Her Christmas Homecoming

by Shirley Wine

  How well do I know Joe? Is he often given to such violence?

  Unable to pretend sleep was close, she dragged herself out of bed and made her way through the house. She didn’t turn on any lights—this was home, and she was now determined it would always be her home, and she knew every inch of it, blindfold.

  Sometime since she’d left Joe’s, Marta had reached a decision. She was not going to sell, regardless of how things settled out at the resort or at Chez Christophe.

  She unlocked the back door and stepped out onto the terrace, the area made comfortable and very livable with the furniture and the other homely touches Joe had provided—flowers, furniture—there was no end to his thoughtfulness.

  The man was a conundrum, one she struggled to understand.

  He dressed like a raggedy scarecrow, yet above the entrance to his market garden was a life-like portrait of Joe, well-groomed and dressed in tan casuals. And on the nights when he accompanied her at Chez Christophe, Joe was conservatively dressed in a dark suit—and far from looking like a plaster dummy. He wore a suit like a second skin; a walking, breathing temptation.

  In a moment of total recall, she remembered catching the faintest whiff of mothballs about him that first night—‘I’ve only been inside here once since my father’s funeral’—to get that suit from a closet?

  If so, Joe hadn’t put on an ounce in the past ten years.

  Why did he take me to his home—scratch that—the house he shared with his parents? It certainly showed no sign anyone had been living there for years.

  To turn her off? Put distance between them?

  Here, he was kind, thoughtful, and without his help Marta knew she would have made little progress at clearing away the junk her mother had somehow managed to accumulate. And yet the same man had left his own house shut up to rot—it didn’t make a lick of sense.

  A breeze twitched the nightgown about her legs, and she shivered.

  She saw a flicker of movement from the corner of her eye and whirled. For an instant, she thought it was a stranger sitting there, on the seat beside her door, and her heart clenched like a fist as he stood.

  Then she realised. It was Joe.

  Before her mind could consciously sort out the details of him, she was in his arms.

  Pressed against him, speechless, she had time to notice things; the arch of his collarbone against her face, the faint smell of disinfectant and soap about him, the softness of the fabric of his T-shirt, the strength of his arms about her and the rasp of his whiskers against her much softer skin.

  ‘It’s you,’ she whispered, and only then realised she was crying. ‘You came!’

  ‘I couldn’t stay away,’ he whispered, his voice breaking. ‘I’m so sorry.’

  ‘You’re sorry?’ She pulled away a little and looked up, but it was too dark to see more than the pale oval of his face. ‘It should be me that’s sorry, saying all those horrible things to you.’

  ‘They were things I needed to hear,’ he whispered, his breath warm against her cheek.

  ‘They were cruel.’

  ‘And sometimes, Marta, sometimes you need to be cruel to be kind.’

  She relaxed her hold a little and tilted her head back to look at him.

  ‘Are we okay? You’re all right?’ She sniffed, her eyes overflowing as she looked at him. ‘What are you doing out here, why didn’t you knock? Let me know you were here?’

  ‘I didn’t want to scare you,’ he said, his voice gruff with emotion. ‘I thought I’d sleep out here, and knock in the morning when you were awake.’

  She snorted, a weepy watery sound. ‘As if I could sleep after that fight.’

  ‘Why are you crying?’

  ‘Because I hurt you, said all those hateful things, and you’ve been so kind to me. Oh, a hundred things and nothing really.’ She pulled away and scrubbed at her cheeks. ‘I thought you would never want to talk to me again, want nothing to do with me and my problems.’

  He made a gruff sound halfway between laughter and frustration. ‘In ten years I’ve never succeeded in erasing you from my thoughts, I can’t see me succeeding now.’

  ‘I don’t deserve you.’ She fiddled with the soft, worn fabric of his shirt. ‘And I don’t care how you dress.’

  He caught her hand and held it firmly pressed against his chest. ‘Strangely, I do care, or at least I intend to care. You nailed it, you know.’

  ‘I did?’

  ‘A long overdue teenage rebellion, one I should have grown out of years ago.’

  She giggled. ‘Christophe and your friends won’t know you if you stop wearing such ratty clothes.’

