LATE JULY
Stella
‘No, Mum, I am not having a nervous breakdown.’
Stella propped the phone between her raised shoulder and her ear and picked up the little jar of shells she’d found on the small dining table of 23 The Strand. Her teeth were clenched together so hard as she spoke that it made her jaw ache. She’d purposely left all technological gadgets – her laptop, her iPad – behind and now she was wishing she’d left her very old, and very basic, mobile there as well.
‘Well, something’s wrong,’ her mother said. ‘I mean, why won’t you tell me where you are? I could come down and sit with you, and…’
‘I’m not ill, Mum. I don’t need sitting with, as you put it,’ Stella said as evenly as she could. Yes, there was something – not wrong exactly, but not in Stella’s plans either. Or her husband James’s. And her mother didn’t need to know about it, not yet. ‘I’m not immobile in a hospital bed needing 24/7 care.’ She jiggled the jar this way and that, watching the light hit the iridescence of the shells – how pretty they were.
‘I can hear bells. Are there bells ringing somewhere? Are you in some sort of retreat?’
Stella held her breath, then let it out in a long, controlled sigh.
‘Sort of,’ she said. Perhaps that much information would make her mother back off a bit.
‘Is it James then? Are you and he having a rough patch?’
‘No. It’s not James and no we aren’t. James and I are absolutely fine. I just need a bit of time on my own, that’s all. James understands my need for that and he’s happy for me to be here.’
‘Your father and I had a rough patch or two,’ her mother said as though Stella hadn’t spoken at all.
‘I know.’ What Stella didn’t add was that she’d heard the rows and wished she hadn’t. Her mother was a widow now but filled her days with activity – swimming in a local hotel pool, Pilates, embroidery club, lunch clubs of various sorts.
‘I could come down. Wherever you are, that is. I don’t know why you won’t let me know—’
‘That’s lovely of you, Mum,’ Stella interrupted, ‘but company isn’t what I need at the moment.’
Stella had plenty of that in her house up on the hill – if she stepped out onto the deck of 23 The Strand she could see the roof of her house against the skyline. It was just that she didn’t want to be in it for a couple of weeks – she needed to recharge, rethink, re-energise. She had the company of her husband, James, and three children – Max and Adam, the twins, who were fifteen, and Lola, who was twelve – pretty much 24/7, especially in the school holidays. And it was rare for a weekend to go by when friends of one or all of her children weren’t around all day or stopping for sleepovers, all of them seeming to regard Stella’s fridge as an extension of their own at home. Sometimes, just sometimes, she wondered if any of them noticed she was there. Did they just see her as a provider of meals, a laundry service, someone to check over homework when asked, and a million other things? It had been Stella’s choice – with James supporting her all the way – to be a stay-at-home mum and she’d loved it. Motherhood was something for which no one got any training and yet it was – in her opinion and in James’s – just about the most important job. She’d been there to fetch sick children from school, or take them for urgent dental appointments, or just to sit, snuggled in a fleecy blanket, to comfort them when they felt sad and she decided they didn’t have to go to school that day and home was the best place to be in the circumstances. But, just when she was thinking of maybe getting back into nursing, retraining, now… this!
‘Do James and the children know where you are?’
‘James does.’
‘I still think it’s irresponsible…’
‘Look, Mum,’ Stella snapped. ‘I’d love to have your approval on this because it’s what I want and need to do. But I’m forty-one years old now and I don’t need that approval. Anyway, got to go. Love you.’
Stella caught the word ‘love’ in her ear, knowing the rest of the sentence would be ‘…you too’, but she’d already switched off the phone.
She’d given herself a fortnight to do nothing at all, or everything. She had given herself the gift of time to indulge herself because who knew how much of that she’d have from now on. Stella had brought six paperbacks with her that she’d been given as presents over the past two or three years and hadn’t, yet, got around to reading because she’d never been able to find the time. She’d brought the tapestry kit her mother had bought her last Christmas, which she might or might not open. She’d brought notepaper and envelopes and her address book and she had a fancy to handwrite a letter to her old school friend Chrissie. They’d kept in touch with Christmas cards, sending changes of address when needed, so Stella knew where to write to now, although they never had got around to exchanging email addresses. Chrissie – so Stella had discovered on Google very recently – had written a novel. It was no mean feat to write a novel and she’d write to Chrissie and congratulate her, and when she got back home she’d order Chrissie’s book from Amazon. And then a thought pinged into her head – maybe she could write one too? Something about family life, maybe? Or start a blog of some sort. Already ideas were beginning to swirl around in her mind.
Max was the first to turn up. He came marching up the steps to the deck, and stepped in through the open doorway.
‘Max?’ Stella said.
‘Don’t say you’ve forgotten me already,’ Max said with the beginnings of a grin.
‘No. Of course I haven’t. I’m surprised to see you, that’s all. And I’m wondering why… and how… you’re here. Did your dad tell you where I was?’
‘No. You could look a bit more pleased to see me, Mum.’
‘Don’t be silly. Of course I’m pleased to see you. I’m just wondering why you’re here, that’s all, seeing as your dad and I explained I need a bit of a break from, well, everything. Just for a while.’
‘Yeah, yeah,’ Max said. ‘I know all that.’
‘So, is there something I can help with? Without having to come back home immediately, that is.’
‘Might be,’ Max said, shrugging his shoulders. ‘Dad is so rubbish at English, Mum.’
