the road, she looked down at the harbour, where the boats were covered with a dusting of snow. She took a deep breath, looking out across the flat water. Grey ice made the harbour look like a village pond. It was so beautiful, it made her feel as if she’d stepped into a Dickens novel. She wasn’t a fan herself, but no doubt Ben, who seemed to have read every book that had ever been made into a movie, would have something to say about it.

  ‘Hey. How’s your head?’ Ben asked, suddenly appearing from around the corner and making her jump. Now she wondered whether he’d seen her coming from the boatshed. She felt herself blushing, but he was smiling at her. ‘Fresh air helped?’

  She’d exaggerated her hangover this morning, in order to get out of the house so that she could meet Elliot.

  ‘I’m OK,’ she said, starting to walk along the road with him.

  ‘You and I must stop bumping into each other,’ he said. ‘People will talk . . .’

  She wasn’t in the mood for banter, much less mild flirtation. ‘Any joy with the boat?’

  ‘I’m not even thinking about it while that ice is out there.’ He held her up as she slipped on the compacted snow on the road. ‘Steady there.’

  Ben saw a couple coming out of one of the houses further up the road and called a greeting to them, swapping Happy Christmases.

  ‘It doesn’t feel like Christmas Day. It’s so strange being here,’ Kellie said.

  ‘No stranger than being in a hotel on your own, surely?’

  They slowed to a halt.

  She could tell that he thought she was weird. It hit her now how odd she must appear to Ben, despite her half-hearted attempt at an explanation in the pub last night. She didn’t blame him for being curious. After all, if their situations had been reversed, she’d have had a million and one questions. Just for a second she longed to tell him the truth. To make him understand that she had proper reasons for being here. That she was a rational human being with a very real explanation, and that her motives were the most honourable motives of all, because they were motives of love – but she knew she couldn’t. Instead, she tried to laugh it off.

  ‘At least I might have got a Christmas lunch at the hotel,’ she said.

  ‘But you’d have had no one to pull your Christmas cracker with . . .’

  ‘I could have used both hands to pull it by myself.’

  Ben held out his arms, testing out the physical possibility of this claim. ‘But you might have hit a waiter with your elbow.’

  ‘No, I’m too co-ordinated for that.’

  ‘You’d still have had no one to read the crap joke to,’ he pointed out.

  ‘That’s true,’ she conceded.

  ‘Well, you needn’t worry,’ he told her, ‘about missing out on Christmas lunch, because we’re not going to starve. I managed to scrounge a few bits and pieces from the pub.’

  It was typical of him, to have thought of her like this. ‘I’m not a bad cook,’ she offered. ‘I’ll give you a hand.’

  ‘No, no. Leave it to me. I’ll fix it. It’s only beans on toast. We can go to the pub afterwards and have crisps for pudding.’

  Beans on toast . . . she tried to keep the disappointment from her face. What did it matter, she quickly reminded herself. Christmas was irrelevant, wasn’t it? It was just a label given to a certain day by a faith she didn’t believe in.

  ‘Beans on toast sounds mighty fine,’ she told Ben. ‘What are we going to do in the meantime?’

  ‘Well, I’ve got to pop over to Jack’s for a bit. I promised him I’d take a look at his dad’s computer, which is knackered. I’d ask you to come along, but it’s not going to be much fun. His dad’s a bit of a nut, to tell the truth.’

  ‘So I’ll see you at lunchtime?’

  ‘Yep. I’ll come and find you.’

  ‘OK, see you then.’ She smiled briefly at him and headed away, but just as she turned her back, she felt something hit her squarely between the shoulder blades.

  She gasped and turned to see Ben grinning at her, already gathering up another snowball.

  ‘You swine!’ Kellie said.

  ‘Oh, come on,’ Ben said. ‘You’re a perfect target. Irresistible, in fact.’

  With that, he threw another snowball at her. She ducked at the last moment, so that it hit the wall beside her.

