I’m no closer to understanding what went on between Auntie Sylvia and Mr Wills, but I do understand that I’ve made yet another mistake.
A horrible one.
“Children, I’d like you to leave now, please,” says Miss Saunders, in as steady a voice as she can manage. “And Gloria, I think it’s best if I write to your mother this evening and ask her to come for you and Richard.”
My heart practically stops as I hear a plaintive cry from the bottom of the ladder below.
“Glory, Glory, Glory?”
Oh, no.
What have I done…?
Me and Auntie Sylvia didn’t talk yesterday evening.
We didn’t talk this morning.
So I was in no hurry to get back to the cottage after school today.
Instead I followed Lawrence, Jess and Archie as they cut through the churchyard and over the stile.
Together, me and my Outsider friends wandered across the common, half-heartedly throwing overripe damsons at each other and ducking so we didn’t get hit.
We climbed the fence and meandered through the strange field of sprouts, which, until I came to Thorntree, I hadn’t even known grew this way: like small, branchless trees, dotted with green nodules all over the stems.
Sitting on the fence that overlooked the back field, we watched as Harry drove the tractor and a giggling Lil rode casually on the back bumper.
I’d thought about coming here and talking to her, telling her how it had all gone wrong with Auntie Sylvia, maybe even asking her advice.
But then I saw in the distance Lil lean over and kiss Harry and reckoned my big sister wouldn’t be interested in what I had to say anyway.
And so me and Jess waved bye to the boys and walked down the lane that would bring us out on to the green, beside the cottage.
“So, do you definitely think your parents will come and collect you before the barn dance?” Jess asks me now, kicking stones along the way.
“I don’t know,” I reply. “I expect Mrs Saunders will tell me as soon as she hears back from them.”
Jess mutters something under her breath. I don’t ask her to repeat it because I think it might have been something incredibly rude about Auntie Sylvia.
“Lawrence was really quiet today, wasn’t he?” I say instead.
We’ve all been quite quiet and gloomy after what happened yesterday. While the whole class gossiped about the film that was shown at the weekend and gossiped even more about the fundraising dance this weekend coming, we three were mostly silent, as if we were in mourning.
But Lawrence seemed wrapped up in his own particular black cloud. He hadn’t asked his dad anything about Auntie Sylvia yet; didn’t want to in front of Harry and Lil and Sally, he said.
“He was quiet because he doesn’t want you to go,” Jess surprises me by saying. “He likes you too much.”
I feel my cheeks burn red. Could it be true? Was Lawrence upset today because of me leaving, as well as the secret he’d found out about his father?
Glancing up at Jess, I’m about to ask her more, but then I see she’s staring at the ground, a frown that might be disappointment on her face.
Maybe she’s not such a tomboy after all.
Maybe I was right about her liking Lawrence…
“Girls!”
Oh – I hadn’t noticed how close we’d come to the cottage. Auntie Sylvia must have seen us and flung the window open to call out to us.
“Can you come in here, please?”
Jess turns to leave.
“No – I meant both of you, please,” Auntie Sylvia says unexpectedly.
Shooting me a puzzled look, Jess follows me to the front door, which Auntie Sylvia has thrown open.
My heart thunders, and I can tell Jess is nervous too from the hesitant, birdlike way she’s walking.
Are we about to get another lecture? I can’t read Auntie Sylvia’s face – her mouth is that still, straight line that gives nothing away.
And then I see what she’s been doing. Tatters of fabric lie on the floor beside the sewing machine, and hanging from the back of the stair door are two beautiful dresses made of ivory-white parachute silk…
Both dresses have sashes at the waist; one is a soft, dusky mauve satin, and one is a leaf-green velvet.
Jess’s mouth hangs open.
“Glory, the one with the mauve sash is for you. It will go well with your colouring,” Auntie Sylvia says matter-of-factly, though I can’t help noticing she’s using my nickname again. “And Jess … I thought you might like the one with the green sash. I thought it would bring out the colour of your eyes.”