  ‘They’ll get used to it.’ He increased the pressure on her hand. ‘Why didn’t you tell me my mother threatened you and your mother?’

  She stiffened, startled by the unexpectedness of this. ‘How …’

  ‘Kev told me.’ His voice shook with anger. ‘That’s a load of lies about my father and your mother.’

  ‘I know.’ She sighed softly, nestling her head closer to his chest. ‘I used to wish your dad was mine. He was so kind to us, talked to Ben and me. Plenty of times we would have gone hungry and your dad would arrive with a basket full of fresh veggies. He refused any offers of payment, and I know he sometimes paid the butcher and grocer for Mum, but only because I was with her and the butcher said her account was paid in full. But I never once saw him so much as touch Mum’s hand.’

  ‘He was that sort of guy. He saw a need; he did something about it, and never expected a word of thanks. He liked you, a lot.’

  ‘He encouraged me to take up my place in that singing class.’ She broke off. ‘He gave me the money for my fare and enough to tide me over until I could support myself.’

  ‘He told me.’

  ‘I never did repay him.’

  ‘You repaid him a million times over when you befriended Rebecca and cared for her and helped her find her feet. What price can I put on my sister’s life?’

  ‘I only did what any other person would have done for a friend in need.’

  ‘No, Marta, it was your kindness and compassion that saved Becky,’ he said, his voice gruff. ‘I will never forget that.’

  She fiddled with his shirt, uncomfortable with his praise, and curious. Where did they go from here? ‘What are you going to do with your house?’

  ‘I’ve expended a lot of elbow grease there today cleaning up my shit, just like you yelled at me to do.’ There was a lilt of laughter in his voice. ‘Then, for good measure, I cleaned the house from one end to the other, and thoroughly aired it out.’

  ‘Are you going to shift in there now?’

  ‘Kev asked me that too, and the answer is the same.’ He looked down at her. ‘I’m going to ask Ben if he would like to live there. It will give him privacy, time alone, and from what I’ve read, this is something he will need. If he lives in the house, he can walk to work.’

  ‘What about Kev and his lady? They’ve been with you a long time.’

  ‘I doubt if it’s possible to winkle them out of their cottage. Kev just about bit my head off when I suggested it a couple of years back.’

  ‘So where will you live?’ Marta’s heart thudded heavily against her breastbone.

  ‘I’m hoping that you can make room for me here. Have you room for me in your home, in your life?’

  ‘What about my music?’

  ‘We work well together. We always have. I have some suggestions to make about music, but for now, I want to make a different kind of music with you.’ He held her close a moment, then put her a little bit away from him so he could put a finger under her chin. ‘I love you, Marta, I always have and I always will. You are the light of my life. Will you marry me, be my wife, and turn this house into our home?’

  ‘It’s taken you long enough to ask. I promised to marry you when we were in fourth grade, remember.’

  ‘So you did.’ He laughed and his arms tightened. He lifted her off her feet and swung her around in a circle.<
br />
  Then on another exuberant burst of laughter, he carried her through to the bed.

  ***

  Marta tucked her hands under her armpits and turned in a full circle trying to take it all in. ‘I had no idea.’

  ‘I know,’ Joe whispered tugging her into his arms and holding her tight against him. ‘And that makes me a very happy man.’

  He caught her by the hand and pulled her around the room he had turned into a music recording studio attached to the bachelor pad he’d built behind the office of Joe’s Gourmet Vegetables.

  ‘So what do you record?’

  Tugging her hand, he towed her over to a state-of-the-art synthesiser and mixer, fiddled with a few buttons and the rich sound of piano and organ filled the airwaves.

  Marta closed her eyes and her toe tapped to the catchy rhythm for a few beats—then she realised she knew this music.

  ‘Marshall Greene!’ She spun around to face him, her eyes bugging out. ‘You’re Marshall Greene.’

  He nodded. ‘I am.’

  ‘But his music is everywhere, bars, clubs, on the radio,’ she stammered. ‘The talkback is all over the airwaves trying to find out anything about the mysterious Marshall Greene. I don’t understand. No one here knows about this?’

