A Midwinter Promise

by Lulu Taylor

  Whatever David thought, he had acted on it. He told Julia that Sally was fine about moving out and certainly she seemed completely normal. She would be staying for as long as it took to renovate the cottage in any case, and that would mean some months more.

  Sometimes, as the year moved into spring, Julia watched Sally with the children, or spent a happy afternoon with her, and she wondered if she was doing the right thing. Perhaps Lala was being ridiculous, warning her about the effect of having Sally in the house. Lala might be progressive and very French and pragmatic in some ways, but sometimes that came out as highly conservative and perhaps regressive. The family could be a flexible unit; maybe there was room for Sally.

  But still, there was something strange about David coming home to be welcomed by the two of them; the two women sitting at the dining table with him, the little pack of children. Sally was always so glamorous, with her blonde hair recently cut short, and her bright blue-green eyes. She was always perfectly turned out, in smart, expensive clothes, even though she hadn’t worked for a year. And she was warm and almost exaggeratedly pleased to see David, hanging on his every word, treating him like some kind of returning hero.

  Has she always been like this? Or am I only seeing it now?

  She wondered if Lala had dropped poison in her mind, the way that picture in the magazine had poisoned her last pregnancy.

  Am I just prone to ideas that take root and then I can’t distinguish them from reality?

  But what good did it do to know that? She still wouldn’t be able to tell the difference.

  Life seemed to settle down to an easy rhythm while they waited for the Kelsey cottage to be finished. Sally was as good-tempered and helpful as ever and if she resented being made to move out, she didn’t show it. If anything, she seemed excited about her new home and all the ways she could make it cosy, comfortable and charming. But underneath, Julia was thinking obsessively about her problem. A trip to the doctor had been of little help; when she’d asked for a hysterectomy, he’d not just told her it was an awful idea, but that it was immoral.

  ‘What if you lose one of your children, God forbid?’ he’d said sternly. ‘You’d never be able to have another. And there are plenty of women forced to have hysterectomies who’d do anything to be in your shoes – healthy and young and fertile. You can hardly expect us to waste taxpayers’ money on you!’ He smiled kindly. ‘You’ll change your mind. You’ll see.’

  ‘What about my husband having a vasectomy?’ she asked timidly. The idea had only just come to her, while David was away, and it seemed like it might be a solution.

  The doctor looked scandalised. ‘You can’t ask a young man like him to do such a thing! What if you divorce and he remarries? You could be condemning another woman to infertility.’

  Julia blinked at him, confused. It seemed odd that she should risk everything to enable an imaginary second wife to have David’s other family, but perhaps the doctor was right and it was entirely unreasonable to put such a condition on David.

  ‘The operation is not one hundred per cent reliable in any case,’ the doctor remarked, reaching for a pen. ‘I’ve heard of several cases where it’s failed.’

  He wrote out a prescription for the pill, suggested a coil as a backup, and told her that she might have an early menopause which would solve everything. The message was clear – contraception was her responsibility. David had a right to remain untouched by the process, and his needs must be fulfilled.

  She’d gone away, downcast and ashamed for voicing her suggestions, wondering if her doctor had even read her medical records. A hysterectomy was extreme, but it was the only way she could think of to be totally certain she wouldn’t get pregnant again, especially if vasectomies sometimes didn’t work.

  It was when she was lying in bed with David one night, a week or so before Sally was due to move out, that the idea came to her. She’d tried several times to make love when he wanted it, usually after a few glasses of wine. But where once they had enjoyed mutual pleasure and satisfaction, Julia had felt unaroused to the point of discomfort, unable to let go and give herself over to the experience. Her fear of what might happen if their contraception failed had overridden anything. All subsequent attempts had gone exactly the same way. She felt both defensive and ashamed, as well as sorry for David, who was suffering because of her.

  I can’t bear to sleep with David anymore. I’ve tried and it’s hideous. But what if I tell him that he’s free to sleep with someone else if he wants to? There must be women in London who he can see, without me ever knowing. I wouldn’t mind that. As long as he stays safe and keeps it discreet, that would be fine.