‘English? Have you been given homework to do in the school holidays?’
What a lousy mother she was not to have asked that before bailing out. But James was there. He’d taken two weeks off to man the fort as it were.
Max was roaming around the chalet now. He peered into the bedroom, then opened and closed the bathroom door. Then he found the mugs and the coffee and switched on the kettle. Stella didn’t have the heart to remind him – just in case there was something seriously worrying him – this was her space and he ought to have asked.
‘So, have you?’ Stella prompted. ‘Been given English homework?’
‘Nah,’ Max said.
‘The word is “no”, Max, not “nah”. Just saying, seeing as you’re the one here saying your dad is rubbish at English.’
‘Ha ha. Yeah, well, point taken,’ Max laughed, looking exactly like his father. Max and Adam might be twins but they didn’t look alike. Max was the spitting image of his father with dark-blond hair and brown eyes, and Adam was more like her, or a male version of her, with wild and curly dark hair, verging on black, and eyes just a shade or two darker than his twin’s. It was wrong, very wrong, Stella knew, to have favourites – but there was something about Max, as her firstborn twin, that made her heart feel that bit warmer, flutter that bit faster, if anything was upsetting him. Goodness, but what a size she’d been when she’d been expecting the twins. Stella put a hand to her pancake-flat stomach – a stomach she was proud of seeing as she was a careful eater and walked at least two miles every day.
‘So, what’s the problem with English and your dad?’
Max shrugged.
‘Well?’
‘He thinks I’m nerdy because I know about things like conjunctions and past participles and stuff like that.’
‘He’s a pharmacist, Max. Science is more his thing. He can’t spell well either but apparently that’s par for the course for many scientific people.’
Stella remembered the shock she’d got the first time he’d written to her when he’d been on holiday with his mates, a holiday he hadn’t been able to get out of soon after meeting her. Hear and here, there, they’re and their were all the same to James.
‘Yeah, well,’ Max said. ‘Coffee? While I’m here making some?’
‘Please. Shall we take it outside on the deck?’
Stella had a feeling Max was here for something else besides the English issue. Just sitting and waiting for him to tell her might be the best plan.
‘I want the truth, Mum,’ Max said, sitting opposite Stella on the deck, cradling the mug of coffee in his hands. ‘You and Dad are splitting up.’
Stella couldn’t detect even the hint of a question in that last sentence – it was more of a statement.
‘Is that what you think?’ she asked gently.
‘Yeah. And so do Adam and Lola.’
‘You’ve discussed this with them?’
‘Lola brought it up first. She said she was almost unique in her class having a mum and dad at home and now she’d be like the others. She was almost pleased. Two Christmases, two birthdays, two holidays abroad somewhere in the summer, that sort of thing. That’s what Lola said.’
‘Well, she’s wrong. She won’t be having any of that sort of thing. Your dad and I aren’t splitting up. Have you said any of this to him?’
‘’Course not. It’s easier saying stuff like this to you. You listen to what I say better than Dad, and you don’t give me lectures and stuff the way he does. And anyway, you’re the one who’s run away.’
Stella gulped back a great wodge of emotion at what Max had just said. It seemed to qualify her decision to be a stay-at-home mum somehow. But now she wasn’t there, and he missed that, didn’t he?
‘Max, darling, I have not run away.’
‘I miss you,’ Max said. His huge brown eyes pooled with tears, and in that moment Stella thought he looked like he had on the first day of school when she’d left him and Adam at the school gate. Adam had run off happily with a boy he knew from playgroup but Max had just stood there, looking at her, tears in his eyes.
Stella almost gave in – there was that pull on her emotions the other two didn’t quite have.
‘I’ve only been gone a day!’ Stella laughed. ‘I haven’t even read the first page of the six books I’ve brought with me. I never seem to get time at home.’
‘Hmm,’ Max said. He tipped his head to one side, studying her. Stella knew he was processing the information and, perhaps, coming to realise that what she said was true.
Max had a sensitive soul. He loved poetry, both reading it and writing it. He was good at writing short stories too. His teachers had him down for studying the arts at university – Cambridge or Oxford had been mentioned.
‘Hmm, what?’ Stella prompted. ‘I’m here with you now, and I’m listening.’
Max gave her a big grin.
‘Yeah,’ he said, slowly, as though he was taking his time about what he was going to say next. ‘I don’t want to be a pharmacist like Dad, however much he’d like me to be,’ Max said suddenly, but with an assurance that made Stella think he’d been rehearsing the words all the way down the hill from home to here. ‘He’s always on about it. He was on about it last night. Says you can work anywhere in the world if you’re a pharmacist because lots of it’s in Latin, which is universal.’
Yes, James did say that. Sometimes Stella had questioned whether her husband understood where Max was coming from with his love of poetry. They’d had sharp words about it, her and James. ‘He’s got to do what’s right for him,’ was what Stella had said, and James had retorted that writing poetry wasn’t going to get Max a decent living and a large house to live in, was it?
‘He’s probably right in what he says about the job prospects, Max, unless a poet gets very, very lucky, and I think you know that. But I’ll have a word with him about all this – we could sit down, all three of us together, and talk it through when I get back. At the end of this fortnight, I mean. And while it’s in my mind, how did you know I was here? Your dad said he wouldn’t tell you where I was.’
