by Megan Tayte
Luke was touching my face anxiously. ‘Why now?’ he said. ‘Do you feel bad? Are you worse?’
‘No,’ I replied honestly. ‘It’s not that day, Luke. I feel okay. It’s just – this will be hard. And I want it done, out of the way, so that all we have ahead is good times. Will you let me do this now? Please?’
He sighed. ‘Okay.’
‘Once more with feeling.’
He smiled. ‘Okay!’
It took me two hours to finish on the computer. During that time Cara came in for breakfast and then took Chester out for a long walk, and Luke kept himself busy making batches of spiced cookies that filled the room with the mouthwatering scent of Christmas. When I was done, I sent two documents to print from the wireless printer in the corner of the room, and then beckoned Luke over. He came with a steaming coffee each for us and sat beside me.
‘Right,’ he said, eying the sheets of paper on the table. ‘Hit me with it.’
‘This one,’ I said, picking up the top sheet, ‘is a list of files on the laptop. All sorts, in case you need it, but these are the main ones.’ I pointed to the top two items on the list: Luke and Cara. ‘Letters for each of you.’
‘What about your mum?’
‘All set up. Scheduled emails. A lot of them.’
‘Are you really not going to tell her? What happens when the emails run out?’
‘It’s the best I can do, Luke.’
When he said nothing, I moved on to the second sheet, a printout of an internet banking transaction. I handed it to him, and watched as his eyes scanned the page. When he looked up he was frowning.
‘I don’t understand,’ he said.
I pointed to a number. ‘This is my account.’ I slid my finger down a line. ‘This is your account. I got the number off your cheque book.’
His eyes widened. ‘You transferred money to me?’
‘All of it.’
‘Scarlett, no! I don’t want your money!’
‘I know. You want me. But it’s just going to sit there, Luke, doing nothing. And you have no job now. And Cara’s been working so hard to set up her business on a shoestring. I want you both to have it.’
He swallowed and looked down at the paper again. ‘Hang on,’ he said. ‘You’ve got the decimal point in the wrong place.’
‘No, I haven’t.’
‘Yes, you have!’
‘No. I haven’t.’
‘Scarlett! This is –’
‘A lot of money. Yes, I realise that. It’s my father’s payoff. I don’t want it. I don’t need it! Take it. Use it!’
He stared at me, and then dropped the paper and sank his head into his hands.
‘This is a good thing, Luke,’ I said, rubbing his back. ‘Think about it – Cara’s fine now. You could go to chef school. Get a job in some fancy restaurant in London, or Paris. Hell, you could open your own restaurant.’
A droplet of water fell onto the printout, obscuring half of the transfer sum.
‘I don’t want to,’ Luke said brokenly. ‘I don’t want any of that without you, Scarlett.’
I wrapped my arms around him and held him tight, rocking him gently, through the tears that followed. Then, when his breath was no longer catching, I let him go and said:
‘Life goes on, Luke. I want to think of you living.’
He lifted his head to look at me. ‘But what about you?’ he said. ‘How does life go on for you? What will you be doing?’
‘Finding my sister.’
‘But how? Where is she? What danger will you be in trying to save her?’
‘I don’t know.’
‘This is crazy, Scarlett! We’ll call Jude. Make him come and explain.’
‘No, we won’t. I don’t want to hear about what comes after. None of that’s real. I don’t want it to be real yet. I just want to be here, with you.’
I picked up my coffee, forgotten on the table, and took a sip. It wasn’t hot, but it was steadying.
‘But Scarlett, don’t you see, I need to know. It will tear me apart when you’re gone not knowing whether you’re okay.’
‘I have a plan for that.’
‘You do?’
‘Yes. Jude will come back. Afterwards. With a letter from me.’
‘But... will he do that?’
‘Yes.’
‘How can you be sure?’
‘Because it’s the right thing to do. And Jude cares about doing the right thing.’
