The Faerie Tree

by Jane Cable

  She’d been better this morning, though. She had cried herself to sleep, so exhausted she lay motionless in my arms all night. But her breathing was steady and shallow and when she woke she said she felt totally different; refreshed and ready to face the day. I didn’t know how long she’d been holding those tears inside but it must have done her good for them to all come out.

  Rather than unlock the house I made my way across the lawn and through the gap in the hedge onto the field. The turned earth was fuzzy with tiny stalks of corn and the sky was a clear, pale blue. To my right in the woods every leaf seemed to be a different shade of green. As I slid down the bank to the Faerie Tree I noticed the first signs of bluebells pushing through. The wheel of the year was turning; the winter of loss relaxing its grip. Everyone was better off when they were in tune with nature so the timing of Izzie’s tears had been nigh on perfect. I looked through the branches to the sky and whispered some words of thanks.

  Closer to the tree I stopped and listened. I could see no-one, but people give their presence away first through sound. A dog barked, but that was some little distance away so I opened the box on the side of the tree and crammed the letters into the my pocket before scrambling back to the hedge. I knew Claire’s was one of them, but now that her wish had been granted I didn’t feel so bad about not being able to reply.

  Back in Jennifer’s kitchen I set the kettle to boil and pulled my pad and pen out of the drawer in the table. I loved opening the children’s letters, freeing myself to sink into their world of innocence where the fairies came properly to life. For Jennifer I think the hidden folk always had been real; for me, well, it was different.

  Of course there was the occasional child who didn’t believe but was after material gain; Xboxes had been the thing last year and I had been able to fob most of them off by explaining the fairies didn’t know what an Xbox (or a Wii) was. Children like that didn’t tend to have the patience for a long conversation with the hidden folk.

  Another popular desire was for a puppy or a kitten and there was one of those today. Samantha, with very wobbly handwriting. The fairies explained that you could love all animals without having a pet of your own and that all the rabbits and mice in the wood would be her special friends. It was a fairly standard reply, to be honest. Jennifer had been much more creative. I often wondered what the parents would think if they knew the fairies’ letter writer was a forty-four year old childless man; probably that I was some sort of pervert.

  I hadn’t planned to read Claire’s letter but curiosity got the better of me. I thought I might find out just why she was so set on going to Newquay but to my absolute amazement it wasn’t even mentioned.

  The letter was about Izzie; how Claire was worried about her drinking because it was making her act funny and forget things. About how scared she was that her mother was falling ill again. And how afraid if she did get ill then she would push me away and I was so good for her. And because she was afraid I might go she couldn’t ask me what to do, and anyway I didn’t take the drinking thing seriously at all. It wasn’t so much a request for help, more of a desperate outpouring.

  The sun still shone as I took the Major’s cuttings from Jennifer’s roses but I worked with an extra jumper on. The spring cut had been an important ritual in Jennifer’s year, only recently entrusted to me, and last March she had been out here too, wandering around and then coming back to tell me I’d missed a bit. She took a trug full of cuttings to the compost heap and when she returned asked me whose garden it was, because it was going to be beautiful in the summer. Even the memory of it broke my heart.

  I sat on my haunches. Already I’d cut back far more than I should. I put my secateurs in my pocket; I’d finish tomorrow. Although why it should matter, when the house would probably be sold by the time the roses bloomed, was beyond me.

  As I washed my hands my thoughts returned to Claire’s letter. That Izzie was stressed was obvious but it wasn’t surprising with her demanding job, losing Connor and now a new man on the scene. I had my history of mental wobbles too, and she seemed to be coping far better than I did; I had trouble holding down a normal life when disaster struck. If Izzie got a bit forgetful and ratty and needed the odd glass of wine to help her to relax then it wasn’t an issue as far as I could see.

  But how to get this across to Claire was a puzzle. The words of the fairies’ reply formed in my head but I could never put them down on paper; my handwriting would give me away the moment she opened it. I stood for a long time staring out of the window, soap twisting in my hands, but inspiration didn’t come.

