An Almost Perfect Holiday

by Lucy Diamond

  Olivia was sitting cross-legged up on the headland, just her and the big sky, with the sea below, all shades from indigo to teal. Funny, she hadn’t spent much time in Cornwall for twenty years and yet she could still name every seabird – the guillemots and cormorants and razorbills – without a second thought. She’d recognized the sea-pinks and vetch too, their names springing instantly to her mind as she noticed them. Cornwall ran through her veins, like it or not. Every place carried a memory for her. Being here, for instance, reminded her of the time she and Aidan had once made their way to this spot together, bunking off sixth form to smoke a badly rolled joint and lie in the warm tussocky grass hand-in-hand for a whole afternoon. It seemed a fitting place to write a letter of confession; she could practically feel his presence there with her, directing her hand.

  Dear Lorna and Roy, she began. I should have told you this a long time ago, but . . .

  Then she stopped, already swamped with shame and doubt. This was going to be the hardest letter to write. How on earth would she be able to find the words? How could she do this?

  Because you owe them, a voice in her head told her. It sounded a lot like her conscience. Don’t you think you owe them that much?

  Her hand shook. She hadn’t smoked for over fifteen years, but she suddenly felt desperate for a cigarette. A brandy, even, to stop her nerves.

  She put the pen down and thought of Mack far away at home with the boys. Somewhere, beyond all the hills and fields and rivers, all those villages and towns and streets, the three of them were carrying on life without her. Eating breakfast, getting dressed, going to the park, digging in the sandpit, swinging on swings. They walked through her head like cutout paper dolls and she felt a small, dull ache inside for them. She missed them. She had failed them. Why had she ever thought she could be a good mother this time around?

  Still searching for the right words with which to begin the letter, she switched on her phone and the familiar flurry of beeps and notifications chorused at her moments later. All from Mack at a guess – oh. No, actually. He must have been ringing around trying to find her, because there were some others too.

  Dad: Everything all right, love? Where are you? Ring me if you want to talk. Mack’s really worried about you.

  Her brother Danny had texted too: You okay? Is this about Mum? You’re not her, remember. Don’t do this, Liv. Call me?

  And – oh God, this was embarrassing. Some of the mums she knew had texted her as well: Mel and Ashleigh and Sara, all asking after her. You all right? Can I help? Ring me if you need a friend, they said and she bit her lip, slightly overwhelmed that everyone was being so concerned. So nice. She also felt kind of embarrassed. Just how many people had Mack told? Were they all gossiping about her now?

  The phone vibrated in her hand as a new message appeared in the next moment: her brother again. Hey – are you in Falmouth? Had a message on Facebook from Nick Barton, saying he thought he saw you in town. Want me to meet you somewhere? Can get out of work if you want to talk. x

  Tears misted Olivia’s eyes. Now that Danny lived in London and was busy with work and dating, while she was so tied up with the boys, they hadn’t seen much of each other recently, but he knew her, he understood. In some ways he knew her a lot better than her own husband. An image came to her of the two of them huddled on the back doorstep the night their mum had left, their small bodies shivering, their small tummies empty. For a short alarming time, it had felt as if it was just the two of them against the world, but they’d had each other at least.

  Thanks, she replied to him. Just figuring some stuff out. Will call in a few days, promise. x

  Mack next. Guilt pierced her as she read his messages and saw the latest photos of the boys he’d sent: a day-trip to Bristol Zoo, by the look of it, then the two of them in the bath later on with soap bubbles on their heads. A little video of them both waving at her and Stanley saying, ‘We love Mummy!’ while Harry loyally added, ‘And Daddy!’

  For so long she had felt weighed down by numbness, but she could feel it starting to lift off her at last, wisp by wisp peeling gradually away. The world seemed to be shifting back into focus again, as if she could see more clearly. She loved the three of them, so much. She always had done.

  Feeling choked up, she typed a message to Mack: Sorry about this. I miss you all too. I’m starting to feel a bit more human. There’s just one thing I have left to do here. x

  She sent the message, then switched off her phone again before anyone could ring her. Then she turned back to her letter. If she could somehow put things right here in Falmouth, she might just be able to face her real life in Bristol again, she thought. It was worth a try, wasn’t it?

