The Little Vintage Carousel by the Sea

by Jaimie Admans

  ‘What are you going to do?’

  I grab my bag and run out of the office. ‘I’m going to write an article about finding a man!’

  Chapter 22

  The following Wednesday, I squash my way onto the early morning train to Maîtresse, although Daph won’t tell me why, considering I don’t work there anymore. As I stand crammed against a rail with the corner of someone’s handbag digging into my back, I wonder why she was so insistent that I get this train. It’s not like I have to be there by nine o’clock now, surely I could’ve come later when it’s less crowded.

  The tube smells like Satan’s unwashed scrotum, and I lean my head against the rail I’m holding on to and close my eyes, picturing the tranquillity of the cottage garden in Pearlholme instead of the sweaty armpit against the side of my face.

  June has moved into July now. The PPP would’ve been judged last weekend, and I keep wondering if we won. Everyone kept saying we would, and Nath deserved it for the amount of work he put in. Thinking about that makes me think about Charles and Camilla and the other villagers, all of whom have undoubtedly heard about what happened between us by now.

  I keep telling myself not to lose hope. When the final part of the article is published, I’m going to print it out and send it to the cottage, and hopefully he’ll read it and realise that I did care. It won’t be enough to make up for how I treated him, I know that, but I also know that I can’t leave things as they are. Nathan deserves better than that.

  The person with the handbag in my back steps backwards, jabbing it into my ribs instead, and my eyes spring open, blinking in the bright artificial light as they lock on to a man at the other end of the carriage. He’s standing up and holding on to a rail like I am, his attention on the phone in his hand, but it’s him. Just like it was before.

  Train Man.

  Nathan.

  I feel like time has stopped. Or like I’m hallucinating. What would he be doing in London? It can’t be him. But his height makes him stand out above the people surrounding him, and the way his eyes crinkle as he squints down at his phone … that’s the kind of thing you don’t hallucinate.

  The noisy tube train, the sniffing and clearing of throats, the ringtones of phones, the beeps, the conversations … it all fades away as I push myself upright, my heart suddenly pounding fast, at odds with the way the world turns to slow motion as he lifts his head, almost like he can feel my eyes on him, and his eyes lock on to mine too.

  I expect him to turn away at the sight of me, but he suddenly stands up straight and his mouth curves up a tiny bit at each side, and it’s impossible to look away.

  The now-familiar butterflies start flapping in my stomach, except they don’t feel like butterflies anymore, they feel like hummingbirds with their wings fluttering eighty times per second.

  His face slowly spreads into a smile as he looks at me, and I feel myself smiling back, unable as always not to return Nathan’s smile whenever it’s directed at me. The dimples appear and he starts making his way towards me.

  Never mind Sliding Doors, maybe I’ve ventured into Groundhog Day and gone back to the start of the day we were last on this train together until I have a chance to fix what went wrong. Bill Murray is sure to pop out at any second.

  I don’t even realise I’m moving until someone barks an angry ‘ouch’ in my direction when I accidentally tread on their toes. I turn to apologise and half-expect the illusion of Nathan will have disappeared by the time I look back.

  He’s still there, manoeuvring his way through the packed carriage towards me. He tilts his head like he’s trying to hold my gaze, and it makes that now-familiar feeling of nervousness and excitement twist in my belly.

  It seems like a lifetime until we’ve edged our way across the train to each other.

  ‘Hi,’ I say nervously, my body pressed against his because there’s barely room to breathe on this train, not that I’m complaining about that, but the last time I saw him, he definitely didn’t seem like he’d want my body anywhere near him ever again.

  ‘Hi.’ He grins like his smile is too wide for his face to contain and looks down at his phone again. ‘I recently went looking for a missing man, a man of mystery, a man who had never been found before. He isn’t the man I set out looking for, but he’s the one I want to talk about today.’ He reads the first line of my article in a funny accent.

  ‘Is that supposed to be me?’ I ask instead of the eleventy-billion other more appropriate questions I could ask him.

