The Last Piece of My Heart

by Paige Toon

  He shoves his hand deep into the pocket of his shorts and pulls out a set of keys.

  ‘I should’ve given these to you earlier.’ He drops them into my palm. ‘You can come and go as you please. Let me talk you through the alarm. I don’t usually bother setting it, but I should.’

  As he goes through the instructions for the keypad on the wall, my eyes drift over the wood dust coating the light-blond hairs on his lean forearms. He notices me noticing.

  ‘No time for a shower.’ He brushes his hands over his arms and I stiffen with embarrassment, trying to focus on the rest of his instructions.

  Chapter 9

  Right, that’s it. I’m going out for the day. It was all very nice tootling along the cycle path yesterday on my, yes, admittedly chunky hired bike, but today I fancy a drive. And it has nothing to do with the fact that my leg muscles are sore now as well as those of my stomach.

  Nicki’s ‘Research’ document mentioned a Morris-and-Kit scene set in the Lost Gardens of Heligan, so that’s where I’m headed.

  I stand on the grass outside the van’s wide side door and stare in at the mess. I’d better make up the bed and store the table at the very least. I should probably also wash up so I can put away the plates and cups. Plus, I need to turn the driver’s seat back around, so that will mean clearing the clothes from the footwell. Christ, I need to take off all the fairy lights as well.

  Urgh. What a faff.

  I start with the table and bed, then decide to tackle the footwell. But, when I go around to the driver’s side of the van, I see to my dismay that the back left wheel is completely flat.

  Ah. So that’s why I’ve been rolling off to one side for the last few nights.

  My shoulders slump. I’ve never changed a tyre in my life.

  I set off to the office in search of help and find Julia sitting behind the desk.

  ‘Hey,’ I say.

  ‘Hey, Bridget!’ she replies, far more chirpily.

  ‘I don’t suppose you or Justin knows how to change a tyre, do you?’

  Her face falls. ‘Have you got a flattie?’

  ‘Yeah.’ I roll my eyes.

  ‘I’m afraid not. We don’t have a car. We cycle everywhere. Neither of us can even drive, to be honest.’

  Bloody hippies.

  ‘Give Charlie a call,’ she suggests, perking up. ‘He’s very handy.’

  ‘Oh, no, I don’t want to bother him.’

  ‘Don’t be silly.’ She picks up the phone and dials a number.

  ‘No, I really don’t want to bother him,’ I reiterate, waving my hands at her in a panic.

  ‘Hi, Charlie?’ Julia says into the receiver, blatantly ignoring me, even as I continue to wave my hands wildly at her. ‘It’s Julia.’ Pause. ‘Hello! Listen, I’ve got Bridget here and she’s got a flat tyre on her campervan.’ Pause. ‘You’re a star. Thanks, darling.’

  She hangs up. I stare at her, mortified.

  ‘He’s coming right over.’

  ‘You didn’t have to do that.’ It’s a struggle to contain my frustration.

  ‘It’s no problem,’ she replies with a sunny smile.

  I get as far as showering and washing up my dirty dishes when Charlie pulls up at my pitch in a silver Mitsubishi pickup truck.

  ‘Sorry about this,’ I say as he climbs out of the vehicle.

  ‘It’s no bother,’ he replies, getting a tool bag and a jack out of the back before seeing to April. She’s sitting in her car seat, eating another one of those gooey round things. I think they’re rice cakes.

  He frees her from her harness and puts her down on the grass, brushing sticky white globules of puffed rice off her yellow cotton dress. He’s wearing washed-out grey cargo shorts and a white T-shirt. April holds her arms up to him, so he stands her on her feet and she gamely snatches his hand.

  ‘No, Daddy’s got to stay here,’ he says firmly as she tries to lead him away. He scoops her up and carries her over to my camping chair, propping her beside it so she has something to lean against. She clutches the armrest and bends forward, clamping her mouth over the green material. She’s like a little puppy. She releases her mouth and grins up at me. I giggle at her, despite the fact that she’s just slobbered all over my chair.

  ‘Can you keep an eye on her?’ Charlie asks over his shoulder as he heads to the other side of the van.

