Kissed by the Rain

by Claudia Winter

  My heart was pounding and I began to perspire. How could I be such a snob? Apologetic words sat on my tongue like bitter pills, but I couldn’t get them out.

  Aidan accepted my mumbled “Thanks” with a blank expression and served Bri’s coffee. Her chocolate cake was placed on the table much more gently than mine had been. He wished my aunts bon appétit and left without so much as looking at me.

  I leaned back in my chair defiantly and crossed my arms. So what if Aidan Murray thought I was a snooty goose? After all, I had figured him out from the start. Casanova was an amateur next to this man.

  Bri took a deep breath.

  “Not one more word,” I said.

  She shrugged and leaned over to Li, who was making a valiant attempt to conquer her tasting plate, though the portions on her fork became smaller and smaller.

  “Like I told you, she likes him,” Bri declared without even attempting to lower her voice.

  Chewing, Li nodded. “He likes her, too.”

  I threw up my hands and walked out, leaving them to their sweets. The shop’s awning offered little protection against the rain, but I was grateful for the drops on my face. I closed my eyes and listened to my aunts’ cheerful voices and Aidan’s deep laughter.

  Everything felt wrong—Grandmother’s demand that I bring back the ring, giving in instead of standing up to Adele von Meeseberg, the flight, this dreadful country with its dreadful rain, and last but not least, my horrible cousin, the cause of this entire disaster, who made me forget my manners and insult someone who had been kind—more than kind, helpful—to me all along.

  I should go back in and apologise . . . after blowing my nose. I pulled out the napkin I had pocketed and stared at the blue cursive script.

  A taste of Scotland since 1830. Murray & Sons Ltd.

  The man’s a baker, I had told Bri, the sentence dripping with condescension even without an added “only.” I hated it when Justus acted like he was above other people, but I was just as bad. I cringed, recalling Grandmother’s admonition when she had settled a dispute between Charlie and me years ago.

  You can’t take back a bad word—you can only regret it. Realising your mistake and apologising doesn’t make you a better person, but at least it shows that you have some backbone.

  I straightened up and opened the shop’s door—almost bumping into my two aunts.

  “Forgot something?” Bri mocked, but she was immediately grabbed at her tweedy sleeve and pulled outside.

  “Leave her alone,” Li said with unusual vigour, winking at me before the door shut behind them.

  I squared my shoulders at the counter, but there was no sign of Aidan Murray.

  “Hello?” I said hoarsely. I cleared my throat and tried again. “Mr. Murray?”

  No response.

  Not sure what to do, I timidly stepped behind the counter, crossing an invisible barrier into Aidan Murray’s life.

  The dirty cups and plates from our order were piled next to the sink. I caught myself rubbing Bri’s lipstick from her coffee cup with my thumb. My untouched chocolate cake was still on its plate. Aidan had selected it for me. What a sweet gesture.

  I broke off a little piece and put it in my mouth. Mmm, incredible. Taking another bite, I tiptoed to the double-leafed swinging door to the bakery and peeked through the little window. I couldn’t help myself.

  Aidan Murray was leaning against a floured working counter. He was on the phone, shock evident on his face.

  This was clearly the point at which I should have made myself scarce. However, my foot seemed to nudge the door of its own accord. I could now hear Aidan’s voice so clearly that I understood his English without a problem.

  “I don’t know what to say . . .” He grabbed the back of his neck as if his head were suddenly too heavy. “Since when? Why didn’t you ever—?” He was obviously struggling to sound calm. “That’s not a problem . . . No, really . . . Ian? Why him of all people?”

  I shifted from one foot to the other and made sure the shop was still empty. When I looked through the window again, Aidan was pacing.

  “How do you figure? I haven’t heard from him in more than a year. How am I going to . . . on such short notice . . . ?” He stopped. “Got it. I’ll try my best . . . No idea. I’ll think of something. He’s got to be somewhere.”

  He stopped in front of a gigantic mixer. Grabbing a big bag of flour with his free hand, he dumped it in without noticing that half ended up on the floor. Then he looked at the empty bag as if unsure what to do with it.

