With a sigh, Anna returned the parcel to the desk and pulled away the ragged-edged brown paper.
Inside was a plain white cardboard box. There was no ribbon or aroma, just a small square of sticky tape that appeared to have been bitten off the roll and stuck on at an impatient angle. It took the top layer of cardboard from the box as Anna peeled it off. Carefully, she lifted the lid.
There was a rumble of discontent around her as the contents were revealed. No tissue paper surrounded them, just a transparent ziplock plastic bag, which looked suspiciously like a sandwich bag. Instead of containing the selection of shells and sea-glass beads inside the box, it had been laid on top of them like a blanket. Each of the shells had been drilled with a small hole and the sea-glass beads were looped with thin silver jewellers’ wire, with a small silver hanging ring attached to each one. A length of narrow black leather thong had been wound into a circle secured by an equally dog-eared scrap of tape. In the bottom of the box was a rectangle of white card, upon which was typed:
Make of this what you will
xx
‘He’s slipping.’ Sheniece’s disgust was immediate.
Rea, searching for positives, gave Anna a weak smile. ‘At least he put kisses?’
‘I thought you said the parcels were amazing?’ an intern whispered to Rea, loud enough for everyone to hear.
One by one the onlookers quietly dispersed, no doubt in a hurry to share the latest instalment of the Anna Browne parcel story with anyone who would listen. Only Ted and Sheniece remained, as Anna stared at the box’s contents.
‘He was bound to run out of ideas sometime,’ Sheniece offered, glancing at Ted for support. ‘I mean, that dodgy old record and map-thing last time were pretty lame.’
No matter how long Anna regarded the gift, she couldn’t make out the reasoning behind it. The shells and sea-glass beads were pretty in their own way, but what was she supposed to ‘make of’ them? She had never been what she would call a ‘crafty’ person. Weaving daisy chains with Grandma Morwenna had been the closest she’d come to making anything – and now she was grown-up she preferred to buy beautifully crafted items rather than make them herself. So why would the sender think this gift suited her?
She pondered this throughout the day without finding answers. When the bus dropped her outside Walton Tower, she headed to the floor below hers instead of going home. Another pair of eyes was required to help her see what had been invisible to her.
Tish sucked a mouthful of air through her veneers. ‘This is disappointing. But I guess there’s only so much imagination a guy can have. Soon it’ll be IOUs and gift certificates.’
‘It is as bad as I thought, isn’t it?’ Anna had hoped her straight-talking friend might be able to offer a ray of hope. Her shoulders dropping, she slumped into the dragging squashiness of Tish’s oversized sofa and wished she hadn’t opened the parcel at work. ‘Do I look like a crafty person?’
Tish’s expression clouded. ‘You couldn’t be devious if you tried. But what does that have to do with the beads?’
‘What I mean is that I’ve never been a creative person. I like handmade things, but I’ve never wanted to make them myself. I don’t know what to do with these shells and beads.’
‘I guess you’re meant to thread them onto the leather string. Weird that there’s no instructions.’
‘Other than “Make of this what you will”.’ Anna groaned. ‘The worst of it is that I chose to open this one at work. And now everyone is talking about how disappointing the parcel was to open – at least, if Ted is to be believed.’
‘You just wanted to share it with your workmates, Anna. It was a sweet thought.’
‘But this parcel doesn’t fit the profile of the others. And I don’t ever want to sound ungrateful, but I’m beginning to wish the sender hadn’t bothered.’ It was a dreadful admission, but after hours of confusion over the parcel, this was the feeling she had been left with.
Until today, Anna had liked the changes wrought in her by each new gift. But this parcel had unearthed an emotion that she didn’t like. She had never considered herself ungrateful before – despite the accusation being repeatedly levelled at her by Senara over the years. And yet, she felt it now: a churning, razor-edged disquiet within her that refused to leave. Why had the sender wrapped the parcel so badly, when every other present had been given such painstaking attention to detail? Why had a different courier delivered it this morning? And why did they expect her to make her own gift?
