‘I’d love that,’ Johnny smiled.
He bent down to kiss Helena goodbye, his beard felt surprisingly soft against her cheek. A small voice inside her head wondered what it would feel like to kiss him, and she had to silence the sudden crazy impulse to do exactly that. Johnny pulled her into the warmest of hugs. She caught the scent of bonfire smoke clinging to his jumper and found it hard to tear herself away. There was something about him; she was always sad to leave his company whenever they said goodbye.
‘Bye then,’ she said. ‘And thanks again for all your help.’
‘Good luck with the grant applications. Let me know how it all goes.’
As Helena closed the front door behind him, she told herself off for indulging herself in romantic notions about Johnny. Shewas clearly imagining things due to her distinct lack of love life. He was definitely not interested in her like that. Perhaps she just needed to find herself a one night stand, and stop this crazy train of thought in its tracks before she ended up losing one of her only friends in the process. She needed to focus on her new business, no distractions. She could hardly believe she had come this far. If she could raise the funds there was nothing stopping her from making her dream a reality. It made her feel sick with nerves but also heady with excitement at the same time.
31
AS SOON ASher business was officially registered as a Community Interest Company, Helena began to apply for every grant possible, heading straight for her laptop as soon as she got home from work each day. Of all the grants she found, she was by far the most excited about her appeal to the National Lottery. They had allocated a huge amount of money to support projects that had been set up to tackle the so-called ‘loneliness epidemic.’ She felt like her community café met the criteria perfectly. As part of her proposal she needed to present a set of anonymous case studies, depicting people in her local area that she felt would benefit from her initiative. She planned to write about herself, Margery and Nathalie’s experiences of loneliness in the community, but she also wanted to find new people to write about too. She felt it was important to really understand for herself the depth of the problem, so that she could better meet the needs of those around her if and when she received the funding.
As a starting point, she asked Nathalie, Margery and Johnny if they knew anyone who might be willing to talk to her, certain by now that potential case studies must exist all over the place. It seemed to her that almost everyone had experienced loneliness at some point in their lives. Nathalie suggested that Helena talk to a teacher friend of hers who worked at a local secondary school. She was called Jennie, she was forty-two and she kindly agreed to meet Helena for a glass of wine and a chat.
It was a bit awkward to begin with. Helena had never interviewed anyone before, however informally. She felt quite nervous when she walked into the bar, looking for the face she had seen fromthe pictures Nathalie had shown her. It was a bit like going on a blind date. Spotting her at a table in the corner she made her way over and introduced herself. Jennie was a pretty, curvaceous brunette of Italian descent, with a small gap between her two front teeth that only added to her charm. They ordered their drinks and some nibbles to share. After a bit of general small talk Helena was relieved when Jennie got straight to the point. ‘So Nathalie tells me you’re setting up some kind of a charity?’ she asked.
‘It’s more of a cross between a charity and a business, I suppose,’ Helena explained. She told Jennie all about her ideas: the permanent café in the village hall, the playgroups, the volunteer opportunities, the community classes, the evening events, the idea of creating a space to bring people together of all ages and backgrounds, to forge connections and fight isolation.
‘I think it sounds brilliant,’ Jennie said. ‘I’d definitely come along! I only live fifteen minutes away from Hambleton, and I don’t get out much, apart from work.’
‘Tell me about it. This is the first time I’ve been to an actual bar in years!’ Helena laughed. ‘I actually can’t remember the last time.’
‘That’s why I suggested it!’ Jennie smiled in agreement, thanking the waiter who placed their glasses of wine in front of them. ‘Even though it’s a bit of a drive to get into town, it’s nice to do something different, you know?’
‘That’s another reason why I want to start this… the pub has shut in Hambleton so now there’s no longer anywhere to even meet for a drink.’
Jennie raised her eyebrows in despair. ‘I’m telling you, before too long there will be nowhere left to go. We’ll all stay tucked away in our own houses, watching Netflix and eating food we’ve ordered in.’
