by Rona Halsall
He swallowed his doubts. He was thinking about his children’s future, that’s what. Their quality of life. He’d been blessed with a close family as a child and he wanted that for his kids. This was the only way it was going to happen, and just as important, it would give him a bit of space to catch his breath, steady himself, and somehow find the energy to start again. He couldn’t do that here, not with the house and neighbourhood so ingrained with reminders of Anna and his loss, sending him deeper into his trough of despair.
‘Okay, ready to roll.’ He turned the ignition and looked at his children. ‘Who wants to go on an adventure?’
‘Me,’ Tessa said, although he could see the apprehension in her eyes. His heart melted for her and the brave face she had learnt to put on things since her mother’s death. At almost nine years old, she’d already taken on the role of looking after her little brother when Luke was struggling.
‘And me,’ Callum said, his seven-year-old face covered with chocolate.
‘Bye-bye, house,’ Luke said, giving it one last look.
‘Bye-bye, house,’ Callum echoed.
‘Bye, Mummy,’ Tessa mumbled, her bottom lip quivering.
‘Mum’s coming with us,’ Luke said, trying to make his voice bright. ‘She’s always with us. Wherever we go, she’s watching us.’
‘But she’s buried over there in the graveyard,’ Tessa said, pointing across the road to the little church where the funeral had been held, just a small gathering of close friends, given that Anna’s parents were both dead and her Irish grandparents, who she’d lived with during her teenage years, were now too infirm to travel. ‘She’s going to miss us when we go.’ Tessa gave a little sob, her face crumpling. ‘I don’t want to leave Mummy all alone.’
Luke had to bite his lip to stop himself from crumpling too. He turned to her and put his hand on her knee, gave it a gentle rub. ‘But Mummy’s spirit is no longer in her body, sweetie. Remember? We talked about this, didn’t we?’ He tapped his chest. ‘Her spirit is in our hearts. Always.’ There was a quiver in his voice. ‘She’ll always be there in our hearts.’ He tried a smile, but knew that he wasn’t fooling his daughter. She’d caught him sobbing on several occasions, creeping up with cat-like stealth, her little arms reaching round his neck and holding him tight. ‘Wherever we go, she comes with us. You really don’t have to worry about leaving her behind.’
‘How can she be in all our hearts when there’s only one of her and three of us?’
Tessa’s logic was a difficult thing to deal with at the best of times and Luke sighed, closing his eyes for a moment while he gathered his thoughts. How hard it had been to explain death to the children. Especially when it had been so sudden, an aneurysm while Anna was doing the weekly shop in Tesco. More or less instant, the doctor had said, no suffering, which was the only thing about the whole incident that gave Luke any measure of comfort.
When he opened his eyes, both his children were gazing at him, waiting for an answer that would make sense to them, that would help to iron out this emotional bump; a bump that would catch them out whichever road they found themselves on. ‘Because Mummy was very special,’ he said, emphasising his words with a nod, hoping that he could stop his voice from cracking. ‘And she had so much love in her heart that it’s more than enough for all three of us. That’s how.’
He handed his children a bag of sweets each, turned back to the steering wheel, and took a deep breath before he rolled out of the drive for the last time, not daring to look back in case his fragile resolve decided to break.
After Anna’s death, Luke had soon discovered that grief was an all-absorbing emotion, and as hard as it was to manage his own feelings, he had to support his children through the experience as well. Not to mention holding down a job and organising everything that had to be done to run a household. Initially, life was a blur of activities that had to be done, something he just had to get through, day by difficult day; time, a concept that blurred into a meaningless continuum of tasks.
Months went by before he recognised that he was failing, letting standards slip to a point where the headmistress had pulled him aside at school and asked if there was anything they could do. Could she perhaps ask social services to help? Or was there a family member who could take the children for a little while? He saw it then. Tessa’s tangled hair, full of knotted clumps that he couldn’t seem to comb out. Her tights with holes in the knees, shoes that were obviously too small. Callum’s jumper with baked bean stains and egg down the front, his clothes crumpled and smelly.
