Cold Cold Sea

by Linda Huber

  Maggie dropped a tea bag into the clown mug that Olivia had won at the hoopla last summer. Livvy’s mug, for hot chocolate and bedtime stories. She poured the water in and cradled the mug in both hands. The warmth was comforting, if anything could be comforting now. Drearily, Maggie went through to the living room, and the whole scene at the beach began in her mind yet again, like a never-ending film going round and round, not letting her switch it off. She could smell the seaweed, hear the still distant breakers and the gulls circling and crying above them. She stood at the front room window and stared out over the ocean. The cold, grey sea.

  Waiting for Livvy was all she could do now. Hot tears streaked down her face as she held the mug against her heart, because of course it wasn’t the only thing here to remind her that she’d once had a daughter. Olivia’s blue hair slides were still on the window ledge, and the picture book she’d been leafing through that last morning was lying on a chair that no-one had sat on for two weeks. Maggie turned from the greyness outside and wandered round the cottage.

  Livvy’s beach ball was lying deflated in the corner beside the bookcase. They’d forgotten it on the fifteenth. And her trainers were under the sofa where she’d kicked them off the night before. The fifteenth, of course, had been sandals-for-the-beach weather.

  The bathroom was the worst place of all.

  Livvy’s stripy peppermint toothpaste. The lotion Maggie had smoothed into her daughter’s skin every evening; the strawberry shower gel. The smells of lost Olivia.

  Maggie lay awake for hours each night, struggling with the less than five minutes on the beach when Olivia must have disappeared. She hadn’t seen where her daughter had gone and neither had Colin or Joe. Howard and his colleagues had reconstructed the entire beach scene and were satisfied that they had drawn the right conclusions, but Maggie knew that one day she would have to go down there and establish for herself just what she and Colin could and couldn’t see. If she checked for herself, then she might believe that Livvy had drowned. Col was so adamant he’d have noticed if Livvy had gone into the water, but Maggie wasn’t so sure and neither was Howard. Colin and Joe hadn’t seen her, but then they hadn’t been watching out for her either.

  Trembling, Maggie went for her jacket. The rain had almost stopped; there was no excuse not to go. In the two weeks since Olivia had vanished, this would be the first time she’d been back on the beach.

  Of course now there were only two possibilities. Either Livvy had drowned, or someone had taken her away. If she’d simply wandered off by herself she would have been found by now.

  Hands deep in her jacket pockets, Maggie walked across to the rock pools. How much of the beach could Col and Joe have seen? They’d been moving about all the time, standing up and crouching down, digging round jellyfish and talking.

  Maggie stood for a moment watching a swarm of tiny fish flit around amongst some seaweed and stones, the odd raindrop shivering the surface of the water. Joe would have had them in jars as quick as anything. Tears stung her eyes at the thought of her son, but she blinked them away and looked back across the beach to the rocky ring.

  She knew that from inside the ring, she’d been able to see about a third of the shoreline. What could Colin see? She would check now and then call him tonight.

  The frostiness between them was thawing, albeit slowly. He had phoned twice now, and they’d talked like strangers, but it was something. A start, maybe.

  Maggie crouched in the middle of the rock pools area, facing the rocky ring but still staring into the nearest pool. From here she would have noticed a little girl running towards her. And if she faced the sea, she would have seen Livvy going into the water. Even if she wasn’t actually looking, the movement would have attracted her attention. But the other direction, facing away from the ring...

  Maggie squatted for a moment, then stood up slowly, massaging her thighs. None of the waves that were rushing up the sand had been within her line of vision just now. If both Colin and Joe had been facing this way, engrossed in the pool-life in front of them, they might well not have seen Olivia go down to the sea. From the very beginning, Colin had refused point-blank to even consider that Livvy could have gone into the water without him noticing her, but he was wrong and she’d just proved it.

  Maggie trudged back across the sand. She’d known all along really that the sea was the most likely option. That was probably why she’d avoided the beach so determinedly. It hadn’t been as painful as she’d expected, though she knew that the pills she had from the doctor were taking the edge off a lot of the pain.

