Copyright © 2021 E V Radwinter
The moral right of the author has been asserted.
Apart from any fair dealing for the purposes of research or private study, or criticism or review, as permitted under the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988, this publication may only be reproduced, stored or transmitted, in any form or by any means, with the prior permission in writing of the publishers, or in the case of reprographic reproduction in accordance with the terms of licences issued by the Copyright Licensing Agency. Enquiries concerning reproduction outside those terms should be sent to the publishers.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, places, events and incidents are either the products of the author’s imagination or used in a fictitious manner. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental.
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To mum.
Forever in my heart.
contents
one.
I hope you are sitting comfortably
two.
The past can haunt the present
three.
So begins the beginning
four.
Lessons from the past
five.
Letting the sunshine into my life
six.
Not all relationships are created equal
seven.
New begets new
eight.
One step forward, two back
nine.
A home is where the heart is
ten.
Racing to the race
eleven.
History often repeats itself
twelve.
When changes are changed
thirteen.
Time to dust myself off
fourteen.
And start all over again
fifteen.
One step at a time
sixteen.
Déjà vu
seventeen.
Time to face my demons
eighteen.
Procession to the processional
note from the author
about the author
one.
I hope you are sitting comfortably
I got love wrong.
Often, if the truth be known.
As a consequence, I realised that whilst we all get our hearts broken at some time in our lives, it is the way that we cope, and survive, that heartbreak that defines us. Like everyone, I have loved, been loved and lost love, and now I live in hope, so much hope, that I will never experience the last of the trilogy again.
Walking is my escape, my physical and mental break from the mundane, a chance to take joy in the beauty of nature. And, as it happens, walking is how my life changed forever and it is where this story begins.
My name is Chloe. I rather vaguely describe myself as being too old to be in the first flush of youth, but not yet of an age to experience the hot flushes that come to all women eventually. Unfortunately I am not the type of person to stand out in a crowd. Instead I prefer to be in the background making myself useful and ensuring everyone around me is happy. My family has described me as having a larger than life personality which, apparently, makes me attractive in my own unique way. However, I lack confidence in myself. I am a little below average height and above average weight, with shoulder-length wavy fair hair. Apparently my most distinctive features are my eyes which twinkle, I am told, especially when I release my raucous laugh. I am passionate about the causes I believe in, my family mean the world to me and, I believe, my best quality is my loyalty. I work in communications and I have to confess that I am a determined, successful and hard-working, career-minded person. Some, if not all, of these characteristics may well be part of the reason why lasting love has eluded me.
That aside, my career has provided me with the means to live on the edge of an attractive medieval town in middle England. It has a cacophony of quaint higgledy-piggledy houses in pastel shades, walls and roofs at unfathomable angles. I often pause to ponder how they have managed to remain standing after so many centuries without having a horizontal or vertical line amongst them. The town has a bustling market twice a week and is nestled into a valley surrounded by green fields and copses.
The day that marked the beginning of a vibrant and new chapter in my life was a beautiful spring Saturday, not the first sunny day of the year, but the first that offered hope for the summer to come. Apart from that it was an ordinary day, the sun shining, a cooling breeze, the birds singing; flowers were beginning to flourish as the warm rays hit the cold earth, the buds on the trees were unfurling into bright green leaves and all around smelt fresh and new as nature awoke after a harsh winter.
The day was too glorious to spend cooped up at home so I set out for a walk. The first hour was uneventful – two hills to power up before dropping back down to more level ground. The walk was mostly along roads, cars and lorries rushing by so close that I could feel the wind blast at me as they passed, requiring a quick reaction to hold down my top for fear it might take flight.
I continued along a minor road, through woods which provided some blessed, shaded relief from the sun. The light was dappled where the sun filtered through the evergreen leaves, the rays brilliant as they danced across the puddles that remained from the rainfall the night before. Around the bend and the trees receded to reveal a stately home, built early in the seventeenth century, set back from the road.
As I was passing the house, I was absorbed by the sight of the sandstone façade reflecting back the sunshine which engulfed it. A short distance further on I turned right, away from the road, towards the meadow that runs along the edge of the walled grounds of the house, passing across the estate farmland. The little-used footpath provides a shortcut and by this stage in the walk, most importantly, an almost level route back to the town.
