by Annie Dyer
“He’s not stayed here?” I asked, opening the fridge door and taking out a pint of milk.
“We’re full. No room at the inn, my dear,” she said, running floury hands under the tap.
“Who’s been helping Grandad while Sam’s not been here?” Sam was my uncle, my grandparent’s other child and only a few years older than me.
“Gabriel. Or Gabe. He’s moved here recently.”
I frowned at her. “I met him before coming in. He was chopping wood round the back of the annex.”
Nan paled. “Sorry. I should’ve told him not to when I knew you were coming.”
The axe. My family knew what had happened. About my nightmares.
“It was fine. He kind of realised something was up when he saw the colour wash out of me. What’s his story, anyway? He was hardly Mister Sociable.”
“London’s not doing anything for your colour, young lady.”
She ignored my question and a rough thumb brushed my cheekbone. I squirmed, feeling eight years old rather than the thirty that I actually was.
“You’ve not turned out bad, kid.”
I forced a smile, noticing the new lines on her face. “I should go and unpack before mum and Kim get back. I’m sure they’ll find a million and one things for me to do when they realise I’m here.”
Footsteps sounded at the back door. Familiar ones, ones I would recognise anywhere at any time.
“Helen!” A male voice yelled through the door. “I need to know what you want me to make for tomorrow.”
“You could have just called, Gerry! You can use a telephone, can’t you? Or are you still on Morse?” Nan shouted back. “Anya,” she kept her voice low. “You scrat into your room, otherwise he’ll have you talking for an hour. You know how he is!”
I nodded, knowing full well what Gerald was like. I picked up the bag she had dropped beside her and made her way out of the kitchen, through to the guest sitting rooms and towards the front door.
“Is that Anya’s car out there?” I heard Gerry say as I’d just left the room.
Pausing because I didn’t want to go back to the annex yet, not quite ready to see Gabe and see the questions in his eyes, I moved up the wide staircase instead, the original banister still intact and polished to a shine, memories of sliding down it still clear in my mind, my father’s furious words embellished in the grain. The stairs went up four floors before coming to a small landing, and then a door that I had to unlock to get through. On the other side of the door the carpet was plainer than that on the other floors and the corners were without adornment. It was simpler than anywhere else in the house and hadn’t changed much other than to be now stripped and ready to renovate, increasing the space for paying guests. This was the floor where most of the family had once had their own rooms, the area of the guesthouse that had been reserved from the beginning for the owners. I went to the room that had once been my own. My brother’s room – Michael – was next door and had been left as vacant as mine for the past few months. The rooms were situated off a long corridor; instead of white paint the doors had been sanded down to the natural wood and polished. I remembered my father having the task of restoring them to the original design one winter, out of the holiday season. I had been a sullen teenager and had protested about having a room with no door for three days. Michael had persistently annoyed me by running into my room whenever our parents had their backs turned, and then I had gotten into trouble for hitting him. We hadn’t changed much.
I opened the door, the room now empty, wallpaper stripped. I’d had a view of the sea, something me and Kim had fought hard over. Kim’s room was bigger, but looked onto the track that led up to the guesthouse. My view was of the endless blue sea, looking over the cliff and the steep drop down to the slim beach and then into the water. In the early morning, with the curtains open, I could see the lights of the fishing boats as they trawled their way back from the depths with their haul. Now, with the light of day, I could see the boats bobbing on the water near the small marina, the tip of the wooden jetty visible to my left. I gazed out of the window, breathing in the fresh sea air, and let the atmosphere of being home seep back into me, some of the past few months of pain floating away like the clouds. The sun was lowering in the sky, its yellow hues being cast through the clouds on the horizon, like someone had spilt daffodils over the sky. Recent events started to fade for a moment, the mysteries of the sea overtaking everything, like they had ever since I had been big enough to sit on the bed and look out of the window. The only person to invade my thoughts for those precious quiet few minutes was Gabe with his tattoos and the expression that contained a sadness that mirrored my own.