  Halfway up the cliff path she turned and looked back at the beach. This end was deserted. On the other side of the rock pools area two dog walkers were sitting on the steps of one of the beach huts, throwing sticks for their dogs.

  Her mobile buzzed in her pocket, and she jumped. It was Howard.

  ‘Maggie, I’m at the cottage.’

  She hurried on up the steep path. Howard or Amanda came by most days to report the lack of progress in the search for Olivia. She didn’t know if this was what would routinely have happened or if they were doing it because they felt sorry for her. Poor Maggie, her daughter drowned and her husband and son gone.

  Occasionally they did have something to report. There had been several ‘sightings’ of Olivia, all of them negative. The police had been round all the hotels, petrol stations, shops, hospitals and restaurants in the area, but Livvy hadn’t been seen in any of them. She had vanished off the face of the earth. The news reports all said ‘missing, believed drowned’. But there was still no proof, and dear God, as Livvy’s mother, she just needed proof.

  He was waiting by the door, a green plastic bag in one hand, and she hurried across the lane. There had been a lot of green plastic bags; the coastguards had found nearly everything Maggie had left on the beach that day. Except, of course, the one thing that was irreplaceable.

  ‘Nothing,’ said Howard, following her inside. It was a kind of code they’d developed. ‘Nothing’ meant ‘we haven’t found a body’. Wilting, Maggie waved him to the sofa and sank into the single armchair opposite, staring at him. He looked different today, his face was set in resignation.

  ‘Maggie. We found this. It’s a size ten.’

  He opened the green bag and produced a blue plastic sandal. It was exactly like the ones Livvy had, except this one was faded and scarred. Maggie bit her lip, surprised that she wasn’t falling to pieces here. But then maybe there was a limit to the number of times you could do that.

  ‘Can I hold it?’

  He handed it over. ‘It was found yesterday at Warders Bay.’

  Maggie held it in both hands. This one was harder, stiffer than she remembered Livvy’s being, but then maybe that was the salt water. And of course there was nothing, just absolutely nothing to say if this particular sandal had ever belonged to Olivia.

  ‘It’s the same as hers, but...’

  Howard returned the sandal to the bag. ‘I know. Okay.’

  He looked at the floor, and suddenly she knew what was coming. The helicopter had stopped searching days ago, of course, but the coastguards still went out. As did the searchers along the clifftops and in the towns. But apart from the contents of the beach bag and now this anonymous blue sandal, nothing had ever been found. She looked at him, feeling the apprehension grow.

  ‘Maggie, I am so, so sorry. You know we’ve gone over the whole area thoroughly, so many times. There’s no sign that Olivia came back up here. We’re going to call off the active search. We’ll keep the file open, we’ll investigate anything that comes in that might even possibly be a lead, but you know yourself that the most likely thing by far is that Livvy went into the sea. And was lost. But if that did happen, she’s at peace now, Maggie.’

  She stared at him. In a way she’d been expecting this, it was the logical next step, but it was still brutal. He was telling her that they were so sure Livvy was dead that nobody would be out there looking for her.

  ‘W
e’ve drawn a blank everywhere,’ he said, his voice heavy. ‘The team has shown her photo for miles around, but no-one has seen her. There are hundreds of posters up all over the place and we’ve had dozens of calls, but, just nothing. And every single person on the sex offenders register that could have been anywhere near here has been checked. I’m sorry, Maggie. I really am.’

  For a moment Maggie stopped breathing. She couldn’t say anything, she couldn’t even cry. There was nothing more that anyone could possibly have done to find Olivia.

  She nodded at Howard, and he stood up.

  ‘Amanda or I will come by again tonight. Maggie - you shouldn’t be alone now.’

  ‘My mother’s coming again tomorrow.’

  The relief on his face was obvious.

  ‘Good. That’s great. Maybe you should go home with her for a while.’