Jess stares at the dress, then stares at Auntie Sylvia.
“If you’ll accept my gift, of course,” Auntie Sylvia adds.
Jess still can’t trust herself to believe it. Can’t get over someone bothering to notice the colour of her eyes. But I can tell Auntie Sylvia has just sewn us a truce.
“The dress is for you, for the barn dance,” I explain to Jess.
She looks at me, tears brimming in her eyes. I don’t think Jess has ever had anything new in her entire life, and certainly nothing this beautiful.
“Oh, thank you, thank you, Miss Saunders!” she suddenly babbles, tears spilling down her cheeks.
Auntie Sylvia reaches in her pinny for a clean handkerchief and hurriedly passes it to Jess. Jess pats her eyes, gives her nose a loud honk, and goes over to the dress.
Her dress.
“Can I touch it?” she asks warily.
“Of course!” says Auntie Sylvia. “But be careful of pins. I haven’t stitched it all together yet. And there’s one more detail to add… Glory, can you go to the attic and fetch my mother’s old hat? The one Richard was, er, playing with? I’d like to take the pansies off it and sew them on your dresses as a corsage.”
“Yes, of course,” I tell her and slip through the door, trying not to disturb our dresses too much.
As I take the steps, I can hear the wonder in Jess’s voice as she asks, “How can you make something like this?” and Auntie Sylvia answers, “It’s quite simple with a sewing machine. Would you like me to show you how it works?”
I don’t know what’s made Auntie Sylvia soften, but her mind has changed and I’m so relieved I can hardly stop myself from squealing with happiness. And someone else is happy too; as I step up the ladder to the attic, I can hear the clucking of hens and Rich singing, “You Are My Sunshine” to them at the top of his voice.
“Where is it, where is it?” I mutter to myself, searching around amongst the suitcases and packages for the hatbox. At last I spot it, and from the top step I reach out and grab it with one hand, pulling it towards me.
The round box isn’t heavy, but it’s awkward to keep hold of and tilts out of my hand and down on to the landing floor. Coming to a stop on its side, the hat and tissue paper tip out, while the lid rolls away like a cardboard wheel.
I quickly pad down the ladder to gather it all up, and then hesitate.
More crumpled tissue paper lines the bottom of the hatbox, and now it’s loosened and slightly come away. Sticking out from underneath, strangely, is the stamped corner of a letter.
My fingers gently pull the tissue paper back, and I see more of the envelope. I tilt my head and read the address written on it, in scratchy copperplate.
Miss Sylvia Saunders
3 The Green
Thorntree
Essex
It’s Joe Wills’ handwriting. Same as on the back of the portrait.
What’s it doing here? Did Auntie Sylvia keep it in the box for a reason? But why wouldn’t it have been in with her own things, instead of hidden away under her mother’s hat?
And then I look closer still and realize that something about the letter isn’t right.
It’s never been opened…
“Jessica had to leave,” says Auntie Sylvia, as I step back down into the living room. “She said she’d be needed back at the pub to help with the pig, and washing up glasses for the evening shift. Poor girl.”
I’m holding the hatbox, with the letter stuffed in my pocket. I’m about to hand both to Auntie Sylvia, but she speaks first.
“Please take a seat, Glory,” she says, ushering me to the settee while she sits herself on the armchair. “Now, I think I might have been a little harsh on your friends. Richard and I have had a good chat today, and he says that they have been very kind to him. Kinder than any other children he’s come across, either here or back in London.”
“It’s true,” I agree.
“Very well. I will certainly be more civil to them from now on. Also, I think we might both need to apologize to each other for what we said in the heat of the moment yesterday. What do you think, dear?”
“Oh, yes, please, Auntie Sylvia!” I gush happily. “I’m awfully sorry. I know what I did was wrong, but I don’t know why I got so angry…”
“Glory, you’ve been through a shocking experience at home, and then you’ve had to leave your parents behind in a potentially worrying situation,” Auntie Sylvia says calmly, her hands in her lap. “You’ve managed remarkably well. It’s no wonder that you lost your temper. You’ve probably needed to have a good old shout at something for a very long time.”