  Chapter Forty-Nine

  Blonde hair on the white pillowcase and morning sunshine creeping around the curtains. Warm skin beneath me, her rhythm matching my own. It was Saturday – and I was being offered perfection.

  Afterwards the soft hairs on her arm caught the light and I ran my fingers over them. “Let’s go to Kimmeridge.”

  “Oh, Robin,” she breathed, “I love you so very much.”

  The sun continued to shine. Leaving Claire to go shopping with Sasha we ate up the miles to Dorset. Near the coast the grassland undulated into pasture, the sheep white dots on the hillside. Izzie rolled the car to a stop as we crested a hill at the top of the Kimmeridge Estate and the sea came into view.

  “How long since you’ve been here?” she asked.

  I put my hand over hers on the gearstick. “You know how long.”

  “Me too. I couldn’t ever… not with anyone else…”

  “Me neither.” I punched her arm. “No handstands in the sea today though.”

  “Chicken,” she laughed as she took her foot off the brake and we started our descent to the beach.

  The tide was in so we climbed the bank to the monument. White horses bobbed in the distance and tumbled over the rock ledges below us, breaking the gun-metal green which stretched to the sky. Behind us the sheep grazed on the hillside, their bleating mixed with the calls of the gulls and the drag of the swell on the pebbles. A trawler inched across the horizon.

  “Sometimes,” Izzie faltered, “when you remember a place from a long time ago your memory distorts it. But not here; it’s all spread out exactly as it should be.”

  “We didn’t come up here last time.”

  “I know. But I suppose my brain kind of helicoptered out to take in the whole view. Does that make sense?”

  “And was the sun always shining too?”

  “Of course.” She squeezed my hand.

  “That’s because you bring the sunshine.”

  “No – we do.”

  And she took off down the slope, windmilling her arms, her laughter mixed with the gulls and the sea.

  I picked up her abandoned handbag and followed. She was waiting for me on the edge of the low cliffs, hands on hips.

  “Slowcoach,” she chided.

  “I’m just enjoying myself – enjoying you – being so happy.”

  She started to walk towards the circle of the bay. “Wednesday night – it made all the difference. But at the time I thought – I’m never going to be able to get into work, face a normal day, after all that emotion. Only I did. It was like my mind was suddenly clear. I’d been struggling, Robin.”

  “I know. Even though you didn’t say.”

  She twisted a strand of hair between her fingers. “It’s odd – you’re alive to my moods, somehow, in a way Connor never was. I’ve wanted that, over the years, without even knowing it. But now I have it, it feels strange.”

  “Intrusive?”

  “See, that’s exactly what I mean. You just know.”

  I was non-committal. “Well… of course, what I can’t know unless you tell me is why.”

  “Take a stab at it.”

  “Losing Connor hit you harder than you wanted to admit. Then there wasn’t enough time to grieve before I came back into your life. And I’m here, all the time; it’s not like the start of a normal relationship. You’ve had no space to feel what you’ve needed to feel. An
d the stress came pouring in on top of you.”

  “You’re putting words into my mouth.” She traced the edges of my beard around my lips. “Do you need space?”

  “No. But I’ll step back a little if that’s what you want.”

  “Right at this moment I never want to let you out of my sight. But sometimes, when I come home from work and the food’s on the table, and the house is clean, and you’ve picked Claire up from somewhere I feel so… so… guilty you’re having to do all this.”

  “I don’t have to do it, Izzie. And at the moment I’m the one with the time. You wait until summer when – I hope – I’ll be working until nine o’clock at night. You’ll have to remember where the oven gloves are and how to use the washing machine then.”

  She shook her head. “I over complicate things, don’t I?”

  “No. We’re just finding our way, that’s all.”