  April holds her hand up to me and lets out a cry, her brow knitting together. I take her hand and she sets off, toddling unsteadily across the grass.

  ‘Where are you going?’ I ask.

  ‘Urghn,’ she replies, leading me to a flowerbed. She reaches down and cheerfully beheads a red geranium.

  ‘Ooh, no, I don’t think we should do that,’ I say light-heartedly. ‘Shall we go and see what Daddy’s doing?’

  She looks up at me and nods – a big purposeful nod. There’s something quite cute about her, I guess.

  As babies go.

  ‘Where’s Daddy?’ I ask as she leads the way. ‘Can you hear him?’

  We emerge around the side of Hermie to find Charlie jacking up the back right-hand side of the van. He’s not wearing a bandana today and his dark-blond hair is falling into his eyes as he winds the handle on the jack. Not even a nun would be blind to the way his muscles are rippling in that T-shirt. He straightens up and shoves his hair off his forehead.

  ‘She’ll give you a backache if you let her do that for too long,’ he warns, nodding at his daughter, who’s still holding my hand.

  ‘I don’t mind,’ I reply.

  ‘Is the spare tyre in the boot?’

  ‘Yeah.’

  He follows slowly while I walk at April’s pace round to the back of the van. When I open the rear door, half of my wardrobe falls out.

  ‘Whoops, there go my clothes.’

  Charlie swings April out of the way, breaking our hand contact. ‘Give me a sec,’ I say, wiping my now-sticky hands on my jeans and gathering up a big armful. I walk around to Hermie’s side door to find it closed.

  ‘Er, Charlie?’ I call out apologetically. ‘Can you open the door for me?’ I look back to see that I’ve dropped three pairs of knickers. At least they’re clean.

  He appears around the back of the van, his eyes darting to my underwear and his lips twitching as he opens the side door.

  I step forward and dump everything in the living space – on top of everything else.

  ‘Whoa!’ he exclaims, surveying the mess. ‘How do you live like this?’

  ‘You can talk,’ I joke impertinently. ‘What about the state of your kitchen every morning?’

  He looks surprised, and I’m not sure that he realises I’m teasing. ‘I’m doing the best that I can,’ he says.

  ‘I can’t believe you’re pulling the widower card on me.’

  He freezes.

  ‘Did I just say that out loud?’ I ask with alarm.

  He lets out an incredulous laugh, his eyebrows jumping practically into his hairline. ‘Yes, you really did.’

  ‘Oh, shit! Sorry. Please don’t fire me,’ I blurt.

  He shakes his head and then laughs again, but this time it’s a full-bodied belly laugh. My insides warm, despite the internal freak-out that’s also going on.

  ‘I don’t know how I’ve lived this long, saying the first thing that comes into my head,’ I mumble. ‘I’ll just get the rest of my clothes.’

  I continue to walk April around while Charlie changes the tyre. My back does begin to hurt from stooping, but luckily April gets bored and wants to explore my so-called living room. I gather all my clothes together for what feels like the fiftieth time and relocate them to the grass; and, while she coasts along the edge of the bench seat playing with the freshly washed plastic dishes, I stand just outside and begin separating clean clothes from dirty. I fold up the former and place them in a neat pile on the camping chair. I really should do some washing today. I fear the Lost Gardens of Heligan will have to wait until next weekend, at the rate I’m going.

>   ‘Do you want a cup of tea?’ I think to ask Charlie after a while.

  ‘That’d be great. I’m pretty much done.’

  I enter the now relatively clear space and fire up the gas, unwittingly creating a health and safety risk. This is exhausting, I think as I return April to the great outdoors.

  ‘You’ve still got a bit of a lean going on,’ Charlie comments a little while later, peering into the van as he sips his tea.

  ‘Have I?’

  ‘Yeah, can’t you see? The back end is sloping down.’

  ‘That’s nothing compared to the poor bastards in those tents on the hill.’

  He smiles past me, looking at the field. ‘Nicki and I camped up there a couple of years ago when we were doing building works to the house. It was a wreck when we bought it.’

  ‘It looks great now,’ I say.

  ‘Thanks. We thought camping would be more fun than living in a shithole,’ he says with a smirk, adding with a glance my way, ‘It wasn’t.’ He nods at Hermie. ‘Is this your dad’s?’

