Jenny x
23
Holly carried her bag and the helmets across to a tiny wooden jetty. It was nestled along one side of a small harbour surrounded by stone walls, and a faded fishing boat bobbed gently in the water below her feet, the blue and white paint cracking in the sunshine.
It was nearing five, and the shadows were starting to lengthen in the fading light.
After spending an awkward hour in one of the island’s estate agencies, with herself and Rupert doing their best to communicate everything they needed to about the house with their limited Greek vocabulary and the brief glossary in the back of the guidebook, Holly felt that they deserved a breather. Rupert had suggested he grab them both a coffee and the temptation to sit at the water’s edge in the town was too great – especially given the stunning view.
She picked absent-mindedly at a small scab on her knee, the skin underneath pink and fresh, quite unlike the rest of her. In just a week, she’d turned a deep brown colour, and while she knew the sun was unhealthy, she couldn’t help but luxuriate in the feel of it against her shoulders. She hadn’t burnt at all, despite being irresponsibly sparing with her application of sun cream. Her natural colouring was in stark contrast to both Rupert and Aidan, whose fair complexions didn’t stand a chance against the Greek summer sun.
Aidan. There he was again, strolling into her subconscious, boldly daring her to ignore him. She longed to give in and picture him: his freckled forearms, his lopsided smile, his broad chest beneath those tatty T-shirts … But she mustn’t. What was the point? As she’d told the estate agent just now, what she wanted was to sell the house and cut all ties to the island as soon as possible. Her mum may have spent years here – and her aunt too – but that didn’t mean she had to follow the same path. On the contrary, she had been trying to build a life for herself in London for years; why would she give that up now? Then again, if she was being completely honest with herself, she definitely had thought about moving over here. She loved this place, she knew that, and there had even been a few secret occasions when she’d imagined creating a life for herself here. A life with Aidan.
But that was before. Today, Aidan had made his feelings perfectly clear. Whatever he’d led her to believe, she now suspected that he must have made exactly the same promises to Clara as soon as she came running back. He probably hooked up with girls all year round on the island. She was nothing special, as she’d always believed. But maybe she really was something special to Rupert. Why the hell was she so fixated on Aidan when she had Rupert? Holly sighed as a flash of pain clenched at her heart. She knew why, of course – it was because Aidan was the only man she’d ever truly been herself with, the only man she’d ever really trusted – and that had meant everything to her.
She took a deep breath and stared down into the clear water. She knew what she must do. If she was ever going to stand a chance of making things work with Rupert, then he had to know the truth.
‘Coffee for the lady.’ Rupert was back, looking slightly sweaty and pink-cheeked, but very happy. Holly suspected it was more to do with the visit to the estate agent than the view of the mountains across the water.
He sat down next to her and smiled.
‘I’m going all pink,’ he said, using his chin to point at his bare shoulders. His T-shirt was riding up and Holly stared for a second at the wiry blond hair around his belly button. ‘Now you know why I’ve always preferred the slopes to the beach,’ he told her with a laugh.
The end of his nose was starting to peel, and Holly felt her resolve weakening.
‘You’re very quiet today,’ he said now, fixing her with one of his Rupert-Farlington-Clark-misses-nothing looks.
She nodded, biting her lip and covering her face with the Styrofoam cup.
While he wasn’t as broad and tall as Aidan, Rupert’s penchant for running, skiing and playing the occasional game of weekend rugby meant that he was in good shape. His fondness for a drink was to blame for the beginnings of a tiny paunch, but as Holly looked sideways at him now, she found that more endearing than anything else. Men that looked too perfect weren’t attractive, as far as she was concerned – she preferred a few flaws.
As if sensing her thoughts, Rupert reached for Holly and held her against him. He was very quiet suddenly and seemed almost nervous. She’d never seen him like this before – it wasn’t a version of Rupert that she recognised, which did little to ease the feelings of dread that were coursing through her.
‘I’ve got something I need to tell you,’ she began, immediately feeling him tense up next to her. Over his shoulder, she could see the distant shapes of two boys kicking a ball to one another on a patch of grass by the water and a child throwing pebbles into the waves.
‘Listen, Hols,’ he interrupted. ‘I’m sorry for turning up here unannounced. That was stupid of me. I just missed you so much and I thought … Well, I thought it would be romantic.’
‘It was!’ Holly pulled away from him and used her fingers to gently lift his chin. ‘It was so sweet of you – it really was. I’m the one who should be saying sorry.’
‘No,’ he squinted at her as the sunlight bounced off the surface of the water below their feet. ‘I ambushed you. I really am sorry if I’ve annoyed you.’
‘I’m sorry that I’ve been acting like a total cow,’ Holly said, pushing a few stray tendrils of hair off her cheeks. ‘The past week has been so weird. I feel … I feel different.’
‘You feel differently about me?’
‘No,’ she lied, biting her lip. ‘I mean me. I’ve found out things that have made me feel differently about myself, things about my past.’
‘But I thought you never knew your aunt?’ Rupert looked confused now, and Holly took a sip of her coffee before she continued.