  I took her hand and we climbed down onto the rocks, slippery with seaweed from the receding tide. As we rounded the corner into the bay a boat chugged towards the open sea, a man preparing mackerel lines on deck. The spray blew up and I could taste the salt in my beard.

  We both knew when we had reached the spot. “It’s been concreted over,” Izzie exclaimed.

  “Yes, but it hasn’t changed the view.” I spread my anorak and we sat down and I pulled her close to me and kissed her. “I wanted to do that last time we were here but I didn’t dare.”

  “I’d started to like you before then, but when we were here – there was a magic to us – and I’ve never forgotten it. We only had those two really happy days; when we came here and when we went to the Faerie Tree, and of course that ended so badly…”

  “It’s funny; for me the Faerie Tree day is sort of split into two distinct parts. There’s this golden memory of our time together and then this sense of everything shattering. It almost seems like that happened another time, although I know it didn’t.”

  Izzie snuggled closer, the wind blowing her hair across my face. “That’s close to what I told Claire,” she said. “The best day and the worst day of my life rolled into one.”

  “And you didn’t even know Mum.”

  “No, but even though I didn’t realise it at the time it was the day I lost you, and we’d only just started.”

  “Mum would have loved you; you would have been everything she’d have wanted for me. And you would have had some right old giggles together. But it would have been tough, too. Caring for her; that could have ended us before we’d really begun as well. Sometimes, Izzie, things are meant to be and maybe that wasn’t our time. And anyway, there needed to be Claire.”

  “Yes,” she smiled up at me, “there needed to be Claire.”

  Chapter Fifty

  It really did seem to be our day. We even managed to get a cancellation at Regginas so I was finally able to treat Izzie to a special meal out. We had a taxi so we shared a bottle of wine. And a brandy afterwards – but nothing over the top. As Izzie refused a second glass I thought of Claire’s letter and I was pleased.

  Izzie wore a green shift dress and she looked so beautiful I didn’t even take it off her when we made love. She lay in it afterwards; crumpled and creased, her eyes shining as she said to me, “That reminded me of the first time, under the willow in the Faerie Tree woods.”

  I repeated the words to myself, but they made no sense. I pretended I hadn’t heard, but when she said them again, they hadn’t changed. Was she thinking of Connor? She was looking at me, waiting for my response.

  “Izzie – I don’t remember.”

  The softness disappeared from her face and her hands twitched to tug her dress down.

  “I don’t understand…” I faltered. “How I could forget… something so… important…”

  “At least you’ve been honest with me, Robin. At least you didn’t pretend.”

  She had to have meant me. My chest tightened.

  “Tell me, Izzie – help me to remember what happened.”

  “It was after we left Jennifer’s and we went back to the Faerie Tree. We held hands and made wishes…”

  “Yes.” The feel of her fingertips in mine, the heaviness of the air around us, the silence in the woods before the storm. Still real; still with me.

  “You remember that?”

  I nodded.

  “Well then it thundered, and started to rain, so we sheltered under a big willow next to the river and you kissed me and we couldn’t stop. I had my back to the trunk but I was shaking so much, the way you were touching me… so we lay down and the ground was completely dry. I was wearing a dress… that’s what reminded me.”

  “I remember the dress – it was yellow. And you had plimsolls on. I remember everything, except the most important thing. Izzie – why?”

  She could see I was distraught and she pulled me to her, her reply muffled by my hair. “Perhaps, Robin… perhaps because within an hour your mother was dead. You were beside yourself with grief. I guess that’s what blotted it out.”

  That night I heard the swish of wet tyres every time a car passed. I counted the drips from the cracked drainpipe above Izzie’s study. A cat fight broke the silence of the smallest hours. But at least I didn’t see the light crawl around the curtains; somehow I slept and dreamt of Kimmeridge.

  Chapter Fifty-One

  Spring sunshine warmed Jennifer’s house and I walked from room to room opening windows to let the air flood in. In my old bedroom the wood had warped so I collected my tools from the van, jemmied the window and took my plane to the uneven surface. I looked at my watch – it was just before noon – I had time for a coat of primer to dry as well.