  ‘How did you know?’ I ask with surprise.

  ‘The first time we met you mentioned he’d stayed at this campsite.’

  ‘Oh, that’s right. Yeah,’ I say. ‘He loves it. Hasn’t used it much since he broke up with his last girlfriend. They toured all around Europe together.’

  ‘When did your parents split up?’

  ‘They divorced when I was ten. It was amicable.’

  But not amicable enough for Dad to continue to want to spend his every holiday on a boat with his ex-wife. My aunt Wendy – Mum’s sister – took me after that. That arrangement lasted for a good few years until Mum screwed it all up by having an affair with a married cruise-ship captain. Wendy was so incensed that she refused to take me the following summer out of principle.

  Every cloud has its silver lining: that was the year I met Elliot.

  ‘So your mum worked on a cruise ship.’

  ‘She still does. That was how my parents met,’ I tell him. ‘Mum was a dancer and Dad was a bartender.’

  They fell in love after a whirlwind romance, but when Mum got pregnant with me, her contract was promptly terminated. Dad quit too. They cheerfully tied the knot and moved to north London, where Dad worked in a pub and Mum retrained as a beauty therapist in her sister’s salon.

  But, as time passed, Mum’s feet got itchy and no amount of Scholl foot spray was going to cure her.

  Dad supported her decision to return to work on a cruise liner, this time as a beauty therapist in the on-board spa.

  I was less pleased about it.

  I was only six years old when my mum became mostly absent from my life. The only time I’d see her would be when Dad and I visited her on a boat or she was between jobs, when she’d come home for long stints at a time. During these weeks – sometimes months – she’d become so bored that she was never very easy to be around.

  But, when she was working, she seemed happy.

  Every summer holiday, and most Easters and Christmases, Dad and I would visit whichever cruise liner she was currently contracted to.

  I grew used to her not being around much, and, eventually, so did Dad. He was the one who asked for a divorce.

  ‘She’s a cruise director now,’ I tell Charlie. ‘Worked her way up the ranks.’ From dancer to beauty therapist to hostess to assistant director to where she is today.

  ‘Sounds like a fun job,’ he says.

  ‘She likes it.’

  ‘Do you get to see her much?’

  ‘Not that much.’

  I survey my clothes. ‘Guess I’d better put this lot away.’

  He downs the rest of his tea and puts his empty cup on Hermie’s table, pausing and squinting at the inside of the van. ‘Don’t you have any levelling blocks?’

  ‘Oh, do you know what? I do,’ I say, remembering. ‘Dad told me about them. They’re in the boot.’

  ‘Let me give you a hand.’

  ‘Really?’ I follow him to the back of the van. ‘I’ve already taken up enough of your time.’

  ‘It’s okay. We didn’t have much else on. Are you going to take that back, by the way?’ He gently kicks the hired bike I’ve locked up to the pitch sign.

  ‘I feel a little uncomfortable about using Nicki’s bike,’ I admit cagily.

  ‘Don’t be stupid about it,’ he chides. ‘I’ll leave it for you in the hall tomorrow morning.’

  ‘Where will you be?’ I ask.

  ‘I’m taking April to my parents’ place. My mum’s going to look after her for a few hours so I can crack on with my job.’

  I open the boot and rummage around for a bit, before pulling out a dark-blue bag. ‘I think this is them.’

  ‘Looks like it,’ he says, taking the bag from me. ‘You driving?’

  ‘I just have to turn the seat around. Er, and clear the footwell. . .’

  Charlie gapes in disbelief when I open the driver’s door. ‘Are you seriously a travel writer? I would’ve thought you’d have packing lightly down to a T.’

  ‘This is me packing lightly,’ I tell him. ‘You should see me when I go abroad.’

  ‘How do you cope?’

  ‘I’m not usually in any rush. I’d rather wait at a conveyor belt for a bit than make do without my essentials.’ I scoop up my clothes. ‘Yeah, I know, I’ve got a lot of essentials.’ I head back around the van to my clothing pile.

  ‘You could do with a tent to put everything in,’ he calls after me.

