Chapter 11
Three o’ clock, the agreed time for Leanne to call in, has long since come and gone. I’m wondering if she has changed her mind, particularly as the snow is now falling quite thick and fast, when I hear a knock at the front door. This is it, I think, taking a deep breath and wiping my slightly sweaty palms down my jeans as I head for the front door. I don’t know why this matters to me so much, but it does. I don’t want there to be any underlying sadness surrounding Wisteria Cottage; I want my home to be a happy place. Maybe getting the two of them back together will be the catalyst to a brighter future for them, and for me as well. I organise my facial features into a smile, open the door and have to adjust my gaze upwards by several inches.
‘Jacob. What on earth are you doing here?’ I say, a tiny fluttering like butterfly wings starting deep in my chest.
‘I already felt guilty that you had no transport over Christmas after I smashed into your car and then it started to snow. I thought maybe I could bring you a bit of shopping to save you having to trek down to the local shops. I’ve probably got you a load of stuff you don’t like, but I just wanted to do something to try and make amends.’
It feels as though my pulse has doubled in speed. People don’t usually do such thoughtful things for me, especially people who are very handsome and charming.
‘Um, well, you’d better come in,’ I say, noticing for the first time that he is carrying generously stuffed supermarket bags in each hand. They are the festive ones and it crosses my mind that he probably had to buy them along with the contents if, as he has suggested, he was acting on impulse.
He steps into my narrow hallway and stamps his feet on the doormat that bids him welcome to rid his shoes of the snow, which I can see on the path behind him is now several inches deep.
‘Shall I carry them through to your kitchen? Then I’ll leave you in peace, I don’t want to intrude.’
‘You’re not,’ I say, a little too quickly. ‘I mean, I’ve finished what I had planned for today and I was just going to make a coffee if you’d like one?’
‘If you’re sure, and then I’ll be on my way. This snow doesn’t look like it’s stopping anytime soon and I wouldn’t want to get stranded.’
I immediately picture the two of us sitting side by side on my parents’ old sofa in front of my roaring log fire, my head resting on his shoulder, and then I blush furiously at where my thoughts have taken me to. Honestly, the poor bloke does a good deed by bringing me a few groceries and I’m planning on seducing him. Perhaps in the film Misery, Kathy Bates’ character started out with similar fantasies. I shake my head to clear the unwelcome thoughts away and fill the kettle with water.
‘It really is so kind of you,’ I say, ‘but totally unnecessary. The garage collected my car on Monday and said I could have had it back tomorrow if they gave it priority but I said there was no rush. I’m going to my sister’s with my mum and dad over Christmas so it would only have been parked out on the road.’
‘Waiting for some other careless idiot to crash into it.’
‘It wasn’t your fault. If it had been a cat rushing out, I would much rather you collide with my car than hit an animal.’
Jacob pauses, a jar of ploughman’s pickle in his hand. He has a sheepish expression on his face.
‘Actually, that wasn’t exactly the truth.’
The warm cosy feelings I have been harbouring towards him come to a shuddering halt, a prickle of panic replacing them. Why would he lie about what had caused him to brake so suddenly? No-one was hurt and it was the black ice which had actually caused the accident. I am acutely aware that I don’t know this person I have invited into my home. He could be a rapist or a serial killer for all I know.
‘W-what do you mean?’ I ask, trying to keep the fear from my voice and wondering if I’ll make it to my thirty-third birthday tomorrow.
‘I saw you putting the bin out.’
Before I can say anything in reply, there is a knock at the door, making me jump almost out of my skin. With Jacob turning up out of the blue, I had completely forgotten about Leanne. Her timing, despite being over an hour late, is impeccable.
‘I need to get that,’ I say, licking my lips nervously and wondering if she would hear me scream if he tried to prevent me.
‘Of course, I should get going anyway, I don’t want to outstay my welcome.’
Maybe I was over-reacting.
‘Perhaps we can have coffee another time,’ I say, leading him out into the hallway, ‘as a thank you for the groceries.’
‘Good idea,’ he replies, but I get the feeling I may have seen the last of him. Shame, really; he is not my usual type but maybe that’s where I have been going wrong. I think my first impressions of him were right. He seems thoughtful and kind where the men I’ve dated in the past have been the opposite. I might have been prepared to forego my dating break for him although I’m a little less keen now that I know he lied to me, unless he has a really good reason for it.
He is standing behind me as I open the front door and a woman, who I presume is Leanne, is already halfway back down the path, probably regretting her decision to venture out on such a filthy afternoon.
‘Thanks so much for coming,’ I say, ‘and in such dreadful conditions. I really appreciate it.’
She turns back and walks towards me, the fur-trimmed hood of her coat pulled down low over her face, protecting her from the icy flakes and swirling wind which is already creating small snowdrifts. Her voice is muffled by her scarf when she speaks.
‘I wasn’t going to come. I don’t like driving in the snow, but I couldn’t bear the thought of you being without a gas supply over Christmas. I thought you were out when you didn’t answer.’
‘Sorry. We were just in the kitchen. Come in out of the cold. The kettle’s boiled if you’ve got time for a coffee or tea to warm you up.’
‘If it’s all the same to you, I’ll just sign the paperwork and get on my way,’ she says, stepping on to my door mat and stamping her feet to rid them of snow just as Jacob had done ten minutes previously.
‘No problem, I’ll fetch it. Jacob’s just leaving.’
Leanne’s bowed head shoots upright causing her oversized hood to fall back from her head.
‘You’ve cut your hair,’ Jacob says, ‘it suits you.’
‘Jake? What the hell is this? Why is he here?’ Leanne asks, looking accusingly at me.
She turns to leave, but Jacob has positioned himself between her and my front door which he has pushed closed with his back.
‘Just hear me out, Annie. It wasn’t planned, I swear, but now that you’re here please can we talk?’
Everything slots into place. Just as Annie is an abbreviation of Leanne, Jake is a shortened version of Jacob. While I have been wondering what my next steps should be in my plan to bring Annie and Jake together, fate has already obliged. No-one knew Leanne was calling at my house today, especially not Jacob, and yet here they both are standing in my hallway. I think I now know what he had been about to tell me before Leanne knocked at the door. He saw ‘me’ putting the bin out on the night of the crash but he must have thought it was her. I wonder how many times he has driven down the lane hoping to catch the merest glimpse of the woman he is clearly still so in love with.
Leanne has been standing very upright glaring firstly at Jacob, then me, then back at Jacob. Suddenly, her legs seem to give way and she begins to fold like a rag doll. In an instant, Jacob has swept her up in his arms and I spring into action.
‘Bring her through here and put her on the sofa. I’ll go and make tea. Poor girl; what a shock it must have been to see you here.’
Jacob raises his eyebrows questioningly then drops his eyes back to Leanne’s face, stroking her forehead with a tenderness I am almost embarrassed to witness. I offer up a silent prayer as I wait for the kettle to boil, hoping beyond hope that when she hears the truth about what happened on the night before their wedding she will give him another chance.