London, 2010
As the innocence and charm of Inês’s words reeled her further and further in, Sarah found herself increasingly entranced, but also discomfited. It was a while before she recognised the negative feelings niggling at the back of her mind and even longer until she forced herself to put a name to them, ashamed as she was to find herself harbouring jealousy. How lucky for Inês to have been so young and so in love, a lifetime with the man of her dreams to look forward to. What she herself had longed for at the same age, had held in her hands but lost. She could deny to herself no longer that the real motivation for returning to Portugal was not just about a good job, a reassertion of her independence or to kick back against Hugo’s neglect.
It was about Scott.
Her first boyfriend, love of her life, the man who she could hardly bear the thought of seeing again, but equally could not get out of her mind or from under her skin. He had populated her dreams for two decades and around his memory she had spun an elaborate web of fantasies of what might have been, what could and should have been – if only. With him, she had always convinced herself, her life would have been so very different. So much better? Sometimes, and more and more frequently these days, it was compellingly beguiling to believe so. Now, having spent so many years trying, and failing, to forget about him, the moment of reckoning had arrived. Should she contact him? How could she? How could she not?
The network of friends and acquaintances from the year she had spent in Portugal had fragmented and dispersed over the two decades since. She was in regular touch only with Carrie, her vivacious, irrepressible, confrontational crony, with whom she had shared many adventures and experiences. Carrie and Scott had continued to correspond for a while and so Sarah knew that, after a few years back home in his native Canada, he had returned to live in Portugal, and that in all likelihood he was still there, working for the same Canadian/Portuguese shipping company. A similar career to Inês’s John, another thing that, at the time, Sarah had felt tied her even more tightly to her beloved great-aunt, her country and her heritage.
She would find his email, she told herself – so easy to do, these days, with the internet; she knew his firm’s name. She could send him a message, friendly but casual, announcing her impending presence in Lisbon and enquiring as to whether he would like to meet. She should do this to put to rest twenty years of regret, to close a door that had been left wide open.
Her stomach churned and flipped at the thought.
She found his company’s website in just a few seconds online. Closed it again, without clicking on the ‘our staff’ tab, or the ‘contact us’ button, though they boldly advertised themselves on the home page, inviting her. She reasoned with herself that she didn’t know if she was going to have time to fit in anything else but work, wouldn’t know her schedule for a few days yet, not until she’d firmed everything up and gone through all her checklists. There was no point contacting him and then having to cancel; that would be embarrassing, and simply a waste of time. And conversely, the later she got in touch, the more likely that he wouldn’t be able to make it, wouldn’t be in town or available, and then the whole thing would just go away and she’d know that it wasn’t because she had lacked the balls to do it, but just due to a simple matter of logistics, of busy lives and prior engagements. And anyway, how to explain a pre-planned meeting to Hugo? He might easily misinterpret such an action, and even if he didn’t, wouldn’t it be tantamount to throwing in his face the fact that their marriage was worn and crumbling, otiose? And would not that, in turn, draw to both of their attentions that they had let it get this way and that neither seemed able to diagnose the sickness nor prescribe the cure? Fiddling with the mouse at the same time as staring into space, a hot rush of shame engulfed Sarah. No matter what the hardship, she must stay true. If there were to be a meeting, it would be a chance one, organised whilst there.
Satisfied with this non-decision for the moment, Sarah concentrated on making preparations amidst dealing with all the mundanity of everyday life. The short amount of time leading to her departure date flew by in a whirl of planning and grocery shopping, chores and organisation, precluding too much introspection.
On her last day, she and Inês walked to the top of Kite Hill as they had so many times over the years. A stiff breeze blew down from the north, and Sarah felt its force as she helped Inês onto the bench and sat down beside her. Before them lay a sweeping view of London, the landmarks familiar from a lifetime of visits: St Paul’s and Battersea Power Station, the BT Tower and Canary Wharf. Over the years, new icons had been added to the old – the Millennium Dome, the London Eye, the Gherkin. The kite-fliers, always present at the weekends, were absent today, but instead, far away in the distance, Sarah could make out the hunched shapes of rooks pecking at the grass. They resembled black paper bags scattered at random, sullying the pristine green.
