by Kate Field
She stopped. Joel hadn’t been around when she’d been approached about the book, and she’d forgotten to mention it to him. How could she not have told him? He would be thrilled for her. She’d send him a text when Daniel had gone. Or should she wait to tell him tonight? Her stomach spasmed at the thought of seeing Joel later.
Daniel’s frown clawed her back to the present.
‘Where will you find the time for all this extra work? You barely have much time with Megan as it is. That isn’t a criticism,’ he said, forestalling the argument that he must have guessed was on its way. ‘Let me help. I don’t understand. You were happy for me to support you before. I have even more obligation to do it now.’
Obligation. It was such an unattractive word.
‘I don’t want to be anyone’s obligation,’ Helen protested. ‘And while we’re talking about money, I don’t need you to pay the school fees either.’
He leaned forward.
‘You can’t change your mind about Broadholme. I thought you’d accepted the place.’
‘I have. But when I did, I spoke to Mrs King about the fees, and she explained that I could apply for a bursary as I’m a single parent on a low income. Confirmation came through this week.’
‘You’re not a single parent.’ Daniel’s fingers tapped his mug so hard that his coffee almost sloshed out.
‘Yes I am. It’s not an attempt to exclude you, it simply means that I’m not in a relationship, and there’s only one income coming into the house.’
‘At the moment.’
‘What do you mean?’ Helen ran nervous fingers over her chin. Surely she hadn’t missed the tell-tale signs of stubble rash?
Daniel smiled at her, and flicked a glance at Megan.
‘Now’s not the time. It can wait.’ He was still smiling. Helen had no idea what was going on. ‘What if we compromise? Give up the shop, but carry on with the crazy patchwork. Do the commissions, do the book, but fit it round Megan. Don’t you want to spend more time with her before she goes to school?’
Of course she did, and it was unfair of him to ask. The compromise he suggested had been the Holy Grail when she had first opened Crazy Little Things: she had wanted to reach the point where she could support herself from crazy patchwork alone. The retail side had been a necessary evil to earn some money initially, but had seemed too much hard work to keep going forever. Now she wasn’t sure. Apart from the practical point that the shop provided a showcase for her work, she loved working there, and dealing with the customers. She loved it even more so far at Church Farm, and the first two sessions of her sewing class had gone brilliantly well. Would she really want to give all that up?
‘Promise you’ll think about it?’ Daniel asked, stretching across and stroking her hand with his finger. Helen jumped. What was he doing? ‘Take as long as you need. You know I’m not going anywhere.’
Joel didn’t reply to Helen’s text telling him about the book. He didn’t call round later, either. In fact, he didn’t seem to return home at all. Helen looked out of the window so often her thighs began to ache with all the bobbing up and down. When ten o’clock came, she tried ringing, but his mobile was off or flat, and his landline went through to the answering machine. Helen went outside and looked at his cottage, which was in darkness. She rang the bell and knocked on the door, but there was no sign of life at all.
She looked again at the text he’d sent on Saturday night. It clearly referred to tomorrow night. Then she noticed the time and kicked herself. It had been sent after midnight, early on Sunday morning. He must have meant Monday night. But he didn’t show up then either.
Helen left the shop three times on Tuesday morning to visit Joel’s office, but it was locked up, and there was no sign that he had been there. His mobile was still off.
‘Has anyone seen Joel?’ she asked, with an attempt at nonchalance, when she returned to the Hay Barn for the third time. Only Saskia and Fiona were around, as it was Malcolm’s day off.
‘Not since Saturday,’ Fiona replied.
‘Have you tried the office?’
‘He’s not there.’
‘Is there a problem with the shop? Isn’t that typical on the day we don’t have Malcolm!’
How Fiona thought Malcolm would be good in a crisis was lost on Helen.
‘The shop’s fine. I only wanted to talk to him about the website,’ Helen improvised.
Saskia sidled out of her shop.
‘He’s staying down in London for a few days,’ she said, smiling at Helen.
‘With Liz? How do you know?’