‘He didn’t. I think it’s bonkers. I mean, we only live up there!’ Max waved an arm in the direction of Barcombe Heights where they lived. ‘It would have made more sense if you’d gone to Spain or something.’
‘It’s not about the place, Max, but my reasons for needing a bit of time on my own. I—’
‘What reasons?’ Max interrupted.
Stella decided to ignore the interruption.
‘I love you all very much,’ she carried on. ‘You know that, but sometimes I wonder if any of you notice me, except when gym equipment is missing or we’re out of Oreos or something.’
‘Oh God,’ Max said. ‘Midlife crisis. I suppose Dad will be next. Wanting a motorbike or something.’ Max stared down at his feet, knowing that he was, perhaps, a little out of order questioning his mother.
‘I’m not going into that,’ Stella said firmly. ‘But I would like an answer to my question about how you knew where to find me if your dad didn’t tell you.’
Max shrugged.
‘So?’ Stella prompted.
‘I hacked into your email.’
‘You what?’
‘Don’t look so shocked. I didn’t know where you were and I wanted to know. Dad wouldn’t say anything except what you’ve just said about wanting space. At least I’m telling you the truth, Mum,’ Max said. ‘You’ve always banged on about that, telling the truth. You’ve always said stuff like it doesn’t matter who broke the window, or had the last KitKat, or whatever, as long as that person owns up to it if asked.’ Max made his hands into tight fists, crossed his arms, and tucked them under his armpits in a challenging gesture. ‘Well, haven’t you?’
‘Yes. You know I have. I think it’s important. And I’m glad you’ve taken that lesson onboard. But I’m still not best pleased at what you’ve done.’
‘It’s not difficult, hacking into someone’s email.’
‘I didn’t ask if it was difficult. But it’s below the belt, and you know it,’ Stella said. ‘And it just emphasises my need for some space if you think it’s acceptable to do that sort of thing.’
‘You’re beginning to sound like Dad, lecturing me and stuff.’
‘Max, darling, I’m not lecturing you.’
‘Are you pleased to see me?’ Max asked. He made a sad, pouty face, the way he often had when he’d been younger. He looked up at Stella from under his eyelashes
‘You’re sounding as though you’re five years old, not fifteen,’ Stella laughed.
‘So, that’s a “yes” then?’ Max unfolded his arms and took a swig of his coffee.
‘I’m always pleased to see you,’ Stella said. ‘You don’t need to be told that.’
‘Back to you,’ Max said. ‘Anyway, Mum, I didn’t read much. Only the booking for this place. You can change your password when you get back. You could do it, like, tonight?’
‘No, Max, I am not coming home tonight,’ Stella said, mustering all her resolve. If she were to weaken and go back, Max would be the one to sway her. But she couldn’t let him. Not yet. Not until she’d made up her mind about the direction she wanted the rest of her life to go in.
Stella half-expected Max to come back again, but he didn’t, and it occurred to her that he probably liked knowing something his brother and sister didn’t. He texted her though – Yr secret safe with me. Just the once. Stella texted back – Mum’s the word! She managed to read one book, and had started another by day three. Staying close to the chalet was probably safer than going into town where she might bump into a neighbour or one of the children’s friends, but she was becoming stiff from sitting too long, idling. She needed a bit of exercise. She was wearing shorts and a strappy vest. She wouldn’t have dreamt of going out dressed like that normally but she was beside the seaside for goodness’ sake. And she was what James had called ‘well fit’. Stella had asked if he’d meant to add ‘for your age’ on the end of that, but he’d said it was a sincere compliment and he’d prove it to her. He did. In the laundry room with the door locked, up against the tumble dryer, while the children were up in their rooms on their computers. Perhaps that was when it had all started, this sense of unease she’d fallen into without giving it a great deal of thought. There’d been no grand plan. But how she was missing James now.
‘A paddle, I think, is in order.’ Stella shook that particular scene from her mind. She put her book face down on the table and could almost hear her mother admonishing her not to do that because it stretched the spine and could ruin the book. But she did it anyway. She nipped into the chalet, took a ten-pound note from her purse, locked the chalet door and put the key and money in her pocket.
When, I wonder, Stella thought as she stepped gingerly over the broken shells and pebbles and bits of slippery seaweed on the tideline, did I last do this? There had been a beach party for Lola’s sixth birthday, she remembered that. Six little girls running about like puppies kept too long in a compound. She’d been exhausted just keeping an eye on where they all were. They’d demolished the mound of sandwiches and bags of crisps and fairy cakes with lurid icing she’d brought for the picnic and then said they were starving and could they have ice cream. Well, it was two ice creams each and a candyfloss in the end, wasn’t it?
But she couldn’t remember coming down to the beach since. James had had a big bonus from work and they’d had a pool put in the garden just after that sixth birthday party. And a trampoline. There’d even been an area dug out for a sandpit for a while, although none of the children played in it these days. To get rid of it or not? Hmm.
‘Oh!’ The water was colder than Stella had expected it to be, but the tide was on the way out and didn’t have warm sand underneath it yet to warm it up. Maybe she’d come back later when the tide turned and it was warmer. Stella marched up and down on the spot for a few seconds to warm her feet up. Ah, that was better. She walked to the pier and back in the shallows, dodging little ones on boogie boards who hadn’t quite got the hang of them yet. Had she ever bought the twins and Lola boogie boards? She couldn’t remember.
