by Lily Graham
In the centre of the small farm-style kitchen with its wood-fired stove, there was a small, cheap Formica table, the kind that reminded me of school gyms and hostels. On top of it was a new kettle, a few mugs, plates and a bottle of washing-up liquid – some things I’d asked the estate agent to get when he’d kindly offered.
In the corner of the room were several large bottles of water. The tap water was likely to be salty – at least that’s what the guidebooks had said. I tested the mains and found electricity, which was a relief. I’d text Allan later and let him know.
In the small main bedroom there was an old iron bed frame and a bare mattress that had seen better days. It was sunken slightly in the middle, and faded to the colour of old, milky tea.
The other two rooms didn’t seem much better; both contained piles of discarded furniture from floor to ceiling. It would take days to clear it.
For a moment, I contemplated booking myself into one of the hotels Allan had suggested. Where there’d be fresh sheets, a television and, perhaps more importantly, vodka. I’d passed a resort on my way here, but a wave of weariness decided me against it. The truth was that I wasn’t up to the hassle of people, not now, not after being surrounded by all those partygoers heading to Ibiza on the plane.
I’d spied a small shop down the street on the taxi drive here that looked as if it sold basic essentials. I could walk there later and get a few supplies. I went back into the bedroom, wheeled in my small case and opened it. Then I took out James’s urn and placed it on the bedside table. ‘Well, we’re here now,’ I said, touching it. Then I shook my head.
‘I hope you’re happy.’
Chapter Four
It felt strange to wake up in a house I’d only ever heard about.
As a child, it had been fun on days when the rain lashed the windows and the grey sky looked like an old bruise to imagine a lost, far-flung, sun-drenched family home.
But the stories were few and far between, prised from my grandmother’s oyster-like lips on rare occasions and only after much pleading.
Perhaps it was harder for her on those dark, grey days, too; perhaps on days like that she was trying not to remember.
If I closed my eyes I could picture her saying the name, almost reluctantly. Marisal. Smell the ocean, and the wild oranges from the garden, picture the old white villa. See how her eyes would grow sad and dark when we brought out the album with the crimson velvet lining from the old wooden chest, where she kept all her other memories too, and ask her to tell us about it. The brown, parchment-like skin of her fingers would trail the dark leather cover as she reluctantly told Allan and me about our Catalan roots. Each word fell from her mouth like it hurt, like it cost her money.
Even by the time she’d died, we still only knew the bare essentials. We knew that our family had lived on the island for as long as she could remember, that they’d originally come from Majorca and that some of her relatives lived in Ibiza too. The family spoke Eivissenc, a dialect of Catalan – forbidden by many of the country’s rulers throughout the centuries in favour of the common language of Spain.
We knew that the Alvarez family, from whom Allan and I were descended, had red hair and beards, which is where my own auburn hair came from, or so my grandmother said.
Green eyes were also a common trait. Most of the family had had that colouring, except for a great-great-grandmother who had been dark and beautiful, with an ebony waterfall for hair, and eyes like India ink. My gran had stopped speaking suddenly when I pressed her for more about this woman, then pursed her lips as if she’d said too much. You had to be gentle, and go slow in case she clammed up, which happened all too often.
When I’d complained about my gran’s reluctance to speak about the past, my mother had told me that they were all like that, not just my grandmother but most people who had lived through the war. ‘None of them like to talk about their old lives – they all just want to leave it in the past, and she left one war only to come here and enter another…’
It couldn’t have been easy, I knew, to leave your country in the midst of a terrible civil war, to flee, only to find yourself in the midst of one of the worst in history, the Second World War, just a few short years later. It wasn’t fair. And it was hardly surprising she hadn’t wanted to speak about it, considering how much pain and heartache she experienced, how much she had witnessed. But it was a pity, too, that she wouldn’t let us know about it because when she was gone, that was it – a lid closed for ever on that part of our family’s history.
