The Little Village of Happiness: A gorgeous uplifting romantic comedy to escape with this summer

by Martin, Holly

  She was also nervous about getting the sign language right when she spoke to Poppy, but at least it would show Andrew she was willing to try.

  She had all the equipment laid out ready to make some candles and she was hoping she and Poppy would have a fun afternoon.

  There was laughter outside and she looked up to see Andrew and Jacob swinging Poppy between them, Poppy holding onto their hands as they swung her up into the air.

  Willow rushed to the door of the shop. ‘Jacob, could you just give me and Andrew a second to talk before you bring Poppy in?’

  ‘Oh, sure,’ Jacob said. He quickly signed something to Poppy and she nodded. He swung Poppy up onto his back and started prancing around outside giving her a piggyback that made her laugh.

  ‘What’s up?’ Andrew said, stepping into the shop and giving her a kiss on the cheek. The affection he had for her shone from his eyes. Clearly he didn’t know.

  ‘Look, I’m really sorry, but…’ She rested her hands on his chest. There was no easy way to say this. ‘But I accidentally let slip to Ruby that you’re deaf.’

  He frowned. ‘Oh.’

  ‘And… she sort of blurted it out to the whole pub,’ Willow cringed.

  His eyebrows shot up in surprise and then slashed down into a furious scowl. He was definitely pissed off.

  ‘So the whole village knows?’

  ‘I’m so sorry, I really am. I asked Jacob if he would interpret for me this afternoon and Ruby was there and she wanted to know why he would need to translate for me and Poppy and I told her she was deaf and then I ended up telling her that you were deaf too and… I’m so sorry. I know you don’t want anyone to know because you don’t want to be treated differently and I’ve ruined that for you. That was never my intention.’

  He didn’t say anything, but his jaw was tense, his eyes were dark and none of the affection he had for her was there any longer.

  ‘Are we all ready?’ Jacob asked from the doorway as Poppy stood in front of him staring round at all the candles with wide eyes.

  Willow looked back at Andrew and he stepped back away from her. ‘We’ll talk later, I have to get back to work.’

  God this hadn’t gone well at all but now, with Poppy eager to explore, it was really not the time to discuss it.

  Jacob brought Poppy inside and Willow smiled slightly that she had brought that hideous doll with her.

  ‘I’ll catch up with you in a few hours,’ Andrew said to Jacob. He knelt down to talk to Poppy. He started signing. ‘I’ll see you later and maybe we can go out for ice cream?’

  Poppy’s face lit up and she nodded.

  ‘You OK?’ Jacob asked. Although his brother nodded, it was very clear that he wasn’t.

  Willow needed to show Andrew that she took this part of his life very seriously. So she quickly crouched down to talk to Poppy.

  ‘Hi Poppy,’ Willow said, and as Andrew watched she very carefully signed the sentence that Morgan had taught her, asking Poppy if she would like to make some candles with her.

  ‘What the hell?’ Andrew exploded.

  Jacob let out a bark of a laugh but he was clearly shocked, which was worrying if even Jacob was shocked.

  Poppy blinked and then burst out laughing.

  Crap. She must have got it wrong. She signed the words again and Poppy’s laughter got louder. Even Jacob joined in this time. The only one who wasn’t laughing was Andrew.

  ‘What the fuck was that?’ Andrew practically yelled. ‘Is that your idea of a joke?’

  Willow stood back up. ‘Wait, did I get it wrong?’

  ‘You’re damned right you got it wrong. Where did you learn that?’

  ‘Morgan taught me,’ Willow said. ‘What did I say?’

  ‘“You have a very small penis,”’ Jacob said.

  ‘WHAT?!’ Willow said. ‘Holy shit, I didn’t mean to say that. I’m so sorry.’

  God, she was going to scar the poor child for life.

  Poppy signed something to Willow, in between laughing almost hysterically.

  ‘She says that she doesn’t have a penis, only boys have one of those,’ Jacob said.

