‘Fine. Let me know what you want and I’ll get it for you. I won’t be able to stop for too long though because I’m out with a work colleague who’s new to the island and I’m supposed to be taking her on a tour of some of the sights.’
‘Her?’ The one word was filled with his mother’s intrigue.
He closed his eyes, desperate not to give in to his irritation. ‘Mum, we work together, nothing more.’ He smiled at Skye and, seeing she was staring out of the window, assumed she was lost in thought taking in the scenery.
‘No need to give you a list,’ she said, sounding overly cheerful all of a sudden. ‘I’ll call them and ask them to put everything by. I’m sure they’ll do that for me.’
‘I’m sure they will.’ He didn’t doubt it for a moment. Faye could be very persuasive when she was at her most charming. ‘I’ll be with you in about twenty minutes.’
‘Sorry about the detour, Skye.’ Not wishing to waste her time, he tried to think how to make the most of having to go out of their way. ‘Although, there are a couple of places like Noirmont and Ouaisné that I’m sure you’d enjoy visiting, but we can do those another day.’
He caught Skye staring at him, an unreadable expression on her face.
‘Would you rather go there today?’
She shook her head. ‘Not at all. I’m in your hands. You decide what we see and when. It’s not like I have a clue what’s here anyway.’
He must have been mistaken. ‘Great. East it is then. We’ll go there as soon as we’re done at Mum’s.’
Mum’s? That hadn’t taken long for him to forget it was his house and now automatically think of the bungalow as his mother’s home.
‘Sounds perfect.’
They turned into the road and, relieved to spot a parking space just outside the store, Joe parked. ‘Is there anything I can get for you while I’m here?’ he asked.
Skye shook her head. ‘I’m good, thanks.’
Joe hurried inside. ‘Hi, Joe,’ the shopkeeper, Mal, said cheerfully. ‘Not like you to drive here?’
Joe sighed. ‘I’m housesitting at a friend’s farm while they’re away,’ he explained. ‘My mother and stepfather have moved into my place. In fact, she was going to phone through an order for me to collect.’ Aware not everyone would accommodate such a thing, Joe decided to apologise for any inconvenience. ‘I’ll understand if you decided it’s not something you wish to do.’
The jovial man shook his head. ‘Not at all. I was only too happy to oblige. Faye explained she now lives in Gerry’s place.’
Hearing the man mention his beloved grandfather, Joe smiled. ‘That’s right.’
‘Sorry, it’s your place now.’ He crossed his arms and leant against the counter. ‘I suppose I’ve been referring to it as Gerry’s place for decades and keep forgetting he’s gone.’
Joe couldn’t miss Mal’s sadness at his grandfather’s passing and somehow it helped ease his own grief slightly to be reminded how loved his grandfather was by so many other islanders. Joe listened as Mal reminisced while he checked through a bag of groceries Faye had requested and began ringing them up on the till.
‘Great chap, Gerry was. Sorely missed around here and at pétanque. We won the league once with him on the team.’
‘Really?’ Joe didn’t recall his grandfather ever mentioning playing pétanque.
‘Yes, he was a good ’un.’ Mal finished with the items and rang up the total. ‘That’ll be fifty-three pounds and seventeen pence, mate.’
Joe took his card from his jeans pocket and paid for his mother’s food. He lifted the bag off the counter. ‘Thanks for doing this. I appreciate it.’
‘No problem at all,’ Mal said. ‘I told Faye that next time I can drop her shopping off if you or she can’t fetch it.’
Joe wondered if his mother had thought to mention that she did in fact have a husband who would usually be happy to do the shopping for her. Or, Joe mused, maybe he wasn’t. It wasn’t as if Joe knew much about him at all, he realised, apart from his first name.
He thanked Mal once more and took the shopping out to the car. ‘Sorry for the wait,’ he said to Skye.
‘It’s fine. I’m perfectly happy sitting here.’
‘The house is only a little further along here,’ he explained.
Joe drove down the lane to the bungalow and had to carefully pass a postal van parked in the narrow lane before he pulled up outside. He and Skye got out of the car and realised the man was leaning against the garden wall with his leg tilted at an odd angle.
