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Chapter 32
The next morning, I wake to find an empty space in the bed next to me. I walk up to the main house, wearing one of Ted’s shirts as a nightgown, hugging it around myself against the cool wind coming up from the sea. I assume Ted must be doing a last bit of cleaning in the house. The skip is being collected this morning, and then he’s handing the keys over to the estate agents this afternoon.
There’s a smell of fresh coffee coming from the kitchen and I find Ted in the living room, looking at the memory cabinet, which he’s hung on the wall. I move to stand next to him, and he puts an arm around me, then notices I’m wearing his shirt.
‘Do you ever wear your own clothes, Laura?’ he asks, a teasing smile on his lips.
‘Not if I can help it,’ I say, resting my head on his shoulder. ‘You hung it up.’
‘I wanted to see what it looked like. It fits perfectly here.’ He points out what he’s put into each compartment: his mother’s scent bag; the hairslide Gerry picked out as one of the memories he had of his own mother; a piece of sea glass; a snuff box his grandfather James brought back from the war; and even an old collar tag with Scamp’s predecessor’s name on it.
‘I didn’t know what to put in for Dad. I thought maybe his old guitar pick – something to symbolise all the things he used to take joy in under this roof.’ He opens one of the small doors in the cabinet, and there’s a miniature gin bottle inside.
I look sideways at Ted and realise he’s Benjamin Buttoned on me again; I swear with his bright eyes and his bed-ruffled hair, he’s verging on early thirties now. Just looking at him makes my stomach drop. My body feels like a sunflower, drawn towards the sun.
‘Perfect. I’m glad you like it,’ I say, wrapping an arm around his waist.
‘Knock knock,’ comes a voice from behind us, and we turn to see Belinda standing in the porch, her hair cascading over her ridiculously attractive shoulders. She’s wearing a silk tiger print kaftan over jeans so skinny they could be chopstick holders. My balloon of happiness instantly turns into a bowling ball and hits the ground with a thud.
‘I thought you’d left?’ I find myself saying, trying to pull Ted’s shirt down to cover my luminous white thighs.
‘Grrrr,’ says Belinda, making cat paws with her hands, ‘you’re jealous, that’s good, it means you like him.’
I have never felt such a strong desire to wrestle another woman to the floor and strangle her with her own ridiculously expensive-looking kaftan.
‘Bell, don’t,’ Ted says, taking a step towards her.
‘It’s OK, I’m on my way to the airport, I’ve done what I needed to do here.’ Belinda looks serious for a moment. ‘I’m pleased I got to see Gerry, and I’m sorry I didn’t come sooner. I won’t leave it so long next time.’
What, she’s coming back? She disappears for years, not a trace, and now she’s planning her next visit like some tanned, toned spectre. She’s going to be like that scary girl in The Ring, showing up whenever I’m half naked, just to show me how much browner her legs are than mine. The disappointment must show on my face, because Belinda turns to me with a sharp smile.
‘Don’t worry, little bear, I won’t be getting in your way.’
‘Why are you calling me little bear?’ I ask, giving her my best Paddington Bear stare.
Belinda gives me a cryptic smile.
‘It’s your inner animal.’
‘My what?’ I ask. She sounds as though she’s quoting Tiger Woman.
‘Laura, don’t engage with this—’ Ted starts to say, but I bat him away with a wave of my hand.
‘No, I want to know.’
‘Well,’ says Belinda, inviting herself in and pacing around the empty room, ‘I am a tiger, Ted here is a bear, as are you, so you see you two are far better suited; your auras match. You’ll enjoy doing beary things together.’
‘I’m not a bear,’ I say, through narrowed eyes. ‘If it’s my “inner animal”, I get to choose, and I don’t want to be a bear. I’ve read Tiger Woman too, you know.’
‘You’ve read it?’ Belinda looks pleased and steps towards me, peering into my eyes as though trying to find something inside. ‘Well, don’t go changing, Ted doesn’t need another tiger in his life.’
‘I am not a bloody bear, OK,’ I explode. Something about her tone has pressed all my buttons, her territorial pacing around the room, as though she’s about to spray the house with her musk. ‘You don’t get to say what animal I am.’
‘Whoa,’ says Ted, stepping between us. ‘OK, let’s just take the animal aura conversation down a notch. Belinda, what did you want to say before you go?’ He pauses, looking at her pleadingly. ‘And I do think you need to go.’
Belinda waves a hand between us.
‘I like that she has fire in her belly,’ Belinda gives me a smug smile, ‘and that she’s read my book.’
