Page 13 of New Beginnings on Railway Lane

She took a deep and calming breath. The job was to tidy up the clutter downstairs. She mentally rolled up her sleeves. It was just another job. Another challenge. And she wouldn’t fail this time either. Especially as the stakes were so high for Bob if, as it seemed, the place was to be sold in the instance of a divorce.

She knew just how it felt to lose one’s home without any choice, so she felt even more determined to get the place tidied for them all before she left.

7

Ryan’s day was going from bad to worse and it wasn’t even lunchtime yet, he thought as he stood in his bedroom.

The postman had delivered a shocking letter that morning that only he knew about. His dad had quickly stuffed it in his pocket, not realising that Ryan was in the kitchen watching him read it. However, the envelope had fallen out of Bob’s overalls as he had left for the workshop. Ryan had picked it up and seen that it was from the bank. Without hesitation and feeling some kind of premonition of doom, he opened it despite the invasion of his dad’s privacy.

His fears had been unfortunately justified as he read through the letter. It was a bank statement on the mortgage that his parents had taken out on the station all those years ago. The amount still left to be paid was enormous.

Ryan had sunk down onto the sofa in shock. His dad had been made redundant and had received a large pay-off at the time. He had assumed that the mortgage would have been paid off at that point to secure the family home, but obviously not. And now that his dad had turned sixty, how on earth were they going to pay off the huge sum remaining when he was effectively retired?

Ryan had been heading downstairs to talk to his dad, although heaven knew how he was going to broach the subject with him when any kind of personal questions were likely to set off more tears. But he had to know the truth. However, his journey had been waylaid by the arrival of Katy. In all honestly, he had almost forgotten about her despite spending the previous evening trying to tidy the place for her stay. It was an unsettling development to have a stranger in the house, however kind her original intention had been to help his dad.

Checking that the bedroom door was most definitely closed, he rang Ethan, who was waiting to board his plane to Canada at the airport and whose call he had just missed. Ryan felt justified in taking out his frustrations on the situation with Katy with his younger brother.

‘This is all your fault,’ he moaned in a quiet tone. ‘She’s completely the wrong person to be here at this time.’

But Ethan just laughed down the line. ‘Is she single?’ he asked.

‘I don’t know,’ muttered Ryan.

In truth, he knew barely anything about her, apart from the fact that she seemed quite work-obsessed.

‘Is she attractive?’ asked Ethan.

Ryan thought back to those long legs in jeans and high heels before shaking his head. He most definitely did not have time for that kind of distraction. ‘I hadn’t noticed,’ he replied quickly.

Ethan laughed once more. ‘Which means that she most definitely is. Shame. Maybe I should have interviewed her after all.’

‘Instead of going to the pub to hide, you mean,’ drawled Ryan. His brother was still running away, even after all these years.

‘I don’t know what you’re moaning about,’ Ethan told him. ‘There’s worse people to be sharing an apartment with than a pretty lady.’

Ryan huffed out a sigh in response. He had enough problems without his brother’s one-track mind adding to them.

‘Good job Dad will be there as a chaperone,’ Ethan carried on.

‘What do you think is going to happen with her staying here for just seven days?’ Ryan asked, bewildered.

‘Knowing the wilderness that’s your love life, bro? Absolutely nothing,’ replied Ethan.

Ryan couldn’t exactly argue with that. It was true. He had had no great love over the years. Girlfriends and dates had come and gone, but there hadn’t been anyone special in his life. After seeing the phoney marriage that his parents had endured, it had stopped him getting close to anyone romantically.

Once he’d finished his call to Ethan, Ryan headed out of his bedroom to show Katy downstairs to the main station. The lock was still a bit stiff as it had been so long since anyone had used it daily, but eventually he was able to get inside and hand over the spare keys for her to use.

Katy was silent. It appeared that she couldn’t even muster one single word at the mess in front of her despite having seen it on her previous visit. It was just piles and piles of random things all looking as if they might topple over at any point. For a second, he sensed that she was overwhelmed by it all.

‘Well, er, just do what you can to start with,’ he told her, with a rueful smile. ‘I’ll be along to help in a while. But if you’ll excuse me, I just need to find my dad. I’ll be back soon.’

Then he made a swift exit.

He felt bad about leaving her to such a mess, but one crisis at a time, he told himself.

So he left Katy in the station and headed down the platform towards the train workshop.

In the old days when the railway had still run, the workshop had been used to service the modern trains. But when the line closed, the spare trains were taken away by the rail company.