Hopeful Hearts at Glendale Hall

by Victoria Walters

  ‘It’s all about bringing the best out in each other. I made you more confident back then, and you made me less selfish and wild. You and Rory do the same for one another too, right?’

  It was an interesting way to look at it. Rory definitely helped to calm me when I needed it, and I had brought him out of his shell, and made him much more sociable. Perhaps it was about balance. It wasn’t always easy to remember that when you were firefighting problems all day though. I glanced behind us to see Drew and Rory trying to lift the tree off the roof of the car. ‘I can’t believe I’m a farmer’s girlfriend. A bloody pig got into the kitchen today.’

  Beth snorted. ‘Never a dull moment here, that’s for sure. But you enjoy it really, don’t you?’ She looked at me seriously then as if suddenly realising I might not be joking.

  ‘It’s harder work than I imagined,’ I admitted. ‘There’s hardly a moment of peace.’

  ‘Peace is overrated though when you have all this in your backyard. Maybe you and Rory need some quality time together. We can always look after Harry. Izzy would love to babysit.’

  I wasn’t sure I could cope with Harry staying away from the farm but I smiled. ‘Maybe once this auction is out of the way, thank you.’

  ‘Okay, well, make sure you take me up on the offer. Now then, I think what the three of us need to do now is make snow angels.’

  ‘We’ll freeze!’ I protested.

  ‘Come on, we always used to do that when you came to the Hall.’ She got down in the snow, giving me a forceful look. One I remembered well from growing up. There was something about Beth that made you end up doing whatever she wanted you to. The problem was it was always usually fun so she was often right, worse luck. With a sigh, I got down too and we lay in the snow, pushing out our arms and legs. Harry watched us, spellbound, and I couldn’t help but laugh as I felt the cold snow pushing into my back.

  ‘You just need to remember to have fun as well as work hard,’ Beth said, looking across at me pointedly. ‘You didn’t used to find that difficult.’

  ‘I know, you’re right. Some days I’m just too tired to even think about having fun… God, I sound really old.’ I thought back to my days at university, where there was always a night out or party to enjoy. Now though, I couldn’t remember the last time I had stayed up past midnight.

  ‘You sound like a mother. It’s not easy, don’t beat yourself up. Come on, Harry!’

  I watched as Harry sat down on the snow beside me. I wanted to have fun with him, to be a fun mum, there were just so many things to do sometimes that fun took a back seat. Harry lay down beside us and tried to make his own angel. I smiled and showed him how to move his arms, spluttering when snow flew across the air over me.

  ‘Harry will help you enjoy yourself when you need it,’ Beth said, sitting up and smiling at us.

  I wondered how I had reached the point of needing reminders from Beth and Harry to enjoy myself. I really needed to do something about that.

  Chapter Eight

  ‘Do you remember this?’ Dad pulled a pink bauble out of the cardboard box on the coffee table, which he had brought back from our family home in the village. ‘You were desperate for us to buy it at a Christmas fair even though it didn’t match anything else we had.’

  Dusk had fallen and we were in the living room with Rory and Harry, the large real tree that Beth and Drew had brought over, standing bare but proud in the corner. Beth and Drew had stayed for lunch then headed off to make sure the Glendale Hall festive trail was ready for the grand opening tomorrow, and to entice Izzy away from her book. Rory had finished his preparations for the auction and after we had sausages and mash for tea, which I couldn’t help but relish after my run-in with the pig earlier, we had come in here to decorate for Christmas.

  ‘I was obsessed with back pink then,’ I said, taking it from him and smiling at it. I was cross-legged on the floor with Harry trying to unravel a set of lights. Rory was digging in another box trying to find something for the top of the tree. Christmas songs played out softly in the background, and our log fire was lit and crackling. It felt cosy and warm in here, and more like home than ever before. I supposed it was down to the act of getting ready for Christmas, something that couldn’t fail to cheer both a room, and the people in it, up.

  ‘Our ornaments don’t have to be matching, we’re not showing it to anyone but us,’ Rory said, triumphantly pulling out a gold star from a box. ‘Uh, Harry, don’t eat that,’ he added.

