I hesitate for a moment, deliberating it all. Would it only hurt more, for him to see his life projected out before him, knowing how it ends?
‘Pretty girl that barmaid, in’t she?’ Jimmy speaks again and I follow his line of sight. Beatrice flits around the pub collecting glasses and other shrapnel left lying about the place. When she spots us looking, she waves, a nervous grin stretching across her face.
Turning back to Jimmy, I lean against the table with a sigh and shake my head. ‘She is,’ is all I can confess.
‘I had a girl like her once, you know.’ Jimmy looks off into the middle distance, as though he has to concentrate hard on the memories before they disappear. ‘I don’t remember her name now, but I can see her clear as day. She had such a stern old look about her, she could make grown men stick to their seats with one pointed look, but the moment she smiled, man, you couldn’t help but melt. You’d be lucky getting a girl like that. You know when she softens up to you that you’re sommat special.’
Stealing another glance at Beatrice, I see she’s already watching us intently, trying her hardest to decipher what’s being spoken without her. Being caught staring, she flushes, opens her mouth to shout what I’m assuming would be an insult, realises she’s in her workplace, then sticks out her tongue in a childish gesture before turning on her heel and escaping out the back.
‘Very lucky.’ I laugh, trying to stop myself remembering the taste of that tongue, and the softness of her lips.
Like a shot of adrenaline, the feelings she stirs in me motivate me to proposition him with the thing I was too shy to mention before. ‘I’d like to make a film about you, Jimmy. I’ve never made one before, at least not by myself, so I can’t promise it would be anything special, but I want to tell your story. Well, me and Beatrice do. The barmaid,’ I clarify at the end of my rant.
‘A film about me?’ He laughs. ‘You taking the piss?’
‘No, no, not at all.’ My back grows sweaty and I look back to search for Beatrice at the bar and she gives me an encouraging thumbs up, and I take another renewing breath. ‘My sister,’ I begin, my apprehension warbling through my voice. ‘My sister has a similar condition to yours. It’s completely different circumstances, but I would like the opportunity to tell the world about the condition, but also about you, who you are, who you were, who the man is behind your diagnosis. I would like the privilege to tell your story, and I feel that, in a way, it could help my Lizzie too.’
‘Why not make a film about her?’ He poses the question to me, and it’s one I have also sat with these last few days. ‘Why me?’
‘I don’t know.’ It’s the truth. Why wouldn’t I just write about Lizzie? I know her better than I know myself, so why dedicate so much of my time to a man I’ve only met a handful of times?
‘It’s too hard,’ he states, watching me closely. I nod, the motion sending a single tear over my waterline that I catch quickly before anyone else sees.
‘You can do it, you can make the film. On one condition.’ Jimmy smiles in his melancholy sort of way.
‘Yeah?’ I’m hopeful. I’m so close to succeeding.
‘You come back to your sister, and tell her story too, when you’re ready.’ I can’t form any words; emotion is too thick in my throat so I only nod erratically and stick my hand out for him to shake.
‘Thank you,’ I finally manage to squeeze out, and he sips at his pint as if nothing has unfolded.
‘You look like an old friend of mine. Eddie Cavendish.’ His sad eyes smile.
‘I’ve got that one a few times, believe it or not.’ I take a swig of my own drink before looking across the bar for Beatrice, and the beaming smile she emits at the sight of my successful thumbs up has made it all feel worthwhile.
When Dad told me he’d come in two months, it felt so long, too far away, too out of reach. Now, two months is an almost impossible deadline. I have made promises, commitments, right here in New York. I can’t just leave halfway through, with unfinished business. I’m not my father. I have two months to make this film. I have two months to give what I can to Jimmy, and to Beatrice. I need to succeed.
Chapter 21
Beatrice
Funny, isn’t it? How the world likes to toy with you.
It was always my life-long dream to share my ideas with Mr Cavendish, to collaborate with him on a project, be a peer, a colleague to him, to match his success. The irony isn’t lost on me as I sit beside one Mr Cavendish, brainstorming from the first light of the sun until the last, exercising my mind in ways I haven’t for so long. And now I think I should have perhaps been more specific in my dreaming. The creator of the universe, whomever she may be, has sent me Arthur instead of Mr Cavendish senior. And instead of some posh London bistro, writing for one of the big studios, she has settled on Ms Riches’ farmhouse dining table writing a story that no one has asked for.
‘Staring at me isn’t getting the first three scenes written now, is it?’ Arthur looks up at me from under his lasheswith a smug grin, and I hide my face behind a stack of papers at the shame of being caught.
‘I wasn’t staring,’ I insist unconvincingly. ‘I was thinking and you just so happen to be situated in my line of sight as I’m doing it.’
‘Hmm.’ He maintains his grin, as he continues sliding through his laptop. His face is illuminated softly by the light of the screen as the evening draws in and the distant sounds of the bleating sheep and Ms Riches’ soap operas accompany the tapping of his fingers on the keys.
‘What are you even doing anyway? Or are you just playing minesweeper whilst I do all of the work?’ I ask with a pointed look. We’ve been at this for at least a week now. When I’m not working, I’m sat at this table, and when I am working, Arthur Cavendish trails behind me transcribing my words verbatim so I can write whilst retrieving sheep from wherever they manage to get themselves stuck.
Arthur turns the laptop to face me and a spreadsheet fills the screen. ‘Contacts,’ is his brief explanation, and when he notices my look of confusion, he continues, ‘I’m compiling a list of people and places that we can pitch this to. Who we can work with to film, who will fund it, actors, you know, all of the boring stuff.’ He scrolls through the tab and it stretches on and on, with each extended page filled with all of the information he could possibly need, and it makes my eyes hurt just looking at it. ‘You must know some people too. Want me to add them to the list?’
I’ve had my fair share of meetings; I had my fair share of phone numbers and email addresses that would have been perfect. But they’re all gone now. I changed my number,never transferred over any of the contents of my old phone, and left that part of my life behind me when I came home two years ago. Even if I hadn’t, I wouldn’t call on them now. I couldn’t let them see me like this. I was a different woman when Tommy was alive. No one in London would recognise me now.
‘No, it’s okay,’ I reply simply, and I’m grateful when Arthur doesn’t press. ‘So, you fancy yourself a producer, eh?’ Shifting the topic, I take a boiled sweet from a jar on Ms Riches’ shelf and plop it into my mouth.