I had trodden this path many times over the years I had lived in the town. Despite the amount of time spent walking along paths adjacent to roads, it was still a favourite walk of mine. However, this was the first time the walk would impact on the future direction of my life.
The path starts out as a concrete slab road that leads to a couple of the estate farmhouses. The road runs a short distance, passing a field with a dilapidated World War II machine gun post, the concrete exterior still intact but now overgrown with weeds. It then crosses a narrow stream, where the water gurgles and bubbles over the stone
s that make up its bed. Beyond that the road continues over a concrete bridge into a chaotic farmyard, with wooden barns which have seen better days, filled with old, long-forgotten machinery and equipment, and on hot days the smell of rotting manure can be pungent. Before the bridge the walker turns off the road and down onto a narrow muddy path that runs between the stream and the estate’s stone and flint wall.
It was just before the road and path separate that I heard a vehicle coming up behind me at speed. I stepped to one side to let it pass, assuming it was a farmer returning home. In fact it was a police van. I was surprised to see it on this road. What on earth has happened at the farm? I thought as my mind went into a flurry of imagined scenarios. I could see through the windows that the van was full of police, so whatever had happened at the holding must have been significant.
I expected the van to pass by me and make its way into the farmyard. However, it ground to a halt just ahead of me and one of the policemen in the back got up, made his way to the door, slid it open and got out. Laughing inwardly, I wondered if they were lost and were stopping to ask for directions. How ironic that would have been.
As the policeman rounded the front of the van, I felt a strange feeling of recognition, or was it the ice-cold fingers of déjà vu gripping my heart, so intense I shivered. It stopped the breath in my chest, and then, just as quickly as it had descended upon me, it was gone. I was slightly perturbed, unsure of what I was feeling or why. I couldn’t work out what was happening. There was no time to dwell on it though as he was here, standing in front of me, smiling sheepishly.
At a guess I would have placed him a few years older than me. His hair was cut short, dark but greying at the edges giving him a distinguished appearance. He looked trustworthy, although that might have been the uniform which his body filled to perfection. He was ruggedly handsome, the sort of man I had previously fallen for. He had a strong chin and cheekbones, a face you could happily stare at for hours. And yes, he was tall, but then at five foot one and a half inches, almost all adults, and some adolescent boys, are taller than me.
As I looked behind him, I could see all eyes in the van fixed on us and I wondered if some practical joke was about to be played on me. I felt a little uncomfortable alone as I was on this track, with a van full of policemen watching me, one of them seemingly lost for words.
It felt like the stand-off of silence might go on forever. This won’t do, I thought, I have a coffee to buy in town and a walk to finish.
“Can I help you?” I asked inquisitively in the most confident voice I could muster at that moment.
“Well, I hope so,” he replied in a deep, firm voice of authority that you would expect from a man in his profession.
“I saw you on the road, just back there.” His voice grew quieter as he turned his body to point in the direction I had come from. He turned back to face me, and continued, “It’s the strangest thing. I think I know you,” his voice just starting to betray a little nervousness in where this conversation might be going. “I was taken aback, you look so familiar, but I just can’t place you. I had this overwhelming need to find out. Before I knew it I had told Graham, the driver, to turn around. I just knew that I needed to speak to you. We are en route to a meeting and it took a while to convince my colleagues. But then we couldn’t see you. You were no longer on the path and we knew you couldn’t have gone too far, well, not unless you had jumped into a car and sped off.” The words were tumbling out of his mouth, like a gushing tap. I remained silent and let him ramble on.
“Luckily one of my eagle-eyed colleagues spotted you and here we are, but now I don’t know what to say. I feel I know you, but I don’t know why or how. Sorry, I’m rambling now, I’ll shut up. I don’t know what I was expecting from this,” he confessed.
“Maybe we could step away from the van a little,” I suggested. “It’s a little off-putting having all your colleagues staring at me.”
He glanced over his shoulder to take in the scene, nodded in agreement and smiled. As he drew closer I could smell his aftershave. I hesitated for a moment as I recognised the distinctive and heavenly scent of Eternity. He put his hand on my elbow to guide me away. The instant there was contact a shot of adrenaline spiked through my body. Maybe it was the aftershave, or the firm, assured way he held me; maybe it was just the proximity. Whatever the reason a flash of memory brought me out of the storm of confusion that had been tumbling around my mind and into the clarity of understanding.
“I know how we know each other,” I said quietly, stopping and turning to him. I glanced over to check we were out of earshot of the van, then looked him in the eye.