  ‘Hey!’ She scrambled away from him, racing to gather up snow to defend herself, but Ben was too fast for her and it wasn’t long before Kellie’s hood was down and her hair was a mess. She was sweating and laughing, as she ran after Ben and, grabbing his arm, held him long enough to jump up and squish a snowball down the back of his neck.

  He collapsed, shouting and pawing at his collar. ‘I surrender, I surrender, no more,’ he begged.

  Kellie laughed and stood back, slapping her gloves together. She was breathless with exertion. It was as she extended her hand to help Ben up from the road that she saw Elliot, standing outside the pub. He stared at her for a moment, his expression stony, and then he turned away.

  ‘You got me,’ Ben said, jumping to his feet and flicking the snow out of his hair. He smiled at her, his cheeks red, his eyes sparkling in the sun.

  ‘You started it,’ she said, but her heart wasn’t in their game any more and she didn’t smile back.

  ‘Are you OK?’ he asked.

  She forced a smile. He mustn’t know that she’d just seen Elliot, or even hint at the significance of it. She had to pretend that everything was fine. ‘I’m suddenly cold, that’s all. I’m going back to warm up.’

  ‘See you in a while,’ he called after her as she walked off. He waved to her and she half-waved back.

  As Kellie hurried back to the pub annexe, her head was crowded with Elliot. She felt so ashamed that he’d seen her snowball fight with Ben. From the look on his face, he was obviously still jealous and now she felt guilty, as if he’d caught her out. She couldn’t bear it. His last image of her was of her holding on to Ben. He’d get it all wrong. Her mind raced with panic. How could she reach him now to reassure him?

  Then again, why should she have to reassure him? He should trust her, just as she trusted him. After all, the onus of trust always fell on her. He was the one who was with his family. He was the one with a boat named after his wife, for God’s sake. What was she supposed to do when he was with Isabelle, anyway? Never laugh? Never have any fun?

  She looked around her. Everything seemed so white and innocent, yet she felt more guilty than she’d ever felt – but she had nothing to feel guilty about, she told herself. Certainly not Ben.

  She thought back to her meeting with Elliot, just ten minutes ago, and any residual reassurance from his kiss now vanished. The boat had been such a physical reminder of Isabelle. Kellie had always imagined that Isabelle would just quietly disappear once she and Elliot were together, but now she realised it would never be that easy. Would Elliot’s family blame her for splitting up his marriage? Of course they would. Would they accept her enough so that one day they could share a family Christmas all together? Only time would tell.

  She suddenly realised that she was about to walk into some people on the street. She stopped, recognising the teenaged boy immediately.
He stared at her. It was Sally’s son, the teenager Elliot had brought to the pub last night.

  ‘You must be Michael,’ Kellie said.

  ‘Yes.’ His eyes shifted away from hers. She noticed his bum-fluff moustache and his gangling awkward limbs and remembered the acute embarrassment of being his age.

  ‘I thought so. Your mum’s been very kind to me. I’m staying in the annexe.’

  ‘I know.’

  She smiled at him, but he didn’t smile back. Kellie turned to the young woman standing next to him, her stomach lurching as eyes frighteningly similar to Elliot’s stared back at her.

  ‘Come on, Taylor,’ Michael said, ‘let’s get going.’

  Kellie felt her mouth grow dry as Taylor’s gaze never faltered. She looked so much older than Kellie had ever imagined her to be. She must be the same age as Michael, but she already looked like an adult. Her posture was almost regal and her gaze was so self-assured, it was arrogant.

  Kellie hurried past, out of their way, almost running for the cottage door. She felt sick as she opened it and went inside, flattening herself against it as she slammed it shut.

  Her cheeks burned as she looked around the cottage: at the bedraggled duvet by the fire where Ben had spent the night. All she wanted to do was to get as far away as possible.

  This was disastrous. She wasn’t supposed to meet Taylor like that: not without Elliot, not before Elliot and Isabelle had broken up. She felt as if everything she’d planned had just shifted further out of her reach.

  Worse than this, she felt something else. Impossible as it seemed, she was sure that Taylor knew.