‘I didn’t.’ She took a deep breath. ‘The thing is, I lied to you about my parents.’
He didn’t say anything to this, merely watched as she struggled to find the words to continue.
‘My mum didn’t die in a car crash. She died from choking on her own vomit after drinking an entire bottle of vodka. That was something she did most days, because she was an alcoholic.’
This was it. He was going to look at her in disgust and tell her he couldn’t be with someone like her, someone with a mother like the one she’d had.
‘You poor thing.’ Rupert took her in his arms again, his hand immediately coming up to stroke her hair. ‘When was this? When did it happen?’
‘When I was eighteen,’ she choked out. She couldn’t believe how sweet he was being. This wasn’t what she’d prepared herself for.
‘You were just a child, really.’ He stared at her in wonder. ‘What about your—’
‘Father?’
He nodded.
‘I have no idea who he is,’ she shrugged. ‘He could be alive still, but chances are he has no idea that I exist.’
She’d expected shock, a barrage of questions and demands about why she’d lied to him, but Rupert merely held her as tightly as he could. She felt a swell of emotion rise up in her chest. All this time she’d doubted his ability to deal with the truth of who she was, but she couldn’t have been more wrong about him.
‘I found her,’ she told him now. ‘My mum. I came home from college one day and she was dead in a chair. Just sitting there, like she always did, but this time she wasn’t there any more. I don’t even remember calling the police, but I must have.’
‘You poor little mouse,’ he said into her ear, his voice cracking a bit. ‘I can’t bear the thought of you going through it. I wish I’d been there for you.’
‘You’re here for me now,’ she smiled against his chest. There were fine hairs standing up on his arms and his sweaty fringe had dried into jagged points against his forehead. She thought about Aidan, how he’d simply sat next to her and listened as she’d told him the truth. Perhaps he thought her stronger than Rupert did, or perhaps he just didn’t care as much.
‘Why are you telling me
all this now?’ Rupert asked. There was a slight edge of suspicion to his voice, as if he was scared to hear her reply.
‘My mum used to live here on the island.’ She smiled. ‘I think she was probably very happy here too, because, well, how could you not be?’
‘Well, I dunno,’ Rupert grinned at her. ‘You know I’m more of a snowy mountains boy.’
‘Something happened,’ she continued. ‘Something that made my mum and my Aunt Sandra, the one who left me the house, not speak to each other any more. My aunt hinted at it in her letter and I’ve been trying to work out what it was.’
‘Do the locals not remember?’ Rupert was frowning now as he took it all in.
‘Oh, they remember my mum all right,’ she grimaced. ‘But either they don’t know what the fight was about, or they’re keeping it from me for some reason.’ She told him about the photo of her aunt and her mum with Socrates the policeman and Dennis, the man Sandra had apparently been married to, but carefully left out the story of how she’d met Alix up at Ocean View.
‘Well, there you go then,’ Rupert told her. ‘This Socrates man is the one you need to find. If he was with your mum back then, I bet he knows exactly what happened.’
‘You’re probably right,’ she agreed. ‘But apparently he’s left Zakynthos now. I don’t even know his last name.’
They sat in silence for a few minutes, listening to the waves lap gently against the wooden poles of the jetty. ‘You might hate me for saying this …’ Rupert took a deep breath. ‘But do you really need to know what happened? I mean, it all happened so many years ago – and knowing will probably only upset you even more. Isn’t it best to just, you know, leave the past in the past?’
Holly considered this for a moment. It was a very good point. Why was she so desperate to find out what had happened? Perhaps Rupert was right, and it was only bound to lead to more heartbreak. She’d really found herself beginning to forgive her mum over the past few days. Hell, she even had moments where she’d felt as if she might be able to love her again. Would finding out something terrible undo all the happiness she’d managed to stitch around herself?
‘You’re probably right,’ she agreed at last. ‘Maybe it is unwise to pull at that thread.’
‘Speaking of threads,’ Rupert took each side of her face in his hands. ‘What’s all this about you being some sort of secret sewing genius?’
She pulled a face at him.
‘Oi! Don’t make that face. I saw the sewing machine at the house and all the things you’ve been making. They’re really good, Hols. Why don’t you do that stuff in London?’
‘I just thought it was a bit lame,’ she mumbled, realising as she said it how misguided she had been for denying herself the indulgence all this time.
‘Listen.’ He waited for her to stop staring at her toes and look at him. ‘I’ve always known that you hold things back from me, Holly.’
He had?
‘I just assumed that over time you’d start to thaw a bit and begin to trust me. I’m not an ogre, you know.’
‘I know.’ Her voice had become very small.
‘God, I want you to be yourself and be happy – that’s what I do. I would never pretend to be someone that I wasn’t, not for anyone.’
She nodded, not trusting herself to speak.
‘If you want to sit around in your pants sewing all day long, then you should,’ he declared. ‘In fact, I’d very much like to come home to find you sitting there in just your pants.’
‘Cheeky!’ She gave him a half-hearted pinch.
‘I’m serious, Holly. I meant what I said to you last night. We spend pretty much every night together anyway. Why don’t we just make it official?’