‘He sent me a text.’
‘When?’
‘Sunday afternoon. Didn’t he tell you?’ Saskia’s smile grew broader. ‘I think he had a last-minute change of heart about coming back.’
About coming back? Or about her? Helen wondered as she drifted back to the comforting embrace of Crazy Little Things. It must be her, mustn’t it? Had she been no more than a drunken fumble, and now he was too embarrassed to face her? Had he only been interested in a one-night stand, while they were both drunk and away from home? His kiss hadn’t felt like that. But how else could she interpret his continuing absence, and the fact that he was texting Saskia while ignoring Helen’s calls?
Shortly before lunch on Friday, a woman came into the shop and looked round. She was vaguely familiar.
‘Hello,’ she said, catching Helen’s eye. ‘You don’t remember me, do you?’ She held out her hand. ‘Lucinda, from Lancashire Life. We met at Alex’s wedding. Didn’t Joel tell you I was coming today?’
‘No, I’ve not seen him for a few days.’
‘That explains your blank look. I only fixed it up yesterday. Sorry it’s such short notice, but we’ve had to pull a feature for legal reasons and when I mentioned Church Farm the editor agreed it would make an ideal filler. Do you mind if I take some photos?’ Her camera was out of her bag before Helen had chance to nod in agreement.
‘Is this the crazy patchwork you mentioned at the wedding?’ Lucinda asked, snapping away. ‘It’s beautiful. Tell me how it’s done again, and about yourself while I make some notes.’
Helen did, watching as Lucinda scribbled it all down.
‘You will feature the other artists as well, won’t you?’ Helen asked. ‘Malcolm and Fiona are here today. Saskia’s on her day off but we can open her shop if you want photos, and there are all the other buildings as well.’
Lucinda laughed.
‘Don’t worry, Joel has given me the grand tour. I’ve seen all the other artists. You were the only one left.’
‘Joel’s here? I thought he was away.’
‘He does look like he’s been travelling, but that rough, unkempt look is pretty appealing, if you know what I mean!’ Lucinda laughed again, but Helen couldn’t join in. Joel was here, but hadn’t returned any of Helen’s messages or calls. He hadn’t told her Lucinda was coming, or asked for her help as he had at the wedding. He had provided a tour of Church Farm, and avoided the Hay Barn. How much more clearly did she need it spelling out?
For the rest of the day she looked out through the shop, through the huge Hay Barn doors, wondering if she would catch a glimpse of him. And then she did – she was sure it was him, the back of his head turned resolutely away from the Hay Barn. It was too much. She followed him to his office, knocked on the door and marched in.
Lucinda hadn’t exaggerated about how he looked. His clothes were rumpled, tawny stubble covered his chin, and a paleness around his eyes suggested he needed sleep. But it was the eyes Helen noticed most, as they fixed on her as she barged through the door. Their expression was dead. With a jolt of shock, Helen realised it was the way Daniel had looked at her when he first came back. Seeing it from Joel was devastating. What had happened to him?
‘What’s wrong?’ she asked, moving nearer and reaching out to touch his arm. He jerked back as if her hand held a syringe of poison. ‘Has something happened?’
‘No.’
‘W
here have you been?’
‘I stayed on with Liz for a few days.’
He wouldn’t meet her eyes, and fiddled with some papers on his desk.
‘Why didn’t you tell me? I sent you dozens of messages. Why wouldn’t you take any of my calls?’
‘I didn’t feel like talking.’
‘And what about how I felt?’ Helen snapped. ‘How could you? How could you ignore me when you kissed me like… like…’
‘Like what?’ His fingers stilled on the papers.
‘Like you cared!’
‘I did care!’ For a second, the lights flashed back on in his eyes and she could see the emotion spilling out. ‘I thought…’
‘Thought what?’
‘I thought I’d fallen in love with you.’ A sort of shrug accompanied his words.