  As soon as she had this idea, it seemed brilliant. The sense of relief that engulfed her was intense – relief that she would be free of her awful fear of pregnancy for good. She could be abstinent. David could satisfy his needs. They would still be a family, and at last, the future would seem bright again.

  Chapter Twenty-Nine

  Present day

  In his bed in the house he’s lived in with Sally for ten years, David Pengelly is moving closer to death. From the start, he’s felt it circling him, hungry for him, keen for him to join the great tribe of those who’ve left the earth forever; but his life force has clung to his physical form, not ready to detach, float free and take the final journey to wherever awaits him. Although it seems that darkness wants to consume him, he also feels that there might be something beyond that, a state or a dimension or a place where something new might begin. It’s so hard to imagine extinction, even though he knows he came from nothing. Or does he know that? Perhaps he came from a place like the one he is going to, he simply can’t remember it.

  For a while, he has thought he might stay indefinitely in this twilight existence, floating to the surface occasionally and then sinking down again into a washing silence. Then, just recently, as he has begun to spend longer listening to the world around him, he suspects that he’s making a very long and slow return to it. He has heard Sally and Mundo talking, and that has given him an impetus to come back and make things right. He needs to find his voice, his clarity, and tell them what he knows to be real and true. They all have to love each other! Time is short. Life is beautiful. Love is everything. Be kind.

  There’s also something else he needs to do. It flickers in and out of his mind. It impels him to anchor himself into his body for a while longer and travel back to the conscious world, to rejoin them all again and make everything clear.

  I want to tell them the truth about Julia, about how I loved her and how I love them.

  He knows and understands everything now; he sees it all and he’s filled with compassion, infinite pity and understanding for all of them. And the heartbreaking love is almost too much to stand. He wants to come back so that he can taste the sweetness of that human love one more time before he gives it up forever.

  But he senses death is close again. He was wrong to think it was in retreat. It is very close now. It is not how he expected death to be.

  He can do nothing. There is no fighting, there is only surrender. He sends out everything he has to those he loves, hoping that somehow it will move through the universe and find them.

  Love one another. Be kind. Goodbye.

  Chapter Thirty

  Alex woke suddenly at four thirty. It was completely dark but the numbers on her alarm clock glowed pale green and showed her how early it was. She sat up, alert for anything that might be happening in the house. Hadji hadn’t made a sound in the kitchen, which meant there was no intruder. Johnnie was ensconced in the rental house, so it wasn’t him. The girls were at Tim’s.

  She listened hard, but there was only silence.

  As she realised just how alone she was, there in the dark, the bedroom cool without the heating on yet, she felt suddenly spooked. She pulled her covers up around her and nestled into the warmth, then lay down and tried to clear her mind. Morning would be here soon enough, if she could just sleep again.

&
nbsp; After a few minutes, she drifted off and slept soundly until her alarm went off at six thirty.

  Johnnie was roused the next morning by a cry from Netta. She was in another room but it pierced his consciousness.

  ‘Is everything okay?’ he called, instantly alert.

  ‘Yes!’ she shouted back. ‘It’s just that Bertie’s emptied out everything in his bathroom, it’s total chaos in there. I’ll have to clean it up.’ She came along the hall and poked her head around the bedroom door. ‘He’s really gone to town with the shampoo.’

  ‘That’s annoying.’

  ‘I’ll clean it up. We can go into town and get some supplies. And I thought we could get the tree today.’

  ‘Tree?’

  ‘Christmas tree. We’re having one, aren’t we? The boys will want one. I brought the decorations, by the way.’

  ‘Did you?’ It hadn’t crossed his mind to bring the Christmas decorations with them but he could see now that it was a good idea. He said nothing, feeling as though he’d been rebuked for being thoughtless.

  There was a pause. Netta said, ‘Don’t thank me or anything.’

  ‘Thank you,’ he said. ‘Thank you for remembering the decorations.’