He was silent, and I wondered what he was thinking about. Judging by the look on his face, he wasn’t entirely convinced that the words ‘Jude’ and ‘right’ belonged in the same sentence. Jude’s act of healing had gone some way to diffuse the distrust in Luke, but not all the way. When it came down to it, Jude was still the guy who was taking his girlfriend away, and I wasn’t sure he could ever forgive that.
‘Luke,’ I said, touching his hand. ‘Let it go. This life is my focus. That world can wait. I need your support today. Please.’
The ice in his eyes melted, and he kissed me softly. Then, in a resolute tone, he said, ‘Right. You’ve written letters, you’ve scheduled emails, you’ve given away an exorbitant amount of money – what’s left on the list?’
I let my glance flick to the tiger, sitting in the doorway, watching.
‘Some goodbyes,’ I said sadly.
49: ALWAYS
We began at the residential home, with Grannie Cavendish. We sat together and watched Sleeping Beauty, and talked about fairytales and happy-ever-afters and what Harold down the corridor had done to irritate her this week. Then I kissed her soft, lined cheek and said goodbye, and she patted my hand and said, ‘Sleep tight, Little Blue Fairy.’
Next we went to Si’s, and talked surfing with him and Geoff and Duvali and Andy over bottles of Coke. Before we left, I excused myself to use the bathroom, and ducked my head into the office at the front of the house. I sat on the sofa and closed my eyes and relived the Cinderella moment I’d once had there with Luke. Then we left, with nothing more than a casual, ‘See you later.’
We drove slowly into the city, so I could take in everything – every landmark, every place that held a memory – to Royal William Yard, and we ate lunch in the River Cottage Canteen at our table, the one we’d had on our first date. The Mount Edgcumbe country park called to me from across the water; I wanted to take the passenger ferry over and walk up to the folly, where we’d had our first kiss, but Luke vetoed that – too far, too cold, too risky. Instead, I settled for climbing the steep steps to the parkland above the naval yard and walking along until we could see the folly high up on the land opposite. It looked so lonely and precariously placed. I wondered how long it would continue to cling to the hillside before it tumbled onto the rocks and waves far below.
When I started shivering Luke hustled me back to the van. He drove to Twycombe with the heaters blowing full blast, and by the time we reached the village I was ready to brave the elements again. We walked onto the beach and right down to the waterline. Luke stood at my back, a giant windbreak, his arms wrapped tightly around me, and I leaned into him and watched the grey waves ebb and flow, thinking of all I’d felt here, on this beach, in these waters: fear, horror, thrill, peace, passion, love.
In a little while, the breaking waves reached the tips of our trainers, and it was time to retreat. We walked back to the promenade, and Luke paused by his van, but I tugged his hand to keep him moving. I wasn’t done in the cove quite yet.
From the clock tower of St Mary’s church, a sorrowful angel watched us approach. The colours of the stained glass were muted in the gathering dusk. Less beautiful by far. The thick wooden doors of the church were shut, but under Luke’s hand they eased open and we stepped into the church. Inside, the lights were on but the space was deserted – Luke tried the vestry, and I called out, but there was no sign of the reverend. I was disappointed. I’d wanted to see him, to thank him.
The church was warm, so warm it made my limbs heavy. I sank onto the fro
nt pew and Luke settled beside me. We sat quietly for a while, still, looking toward the sanctuary and its focal point, the altar, as if it were Sunday service and we were listening to a sermon. Respectfully, but not without doubts.
‘Do you believe there’s a God?’ asked Luke.
‘I don’t know,’ I said. ‘I used to think so. I want to think so now.’
‘If there’s a God, how can he take you away?’
‘I suppose if the reverend were here he’d say there is a God, and he gave you and me the gift of all we’ve had together.’
‘But it’s not enough. It’s not enough time.’
I sighed heavily, and he looked at me. ‘What is it?’ he said.
