‘Luce – are you there? Say something.’ His voice, gentle, persuasive, filters through to her.
‘Yes. Sorry. Yes, I heard you. So. Did things not work out with Suzi?’
‘It’s over. A stupid fling. Ended as soon as it had started.’
‘She finished with you, you mean?’
A long sigh. ‘It was mutual. I realised I’d been stupid.’
She waits. He gives a low, you-can’t-blame-me-for-trying laugh that betrays his embarrassment. ‘All right. You win. She was the one who called it a day. But it was a relief. I just hadn’t had the balls to do it myself. It was just sex, Luce. No – don’t hang up on me. I mean: it meant nothing, absolutely nothing.’ His breath comes out in one long whoosh and she hears a catch in his voice, before it softens. So: he is nervous. ‘It meant nothing. Not like you and me.’
Her tongue feels dull in her mouth: her brain, befuddled. She wants to believe him, to imagine it would be easy to forgive and to step back into her old life again. For a moment, she remembers their first kiss: Waterloo Bridge at dusk, early December after ice-skating at Somerset House; the atmosphere charged as they slipped from being just friends to being a couple in a move that seemed to make perfect sense.
It doesn’t now. It was just sex. Who is he? This man who thinks she wants to hear this, even though she is glad there was no emotional connection. But still, he is talking about a sexual relationship with someone else: wide-mouthed, sensual, lithe, taut-limbed. She looks at her jeans, splattered with mud, and her boots, powdered with dust. Down the phone, she hears the rattle of buses, the bustle of a street, the wail of a siren. He must be walking to the Tube. The cacophony of London confounds her, overloud, excessive, as it pushes in.
‘Actually, I’m a bit busy at the moment. There’s quite a lot going on,’ she says, unable to think.
‘Can I help?’
For a second, she is tempted to tell him about Fred’s suicide, for he would be sympathetic, she knows that. He liked her dad, loved him even, and he has always been a good listener. He would understand, she thinks. But no, he can’t help now. Her chest aches at the thought that she has lost her confidant: for she can’t open up to someone who betrayed her so spectacularly, can’t risk him seeing her so vulnerable.
‘No, not really,’ she says.
Her grandmother is sitting on her bench under the crab apple tree when she returns to the farmhouse.
‘You look thoughtful.’ Maggie looks at her shrewdly.
‘Just enjoying this beautiful day.’
Maggie nods in agreement. ‘I always think it’s at its best early on, before it gets too hot or busy. When you have the world to yourself.’
Lucy smiles, and then tears start welling, for she has never been able to fool Maggie. She perches beside her and they sit in silence, Lucy focusing on the lichen-covered tree trunk, gnarled and distorted, and the bright green marbles of fruit above her. Her grandmother waits.
‘Your mother told me that you knew about your father. That he killed himself,’ Maggie says eventually.
‘I feel so stupid. So selfish.’
‘Oh, what rot! Nothing for you to feel foolish about, or Judith.’ Maggie gives a sniff that suggests that were she to meet Fred Petherick in another life, she might not be so sympathetic to him.
‘Do you want to talk about it?’
‘Not really, if you don’t mind. Just trying to think it all through.’
Her grandmother pats her knee. ‘Very wise,’ she says, approvingly. ‘Sometimes you just need some quiet and space.’
They sit for a few minutes, and Lucy tries to empty her mind and concentrate on the surroundings: a skylark hovering above them, the smell of grass, moist with dew still, the scent of lavender, boiling with bees.
But Matt pushes his way in. The night they met, at a party held by an old colleague with whom he’d been at college, where she’d been stunned by his sharp one-liners. The excitement of being shown London by someone brought up there: who delighted in his ‘manor’, though his bit of Dulwich was closer to the college than Peckham and his estuarine twang affected. His enthusiasm and energy that, for a while, masked his stubborn streak. She misses those early days, when they would lie in bed, her tracing the dark whorls of hair on his chest, and plot what they would do that weekend. Her mid to late twenties, when time seemed endless. Before her dad died and she knew that it wasn’t. Before life became shrouded in grief.