  Willow suddenly realised that she’d got the two sentences Morgan had taught her the wrong way round and what she’d signed to Poppy had been meant for Andrew, although why the hell would Morgan teach her that? She decided to try what Andrew had taught her the night before, she shouldn’t go too far wrong with that.

  She carefully signed to Poppy.

  Poppy’s laughter got louder and Andrew rolled his eyes. With that he stormed out of the shop.

  She turned to Jacob. ‘What did I say now?’

  He pulled a face. ‘Best translation I can come up with: “Your doll is making candles with me.”’

  Shit. This was just getting worse. ‘Can you show Poppy round the shop for a moment? I need to talk to Andrew.’

  Jacob nodded.

  Tears smarting her eyes, she ran out of the shop after Andrew.

  He was standing out on the street pacing back and forth. She raced up to him.

  ‘I’m so sorry—’

  ‘You just told my six-year-old niece that she has a small penis, how inappropriate is that?’

  ‘I would never do that deliberately—’

  ‘You should never have tried to talk to her at all unless you know more sign language, who knows what else you could have accidentally said,’ Andrew said.

  ‘I shouldn’t have tried to communicate with her? Are you serious? I did this because I wanted to be part of your life and hers. I know I screwed it up but at least I was trying to share that side of your life with you.’

  ‘I never asked you to do that.’

  ‘But I wanted to. I wanted you to see that I took that part of your life seriously and how important you are to me. And you’re just throwing that back in my face. And in actual fact, Morgan showed me how to sign that to her so if you have issues with my signing you take it up with her.’

  ‘Are you saying all this is Morgan’s fault?’ Andrew said.

  ‘Yes… No,’ Willow said, the fight going out of her. Because he wasn’t really angry at her for messing up the sign language, they both knew that. This was about her telling the whole village he was deaf and that was all on her, no matter what Morgan had deviously tried to teach her.

  ‘Don’t you dare put this on Morgan,’ Andrew said. ‘She wasn’t the one who just blabbed to the whole village that I’m deaf. Do you know how let down I feel about that? This is my home and now you’ve made it awkward for me to carry on living here.’

  ‘These people love you and care about you, they would want to help you. Why not let them in?’ Willow said.

  ‘That wasn’t your decision to make.’

  ‘That’s what Morgan said, you really are well suited.’

  Andrew clearly ignored that. ‘I don’t need their help, or anyone’s.’

  ‘That’s ridiculous. You’ve always said that you want Poppy to grow up being proud of who she is, yet what kind of example are you setting for her pretending to everyone that you’re not deaf?’

  ‘You have no idea what it’s like to be deaf, how bloody hard it is. You couldn’t possibly understand what it’s like to have that label permanently hanging over your head.’

  ‘Because you won’t tell me, you won’t share that part of your life with me. Every time I asked you about it, you shut me out. Yet you’ll share all that with Morgan. The man you are now, the most incredible man I’ve ever met, is a product of the life you’ve led, the good, the bad, the ugly, the things you love, the things you hate. And one of the most significant influences on your life, for good or bad, is you being deaf. But you won’t share that with me. On our first date you made a toast to getting to know each other but you didn’t really mean that, did you? You just meant the shiny stuff, the best bits, nothing else. You said you wanted us to be honest with each other but you have closed down conversations, changed the subject and lied whenever I asked you questions about that pa
rt of your life.’ She took a step away from him as the full realisation of this hit her. ‘I guess I really wasn’t enough for you if you couldn’t share that with me.’

  Andrew didn’t say anything, just stared at her.

  ‘I’m sorry, I truly am, for telling the village you’re deaf. I’m sorry for letting you down.’ She swallowed down the lump of burning emotion in her throat. ‘But I can’t go through the next few years of my life feeling like I’m not enough and you shouldn’t be with someone who you can’t be yourself with.’

  With that Willow turned and walked away, tears streaming down her cheeks as her heart broke into a million pieces.

  Thirty-Three

  Andrew slammed the tray of chips down on the kitchen unit and they bounced so hard that some of them landed on the floor.

  ‘Jesus! Let me do that before you break something,’ Lottie said behind him as Poppy sat happily at the kitchen table playing with her toys. ‘Go and sit down.’