“I didn’t mean it to be you, though!” I tell her, feeling a little teary myself now she’s being so understanding.
“Well, perhaps we’re a little alike, you and I. I think I may have also been keeping things bottled up inside.”
“Perhaps you needed a shout too?” I try to joke.
“Perhaps I did.” Auntie Sylvia smiles back at me. “I’m afraid I just felt very embarrassed when I heard you and your friends talking about Mr Wills. And angry with myself for not keeping quiet about the photograph when you first saw it. I really should have destroyed it years ago.”
The impolite question that I really should keep to myself … it slips from my lips anyway.
“What… what exactly happened between you and Mr Wills, Auntie Sylvia?”
Auntie Sylvia looks down at her hands for a moment, and I wonder if I’ve gone too far, asked too delicate a question.
“Joe Wills turned eighteen at the end of 1917, and enlisted for the army straight away,” she finally begins, lifting her head and looking intently at me through her wire spectacles. “He asked my father if we could be married before he left, and my father said no. Though Father did say that after the war, if we felt the same, he would reconsider. But Joe obviously changed his mind; out in France, he met a pretty nurse from Manchester. He married her and brought her back to the farm, and I was humiliated. The whole village has been laughing at me ever since.”
I want to tell her that’s not fair.
I want to tell her I’m sorry it worked out that way.
But most of all I want to tell her she’s wrong.
“Oh, it’s not like that! I really don’t think anyone is laughing at you. No one remembers or cares or even knows about what went on all those years ago. Lawrence certainly didn’t.”
Auntie Sylvia gives a start, taken aback at the forthright way I’m talking. But I need her to understand something I feel suddenly very sure of.
“Look, I thought Lawrence and Jess and Archie were unfriendly when I first arrived in the village, but I was acting unfriendly to them too,” I say quickly, desperate to get my point across. “Don’t you see that might be the problem? People in Thorntree just wonder why you’re so … aloof. That’s all. I honestly think that’s all.”
Auntie Sylvia blinks at me.
“I … I hadn’t thought of it that way,” she stumbles over her words. “That’s very … insightful of you, dear. I shall certainly give it some consideration.”
I’m suddenly thrown, all my bravery leaving me now that I’ve said my piece. I’m just a thirteen-year-old girl sitting across from an older woman, wondering if I’ve been far too forward in the way I’ve just spoken to her.
“Sorry,” I say in a small voice.
“Not at all, Glory,” says Auntie Sylvia, dismissing my worries with a wave of her hand. “And I really am very sorry about what I said to you yesterday, you know. I have enjoyed your company very much, yours and Richard’s. You’ve both been … a joy.”
A joy.
A hard lump forms in my throat at her lovely words, and now I feel terrible.
I’ve done something I shouldn’t have.
“You might not think so when you see this,” I say, remembering the letter in my pocket.
“What is this?” asks Auntie Sylvia, taking it from me as I lean over to her.
“It fell out of the bottom of the hatbox. I think … well, I think your mother hid it there. It was unopened – till a minute ago. I read it before I came down. I’m sorry.”
But I don’t think Auntie Sylvia is listening to me. She’s recognized the handwriting, and one hand flies to her mouth as soon as she pulls the letter from the envelope.
“Oh, Joe…!” she cries, her eyes scanning the twenty-two-year-old letter, sent from France with love and desperation.
… you’ve never written to me in months, Sylv, and it’s breaking my heart. The post is not always reliable, I know, so I’ll wait till the end of the year, and if I still hear nothing … well, I’ll understand your meaning. Perhaps you want to respect your parents’ wishes. Perhaps you’ve found someone else. I don’t want this to be true, of course, but if it is, I’ll let you go, if that’s what you want…
“I did write! I wrote him endless letters,” Auntie Sylvia practically moans. “Why didn’t he get them?”