‘I’ve just had a call from Matt,’ she says, after a while.
‘Ah.’
‘I think he might want to get back with me.’
‘And what do you want?’
‘I don’t know.’ She lets out her breath and reaches forward, clutching the back of her knees. ‘He’s my husband, I should want to be back with him: I’ve been longing for him to apologise. But I’m so messed up, not just about Dad, but about what I’m doing with my life. I don’t want to go back to London. I’m terrified of returning to work – scared of making the same mistake – and it feels as if everything’s connected. I don’t think I’m ready to leave here – and all of you. To embrace my old London life again.’
Her grandmother takes her time to answer, and when she does her words are weighed, considered. ‘I think you seem to be in a bit of a muddle, if you don’t mind me saying. They seem like different issues. If you don’t feel ready to return to the hospital, that’s one thing – perhaps you could go to a GP down here and explain that. See if you could be given some more sick leave?’
‘Yes.’ She chews at her bottom lip. ‘I’m meant to be back in a fortnight, so I need to speak to occupational health anyway.’
‘And if you’re not sure about being with Matt, then give yourself some time to think. But do think about what you’d be giving up, won’t you? You know he’s never been my favourite person, but no one outside a marriage can judge it properly. If you really love him, then that’s a lot to lose. Lost love can be so painful. That and wondering what might have been. Never having the chance to discover, well, I think that’s the most painful thing.’ She pauses. ‘Listen to me sticking my oar in. You know enough about loss. Don’t need me lecturing you, at all.’
‘No.’ Lucy thinks of her father, but is distracted, conscious of Judith’s suspicions: aware that her grandmother has been alluding to something in her own life, for her voice is anchored by a tug of pain.
She thinks of her grandfather, Edward, who died of cancer long before she was born. ‘It must have been like that for you when Grandpa died.’
‘Oh, pff.’ Maggie is so dismissive Lucy is shocked. ‘Well, I mean, of course I was distressed, then. But I was thinking about other losses.’ She pauses. ‘I’ve had quite a lot of those, in my life.’
Her face dissolves into blankness. Who is she thinking of? Lucy wonders if she can ask her, but she is so resolutely private any question would feel intrusive, and the moment slips away.
Maggie shakes herself from contemplation; forces a tight, bright smile.
‘I don’t want you to experience any more loss,’ she says, and there is an urgency to her voice that says: Yes, I know what I’m talking about, here.
Her eyes bead, steely. ‘If he’s not right, walk away, but don’t if you think that doing so is something you might regret. We get so few second chances in life that sometimes, if they come along, we should snap them up. You don’t want to think, later in life: “Oh, if only”. You don’t want to be filled with regret.’
The day stretches, long and sorrowful as a damp winter Sunday. She manages to make an appointment to see the family GP, who extends her sick leave, so that she need not return to the hospital until September 13th. She mutters her thanks but does not know how she will manage even that. She feels so out of kilter that the thought of being responsible for a desperately sick child terrifies her. How will she deal with the pressure to be precise and conscientious at all times, even when preoccupied or exhausted? Her stomach churns at the memory of Jacob – poor skinned chick of a child
– and the wrong infusion; of Emma’s expression, the shock hastily covered up, and then the terrible pity. She cannot imagine ever feeling confident of being a good nurse again.
On edge, she slips from the farmhouse for a swim later in the evening. Her day’s work is done, and she needs to clear her head. The tide is high. It will fill the cove along the cliff so that she can dive off the rocks and immerse herself completely. She wants the chill Atlantic to take her breath away, the swell of the tide to lift her, the strong pull to challenge her so that she doesn’t have the headspace to obsess about Jacob or Matt or Fred: so that she has to concentrate to swim hard against the force of the sea.
The cove is deserted by the time she clambers down to it: the water deep and petrol blue, shadows darkening the surface, hidden rocks and fronds of bladderwrack lurking beneath. She picks out the path she always takes, with the fewest torturous leaps from rock to rock and only a smattering of mussels and barnacles to prick her feet; finds the spot where the rocks drop not shelve and she will not graze herself; readies herself; and plunges in.