‘I just...’ I took his hand, and said quickly, clumsily: ‘I want to say something meaningful. That what we’ve had is enough, because time isn’t linear, and every moment we’ve had will exist eternally, and we can live in those moments forever. That you can hold on to me, knowing I’m out there, remembering you, loving you, always. That when we’re apart you can see me in the sunrise and feel me in the breeze on your skin and hear me in the crash of the waves. I want to say something beautifully poetic about lying with you for eternity in a field of forget-me-nots beneath a cloudless sky. But I can’t.’
He smiled and touched his forehead to mine. ‘You just did,’ he murmured.
‘No,’ I said. ‘I didn’t, Luke. I didn’t say always. Or forever. Or infinity. I want to, and I know you want to, because it feels right, because we love each other, because what we’ve had isn’t enough and we want more, and forever is more.
‘But forever wouldn’t be fair on you, Luke. You have a whole life ahead. So many years. You can’t hold on to me. You can’t give me your heart to keep. This isn’t a fairytale. This is real life. And ours isn’t the love story of the century, it’s the story of one summer and one autumn and one winter. Just a chapter in your life. When you’re old and grey, you’ll look back and you’ll remember that girl you loved first. But there’ll be so much more in your heart than this love. And that’s okay, Luke. That’s how it has to be.’
He stood up then and walked away from me, over to the pulpit. I saw his shoulders trembling beneath his coat, his hands fisted at his side, his head bowed.
‘Luke...’ I said, and I began to stand.
But he held up a hand and said, without turning: ‘Please, Scarlett. Give me a minute.’
He was angry. I knew him well – he wanted to turn around and yell at me. How dare I suggest he move on? How dare I give him permission to find some other girl? Why was I so goddam calm and gracious and sensible about it all? But the truth was, if he’d looked in my eyes right then, he’d have seen that I was none of those things. Every word I’d said to him in this place had sliced through me. The thought of him with some other girl, playing chicken with the waves, sharing a cake, laughing, tickling, kissing... it was agony. I wasn’t calm. I wasn’t gracious. I had no desire to be sensible. But there was no shying away from the fundamental truth: when you love someone, when you really-true-love-love someone, then you have to set them free.
I don’t know what Luke found in that corner of the church, but when he came back to me the tension in him had lifted. He stooped down, and I thought he meant to sit beside me again, but he kept lowering until one knee met the cold stone of the floor. He took my hands in his, and he said with a smile that told me he really-true-love-loved me:
‘You’re wrong about the always. Scarlett Blake and Luke Cavendish. For a summer and an autumn and a winter they took each other. To have and to hold. For better, for worse. For richer, for poorer. In sickness and in health. To love and to cherish... till death did they part. That’s how I’ll remember us, always. Do you promise to remember us that way, always?’
Leaning into him, I touched my lips to his. ‘I do,’ I promised. I threw my head back and shouted so that the words rang out in the empty church: ‘I do, I do, I do.’
*
Darkness had fallen by the time we left the church, and the lanes leading to the cottage were the nightmarish tunnels of a labyrinth. The cottage, when it came into view, was like something out of a ghost story – eerie, desolate, dark. I felt a terrible pang for having abandoned my little home. I’d been back only briefly since I’d left, to gather clothes and books and other items for Luke’s house. The plan had been to grab and run today too – we’d only come to collect a load of Christmas presents I’d bought online for Luke and Cara and unthinkingly had shipped here. But now, as I stepped inside the cottage and flicked the light switch to disperse the shadows, I felt a desire to be here, just for a little while, on this day of goodbyes.
I said as much to Luke, and he agreed. He headed off to the kitchen to fire up the old boiler, while I moved from room to room, trailing my hand over my grandfather’s writing desk, my grandmother’s favourite easy chair. I loved this place. I would miss it.
The fridge was empty, the cupboards pretty bare, so we had to make do with soup-in-a-cup followed by tinned custard for dinner. But we made an occasion of it, eating by candlelight at the kitchen table, the radio playing softly in the background. Then we moved to the living room, and Luke lit more candles and we curled up on the sofa and watched mindless television.