Luke had looked at the headmistress and nodded, forced a smile that he didn’t feel and made a decision that he understood was inevitable, however much he hadn’t wanted to see it. ‘Thanks for your concern. It’s good to know that you’re looking out for us. But you don’t need to worry. We’ll be moving back to Wales shortly. My family are there.’
He’d seen the relief in her eyes and knew it was the right thing to do. He was letting Anna down and that was the very last thing he wanted. It was time to swallow his pride and mend the bridges that he’d broken with his parents all those years ago when, at eighteen, he’d chosen to join the armed forces.
His parents were staunch pacifists and they were furious and heartbroken at his choice of career, but Luke had believed the adverts. He was young and restless, wanted to see the world and get trained for a profession at the same time. To him, it made so much sense. And it wasn’t like he’d chosen to actually kill people, he wasn’t front line. He’d chosen to be an engineer and learnt how to look after helicopters, a profession he knew would keep him on the ground, in a base and away from danger. Which it had. And after five years, when he’d decided to bail out of the forces, his training had allowed him to get a good job in Aberdeen, looking after the helicopters that flew crew and supplies to the oil rigs.
There was no doubting that his decision had given him a good life and provided opportunities that just wouldn’t have been there for him in rural Snowdonia. It had also led him to Anna, who he’d met in Cyprus, where she was a rep with a travel company. Yes, he had a lot to thank the armed forces for and he had no regrets, even though it had driven a wedge between himself and his family. It had been worth it to have those eleven years with Anna.
He blinked to clear his eyes, made himself concentrate on the road ahead of him.
Now he was going back to live on the family farm. It’ll be fine, he reassured himself, clasping the steering wheel a little tighter. Absolutely fine.
Luke hadn’t rung ahead, just in case he lost his nerve and ended up turning round before he got to the farm. So his mum wasn’t technically expecting him. But she’d been fine on the phone a few weeks ago, when he’d first called, like they’d only spoken the other day instead of fifteen years ago.
‘Luke! Luke, it’s you, isn’t it? Oh my God. Luke.’ Her voice had been breathless, quivering with excitement and very different to the harsh tones she’d used when he’d told his parents of his decision to join the forces. ‘I didn’t bring you into the world to have you go off and get killed in some stupid bloody war that’s about nothing more than sodding oil.’ That was the tone of voice that he’d heard in his head for all those years, along with his father’s final shouted words: ‘You know how we feel about war, about mindless killing. Joining the armed forces goes against all our beliefs. And you know that! You leave here, son, then you don’t come back.’ His face had been red with rage, his fists twitching as if he’d wanted to hit Luke. Their anger with his choice had kept him away, although he was in touch with his younger sister and a handful of local friends on Facebook, who kept him up to date with what was going on.
But his mother had sounded so happy to hear from him, he wondered why he hadn’t made the effort to get in touch sooner. He’d had Anna though and they were a tight little unit. To be honest, he hadn’t needed anyone else, content as he was within his world.
‘How are you, son?’ The concern in her voice had made his heart ache.
‘Oh, you know.’ He told himself not to sound so miserable, but they were the only words that would come out before his emotions choked him.
‘Sweetheart, we heard about Anna. Oh God, it must be so hard for you with the little ones. How are you coping now that…?’ She’d stopped herself and Luke swallowed, pinched the bridge of his nose.
I will not cry. I will not cry.
‘Yeah,’ he said, more of a sigh than a word.
‘Come home, love. Why don’t you come back? Just for a bit. Get yourself sorted.’ Her words rushed down the phone as though she’d been saving them up, ready. ‘There’s plenty of space here, you know that. Now that Granny and Grandad are gone, we’re in the bungalow, me and your dad. So, our room is going spare. And then there’s… well, we can jig things around, fit you all in. Ceri and Ted are still here, but there’s room for all of you. This is your home, Luke. It’ll always be your home and there will always be room for you. Always.’
