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“Perfect, Sherbert. Never better.”
“The doctor still keeping an eye on you?” Charlie slipped her sunglasses down the bridge of her nose to peer at him.
“Absolutely. Heart, lungs, sugar, and mind. All in check.” He leaned back into the sagging canvas. “You don’t need to worry. Your mother does enough of that for all three of us.”
“Chloe, come and see the rocks.” Jacob jumped up and dragged his sister to the water’s edge.
“Off they go.” Her dad nodded towards their silhouettes.
Sam was strolling further along the beach, alone in his own world with his headphones on. Charlie frowned and settled into the matching deck chair next to her father. She grabbed at the sand with her toes. “I worry about Chloe and Sam. They’ve disappeared into themselves.”
“They’re good kids.”
“That’s what worries me. They’re so compliant. It’s not normal for teenagers.” Charlie folded her arms and let the canvas support her neck. “They’ve seen a lot of horrible things. They should be angry. But they just do whatever’s asked of them.”
“I forget you’re a grown-up sometimes. You’ve had a hell of a time. It’s not like a usual case that you can let go when you take your robes off. Are you sure about all of this?”
Charlie took a deep breath. The breeze made her eyes sting. “I don’t know what I’m doing, Dad. I’m drifting away from Elda while I’m picking up pieces for a woman I barely know and for children I have no responsibility for.”
“Yes, it’s all a bit complicated, isn’t it, Sherbert?” Her father’s gaze fixed on the horizon, but he gave her arm a squeeze. “You’ll work it out though; you always do.”
Charlie was safe and whole in the scale of her father’s presence. Her thoughts drifted to Elda, sitting alone in Linda’s acrid house. She swallowed.Fuck. I have everything, and she has nothing. And I’ve left her to it.
“Dad.” Charlie stood. “I think I’ve messed everything up a bit.”
“Maybe, Sherbert. One step at a time though. Let’s get these kiddos back to base for lunch.”
The walk back along the dunes was harder than ever. Charlie sank further into the sand with every step. Forcing her way out only served to dig deeper. She was frustrated. Life was crammed with other people’s problems, and she was trying to troubleshoot everything all at once. She had to get back to Elda before it was too late. She had to repair the rift she’d torn between them the night that Nancy died. Before all this, they’d been inseparable, maybe even indestructible. Was it too late to get back to what they’d had?
Chapter Thirty-Two
Elda could feel Charlie’s presence behind her. She flicked her thin jacket collar up and marched on. Charlie jogged to catch up. They were walking in the woods. The sunlight dappled onto a bed of leaves under their feet. It was mid-morning, and the air was beginning to warm around them, but the atmosphere between them was frosty.
Charlie grabbed her arm. “Elda, wait. I want to talk about this.”
“There’s nothing more to talk about. I’ve heard what you’ve said, and I know you think I’m an idiot.” Elda wasn’t ready for Charlie to expose her erratic behaviour. “Do you know how many times I’ve wished I could be held by my dad?”
Charlie sighed as she caught up.
“I’ve wanted to be loved by him forever. Once I cut out an advert in the back of a pink paper for a private investigator.”
“What happened?” Charlie asked.
“I got cold feet and threw the ad in the bin, but that’s not the point.” She ran her hands through her hair. “I don’t have anyone. Not anymore.”
“Please. You have me. Running away isn’t the answer.” She held the soft part of Elda’s upper arm and she turned. “Are you going to look for your dad? Is that what this is about?”
“No. That’s not what I’m doing.”
They stood for a moment, daring the other to move first.
“I know you think I’m wrong. But you’re not me. You can’t feel what I’m feeling. I’m suffocating. I need to be alone to work some of this out,” Elda said.
“Why are you going to Paris of all places?” Charlie asked. “Everything went to shit last time, and you came home miserable.”
Elda understood Charlie’s angry desperation, but it made her all the more determined to carve her own path out of this mess. “Well, everything’s gone to shit here too, Charlie. So I’ve got nothing to lose.”
A stillness fell between them.