  “We’re doing great! Ever since we removed the sign outside, tourists flock here because they think they’re in on a secret. So don’t worry about—” He snorted. “Dad, honestly, I don’t feel like talking business right now. I’ll come up as soon as I can, okay? We can talk then . . . You’re not serious, are you? . . . Vicky will manage . . . Yes . . . No . . . Yes! I promised, didn’t I? If need be, I’ll beat the living daylights out of him or knock him out cold with whisky, or both.” With a scornful laugh, Aidan closed his eyes for a moment. “Don’t let it get to you, old man. I love you—Mo gràdh ort, athair.”

  Aidan hung up, his head falling forward onto his chest. I held my breath as his gaze wandered around the room. Then he looked at his phone and smashed it against the wall with a roar. To my horror, Aidan Murray crouched down, hiding his face in his hands.

  “Earlier on, did you manage to do what you wanted to do?” Bri finally asked after I’d trailed them silently from one shop to another for more than an hour, listening to them quarrel and chatter about trivialities. I managed a glum nod in reply.

  “She didn’t settle it,” Bri declared while examining the cowboy hat on a mannequin in a shop window, which also sported a sexy interpretation of a Scottish kilt.

  “You don’t think so?” Li scrutinised the doll as well. “Quite pretty,” she mumbled, and I hoped she was talking about the hat and not the obscene mini-kilt.

  “That he was,” mumbled Bri. “And such a manly man; quite a change from—”

  “Manly? But this is a lady’s hat,” Li objected, pointing to the mannequin. She could barely lift her arm, so many shopping bags dangled from it.

  I stared at the little bag from Murray & Sons and forgot the tart comment I was about to make. Instead, I saw Aidan crouched on the linoleum floor like a devastated little boy. Of course, I had silently slipped away to save us both from embarrassment. I’d just have to live with my remorse by myself and make sure never to commit such a terrible faux pas again. That was not the Josefine I wanted to be.

  “I got cookies.” Li proudly held up the bag. “Lucky stars, a Murray specialty. Mr. Murray told us that you—”

  “Please, Aunt Li,” I said firmly. “I don’t want to talk about that man any more. That goes also for you, Bri.”

  “All I meant was—”

  “Enough.”

  “Fine.” Bri shrugged and headed to the store on our right. A hat shop—god help us.

  “Aunt Bri?”

  She stopped. “Yes, child?”

  “Don’t you think we should go back to the hotel and pack? Unless we get going soon, we’ll have to drive in the dark.”

  “Where are we going?” Li asked innocently, earning a poke in the ribs from her sister.

  “Why can’t you ever listen? As Mathilde explained, Josefine got this postcard from Charlie. The girl is staying at some sort of bed and breakfast in the Highlands.”

  “I wouldn’t mind an excursion to the Highlands at all, but what makes you think that Charlie is still there?” Li sounded insulted.

  “We have to start somewhere,” Bri replied. “Unless you have a better idea.”

  I turned away with a sigh. If I’d had my own car, I’d have left these two at Eden Rock Lodge in a heartbeat, where they could play rummy and bicker with each other to their hearts’ content. I looked up and froze.

  It was just for a split second. I craned my neck to follow the two figures I thought I had seen among umbrellas
and rain parkas. We were back at the mat where the young man had played guitar a few hours ago. It was deserted, covered with footprints.

  “Are you all right, Josefine?” Li called, but my rubber boots had awoken with a life of their own.

  I’d never been a good runner, even back when I was trying to lose a few pounds to please Justus. I had soon realised I was in over my head—both with 6 a.m. wake-ups and the speed at which Justus ran. Eventually, a torn muscle ended my half-hearted ambition, and my fiancé admitted that I was impeding his marathon training. Since then, he had made his peace with my love handles, and the only time I ever ran was to catch the subway.

  Now I wished I had more stamina. I felt a stabbing pain in my ribs after just a few hundred yards and had to slow down. I stopped on a side street, gasping for air, desperate not to let the young man and woman out of my sight.

  “Charlie!”

  My shout echoed hollowly off the row of identical brown houses with bluish doors. With my hands on my hips, I straightened up and exhaled noisily, disappointed. They were gone.