As I looked around, I realised that there was so much I didn’t know about this place. Who had been the people who once called it home?
Who was the mysterious dark-haired female relative my grandmother hadn’t wanted to speak about?
The house itself offered no real clues.
I got up, still wearing James’s old bathrobe, which I’d put on partly as a barrier against the bare mattress, partly because I liked to think it still smelt like him, although that was now unlikely as I’d worn it too often since he’d passed and if it smelt like anything now, it was me. The sun had moved high into the sky and the light had entered the room, making the air warm and drowsy. I poured myself some water and got started on airing out the house and getting rid of some of the thick bands of dust, leaving James’s urn in the bedroom.
I got changed into a pair of tracksuit bottoms that used to be slightly snug and now hung off me, catching sight of myself in the mirror on the wall with a grimace. I looked haunted, deflated, even to my own eyes. I looked away, then put the collar of my shirt over my mouth as I began tackling the dust. I was still making little progress some time later that morning when there was a knock on the door.
I opened the door, shading my eyes against the glare, when a short man came into view, wearing a dark grey wool suit, despite the heat of the day.
His hair was like steel wool and he had kindly, crinkly eyes. His was the sort of face where you could only guess at his age; he could be anywhere from early sixties to eighty.
‘Charlotte?’ he asked, his voice lilting and musical and as warm as the sunshine that was trickling inside the cool interior of the house.
I nodded.
‘I am Escobar de Riba.’
‘Hola, Señor,’ I said, recognising the name of the estate agent.
‘I come to check everything is okay. You find the finca all right?’
‘Finca?’ I asked.
‘The farmhouse?’ he said with a quirk of his eyebrow.
‘Ah,’ I said with a grin.
His English was pretty good, I realised, grateful. ‘Fine, thanks – and thank you for everything else,’ I said, indicating the supplies he’d bought – including my new kettle and mugs.
‘It’s no trouble.’ He hesitated, frowned, then cleared his throat, staring at me rather nervously.
‘I…’ he paused, then shook his head and gave me a polite smile as he stepped back.
‘What?’ I asked, puzzled.
‘It’s just I couldn’t help to wonder about you. Well, after everything.’
I frowned. ‘You wondered about me?’
His face reddened slightly. ‘Yes – I’m sorry. I wondered about you after I spoke to your husband…’
‘You spoke to James,’ I repeated dumbly.
‘Many times.’ His eyes grew sad. ‘Such a good man, I thought. I was sorry to hear that he’d passed.’
My eyes smarted. I could only nod, looking up at the sky, trying, desperately, not to cry in front of this well-meaning stranger.
‘It’s why I’m here today, really,’ he said, then gave me that smile – the one that everyone had been giving me since he’d passed, full of regret. ‘To give you this.’
It was another letter.
Chapter Five
My fingers shook as I pulled the paper out of the envelope.
My love,
Okay. So, you’re furious with me. I know. I’m sorry.
I wanted to explain everythin
g straight away – you know how I am with secrets. Impossible. But I knew you had to get here by yourself first.
To the island, I mean. And if you’re reading this, that’s where you are, which is kind of amazing.
It couldn’t be me telling you to go – even though, I’m sure, ‘Honey, I bought you a house’ probably felt a bit like that. I hope you didn’t feel pressured – that’s not what this was about.
Okay, that’s a lie, it’s a little bit what this is about – I did want to pressure you, but subtly though. And dare I say, with a dash of mystery too? Cue Sean Connery’s voice… Anyway, I wanted to do it without the monumental list of reasons you would have given me against going.
Clever me, no?
But seriously, I’m sure you’ve guessed by now that I just didn’t want you at home, lost and wasting away. I think it’s that thought that kills me most.
Yeah, I know. Bad joke.
So anyway, this is what I want you to do, all right? I want you to think about living, really living, and well, an island just off Spain seems pretty great from where I’m sitting. Though I know you, you’ll resist, but don’t, okay?