  His teeth pull his lower lip into his mouth and his eyes are dancing again. ‘Abraham Elwood was a barker for a carousel on Scarborough seafront. In 1896, at nineteen years old, he began carving a carousel of his own, the most gorgeous, intricate carousel that he’d probably be proud to know hasn’t lost any of its charm in the century since he finished it. The carousel was a gift to show his love for a lady who had waited six years for him to finish it, but was unfortunately destined to wait for him forever, because that’s exactly what she did when he went missing just months after finishing the carousel. He was declared dead in 1901. Lost at sea.’

  He lowers his head so I can hear him. ‘This answers every question we had about the carousel. Ivy knew he was dead, but his body was never found, so she always had hope that he would come back to her. That the carousel music from the cliff top would guide him home. She knew that he would love her for as long as the carousel kept turning. She was keeping him alive in the only way she could.’

  I look up at him, still trying to convince myself that he’s really here and that he doesn’t hate me as much as he did the last time I saw him. ‘She was waiting for a miracle that never came.’

  ‘But she believed in their love so strongly that she never gave up.’ He smiles that secret smile that makes me feel like I’m the only one who’s ever seen it. ‘It’s quite romantic when you think about it, isn’t it?’

  ‘You don’t believe in romantic old stories, Nath.’ I fight the urge to reach up and brush his hair back. It’s so tempting this close, with the way his aftershave has blocked out the other smells around me, the way his voice blocks out all other sounds.

  ‘This isn’t just a story though, is it? This is fact. You found all this because you knew I needed to know.’ He taps his phone and turns it to show me, and I love that he’s so excited that he’s sharing it with me like I’ve never seen it before. ‘This is a copy of the actual newspaper report about his boat sinking. He was going to get material for her wedding dress, Ness. This is so much more than history to me now – I feel like we actually know these people. Look at this. You even found their death certificates. Ivy Loren. Died 1956, aged eighty-two, heart failure. How did you get all this?’

  Another tube stop is announced and people flock past us, and I like the way his arm slides around me and pulls me tighter against him, holding me steady.

  ‘Until last Friday, I was a fact-checker. For my last trick, I decided to check some facts,’ I say after one set of people have swarmed off and another have swarmed on. ‘We knew where he lived, we knew his occupation, we knew Ivy’s name, and the date of the carousel. There was a census taken every ten years back then. It wasn’t that hard to narrow down in the end. Once I had a name, I could search through the national archives and build on what we already knew.’

  ‘You really quit your job?’

  I nod. ‘I know you don’t believe me, but I wasn’t using you to further my career. I used my job as an excuse to come to Pearlholme and find you. That’s why it kept going so wrong – because I didn’t need an excuse. As soon as I met you, I knew I was exactly where I was supposed to be.’

  ‘You solved the mystery. You found out who he was. For me.’

  I reach out and slip my fingers around his. ‘For me too. I care about that carousel, Nath. And I care about you, and I wanted to show you that you were right. I wanted you to know that even when you doubt yourself, I don’t.’

  ‘I liked the bit about the carousel restorer.’ He’
s blushing as he speaks.

  ‘Ah, you mean the paragraph I agonised over for hours to try to make it sound casual and detached?’ I take the phone out of his hand and scroll down until I find the words, even though I know them off by heart anyway. ‘And then there’s the man I did set out to find. A beautiful carousel restorer who can look at things and instantly see how to make them better. A man who’s inspired me to want something more out of life. A man who’s made me realise there’s a difference between being happy and being distracted from how sad you are. A man who knows that if there’s something missing in your life, it is generally always an ice cream.’

  The train jolts and I fall against him, and his arms encircle me again, but not just because he’s holding me up this time. He pulls me in tight and drops his head to rest on mine, his mouth moving against my ear. ‘I’m sorry about the other day. It took me back in time and I shut down rather than listening to you. I knew I knew you better than that, I knew that nothing between us had been pretend, and I just … I don’t know … I’m so damaged—’

  ‘You’re perfect.’

  ‘So are you.’ His lips press into my cheek, and I giggle because he makes the loudest ‘mwah’ sound and several people turn to look at us, and I wait for him to start blushing with embarrassment, but he doesn’t.