The chill takes her breath away. She wants to scream, so intense is the sensation. She treads water, acclimatising to the cold that freezes then burns in pain. Her legs, beneath the water, gleam pale, and she kicks them away, plunging her head beneath a wave and swimming, eyes open. She surfaces, eyes stinging and, buffeted by a wave, takes in a mouthful: far saltier than she remembers. She spits it out and rolls onto her back, ears singing with the silvered sound of the sea.
The sky rocks, filled with vast, brooding clouds, and she drifts out, allowing herself to be buoyed up, suspended, cradled. This is what I need, she thinks. How I have missed this. And again: Why did I stay away?
Dad, she thinks, and the Fred-sized hole left by his death. Tears seep from her eyes, mingling with the salt of the water. Grief has infantilised her: made her persist in believing the tale she was told, though she knew that some secret remained unsaid. It has made her selfish, too: preventing her from coming home for fear of confronting the scene of his death. But loss has touched Judith and Tom just as keenly. Perhaps now there are no secrets, she can shoulder the responsibility for the farm as equally as her brother. No more hiding in London, closed to their troubles, ever again.
A wave lifts her up and lowers her down, gentle and rhapsodic. She is a child, once more, being rocked by a vast mass of sea. She thinks of her grandmother and what she said about loss, and more than that, the tone of her voice: that unmistakable anchoring of pain. She sculls lightly, as the waves buoy her up and knock her down, and Maggie’s words fill her head once more. Lost love can be so painful. That and wondering what might have been. Never having the chance to discover. You don’t want to be filled with regret.
Would she regret not getting back with Matt – or not returning to London? For the two don’t have to be linked. One without the other could be possible, though the thought shocks her. Her body rocks as she puzzles over the possibilities. What does she want? A relationship that is warm and passionate; a career in which she feels confident; and this, a life immersed, supported and enriched by land and sea.
Even as she orders her thoughts, she realises she cannot have all three things with Matt. He would never live here, nor is their relationship passionate, though – and a fresh sob bubbles up – he has been capable of passion with Suzi, it seems. She thinks back to their good times: lazy brunches reading the papers over cappuccinos and fry-ups in ironic greasy spoons; autumn walks along the Thames; late-night drinking in Soho; city breaks – to Istanbul, Barcelona, Reykjavik. That heady weekend in Paris, kissing in the Jardins de Luxembourg, his breath on her neck. The way he held her after her dad died, just being there for her. I miss you … I made a mistake. I’m sorry. Can she ever believe him again?
A wave surprises her, almost tips her up, and she swims further out then rolls back over, watching the sky arching over her, the greying clouds buffeting her way. There were languid Sunday afternoons when they would just potter, and any silence lacked tension but hummed with quiet contentment, gentle mornings when they slept in late and made love. But they were in the early days of their relationship, quite some time ago. The stomach wrenching, palpitating agony of romantic love has long gone, and what was left was affection and a friendly tolerance sometimes marred by irritation – or that was what she thought they had, before Suzi. Is it a sufficient basis on which to try to resurrect a relationship – especially if Matt has felt something more powerful for another woman, however fleetingly?
The cloud hangs over her now, chilling her to the bone, and she thinks, briefly, dispassionately: that means thunderstorms; that means rain. The thought shocks her. She doesn’t like swimming in a storm. She rolls onto her front and tries to power forwards but it’s hard work: she has drifted further than she thought and for each four strokes she barely moves forward. Don’t panic. Don’t panic. It’s only the sea, you’ve swum here since you were six. A vision of her dad, playing at dolphins with her clinging to his back, rises up, unbidden. He had spat salt water out in an arc as she had laughed ‘more, more’ and ‘faster’. Then he’d ducked under, and she’d felt the terrifying thrill of swimming under water for the first time.
He’s not here now, though. She feels a sharp shot of anger: You’re not here, now, when I need you. But all thoughts go as a wave slaps her in the face.