  Maggie shook her head. Her mother had been here three days last week too, but it had been difficult for them both. Mum loved her, but she had loved Livvy too, and every word the older woman spoke was tinged with reproach.

  ‘I want my little girl back,’ she told Howard. ‘I’ll stay here and wait.’

  ‘It could take weeks. It might not happen at all,’ he said helplessly. ‘When people are lost at sea... we don’t always get them back.’

  Maggie knew there was no way she could leave Cove Cottage without Olivia. She would stay here until she was an old woman if necessary. Because if Howard was right, then Livvy was just a few yards away outside. In the sea.

  ‘I’m waiting for her,’ she said, and he nodded.

  ‘I’ll see myself out.’

  Maggie remained slumped in the armchair. There was nothing more to do now.

  Chapter Ten

  Mid September

  Phillip pushed the wheelchair through the hospital park, where tall palm trees were providing welcome shade to those patients well enough to be outdoors. Even halfway through September it was still hot. It was great that Gran was well enough now to come down here again; he loved to see her with more colour in her face. The radiotherapy had made her tired and sick, but the course was over now and she had been for a scan that morning.

  ‘Let’s sit by the bandstand for a bit, have an ice cream,’ he suggested, pleased when she smiled and nodded. If the radiotherapy gave her a few more ‘quality’ months he would definitely bring Jennifer over. A long holiday would do them both good, well away from home and all the unhappy memories.

  He parked the wheelchair under a tree and went for the usual strawberry cornets. They sat in companiable silence, the old lady eating her ice cream with a dreamy, far-away expression in her eyes. Phillip glanced at her uneasily. She had always been such a chatterbox and these new silences were unnerving. It was almost as if she was slipping away from him already. She was better in that the side effects of the radiotherapy had gone now, but somehow she didn’t seem to be the same person. Or maybe he was expecting too much too soon. Maybe she simply needed more peace and quiet and time to do normal things. Exactly what you didn’t get in a hospital.

  His thoughts turned to Jennifer. How could he best persuade her to come out to California? She had always hated long haul flights, her aversion almost amounted to a phobia and God knows he didn’t want to stress her. But she had to come, she had already been alone since the beginning of July, and now that she’d moved to Polpayne, Thea wouldn’t be around every day to keep an eye on things.

  At least the new house was giving Jennifer something constructive to do, but it was difficult to know exactly what was going on. It was strange that Jennifer hadn’t waited for his return before tackling such a big project. Was she coping? She hadn’t spoken to her mother for months so he couldn’t ask Bea how things were, and none of their old friends lived anywhere near Polpayne to check up on Jennifer. She must be feeling pretty isolated. Phillip came to a sudden decision: if Gran’s scan results were good, he would go over for her at the weekend.

  It would be alright. Jennifer always sounded busy when they phoned, she was organising the house and settling into the village... she was talking and laughing, telling him stories about the new front door and the garden. Surely she wouldn’t be doing that if she wasn’t alright.

  Tears rushed into Phillip’s eyes as he remembered her terrible silence at the start of the Black Patch, and he blinked them away before Gran noticed. All this time, and he still couldn’t face the awful thing that had happened to them.

  They’d been in Turkey, in a beautiful hotel complex near Side. It was the first holiday abroad they’d had for a couple of years, since Hailey had been born, in fact. Jennifer had booked it, and as usual her judgement had been spot-on. The beach, private to the hotel, was perfect, sloping gradually into the water. And the hotel itself had been out of this world. It should have been a wonderful holiday. Even the weather was almost guaranteed.

  And for the first nine days their holiday had been wonderful. They had long lie-ins and leisurely breakfasts. Afterwards, Jennifer generally went off to do whatever was on the keep-fit schedule that morning, while Phillip and Hailey spent their time by the pool. How he’d loved those mornings alone with his daughter. They would meet Jennifer for a lunchtime sandwich in the gardens, and then in the afternoons they had done something different almost every day.

  They’d visited Side, with its quaint shopping alleys. They’d gone on a boat trip to see basking turtles, which Hailey had loved. They’d driven to Antalya once, to see the market. And several times they had spent the afternoon on the beach, because that was what Hailey liked best.

