Page 11 of Carry Me Home

‘We invited Tom,’ Meg says. ‘He said he’d think about it.’

I blink.

I know what Tom thinking about something means. It means he has thought about it, reached a conclusion, and is not ready to share the conclusion yet. He has been doing this since we were seventeen and I have never once successfully rushed him and I have largely stopped trying.

‘He had the Treloars,’ Hayley says, helpfully. ‘Yesterday.’

I wince. Tom prepares for a trip to the Treloars like he’s preparing for battle and may never return. For a long stretch of a moment, the pull to hear him talk about it again, for us to sit, just like we used to, me with my legs tucked up on my sofa, Tom sprawled on the armchair in my flat’s front room while he told me horror stories of the Treloars’ lambing season, washes over me.

The pull is long and hard, painful enough that I wince, because those times, those moments, were before everything, before Peter went, before Peter even arrived and made me his own. Back when it was just me and Tom. It feels like an age ago.

‘He also had the – what was it, Dad said something…’ Hayley trails off, like people often do when talking of Mr Darcy Senior. You couldn’t meet a less impressive person, what with his vague rambling and incoherent half-muttered thoughts, but he’s a lovely man, kind down to the very marrow of him. The Darcy siblings lucked out on the parent front.

‘Something about a sheep,’ Meg says, ‘which I think we can agree was a very convenient sheep.’ She bites into the scone and her expression tips over into ecstatic, eyes wide. ‘Oh, this is incredible. Mrs Ellis, this is incredible.’

‘Gina,’ Mum says, already refilling the plate. ‘I’ve been telling you girls for years to call me Gina.’

I wrap my hands around my mug and look at the two of them, and feel a longing I haven’t in three weeks. Not for the village itself, not the harbour or the café or the fuchsias.

But for the warmth of it.

The quality of people who have known you long enough to show up in Truro on a Sunday on a pretext that wouldn’t fool anyone.

‘How’s everyone?’ I ask, and mean it.

‘Reuben had a good week,’ Hayley says. ‘Kit took him out on the boat on Wednesday. He knew exactly where he was. Him and Helen still haven’t spoken though, although Lily’s been down last weekend to see them all.’

I nod. ‘I don’t think Helen and Reuben will be on talking terms any time soon.’ The catastrophic Harding family rupture rocked Sea Salt Bay a couple of months ago. The Hardings are the backbone of our village, always have been, but when Brynn Trelawney, whom I instantly loved just for the pure fight in her, turned up, the balance shifted.

Everything changed. Again.

I’ve decided I’m not a fan of change.

‘Jude and Brynn are insufferable,’ Meg says, grin spreading wide. ‘In the best possible way. She’s got the boat doing really well.’

‘Maisie lost a tooth,’ Hayley adds. ‘Left it for the tooth fairy and then apparently couldn’t sleep because she was worried the tooth fairy would struggle to find Sea Salt Bay.’

‘What did Kit tell her?’

‘That the tooth fairy has maritime GPS and is fully RNLI certified.’ Hayley smiles. ‘Tom told him to say that.’

Of course he did.

I smile before I can stop myself. Mum sees it. Says nothing.

They stay for an hour. Mum keeps the scones coming. Meg asks about the café – not how is it, not when are you going back, just are you all right – and I tell her what I know how to say. That it’s fine. That I needed some time. That I’m not ready yet but I’m getting there.

She nods, and doesn’t push, and steals another scone, and somehow that is exactly the right response.

When they leave, Meg hugs me like she’s been doing it for years – which she hasn’t, we have never been huggers, there was always the slight distance of Tom between us, the fact of being his friend rather than theirs – but then she whispers, close to my ear, ‘We miss you. The village misses you. Come home when you’re ready.’

Home.

I stand on the step and wave them up the street. Meg’s already talking, Hayley tilting her head, listening, and I stay rooted there until they turn the corner and disappear.

Mum appears beside me with a tea towel.

Inside, the coffee machine hisses.