“You seem somewhat strained,” said Inês once they were settled, her frail voice battling the wind.
Sarah shifted uncomfortably. She could hide her feelings from most people; from Hugo, her mother, her friends. But not Inês.
“Just tired with getting everything sorted, making sure all the pieces of the jigsaw are in place.” She shrugged and hoped her excuse was enough. She had never talked about Scott because it had always been too raw, too agonising. Events of the past few days had shown her that it still was.
“Will you see any of your old companions in Lisbon?” asked Inês, as if she had read Sarah’s mind.
“Oh no,” replied Sarah, hastily. “I mean, I shouldn’t think so. I’ve lost touch with everyone but Carrie and she lives here.” She shrugged and pulled her hands further inside her coat sleeves.
“What about your special friend?” Inês continued, unperturbed by Sarah’s taciturnity. “Your boyfriend – Scott was his name, I seem to remember.”
Sarah watched as a chocolate brown Labrador raced towards one of the rooks in a vain attempt to catch it. The bird waited until the last moment to soar into the air and mock the dog from above.
“Scott, yes. Scott Calvin. Clever of you to remember.”
Just the simple act of saying his name sent shockwaves running through her. It was a name that evoked a lost existence, the utterance of which tore down the walls and barriers she had so carefully built and rebuilt, time and time again. It was a name that told of heat-soaked days on deserted beaches and tumultuous nights in the liquorice allsort pink-and-blue house in Alcantâra where she had lived all those years ago. Of sunlight that danced on cobbles and bleached the washing on the lines. Of the scent of sun-warmed skin and sweat and sex. Of the shallow dip between his neck and collarbone which, seen by the light of a full moon, made her heart overflow with an adoration that temporarily stilled her breathing.
It struck her how few times, in all the years, she had ever said his name aloud. There had been no reason to.
“You really loved him, didn’t you?” The question, uttered so gently, was like a thunder bolt.
Sarah felt the breeze snatch at her breath as she looked away and saw him before her; his crinkly-kind eyes, suggestive smile and messy, honey-brown hair. His skin, warm and brown, the colour of a smooth hazelnut shell. His warmth and strength, that encompassed her so entirely.
“Yes.”
It was impossible to answer with anything but the truth.
“So what went wrong, my dear? You never told me.” Inês’s question hung suspended in the air between them like the rook that still circled above.
“I guess I wasn’t ready to talk about it, then.”
“Are you now?”
Sarah lifted her blue-grey eyes to Inês and attempted a carefree laugh. “Now! Now there’s nothing to talk about.”
Another silence, filled only by the wind. Inês had been a surrogate mother to Sarah all the years that her mother Natalie had worked so hard building up her business. Inês had always been there for her, tending for her, caring for her, picking her up when she fell, physicall
y and metaphorically. They had always shared everything. Except this.
Inês’s lips trembled slightly, and she struggled to steady them before responding. “Is it really that simple?”
She held Sarah’s gaze as she spoke. Her black eyes, though age-paled and watery, were still piercing. “In my experience, that’s rarely the case.”
No. No, it’s not that bloody simple.
Sarah looked down at the bench and dug off a piece of flaking varnish with her fingernail. For a fleeting second she felt as if she were drowning, had to gulp for the air that the vicious gusts of wind seemed determined to deny her.
“Simple or not, it’s the way things worked out.”
It was a long time before either spoke again. Sarah found her thoughts drifting from her own dilemma, to which she had not yet worked out the solution, and towards the journal and to Inês’s youth. John, who she had loved so much, had joined up when war was declared and Inês hadn’t seen him for years.
“Did you miss him when he went away?” she asked, as the thought occurred to her.