Love? He was in love with her? Helen hadn’t expected that. She hadn’t expected anyone to ever say that to her again, not the way she was now, and not after what she had done. And for Joel to say it… Her heart began to stretch, as if preparing to wake up. Then it occurred to her that he had used the past tense. Was that it, already?
‘Kissing me changed your mind, did it? I know I haven’t kissed anyone for five years, but I didn’t think it was that bad.’
‘It wasn’t. The kiss was perfect.’ His eyes were blank as he looked at her, but he couldn’t disguise the ache in his voice. ‘What changed my mind was discovering that you weren’t perfect. That I didn’t actually know you at all.’
‘What do you mean? Of course you do.’ But an icy drop of apprehension began to trickle down Helen’s spine.
‘I found out your secret.’
‘I don’t have a secret.’ The lie pooled around the small of her back.
‘But you did, didn’t you? I thought Fliss’ deception was as bad as it could get, but you take it to a whole new level. Because from what I’ve heard, it’s a good job we stopped at a kiss. If I’d gone back to your room – if there’d been an accident and you’d ended up pregnant – it might have been four years before I’d known anything about it.’
Oh God, he knew. Helen sat down on the desk, her legs too numb to support her. She had chosen not to tell him, fearing exactly this reaction, but she saw now, too late, how much better it would have been to tell him herself, and to explain why she had done it.
‘Who told you?’
‘One of your friends. A good friend to me, as it turns out.’
‘Kirsty?’ Helen asked. She was the only one who knew the story, but Helen couldn’t believe that Kirsty would have revealed it to Joel. ‘When did Kirsty tell you?’
‘Not Kirsty, Saskia. She saw us kissing outside the hotel. She sent me a series of texts with some information she thought I should know before it went further. Thank God she did.’
Now it all made sense. The figure Helen had seen darting into the hotel must have been Saskia: Saskia who had recently asked questions about Daniel, and who had never concealed her attraction to Joel and her resentment towards Helen. She had seen a way to scupper Joel’s interest in Helen and taken it. But however she had found out about Daniel, she couldn’t know the whole truth, and that meant Joel didn’t either.
‘What did Saskia tell you?’
‘Everything. That you were a bored ‘It girl’ who wanted a baby as the latest accessory. That you deliberately got pregnant, and dumped Daniel as soon as you were. That you didn’t tell him you were pregnant, and he only found out when he saw Megan for the first time last year. Are you going to tell me none of it is true?’
She couldn’t, and he must have seen that in her face. Joel sank into his chair.
‘It’s all been distorted,’ Helen protested.
‘Did you want the baby?’
‘Yes, there was no question of…’
‘Did you end the relationship with Daniel when you found out you were pregnant?’
‘Yes, but…’
‘Did you tell him you were having a baby?’
‘No, because…’
‘Did you tell him that Megan existed before he saw her?’
‘No,’ Helen replied dully. She saw the disappointment settle on his face. ‘Do you even want to hear the truth?’
‘What more is there?’ Joel’s voice sounded duller than Helen’s. ‘You’ve confirmed everything Saskia said.’
‘Only the facts, not the feelings. I loved Daniel. I would have done anything for him.’ Helen saw the pain ripple across Joel’s face, but pressed on. ‘We were about to start a new life in Hong Kong when I found I was pregnant. I knew Daniel didn’t want children yet, and it would ruin everything he had worked for. I thought that if he heard I was pregnant, he would either come back to England for me, or persuade me to have an abortion, and I couldn’t have lived with either of those alternatives. So I chose the third option. I didn’t tell him. I let him go to Hong Kong and have the life he wanted, and I brought up Megan on my own. She’s no accessory. She’s everything. You must have seen that.’
‘God, you’re incredible,’ Joel said, and for a second Helen thought that she had convinced him, until she saw from his face that it was no compliment. She wasn’t incredible in the way she had been before. ‘Do you really expect me to believe that you did this for him?’
‘No,’ she replied. It had been hope, not expectation, but as she looked at him, saw the ruins of his affection in his face, she realised that she had nothing left to lose. She might as well tell him the truth – the real truth, not the romanticised version she had told herself so often that she almost believed it. Perhaps it would even give her some peace to make her confession at last.