  ‘It doesn’t really mean much when I have to tell you to do it,’ she said coolly, and disappeared back into Bertie’s en suite to start dealing with the mess.

  Johnnie grimaced in frustration. He wanted to say the right thing. He could always see with hindsight exactly what he should have said. Why did it never pop into his mind when he needed it? Instead of feeling criticised for not remembering the decorations, he should have congratulated Netta on doing it. It was obvious now. But clear as it was, he was sure that next time he would get it wrong again. He felt helpless, doomed to fail over and over. It demotivated him. It felt as though there was no point in trying. His faith that he could work this out started to waver.

  He picked up his phone and began scrolling through his work emails. In a minute, he’d get up and make some coffee, take it to Netta with a smile on his face and try to make amends. He’d told her last night that Alex was taking Bertie this morning, but that had annoyed her too. ‘Why shouldn’t Bertie be allowed to see his grandfather like the other two?’ she’d asked, and when he tried to explain about Sally, she’d snapped back, ‘Sally will just have to deal with it.’

  So he’d said no more. But Alex was expecting Bertie this morning, so he needed to make that happen, and the best way was probably just to assume it was going ahead as he’d said, get Bertie ready and put him in the car. If Netta said nothing, she was fine with it.

  Just then a text popped up on his phone. It was from Sally. She never texted him, and had only phoned maybe twice in twenty years, both times from the car when Pa was driving and couldn’t use his phone. It was all in caps:

  JONATHAN PLEASE CALL ME AT ONCE SALLY

  Something turned over in his stomach, and his heart started pounding. He had a bad feeling, a sense that things had suddenly spun out of his control. His thumb was trembling as he managed to get her number up and press to connect to it.

  It rang only once.

  ‘Jonathan!’

  He knew immediately. It was the raw pain in her voice. ‘Pa.’ He said it like a flat statement of fact, even though part of him still wanted her to contradict him. ‘He’s dead.’

  ‘He’s gone, Johnnie!’ wailed Sally. ‘You have to tell Alex.’

  ‘Yes.’ He closed his eyes, trying to be businesslike. Why had he been so stupid? This was bound to happen. He should have known. ‘Did he have another stroke?’

  ‘We don’t know. The doctor is coming to certify the cause. Miss Thomas is helping me. We don’t know what’s happened! It’s a stroke, I think, we don’t know!’

  ‘Okay.’ She was obviously teetering on the edge of hysteria. ‘I’ll ring Alex and come over. Please don’t do anything until we get there, Sally. Do you understand?’

  ‘Yes, yes. We won’t do anything. Oh David, David.’

  ‘Is Mundo there?’

  ‘He went out this morning, I don’t know where he is.’

  ‘I’ll be there very soon.’

  He ended the call, then lay back on his pillows, stunned. A moment later, Netta came in, talking about what the boys needed for breakfast. She stopped when she saw Johnnie’s face. ‘What’s happened?’

  ‘It’s Pa.’

  She stared, her eyes wide. ‘Is he . . .?’

  He nodded.

  ‘No, Johnnie.’ She rushed to him and hugged him hard, then pulled back, her eyes full of tears. ‘I’m sorry.’

  He stared at her, his lips dry. ‘How am I going to tell Alex?’

  ‘I’ll drive you. Come on. We’ve still got that van. I’ll take you to her, and then both of you to your father’s house.’ She took his hand and held it. ‘Johnnie, I’m so sorry. I thought he might be recovering, at least a little. Are you okay?’

  How do I feel? Emotions were whirling through him, but most of all he felt numb. ‘Fine. Thank you,’ he said. ‘I’ll get dressed.’

  There was no answer at the front door of the Old Barn, and Hadji came trotting in his sideways way around the house, yapping a welcome, so Johnnie guessed that Alex was in the potting shed.

  He walked slowly around the barn and across the yard, letting her have a few more minutes without the knowledge he had to impart. The door was open, strains of music coming out of the shed along with Alex’s tuneful humming.