  Andrew sighed and stepped back out of the way, because he had already burnt himself on the oven twice that night; his mind was clearly elsewhere.

  Poppy, by all accounts, had had a lovely afternoon making candles with Willow. Jacob had said that Willow had arrived back at the shop clearly upset but somehow managed to pull it together to spend a few hours teaching Poppy. His niece hadn’t stopped telling him all about it since she’d arrived at his house earlier.

  ‘I can’t believe you and Willow broke up,’ Lottie said, as she turned the chips over and returned them to the oven. ‘Over nothing.’

  ‘It wasn’t nothing,’ Andrew said.

  ‘Oh yes, she accidentally let slip to her best friend that you’re deaf. Best friends do tend to tell each other everything.’

  ‘And Ruby then blurted it out to the whole pub.’

  ‘And that’s worth losing the love of your life over? I don’t know why you’re so insistent on keeping that part of your life secret anyway. You need to learn to let people in. Being surrounded by people who have an understanding of your needs, even if it’s a limited understanding, has got to be better than being surrounded by people who are completely ignorant to it.’

  She’d hit the nail on the head.

  Andrew sighed as he sat down at the table with Poppy. ‘I think that’s more the real reason why we broke up. I’ve been shutting her out.’

  Lottie shook her head in exasperation. ‘And why is that?’

  ‘I guess I don’t want to appear… less.’

  ‘Oh Andrew. You are not… less of anything. You are my favourite person in the world. Don’t tell Jacob I said that.’

  Andrew smiled slightly.

  Poppy galloped a toy horse up his arm and he grabbed a pig and trotted it up her arm, making her laugh.

  Lottie sat down with them. ‘You should have heard what Willow was saying in the pub about deaf people. She was telling Ruby off for feeling sorry for Poppy, she said that deaf people need empathy not sympathy. I think she understands a lot more than you think.’

  Poppy started signing something. ‘I like Willow, she’s funny.’

  He signed back. ‘I like her too.’

  ‘She’s not very good at sign language,’ Poppy giggled.

  He smiled sadly and shook his head.

  ‘I can’t believe she signed to Poppy that she had a small penis,’ Lottie said.

  ‘I can’t believe you’re not mad about that,’ Andrew said.

  ‘Why would I be mad? Firstly it’s hilarious, secondly Poppy does know the names of all the body parts so it’s not like it was something completely inappropriate.’

  ‘Willow said Morgan taught her to sign that.’

  ‘I can well believe it.’

  Andrew could too, it wasn’t the first time Morgan had taught someone the wrong thing to sign for a laugh.

  ‘You said you liked Morgan,’ Andrew said.

  ‘I do but she was very annoyed with Willow for outing you to the village. She’s very protective of you. It wouldn’t surprise me if she did that to get her back. I think she likes you.’

  Andrew sighed. ‘I think so too.’

  Poppy started signing again. ‘You need to teach Willow how to sign properly. She really wants to learn it.’

  He swallowed the lump in his throat. ‘I know.’

  Poppy continued to sign. ‘Because she loves you.’

  Andrew rubbed his hand across his eyes because Poppy in her innocence had got to the heart of the matter. Willow wanted to share this with him because she loved him and if he loved her he needed to let her in.

  ‘I need to see her,’ Andrew said.

  ‘Yes you do,’ Lottie said.

  ‘And say sorry for making her sad,’ Poppy signed. ‘And then bring her back here and we can share that tub of ice cream in the freezer.’

  He smiled and kissed her on the head. ‘I’ll be back soon.’

  Lottie gave him a nod of encouragement and he raced out of the door.

  The sun was setting, making the whole world outside rose-coloured as he ran up the lane towards Sunrise Cottage. He burst through the gate and hammered on the door.

  Willow answered it and it was quite obvious she had been crying.

  All the words he wanted to say went straight out of his head as he stared at her, bathed in the rose-gold light of the receding sun. He loved this woman so much. He stepped forward and kissed her and for a few seconds she kissed him back, melting against him, a little sob escaping on her lips before she put her hands on his chest and stopped him.