Tears had spilt down his cheeks, his throat so tight he couldn’t speak. Silence filled his ears for a long moment, and when his mum finally spoke, her voice was as gentle as the hug he so desperately needed.
‘Whatever we all fell out about, Luke, well it’s water under the bridge now, love. Water under the bridge. Just come home, son.’
He ended the call without saying goodbye, and sat with his head in his hands, sobbing. He hadn’t even invited his family to the funeral and it suddenly seemed important, wrong. But at the time he’d just wanted the people who loved Anna to be there, not people who were there out of obligation. She didn’t deserve that and he hadn’t been in the right frame of mind to deal with any sort of conflict, his focus being to get through the day and be strong for the children. Nothing else had mattered. Now he wondered if it should have.
Anna had been a jewel, a shining bit of magic, able to light up every corner of his soul with just one smile, one gentle touch. Soulmates. That’s what they’d been. Bloody soulmates. And without her, he felt so vulnerable, like all his skin had been peeled off, exposing organs and muscles that ached and pinched with every breath. There were still times, eight months after her death, when he wondered what it would be like to just swallow all the paracetamol and go to sleep.
He swiped the back of his hand over his eyes. Stop it! You can’t think like that. He glanced in the rear-view mirror, glad to see that both the kids were fast asleep. A friend at school had committed suicide and he knew what it felt like to be abandoned in that way. He’d like to believe that he’d never do that to his children, but there were times when he’d frightened himself. Times when it had been close.
Coming back home was the only way he was going to make things work. He had to accept that he needed support, a little bit of nurturing to get him through this and help them all to move on. His jaw tightened as he thought about the family he’d left behind in Wales. It would be good to see his sister, Ceri. She was only fourteen months younger than him and they’d been close as children, although they’d drifted apart a bit as teenagers. His cousin, Ted, well, that was a different matter, the mere thought of his name bunching the muscles in Luke’s shoulders.
It’s only for a little while, he told himself. Not forever. And fifteen years is a long time. People change. Mature.
Thirteen
Luke drove with a mind full of memories, the good times he’d had as a child, the freedom to roam. In many ways it had been the perfect childhood. He would be apologetic, he told himself. He would grovel to his father, be nice to Ted. He would do whatever it took to get the support of his family and give his kids the sort of childhood he’d enjoyed. If he could just get a good night’s sleep he might have a bit more patience and make time to play with them, rather than let them spend all their time in front of their tablets, which had become a handy babysitter while he nursed a glass of whiskey and stared into space, numb all the way through.
It’s not good enough.
He heard her voice sometimes, telling him off. Anna was good at that. Her a mere slip of a thing and him at least a foot taller. She was doing it now, urging him on when he wanted to turn back, not sure if he had the mental energy for the reunion, however it might go down.
An image of his mother came into his mind, tall and blonde with inquisitive blue eyes, and he wondered how she was doing, if her MS had progressed any further. Before he’d left, she’d been having a hard time with mood swings and fatigue and some days she just took to her bed. At the time, the doctors had given her medication which had seemed to smooth things out for her, and he hoped it was still working. His overriding memories of his mother were of an active woman, always out in the fields or the polytunnel with her horticultural ventures. Experimenting with new crops to grow. She was the backbone of the farm, the organiser, the business mind. She was the cog that made the wheel turn and if she wasn’t well, he wasn’t sure how it would all function.
I can help now, he thought. Time to give something back.
He turned off the main road and onto the single-track lane that led up the valley to their farm, which stood right at the end, like a full stop at the end of a sentence. His pulse rate started to quicken, his palms slick on the steering wheel. How would they take to him just turning up like this? Whatever his mother had said, it was his father’s words that took prominence in his mind.
‘If you leave here, then you don’t come back!’ His dad had banged the table with his fist to emphasis the finality of his words and the anger in his eyes told Luke that he’d meant it. A lot more was said, his father becoming ever more clear that Luke’s decision was final. It was either the forces or the family. He couldn’t have both.