I hope it’s fun, or something like fun, at least. This past year has been hell, period. I’ll be happy knowing you’re doing something positive, something that brings a little joy, I hope.
With that in mind, I did some digging while I’ve been stuck here – with Steve’s help. Apparently, the house has been lived in by some hippies who abandoned it some time ago so there’s not much in it that belongs to your family, more’s the pity, so it’s not much to go on.
But, Steve hired a detective. I know, sounds so sleuthy – and you know how much I love that. All those detective novels I read in the bath…
Anyway, he traced back your grandmother’s ancestry and well, he found out something interesting. It turns out that her sister is still living on the island. Her name is Maria de Palma. Did you know she even had a sister?! I’m sure you never mentioned it to me. Here’s her address. Apparently, she knows a lot more than she would let on to the detective. I’m told that the locals are a bit like your dear gran when it comes to sharing their history – very closed up.
Still, you’ll have some family to get to know – which is a good start. I wish that I was there to help – maybe this is how.
I love you.
J.
I didn’t know what I felt afterwards. No, that wasn’t true. I felt almost, for just a moment, like James was back here with me. The letter was so him. He used to light up a room, make you laugh so hard you snorted things from out of your nose. It was like hearing his voice again after all this silence, and all I could do was sob. Which was when I got angry. I couldn’t help it.
For James, this had been like some sort of play, but for me it was real. A really big, aching part of me really did just want to go to bed for a year and not get up until the pain of losing him had become something manageable. Wasn’t that my right? I didn’t want to be here on this bright, beautiful, hippie-overtaken island trying to find some link to my family’s past. Not yet, anyway.
So, I took his urn and put it in the wardrobe, and closed the door. I couldn’t face him right now.
Then I went for a walk, in search of mobile reception. I found it about half a mile from the house. I texted Allan and Sage telling them that I’d arrived safe and sound, sending them a few photographs that I snapped while I was standing there. One of the house, and the surrounding countryside and turquoise ocean, my brain not even taking in the beauty of it. I didn’t tell them about James’s letter, not then anyway.
Later I went to the small shop around the corner. It had dusty shelves crammed full of tinned produce and toiletries. An old man, whose face was like a crumpled towel of lines, wearing a faded black hat at an angle, sat outside the shop on a little stool, watching the world go by, though occasionally breaking his watch to play a round of dominoes with a small boy with laughing brown eyes. The old man introduced himself as Francisco, and the boy as his grandson, Andreas.
I got a few things from the shelves – tea, a packet of lemon biscuits that were coated in a thin layer of dust, some cleaning materials, a basket and what turned out to be Francisco’s home-made wine. ‘This cures everything,’ he said with a knowing sort of look. ‘Take it just up to here,’ he warned, with a thick finger noting the amount on the bottle, as if he were a pharmacist. He stared into my eyes as I was paying, and I looked away, wondering when the pain in them would not be so obvious.
At three in the morning, after I’d had more than Francisco’s recommended dosage and was feeling better, I went and fetched James.
‘Look. I’m sorry I was angry,’ I said, and put his ashes on the bedside table with a relieved sigh. I couldn’t sleep knowing I’d stuck him inside the wardrobe. He didn’t deserve it, not when all he was trying to do was look out for me. ‘I know you meant well, but love, this seems crazy to me, even just being here.’
I’d given up thinking about how crazily I was behaving with his ashes, grateful that at least no one was around to witness it. Just me and him, really, and well, even when he was alive, James had been well used to my peculiarities, so I was fairly sure it came as no surprise to him that they had got worse now that he was dead. The way I had to light a candle before I started writing. Or how I couldn’t fall asleep unless the bedcover was straight. Now I couldn’t function without taking his ashes along to every room I visited.