“But first my name is Chloe,” and I proffered my hand in a slightly over-formal gesture. He responded in kind and a firm shake ensued. He looked at me confused, but adhering to tradition replied, “I’m Edward. Ed.”
“Nice to meet you again Ed,” I said as we let go of each other’s hands. He tilted his head to one side after I said ‘again’. Obviously if he had recognised me then we must be meeting again, but clearly he was still unsure as to when or where our first meeting had occurred.
I continued quickly, to put him out of his misery, “We met in Nottingham. You had just finished your police training and were out celebrating. I had just graduated from university and was also out celebrating. We got chatting and…”
At this point the fog evidently lifted from Ed’s memory. His eyes widened as his smile grew and he took up the recollection.
“And we got chatting, we drank too much, and one thing led to another. I didn’t want it to be just that one night, but we got split up. I looked for you but I… well, obviously, I didn’t find you. Not a very good start for a policeman’s career,” he said with genuine regret in his voice.
“It’s okay,” I reassured him, “I’d have liked it if you had found me, but it’s not exactly held me back. So how have you been over the intervening years? You’re still a policeman, I see.”
At this point there was a toot of the van’s horn and Graham tapped his watch impatiently from behind the wheel. As the van did a far-too-rapid three-point turn for the narrow road, Ed said, “Look, I hate to go, like I said we are en route to a meeting and it wouldn’t be good to turn up late. But I’m not going to go without taking your number. I’m not going to mess up this second chance.” I felt my heart flutter, a feeling long suppressed and unexplored in me.
Ed typed my number into his phone and jogged back to the van. As he climbed in, he turned back and gave me a heartfelt smile and wave, and then he was gone.
I turned slowly back to the path, a huge smile on my face.
This is my favourite part of the walk, shaded by the trees that have grown above the estate wall to provide a canopy. The path leads to an ancient stone arched gateway that would have previously contained a heavy oak door, long since rotted away, one of the few remaining clues that once a monastery stood on this land.
The rest of the walk passed quickly as I made my way along the side of the river, across the meadow, emerging into the town where I bought a massive coffee (a passion of mine). As I took the last few steps towards home I realised that the last half an hour had been a blur, my mind racing – hopeful possibility, moments of doubt. I didn’t have a chance to ask if he was married. Why am I even thinking about that? But of course he is, I thought. Most men, and especially the good, handsome ones are. Why didn’t I look for a wedding ring? Would he have asked for my number if he was married? Then again, he didn’t ask about my situation either. In truth the conversation was just too short, there simply hadn’t been time.
He had stopped because he recognised me but didn’t know why. Maybe he took my number because he felt guilty, or to save face in front of his colleagues. Who knew? If he’s married then he won’t call, I thought. Either way it was nice to feel alive again, to feel the rush of excitement at the prospect of a new relationship, and heaven knows it had been
a long time since that had last happened.
Now, as I paused to think about it, it had been several years. Not that I had been counting, nor had I been looking for a man in my life. A succession of disastrous relationships had left me rather raw and of the opinion that it would be better to be alone than to enter another bad relationship, another set of years wasted whilst wanting to escape it but not knowing how.
I was surprised to find myself hoping Ed would call. Oh, those giddy early days of nervous anticipation, of constantly checking the phone for non-existent messages, hoping that a message had come without knowing it, even though the volume was on full and it was never far from my hand. Oh blessed phone, please ring.
Calm down, I told myself. It’s only been two hours and he is probably still in his meeting.
It was no good, I would have to find something productive to do for the afternoon, as much as I loved sitting in my little garden, lounging on the wooden steamer chair and soaking up the heavenly warm rays of sunshine, the cool breeze rustling through the shrubs that surrounded my garden and the beautiful red ornamental cherry tree that stood proudly in the centre. The birds were busily chirping a happy tune nearby, but it was no good because sitting and doing nothing meant it allowed my mind to wander. Usually this was my sanctuary, the place to let my mind switch off from the worries of life, of work, of everything. But now, sitting there, sipping my coffee, my mind kept wandering back to Ed and I found myself starting to daydream about what might be.
No, I told myself, this will not do. Reluctantly I rose from the lounger and made my way to the front drive, which was just big enough to fit my car on. Unfortunately, though, the weeds were starting to take over the gravel.
Loves Lost and Found Page 1