At the time, the argument had spurred Luke on rather than made him reconsider, because, by the time he’d told his parents about his plans, he’d secretly been through the selection process and had been offered a place. Two weeks after the argument, he’d left home and he hadn’t been in touch with them since. Although he’d thought about them often, and he messaged Ceri every now and again, he’d never pushed himself to make the phone call and get back in touch and the longer he left it, the harder it became to make that first move. He thought he didn’t need his family once he had his own. He shook his head as he pondered on this now, marvelled at his arrogance, his naivety.
Stupid, pig-headed bastard, that’s what you are.
He hoped the presence of the children would keep things calm, civil at the very least, because his father was a big man with a big temper and was pretty scary when he was in full flow.
The road wound steadily upwards, round tight bends, past familiar driveways leading to familiar farms and houses. Mountains rose steeply on either side, the lower wooded slopes of the Nantlle Ridge on his left, the tops of the mountains forming a jagged edge on the skyline. To the right was the huge, bare hump of Hebog, the highest mountain in the valley. The air smelt different here, earthy and fresh, as it wafted through his open window, touching a place in his heart that had been tender ever since he’d left.
He turned the last corner and could see the house, a large, stone-built monolith standing tall in the face of the elements, extended over the years, so now it looked like two houses joined together, mirror images of each other, with two roofs and four chimneys. A broad expanse of flat fields surrounded the property, edged by a stream to the left, before the mountains rose steeply on three sides. To the right of the house was a long line of stone outbuildings; some used for stables, others for storage. In front of these was a yard, where a car, a pickup truck, a tractor and a range of agricultural machinery were parked. Behind the house, the edge of the large, corrugated-metal barn could be seen poking out.
He felt like he’d travelled back in time and remembered how, as a child, he’d loved to hear the story of how his world came into being.
‘Once upon a time,’ his father would say, grinning at his mother, ‘a lonely farmer was out tending his sheep when he met a beautiful young scientist who’d gone and got herself lost. She’d bee
n walking on the Nantlle Ridge and had taken a wrong turning in the mist.’ He’d always shake his head at this point and widen his eyes, as though getting lost was the most stupid thing anyone could do. ‘She was soaked through, tired and hungry, so the farmer took her to his home, which he shared with his grandparents. She borrowed some warm clothes and stayed for something to eat, enchanting him with tales of Cornwall, where she grew up.’
‘You fell in love,’ Luke would pipe up at this point, nodding sagely as if he knew what it meant.
‘We did indeed.’
‘And then Grandad had an accident.’
His father would nod. ‘A runaway tractor broke poor Grandad’s legs and he and Granny decided that it was time to retire.’
‘So you built them a bungalow.’
‘Who built the bungalow?’
‘You and mummy and Uncle Robin and Auntie Bea.’
‘That’s right. The four musketeers we were in those days. All for one and one for all. Do you know what that means?’
‘You all help each other. Like you do now.’
‘That’s right. Well, I couldn’t run the farm on my own and Mum was still a student, so she had no money. We were poor as poor could be.’
‘So you all lived together.’
‘We did.’
‘Because it’s good to share.’
‘Yes it is.’ His father would chuck him under the chin. ‘That’s right, son. We all need to share and to help each other.’
Luke gave a wry smile and hoped that his father remembered those words now.
Looking back, he could honestly say that Phil had been a great dad. Not just Phil, but all of them. You couldn’t wish for a better set of parents and with four adults sharing the job, there was always one of them with the energy to be patient.
The family dynamics had changed when his aunt and uncle went away for a weekend to celebrate their tenth wedding anniversary and never came back, killed in a pile-up on the M6, leaving six-year-old Ted orphaned. But he was absorbed into the family, Luke’s parents smothering him with love and attention to make up for his loss, and he became more like an annoying younger brother than a cousin.