Inês’s eyes were focused on the faraway dome of St Paul’s. “It was too far to go to him,” she replied, her voice strangely devoid of emotion. She seemed to understand what Sarah meant despite the lack of explanation. “Travel was difficult, then.”
“Of course, during the war, I suppose it must have been,” Sarah concurred. “And anyway, he was fighting, wasn’t he?”
The rooks in the belt of trees further down the hill began to caw cacophonously.
“Fighting?” questioned Inês, suddenly seeming confused, even alarmed. “No, no, there was a gun but it was an accident…” She tailed off, gazing into space.
Sarah frowned. John had definitely been a soldier, in a senior rank; Inês had his medals to prove it.
“The Second World War, John went back to England, didn’t he?” she elucidated, trying to quell the panic in her voice. Inês seemed to have aged so quickly lately; was this misunderstanding an indication that she was losing her marbles as well?
Realisation dawned on Inês’s face as she turned slowly to Sarah.
“Oh, John. Yes, of course, John.” She sounded relieved, as Sarah felt. Just a momentary memory lapse, after all. “You’re right, I had to stay put until it was all over. I missed him, but he survived. So many didn’t.”
There was a bluntness to her statement that Sarah put down to an unwillingness, common in that generation, to indulge personal memories of sadness when so many had sacrificed everything. The wind gathered strength and Inês shivered violently. Studying her closely, Sarah realised with a lurch of her heart how tiny, frail and very, very old she looked, all bundled up in her coat with strands of her hair, once ebony, now pure white, poking out from underneath her red beret.
“We need to get home. Come on, take my arm.”
Sarah escorted Inês back down the crumbling path, trying not to notice how painfully she walked.
4
London, 2010
That evening, Sarah’s friend Lorna had organised a farewell dinner for her; overkill, Sarah felt, as she was only going for six days and hadn’t wanted a big fuss made but still, any meal she didn’t have to cook herself was always welcome. Sarah and Hugo had met Lorna and her husband Rich by dint of having children at the same school and in the same class; Lorna was as outspoken as Sarah was reticent.
“But wasn’t Lisbon the place of your first love, Sarah?” demanded Lorna, true to form, as soon as they had settled into their seats at the pitted wooden table in their local pub. “Your grand amour?”
She looked at Sarah questioningly, smiling broadly, proud of recalling and advertising something of such significance. Sarah gulped hard, blushed and glanced involuntarily towards Hugo. She couldn’t believe that Lorna had even remembered this fact, blurted forth one drunken evening years before when she had been wheedling out confessions, immediately regretted. Fortunately, Hugo was busy contemplating the menu and didn’t seem to have heard.
“It was a long time ago,” she muttered, hoping the finality in her voice would put an end to the matter. “Really not important any more.”
The waiter came to the table. He pulled the cork on the bottle of red they’d ordered, Portuguese in honour of the occasion, and poured a glass for each.
“But darling!” exclaimed Lorna. “First love never dies. Isn’t that right, Rich?”
She and Rich were childhood sweethearts; Lorna had confided to Sarah once that she’d never had another boyfriend and Rich was the only person she’d ever slept with. Sarah had not mentioned that Rich, when under the influence of alcohol, sometimes seemed to have a severe case of WHD, ‘wandering hand disease’ as they had called it in sixth form and that she, Sarah, had been the victim of it on more than one occasion.
“What’s all this about?” Rich failed to endorse Lorna’s assertions about their everlasting love but instead turned to Hugo to question him. “You’re letting the wife go off cavorting unchaperoned in a city full of Lotharios?”
Rich made the trip sound outrageous and Sarah feckless and irresponsible. Why was everyone suddenly so interested in what she was doing?
“I guess so.” Hugo looked doubtful, as if he wasn’t quite sure where he had gone wrong, what he was supposed to have done or said. Everyone except Hugo, that was.