‘It’s so depressing. Anyway, that’s exactly what I’m trying to fight,’ Helena said. ‘I’m trying to find out what people’s different experiences of loneliness have been, and what they might find beneficial about a community space like the café.’ She found herself warming to Jennie immediately. Just like Nathalie, she was an open book.
As Jennie sipped her wine, she started telling Helena about her own experience. ‘It’s hard. It really is. And it almost feels shameful to admit it. I don’t know why, but there’s something taboo about holding your hands up and saying I’m forty-two years old and I am lonely. It’s embarrassing.’
Helena nodded, she knew the feeling only too well.
‘Even though I’m busy with work, I enjoy my job, I’m surrounded by colleagues, and I have a few friends, a few family members scattered around and about, I am still lonely.’ Jennie frowned. ‘The thing is, they all go home to other people. Even Nathalie, she has a house full of kids. But I’ve lived alone for ten years, and that’s a hell of a long time. I assumed that I would meet someone, like everyone else that I know. I thought I’d fall in love, maybe start a family. I kept on telling myself, any day now, it will happen. That there was no rush, that I still had plenty of time. And then one day I woke up and realised, it’s probably too late for me to have a family. And that person never came. Maybe they never will.’ Jennie wiped a tear away and fixed a smile across her cheeks.
Helena felt herself well up too, her longing for Raffy surged through her, ever present and ready to sweep over her at any moment.
‘I feel the same, quite a lot of the time,’ Helena said. ‘It’s horrible, that pressure of time, and the feeling that you are missing out on the life you had imagined for yourself.’
The waiter came over with a bowl of smoked almonds and another one full of enormous green olives. He put them on the table and Jennie continued, warming to her theme. ‘It’s a feeling of failure too. That’s the part I struggle with the most. I can’t help but ask myself, what have I done wrong? What is it about me? If I lost a bit of weight, would it happen? If I put myself out there more, would I still be single? But I’m sick of dieting, I’m fed up with going on dating apps only to end up more miserable when no date materialises, or when the person I meet is nothing like their profile.’
Helena couldn’t agree more, shuddering at the thought ofthe horrendous experiences she’d had with online dating. ‘It’s a daunting world.’
Jennie speared an olive with a cocktail stick, pulling it off with her teeth and chewing it thoughtfully. ‘It would be lovely to have somewhere like your community café to help out in during the holidays, I’d love to get involved in some way. Make myself useful.’
‘Well I’d love to have you as a volunteer, whenever you’d like. And hopefully you can come along to some of the evening events too, we’ll host supper clubs, quiz nights, that sort of thing.’ Helena kept thinking of new ideas, there seemed no limit to its potential.
‘Anything to get me out of the house and keep me busy. That’s the main thing. The holidays can drag on for an eternity when you’re on your own.’
Helena could imagine. Being busy at work had been her saving grace. Having enforced periods of solitude as a teacher must be hard for the lonely, especially when all your colleagues would be counting down the days for the holidays to start, to spend time with their loved ones.
As Helena drove back home, she felt more convinced than ever that the Community Café would serve a vital purpose. By giving people the chance to volunteer, she could gain extra help whilst providing a place to come and be useful, to help others more vulnerable and in need than themselves, and to escape the claustrophobia of feeling trapped in the house.
The next person she met on her quest to compile her case studies was an eighty-year-old widower called Derek. Johnny had suggested he might be a good person to talk to. He had done a bit of work for him, cutting back an overgrown hedge that overlooked his sitting room and had begun to block the light from coming in. Derek had been delighted when Helena had phoned him up to ask if she could pop over for a cup of tea and a chat.
When she arrived, she found him outside the front door, peering anxiously down the lane, waiting for her. He was bent over awalking stick, with a pair of glasses perched on the bridge of his nose and a smattering of thin grey hair.