  There was a children’s playground where the hotel garden met the beach. Hailey had always gone there first, while he and Jennifer swam in the sea. Then he would fetch Hailey back and the two of them would go for a ride on the banana-boat. It had been such a joy, watching his little girl having fun, laughing with her, building sandcastles, looking for shells. Phillip had truly felt that this was the best time of his life.

  Then came the tenth day.

  ‘Phillip, darling, do you have any tissues?’

  Consumed with memories and grief, Phillip tossed his half-eaten cornet into a nearby bin and pulled out a wipe for Gran’s chin.

  ‘Here you are. Enjoy that?’

  She took the wipe and applied it to her mouth, and he noticed that her fingers were shaking. She was tired, it was time to go back to the ward and let her rest. He pushed the chair back towards the oncology unit, taking deep breaths, forcing the memories to the back of his mind. This was Gran’s time now, not his, not Jennifer’s and not Hailey’s. He should remember that.

  ‘Thank you, Phillip darling. It was wonderful to be outside and hear the ocean and smell the wind,’ she said as they approached the building.

  ‘We’ll do it again very soon,’ said Phillip, unwaveringly cheerful, pushing her inside and realising just how very antiseptic the smell here was.

  She was silent in the lift and Phillip couldn’t think of anything to say either. Perhaps she was worried about the scan. They would have the result very soon. But she was in less pain now so surely the tumours must have shrunk.

  He was abruptly less sure about this when he wheeled Gran out of the lift and into the ward. Dr Powell was standing at the nurses’ station, clutching one of these portable screens they showed scans on. His eyes met Phillip’s, and the expression on his face was grim.

  Chapter Eleven

  Maggie sat on her rock at the top of the cliff path. Out here, with the wind whistling past her ears it felt as if she was sitting on the edge of the world. If she concentrated hard enough she could imagine that there was no world at her back, just the never-ending ocean before her and the heavens above - and somewhere out there in the enormity of it all was Olivia. The rock had turned into the only place where she still felt connected to her daughter, and so here she would sit, from morning until night when the weather was fine, and sometimes even when it wasn’t. Livvy was gone, summer was dying, and the smell on the wind was autumn.

  T
oday there was greyness everywhere. The sea was grey and swollen, and thick grey clouds were sweeping across a grey sky. Foamy grey waves rushed up the sands then back again. The tide was going out, and Maggie could see the rocky ring and the sand where Olivia’s last castle had stood so briefly. In the distance the beach huts were providing the only splash of colour: blue, green and yellow against the grey sky.

  The rock was cold, but Maggie knew she would stay here until she barely had the strength to move away. Sitting here she could watch over the entire sweep of the bay, from Borrower’s cave on the right, all the way along to Joe and Colin’s rock pools on the left, filled with cold, fresh seawater now that the tide was retreating. The wet sand looked dull and uninviting, and no kids were playing down there today.

  If only the sea would give them Olivia back. Until it did there would always be one thought hidden at the back of Maggie’s mind, an unbearable hope that she didn’t dare put into words because no-one believed it. She didn’t believe it herself any more, but if only they knew what had happened on that day. On the fifteenth of August.

  She heard footsteps behind her, and turned to see Mary Barnes, shopping bag clutched under her arm while her husband reversed their Nissan into the lane. The elderly couple had the cottage two along from Maggie, and they had known Livvy since she was a baby.

  ‘We’re going to the supermarket,’ said Mary, and Maggie struggled to concentrate on the words. ‘Would you like to come too, Maggie? Or can I bring you anything?’

  Maggie shivered. She hated going into town. Posters of Olivia were still everywhere; torn, battered affairs now, destroyed by the wind and rain.

  And the stares that followed her everywhere, faces full of pity and horror and ‘thank God my kids are safe’. Eyes that never quite met her own, and she didn’t want them to, either. All she wanted was to be left alone and wait for Olivia.