  He went in and saw her at the table, well wrapped up against the cold and wearing her fingerless gloves so that she could push tiny flower heads into bauble shapes. She looked up, and a smile broke over her face. ‘You’re here! Where’s Bertie?’

  ‘He’s outside in the car with Netta.’

  ‘Aren’t you bringing him in?’

  ‘Alex.’ He drew in a breath and his face contorted in pain.

  Her scissors fell on the table.

  Johnnie never forgot the expression that spread over her face and whenever he thought of it, he saw the face of a statue carved into utter torment.

  PART TWO

  Chapter Thirty-One

  Three weeks later

  Alex was getting out of her car in the marketplace when she heard her name. Turning, she saw Jasper coming towards her, puffing as he wove between the parked cars to reach her.

  ‘Alex! Hi! How are you?’ he asked, his eyes questioning. ‘Are you okay? I’m so sorry about everything, about your dad. It’s just awful. Of course you’re not okay, what am I thinking?’ Jasper’s liquid Scottish accent came rolling rapidly out as though he was worried she’d disappear on him. He was a little red in the face, but looked just as she remembered from before Christmas, except that he was now dressed in a long dark coat with a bright green scarf wrapped messily at his throat, and his black hair stood up in a soft ruffle on the top of his head. ‘I’m just really sorry.’

  Before Christmas. She could vaguely recall that carefree day at Tawray, decorating the trees. That feels like an age ago now. A different life. They were in the dead period now, the cold dark time that followed the New Year festivities.

  ‘Thanks,’ she said. She’d not thought about him since Pa had died and it was almost like seeing a stranger.

  Jasper looked awkward. ‘Are you busy? Do you have time for a coffee or something? I could tell you how the flower day turned out, if you want to hear about it. And there’s something else I want to talk about. Though of course it’s perfectly understandable if you’d rather not right now.’

  She blinked at him. The flower day. The first one she’d missed. ‘How did it work out?’

  ‘We missed you, but your decorations looked fantastic. People seemed to enjoy it and the local traders were thrilled. They definitely want a rerun next year.’

  Alex smiled. ‘I’m glad. Really, I am. I’m sorry I couldn’t be there.’

  ‘Don’t be silly. I wouldn’t have dreamed of expecting it.’ He thrust his hands in his pockets and smiled back.
‘So . . . do you want to get that coffee?’

  ‘I’d like that, but I can’t right now. I’m afraid I’ve got an appointment at the solicitor’s. We’re reading my father’s will this morning.’

  Jasper flushed and looked embarrassed. ‘God, I’m sorry, how awful of me.’

  ‘You weren’t to know. It’s fine.’

  ‘I won’t hold you up. But can I give you a ring maybe tomorrow? There’s something I want to talk to you about.’

  ‘Of course.’ She smiled. ‘I’m around.’

  ‘Great. I’ll talk to you then.’ He nodded his farewell and headed back through the marketplace.

  Alex hadn’t been sure how formal the meeting would be, but the process of reading the will seemed like an important one, so she’d put on her navy work suit and a pair of heels, pulling her dark hair back into a sleek ponytail. She’d left the girls with Netta, who was packing up the rectory and seemed to be raring to get home, before driving into town.

  Now she walked across the square towards the solicitor’s office housed in the old Corn Exchange.

  The last few weeks had been terrible. For the first time, she’d been glad of Tim being able to take the girls over Christmas, and she agreed that they would actually be better off with him. She was floored by her grief for Pa in a way she hadn’t expected, and flagged even more under the burden of Sally’s needs.

  That was one of the strangest things: Sally’s volte-face. After years of condescension and barely concealed scorn, Sally clung to her like a child to its mother. She needed reassurance about the most basic things, and seemed bewildered by everything that had to be done, and frightened of the future.

  ‘Why doesn’t she rely on Mundo?’ she had asked Johnnie, when the two of them were sitting at Sally’s kitchen table drinking tea. Sally had gone off to find a hymn book so that they could select David’s favourite hymns for the funeral.

  ‘My question exactly,’ Johnnie had said, raising his eyebrows. ‘Where is Mundo anyway?’