And then a thought occurred to her. ‘Tish, you don’t think they’re annoyed I tried to contact them, do you? Was this parcel meant to show me I’d upset them?’ Even as the words came out, they sounded preposterous. But what else was she supposed to think?
Tish was noncommittal. ‘Who knows? Maybe just take this one as a slip-up, and hope the guy smartens his act next time . . .’
The answer did nothing to reassure Anna.
That evening, the contents of the box spread out across her dining table, she looked again at the note:
Make of this what you will
xx
The shells and sea-glass beads told her nothing. Frustrated, Anna pushed them away and cradled her head in her hands. If there were answers to be found, they hadn’t been included in this delivery. From feeling on the verge of solving the mystery, she was now further away than she had ever been. She would have to wait for the sender’s next move – if there was one . . .
Thirty
For the next week a stubborn bank of rain lodged itself over the city, magnifying its greyness with unrelenting gloom. Sheets of water lashed down, turning the pavements into leaden glass and the roads into car parks – journeys halted by the inclement conditions. Famous red double-decker buses dragged through congested streets in a sea of stationary black cabs, a slow-moving slash of scarlet in the unremitting monochrome. It seemed to mirror Anna’s mood, which had not been improved by seven days of mulling over her latest parcel. This morning the bus ride into work was slower than ever, its driver making no attempt to disguise his frustration with the traffic or his bad-tempered passengers.
‘Thirty-five minutes we waited for you,’ a sour-faced woman snarled at him as she flashed her Oyster card like a middle finger. ‘Call this service?’
‘You want I should make this bus fly?’ he snapped back, his Eastern European accent deepened by anger. ‘You don’t like it, lady? Then walk.’
By the time the bus arrived at the stop outside Freya & Georgie’s Anna barely had enough time to grab a takeaway cup before work. Ben was waiting by the counter, checking his watch, when Anna hurried inside, brushing rain from her coat sleeves.
‘You made it!’ he grinned, a sight even more welcoming to Anna than the large coffee cup he held out to her. ‘I took the liberty of ordering for you, given the time. Hope you don’t mind?’
‘Not in the slightest.’ Anna glanced at her watch. ‘I have to be on reception in twenty minutes.’
Ben indicated the bar stools in the window. ‘So, sit with me for ten?’
On any other day Anna would have headed straight to the Messenger building, not wanting to risk being late, but today she needed a friend. The rumours surrounding her most recent parcel had raged around the floors at work, causing her to answer a torrent of questions as unremitting as the rain that pounded the streets of the city. She was tired of being the centre of attention – and at least with Ben she knew she was safe from questions that she had no answers for.
‘You look tired,’ he observed, taking the lid off his coffee cup and stirring in two packets of brown sugar.
‘I feel tired. I think it’s this weather. It’s so depressing – it’s meant to be summer, for heaven’s sake, not winter.’
‘Unfortunately, nobody’s told the clouds that. Still, it adds to efficiency at work. Nobody’s interested in extended lunch breaks when they have to dodge the rain. I’ve never seen the interns in the newsroom so keen to work in-house before. Usually they’
re begging me to take them out on assignment. Not this week.’ He smiled and then, without warning or invitation, took hold of Anna’s hand.
Surprised, Anna looked down, but she didn’t pull away. The sight of Ben’s fingers cradling hers was beautiful – and in that moment she forgot the parcel and the questions and her own dark mood. None of it mattered. The warmth of his skin against hers made her aware of her own heartbeat; and when she raised her eyes to his, she realised she was smiling.
‘Is this – okay?’ he asked, his tone low and uncertain.
‘Yes. It is.’
For a while neither spoke, their smiles and touch surrounded by the noise and activity of the coffee house. Anna was pleased by the silence between them, because at that precise moment words failed her. She saw neither the rain pelting on the window nor the second hand on the clock above the counter, marking the time passing. All she could think about was Ben. She wanted to tell him what this meant to her, what he had come to mean to her as they had talked here for weeks. Had she found the words she was searching for, she could have expressed how this moment was more profound, more heartfelt and more of a gift than any of her mystery parcels – and how differently he made her feel about her own life . . .