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  Outside the hair salon, crowds of cheerful holidaymakers were making their way through the bunting-laced streets, while seagulls cruised above, tracing wide arcs against the blue. Dogs sniffed out dropped pasty crumbs in the gutters, babies dozed in prams, small children in colourful T-shirts and sunglasses rode high up on their dads’ necks. Maggie breathed in the seaside scents of vinegary chips, coconut sun cream and frying onions, then joined the melee, enjoying the sensation of her hair bouncing lightly with each step.

  What next for the bold new Maggie? It was a warm day, the sun already high in the sky, and she decided to head down to the beach, past all of the pretty little shops and galleries – one of which had a sign up in the door saying: NO TEENAGERS. Then she stopped, remembering that this was the place Em had pointed out to her a few days earlier – something to do with their kids, but the full story had never come out. She must get to the bottom of that, she thought to herself with a frown. Moving on again, she kept catching sight of her own reflection in shop windows and being startled by how nice she looked, how much happier and younger she seemed without all that heavy hair weighing her down.

  Once on the beach, she kicked off her sandals, the sand warm and gritty underfoot as she walked along. It was busy already there, with families laying out towels and beach mats, toddlers squatting in the shallows making mud pies in colourful buckets. A strong breeze whisked the newly bared back of her neck, and she smiled as she spotted a little girl gleefully licking an enormous chocolate ice-cream that was going all over her chin – ‘Oh, Romy, you’re wearing that ice-cream, my darling,’ her mother said, half-exasperated, half-affectionate.

  An elderly couple were sitting in a pair of deckchairs nearby and Maggie noticed they were holding hands across the sandy divide, their silvery heads turned to one another as they talked. Nearby there was a small wicker picnic basket and a Thermos flask, plus two paperbacks piled on a folded towel: a tableau that signalled companionship, a nice easy afternoon with the person you loved. It gave Maggie a similar feeling to the one she’d had in the church at Zennor, a pang of something she couldn’t quite put her finger on: envy? Regret? Wistfulness?

  ‘It’s lonely sometimes being on your own, isn’t it?’ her mum had sighed in the years following her dad’s death, but Maggie always refused to entertain the idea.

  ‘Lonely? Ha! Chance would be a fine thing. I’m far too busy to be lonely,’ she’d always replied, steadfastly turning away from the direction of self-pity. Turning down all the invitations she’d received, too, in dogged pursuit of being the best parent ever, running around after Amelia’s wants and needs. Yet if she was honest with herself, she could see how gratifying it must be to have a decades-long loving relationship; to still be holding hands on a crowded beach, glad of each other.

  Yes, well. Sometimes it wasn’t as easy as all that.

  Meanwhile, what might Amelia be doing with Will right now? Maggie checked her phone out of habit, but there was still no message. Maybe Will had taken her off to Exmoor with a load of camera equipment for a photography lesson, she thought, picturing him giving directions as he leaned over Amelia’s shoulder, the two of them concentrating deeply on the moment. Perhaps they were walking along the river together, swapping stories and getting to know eac
h other. Or maybe all five of them had gone out, one big new patchwork family, and Amelia was enjoying her role as older sister to the little ones. Maggie remembered how, aged five or six, Amelia had liked nothing more than lining up dolls and teddies and bossing them around with gusto. She would be a good big sister, she thought. Better late than never.

  Further along the beach, a bohemian-looking woman caught her eye. There was something Pre-Raphaelite about her long red flowing dress and the headdress of flowers on her blonde hair, and she had set up some kind of stall near the kayak-hire place just along from the café. HAPPINESS ART PROJECT, Maggie read on a rippling banner.

  ‘Hello, would you like to take part in my project?’ the woman called out, seeing her looking. She was young – early twenties, at a guess – with a sweet round face.

