*
Melissa saw far too many things she liked in the candle shop – a pair of beautiful teardrop ivory candles set in glass stands, burgundy and corn-yellow floating candles to put in elegant glass bowls, scented candles in orange pomander and thyme and mint, and the most gorgeous earthenware to hold tealights. She came away with the earthenware to take back to her flat in Windsor and suspected she’d be back in the shop before long, giving her credit card a good workout.
After her tears earlier Melissa felt a strange sense of relief. She hadn’t expected to cry, she hadn’t expected to bump into Tilly, never mind to call a truce with her. She’d expected to go to the cemetery, feel incredibly sad, and to want to run. But she hadn’t. She’d happily gone to Tilly’s shop after the bakery, they’d talked more about inconsequential things – her flat, the trendy shops in her local area, Tilly’s new stock – and then Tilly had taken charge by telling her she couldn’t avoid people any longer. They would all see her at the ball, it was time for both her and those who judged her to get over themselves. She’d taken control and made her go to the tea rooms, where they’d seen Etna who ran the show and Patricia who worked there. Both had acted as though Melissa had only been in there last week, asking no questions apart from whether they wanted tea or scones, both of which they’d declined for now. Then it had been heads held high and a walk along the length of The Street, anyone they knew nodding a hello in passing, everyone else going about their business just as they were.
By late afternoon after a phone call from Jay, she was feeling the most relaxed she’d been in a long while. He hadn’t mentioned the idea of a bolthole in Europe again, she’d been too busy blabbering on about the Wedding Dress Ball and how the plans were coming together so well. But even still, Melissa knew it was time to stop putting off the inevitable and go see her little cottage.
She walked from the inn, past the bus stop and to the road beyond that led down to the riding school, past the paddocks where horses grazed and a group of riders saddled up preparing to go out on a hack, and, finally, she stood outside the cottage where she’d gone from being a baby to a toddler, an unsure teen to a woman, a happy daughter of two doting parents who had the world at her feet to a grieving adult who didn’t know which way to turn. The path still had the wobbly brick right on the edge where it met the pavement – she put her foot out to test it. The flowerbeds in front of the downstairs window had kept the familiar curve her dad had dug one summer for her mum to plant bulbs to add colour to the otherwise neat and tidy tiny patch of lawn. Only one cluster of tulips remained, the rest had died away for another season and now bright orange marigolds and a row of rich blue delphiniums had begun to spring up to take their turn. The front door had once been the same blue as those delphiniums but over the years it had faded, the paint had peeled near the letterbox, and her mum never had planted those roses across the door. She wondered, did the tenants love to light a fire in the winter months, cursing as they cleaned out the grate the following morning, but realising as they cosied down in the room and watched the flames flicker that it was worth it every time? She wanted to know whether the stairs still creaked on the second step up unless you stood on the edge that wasn’t carpeted, and if, when you opened the windows at the back of the property, you could hear the distant braying of the ponies at the riding school.
Melissa had so many good memories caught up in this cottage. It was funny to think that part of her life was contained in those walls that no amount of repainting would gloss over. So much was the same, yet everything had changed. She thought about the holiday homes she and Jay had looked at on the internet, including the latest one he’d found, and realised she had never wanted anything less. She might not live here anymore, but somehow she didn’t want to cut her ties with this little cottage. Maybe she would one day, but for now, she wasn’t ready.
When a little boy’s face popped up at the window investigating who had taken such an interest in the cottage, she went back the way she’d come.
Back on The Street there was only one place to go now, the cove, where she’d done so much of her thinking over the years, and when she turned down beside the chapel she smiled and didn’t feel that tug of pain or brace herself when she knew she was parallel to the cemetery. Instead, she felt a sense of peace.
Her smiled widened when she got to the part of the track from where she caught her first glimpse of the water. She made her way down to the sands, picked up a handful of stones and walked down to the water’s edge.
She stood, breathing in the salty tang, letting the breeze caress her skin. The sound of the waves made her shoulders drop and she relaxed. She loved the feel of the sea air on her skin. After the last time she’d come down here she’d got back to the Heritage Inn and tried to brush her hair, tugging at the tangled strands bound together with salt residue. She knew it would be the same after this visit too.
She tried to skim the stones, one after the other, none of them managing to come up from their initial immersion. She’d only just run out of stones when one came from past her right shoulder and expertly hopped from one part of the water to the next, the next and the next after that.
‘You never were any good.’ Harvey came to stand beside her.
‘And you could always do it,’ she answered with a smile. People seemed to be springing up when she least expected today. ‘It frustrated me no end.’ She didn’t have to look to see he was grinning.
‘May I?’ He took hold of her wrist when she picked up another stone and when she didn’t move her arm away he showed her how to rest the stone on her second finger while making a backwards C shape with her thumb and first finger. ‘You want to angle it at about twenty degrees, give a side throw, flicking the wrist.’
‘Like this?’ She moved so it was at the correct angle.
‘Go for it.’
She threw again, tried another and then a third, which skimmed twice and then plopped into the depths of the water.
‘Practice,’ he said.
She sat on the sand as the water gently lapped a few feet away. It was cooler this afternoon as though the summer had already had enough for one day but with a cardigan on over a navy-and-white-striped cotton dress it was pleasant enough. ‘Why aren’t you at work?’
‘I was, I went after we showed Barney the barn, but now I’m done for the day – it was a very early start, remember.’ He let the quiet between them settle.
‘You must like having varied hours.’
‘I do, especially when I get to enjoy time down here.’
‘I’ve been to a lot of countries, you know I’ve seen my share of beautiful beaches,’ she told him, ‘but this is special.’
‘You can’t beat the British seaside. It’s got character. Pity we can’t make the cove like one of those fancy gardens in London where you need a key to gain access. Residents only.’
‘I like the way you think,’ she grinned.
He picked up another stone and toyed with it before skimming it across the water. ‘How are you feeling now, about being back here?’
She could tell from his voice he wasn’t all that sure about asking the question. ‘Better than I was, put it that way. I went to the cemetery today.’
‘And how was that?’
‘Traumatic.’ But she was smiling. She told him how Tilly turned up, how they’d talked, how they’d spent time together and Tilly had made her go into the tea rooms, walk The Street with her head held high and get over it.
‘She’s a good sort, Tilly. Bossy, but I’m pleased she’s giving you a break.’