“Maybe … maybe…” I flounder, trying to help find an explanation.
“Oh,” she says flatly, something occurring to her, I’m sure. “Of course. I gave Father the letters to send for me when he went to work, because he said the post in town was more regular and frequent.”
“He didn’t ever send them,” I murmur.
“They disapproved that badly?” Auntie Sylvia says sadly of her parents. “To take Joe’s letters … to take away our chance of happiness. And for what? Ha! Here I am, an old spinster on my own in this cottage, while Joe Wills had an unhappy marriage with a girl who hated the countryside and went so mad with loneliness that she left him and her children in desperation to go back to the city. Oh, my … what a terrible, terrible waste!”
You know, Rich isn’t the only one who’s allowed to give out hugs.
I leap up and rush to Auntie Sylvia’s side, letting the hatbox tumble from my lap and on to the floor.
“It’s fine. Everything’s fine,” I tell her, as I wrap my arms around Auntie Sylvia and feel her lean gratefully into me as she cries.
“It’s going to be all right,” says another voice, and Rich appears.
What did he hear? Would he have been able to understand any of it?
But those thoughts are pushed to one side as my brother scrambles on to the arm of the chair with Duckie and Mr Mousey, the three of them joining our cuddle…
“You can open your eyes now…”
I do as Auntie Sylvia says, and stare into the long mirror fixed to the wardrobe in her room.
In front of me is a girl in a simple but beautiful ivory-white silk dress with a mauve sash and pretty corsage of purple fabric pansies.
Her black shoes are glossy with shoe shine, and her long black socks are pulled up to her knees. With the long hem of the dress, they look more grown up, almost like stockings.
Waves of brown frame her face, thanks to the rags that have been tied in her hair all day and teased out with Auntie Sylvia’s fingers.
“So, what do you think?” Auntie Sylvia asks me.
“I think you look lovely,” I t
ell her, catching sight now of the cornflower-blue dress Auntie Sylvia’s wearing. It’s a bit old-fashioned, like a long-sleeved flapper style from the 1920s, but it suits her and is miles better than her drab owl uniform of brown tweed skirt and charcoal-grey cardigan.
“We’re not talking about me, silly sausage,” Auntie Sylvia laughs, but I think she’s secretly pleased with the compliment. “Are you happy?”
“Yes, yes, I am,” I say, turning this way and that, hardly recognizing myself.
What must Jess be feeling right now, as she tries on her own party dress at the pub? I’ve seen Archie already – he passed the cottage earlier, on his way to meet his mum from the bus. I knocked frantically on the upstairs window till I got his attention, and then gave him a wave and a thumbs up. In return, he grinned and waved the navy striped tie he must have borrowed from Mr Wills or Harry. “Very smart!” I mouthed at him as he grinned and hurried away.
And in a few minutes, just as soon as Rich locks the chickens safely away in their coop, we’ll set off for Eastfield Farm, where I’ll see Lawrence, and Lawrence will see me.
I get tummy flutters at the very thought.
Does Auntie Sylvia feel the same way about seeing Mr Wills? Or have too many years and too many hurt feelings ruined any chance for them to even just talk and be polite to each other?
“Here…” says Auntie Sylvia, lifting a dainty glass bottle from her bedside table. “It’s lily of the valley.”
She dabs the cool stopper on my wrists and either side of my neck.
Now I feel grown up and pretty, in a very different way from my sister. And instantly I know that I love Lil, even if we’re as alike as sherbet and sprouts, even if she’s as flighty as a cabbage white butterfly hovering over the green outside.
“All done! Readyyyyy!!” Rich shouts up to us.
“Shall we go to the, ahem, ball?” Auntie Sylvia jokes with me.
“Let’s!” I smile at her.
As I turn to leave, I feel an itch on my face and scratch it without looking.
“Oh,” I mumble, feeling the pinch on my cheek and the dampness on my finger.
Catching Falling Stars Page 14