  Maggie smiled politely but kept walking. She never took part in avant-garde things if she could help it; they made her feel self-conscious. Plus she had a strong feeling that this young woman’s project was going to be ‘out there’, as Amelia would say. No, thank you, she thought to herself.

  ‘It’s completely free and practically guarantees happiness,’ the woman added winningly. ‘Come on, it’ll only take a few minutes. Have a go!’

  For some reason, Maggie found herself hesitating. Stopping. Maybe it was her new haircut and Suzanne having told her she could take on the world that made her think twice. Maybe there was something in the sea air that day, opening her mind to new possibilities. Or maybe she was just plain old tired of saying, No, thank you all the time – to friends, to colleagues, to Paul, to strange random women on the beach.

  ‘Go on then,’ she said, approaching the stand with an unexpected prickle of curiosity. Whatever this was all about, it surely couldn’t be any more embarrassing than her meltdown in Zennor yesterday, she decided.

  A pile of large grey and white pebbles had been set out on a table, along with a box of colourful chalks, plus a selection of marker pens. ‘Fabulous!’ said the blonde woman. ‘So this project is about releasing bad thoughts and thinking up new hopeful ones to replace them, as a means of making us all a little bit happier. I’m asking people to choose a pebble each and then to write on them with chalk any negative thoughts or messages that have been holding them back. Anything that’s a worry.’

  Maggie was starting to regret getting involved in this. ‘Right,’ she said suspiciously. Because achieving happiness was that simple, clearly. What a load of rubbish!

  ‘I’ll photograph the chalked pebble in your hand – it’s all anonymous, by the way – and then the idea is that you walk down to the sea and throw the pebble out as far as you can. Really let it go! The tide will take it away – along with your worry.’ She smiled a rather goofy smile. ‘I know it sounds kooky, but the symbolism is really nice. And we all love chucking stones in the sea, right?’

  ‘Well . . .’ said Maggie, who was already worrying about hitting someone with hers. Followed by an arrest for grievous bodily harm shortly afterwards, knowing her luck.

  ‘THEN – and this is the good bit – you take another pebble and with one of the permanent markers you write something hopeful and positive. Whatever you want. I’ll photograph that too, then you get to take it away with you. Then we’re done!’

  ‘Right,’ said Maggie, still dubious. She knew from her geologist days how the Coast Protection Act stated that taking stones from beaches was illegal but she could see a garden-centre bag of sandstone and shale pebbles behind the woman, so presumably these had already been bought, rather than collected from the surroundings. More importantly though, why did this person think anyone would want to pour out their secrets so publicly? On a pebble?

  ‘You’re looking unsure – let me show you some of the pictures so far,’ the woman said, pulling out a folder from a bag. ‘Here – see? I’m putting on an exhibition at the end of the season. You’re welcome to come along if you’ll still be in town.’

  Maggie stared as the woman flicked through the pages of the folder. The photographs were beautifully shot: a hand holding the pebble each time, with their words springing out in coloured chalks. Grandad dying, was written in pink chalk on one. Being alone, read another in pale-blue capitals. Exam results, said a third.

  Opposite them was a second photograph, the same hand with a different pebble. These ones carried much more upbeat pronouncements. LOVE, said one. HOPE, said another. KEEP GOING, said the third.

  They were just words written on lumps of rock, but there was something so simplistic about them, so poignant, that Maggie felt quite moved. ‘Gosh,’ she said. ‘They’re lovely.’

  ‘The aim is that people take their pebbles away with them and just hold them now and then – because pebbles are so lovely to hold, aren’t they? – and remember being here: a sunny beach, on a summer’s day, feeling hopeful and positive. Like I said, almost a guarantee of happiness!’

  ‘Okay,’ said Maggie, even though she was more used to studying rocks rather than writing on them. The girl had charmed her with these photographs and her earnest goofy smile. It was impossible to refuse now.

  ‘Great! Well . . . choose your pebble and chalk, and go for it!’

  Maggie picked up a large grey pebble that had a thin white stripe running around its middle like a belt. It was cold and heavy, beautifully smooth. The girl was right, it did feel lovely to hold. Then she chose a yellow piece of chalk and considered a few options.