And then Ben spoke. ‘I want to ask you something, but I’m not sure how you’ll react.’
Anything, Ben. Ask me anything . . . ‘Go ahead.’
Was this what she thought it might be? Did he feel the attraction between them, too? Anna held her breath and waited for his reply.
‘The last parcel upset you, didn’t it?’
For a moment Anna wavered, her thoughts everywhere and nowhere at once. She saw Ben’s smile fade away and realised she had snatched her hand from his. The last words he had spoken replayed in her mind, a scrambled anagram that wouldn’t let her solve it.
‘What did you say?’
‘The shells and the beads . . . ?’ He had moved away from her a little, his tone cautious.
‘I know what was in it.’ The sharpness of her reply surprised her more than him.
‘Of course . . . I – I just wanted to say I’m sorry you didn’t like it.’
Why would Ben McAra be sorry? Unless . . .
‘Did you send it?’ The question was immediate, and for once Anna didn’t pause to consider whether she should be asking. ‘Were the parcels from you?’ She had relied on Ben being the only person who didn’t want to know about them, but his question changed everything. ‘Have you been sending them?’
His eyes widened and Anna couldn’t make out if it was guilt at his secret being revealed or shock that she would even accuse him. He caught her coat sleeve as she made to leave. ‘Please, Anna, just listen. I didn’t mean to freak you out. I know I haven’t asked before. It’s just . . .’ His eyes darted left and right across the wooden countertop as if he might find the right words etched in its polished grain. ‘People were talking about it this week: about how you opened the parcel with an audience, and how you’ve been quiet ever since. And – I don’t know – I wanted to check you’re all right. The other gifts were so kind and genuine . . .’
So Ben knew it all. Anna kicked herself for not guessing he would be on top of the Messenger gossip. Of course he would be: it was his job to know what was happening. ‘I’m fine.’
‘Are you?’
Anna stared at him. Why did he care? Wasn’t the office gossip enough?
‘You don’t look fine to me. I’ve watched you on reception since that parcel arrived and you looked so different. I miss your smile, Anna, and I think you do, too. I realise it’s none of my business, even if half of the Daily Messenger staff seem to think what’s happening to you is public property. And the irony of a tabloid journalist making that statement is not lost on me. I think this parcel was a blip. I believe the next one will be better. Far better. Listen, what I’m saying is that I’m here if you’d like to talk about it – or not talk about it?’ His eyes drifted to the rain-battered street. ‘That’s all I wanted to say.’
She had been blindsided by Ben’s question, but what he’d said struck a chord. After the disappointing seventh parcel, everyone around her had returned to their favoured pessimistic theories about the sender. It was definitely a man, Sheniece and her friends claimed, because men always defaulted to disappointing with their gifts. Perhaps the sender was getting bored, others like Tish argued, and maybe the game they had started was running out of appeal. Jonah being away and unreachable on location didn’t help, either. Meanwhile, Ted and several of his gossip merchants repeated their darker assumptions: that the sender’s plan had taken a sinister turn, leading Anna down the path they had always intended for her.
But nobody – not a single person in Anna’s life – had attempted to comfort her, or offer a positive perspective.
Until now.
He might have raised the issue in a clumsy manner, but Ben’s heartfelt words were soothing. There were many things Anna didn’t need, but Ben stepping back from her – when his was the only encouraging voice amidst the doomsayers – wasn’t one of them.
‘You really think there will be more?’ she asked.
‘I do. And when they arrive, talk to me about them. Because I’m interested.’
The interior of Freya & Georgie’s seemed to brighten a little despite the unchanging greyness outside, as Anna smiled at the journalist. ‘I’d like that.’