The water might have been cooler than she thought it would be, but goodness, it was invigorating! Her legs were tingling with the activity and a sort of water massage, she supposed, as she walked, barefoot, back to the chalet, via a papershop that sold a few basic groceries, bread, and a very scant selection of wines. How decadent, walking in bare feet on a pavement – she hadn’t done that since she was a teenager.
Oh no. Frank. A neighbour. He was walking his Alsatian on the promenade, on a lead, because dogs weren’t allowed on the beach in the summer, and he was walking towards her.
‘Stella! Not seen you around for a few days,’ Frank said. ‘Did you walk down? We could walk back together if you like.’
‘I’m not going back just yet,’ Stella said. She closed the top of the plastic carrier so Frank wouldn’t see she had the wherewithal for lunch – a baguette, a box of salad and a packet of ham – sticking out of it.
She really, really didn’t want to stop and talk, but Frank did, it seemed, and the dog had got the message because it sat down, spreading itself out on the path, as though it knew there wasn’t much point trying to walk on now its owner had found someone to talk to.
‘James and your boys were out mowing the lawn and clipping bushes yesterday. I didn’t see you though.’
‘No. No,’ Stella said, remembering that Frank led the local neighbourhood watch scheme. The road was glad of Frank, who seemed permanently attuned to anything a little out of the norm, but she could live without him knowing every movement her family made just now. ‘I had things to do indoors.’
‘Lola was banging a ball up against the wall with a tennis racket.’
‘Oh, was she?’
Was this a complaint? Most of the homeowners in her road were retired, but not all. And she and James were aware of what constituted appropriate fun and games for children in their own garden and what was considered a nuisance.
‘You couldn’t have not heard it, Stella,’ Frank said.
‘I probably had the radio up loud,’ Stella lied. ‘I’ll have a word with Lola if it was annoying you.’
And then, so Stella didn’t have to make further conversation, and because she didn’t want Frank to notice she wasn’t wearing shoes, and ask why not, she said her goodbyes and hurried back to 23 The Strand. She must expect to see people she knew – she’d just have to be sharper in her responses to anything they said, wouldn’t she?
Stella rifled through the leaflets left for holidaymakers. All the Indian and Chinese takeaways and the pizza places. She didn’t think she could stomach an Indian or a Chinese but a pizza would be fine. Anything left over she could throw to the gulls, even though there were notices all along the promenade asking people not to feed them.
It felt odd ordering a pizza for one – ham and pineapple with a side of coleslaw – instead of pizzas for five with all sorts of extras like chips and colas and the like. Stella just had time to shower and change into a loose and comfy kaftan and tie back her hair before there was a knock on the door.
‘Oh,’ he said. ‘It’s you. Barcombe Heights. Number 84. Never been asked to deliver here before,’ he said. ‘Holidaymakers usually eat out.’
‘Oh dear,’ Stella laughed. ‘Do we order that many pizzas that you recognise me?’
‘Pepperoni mostly. Mixed meats. Chicken tikka. Colas. Right?’
‘Right,’ Stella laughed. ‘As you know, I’m not a holidaymaker, and you haven’t seen me. Right?’ She made a zipping-up gesture across her lips.
‘Mum’s the word,’ the lad said as she paid him. With a tip. A very generous tip. ‘Hey, thanks for the tip. My lips are sealed!’
And off he ran to his bike, parked – illegally – against the sea wall. But Stella wasn’t sure she could eat the pizza now after all. And getting away from it all wasn’t as easy as she’d thought it would be, was it?
Stella sat on the deck in the sunshine, dark glasses on, hat on her head, feet propped up on the chair opposite, her long legs taking on a healthy, tanned look, enjoying the warmth. Dozing.
‘There you are!’
Lola’s indignant voice startled Stella from a lovely daydream about sitting in the local bookshop signing copies of her first novel – a novel she hadn’t even begun to write yet, but hey…
‘Hello, darlings,’ Stella said as Lola and Adam studied her nervously.
She was genuinely delighted to see them, although there was also a part of her that hoped they wouldn’t stay long.
‘Max was gloating that he’d seen you but he wouldn’t tell us where,’ Lola said. ‘Adam had to squeeze it out of him. It took days! But he did it in the end, didn’t you, Ad?’ Lola looked thoroughly delighted Adam had won that little contest.
‘Yeah, well,’ Adam said. ‘It’s not fair he should know and we don’t.’
Stella decided not to ask if there’d been a fight or some sort of blackmail going on to prise the details out of Max.
‘So, now you’re here, is anything wrong at home?’
‘Apart from Dad being a lousy cook? That’s bad enough,’ Lola said. ‘He tried to make cottage pie but it was, like, yuck! All swimmy with greasy fat and there were lumps in the potato. And it wasn’t browned on the top the way your cottage pies are.’
‘So,’ Stella laughed. ‘You’re missing my cooking if not me?’
‘Dad won’t be able to do a roast on Sunday, Mum,’ Adam said.
Well, that’s me told, Stella thought with a pang of sadness. Adam hadn’t exactly rushed to say he was missing her, had he?
‘Not one we could actually eat, that is,’ Lola chimed in.
Stella sighed. Hmm, perhaps Max had had a point when he’d said she should have gone to Spain or somewhere further away than just a mile and a half down the road.