  I sigh on my return. ‘Dad wanted me to bring one. I didn’t think I’d need it.’

  ‘I’ve got a tent you could borrow.’ He pauses for thought, adding, ‘Somewhere. . .’

  I grab my second and final armful. ‘I’ll be fine. I’ll just shove everything back in the boot.’

  ‘Doesn’t it get in the way when you have to put the bed down?’

  ‘Yeah, I have to move it all again. It’s a pain in the arse, to be honest,’ I call over my shoulder. ‘The ridiculous thing is I went shopping on Friday and almost bought more clothes.’

  ‘You’re a nutter,’ he says with a grin as I reappear.

  I shrug. ‘Best you know that early.’ I climb in the car and start up the ignition, closing the door and putting down the window. ‘What do I do?’

  He goes to the back of the car and lays down one of the levelling blocks. ‘Reverse backwards about twenty centimetres.’

  Well, that’s easier said that done. It takes several minutes of going backwards and forwards, moving a little to the left and a little to the right, before Charlie is satisfied that the van is on level ground.

  ‘Do I really have to do that every time I go out in this bloody thing?’ I ask.

  ‘If you want to sleep well at night,’ he replies.

  I’m starting to understand why Julia and Justin stick with cycling.

  Chapter 10

  I do sleep better that night – so much so that I’m going to be late if I don’t get a wriggle on. I wash my hair and leave it to dry naturally.

  I feel as if Charlie and I bonded a bit yesterday, and I’m actually quite looking forward to seeing him this morning. It’s only when I get to his place and there’s no answer that I remember he’s dropping April to his parents. Luckily, I have the keys, so I let myself in.

  There’s a purple bike in the hall. A pretty purple bicycle.

  He meant it, then.

  I dropped off the hired bike yesterday after Charlie left, figuring it wouldn’t be too much of a pain to rent another if he changed his mind.

  I run my hand over the bike’s frame and find that it’s shiny and dust-free. There’s even a helmet clipped to one of the handlebars.

  I sit on the bottom stair, staring at the bike. I don’t know why I suddenly feel so sad.

  Has Charlie still got everything that belonged to Nicki? Is her wardrobe still full of her clothes? Is the television cabinet still full of her DVDs? Are there chutneys in the fridge that he can’t bear to throw out because they�
�re hers, even though he hates the taste of them? Her office seems untouched since she died. How long does a person wait before they let go of the one they love?

  And Charlie clearly loved her very much, as she did him. No one can write about love so beautifully – so believably – without experiencing it themselves.

  Panic rises up within me as, not for the first time, I worry that Nicki’s publisher made a mistake in hiring me.

  How am I going to pull off this novel? How am I going to write about love the way Nicki did?

  The protagonist is a travel writer just like you, so you should be able to identify with her brilliantly, Sara said.

  But I need to connect to Nicki’s heroine, Kit, at a far deeper level, and I don’t know how I’m going to do it.

  I get up and sigh loudly, picking up my rucksack and heading into the kitchen. I pull out my speaker and iPod and look for a suitable song. It’s not long before I’m head-banging to Def Leppard’s ‘Pour Some Sugar On Me’.

  My hair will be dry in no time.

  I don’t hear Charlie come back because I’m in the office with my music turned up, so the first I know of his return is when I see him out in the back garden.

  I’m a little surprised – piqued, even – that he didn’t come to say hello after yesterday, but fair enough if he’s keen to crack on. I watch as he carries one of the sanded branches out from under the veranda and sets it across two workbenches before glancing up at the office window. I shrink back instinctively and then want to kick myself. Why didn’t I just wave? Obviously, I don’t want him to think that I’m spying, but it’s hardly a crime for me to notice he’s back.

  I stand up and open the window to try to cover up.

  ‘It’s a bit warm in here today,’ I say, pausing my music.

  The way he shades his eyes to look up at me makes me think he probably didn’t even see me before.

  ‘Hey, thanks very much for the bike,’ I say.

  ‘No worries,’ he replies.

  ‘How was the rest of your weekend?’ I ask.

  ‘Pretty quiet. Yours?’

  ‘Same.’

  He nods.

  ‘I’ll let you get on,’ I say eventually.

  ‘Thank you.’