Gabe
“Another?” Tim asked me, standing at the bar and pointing to my empty pint pot.
It was still early. Hollywood hour had come and gone; I’d made the most of the light and taken a few photographs while the sun was at the angle where everything looked good, and now it was starting to dip into the horizon. The sky was painted with colour, another fine island day promised tomorrow.
“One more. Then I’m heading home.”
Home. It was a word that felt foreign still. I didn’t get how the fuck I’d ended up on the island, Ynys Môn to give it its Welsh name, working as help for the crews of fishermen that went out, and a handyman to the locals. Yet, this was home. Wherever I’d lived before I couldn’t return to. I’d been exiled from my history.
I’d exiled myself.
“You out on the boats tomorrow?” Tim had perched on a stool that shouldn’t have been able to take his weight.
“First thing.” First thing was early. Before sunrise. The sea would be a whirling black along the Menai Strait, Snowdonia a shadow on the horizon, its mountain range still tipped with snow. I hated mornings. Before I moved to the island I’d deliberately scheduled my days to start after ten o’clock because any earlier meant I was a cranky fucker.
But that wasn’t my life any more.
Heavy feet and a loud sigh told me that Gerry had entered the bar, a pub called the Ship Inn. It was filled with memorabilia from the sea, and the locals and people who summered here. Day trippers and holiday makers tended to head for The View, the trendier, bigger, modern bar and restaurant that was higher up and had a kids’ area. It suited everyone.
“Evening, gentlemen.” Gerry’s accent was broad northern, lacking the local Welsh lilt. He was an interesting man, delivering local food produce. He was also the island’s biggest gossip. “Quiet in here tonight.”
It was. The Ship was generally busy, even on a Tuesday, but tonight there were only a dozen and a half people in there.
“Not surprised though. Anya’s back home, so everyone’ll have gone up to the guesthouse to say hello.” Gerry settled down on another bar stool and tapped the pump with the bitter in it. Not that he needed to – he ordered the same thing every night, probably for about forty years.
Anya had been my fourth or fifth fuck up of the day. She’d startled me; I hadn’t expected to see a pretty woman with thick dark hair appear while I was butchering a tree. I’d heard her name; she was the prodigal grandchild, spoken about with some sort of pissing reverence even though she hadn’t bothered to turn up to see her dying aunt or get there in time for her funeral. I had no time for princesses. Never had.
“How’s she doing? She should’ve come home sooner, then we could’ve looked after her.” Tim’s tone was sympathetic.
I smothered my scorn. I was new here. I’d still be new here in twenty years, if I stayed that long, and saying anything negative about the darling of Moelfre was not going to win me any fans. But I’d spent time with Marcy, and Marcy had spoken plenty about Anya, about how she was a good girl. But Anya had never visited. Never made that effort.
“I’m not sure.” Gerry watched his pint being poured with heavy scrutiny. “I only saw her briefly. She’s lost weight. Looks pale.”
“Helen’ll feed her up. The sea air and being with her family and at home
will help.”
Tim passed me my pint.
I looked from one man to the other. “Isn’t she just home for the school holidays? I know teachers have it hard, but I would’ve thought that she’d have been happier staying wherever it is she lives.” I had no warm and fuzzy feelings towards her. What had happened that night and the resulting recovery had significantly lowered my tolerance to anyone who took what they had for granted, such as family and friends.
Gerry eyed me, then shook his head. “I forget you wouldn’t know. It happened just before you came here.”
“What happened?” I braced myself for feeling like a complete dick for the millionth time that day.
“One of the pupils she had in her class was killed by his father. The father killed the kid’s mum and his sister too. You might’ve heard it on the news.” Gerry took the pint. “That’ll need topping up, Gethin.” He passed the pint back, the foamy head too large for his liking.