‘Now then,’ Stella said. ‘I know this is going to sound like a lecture and I don’t mean it to but there’s no other way to say it.’ Both children rolled their eyes heavenwards, then looked at one another and shrugged in unison. Yes, it is, their gestures said. Stella chose not to comment. ‘You’re fifteen, Adam, and Lola, you’re twelve. Quite old enough, I should think, for you to cook lunch between you. There’s plenty of everything in the freezer, and the organic veg delivery is on Friday, so there’ll be all sorts of good things to eat in that.’
Both children crossed their arms over their waists. Silent outrage at the thought!
‘Seems like Max lied, Lola,’ Adam said.
‘Yeah. We’re going to be another statistic very soon.’
‘What statistic is that, darling?’ Stella asked, although she could guess. Lola always had been something of a drama queen.
‘One-parent family. But that’s got its advantages because then we’d have two Christmases and birthdays and Easter and stuff like that. Dad and whoever he marries next, and you and your new man. Double presents and holidays. Olivia in my class says it’s ace!’
‘You’ll have to take her word for it then, Lola, because you won’t be experiencing it. Your dad and I are not splitting up. We’ve got too many commitments and, besides, we love one another.’
Adam put his finger in his mouth and made gagging noises.
‘I don’t know I can stomach Dad’s cooking much longer,’ Lola said. She made a gagging noise of her own. ‘I might just go and live with Grandma. She always says I’m her favourite granddaughter.’
Well, she would say that seeing as Lola was her grandmother’s only granddaughter. And Stella knew Lola wouldn’t be welcome on a permanent basis – it would be too much of an upheaval to her mother’s lifestyle.
‘None of that is going to happen, guys,’ Stella said. ‘Your dad and I are not splitting up.’
‘Something’s not right though,’ Lola said. ‘You’re not normal at the moment.’
‘Not normal?’
‘Yeah. You don’t wear, like, shorts at home. Showing off your legs and that. And you’ve painted your toenails.’
‘What crimes!’ Stella laughed, waggling her feet in turn, admiring the indigo nail varnish she’d put on that morning. When did she ever get time to do that at home between school runs to two different schools and then a daily supermarket shop, not to mention cooking something healthy, from scratch, for when they all got home again?
‘I didn’t know you had that,’ Lola said. She pulled a mock-sad face. ‘Funny colour. Nice though.’
‘Indigo,’ Stella said. ‘You can do yours if you like. Now if you want. Or you can take it home.’
‘Like, are you serious?’ Lola asked, looking at Stella as though she’d just grown an extra head or something.
It was true Stella didn’t let Lola wear nail varnish – fingers or toes – in term-time but there was no reason she couldn’t wear some now. She was growing up, and growing up fast. She was funny and feisty and Stella loved her dearly, even though she could be hard work at times with her drama-queen antics and almost-teen sulks. In idle moments Stella wondered if they might become good friends as well as mother and daughter – go on girly weekends away, or fun shopping trips while they tried on designer clothes in Hoopers they had no intention of buying. Would that all be nipped in the bud if…?
‘Very serious,’ Stella told her. ‘I’ve got a couple of other colours with me.’
‘Like you’re staying for ever?’ Adam said, the last word coming out in a wail.
‘No, darling, not for ever. Just until the end of next week. I need a bit of time on my own, that’s all. A little while to be quiet, and to think. I’m sure you understand that, Adam.’ Adam, the quietest of all her children often spent hours in his room, reading or on the computer, or listening to music. He went off on his own on bike rides into the country as well. It worried her sometimes but that was how he was and she let him be himself as much as she could.
‘Yeah, Max’s music choice is questionable and I think he needs to get his ears tested because he has it up way too loud.’
‘Does he now?’ Stella laughed. Three children, in three different rooms, all listening to different music at full volume – how could Adam tell?
‘And you snore, Ad,’ Lola said. ‘I mean, so loud I can hear it from my room with the door closed!’
‘Do not,’ Adam said. ‘That must be Max.’
‘And he’s not here to stand up for himself, is he?’ Lola pouted, and Stella got the feeling she’d been caught out in a lie. Stella couldn’t remember hearing any of her children snoring except, perhaps, if they had a bad cold.
‘Now, now, children,’ she said, wagging a finger at them playfully. ‘Don’t fight.’
‘She started it,’ Adam said. ‘And before you tell me “she” is the cat’s mother, I’ll correct that – Lola started it.’
‘Miaow,’ Lola said, sticking her tongue out at Adam.
Stella closed her eyes. How very normal and comforting this was in its way. It’s what families did – bicker good-naturedly, or not good-naturedly sometimes, but they were all always there for one another when the chips were down.
‘So,’ Stella said, ‘before you go back home and become victims of your dad’s terrible cooking, would you like some chocolate Hobnobs and a drink?’
‘Nope,’ Lola said. ‘I’ve got nails to paint. Right?’
‘Gross,’ Adam said. ‘I’ll go out on my bike until the stink is out of the house. Right?’
‘Hugs then?’ Stella said. ‘Before you go?’
Both children held their arms out wide and came towards her, all bickering forgotten, and it was a threesome hug. It was something they did all the time at home but it made Stella feel far more emotional now than she’d ever thought it would.
Stella was sick – very sick – the next morning.
‘Emotion,’ she told herself as she wiped the toilet seat clean. Then she was sick all over again. It was more than emotion and she knew it. She couldn’t remember being sick – ever – when she’d been pregnant with Max and Adam, or with Lola. There were all the dangers of being an older mum to take into consideration. She and James had talked those through.