I must have dropped off, because one minute I was watching a politician clatter around a ballroom dancefloor in a revealing flamenco dress, and the next a panel of judges was telling some sweaty bloke clutching a microphone that he’d really made the song his own. I sat up groggily and Luke said, ‘Bed?’
‘Bed,’ I agreed.
He kissed my cheek and said, ‘Up you go. I’ll lock up down here.’
I stumbled drowsily out into the hall and peered at the grandfather clock for the time. The hands were at the four and the seven. That wasn’t right. No ticking, I registered belatedly. It needed to be wound. Well, that would have to wait.
I went through the motions sluggishly in the bathroom, but in the bedroom I didn’t bother doing anything more than pull off my jeans and collapse into bed. Soon, Luke slipped under the covers with me and I reached for him and started kissing him, slowly, sleepily.
‘Shush,’ he said. ‘Rest now. There’s time enough for that tomorrow.’
So I snuggled into his arms, and his arms relaxed around me, and we drifted off in the darkness.
And we didn’t hear the candle fall.
And we didn’t smell the smoke.
And we didn’t feel the heat rising.
And we didn’t see the yellow glow of light flickering through the floorboards.
We slept, dreaming of a tomorrow that would never be.
50: KINDLING
The bonfire at Hollythwaite.
Tyger, tyger, burning bright.
Sienna circling joyously, taunting the beast in the flames.
My mother writhing on a throne, tied down, fighting her bonds.
A stranger stroking my face. ‘Sleep now. Sleep.’
Flames, consuming.
Smoke, suffocating.
‘Sleep now. Sleep.’
51: WHEN ANGELS CRY
I woke up with a single word on my lips: ‘No.’
I didn’t know what I was responding to, but when I opened my eyes I saw it wasn’t a what, it was a he. Silhouetted at the window, a man. Impossible to identify in the low light and through the smoke.
The smoke.
Smoke.
Smoke in the room!
‘No!’ I shot upright. ‘No – no!’ I shoved Luke. ‘Wake up! WAKE UP!’
His eyes flew open, and he took it all in – the smell, the smoke, the heat. But not the man at the window. He was gone.
We both flew out of the bed – he the window side, me the door side. I crashed into the bedside table and saw, too late, the small blue shards that littered it. The chalcanthite, smashed to pieces.
Luke was at the window, wrestling against the old sash mechanism. ‘Quickly,’ he yelled, ‘it’s the only –’
But the res
t of his words were drowned out in a wrenching creak, and I threw myself back into the wall as an old ceiling beam collapsed, bisecting the room, and a wall of fire sprang up between us. For a minute, we just stood there, staring at each other through the flames. Then we began shouting:
‘There’s no way through. I can’t get to you!’
‘The window! You have to jump now – quickly.’
‘No! I won’t leave you.’
‘You have to. You can’t die here!’
‘Neither can you!’
‘I’ll go out the door. I’ll be okay. Go – jump – quickly!’
‘Scarlett.’ He reached out a hand, palm first.
I mirrored him, and then begged, ‘Go, please.’
I didn’t hear his last words over the roaring in my ears, but I saw them on his lips: ‘I love you.’
‘I love you,’ I cried, and then, without waiting to see what he would do, I turned away from him.
When I opened the door the wall of heat that hit me was so fierce that I thought I would melt, but I stepped out and slammed the door shut behind me. Some distant part of my brain registered that there were no flames up here, so it was strange that a burning beam had fallen in my bedroom. But there wasn’t time to think, only to find a way out. Walking was too much – I dropped to my knees and crawled along the landing.
I nearly made it to my sister’s room. I was on the threshold when an old, creaking floor joist gave way. And then, so quickly time must have been folded, I wasn’t upstairs any more; I was downstairs, in the living room.