  “What was that about?” someone panted behind me. “Next time you feel like running a race, let me know, will you?”

  “Aunt Bri! You ran after me?”

  “No, I took a taxi,” she shot back, plopping down red-faced on the steps in front of number 67.

  Worried, I crouched down next to her. “Are you all right?”

  “I’m no porcelain doll. And I won’t be pushing up your grandmother’s daisies anytime soon. It’s my plan to survive the whole lot of you and make off with the von Meeseberg fortune.”

  “I can believe it! What’s your secret, Super-Bri?”

  “Yoga three times a week and a lover who’s thirty-five,” she replied in such a serious tone that I believed it for a fraction of a second, until the hint of a grin betrayed her.

  “That’s what I suspected.”

  We smiled at each other and shared a rare, peaceful moment there on the wet stairs. My relationship with Bri had always been complicated, mostly because she used to steer clear of us kids. Her disinterest probably made Charlie and me cling to her even more, no matter how often she claimed that we got on her nerves. After all, who else in our upright family liked to spit cherry pits across the room or collected tadpoles?

  “I saw Charlie. At least, the girl looked just like her.”

  “If my eyes didn’t deceive me, the pair you were after went in there.” Bri pointed to a green, wood-panelled house at the end of the little street. It was probably a bar or a pub.

  I jumped up, but she grabbed my sleeve.

  “Hold up. I’m all for a cold beer, but we should look for your aunt Li first. I gave her the slip back on George Street. Who knows where she’s got to by now. I wouldn’t want her to fall prey to some Scottish Casanova who claims to be the great-grandson of Sir Walter Scott.”

  6

  Bennet’s Inn was not one of those pubs where you go to read the paper or play backgammon with a friend. We stepped into a cacophony of voices and were hit with the sour, humid odour of people who’ve had too much to drink and are crammed together in a small space.

  I pressed ahead of Li, who held on to her sister’s arm and looked around curiously. We had found her on George Street in the company of an elderly gentleman who turned out to be quite harmless. The suspected swindler sold bratwurst and other cholesterol-rich delicacies at a stand. Li had sulked as Bri tossed her deep-fried Mars bar into the nearest garbage can.

  I scanned the room anxiously. I hadn’t made up my mind on whether to embrace Charlie or slap her first.

  I pointed to an open table by the window. “Wait there while I look around.”

  The sound of someone playing guitar came from the next room.

  “Get a beer for me, Josefine, and some herbal tea of the digestive variety for your aunt Li. She needs one after that heart attack–inducing snack,” Bri shouted after me while Li scowled at her.

  I gave her a thumbs-up and dived into the crowd.

  It took forever to make my way to the bar, being either elbowed, leered at, or complimented with every step. At first I responded to the compliments with a polite smile, but I quickly learned to studiously ignore them.

  The adjacent room had no windows. A motley group of old and young musicians was gathered around the only table, drinking dark beer out of pint glasses. When one struck up a melody, the others joined in on their flutes, stringed instruments, and harmonicas.

  I honed in on the young, red-haired guitar player and his companion. The song they were playing was familiar. Charlie used to play The Corrs on repeat, the Irish band blasting through the house as I tried to practice Debussy études on Aunt Li’s piano. My heart started to beat faster, marking time with “At Your Side.” The girl’s head was leaning against the guitar player’s shoulder. She gazed into space while her knees bounced to the beat.

  She was the spitting image of Charlie—the same boyish figure in jeans and sneakers, the same unruly, dyed-black hair, which contrasted strangely with her delicate, elfin face and light eyebrows. But this girl had a thinner mouth, not the full lips that Charlie constantly smeared with shiny lip gloss. Her eyes, shadowed by long, thick eyelashes, were slightly too close together, making her look a little naïve.

  I was disappointed, but not surprised. The past few days had shown that nothing about this trip was going to be easy. Someone else might have seen meaning in this doppelgäanger, this strange coincidence—but not me. I was not one of those people who would see rabbits and flying horses in cloud formations. Clouds were clouds—no more, no less. All I had done was mistake a stranger for my cousin, wasting time in the process.