Spitting water, she fights against the drag, increasingly panicky. An ominous rumble. Thunder. The water turns cooler, the sun hidden by a vast mass of grey. She scans the cliffs, hoping that someone might, miraculously, be walking their dog, but the path, fringed with darkening hedgerows, remains empty. Not even a black Labrador bounding ahead of its holidaying owner. She ducks under a wave and pushes forwards, praying that there will be someone when she surfaces. Anyone. Anyone at all?
And, suddenly, there is. A dark head bobs along then disappears behind a thicket.
‘Help!’ She doesn’t mean to shout, but the relief of seeing someone is so intense it is involuntary. ‘Help!’ Her voice echoes around the cove, but the person doesn’t seem to hear. She treads water and cries out again. Nothing. Frustration and self-pity merge, and she ducks under the water, trying to fight against the pull, to swim inland. Don’t panic, don’t panic. A spasm of cramp grasps her left foot and she comes up for air.
‘You all right?’ Someone is shouting at her. The relief is so intense that, for a second, she cannot answer.
‘No … Can you help?’ Salt stings her eyes, her mouth tastes metallic with fear.
The man reaches into a small boat, dragged up on the slipway, then runs onto the rocks. Tall, dark, broad-shouldered, she can’t make out his features without her contact lenses, but in his hand – mercifully, incredibly – is a length of rope.
‘If I throw can you grab this?’
‘Yes. Yes.’ She almost laughs with relief. The rope whips the wave in front of her and she dives down to catch its hairy thickness before it sinks down into the deep.
Straddled on the rocks, he reels her in and, as she is pulled closer, she recognises her rescuer. Ben Jose grabs her upper arms to pull her out of the water, his grip firm against her mottled skin.
‘Here, have this.’ He passes her the threadbare towel she brought down to the rocks, and watches as she pulls it around herself. She feels exposed, shivering alongside him, a snake of water spilling down her back, her legs two white sticks goose-pimpling.
‘That was a bloody stupid thing to do, you know that, don’t you?’ His voice is tight. She pulls the towel tighter, feeling defensive.
‘I didn’t intend to be rescued.’
‘What do you mean by that?’ The colour drains from his face.
She moves towards him, alarmed by his reaction. Does he know about her dad?
‘I mean, I didn’t think I’d need rescuing; I thought I’d just have a swim. Here – we’d better get going.’ She begins to collect her things together, embarrassed, as thunder rumbles and she feels the first fat drop of rain.
She reaches for her cut-off jeans and T-shirt, pulls them on over her sodden swimming costume, and clambers over the rocks with Ben following. Did he really think she wanted to kill herself? Believe in some genetic predisposition? She thinks of her moment on the headland; shakes the memory away.
The cliff path is earthy beneath her bare, wet feet. Her toes, squelching, quickly darken. She walks faster, aware of the grey clouds rolling towards the farm half a mile away.
‘What were you doing here, anyway?’ she calls over her shoulder.
‘I came looking for you.’
‘Oh.’ She carries on walking, heat rising in her cheeks as she takes this in.
‘I’d gone to the farm to talk to you and Tom – but he couldn’t find you. He was worried; mentioned that you seemed upset.’
The thought of being searched for like an errant teenager is humiliating and she half-runs forwards, a sob catching in her throat, her body shivering.
‘Hey – wait a minute.’ He catches her up. She turns, but his face has softened. ‘He was worried about you. We both were. You know there’s a strong current there – or you should do. It’s not a place to be swimming; not when the tide’s on the turn and a storm’s coming in.’ He pauses and looks embarrassed. ‘Perhaps I overreacted.’
‘No,’ she says. ‘Really. It’s fine.’
‘There was a boy in my year. Mike Prouse. A good mate. Drowned the summer we did our A levels. We’d had a beach party. He’d drunk a bit. Not masses but enough. He said he was going swimming. It all seemed calm, but then the weather came in, suddenly – just like this. He didn’t stand a chance. Makes me a bit jittery whenever someone’s swimming and a storm’s brewing.’
‘That’s OK.’ Another death in the sea, around these cliffs. Another death in view of Skylark. She hugs her shoulders, not knowing what to say.
The Farm at the Edge of the World : A Novel (2016) Page 18