I hadn’t heard it on the news. It had only been in recent weeks I’d finally started to remember that I lived in a world that was more than just me. I could run again, lift the same weights I’d been able to before the accident and moved like I remembered. But I wasn’t the person I remembered. “I didn’t hear about it. What happened?”
“It was parents’ evening at the school where Anya works. She’d met with the boy’s parents. They’d come together even though they were divorced. She got a phone call in the early hours from the head to tell her that the father had gone home with them that night and at some point had killed his kids and their mother. I think it was with a knife.” Gerry looked at his drink as he spoke, clearly finding it difficult to consider the details.
“An axe.” Tim stood up off his stool. “It were an axe. Then he killed himself with an overdose. Bastard.” He shook his head.
“An’s found it hard. As you would. I don’t know too many details but she’s finally taking advice to have some time away and get her head sorted. Coming home.” He looked at me. “She’s a good lass. No one deserves to go through any of that. Least of all her.”
I looked at the floor. Her reaction when she’d seen me today, while I was holding an axe, now made sense. But she hadn’t fled or fucked off instantly; she’d tried to be polite and I had been a tosser. Standard.
“Why didn’t she come to see Marcy before she died?” I didn’t get that. It wasn’t because I was a jerk, although to be fucking honest, I was. I didn’t always get people. My brain wasn’t wired that way. And I didn’t get why she hadn’t been home to see the old lady who clearly adored her.
“You’d need to ask her family. I don’t like to say.” Gerry looked me directly in the eye, making me focus on him. Not gossiping for once.
Making me goddamn uncomfortable.
“Hang on.” Tim knocked back most of his pint. “He doesn’t know Anya. You know Marcy was upset that Anya didn’t come home…”
“She never complained.” Marcy didn’t say a word about Anya not coming home. They spoke on the phone, and she mentioned their conversations about the books they’d discussed, or the audio books that Marcy listened to when she could no longer read. “I think she’d have liked to have seen Anya but she never said so.” I shrugged, unsure about hearing any more.
Tim’s expression altered. His eyes were darker. “Anya was advised not to come back. She saw someone to help her after it all happened, and they thought that having to deal with more grief would send her under.”
I shrugged and stood up. “Not really my business. I’ll stay out of her way. She clearly has a lot to deal with.”
The lines on Tim’s head deepened. “Look, son, you live here. We’re a small island. You get to know people’s business and rather you hear all about it from Wendy-in-the-shop or old Bill, you’re better off hearing half a true tale from us. She’s a good girl is An. It’ll be good for her to have people her own age around the island apart from her sister.”
If it had been two years ago, I would’ve suspected I was being set up. But the man that I was didn’t inhabit this body any more. I walked away, feeling my back stiffen having been sitting too long, chopping wood – too much wood – had taken its toll on me. My physio had warned me, but as usual I didn’t listen. “I’ll see you tomorrow. And don’t worry, I won’t give Anya a hard time. It’s not for me to judge.”
I heard their silence as I left, the light from the sun now shrouded by the early evening. It looked like a sea fret was on its way in, the clouds holding a promise. I couldn’t read the weather yet; I hadn’t lived here long enough, but there was something different in the air tonight.
The beach was empty except for a few teenagers who had escaped away from the holiday home parks to gather on the sands where their parents couldn’t see them. They were the kids whose exams had already finished and had nothing to do apart from holiday on the island and wait for the new term to start. Weeks of nothing would be panned out in front of them, no cares or fears. Just summer and an endless blue sea.
I yanked off my trainers and dug my feet into the damp sand, the tide on its way out. Being here was all the therapy I needed at the moment. After the crash, they’d advised seeing someone to talk through what had happened. Going along with it was easy; feeling it was not. I knew what words to say, what they wanted to hear, but when I continually refused to get into a car, or a van, or even on a bus, they’d started to give up, saying I wasn’t ready and you couldn’t force it.
The sea was different. Being on a boat every morning when the world was still silent eased the rawness I still embraced.
Loss.