Sarah contemplated the irony of the fact that she would have been furious if Hugo had dared to try to stop her going for anything other than purely practical, childcare-related issues. But on the other hand – should he care more, should he be more protective of her, more concerned about the possibility that temptation might cross her path? It seemed that this did not even cross his mind. If it had, would she feel differently? Would it show her that she still had the care and devotion of the man she had married, rather than the rather impatient near-disregard that was usually directed her way?
Order pad rustling, the waiter came to the table and the distraction of choosing the dishes, selecting sides to share and making last-minute changes proved useful in moving the conversation on to other subjects.
As the meal drew to a close and they made moves to leave, Hugo got a message on his phone.
“Some of the boys are having a drink at the Gate,” he said to Sarah. “You don’t mind if I join them for a nightcap do you?”
Sarah instinctively looked at her watch. It was 10pm.
“You’ll be wanting to get to bed,” Hugo added, seeing her check the time. “I won’t be late – just a quick half and I’ll be back.”
“Fine.” Didn’t he want to come back with her, bid her an intimate farewell? Obviously not.
Kisses and hugs exchanged, the four parted company. It was only a few minutes’ walk home for Sarah. As she rounded the last corner, the streetlamp threw her shadow upon the wall of the end house, huge and distorted, a giant woman with oversized head and tiny feet looming large over the neighbourhood.
The phone on the hall table was flashing with a message when she got in. Pressing play, there was a long pause and Sarah was about to walk away, thinking it a drop-down from some irritating robot caller. And then a voice wavered out of the speaker, a voice so well known and loved that Sarah stopped immediately and bent close to listen, as it was very faint.
“It’s just me, dear, Inês. Before you go… I wanted to remind you to take the journal I gave you. It might… I think… I’d like you to have it there, and read it there. In Portugal.”
There was another pause.
“That’s all. Night night, dear Sarah.”
In her bedroom, having paid the babysitter and made a cup of camomile tea, she checked her bag once more for essentials ready for her early start the next day – passport, boarding pass and euros. Her notebook was safely stashed away, plus her laptop and the inordinate number of chargers – computer, phone, kindle, camera – that seemed to accompany any journey. At the very top of the suitcase, balancing on the rolled up clothes, lay the journal. Something was troubling Inês and it seemed tha
t somewhere in its pages might lie the secret.
Portugal, 2010
It was hot, intensely so, despite the protective cover of the branches. Sitting on a grassy tussock, Sarah leant back against the tree’s broad trunk and took a slug of water from the bottle in her bag. Around her, the harvest was in full flow, cloth-capped men of all ages working methodically from tree to tree, everything happening exactly the same way now as it would have done in Inês’s childhood, apart the use of tractors to haul away the crop rather than mules or horses. One by one the oaks were stripped of their outer skin, leaving skinny orange trunks that appeared strangely vulnerable in their nakedness. The air was redolent with the earthy smell of freshly cut cork bark.
Sarah looked down at the notebook on her lap, poised to capture the story of cork. On the cover was a picture of a princess, top-heavy in an oversized crown, that Honor had drawn for her by way of decoration. She thought of the children, where they would be and what they would be doing. At school right now, their identical tumbling chestnut hair most likely un-brushed without Sarah there to supervise. They would come home at three-thirty, cardigans lopsided with wrongly done up buttons, fingers stained with paint or glue, demanding snacks and cuddles and CBeebies, and for a whole week she would not be there. It was the first time she had left them for so much as a night.
Perched on her clump of grass in the shade of the cork oak tree, Sarah shivered as a cloud passed over. Weariness threatened to overwhelm her; she had been up since 4.30am and driven straight here from the airport. She opened the accusing notebook and scrawled some hasty notes, all the while preoccupied by the decision – to contact Scott or not – that awaited her when she got to her hotel in Lisbon. When next she looked up, she saw that João Pinheiro, proud possessor of an enormous black handlebar moustache that bounced up and down as he spoke, and also owner of the montado and her host for the day, was waiting by the jeep to take her back to the farmhouse for a late lunch.
Garden of Stars Page 4