  ‘How do you have that, anyway? It hasn’t been published yet. Zinnia refused to put it online until next week when she’s done some damage control.’ I push his phone back into his hand, even though I strongly suspect I know exactly how Daph’s been spending her last week before maternity leave.

  ‘Daphne emailed it to me.’

  ‘How does Daph have your email address? I don’t even have your email address. I wanted to call you but …’

  ‘We never swapped numbers. I know. It’s ridiculous when you think about it, right? I only ever called you on my phone. I didn’t expect things to end like that …’ He shakes his head. ‘And her email said something about using her journalistic powers that us mere mortals mustn’t question to track me down, but what she actually did was phone The Sun & Sand, who phoned Camilla, who got it from my booking form, and couldn’t wait to tell me about the trail of espionage. I think her and Charles are applying to join MI5 next week.’

  ‘That sounds like Daph all right,’ I say fondly. I know she felt bad about the Train Man articles, but that’s going above and beyond, even for her.

  I look up at him and his eyes are smiling, the crow’s feet crinkling up around them, and it’s never been more difficult to resist kissing someone in my life.

  ‘What are you doing back in London?’ I force myself to think about something else. ‘And on a train? You hate travelling and crowded places.’

  ‘Not as much as I hated losing you last week. I’m on my way to Maîtresse to try to win you back.’

  ‘I’m on my way to Maîtresse. Daphne did tell you I don’t work there anymore, didn’t she?’

  ‘She did, but she also said you’d be in this morning if I wanted to catch you. And if you don’t work there anymore, why are you going?’

  ‘I don’t know. Daph told me to. She said she had a surprise for me, something that was too heavy for her to carry while pregnant …’ I trail off as I fall in. ‘And I’ve just met it. You’re the surprise. She was making sure we’d meet again.’

  ‘Well, I’m definitely too heavy to carry.’

  ‘She could’ve just given you my address, I wouldn’t have minded.’ I glance up at him. ‘She always writes about couples who meet in unusual ways – she probably wants an article out of this.’

  ‘I don’t mind that. I just want you, Ness.’ His finger slides along my jaw and he tilts my head up to look at him. ‘I’ve been alone for so long, I hadn’t realised how much had been missing from my life until I met you. You made me feel loved in a way I didn’t think existed. I’ve tried so hard to convince myself I don’t want a relationship, but now I don’t know how to be without you. If you’ll give me another chance?’

  I don’t realise I’m crying until he wraps his arms around me and pulls me against his chest. ‘I’m so sorry about the articles, Nath. It wasn’t meant to go as far as it did,’ I say into his T-shirt. ‘I was so scared last week. I know we haven’t known each other long but I can’t imagine my life without you in it.’

  ‘Maybe there’s a little magic in that old carousel after all …’ He waggles his eyebrows when I look up at him. ‘All I know is that I look forward to finding out.’

  I can feel my pulse thrumming in my lips, all over my body, as he lowers his head to mine, and everything stops. The whole world stills and every noise fades away to nothing but Nathan, the scent of his aftershave, the feel of his mouth against mine, his hand in my hair, and the complete relief that nearly knocks me off my feet as I cling on to him. I hadn’t realised until this moment how scared I was that I’d never get to kiss him again.

  My hand automatically goes to his shoulder and he pulls me impossibly closer, having seemingly forgotten that we’re in the middle of a very packed train, and somewhere in the recesses of my mind, I’m sure the announcement for our stop came three stations ago.

  I let myself get lost in his kiss, swept away by him, and let go of all the excuses I’ve built my life around in the past few years. This kiss, and a future with him, is worth every risk I’ve always been too scared to take.

  When we pull apart, there’s a round of applause, cheering, and whistling from the rest of the carriage, and this time he does blush, resting his forehead in my hair and turning his face away.

  I’m blushing too, but I don’t care. ‘You hate kissing in public.’

  ‘Again, not as much as I hate losing you. Besides, I’m not planning on staying in London. I don’t give a toss what these people think.’

  ‘You wouldn’t be planning on going back to Pearlholme, would you?’