I got loss. It was what I painted every day when I headed back to the half ruined house I’d bought for a steal, with its huge barn where I could sleep and apply colour to canvas, capturing the people and places of the island.
Cold water gripped my feet, the hem of my jeans getting soaked. A dog ran past, spraying droplets, a too-big stick in its mouth. Kids laughed and a fire crackled.
I bent down and picked up a shell, perfect and unchipped. Underneath it was smooth and damp, recently gifted by the sea. Collecting shells was something young children did and not grown men, but I didn’t give a shit about what people thought I should do. This shell would form part of a painting, mixed media, somewhere else I could lose myself.
As I stood up I saw a female figure, up to her knees in the sea. Long hair was being tossed by the growing breeze, the last rays of light casting her as a dark silhouette. I pulled out my phone and took a photo, the hairs on the back of my neck standing to attention as my mind saw the colours and textures on the canvas, heavy acrylic paint pooling ochres and old golds, rusts and bronzes.
And her.
Her light pouring through the shadow.
I took a second photo, and a third, hoping to fuck the light was good enough now to make the picture permanent.
Then she turned, aware of my eyes watching her and she froze, paralysed.
I saw her then. Her face recognisable even in the dimming light, even though I’d only seen her once before.
Anya.
The teenagers’ laughter morphed into the sounds of the sea, the late cries of the gulls echoing up to the skies and beyond. It was all background noise. She took up every wavelength I was tuned into.
Her lips parted, as if she was about to speak. I waited, wondering what she needed to say, to ask. To yell or curse or scream.
She said nothing. Instead the waves splashed as she turned and walked away, towards the steps that led from the beach to the top of the cliff where the guesthouse was, now bright white against a darkening sky.
I watched her go, the waves hitting my legs, soaking the denim. My eyes didn’t leave her until she’d climbed the steps, disappearing like she was never really there.
I held the shell as I walked back along the beach, climbing over the dark rocky outcrop over to the next small beach. The sand turned into soil as I left the sea behind me, walking through the scattered trees and shrubs to the house th
at I knew how to fix, but couldn’t. Not right now. How could something so insanely broken fix anything?
The barn was dark, a quiet rustle suggesting that some other fucker was living in my space. I left it be, mouse or rat or hedgehog. Instead I switched on the dim lamp and took out my phone, flicking through the photos of Anya.
She wasn’t what I thought. But I wasn’t sure what I thought when I’d first seen her staring at me. Two years ago, I was used to that reaction from women. I worked out, ran, had a profession that was considered catnip and looked a lot tidier than I did now.
And was rarely splattered in paint.
My girlfriend didn’t model, but could have. Instead she worked in finance. My family was happy, settled. Proud. And then I ended up on my back in hospital, the subject of several operations, none which I wanted and with no desire to live. Because I’d survived.
I pulled off my jeans, remembering they were still wet and yanked off my T-shirt. There were a pair of grey sweats flung over the back of a chair which I pulled on, thin ones that were already splattered with paint. The lights flickered on, one button giving me the brightness I needed in the barn to be able to put colour on canvas.
Usually, I’d stick on some music, but tonight I didn’t need noise. I had enough in my head. I mixed my palette and pulled out an oversized canvas, adjusting one of the easels.
Usually, I’d use pencil to outline, apply some degree of control to what I was creating, but right now, I didn’t want that. Brush dipped into ochre and then smeared across the white, mimicking sunshine, mimicking the dying day. Then rust and amber and then her. A black shadow against the sky from which poured out the light.
I lost myself in the place where I knew I was hiding. The colours, the sounds of brush on canvas. It became my peace. By the time I fell onto the unmade mattress, a slice of my soul had returned and my breath came easier.
My eyes closed to a slideshow of images I’d collected throughout the day. The sea and the wood, the axe on the floor and in my hand. Her frightened eyes and the hunger I’d seen or hoped I’d seen. The sand and shell and her against the sky.