At first James had been thrilled when she’d told him she thought she might be pregnant. In bed, certain all the children were asleep. They’d been cuddled together like spoons.
‘I’ve done a test,’ Stella had whispered, just in case one of the children was awake. Sound carried further at night.
‘What sort of test?’
James spent every working moment dispensing medication for people who had had tests and needed treatment.
‘The little blue line one. Positive.’
‘Not an early menopause, is it?’ James had said.
‘Ever the scientist!’ Stella said. ‘And I’m not that old!’
‘How many months?’
‘Weeks. Six.’
‘Oh.’
‘And you don’t mind?’
‘Mind?’ James had hugged her closer to him, kissed the back of her neck. ‘I’m delighted. Thrilled in fact. It’ll be nice to have the patter of tiny feet about the place again. Won’t it?’
But there must have been something about the way Stella had remained stiffly in his arms, and didn’t respond to his kiss, and didn’t answer his question, that had alerted him to something else.
‘Stella? What is it?’
‘I don’t know’ Stella said, her mouth dry with nerves, ‘that I want the patter of tiny feet about the place.’
Stella still didn’t know. And she’d been trying hard not to think about it, if she was honest. When the children had visited – albeit unasked and uninvited – Stella had been reminded what a fantastic family unit they were. Max, Adam and Lola were great kids and Stella had no reason to believe the child inside her wouldn’t be great as well. But would their relationships with one another, and with her and James, be changed – perhaps not in a good way – with another child in the equation?
As if that yet-to-be-born child could read her feelings, Stella was sick again – just to remind her it was there, perhaps.
Yes, she was well and truly pregnant. Again. Unplanned. That incident in the laundry room? Who knew? James had been supportive and said that, while he was very much pro-life, he would accept any decision Stella made about the baby. It would be she, after all, who would have the lion’s share of the caring to do, as well as the carrying of it for nine months.
Stella sighed. Her mind seemed to be in two halves at the moment. There was the person she’d been for years now, wife and mum, and there was the person she might be if, like her friend Chrissie, she were to write a book – and the more she thought about it, the more she knew she wanted to do it. She’d been into town and bought a reporter’s notebook, and two biros – one with black ink, the other blue – ready to jot down ideas for her novel (or novels, why not?) if they came to her while she was here at 23 The Strand. She might have to fight James for use of the computer to type up those ideas when she got home, but for now she was enjoying getting her thoughts from mind, to hand, to pen, to paper.
She’d also bought a card with a beach scene on it and written to Chrissie, congratulating her on her literary success and telling her she’d ordered the book from her local bookshop and was looking forward to reading it.
‘ …and I’ve often thought I might write a book myself one day, but seeing as I’m expecting a fourth child I don’t know when or where I’m going to find the time!’
Seeing the words written down made it seem more real. That and the morning sickness.
Stella had had to pass on breakfast yet again. Almost ten-thirty now. She picked up the little jar of shells the previous tenant had left her. She unscrewed the lid, and hoiked one out with a finger. Shell-pink, the same shade as the dog roses that grew over the back fence of her garden, from the patch of wild land behind, and which Stella couldn’t bear to get rid of. And small. The two hinged ovals were still smaller than the nail on her ring finger. Was that the sort of size her baby was now? And who was this Ana who had left them? She worked here now, so she’d said in the letter she’d left for Stella. So, on a whim, Stella decided to walk along the promenade to The Port Light. She didn’t know Ana but they had a link, didn’t they, with the shells? If she were honest with herself, Stella was becoming more than a little homesick. And lonely in a way she had never experienced before. But she’d said she’d stop at 23 The Strand for two weeks and try and come to a decision, and she would.
It was quite busy in The Port Light. People sat in twos and threes, hunched over coffees and teas, and nibbling on cakes and pastries between sentences. Two young women were behind the counter and the coffee machine hissed. One of them – the one Stella thought might be Ana – put a jug of milk to the frother and for the few seconds it was running it drowned out all other sound.
She looked up.
‘Hello,’ she said to Stella with a welcoming grin. ‘I won’t be long. One moment.’ Deftly she swirled the frothed milk onto a wide cup of coffee.
And as Stella neared the counter she saw the name ‘Ana’ on the badge on Ana’s overall. She’d been right; this was the young woman who had left her the shells.
The other assistant took the coffee over to a table in the corner.
‘Black coffee, please,’ Stella said.
‘Small, big or in a mug?’ Ana said.
‘Small, please.’ Stella hoped she’d be able to drink it without having to run to the toilet. She glanced around to see where it was, just in case she did.
‘And cake? I have good carrot cake.’
‘Not today, thanks,’ Stella told her. She wrapped her arms across her stomach as a wave of nausea hit her again.
Ana stretched an arm out across the counter and touched Stella gently on the shoulder.
‘Ah, I think I understand why you don’t want to eat, yes?’
‘Yes,’ Stella said.
‘Sit down. I will bring your coffee over.’
So Stella sat down at the last empty table and when Ana brought her coffee she came with a small, plain biscuit as well.
‘It’s good for sickness of the morning,’ Ana whispered. And then her face lost its beaming smile and Stella saw there were tears in her eyes. ‘I took it once. But now I… I don’t have a baby after all.’
‘Oh, I’m sorry,’ Stella said.
‘I never forget. I forget the man but not the baby,’ Ana said. ‘I should not say this to you. I’m sorry. I don’t mean to alarm you. You and your baby will be very well. I know it.’