It was after he was back where he belonged, next to me, that I thought about what he’d said in his letter – about my grandmother having a sister. A sister she’d never spoken about. Despite everything, I was curious. Had this relative lived here on the island this whole time? And if so, why hadn’t my grandmother got in touch with her – or returned here after the war? Maybe she had, though? Perhaps she’d just never told me. But why not? And why had she never mentioned her to us at all?
‘It’s a mystery all right,’ I told him.
Chapter Six
In the morning the lemon-coloured sunlight arrived early, casting dust-mote rainbows from behind the closed shutters. The air was scented with olives, wild rosemary and salt, and it stirred my senses as I slept, making me think of long-ago summers and sun-kissed memories with James.
Everywhere here smelt like the sea, and it was all you could hear at night.
I blinked at the warmth behind my eyelids, sighing as I remembered where I was. Sometimes, I could swear I heard James’s voice while I slept, like he was just here, waiting for me to wake up. It usually made me sad when I did awake to discover the painful trick my brain was playing on me, especially when my eyes fell upon his ashes.
I got out of bed, touching them. My grandmother always used to say, ‘When you can’t do anything else for the day, make your bed.’
It was good advice. It was just a pity it had taken me nearly forty years to understand what she meant. I made some coffee, taking James with me to the kitchen, and decided that my first order of business was to find something to put on the bed besides James’s bathrobe and then to carry on with the clean-up of the house. At least then when Hannah, Allan or Sage phoned me, I could tell them that I was doing something productive with my time, instead of talking to my dead husband’s ashes, and slowly waiting out the week I’d promised Allan I’d give the place before crawling back into my own bed back home in the Surrey countryside.
When I popped round to the little shop for some advice and some paracetamol, Francisco told me where I could venture out for some bedding, noting my slightly hungover state with a shake of his head. ‘It’s strong stuff, I did warn you,’ he said, pouring me a glass of water right there so that I could take two of the pills he held out in his palm. I took them gratefully and left, with a sheepish grin and a promise to take it more slowly next time.
The sun was warm on my shoulders as I walked to the port at La Savina that afternoon, my headache finally beginning to abate. I decided that I’d have to either hire a bicycle for the rest of the
week or risk blisters from walking in my sandals in the baking sun. Still, the walk was pleasant, the air mild with a cooling breeze, and I was feeling a lift to my spirits as a result.
I took in the scent of paella, farm-fresh salad and just-roasted coffee from the bars and cafes. The more I saw of the town, which according to the guidebooks was a centre for million-pound yachts, sailing and regattas, the more I could see that it still retained some of the flavour of the bygone hippie era. On its seafront stalls there were artisanal one-of-a-kind items for sale mixed in with the cheap and cheerful. The people were friendly and laid-back too, and I felt myself enjoying the day more and more as I browsed.
As I walked I saw cars, scooters and bike rental places and the buzz of people arriving from the ferry, which created a masala mix that seemed like a summer festival, a snapshot of paradise, and for a moment I felt a part of it, glad to be where I was.
My mother had told me when my father had passed away that death was something you managed, not something you ever truly got over, and that some days were easier than others. I was grateful that today was one of those rare easier ones.
I’d rented a bicycle, and purchased a particularly pleasing bed set in a soft blush pink with grey accents, and was continuing to browse the stalls, when I met Isla. A thirty-something singer and artist from Alabama, who seemed to fit in with the old hippie culture as if she was born in their generation, rather than being about forty years too young for it. She had dark eyes fringed by thick lashes, a blue gem stud in her nose and shoulder-length brown hair that fell in waves across her tanned shoulders. She moved with a dancer’s grace as she showed me her artworks.
They were beautiful seascapes, dreamy and impressionistic, and I bent to look at them more closely. One in particular, of a lonely lighthouse, charmed me so much that I bought it then and there, hoping it would fit into the little basket of the bicycle I’d rented. Marisal could do with some life, and colour. The price was ridiculously low and I felt a bit bad offering so little for such lovely work.