Having an ally in Ben was the tonic Anna needed. That day she hardly noticed when the same half-baked suppositions swirled around her, laughing away the doubters. She was confident once more, daring to hope for better things. As the week passed, she began to look objectively on the sixth and seventh parcels. The old record and her trip out to Notting Hill with Jonah had caused more questions than they’d answered, but the gift had given her two things: firstly, the story behind ‘Ain’t She Sweet’, which, true or not, hinted at someone observing a woman they were so proud of that they wanted others to look at her; and, secondly, the chance to say thank you to the person who had sent the gifts. That they had chosen not to reply was immaterial. Finding a lead of any kind felt like a step forward, bringing Anna back into control. She remembered something her brother Ruari had said a few months ago, when a potentially lucrative sponsor for his surf school had pulled the plug at the last minute: ‘I can’t waste time worrying about slammed doors. This is just one closer to finding an open one.’
The sea-glass and shells were harder to rationalise, with the bruises of recent disappointment still smarting. But the pieces had a beauty of their own, even in their unfinished state. The sender wasn’t to know that Anna wouldn’t know what to do with them. If Ben was right and this was a blip, maybe she would understand better when the next parcel arrived.
‘You’ve got that posh scarf on again, I see.’ Babs nodded approvingly as she dusted the reception counter.
Anna was almost an hour early for work, but she had come in anyway, relishing the space and quiet before her colleagues arrived. As she had been leaving home she was struck by a sudden urge to wear the silk scarf with the yellow rose-print again. It rested like a lover’s whisper against her skin now and reminded her of how everything had started to change with its arrival. Too many questions had crowded her lately; she needed to return to the breathless optimism the parcels had unearthed in her – to reconnect to the sense of magic and wonder. Maybe then she would find a new clue to unveiling the sender.
‘It is lovely, isn’t it? And it feels fantastic on, too.’
‘I’ll bet.’ Babs coughed through the cloud of spray polish and scowled accusingly at the aerosol can. ‘Oh, this stuff is abysmal! I swear management has started shopping for cleaning products at one of them pound-shops,’ she said, showing it to Anna. ‘Mr Shiny Polish? Never heard of it! And it’s not just this, either. These dusters would tear in a summer breeze. And the floor-cleaner is so thin I need half a bottle to do one bucket.’ She gave a loud, disapproving tut. ‘Cost-cutting, that’s what this is. You take my advice, flower:
find the chap who could afford to send you that scarf and marry him. Better to be a kept woman, if you’re going to be next on the list for the chop.’
Anna touched the gossamer-soft silk at her neck and tried her best to discount the cleaner’s suggestion. Every business had to cut costs, she assured herself; better that it be in cleaning products and printer paper than in personnel.
But still, it was worrying. She thought back to Ted’s reaction after she’d helped Juliet move office and he’d found out, despite Anna’s best attempts to keep the editor’s secret. ‘I told you this place was going up the Swanny. If Dragon Evans is giving up her lair, it can only mean one thing: bad news.’
Anna had argued back. ‘It means nothing of the sort, Ted. People move offices all the time.’
‘All smoke and mirrors, ain’t it? Make us all think it’s business as usual and then – whammo! – four hundred employees out on their sweet backsides!’
As Babs shuffled her duster around the atrium, Anna lifted her fingers again to the reassuring coolness of her scarf. What if her job was in danger? Was it the worst thing that could happen? Juliet’s words from her starkly empty office came back to Anna’s mind: Keep taking risks, Ms Browne. Your life will be all the better for it.
What if losing her job at the newspaper allowed Anna to take a risk? She considered what else she could be doing, if not working on reception. She liked working with people and got a kick out of solving other people’s problems. She’d enjoyed organising the rota among her friends to help Isadora last year – and she’d been surprised by how much she’d liked working out business plans for Ruari and Gary her dentist. Perhaps she could revisit what she’d learned at university – maybe working with other entrepreneurs to make their business dreams happen. It was something she’d never considered before, but in the early-morning stillness of the atrium the idea began to take shape.
Thirty-One
A Parcel for Anna Browne Page 20