  I walked back to the bar, but then a crack appeared in my smug rationalism.

  “If I didn’t know your opinion of guys like me, I might think you’re stalking me,” Aidan grumbled into his glass.

  I shifted nervously from one foot to the other. “Listen, Mr. Murray—”

  “Why so formal all of the sudden?”

  Maybe running into Aidan Murray for the third time meant something after all. If nothing else, it was an opportunity to apologise for my outrageous remark in the pastry shop.

  “Aidan, I’m sorry that you had to overhear my conversation with my aunts.”

  The words sounded lame even before they were out of my mouth. Aidan set down his glass, hard.

  “Are you sorry that I heard you, or do you regret saying what you said?”

  “I . . . both. What I said about you wasn’t fair . . .” I stopped, confused.

  Straight-faced, he returned to his beer. “You can think whatever you want.” Lifting the half-full glass, he emptied it in one gulp. He gestured to the bartender, who looked like a member of a biker gang with his beard and tattooed arms. “Gavin, get me another ale and also a Glenmorangie. That way, my stomach might be able to tolerate your horrible Scotch pies. Why don’t you shoot the butcher who sells them to you?”

  “Aidan, mo charaid—my friend. Playing the tough guy, are ya? Did you burn a tray of scones, or are you out to prove something to the pretty German lassie?” Gavin pulled the tap handle with a roaring laugh.

  I wasn’t sure what bothered me more—this grouchy man who bore little resemblance to the lady-killer from the plane, or his melancholy eyes, which made him look soft, almost feminine. Yet nothing about Aidan Murray was . . . My thoughts turned to mush and the words refused to come.

  He looked at me wearily. “Was that all, Mrs. Stone?”

  “That’s not my . . .” My nose twitched. “Did you just call me your teacher’s name?”

  “Well, you look like her and you’re both know-it-alls. The wordplay’s not bad either. You are a bit like a stone—a pretty stone, but a stone nonetheless.”

  “A stone?”

  “Mhm,” he said with closed eyes.

  “That’s not a compliment.”

  “I had no intention of paying you one.”

  He seemed to inhale rather than drink the
honey-coloured brew. Ugh. For me, the peaty aroma of Scotch always conjured up visions of smoked, dead animals.

  “I guess I deserve that,” I said.

  “You do.”

  “Fine.” I nodded as regally as I could. “We’re even, then. I wish you continued success with your bakery. Your cakes are terrific, by the way. Good-bye, Aidan.”

  At least I had tried.

  “Josefine?”

  I stopped. Aidan looked me over from my face down to below my breasts. Super! I had momentarily forgotten about my hideous jumper.

  “Have you ever tasted a real single malt?”

  But reconciliation over shots was not to be. Before I could respond, a sudden ruckus broke out a few steps away, near the restrooms. I caught a glimpse of a wildly bobbing pheasant feather in the middle of the commotion.

  “Bri? Aunt Bri?”

  My heart was pounding when I finally got close enough to see—and then I stopped short, thunderstruck.

  A stout, short man, bald and bull-necked, had planted himself in front of another man and was unloading a battery of unintelligible Gaelic invectives. Two heads shorter than his opponent, his bluster seemed almost ridiculous at first. But then I registered the dangerous flicker in his eyes and the fact that Bri was within the reach of his meaty arms. Her face was pale with anger. She pushed past the tall man, who was apparently trying to protect her.

  “You’re a very rude fellow and possess not an ounce of decency!” Her finger wagged like a metronome in front of the Scotsman’s nose.

  “Madame, my name is Antoine Barneau. Please allow me to settle this unpleasant matter,” said the tall man and, to Bri’s clear displeasure, he stepped back in front of her.

  It was the charming Frenchman who had held the door to Aidan’s shop for us.

  The entire situation was beyond strange. Edinburgh is a city of four hundred and fifty thousand, but at that moment, it seemed like a claustrophobic village in which one constantly stumbled across the same people.

  “If you excuse my saying so, Monsieur Barneau, there’s no need for you to play musketeer.” My aunt thrust past the helpful man like a belligerent child.