‘You’re right,’ she said. ‘I’m not perfect. And Saskia was right. I was a bored ‘It girl’, if that’s what you want to call me. I’d never had any real identity beyond being Patrick Walters’ daughter, and Daniel Blake’s girlfriend. And for a long time that was enough. But then it wasn’t. I started sewing again, and designing crazy patchwork, but that wasn’t enough either. I wanted something more, something of my own, some purpose to life. So I stopped using contraception, and no, I didn’t tell Daniel.’
Helen looked at Joel. He was still listening, but it was impossible to know what he was thinking. She carried on.
‘Then the job in Hong Kong came up, and it was going to be the most fantastic adventure. We only had a few weeks to sort it out, and in the excitement of it all, contraception never crossed my mind. I found out I was pregnant two days before I was meant to join him over there. You know what I did. I chose my baby over Daniel. I had found my something. My everything,’ she repeated. ‘So no, I didn’t act entirely for Daniel; in fact I probably acted entirely for myself. I will never regret having Megan. And I will never stop regretting how I’ve treated Daniel. You can’t possibly hate me for that as much as I hate myself. So now you know it all. I am selfish, inconsistent and completely imperfect, but I’m still the person you’ve come to know over the last few months.’
‘You’re not though, are you? You’ve lied about who you are from the start. All those times you told me you couldn’t afford to improve your website, or expand the business – when I arranged reduced rent at the shop and the cottage to help you out, persuaded my friends to do your removal to save you money – and it wasn’t bloody true! You’ve admitted it yourself, you’re rich! As Saskia said, the shop and the sewing are nothing but a rich girl’s hobby.’
‘I’m not rich.’
‘You can’t deny it! Your dad has a bloody CBE!’
‘That doesn’t make me rich.’ Helen banged her heels against the desk in frustration.
‘I should have worked it out from what you said at Liz’s house. The huge surprise party at Claridges, your dad flying around the world, and selling his business… It’s not the background of someone genuinely struggling to earn a living. I admired you so much, for who you are, what you’ve achieved, and none of it’s real. I can’t believe I’ve been taken in again. Do I have “idiot” stamped on my forehead, or do you t
reat all men like this? Because you’re good. You really know how to screw up a man. Perhaps you should add that to your list of classes in the Hay Barn.’
Helen jumped down from the desk. It would have hurt to hear anyone say these things about her. But from Joel… When only a few days ago his lips had persuaded her of such different feelings… She couldn’t bear it. And there was only one thing left she could think of to offer him: another truth, that she hadn’t even shared with Daniel.
‘Yes, I’ve been spoilt and selfish all my life, but having Megan changed everything. If you were listening to me at Liz’s dinner, you’ll also know that my parents are devout Catholics – devout to the extreme. I couldn’t stand all their holiness and morality as I was growing up, and rebelled in every way I could: smoking, drinking, playing truant, going out with countless boys – you name it, I probably tried it. When they found out that I was pregnant, and that Daniel had left me, they were horrified. It was the final straw, as far as they were concerned. Instead of coming to the hospital themselves, as proud grandparents, they sent a stranger to persuade me to give up Megan for adoption. They said that I wasn’t fit to be a mother, and that it would be best for both of us. Can you even begin to imagine how that felt?’
Helen could feel her heart breaking all over again as she remembered that time. Until then, she had truly believed that despite their initial disapproval, her parents would be thrilled as soon as her baby arrived.
‘From that moment, I haven’t accepted a penny from them. Adam lent me the deposit to rent a house and gave me a loan to open the shop – and I’m still trying to pay him back for both.’ She took a deep breath. ‘It’s been harder work than I ever expected, and quite terrifying. I’m up until the early morning to get everything done. Sometimes I’ve lived for days only on toast, because I couldn’t afford to feed us both. That’s how real this is. So you can accuse me of playing at having a career, but it’s not true. Not since I had Megan.’