  Anything bad happening to Amelia. No. She’d never fit all of those words on the pebble, for starters.

  Will left me. Another no. That was an old wound, she wouldn’t reopen it for the sake of an art project.

  Dying alone surrounded by feral cats. Now she was just being silly. Come on, Maggie, for heaven’s sake, get a grip.

  ‘Sorry, I’m taking ages here,’ she felt obliged to say, still hovering with her chalk in hand. ‘I can’t decide what to write.’

  ‘It’s fine, take your time,’ the woman replied, removing the lens cap from a fancy-looking camera. ‘Sometimes just letting the first and simplest thought pop into your head is best, but there’s no rush.’

  Maggie thought again of her dream, how she’d been paralysed at the top of the zip-slide, not wanting to jump. What are you so scared of? Helena had taunted her.

  Maybe that summed it up: how bogged down she had become with all her no-thank-yous. How her own fear was perhaps holding her back. Being too scared to try, she chalked carefully onto the pebble, then grimaced a little as she held it out to the woman in the red dress. ‘I know this is a bit pathetic,’ she said, wanting to pre-empt any criticism.

  But no criticism came. ‘Not at all,’ the woman said earnestly instead. ‘It’s perfect. Thank you so much. Now if you could just turn a little, so we can get the best light . . .’ She angled the camera, leaning it over Maggie’s hand, then began clicking off shots. ‘And perhaps if you could hold it up against this piece of driftwood,’ she went on, heaving a chunk of wood up from beside her table. ‘Lovely. Yes. Super!’ She beamed at Maggie and put the camera down. ‘Okay. Now you can go ahead and hurl your worry into the sea. Throw with all your might.’

  ‘I’ll try not to hit anyone,’ Maggie promised. Feeling rather self-conscious, she walked down to the water’s edge, found a stretch of shoreline where there were no swimmers or frolicking children within throwing distance and bowled the pebble underarm. It landed with a satisfying splosh, ten feet or so away, and vanished beneath the surface.

  She knew it was symbolic rather than anything real, but all the same, the act of throwing the pebble away felt good. Surprisingly good. She imagined it sinking through the water before settling into the muddy depths, down below the waves, and the letters she had chalked gradually washing away. Being too scared to try: gone.

  All the way back up to the art-project table, she could hear that splosh resounding in her ears and she smiled as she caught the woman’s eye on returning. ‘Nice,’ she said. ‘Thank you. Do you know, I feel oddly better for that.’<
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  ‘Good! That’s the whole point,’ came the reply. ‘Consider that worry lifted off your shoulders.’ She grinned. ‘Okay, now for the more upbeat part.’

  This woman was infectious, she really was. Because not only was Maggie then absorbed in choosing the nicest pebble to keep and the marker with the prettiest colour (the sage-green was quite lovely, she eventually decided), but she then found herself deliberating for some time about what she wanted to write on it. On a pebble! She must be going soft in the head, she really must. And yet . . .

  And yet it mattered, weirdly. She wanted to pick exactly the right word. HOPE, she pondered. STRENGTH? LOVE? TOGETHERNESS?

  In the end, she wrote COURAGE in her neatest lettering and awarded herself a small approving nod. Yes. That was what she was looking for.

  ‘Wonderful! Perfect,’ came the enthusiastic response from the artist. ‘Great – nobody’s done that yet, and it’s such a good strong word. Right, last photograph and then I won’t take up any more of your time. So, let me position your hand here . . . Lovely!’

  Some clicking followed, a few rearrangements of angle and placing, and then it was all over. ‘Thank you for taking part,’ said the woman, passing her a small business card. ‘Here are the details of the show, if you’re in the area – otherwise, I’ll be putting the prints online for you to look at.’ Her flowered headdress had slipped sideways on her head, and there was lipstick on one of her front teeth, but she reminded Maggie of a sea nymph or even a good fairy, standing there amidst her pebbles and hopefulness. Her nose wrinkled as she smiled. ‘You are now free to take your courage and leave. Have a lovely day.’