Alice hoped this last point referred to Murray and Finlay who, no one could have failed to notice, didn’t always get on. It was, however, just as possible Kellie meant Cary and her. The thought made her shrink with shame. She was supposed to be the medical professional at the heart of the project. Had the patients seen through her disguise to the messy reality beneath?
Something Bonnie, her therapist, had spent a long time unpacking with Alice, both at the therapeutic spa escape and in her consulting room over the high street, was exactly what Alice thought she had gained from hiding her difficulties from the world. Alice had to conclude that not one positive benefit had come from acting like she was coping when she wasn’t.
Just saying out loud how unbelievably hard it had all been for her – the awful things she’d seen in training, the parental pressure to excel when she’d have been happy just coasting along, had she been allowed, and then everything with Bastian and how, deep down, she’d known she was dating him to make her dad happy, while letting her own needs go unmet – every word of it, when said out loud in front of a trained listener and knowledgeable advisor, had felt like weights lifted one after another from her soul.
‘Penny for them?’ came a woman’s voice.
Livvie Cooper was by her side in the café.
‘Oh, just…’ She’d been about to lie. ‘Thinking how far I’ve come.’
Livvie smiled like this was something she’d been waiting to hear. ‘Good for you, Doc.’
Little Shell emerged from behind her mum’s back, fixing those startled wide eyes on her.
‘You OK, Shell? Why aren’t you at school?’ Alice asked in her softest voice. Still, the girl withdrew like a snail being eyed by a hungry bird, pulling back its horns.
‘The primary school kids can go home for lunch if they want,’ said Livvie, though Alice had never heard of such a thing happening in England. ‘I pick her up and bring her here to eat with me. She was hoping to see Jolyon, I think.’
‘He’s a nice boy,’ Alice said, careful not to pose this as a demand for Shell’s agreement.
The little girl nodded almost indiscernibly. ‘He’s all right,’ she said. ‘I wish he’d keep his hands off my blanket.’
Alice laughed but when she noticed Livvie pointedlynotlaughing, she straightened her face. The girl clearly objected to this infringement, and who was Alice to say that was unreasonable? It was her security blanket, after all. Alice, of all people, having sent Bastian packing all too late, should know how frustrating it was when a boy insisted on pushing a boundary.
‘Here,’ Alice said, sorting the letters in her hand, figuring it couldn’t do any harm. ‘He drew a picture of you both.’
Shell took it wordlessly in her hand and looked it over, a smile sneaking over her lips. In an instant she was gone, digging for her paper and crayons in her backpack over by the beanbags.
Livvie and Alice watched her settle down to draw.
‘She’ll be making him a picture,’ Livvie told her, coming closer, deciding to sit, but only perching on the edge of a café chair. ‘When the police moved us out of town, we weren’t allowed anything from the house, just had to go in the clothes we stood in. But Shell happened to have that doll’s blanket with her. She grew right out of baby dolls while we were away.’ Guilt and worry creased her face as she spoke. ‘But she kept hold of the blanket.’
‘I get it,’ Alice said. ‘You know, if there’s anything else we can do, at the surgery… or if there’s anything I can do, you will just ask?’
Livvie smiled, as much as she’d ever seen her smile. ‘You’re doing enough, just being here in the town,’ and that, coming from the measured Livvie Cooper felt like the best appraisal Alice had ever had.
‘I’d better head back to work then, now I’ve collected these,’ Alice told her, folding the feedback forms up to take with her, and letting her eyes for the briefest moment flit to Cary’s side of the shed and his vacant spot by the sharpening wheel.
‘Do you still think he’s coming back?’ Alice said. ‘It’s been ten days.’
Livvie tried to soften her shrug of uncertainty with another smile.
39
After a leisurely breakfast of streaky smoked bacon fried on the skillet over the fire, Murray had insisted on washing up and, after that, he’d insisted Finlay go and have a proper sleep in his own bed.
‘I’ve been fine on the sofa,’ he’d said.
Murray hadn’t listened to a word of it and made him climb onto the bed, tucking him under the sheets, fluffing the pillow at his back, telling him to take a nap, but Finlay was fighting the tiredness brought about by his painkillers, not wanting to waste a moment of Murray’s last morning at the cruive.
Murray handed him the tin mug of tea he’d asked for at breakfast but hadn’t drunk yet.
‘No biscuits?’
‘No biscuits,’ Murray lied.
Finlay sipped his tea like a sulky child.