  ‘What are you doing here?’

  ‘I’ve come to say I’m sorry.’

  She shook her head and his heart dropped into his stomach.

  ‘This isn’t going to work between us,’ Willow said.

  Christ he was really going to lose her. ‘I love you. You said you loved me.’

  ‘We rushed into a relationship without getting to know each other, how could we really love each other, it’s been just over a week. We didn’t know each other at all.’

  ‘That’s bollocks, I know how I feel for you, I don’t care how long it’s been. You must have felt that too.’

  ‘I know you made me happy,’ her voice was choked. ‘You made me laugh and smile a lot.’ She frowned. ‘I know you are kind, generous, silly, determined, protective, I know you are an amazing man, and yes I think I did fall in love with you, but it wasn’t enough. There was something missing—’

  ‘There was something missing because I didn’t let you in. That was all my fault. I want to change that, I’ll tell you everything, whatever you want to know,’ Andrew said, desperately.

  She stared at him and he knew he had to give her something.

  ‘I was bullied incessantly in school. About my hearing aids, about being deaf, about being stupid. I think the hearing children thought I was rude or antisocial when it was just easier sometimes to not get involved in group conversations in the playground or in class, everyone shouting over everyone else and speaking so quickly, I struggled to keep up with it all. I found secondary school especially hard, being with so many different children and different teachers’ voices and trying to learn and understand their lip patterns when I was lip-reading. It was hard to concentrate with the other noises and I didn’t get the best grades because of it. I just felt I didn’t belong sometimes and it made me feel weak. I didn’t tell you these things because I didn’t want you to think I was weak.’

  She stepped up and cupped his face. ‘You are not weak, you are the bravest, strongest man I know.’

  He leaned his forehead against hers, tentatively wrapping his hands around her waist. She didn’t pull away.

  ‘There is a chance that by the time I’m fifty I will have lost all my hearing completely. It’s slowly getting worse and if that happens my hearing aids might not be of any use to me. I might be able to get a cochlear implant, which will help a lot, but it’s not a magic fix and I might not be suitable for it anyway. And that is something I haven’t really discussed with an
yone, not even my family. They know, but we don’t talk about it, simply because I would rather bury my head in the sand than think about what it will be like to not hear anything any more, to lose the sounds I love the most. Your laugh is one of the most beautiful sounds I’ve heard, it fills my heart every time I hear it and I don’t want to lose that.’

  ‘You may not be able to hear me laugh but you will still be able to see me smile. You’ll still feel my touch when we make love, my breath on your lips. You won’t lose that.’

  He looked her in the eyes. ‘Won’t I?’

  Tears filled her eyes and she shook her head. ‘I love you. I’m not going anywhere.’

  ‘I swear, I’ll tell you everything, my hopes, my fears, my frustrations and triumphs.’

  ‘I need to learn sign language.’

  ‘I’ll teach you, every word. I love you and I want to share this with you.’

  She smiled and leaned forward and kissed him and he sighed with relief against her lips.

  They were going to be OK and for the first time in his life he felt like he’d found somewhere where he truly belonged.

  Thirty-Four

  Willow came out of the castle ready for the big open day to start. They’d told estate agents and lettings agents that the village open day started officially at twelve and, as it was only quarter past eleven, they still had a short while before people started to arrive, although Willow suspected some people would come early.

  The castle was going to have its official opening at the same time and she knew people in the local area were particularly curious about seeing it. The castle grounds were filled with knights and princesses who were going to engage with the visitors and there was going to be a big jousting display later.

  Outside the castle walls, on the grassy slopes near the village entrance, the villagers had set up tables. They had all risen spectacularly to the challenge of providing Happiness gifts for everyone. There were cakes, toys, jewellery, plants, knitted things, sweets, biscuits, hand-painted bits of slate and pottery mugs. Even Ruby had set up a small stand with baubles hand-painted with the word ‘Happiness’ and pretty little flowers. They didn’t look remotely Christmassy but, as Ruby pointed out, anything could look festive once hung on a Christmas tree.