  I turned in alarm to see Harry deciding one of the bulbs on the fairy lights looked edible. I snatched it away, relieved they weren’t switched on. ‘I think I’d better put these on the tree,’ I said, carrying the lights hastily over to the tree. It didn’t matter how carefully we packed them away each year, they were always tangled again when we brought them out the following year. The smell of the fresh tree floated around me as I started to drape the lights around the tree, standing on my tip-toes to reach up the top.

  ‘Heather made this one,’ my dad said then, holding up a wooden reindeer that I had made in secondary school. ‘It has to go on the tree.’

  ‘I almost sawed my finger off that day,’ I said with a shudder, remembering. I had certainly not been good at any practical skills back then. Not that I was particularly great at them now. I tried to tell myself that each of us have our own skills in life. I went back to the box and pulled out the second string of lights. ‘Oh, look,’ I said in a half-whisper, seeing an ornament sticking out. It was a sparkling gold bauble. I pulled it out and let out a gasp when it dropped from the holder and string in my hand. I just managed to catch it before it smashed on the floor. ‘Oh, no.’

  ‘That was your mum’s favourite,’ Dad said, looking at it. ‘She bought it as the first ornament for the tree in our house our first Christmas after we got married. She found it in a charity shop and hung it on the otherwise bare tree. It took a few Christmases to fill it up as we didn’t have much money.’

  ‘It’s broken,’ I said, looking at it, my eyes filling with tears as I pictured her all excited buying it for their first Christmas tree together.

  ‘I can fix it,’ Rory said, holding his hand out. I dropped the parts into his cupped hand. ‘I’ll be back.’ He hurried off, always happy to try to fix something. I watched him go, and couldn’t help but wonder whether he saw me as someone that needed fixing.

  ‘It’s always strange without her at this time of year, isn’t it?’ my dad said, going back to the box but not before I saw his own eyes had welled up too.

  Harry reached for me then and I pulled him onto my lap, letting him grab hold of a bit of tinsel in there. I couldn’t help but hold him tightly against me. ‘She’ll never know Harry, Dad. She should be here helping us dress the tree, she would have loved it.’

  ‘Aye, she would.’ He looked up. ‘But she wouldn’t want us all maudlin, would she? She would crank up the music, get out the mulled wine and tell us to enjoy ourselves.’

  I smiled through my tears because that’s exactly what she would have done.

  ‘Sounds like a good idea to me,’ Rory agreed, appearing behind us again. ‘All fixed.’

  ‘Thank you,’ I said, giving him a quick hug as I took it from him. My dad smiled at us. ‘Where’s the fairy we put on the top last year, the one you had growing up?’ Like me, Rory had only his memories of his mother during the festive period, but also his dad, and he needed something of theirs on this tree too.

  He fished the fairy out of a box. ‘We should make a wish when we put these up,’ I told them firmly. These were special ornaments, and it was a special time of year, surely that equalled the possibility of some Christmas magic being available?

  I picked a spot right in the centre of the tree and hung my mum’s ornament on it, closing my eyes, and wishing that I could be as good a mother to Harry as she had been to me. I opened my eyes and watched Rory standing on his tip-toes to top the tree with the fairy, which had faded over the years. I wondered what he had wished for
. Dad started to clap, which Harry joined in with enthusiastically.

  I looked at the bauble as it sparkled back at me, and I took out my phone to snap a photo for our Instagram.

  My mother’s favourite ornament hanging on our tree in the farmhouse. I miss her the most at this time of year, but she was with us today, I’m sure of it.

  * * *

  It was five a.m. the following day when the alarm went off. Rory needed the extra early start so he could get the cows ready and set off for the auction, which was a four-hour drive away. I got up too, eager to spend as much time as possible with him before he headed off. I wanted to make him a good breakfast for the journey too.

  The snow was patchy over the grass when I went outside to feed the chickens. It was freezing outside, but the weather had turned into a bitter wind, more snow seemingly fended off for the time being. I had left Harry inside with Dad so I could do the chores faster and then we could all have a family breakfast together. As I re-filled the water trough, Angus walked by.

  ‘Cows are in the trailer ready,’ he said, without saying hello. Rory had gone inside to shower and change.