  Of course they didn’t. If anyone in Marandowie caught a whiff of this there would be reporters queuing for miles trying to get an exclusive interview with the reclusive musician who shunned publicity.

  ‘Only Kev and my agent, and they are sworn to silence.’ Joe studied her a moment, his head on one side. ‘Does this upset you?’

  ‘No. Not really. It’s just such a surprise, but why the secrecy?’

  Joe flicked a switch and the quietness echoed. He escorted her from the studio and locked the door behind them. In the comfortable bedsit she sat in a wingback chair, and he sat at the miniscule table.

  ‘Music is as much in my blood as it is in yours, Marta. It didn’t take me long to realise that while I loved everything about the freedom of the growing houses, I missed my music.’

  ‘I can understand this.’

  ‘Then one day, I was having lunch and I picked up a growers’ magazine that outlined an experiment about playing music to vegetables; it extolled the advantages of music making plants grow better and making them much more resistant to disease.’ He chuckled and shook his head. ‘It was like someone stood there in front of me and said, here mate, I give you permission to try this and give this a go. And that sounds ridiculous.’

  ‘No, it makes perfect sense to me. After your dad died, and that bust-up with your mother, you blamed it all on music.’

  He stared at her, his expression arrested. ‘I did,’ he said, slowly shaking his head. ‘I did blame Mother and music. Why did I not realise this?’

  ‘You were far too close to it all. But that article is a long way from the professional set-up you have in there.’

  ‘I bought a keyboard and made some crude CDs and played them in the glasshouse over a cheap amplifying system. The guys who worked for me thought I was nuts.’

  ‘I’ll bet.’ Marta grinned.

  ‘Then a strange thing happened. The guys started to bring their own CDs and put them in the recorder, jazz, guitar, blues, rock and roll, you name it. We all noticed there was far less stress among the workers, and the plants cropped well, and it just grew from there.’

  ‘And once you had a keyboard—’

  ‘I started composing. Then in a moment of pure serendipity, I ran into one of my mates from our teenage band in Sydney, and we got together for a jam session at his house. He was so taken with some of my music, he persuaded me to get an agent, and from there it snowballed.’

  ‘And the pseudonym?’

  ‘Marshall is my name and Greene—well I make my living growing green things.’

  ‘Clever! I would never have guessed.’

  ‘That is the idea.’

  A sliver of apprehension snaked through her. What did all this mean for them? They were so attuned, Joe picked up on her unease.

  ‘It means you can sing for Christophe, and if you’re agreeable, we can cut a few tracks together and see how they go.’ He pulled her out of the chair and onto his lap. ‘My records are selling well, and I’m sure us working together will be equally well received. We can talk to my agent about it, and while I’m happy to be your accompanist for gigs, that’s it for public appearances. I value my privacy.’

  ‘So do I. Do you really think I could get a recording contract?’

  ‘Without a doubt, sweetheart, you could fly to the moon if you set your sights on doing so.’ He framed her face with his hands. ‘I love you, and I will be there for you for the rest of our lives.’

  ‘You want to live at our house?’

  ‘And if we are both here in Marandowie we can look out for your mother and your brother. They both need lots of love and care. I promise I will be there for you, and for them, for the long haul, and we should consider buying out your brother’s and mother’s share in your house, but these are details we’ll need to work out.’

  ‘I love you, Joe. I’ve always loved you, and I always will,’ she whispered, and as she looked into his eyes, she could see the truth of his words reflected there.

  And she knew that sometimes, just sometimes, when a special man says forever, he means it.

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  Thanks for reading Her Christmas Homecoming. I hope you enjoyed it.

  If you liked this book, here are my other titles: Tell Me No Lies; Ask Me No Questions; Give Me Some Answers; Lies That Bind.

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  ISBN: 9781489296863

  Title: Her Christmas Homecoming

  Copyright © 2019 by SHIRLEY WINE

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  All characters in this book have no existence outside the imagination of the author and have no relation whatsoever to anyone bearing the same name or names. They are not even distantly inspired by any individual known or unknown to the author, and all incidents are pure invention.

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