‘You were drunk out of your skull when you said that,’ she protested. ‘You can’t really have meant that you wanted us to live together?’
‘Yes, I did.’ He looked at her and laughed. ‘Dear God, I’m not that scary a prospect, am I? I promise to try and put the toilet seat down and not leave wet towels on the bed.’
‘It’s not that.’ Holly shook her head. How could she tell him that the real reason she was reluctant was because she’d been doing all sorts of intimate and forbidden things with another man? That she’d thought barely anything of cheating on him and lying to him?
‘But how would we? Where?’ she stammered.
‘Well, you know my parents lent me a load of money to buy my place?’
Holly shook her head slowly.
‘Okay, well, they did. I’m a spoilt little rich boy, blah blah. But it means that you can come and live with me for free. I mean it, just do your sewing and take some time out until you feel better. I can look after us, after you. I want to look after you.’
Holly’s feelings of confusion, shock, love and guilt tangled up inside her belly like a big, knotted pile of fluffy wool and strips of Velcro. She was afraid to open her mouth in case Rupert heard the ripping sounds as it all came apart.
He looked so earnest and full of affection, so hopeful that she would say yes and let him look after her. And didn’t she deserve to be looked after a bit? She’d spent years looking after herself – ever since she was about ten years old and her mum gave up on her. She tried to picture it: leaving her job at Flash to start a business making clothes from the comfort of Rupert’s spacious flat while he was out at work all day; preparing dinner for when he came home each night and ironing his shirts. Wasn’t it the thing she’d wanted all along, that sort of stability? Hadn’t he just offered her exactly what she’d been secretly hoping he would since they met? It was a bit of a shock, sure, but what was the alternative?
Holly turned away from Rupert and stared across the bay, to where the mountains rose up like majestic warriors from the ocean. The sun was slowly making its way down the sky and they were edged in a warm golden light.
She allowed herself once again to picture herself and Aidan, side by side on the stony beach where Jenny and Sandra had hidden away in their own private little world. In her head it all looked so tantalising, but the reality was that Aidan wasn’t the man she’d thought he was. Hadn’t her mum made the same mistake? Picked the wrong man – or the wrong men – over and over again? Hadn’t Jenny Wright always picked adventure and excitement over stability and security?
Simon had been the closest thing to a stepdad that Holly ever had, but her mum had torn apart the patchwork squares of love and commitment that he had so painstakingly tried to stitch together in their lives. Jenny had made a lot of mistakes with men, and Holly didn’t want to do the same thing. If being here in Zakynthos had taught her anything, it was that there was such a thing as having too much of a good thing. She’d allowed herself to believe in the bubble she had floated around in over the past week, but it wasn’t real. Rupert was real. He was sitting here next to her now, holding her hand and asking her to live with him, to be there when he went to sleep every night and when he woke up every morning. What was Aidan offering her? Nothing.
As the first spots of coloured light started to glow from the harbour bars and the pale moon crept up from its resting place down behind the navy curtain of ocean, Holly let herself take Rupert’s hand in her own.
‘Okay then, you crazy, sweet man – let’s do it.’
24
The sun rose the next morning as it always did, wide and bright and unapologetically strong, but Holly felt as if she was looking at it through different eyes. She had woken early and slipped out from under the covers, leaving Rupert looking crumpled but content on the pillow. They’d had dinner on the beach in Laganas the night before, still in their casual clothes from the daytime, the warm evening breeze blowing tendrils of salt-mangled hair off their necks.
She stood now with her back to the house, staring out across the ocean below, and thought about her mother. Jenny Wright had been such a black spot in her mind for so many years, but this morning she was full of colour and ferocious vitality, refusing to stay hidden in the deep recesses of Holly’s min
d. Now that she’d been to so many of the places her mum had loved, gazed at the same stunning views, eaten off the same tables and scrunched her toes through the sand on the same beaches where Jenny had once been so happy, she felt as if she understood her better. But there was still a gaping hole there, a chasm of emptiness inside her, where the last few years’ worth of memories festered. What had happened to turn her bright, beautiful mother into a bitter and sick individual?
I should have let someone else take you in.
Even knowing that her mother’s addiction was a sickness didn’t stop the recollection of those words stinging Holly like the lash of a whip. Just thinking about it made her wince, all these years later. She had a real chance now to put her past behind her and embark on a future with Rupert, but yet here she was, lurking out here all alone having sneaked away from him.
She heard the sound of Aidan’s back door opening too late to move, so instead she remained rooted to the spot, stubbornly refusing to turn her head. Phelan, presumably let out to have a morning wee, seemed to sense that even he wasn’t welcome, and shuffled to an uneasy standstill just a few feet behind her. There was a palpable silence, and she knew that Aidan must be standing there. She could feel the force of his glare burning a smouldering hole into her back, but still she didn’t move. Aidan was just one complication too much for her at the moment.
Eventually, as the sun rose higher in the sky and the surface of the water started to sparkle like discarded Christmas tinsel, Holly heard the sound of his door closing gently behind him.
My Map of You Page 23