  ‘Great, thanks.’ I turned to go then paused, feeling bad for not thinking he should be included in our breakfast. The thing was, he rarely came into the farmhouse. I had worried it was to avoid me when I came to live here, but Rory said he had rarely done it when his father was in charge either. That he preferred to keep to himself in the cottage. I thought he must be lonely there sometimes though. ‘Do you want to join us for breakfast, Angus? We’re making a cooked one for Rory.’

  ‘No, I’m going to let the horses out. But thank you.’ He tipped his hat and slouched off. I couldn’t help but be curious about people, and I longed to ask him for his story. He wasn’t married, and had no children either, had lived on the farm since he arrived aged twenty, and rarely left it. But I didn’t feel like I could ask him. He didn’t really invite conversation, even with Rory he only talked about the farm. I was relieved he would be here though with Rory gone – what he didn’t know about farming wasn’t worth knowing.

  ‘Right, I think I’m all done for the morning,’ I said when I walked in the back door. My dad was grilling sausages and the smell instantly made my stomach rumble. ‘You didn’t have to do that.’

  ‘I keep telling you – I want to help as much as I can,’ he replied sternly. ‘Now, sit down and see to your son, I’m perfectly capable of cooking breakfast.’ My mum had done the cooking all through their marriage but when she died, he tried to learn as I was out working all day, and he now was pretty good at a whole host of comforting dishes, especially a good old fry up. I did as I was told and sat down, getting a glass of milk for Harry and a cup of coffee for me.

  ‘Daddy!’ Harry said then as Rory came in washed and changed with a spring in his step – he loved going to auctions and seeing all the farmers and getting all the news from around the county.

  ‘This smells great, Don, I’m starving,’ he said, coming to sit with us. ‘Everything okay, Heth?’ He added then in a lower voice, noticing the frown on my face.

  ‘Just been looking at the forecast, more snow is on the way,’ I told him, looking up from my phone. We didn’t always get a phone signal out here but the Wi-Fi worked well thank goodness. ‘For here, and where you’re going.’

  ‘I need to go, it’ll be fine,’ Rory said, waving off my concern. ‘After this, you’ll have me for the whole winter, you’d think you’d be glad to see the back of me for a day,’ he joked.

  I managed to raise a smile in reply. I knew he was trying to cheer me up. But I just didn’t feel confident with him gone even though I wasn’t alone with my dad and Angus here, and Harry too, of course. I went on to Instagram and was surprised to see a bunch of likes, comments and new followers after my tree post. A few people had mentioned that they always thought of loved ones more at this time of year too, and how lovely it was to have my mother’s ornament on the tree. ‘Look at this,’ I said, showing it to Rory. ‘I didn’t think people would be interested…’

  ‘So many people have lost someone, haven’t they?’ he said quietly. He leaned over to give me a quick kiss. I often thought that was why nothing really fazed Rory; he had been through the worst when he’d lost his parents. ‘I won’t be gone long,’ he added in a low voice, perhaps feeling bad about not taking my concerns seriously.

  ‘I’ll be fine,’ I said, taking my phone back, hoping if I said the words then they would be true. I wasn’t someone that shared how I felt with many people, I tried to keep my worries to myself as much as possible, although it was hard to fool my dad or Rory, or Beth a lot of the time, but I hated to make them worry about me, and sometimes I just felt embarrassed by my feelings. It was a lot easier to keep up a cheerful front, but opening up on that post, even in such a small way, had made me feel better, and it seemed like others felt better because of it too.

  ‘Right, kids, eat up,’ my dad said then, carrying over plates piled with eggs, bacon and sausages. He brought over a rack of toast too. ‘Although if I keep eating like this every day, I won’t fit into any of my trousers.’

  ‘You’ll have to come out to the cows, that uses up more than enough calories for the day,’ Rory said.

  ‘I don’t know how you do it all, in this weather too. Puts my sitting behind a desk for my working years to shame. I still can’t believe you’ve persuaded my daughter to this life,’ my dad said, buttering his toast, throwing me a grin.

  ‘What can I say? I was too charming for her to resist,’ Rory replied. ‘Isn’t that right, Heth?’