While this was such a personal, intimate conversation, Stella could understand the reason for it. She realised English wasn’t Ana’s first language and that she was probably alone in a strange country with few people around her to whom she could talk of such things. And wasn’t that why Stella was here this morning? In a bid to combat loneliness?
‘It’s okay. Don’t worry. I understand. Sometimes we have to say what’s in our hearts.’
‘Yes,’ Ana said, and again that beaming smile that made her cheeks look like two rosy crab apples.
‘I’m stopping at 23 The Strand,’ Stella said. She desperately wanted to keep that smile on Ana’s face now. ‘I’ve come to say thank you for your gift of shells. I was born here, and have lived here all my life and walked on this beach thousands of times, but I’ve never, ever, stopped to collect shells.’
‘Sometimes,’ Ana said, ‘it’s easy not to see the beauty of things when we have other things, which are not so beautiful, in our minds. Yes?’
‘Yes.’
‘When I picked up those shells they reminded me that the world was still beautiful, that there are still things to know and learn, and people to meet. I am very happy you like the shells.’
Ana had to go back and serve a customer who had come in, and Stella sat and enjoyed her coffee and nibbled at the biscuit and looked at the people around her, wondering what sort of things they might have in their lives and if any of them had a reason for being in The Port Light. Some looked very happy, some sad, with barely a smile. One or two were on their own, like Stella. Another idea for the book she now knew she would write came to her and she took her notepad and pen from her bag and wrote it down in case she forgot. Being pregnant could make a woman feel very forgetful – she remembered that.
Before leaving, Stella told Ana she would visit The Port Light again.
‘Bring the baby to show me,’ Ana whispered, just the hint of a question in her voice. ‘I would like to meet her. Or him.’
Stella nodded. But would she? Would she keep it? It was, she knew, hardly bigger than her baby fingernail, with no discernible features.
Would she?
Stella walked into town to collect her ordered book from the bookshop. Was there room for one more book on the shelves? Hers? Would she have time to write it if she kept this baby? Stella knew James would support her in whatever decision she made. She could have the termination as a day patient and her mother and children need never know. But wasn’t that immoral? Denying her mother another grandchild and depriving her children of a sibling. James of another son or daughter. And now Ana, who had asked her to bring in the baby to show her.
‘Here we go then,’ the smiling man behind the counter said. ‘Happy reading.’
‘Thank you. I’ll just look around while I’m here.’
‘Please do. We’ll leave this here then, in case there’s something else you see and can’t resist. We sell chocolates too.’ He waved an arm towards a display of artisan chocolates.
‘Mmm,’ Stella said. She never had been able to resist chocolates. She rarely bought them for that very reason but… well, she was salivating now. She walked towards the display. I live here, for goodness’ sake, she thought, and I didn’t know the bookshop sold such deliciousness. Perhaps, she thought, I’ll buy chocolates to leave as a gift for the next occupant of 23 The Strand. If I can resist eating them! And then a thought struck her… were chocolates good or bad for gestating babies? She didn’t know. She would have to look it up.
And then she noticed a display table with a notice – SUMMER READS. Lots of author names she knew and had read. And some she didn’t. She picked up a book, read the blurb, put it down. Tried another. She brought it towards her nose and sniffed. Oh yes, there was something about a paper book, so tactile between her fingers, that stirred the senses.
‘And this,’ she said, taking the book over to the counter. She’d leave this book as a gift. She’d enjoyed reading while being at 23 The Strand, and she hoped the next occupant would too.
James was sitting on the top step of 23 The Strand when she got back. He had his head in his hands, staring down at his feet.
Stella saw him as she rounded the corner onto the pedestrian-only promenade that ran in front of the chalets. She began to run.
‘What’s happened?’
James leapt to his feet and hugged her tight so her words were muffled against him.
‘Nothing’s happened.’ James released his hold, held Stella a little away from him, looking her straight in the eye. ‘Unless it is that I’ve missed you more than I ever thought I would. Unless it’s that I’ve realised you make a far better job of keeping the home and family together than I ever could. Unless it’s that I’ve realised we all take you far, far too much for granted. Unless it’s that I’ve realised how very much I love you.’ He kissed her forehead.
Stella felt her insides melt – like sweet and soft caramel. Yes, she often thought her family took her for granted but no one had held a gun to her head and made her become a wife and mother, and to choose to be a stay-at-home mum, had they?
‘I love you too. Very much. And I’ve missed you,’ she said, ‘And the children. Although they did visit.’
‘Did they?’ James looked genuinely surprised. ‘I didn’t know. I didn’t tell them.’
‘I didn’t think for one minute you would, even under pressure. Max hacked into my email account. He found the one confirming my booking for this place. It seems Adam forced it out of him and he and Lola turned up a couple of days later.’ Stella was clinging to James’s arm, reluctant to let go. ‘Where are they, by the way?’
‘Max and Adam have gone on a bike ride together. First time ever!’
Stella linked her arm through James’s and steered him across the deck.
‘Come on. We can’t stop here chatting all day. It’s good, though, that the boys are out together,’ Stella said. ‘I’ve always thought twins were supposed to be on the same wavelength but our two have always been so different. But what about Lola?’
‘On a playdate at Rosie’s. I think that’s what she said it was called although she did say she was too old for play. Whatever, she’s stopping the night.’
‘I’ll get some coffee,’ Stella said, fumbling for her key.