  I was bending down to stir the paint when I heard a car in the drive. I raised my head and watched as the metallic blue cabriolet pulled to a halt behind my van. Stephen. And he looked every bit as puzzled as I felt to see another vehicle on the drive. I poked my head out of the window.

  “Morning,” I called.

  He grinned up at me. “Oh, it is you, Robin. Got yourself a van?”

  I nodded. “I’ll just finish this then I’ll come down.”

  “I’ll put the kettle on,” he replied, disappearing past the porch and along the side of the house.

  By the time I joined him in the kitchen he had made two mugs of coffee and was rummaging through the pile of post I’d picked up off the mat. He looked up from his task.

  “You got my message then?”

  “No.”

  “But you’re here?”

  I picked up my coffee. “I came to finish pruning the roses. I just got side-tracked by the window – it’s got a bit warped over the winter.”

  “Oh.” Stephen looked away and started flicking through the pile of envelopes again.

  “What’s up?”

  He still didn’t look at me. “I’ve got a couple of estate agents coming around this afternoon – just to try and a get a handle on the valuation… for probate, you see.”

  “There’s no need to look so awkward. I know you won’t want to keep the house.”

  His chin jerked up and he reminded me so much of Claire. “I might.”

  I put my hand on his shoulder. “Whatever you do, Stephen, it’s your decision and your decision alone. Nothing to do with me.”

  “I don’t like to think of you not being able to come here. In fact, I don’t like to think of not being able to come here myself at the moment.”

  “Then it’s too soon for you to decide.” I squeezed his shoulder again.

  After a few moments he cleared his throat. “You said you didn’t get my message. I thought it was odd you didn’t call back; I tried to reach you Friday evening and a couple of times on Saturday.”

  “I left my phone in the van. It’s a new one too – a Blackberry – and I’m buggered if I can work out how to access my voicemail.”

  “But Robin – that’s awful – you’re running a business. Give it here and I’ll sort it out for you.” He held out his hand.

  “Woul
d you? Claire’s already set up my email and I’d feel such a fool if I had to ask her to do anything else.”

  He arched his eyebrows. “You are hopeless.”

  We sat down at the table and I handed him my phone, watching as he clicked a few buttons. Then he dialled a number, punched one key and then another. “OK,” he said, “ready to record your personal greeting?”

  “My what?”

  “The message you want people to hear when you’ve left your phone in the van.”

  “Oh, isn’t there a standard one?”

  “Yes, but it’s not very friendly. Just say who you are and ask people to leave a name and number so you can call them back.”

  I cleared my throat. “Alright. Let’s do it.”

  “Just say it to practice,” Stephen encouraged, so I did.

  “All done,” he grinned.

  “What do you mean?”

  “Well I knew you’d sound more natural if you didn’t think I was recording. Do you want to listen to it?”

  I shook my head. “It’s bad enough other people get to hear it.”

  Stephen was just handing the phone back to me when it bleeped. “Oh, that’s probably telling you about my voicemail. Shall I clear it?”

  I nodded and he pressed a key, but immediately coloured up, pushing the phone across the table. “Oh Robin – I’m sorry – it’s a text from Izzie – I shouldn’t have seen it.”

  It was simple enough: ‘Are you over the shock now? Feeling better? xxx’

  Stephen fiddled with the handle of his mug. “You did get my message, didn’t you?”

  “No – really. This was something else.” I stood and walked across the kitchen. The dregs of my coffee fizzed and gurgled down the plughole. Through the window I could see the lawn; it would need cutting soon. Stephen said nothing.

  “It’s just that I forgot something; something really important, and it shook me up.”

  “We all forget things.”

  “No – not like this.” I turned to face him, my fingers gripping the sink behind my back. “Would you ever forget the first time you and Gareth made love?”