Clare Mackintosh - I Let You Go

I head towards the cottage, but when I reach the fork in the path I hesitate. I picture Bethan at the caravan park shop, and the way she reminded me of my sister. I feel an ache of homesickness and before I can change my mind I take the path leading to the caravan park. What reason can I give for visiting the shop? I don’t have any money with me, so I can’t pretend I’ve come for milk or bread. I might ask a question, I suppose, but I struggle to think of something plausible. Whatever I come up with, Bethan will know it is an excuse. She’ll think I’m pathetic.

My resolve fades before I’ve walked a hundred yards, and when I reach the car park I stop. I look across to the shop and see a shape in the window – I can’t tell if it’s Bethan and I don’t wait to find out. I turn and run back to the cottage.

I reach Blaen Cedi and pull the key from my pocket, but when I put my hand on the door it moves a little, and I realise it isn’t locked. The door is old and the mechanism unreliable: Iestyn showed me how to pull the door just so, and turn the key at such an angle it clicks home, but at times I’ve spent ten minutes or more trying. He left me his number, but he doesn’t know I threw away my mobile phone. There’s a phone line to the cottage, but no telephone installed, so I will have to walk to Penfach and find a telephone box to see if he’ll come and fix it.

I have only been inside for a few minutes, when there is a knock at the door.

‘Jenna? It’s Bethan.’

I contemplate staying where I am, but my curiosity gets the better of me, and I feel a leap of excitement as I open the door. For all that I sought an escape, I’m lonely here in Penfach.

‘I brought you a pie.’ Bethan holds up a tea-towel-covered dish and comes in without waiting for an invitation. She puts it down in the kitchen next to the range.

‘Thank you.’ I search for small talk, but Bethan just smiles. She takes off her heavy woollen coat and the action galvanises me. ‘Would you like tea?’

‘If you’re making,’ she says. ‘I thought I’d come by and see how you’re doing. I did wonder if you might have popped in to see me before now, but I know what it’s like when you’re settling into a new place.’ She looks around the cottage and stops talking, taking in the sparse sitting room, no different from when Iestyn first brought me here.

‘I don’t have much,’ I say, embarrassed.

‘None of us does, round here,’ Bethan says cheerfully. ‘As long as you’re warm and comfortable, that’s the main thing.’

I move around the kitchen as she talks, making the tea, grateful for something to do with my hands, and we sit at the pine table with our mugs.

‘How are you finding Blaen Cedi?’

‘It’s perfect,’ I say. ‘Exactly what I needed.’

‘Tiny and cold, you mean?’ Bethan says, with a ripple of laughter that slops tea over the rim of her mug. She gives an ineffective rub at her trousers and the liquid sinks into a dark patch on her thigh.

‘I don’t need much room, and the fire keeps me warm enough.’ I smile. ‘Really, I like it.’

‘So what’s your story, Jenna? How did you come to be in Penfach?’

‘It’s beautiful here,’ I say simply, wrapping my hands around my mug and looking down into it, to avoid meeting Bethan’s sharp eyes. She doesn’t push me.

‘That’s true enough. There are worse places to live, although it’s bleak at this time of year.’

‘When do you start letting the caravans?’

‘We open at Easter,’ Bethan says, ‘then it’s all systems go for the summer months – you won’t recognise the place – and we finally wind down after the October half-term. Let me know if you’ve got family visiting and need a ’van – you’ll never squeeze guests in here.’

‘That’s kind of you, but I’m not expecting anyone to visit.’

‘You don’t have any family?’ Bethan looks directly at me, and I find myself unable to drop my gaze.

‘I have a sister,’ I admit, ‘but we don’t speak any more.’

‘What happened?’

‘Oh, the usual sibling tensions,’ I say lightly. Even now, I can see Eve’s angry face as she implored me to listen to her. I was too proud, I can see that now; too blinded by love. Perhaps if I had listened to Eve, things would have been different.

‘Thank you for the pie,’ I say. ‘It’s very kind of you.’

‘Nonsense,’ Bethan says, unperturbed by the change in subject. She puts on her coat and wraps a scarf several times round her neck. ‘What are neighbours for? Now, you’ll be dropping in for tea at the caravan park before too long.’

It’s not a question, but I nod. She fixes me with rich brown eyes and I suddenly feel like a child again.

‘I will,’ I say. ‘I promise.’ And I mean it.

When Bethan has gone I take the memory stick from my camera and load the photos on to my laptop. Most are no use, but there are a few that capture perfectly the writing in the sand, against a backdrop of fierce winter sea. I put the kettle on the range to make more tea, but I lose track of time, and it’s half an hour later when I realise it still hasn’t boiled. I put out a hand only to discover the range is stone cold. It’s gone out again. I was so engrossed in editing photos that I didn’t notice the temperature falling, but now my teeth start to chatter and I can’t make them stop. I look at Bethan’s chicken pie and feel my stomach growl with hunger. The last time this happened it took me two days to relight it, and my heart sinks at the thought of a repeat performance.

I shake myself. When did I become so pathetic? When did I lose the ability to make decisions; to solve problems? I’m better than this.

‘Right,’ I say out loud, my voice sounding strange in the empty kitchen. ‘Let’s sort this out.’

The sun is rising over Penfach before I am warm again. My knees are stiff after hours spent crouching on the kitchen floor, and I have smears of grease in my hair. But I have a sense of achievement I haven’t felt in a long time, as I place Bethan’s pie in the range to warm through. I don’t care that it’s closer to breakfast than supper, or that my hunger pangs have been and gone. I set the table for dinner, and I relish every single bite.

7

‘Come on!’ Ray bellowed up the stairs to Tom and Lucy, looking at his watch for the fifth time in as many minutes. ‘We’re going to be late!’

As if Monday mornings weren’t stressful enough, Mags had spent the night at her sister’s and wasn’t due back until lunchtime, so Ray had been flying solo for twenty-four hours. He had – rather unwisely, he now saw – allowed the children to stay up late to watch a film the previous night, and had had to prise even the ever-chirpy Lucy out of bed at seven-thirty. Now it was eight-thirty-five and they were going to have to get a shift on. Ray had been summoned to the chief constable’s office at nine-thirty, and at this rate he was still going to be standing at the foot of the stairs shouting at his children.

‘Get a move on!’ Ray marched out to the car and started the engine, leaving the front door swinging open. Lucy came racing through it, unbrushed hair flying about her face, and slid into the front seat beside her dad. Her navy school skirt was crumpled, and one knee-length sock was already round her ankle. A full minute later Tom sauntered out to the car, his shirt untucked and flapping in the breeze. He had his tie in his hand and showed no sign of putting it on. He was going through a growth spurt and carried his new-found height awkwardly, his head permanently bowed and his shoulders stooped.

Ray opened his window. ‘Door, Tom!’

‘Huh?’ Tom looked at Ray.

‘The front door?’ Ray clenched his fists. How Mags did this every day without losing her temper, he would never know. The list of things he had to do loomed large in his mind, and he could have done without the school run today of all days.