  ‘If you believe that, you’ll believe anything,’ I replied with a snort. Rory grinned at me, seeming pleased that I sounded more cheerful. I wished I didn’t have to force it but I couldn’t help but worry about Rory being gone all day, and having responsibility for the farm without him. I had hardly been here by myself so it was nerve-wracking. I really hoped nothing went wrong today. I glanced out of the window as a large snowflake drifted down, and bit my lip.

  Chapter Nine

  After Rory left, my dad suggested that he take Harry with him into Glendale. He had left a couple of Christmas presents at home, and offered to take the milk we had for the farm shop. ‘It’ll be too much for you,’ I protested.

  ‘No, it won’t. Let me help you more, please,’ he replied firmly, scooping Harry out of his highchair. ‘You said yourself, you wanted time alone to wrap some presents now, didn’t you?’ I couldn’t think of an argument to that so once they had put their coats on and walked out to the car, I found myself in the farmhouse alone. Something I didn’t think had happened since I moved in.

  Heading into the living room, I went to the chest in the corner and pulled out the presents I had bought for Harry, Rory and my dad and tried to enjoy the quiet as I pulled out the wrapping paper, and bows, and sat on the floor to wrap them. Tabby, the cat, soon found me, and tried to run off with the ribbon. ‘That’s not a toy!’ I cried but she rolled on her back and began to wrestle with it, evidently thinking it was. I supposed at least a goat hadn’t got in and chewed up the lot – a cat I could cope with. The only pet I’d had growing up was a hamster called Honey – after she died and I cried for two days, my mum had banned any others. Now I had a menagerie.

  Tabby soon grew tired of playing with the ribbon, and curled up on a sheet of paper and fell asleep instead. I knew as I wrapped the gifts, I had bought far too much for Harry. He would likely be more interested in the paper I wrapped them with but it was far too easy to order things online. I still had this nagging feeling that I should be doing more as a mother, and this was one way I had tried to do so. Rory hadn’t seen half of what I had got, and would no doubt tell me that I’d gone overboard. But I needed this Christmas to be a wonderful one for us all. If I could make it perfect then maybe I could stop feeling like I was failing here.

  The doorbell rang out in the silence then, making me jump. I couldn’t remember the last time the doorbell had rung – our family a
nd friends usually just walked in the back door. I hoped it wasn’t anyone official. The farm was regularly inspected without warning and I so did not need that today with Rory gone. I thought again about the two figures I had seen near to the farm, and hoped it wasn’t anything to do with them. Reluctantly, I got up and made my way into the hall, leaving the mess on the floor and the cat curled up in the middle of it. So much for my stress-free morning.

  I opened up the door to a man in a dark coat standing on the doorstep. ‘Can I help you?’ I asked, keeping my hand on the door warily.

  He broke into a grin. ‘What, you don’t recognise me? It’s only been a few years.’

  My mouth fell open unattractively as I took him in properly. ‘Stewart?’ I squeaked. I stared at him in utter shock – my height, wearing dark jeans, a black jumper with a wool overcoat, his dark hair ruffled by the wind, his blue eyes bright. Just as handsome as he had always been. ‘Oh my God! What are you doing here?’ I asked my ex-boyfriend, reeling. I hadn’t seen him since my abrupt exit from university when my mum had became ill.

  ‘How about you ask me inside for a coffee, and I’ll tell you?’ he asked, his lips curving into a warm smile. ‘It’s pretty cold out here.’

  I realised then that he was still on the doorstep, and hastily pulled the door wide open. ‘Sorry, of course, come on in,’ I said, watching him walk past me in wonder. I honestly hadn’t expected to ever see him again. I touched my hair, wondering how messy it might look after the morning chores. I tried to smooth it down as I took in a steadying breath trying to calm down my shock at seeing him. I closed the door and faced him again, arranging what I hoped was a more collected expression on my face. ‘Right, this way,’ I said, leading him into the kitchen. I couldn’t help but feel relieved to have the house to myself. Rory knew about Stewart, of course, but it would have been far too strange to see them in the same room together. ‘Coffee then? Sit down, sit down,’ I said, hurrying over to make us a drink. Stewart sat down at the table, looking around with open interest. I glanced over my shoulder to see him turn his gaze on me and smile. He looked the same. Older, of course, and thinner maybe, but the same. It was disconcerting. ‘I can’t believe you’re sitting in my kitchen.’