  ‘You have to come back, Ness. We won the PPP but they wouldn’t give me the trophy because that whole garden was you, your idea, your creativity, and you’re not there. People keep saying they want you to do theirs next year because no one’s garden looked as good as ours.’ He swallows. ‘And it is ours. If we want it. Camilla keeps saying she’s getting too old to do holiday lets, and she knows how much I love it there. She asked if I wanted to rent the cottage on a more permanent basis and be a proper tenant, but I can’t imagine living there without you.’

  I know my face has lit up because I see the joy reflected in his eyes. ‘What about work?’

  ‘We’ll figure it out. I can’t live in London anymore, and I don’t think you can either. Most of my jobs are out-of-office anyway, but when I’m needed in the workshop, it would be easier to commute to it and live somewhere that makes me happy the rest of the time. And Camilla’s list of work she wants you to do is growing by the day. If she gives up the cottage, she’s going to get involved with the hotel instead. She wants you to oversee it. She’s determined to make it the best hotel in the north, rather than the one thing that lets Pearlholme down. She’s already been out with her machete chopping branches off overgrown trees. Charles is positively overjoyed, as you can imagine.’

  The sarcasm makes me laugh. I grin at him, my face genuinely aching from smiling so much, a smile that’s barely faded since the last time I saw him across a crowded train carriage, on a morning that feels like it might have been just a little bit magical after all.

  Chapter 23

  The sun is shining down on us as we gather at the beach where Nathan and I have spent the past three weeks restoring the carousel. I’ve sanded and painted the horses and learned how to fix broken wooden limbs and reattach lost ears, while he’s painstakingly checked and repaired every part of the carousel and rebuilt it one piece at a time. We’ve been to every DIY shop in Yorkshire to match the original paint colours, we got a local artist to repaint the decorative panels with scenes from the area, and found a haberdasher online who still manufactured the pink and yellow ribbons used for the canopy all those years ag
o.

  ‘It was worth the trip up,’ Daphne says, pushing baby Ivy in her pram with Gavin by her side.

  ‘And I promised we wouldn’t wait until Christmas to see you again, didn’t I?’ Mum says, patting Nathan’s arm, who looks genuinely overjoyed to see my parents, despite the fact he probably didn’t bank on seeing them again quite so soon.

  All the villagers are here too: Bunion Frank and his Labrador, the woman from The Sun & Sand and the woman who works in the shop, old couples who keep coming over and asking how much I charge for garden design services. There are parents with children who have come for a day on the beach and stumbled across the opening of the carousel, and others who have heard about it and come specifically to have a first ride on the historic merry-go-round, and of course, Pearlholme’s very own royal couple, Charles and Camilla, are cutting the ribbon.

  Camilla claps to get everyone’s attention. ‘Thank you all for coming. This carousel has been at the heart of a mystery that’s haunted Pearlholme for many years, and I’m pleased to say that this restoration puts some old ghosts to rest.’

  ‘And lets many men sleep easier in their beds!’ Charles guffaws.

  Camilla wallops him before he can explain any further with children present, and points to an engraved plaque beside the carousel that tells the story of Abraham and Ivy, sharing their love with a new generation.

  Nathan has turned around the panel that hid Abraham’s message to Ivy. It’s now in the centre of the carousel for all to see so their love will live on, until the next time the carousel stops turning, which won’t be for many years with Nathan around.

  Camilla and Charles hold a pair of oversized scissors and cut the ribbon between them, and the crowd on the beach whoops and cheers as everyone starts lining up for a ride.

  Charles delays letting anyone on until Nath and I have stepped onto the suspended wooden platform and have first choice of the horses, and he pulls me across to a certain one. It’s not the lead horse – that’s still Ivy’s – but there’s something about this horse that I’ve been taken with. It had a missing ear, chips out of its trimmings, and two broken legs, and it’s the one I’ve been practising on while I learnt the techniques Nath has showed me. It’s white with a pale pink mane and turquoise trappings, a fuchsia saddle with sparkling gems embedded around the edge, and a bridle made of tiny carved daisies. It still has a few scars, but they give it character, and I hope that some little girl will choose it as a favourite and always ride this one whenever they come here, just like I did with my favourite when I was young.