‘Not yet. Let’s sit here for a moment.’ James pulled out the chairs and waited for Stella to sit down.
Gosh, what gallantry, Stella thought. Maybe she should stop away from home more often!
‘It all looks so very different from here,’ James said. ‘Torquay looks almost like Monaco across the water, if a bit greener. There’s even a cruise ship out there,’ he went on, pointing to a startlingly white cruise ship it hurt Stella’s eyes to look at. ‘Are there any for sale, do you know? Or for rent? We could have one as a sort of love nest.’
Stella burst out laughing.
‘We’ve done more than our fair share of loving,’ she said, patting her stomach, which seemed to have become more rounded since she’d been here.
‘One can never have enough!’
James picked up the jar of shells Ana had left. Stella had been adding to it in ones and twos from her walks along the beach.
‘Been beachcombing?’
‘Sort of,’ Stella told him. ‘The previous occupant – a young girl from Poland or Romania or somewhere like that – who stayed here before me, left them as a gift. I don’t know how I didn’t notice them on the beach before, how beautiful they are. But then, it’s been a long time since I’ve been down to the beach.’
‘And me,’ James said. ‘I wasn’t very hands-on about it when the kids were small, was I? Left it all to you.’
‘You did a bit, but it doesn’t matter. Anyway, I went to visit Ana because she works at The Port Light now. She’s lovely. She’s got the most amazing smile and you notice it even more because she’s had sad things happen too. She told me.’
‘Like what?’
‘A relationship break-up. A baby she couldn’t carry to full term. I’m not sure in what sort of order that was. She guessed why I suddenly went a bit pale. I felt queasy and just thinking about the slice of cake she offered me made me gag a bit.’
‘And will you take the baby to show her?’
‘I don’t know yet.’ Stella reached for the jar of shells and held them up to the light. The sun was lower in the sky now and the light shone through the shells, giving everything a rainbow mother-of-pearl translucence. ‘I need a bit more time.’
‘And I’ve come and put my size tens all over it.’
‘No, you haven’t. I’m glad to see you. Really glad. I must have been mad thinking I had to make this decision on my own. It’s your baby too. And I must have been mad to think I could manage without phone calls or without you ruffling my hair and mussing it all up every time you pass.’
‘I do do that, don’t I?’
‘Every time,’ Stella said. ‘And this jar’s not full yet. I told myself I’d fill the jar and then I would have come to a decision. Come on. Let’s go and collect some more.’
‘Now?’
‘Now.’
So that’s what they did. They left their shoes inside 23 The Strand and walked the length of the beach, hand in hand. The beach was emptying now, people returning to their hotels and B&Bs. The sand was warm beneath their feet.
‘I ordered pizza one night,’ Stella said, ‘and the pizza-delivery lad recognised me.’
‘The ginger-haired one?’
‘Him.’
‘He never said.’
‘He promised he wouldn’t. How many times did you ring out for pizzas?’
‘Well, after I had written notes from the children begging me not to cook any more. Then.’
Stella laughed.
The sound of a boat engine getting nearer made them turn towards it.
A small boat with fairy lights strung from bow to stern and a few places in between was going past. It seemed full of people, many holding drinks. And there was music.
‘Ah,’ James said. ‘The famous romantic evening cruise. See the bay by moonlight. Champagne under the stars.’
‘There’s no moon yet,’ Stella said.
‘Ah, sometimes the delight is all in the anticipation. They’ve started on the champagne, though, if that row is anything to go by.’
‘We’ve never been on that, have we?’ Stella said.
‘No. Like a lot of people who live in a holiday place who never do all the attractions, I should think.’
‘But we could.’
‘We could. But I’ve got a better idea. Let’s go back to the chalet.’
‘What now?’ Stella said.
‘Now.’
‘I haven’t got anything for supper. Well, not enough to share. Lidl should still be open.’
‘Who said anything about eating?’
‘What then?’
‘Bed?’ James said.
Stella laughed. It was still daylight. She and James hadn’t gone to bed in daylight since their honeymoon.
‘You’ve already had your evil way with me,’ Stella told him. She patted her stomach, now with its precious cargo.
‘It takes two,’ James said.
‘It does. It did. I’m going to keep the baby.’
James pressed his lips together but didn’t say anything. His eyes were dancing with delight though.
‘The kids are going to get a bit of a shock,’ he said. ‘But I think it will be good for them. They’ll need to help more.’
‘Definitely,’ Stella told him. ‘Especially as I’m going to write a book.’
‘You are?’
‘Yep.’
‘But you’re not going to start it right now, are you?’
‘Why not?’ Stella teased him.
‘Because I think my suggestion is better. Bed. Now.’ James began to quicken his pace, dragging a giggling Stella along behind him. ‘I’ll be gentle with you.’
‘You’d better be,’ Stella laughed.
Dear next occupant,
Two weeks. How fast they go, and yet how slowly at times, which for me was in a delicious and delightful way. Time to read as much as you want, to stare out to sea as much as you want. To be who you want to be, away from the confines of your usual habitat. I’m told it’s something of a tradition to leave a small gift for the next occupant (although it’s not, apparently, obligatory) so I hope you will accept this book as my gift to you. It’s yours to read or give away or donate to a charity shop because I don’t know who you are – male or female – or what your reading habits might be. This time next year my own novel might be on the shelves. Who knows?
Happy holiday,
Stella (and her bump!)